Saturday, January 8, 2011

Law and Order

Heather MacDonald begins her report in the City Journal thus:
Conservative ideas are responsible for the two great urban-policy successes of the last quarter-century: the breathtaking drops in crime and in welfare dependency since the early 1990s. You’d never know it from members of the opinion elite, however, who have rarely recognized these successes, much less their provenance. So let’s recapitulate an epic battle about the foundations of social order, a battle that had not just a clear winner but also a clear loser: the liberal policy prescriptions for cities that many opinion makers and politicians still embrace.
"Still embrace."

It's unbelievable really that these same people, and so many others besides, who simply won't let go of their demonstrably foolish ideas about the "foundations of social order", continue nevertheless to be elected and reelected to public office, to be appointed to important positions in this Administration and others, to be hired as writers and reporters at Big Media outlets, to win tenure at elite universities, etc.  In a sane world they would be ignored, mocked, or both.

It's also excruciatingly frustrating that common-sense notions like, oh, I don't know, able-bodied men have to work if they expect to eat or all crime (no crime is petty if you're the victim) must be punished, have to defended at all.

But they do.  MacDonald's piece is as good a defense as you'll see and well worth a moment of your time.

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