John Stossel: Sit Down and Shut Up While the Grown Ups Run Your Lives

I like a lot of what John Stossel writes and reports, but sometimes he lapses into really abhorrent elitism. His latest article essentially argues that some people are too dumb to vote. Apparently, he believes that you need to agree with him on economic issues to be worthy of casting a ballot. It's true that bad economic policies (like protectionism) are often popular with the general public, and, as a result, frequently become national policy. That's the price you pay, though, for the much greater social good of getting people invested in the political process and in the country. Alienation and disenfranchisement (especially among young people, who Stossel particularly targets as not knowing enough to vote) fuels unrest and social disorder, as much of the rest of the world has shown. If the price of social stability is a tariff or two, so be it.

Economic Illiteracy and Rational Voters