Cultural in what way?

Roger Pilon at Cato has a post up about the Arizona controversy regarding political speech and the profound differences we now experience in a divided society.

Pilon links to Daniel Henninger at WSJ and, while I had not read this piece, it fits in with my post The Political Art of Obfuscation. The question is what type of foundational, cultural differences do we experience? I suppose there are many, but I would suggest the most meaningful distincton to make in this case is between a political culture practicing political means and private sector culture practicing economic means -- these two cultures are broad and over-arching, but the more specific differences of gender, geography, race, etc, I believe, while important in their own specific ways, are not as clarifying as this broader division between political means and economic means, especially when we're talking about unemployment, national debt, the healthcare law and other things related to our financial crisis -- and this is where the conflict lies in the political/economic realms.

The culture of the political class is foreign to many who produce and work in the private sector, and  political means appear manipulative and ineffective to many who understand where jobs and economic growth originate. The private sector culture is foreign to many in the political class, as we see from how they talk about the private sector, Fat Cats and the need for more infrastructure spending, and how their actions to solve problems appear counter-productive to business people. We also cool down the rhetoric by lifting the debate to this level of concern, while the other differences are ironed out in communities, national conversations focused on these issues and between individuals. The problem is that these other cultural issues are brought into the debate and they obfuscate the broader division making it difficult to solve problems which affect us all, which are related to the economy and government intervention into the economy. When we politicize every issue affecting our society, dividing "culture" between two political parties, it creates the kind of ballistic back and forth so many are condemning.

NYT Constitutionalists

Roger Pilon at Cato writes about the NYT and their concern that the Tea Party doesn't understand how the federal government is designed to go beyond constitutional limits.

To all those calling for a disingenuous unity

Roger Pilon at Cato captures the essence of the issue.

Rather than unity, the American people need to make informed choices between two visions.

If we can't take the reality of freedom, then we will have none

There's a great, short article today at Cato by Roger Pilon.

Pilon is absolutely right, if we can't take the truth and diligently adhere to the limitations of the Constitution, then we don't deserve freedom -- the problem is that the majority might give up freedom willingly, but the minority who want to protect freedom are not willing. This is what the Constitution is supposed to protect against, tyranny of the majority. The loopholes in the Constitution have been cynically exploited, and in some case the Constitution has been arrogantly ignored. This direction will destroy the nation.

Expression of freedom and independence

The Tea Party is About More Than Government

You will be hard-pressed to find a clearer statement on the broad national movement to limit State power than the one linked above by Roger Pilon at Cato.