Apparently, The Quitter — who’s going to Sudan in July to see the Sphinx in the great country of Africa and generally bolster her learnin’ about furriners — also wanted to sneak in a photo-op stop with the Iron Lady.

The word public, as in public schools or public option, has become a dirty word in, uh, public life. The question is, can a nation survive once it has abandoned not just moral notions of the public good but the positive notion that there is a public?

Conservatives, including those of the Tea Party variety, aren’t “anti-government.” In most respects they are pro-government to the point of authoritarianism. What they really oppose is any form of cooperative or collective solution to the problems of a complex industrial (or post-industrial) society – especially when the beneficiaries are people they regard with suspicion or fear.

Sarah “Reagan” Palin? There she goes again…