Lawrence W. Reed

Are you for peace? The great test of your devotion to peace is not how many words you utter on its behalf. It__ not even how you propose to deal with people of other countries, though that certainly tells us something. To fully measure your __eacefulness_ requires that we examine how you propose to treat people in your own backyard. Do you demand more of what doesn__ belong to you? Do you endorse the use of force to punish people for victimless __rimes_? Do you support politicians who promise to seize the earnings of others to pay for your bailout, your subsidy, your student loan, your child__ education or whatever pet cause or project you think is more important than what your fellow citizens might personally prefer to spend their own money on? Do you believe theft is OK if it__ for a good cause or endorsed by a majority? If you answered yes to any of these questions, then have the courage to admit that peace is not your priority. How can I trust your foreign policy if your domestic policy requires so much to be done at gunpoint?

My take on socialism is this: Socialism only seems to work when you don't fully implement it, when you keep enough capitalism around to pay socialism's bills, at least for a time. It's the difference between milking the cow and killing it. Socialism has no theory of wealth creation; it's just a destructive, envy-driven fantasy about redistributing it after something else (and somebody else) creates it first.

Collectivists see the world the way Mr. Magoo did__s one big blur. They homogenize people in a communal blender, sacrificing the discrete features that make us who we are.

Have you ever noticed how statists are constantly __eforming_ their own handiwork? Education reform. Health-care reform. Welfare reform. Tax reform. The very fact they__e always busy __eforming_ is an implicit admission that they didn__ get it right the first 50 times.

("A Free Market in Education: The Answer to Prayer, And Other Issues")No matter where you are on the issue, there is no solution to it within a government school context, only perpetual conflict. The answer involves choice, competition and private alternatives. If you don't like what a business offers, you don't argue endlessly about it; you walk across the street. Why is this principle so complicated for some people?