I just received my brand spanking new issue of THE CITY, which has articles by Lawler and Knippenberg reflecting on "where we go from here" after November 4th. Too bad they’re not yet online, but subscriptions to the print journal are free.

There are some other first-rate pieces in the issue as well, among them a plea from Ryan T. Anderson for evangelicals to use the language and/or categories of natural law and Matthew Lee Anderson’s perspicacious analysis of the wayward non-partisanship of young evangelicals.

If they honor the imperatives of a constitutional conservatism, both social conservatives and libertarian conservatives will have to bite their fair share of bullets as they translate these goals into concrete policy. They will, though, have a big advantage: Moderation is not only a conservative virtue, but the governing virtue of a constitutional conservatism.

But haven’t we already gone rather far down that path. What are entitlements if not grants that help people from both their own mistakes and from the unavoidable tragedies of life? I am not saying that’s all bad, but I am saying that a government that grows accustomed to helping individual voters when life happens will tend to be the kind of government that will try to rescue corporations (classically regarded as artificial persons, created by law) when they are suffering. Can the welfare state be restricted to individuals and not include corporations? Do we have an example of it doing so for any length of time in any country? The character of the laws shapes the character of a people, both inside and outside of government. The more people who get hand-outs, it seems, the more likely it is that big corporations will get them too. Over time, history seems to suggest that’s the case.

We could make a similar point about the constitution and the bailout. Congress has grown accustomed to writing vague plenary grants to administrative agencies, as opposed to clear law. In that sense, the bailout is another continuation of a trend.

The bailout idea is hardly new. It is the central organizing principle of government in an age of entitlement.

Meanwhile, the headline of the day comes from Nature magazine: "Experts Still Needed." Indeed, what would we do without them?

Here are the cautious and often witty predictions for 2009 from the NATIONAL REVIEW people, including our own Steve Hayward.

Among the predictions: Obams will disappoint the Greens, the gays (well, he already has), the feminists (because the Freedom of Choice Act will not become law), and even the early-education activists (who’ll think their scheme is underfunded).

If he also disappoints those who hope for a quick, new, and improved New Deal, Steve predicts, the stock market may well surge well before year’s end. If it does, I’m getting the heck out for good (so that I might retire in my lifetime).

If Obama manages to do all this disappointing, he’ll probably be our most popular president ever. The disappointed, of course, have nowhere to go but him, and everyone else will be surprised and reassured by his cold-hearted prudence.

My added fantasy is renowned anti-smoker Harry Jaffa coming on the scene and snatching the cigarette away, lecturing the 44th president, reminding him Lincoln abstained from both drink and the weed.

One of the biggest killers of all is that states insist on allocating federal transportation funds through a politically devised formula. The result? Smooth, well-paved rural highways and worn-out urban roadways that are paved with a layer of asphalt too thin to withstand heavy use and are therefore in need of excessive, costly maintenance. . . .

It takes the nation’s busiest airports decades and billions of dollars to build new runways, for example, because of onerous regulations imposed by the Federal Aviation Administration and the Environmental Protection Agency. Davis-Bacon mandates, which effectively require that "prevailing" union wages (often much higher than the actually prevailing market wage) be paid to workers on any construction project receiving federal funds, also drive up the costs of roads and other federal transport projects. The Federal Transit Act also makes it extremely expensive to lay off transit employees.

I happen to believe that The Soldier and the State is Sam’s most influential work. But that is probably because civil-military relations is an area of particular interest to me.

Sam was not just a remarkable scholar. He also produced excellent students, e.g. Eliot Cohen and Steve Rosen. He will be missed.