I agree with you that the accusation of treachery is ridiculous. The Left should be opposing John Ashcroft, not imitating him. The rest of the comments, however, are right on target. Especially the bit about patriotism being more than waving flags and bumper-stickers.

Carey, Come now. Certainly you aren't saying that you believe 'do you wish to' and 'do you wish to be forced to' are the same question. Even if the spirit of the question--what we might believe Justin is trying to say--makes sense, what he says is purely ridiculous.

charicaturing, is this like charcuterie? Kind of butchering, but in a well presented way? Anyway, I'll take your main point - it's wrong to claim that a failure to volunteer and a failure to agree to taxation are similar things, and that they are nothing close to *treachery*. He's right though to point out a contradiction between positions like declaring undying support for the armed forces while cutting veterans benefits. However one of the main differences between left and right is in the belief about what states can and should do with money. Some (me) would argue that states can do things with money individuals can't, that missing markets are a real and serious problem, that natural monopolies are best run by the state and that the natural consequences of a free market are neither just nor fair and so should be constrained. Most economic debate revolves around how serious you think these problems are and what the take of the government in GDP should be when it tries to stop them. Having read his whole piece the argument he's advancing is that being willing to pay taxes for the benefit of the nation as a whole (and indirectly yourself) is patriotic. I don't like the word patriotic but the late John Smith used to talk about civic responsibility and I think this is right. If we are intent of establishing a free and just society (I've been reading Rawles lately) then we have to accept a certain amount of redistribution and our willingness to contribute to this is indicative of our belief in and support for the society we're part of. It's a point worth making because while the spend side of the tax and spend equation is often seen as good (hospitals, education, armed forces, diplomats, roads) the actual action of paying tax is rarely seen as something to be proud of. The notion that 'I pay my taxes, those taxes built that hospital, I'm damn proud of that and so should you all be' is not one you're going to hear much. Which is a shame. Personally I thought the post was reasonably coherent, well argued and in no way embarrassing to the institution Mr Slaughter attends. After all, you and I have been around enough elite educational institutions to know that there's no shortage of morons in high places. There is on the other hand a shortage of people suggesting that the right to publish in public be restricted, and long may that continue. (ps : the link to the Filibuster is broken)

Martin: Whilst I can see the argument behind (even if I don't agree with) the argument you make, and you think Slaughter's making, it is not in fact the argument he made. Besides the rather dubious practice of setting up fictional entities as stand-ins for reality ("Freepers say" without actually having so much as a quote), the argument is clumsy, badly put, humiliating, and easily countered. You'll note that I'm not in the habit of using the words, "Liberals say....[x]." If I do, I usually provide an actual quote by a real, live, respectable liberal, or at least by Paul Krugman, who pretends to be respectable at times. And if I do, I try not to make it an argument so easily countered that I look absolutely ridiculous. The counterpoint to your argument, of course, is that virtues of charity and such would be better served if you had directly paid for that hospital, as opposed to fractionally paid for it by making every one of your fellow citizens contribute. You may not buy the argument, but it's a reasonable one that fellow citizens can make, and in fact do make without sounding like the ignorant 'freepers' (whatever the hell those are) that Slaughter has decided to raise as his own personal hobgoblins. Sorry, but I'd expect better from anyone at Oxford, especially if they were publishing under the brand. From a group that makes some passing claim to 'non-partisanship'? This is lunacy.

"Sorry, but I'd expect better from anyone at Oxford" You'd be sadly disappointed then. Remember, I did the student politics thing and know of what I speak. Meanwhile should you want to investigate the Free Republic http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1166719/posts Which I will use as exhibit 'a' when I characterise the site as a community harbouring a bunch of ignorant racists and propogating far right ideas.

Meanwhile (sorry for multiple posts) I present Mr Slaughters missing attributions America is the Greatest Country in the World Period. http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1075416/posts and taxation as confiscation http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/910364/posts Truth is you can find just about anything on the Free Republic, provided it sits in a broadly right wing agenda.

OK, but if the whole of my argument is that "Democrats should do X because there's a small number of very silly Republicans" or the first sentence of his article could just as easily read "Rather uninformed Freepers will say..." then what the heck is the point? It makes sense to rebut good arguments, or even the best argument you can see your opponent making, but otherwise what is he on about? I seem to remember you haranguing me for a vast overgeneralization about whether an advertisement belonged to someone who broadcast it: certainly you'd hold to the same standards someone who is ascribing to the whole of a group something that may only apply to a minority of it? As for these being his attributions, Martin: don't you think it would be wise to provide examples of the same person saying something (even if we grant you that those two posts are contradictory in the same way as Slaughter describes, which they're not)? They hardly prove his point.

Well given that your complaint was that he didn't provide evidence to substantiate his claim that 'Freepers' (plural) were inconsistent I think I'm doing OK. It's not really any different to saying something like 'Democrats want to have it both ways' - which while you may scrupulously avoid I'm sure your elected representatives don't. More to the point I'm sure we'd both admit that there will be people who hold the position he describes. The criticism you want to make is 'no-one takes these guys seriously so what's the point in citing them' Although I suspect they represent rather more people than you imagine. I'd see the Republican problem with the extreme right as analogous to Labour's problems with 'Militant' in the 1980's. There's a nasty bit of the party with more clout than it should have and someone's got to do what Kinnock did, call them out, expose them and then get back to the serious business of representing the core rather than the noisy, hysterical minority.