The United States has now acquired an electorally powerful liberal bourgeoisie who are convinced, as their European counterparts have been for several generations, in spite of all evidence to the contrary, that public spending is inherently virtuous, that poverty can be cured by penalising wealth creation, and that government intervention can engineer social "fairness."  But just when some of Europe's political class has begun to appreciate the dangers of this philosophy - that taken to its logical conclusion, it leads to economic stagnation and social division - America seems to have decided that it is the quintessence of enlightened sophistication. - columnist Janet Daley writing in the London Telegraph, 11Nov12, as reported in the Wall Street Journal