At 10:10 -0700 6/16/97, Tim May wrote:
Some of you, including Declan, have read too much in my comments. I did not say he _had_ sold out, I said in several places there is a well-known danger of becoming assimilated by the Washington system. Reread what I said.
(By the way, I've never suggested Declan would lose his ideological bearings. Democrats and Republicans who become assimilated remain true to their roots, but they see everything as part of a larger system, a negotiation. They lose their ability to see in outside the Beltway simple terms. The giveaway will be if and when Declan begins to say that things are not so simple.)
What I found interesting about Tim's comments above is how he neglects to mention libertarians. Certainly he realizes my "ideological bearings" are much closer to libertarianism than conservatism or modern liberalism. Do the folks at the Cato Institute, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, IFJ, IHS, or AEI "lose their ability to see in simple terms?" I suggest not. -Declan PS: Details about negotiations and who's-backing-what-bill and what the political tradeoffs will be are often astoundingly complex. But the underlying principles remain crystal-clear: government out of our private lives.