This is a quote from an op-ed piece run by the Kansas City Star on 31 October 2007.  The reason for the title of this entry will be apparent in a moment.

(Americans) "...feel that their neighborhood happiness is threatened by global problem that are beyond their power to control:  terrorism, rising health-care costs, looming public debt, illegal immigration, global warming, and the rise of China and India.  These voters don't believe government can lift their standard of living or lead a moral revival.  They want a federal government that will focus on a few macro threats - terrorism, health-care costs, energy, entitlement debt, and immigration - and stay out of the intimate realms of life.

"This is not liberalism, which inserts itself into the crannies of life.  It's not conservatism, suspicious of federal power.  It's a gimlet-eyed federalism - strong government with sharply defined tasks."

Here's the kicker.  The writer is David Broder, whose employer is the New York Times.

How in the WORLD did the NYT's editors let that last paragraph slip by?

"...liberalism...inserts itself into the crannies of life".  You can't FIND a more damning appraisal of liberalism than that, especially since it is the left which claims that conservatives are the ones poking their collective noses into every aspect of a person's private and public life.  Those who say that, though, have never been on government support, because the Feds and the state want to know EVERYTHING about your income and possessions when you're receiving any kind of entitlement benefit, and the Social and Rehabilitation Service (SRS) here in Kansas will cheerfully remove children from a stable home environment if just ONE nosy-parker neighbor or passerby thinks your house is dirty or you mistreat your children.The very core of liberalism as defined today is "the government knows best", and that's socialism in a nutshell.

Mr. Broder doesn't give conservatism a free pass, though.  "These voters don't believe government can...lead a moral revival" sticks a finger in the eye of the Pat Robertson crowd.  Equally,  "It's not conservatism, suspicious of federal power" chides those who believe that there should be no government regulation or intervention of any aspect of American life.  What Mr. Broder espouses here is federalism at its' best, defining the areas that a national government is best equipped to handle, and limiting the government to those areas.  The state and local governments are tacitly charged with handling the rest.  (Gee, I seem to remember something in the Constitution about that....the Tenth Amendment...shame no one else except David Broder has read the thing recently.)

I might disagree with Mr. Broder on some areas that he feels are the purview of the national government, but at least I can agree with him in other areas, and that is WAY more than I can say for the majority of dreck that spews from the NY Times.  Maybe Mr. Broder could write a couple of articles for the front page; that would certainly bring a little more objectivity into the "news" department of the NYT.