Wrong

Jonah Goldberg returns to an old bugaboo of his: independents-centrists-moderates. He is correct that extremism is often necessary or even essential, and that in a perfect world comprehensive programs or policies would be more efficient than what we have. But, boy, such an argument is well down that slippery slope of utopianism (and its wicked stepbrother totalitarianism).

Our democratic and republican system, with all of its checks and balances, was designed to be messy. It was designed to force compromise. That doesn't mean we can't compromise on extreme solutions, but it is difficult to do so. We should all be pretty thankful about that, especially when it comes to domestic policy, lest we end up with a few more Prohibitions.

(We can talk about foreign policy later.)