A healthy trend, from John Fund in Opinion Journal (my bolds):
In 1997, the Stockholm Network had five members; it now boasts more than 130 affiliated groups, stretching from Iceland to Armenia. In Bulgaria, the Center for Market Economics has played a major role in building support for the country's adoption of a 10% flat-rate income tax, effective Jan. 1. "Watch Bulgaria," says Steve Masty, an economic development specialist based in London. "The intellectual light bulbs that have been switched on there are now having real-world results."
More than one guest at the Stockholm Network dinner commented that several countries in Europe that escaped the Soviet bloc less than two decades ago are now pursuing reforms that would be regarded as too radical for Western European electorates. In Slovakia, the introduction of a profit-based health system has led to the entry of two private health-insurance companies that have helped drop the state share of the health-care market to 65% from 80% in just two years.
Read the whole thing. "Free-markets and free people" is what is truly "progressive" in today's world. What is termed "progressive" in the US is retrogressive: it's not the 1930s anymore. Totalitarian socialism and Communism had their chance, and the results were not pleasant. Parts of Europe, Canada, and Australia are moving backwards, and parts forward. What about the US?
Today, the true progressives are the bearers of individual freedom and not the bearers of State power. If the word "progress" has any meaning at all, it should mean the unleashing of the human spirit from external power and control.
Just my humble opinion, but I deem myself smarter and more worldly than politicians and bureaucrats. I do not like or trust people who want power over me. They are sickos, by definition, who should be worrying about running their own lives in a sane and sober fashion instead of trying to run mine.
Who are these people? as my friend L. often asks.
