Ignore the propaganda. Things are more complicated.

This narrative serves America well save for two minor flaws: It’s a lie and it hurts people. Confirmation bias and ex post rationalization are human universals, not the exclusive province of the political right. Every day, the best interests of vulnerable people are sacrificed on the altar of leftist faiths as ironclad any conservative presuppositions.

Take Medicaid, a policy issue I touched on recently in these pages. The vast majority of Democratic policymakers and sympathetic journalists take it on faith that the good intentions that inspire the program and the vast sums we invest in it add up to something that improves poor people’s lives. When progressives discuss red states’ reluctance to volunteer for the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion, they almost describe a clear trade-off: Conservatives’ contempt for social assistance and the GOP’s austerity fetish are on one side, and the medical destinies of needy Americans are on the other. Shame on the heartless Scrooge who could possibly prioritize the former!

But leftists rarely pause to interrogate the premise, to actually verify that signing humans up for a complex and convoluted financial product is in fact synonymous with boosting their well-being. It’s hard to fault laypeople for leaning on this commonsensical assumption. But in 2014, every serious student of policy should be aware of the growing evidence that calls it into question.

http://thefederalist.com/2014/02/12/the-party-of-science-has-absolutely-no-clue-what-its-talking-about/