Gene Healy’s irritated by the growing chatter about a “politics of meaning.” I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to suggest that this is an unintended, but possibly unavoidable, side effect of expecting the national government to be an all-purpose solver of problems and doer of good. People come to think that—perhaps like some of the local religious or social groups whose previous functions government has usurped—it ought to provide them with a sense of community and purpose and spiritual fulfillment too. If federal legislators are supposed have a plan to keep your medication affordable, your kids learning, and your cable TV channels wholesome, why shouldn’t they be just as attentive to the state of your soul?