So then, Ron Paul was the surprise winner of the CPAC presidential straw poll, and herein lies a lesson . . . for somebody. He came in first by a long shot, Romney second, and Palin third. It may soon start to sink in on establishment republicants, who want to “harness” all that tea party energy lying around, in order to get us a return to something like the Bush years, that this might be harder than it looks. The electorate is starting to act like a bear with a sore head. The immediate focus of this anger is Obama and his trillion-wielding minions, but a large number of Republicans wouldn't have to work too hard to get the treatment either.

There are deficiencies in Paul's approach to the world, but hardly any deficiencies in his approach to things like the deficit. And it is the deficit, and Republican earmarks, and Democratic earmarks, and the way things are usually done in Washington, that are the immediate and pressing danger to national security, and a bunch of people are starting to realize it. My children and grandchildren are far more likely to have their lives ruined by the big spenders than they are by the Taliban — determined by common sense and ordinary math.

Read the rest at Like a Bear With a Sore Head.

While Americans feel increasingly disheartened, their leaders evince a mindless . . . one almost calls it optimism, but it is not that.

It is a curious thing that those who feel most mistily affectionate toward America, and most protective toward it, are the most aware of its vulnerabilities, the most aware that it can be harmed. They don’t see it as all-powerful, impregnable, unharmable. The loving have a sense of its limits.

When I see those in government, both locally and in Washington, spend and tax and come up each day with new ways to spend and tax—health care, cap and trade, etc.—I think: Why aren’t they worried about the impact of what they’re doing? Why do they think America is so strong it can take endless abuse?

I think I know part of the answer. It is that they’ve never seen things go dark. They came of age during the great abundance, circa 1980-2008 (or 1950-2008, take your pick), and they don’t have the habit of worry. They talk about their “concerns”—they’re big on that word. But they’re not really concerned. They think America is the goose that lays the golden egg. Why not? She laid it in their laps. She laid it in grandpa’s lap.

They don’t feel anxious, because they never had anything to be anxious about. They grew up in an America surrounded by phrases—”strongest nation in the world,” “indispensable nation,” “unipolar power,” “highest standard of living”—and are not bright enough, or serious enough, to imagine that they can damage that, hurt it, even fatally.

We are governed at all levels by America’s luckiest children, sons and daughters of the abundance, and they call themselves optimists but they’re not optimists—they’re unimaginative. They don’t have faith, they’ve just never been foreclosed on. They are stupid and they are callous, and they don’t mind it when people become disheartened. They don’t even notice.

Read the rest at: Peggy Noonan: We’re Governed by Callous Children – WSJ.com.