Another answer to Thom Hartmann

Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Wealth

By Jonathan Hoenig
March 8, 2004
The big conflict in the world today isn't between Democrats and Republicans, or even the West and the Middle East. It's between the individual and the collective. For it's the individual who believes rights to be unalienable, while it's the collective that seems to consider them subject to majority rule. It is the individual who sees his own happiness as a worthwhile goal, while the collective believes we're grist for the mill of the "public good." It's the individual who sees man as an end unto himself, while the collective sees him as a means to an end for others. And it's the individual who understands that capitalism protects our liberties, even as the collective tries to obliterate them.