This N&O editorial reports gloomy economic forecasting, which the writer(s) believes justifies shoring up the welfare state (read: expanding yet further). Of course, ‘compassionate’ journalists aren’t expected to understand the relationship between taxing, spending, and making people more state-dependent on the one hand, and economic hardship on the other. These phenomena are self-reinforcing, among myriad other factors. But the welfare-state/economic-hardship nexus is difficult even for lefties to deny in the wake of Welfare Reform.
The article gets one thing right, though: "Maybe the economic boat will right itself — but if not, we can’t complain that we weren’t warned."
-Max Borders
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