OP in the comments: "A part of why I love this article is this great sample questionnaire to determine how fit you are to be making big decisions about the country:
What is your favorite book? (Cannot answer “The Bible.”)
How many languages do you speak? (Let’s be wary of numbers lower than 3.)
What’s your favorite opera? Ballet? (How can we expect arts funding from people who don’t appreciate the arts?)
When did you last use your passport? Where did you go? (If you don’t have a passport, maybe you shouldn’t be anywhere near foreign policy. Ditto if your travels have only ever taken you to Mexico and Canada.)
Who is your favorite political philosopher? Have you read Burke? Paine? (Any good music teacher will tell you, theory first!)
Obviously it's more of a thought experiment than a serious proposal, but imagine if the people making decisions actually appreciated art and travel and culture. It actually sounds like a constituency you'd find in a major European city, with no Billy Bobs in trailer parks to hold us back culturally."
Hmm, I wonder why exactly rural people hate liberals? :thinkin-lenin: Obviously they are just good for nothing disgusting poors. Back to brunch!
THOMAS PAINE WOULD'VE HATED YOU.
The man died penniless, and hated by the rest of the founding fathers, because he fought against slavery, and opposed the Bourgeois government formed after the American Revolutions success.
Its funny they put him on the same plane as Burke, when Burke spent years slandering Paine for writing positively about the French Revolution.
Also, the only theory Neolibs read is the Economist and Econ 101 textbooks, it's like how no Neoclassical Economist has actually read Adam Smith
Paine was one of the only based posters. Posted about the American Revolution, then went to France and posted about the French Revolution, moved to England and pissed off the king of England enough through posting that he had to flee to France where he was elected to government despite not speaking French, then for a finale posted so hard that he pissed off Robespierre and had to go back to where he started in America.