You don’t have to be a wild-eyed socialist or a bleeding-heart liberal to believe in fire departments, for example. If your house catches fire, you’re thrilled the government thinks it’s its duty to put that blaze out. And the rest of your neighborhood is thrilled, too, since a one-house fire can quickly consume a whole block. Likewise with health insurance. If one child’s family can’t afford medical care and he gets sick, every kid in the classroom can come down with the mumps.

Protecting everyone equally may be moral; it’s also plain smart.

Reading this post-Hurricane Sandy, I've noticed that all calls for privatizing FEMA have gone silent.