Ross Douthat says Rep. Paul Ryan’s budget proposal offers a way forward: “Ryan’s roadmap holds out the possibility of at least some common ground between the limited-government right and the redistributionist left — and long-term solvency into the bargain.” Reihan Salam, meanwhile, defends Ryan’s plan from its critics on the Left and concludes that it “offers a stable, sustainable course for the welfare state that promises to be far more stable than a centrally directed alternative that burdens the federal government with more complexity than it can successfully manage.”

A Pew quiz shows how alarmingly ignorant many Americans are of current events, while an ISI study finds that college graduates can’t answer basic civics questions. Ilya Somin offered a few thoughts on rational political ignorance back in 2008.

And last but not least, BeyondDC offers up a few reasons why city-dwellers have it better.