We're all Marxists now ...

It was amusing and dispiriting to me to witness so many Tea Party protesters, over the past few months, stand shoulder to shoulder with signs that cried for liberty on the one hand, and yet decried any effort to "touch" Medicare (and other, ahem, very socialist programs).

Is Barack Obama a socialist? Yes, but no more or no less than was George W. Bush, his father, Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan (in spite of his words to the contrary), or any other American politician, with very few exceptions (Ron Paul, and the relative few that see the clear dangers of collectivism). Fact is, Social Security IS socialism; so is Medicare, Medicaid, ADFC, and any other government program that uses taxation to fund social engineering at any level. To the extent any of us embraces this, we are socialists. The moment I cash my first Social Security check, I am de facto a socialist.

Like it or not, that's the bottom line. The documentary Original Intent deals with them at some length:

As the quote misattributed to Alexis de Tocqueville famously reads: "A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the majority discovers it can vote itself largess out of the public treasury. After that, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits with the result the democracy collapses because of the loose fiscal policy ensuing, always to be followed by a dictatorship, then a monarchy."