On the Square Today

In his latest On the Square column, R.R. Reno discusses the crisis of government :

The brinksmanship in Washington over the federal debt ceiling caused me to think about our current difficulties. By and large liberals see in the present crisis images of dolorous unemployment lines and want more government spending; conservatives see a bankrupt banana republic and want cuts in spending. Whose vision is clearest?

The liberals have history on their side. The 1930s gave us pictures of men waiting at factory gates, groups idling on street corners, and tent cities of transients despairing of ever finding work. Unemployment—and with unemployment the threat of destitution, abject poverty, and angry rebellion—emerged as the dark, threatening motif of the era.