In agreement...

I had to chuckle at your post... I have become a bit of the sort of "conservative" that I think my Grandfather probably was: disdainful of waste in government and tired of paying more in taxes than is necessary. Perhaps its the wisdom that comes with age. More likely, it's just common sense finally working its way to the surface.

Our Ryan (not Paul Ryan), Glenn Beck, and a plethora of other conservative pundits have long decried the "legacy" of FDR and the New Deal, but I am fast becoming convinced that the greatest error of the New Deal wasn't in what was done, but in what was perceived to be done. There have been many Administrations that have operated in a deficit, beginning with Jefferson's... but since the Era of New Deal, it seems that many think that prosperity only comes when the government operates outside of its means of revenue. This is NOT what Keynes advocated... it is the reality of the FDR economic model... for good or bad.

Since that time, many in government (and most liberals and progressives, it seems) think that the more a government spends, the better the nation will be. What is forgotten is that for a government to spend, it must tax... and the more a government spends, the more it must tax. The top 15% of earners in this nation constitute more than 65% of the tax base... and that is an unsustainable proportion in anyone's books, because that 15% of taxpayers are NOT reaping 65% of the benefits of their taxes. In reality, the less a government spends (and thus taxes), the better the economic climate and the better the nation as a whole.

Oh, and that was a good episode of "Pillars"... I agree. Looking forward to next weeks, too.