Dear Dr. Hurd: One thing you said specifically was "The next four years are going to be a time of enormous education for the American people."

Dr. Hurd, with all due respect--the American people didn't learn under Andrew Jackson, they didn't learn under William Henry Harrison, they didn't learn under Warren G. Harding, Woodrow Wilson, Herbert Hoover, FDR, JFK, Eisenhower, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, either Bushs, Bill Clinton, or FROM Millard Fillmore, Abraham Lincoln, Calvin Coolidge, or Ronald Reagan. If after all that, they haven't yet figured it out, it ain't gonna happen these next four years either...or the four after that...or the...you get the picture.

What I've come to realize is that stupid, hypocritical people vote in politicians who, as scary as it may seem, DO reflect their basic moral ideas. The plus side to all this is that, most of the time, neither the voters nor the people they elect to determine policies really think out the idiotic laws they put into effect- creating a dozen loopholes. Work around the stupidity, and use the loopholes to one's advantage.

People can succeed in this world, no matter how stupid/corrupt the politician- or the voters who elect him/her- is/are. To do that, they have to be motivated, think "outside the box", and NOT "go with the flow". The people who make this world work don't complain about how bad things are-they MAKE them better, and they indirectly tell the whiners to "stuff it".

They're not even bothered by "how bad things are", as they know how to work around it, and live a wonderful, satisfying life, regardless.

Dr. Hurd's response: Of course people don't learn from statist politicians--or if they do, they usually learn the wrong things. I never stated that they do, nor would I imply it. What I do state and imply is that Americans who don't already grasp the perils of statism, collectivism and Big Government have an opportunity under a particularly statist government to learn just why these things are bad and wrong. Obama is a particularly statist politician. A President Obama, working hand-in-hand for 2-8 years with the likes of Nancy Pelosi, Ted Kennedy, and Hillary Clinton, will impose on Americans, for sure, the most controlling and statist policies since FDR's New Deal.

Ironically, the things that are working least well in America right now are things started by FDR or people like him: Social Security, Medicare, federalized education, "progressive" taxation, and the Federal Reserve system. When FDR's policies failed, and the Great Depression dragged on a decade after his initial election, most Americans could be persuaded: "Well, it's a depression. It's a mess. It's going to take time." When Obama's policies fail to transform the world in, say, 2 years, and when those policies in fact make things even worse, do you think the reacton of contemporary Americans will be the same as back then? Somehow, I don't think so. Also, in 2008 and 2010 there is a thriving -- flawed, but thriving and growing -- intellectual movement in favor of free markets, individualism, and all the things that people like Obama despise and oppose. There was little or none of that back in 1935 and 1940. In the coming few years, there will be a rather loud chorus of people prepared to argue: "We don't need Bush's version of socialism, and we certainly don't need Obama's full-fledged socialism. We need freedom and capitalism!"

I'm not hoping Obama wins and I will not vote for him. However, given the very good possibility he will win, those of us who sit mostly to the right of Bush and McCain have to face facts. Americans are in for the biggest round of statism--bordering on all-out, completed socialism--in our nation's history. This is not merely polemical. It's a fact, and it sure weighs heavily on my mind these days.

It may be true that most people are idiotic, immoral and stupid as this writer implies. However, for this to be true, there could be no greatness in the world--greatness that the writer himself acknowledges. There is so much great about our world, and about human life--especially in the United States, where freedom, capitalism, secularism and rationality have been given the best chance ever in human history. Who knows? Even Obama and company might not succeed at destroying it. He will certainly be the most inexperienced President--if he wins--since Jimmy Carter, and Democrats have just as impressive a history of imploding once in power as do the Republicans. (That's a good thing).

I agree that people can probably still succeed in life regardless of who's in power. But we have to curb the inappropriate power of our politicians if success is to still have a chance, as it has for several centuries now, at least in America.