Words matter. If the left succeeds in re-defining the very terms of debate to the point that it becomes difficult or impossible to describe the judicial behavior that is objectionable — if they usurp the term “judicial activism” (and how many others?) and replace its meaning with something less objectionable — then they win by default.
Those born to the lower class that are now living by upper class values and norms have made a conscious choice to do so. In a sense, they have repudiated their roots, declared by their actions that the way they live now is better than the way they lived then. And believe me, those on the other side of that divide are aware of the choice and feel it as a challenge. When you’ve actively chosen one way over another it’s hard to make the argument, even to yourself, that the choice was merely between two equivalents rather than between a better and a worse.
…prioritizing and making tradeoffs is infinitely more difficult when the government has made promises in flush times that it is hard-pressed to keep in lean times. And yet that seems to be the default mode of operation: commit windfalls when the economy is strong to long-term and popular causes, like entitlements and salaries and program expansions, that are politically difficult to rescind when the windfall evaporates.
If revenues were estimated and allocated based on the mean over some suitable period — say a typical business cycle — then decisions about priorities could be made in a relatively stable fiscal environment without the periodic panics that characterize the present budgeting process.