The Extremists

I was intrigued when I saw this title for an article at The American Spectator: Chief Justice Neville Chamberlain. The story is just what you imagine from the title - comparing Chief Justice John Roberts' ruling on Obamacare to Neville Chamberlain's attempts to appease Adolf Hitler.

Why all the anger towards John Roberts?...

Because there is a considerable feeling the Chief Justice has treated with Statism and the Constitution's foes as Neville Chamberlain once treated with Adolf Hitler.

By appeasing, by attempting to pacify -- yielding to demands from the Left at the expense of the Constitution's First Principles.

The article goes on an on, but the author (Jeffrey Lord - former Reagan White House political director) never says much more than that.

Of course in a sane world, comparing health care for an additional 30 million people to the world's most notorious genocidal tyrant would probably qualify someone for a nice safe padded cell somewhere. But the author didn't get published by the Breitbart crew - his article shows up in what is often billed as the premiere intellectual publication for conservatives.

That's how far off the cliff Republicans have gone.

On the other side of the continuum, we have Glenn Greenwald ticked off at the left for not similarly excoriating Justice Elena Kagan for her vote to allow states to opt out of the Medicaid expansion in Obamacare.

Although it was John Roberts’ ideological apostasy that has received the most attention, Kagan joined with the Court’s five right-wing Justices (as well as Stephen Breyer) to strike down one of the most important provisions of the bill — its Medicaid expansion program...

Although Greenwald obviously didn't go as far as Lord did with incendiary symbolism, its clear that the concerns mirror one another...the problem is "siding with the opposition." This, for ideologues and extremists on both sides is apostasy. For Greenwald, it doesn't matter that perhaps Kagan's vote is what kept Roberts' from siding with the conservatives on the court to throw out the Medicaid expansion completely (or the whole ACA for that matter). As we've seen so often from both the right and left extremists...ANY compromise outweighs any benefit.

The good news is that while Lord is echoing the position of the Republican Party these days, Greenwald pretty much stands alone. He did find some common ground with Dahlia Lithwick, but that's pretty much it.

And that, my friends, is why we win...we don't empower our extremists.