Want even more extreme policies from the radically egalitarian vermin than we've seen evolve within the US over the past century? Follow the ideas of this turkey and you'll get them! You can have freedom or you can have this kind of enforced utopian egalitiarianism--you can't have both. I'll choose freedom any time.

Mickey Kaus' engaging and highly readable book sets itself a pretty big task: propose, in detail, a new approach to the pursuit of equality in America, an approach that eschews the apparently unproductive obsessions of left-wing egalitarians of recent times, and instead promotes reforms just as radical as those that have emerged from the neoconservative movement. Kaus wants us to be equal - not in material goods, where he believes the government should simply enforce minimum standards (and to that effect provide jobs to all willing to take them), but rather in social terms. Reducing monetary inequality in America might be impossible, Kaus says, given the direction that modern economies are taking. How can an egalitarian resond? By reducing the sphere in which money makes a difference. "Social equality" requires that people from all strata of society mix together in a strong and broad public sphere. Kaus presents a program that would take a lot of political will to enact in full - even if you agree with aspects of it, the whole may not agree with you. The great thing is, most of his proposals could function independently, and each would work on its own to produce Kaus' vision of equality. Highly recommended.