In America, the liberal-conservative debate is seemingly interminable.  Despite the manifest failures of its dogma, the left will never recant.  There's always a ready rationale for its latest debacle, usually variants of :  We didn't go far enough.
Liberals can admit neither their defeats nor our triumphs.  They're still lying about the Reagan years, which saw the greatest peacetime expansion in our history and the demise of international communism.
    WHEN WE RESIST THEIR efforts at social engineering, the media duly inform us that the American people are deeply divided over this or that issue.
    Since we diverge so dramatically, with differences irreconcilable, I propose that we make the ideological physical, by partitioning the nation.  As a laboratory experiment in the practicality of these eternally competing philosophies, liberals and conservatives each should have their own territory.
    The right will get the West, South and much of the Midwest--the heartland of Middle America.  Liberals will have the knee-jerk Northeast and Rust Belt.  Some minor adjustments will be required.  San Francisco and Santa Monica would certainly feel deprived if excluded from Clinton country.
    We'll call their land The People's Republic of Euphoria (PR of E) and ours something snappy like The United States of America.  Absent much internal opposition, each will have the long-awaited opportunity to realize its grand vision.
The US of A will institute a 10 percent flat tax, which can be filed on a postcard size 1040 form, abolish the capital gains tax, mandate a balanced budget, institute term limitation and euthanize much of the civil service.  Who does not work won't need Ultra-Slimfast.
    The PR of E will confiscate all earnings above Hillary's income, institute visionary income redistribution, nationalize the atmosphere and expand the bureaucracy to at least three regulators for every entrepreneur.
In the area of crime control, the US of A will provide for the widespread use of capital punishment, public decapitation of drug dealers and reform the criminal justice system so that criminals can no longer exploit the system to frustrate justice.
In the Republic of Compassion, they'll abolish the death sentence, confiscate handguns (in recognition of the lethal propensities of inanimate objects), legalize drugs (save nicotine, which will be outlawed) and limit prison sentences to the most heinous offenses (polluting, hate crimes and insider trading).  They won't need a legislature; judges will fulfill that function.
    THE REAL AMERICA will have vouchers for parental choice, public schools that stress traditional disciplines, the absence of pedagogic indoctrination (AIDS education, condoms, etc.) and Judeo-Christian values in the classroom.  Like the fabled walls of Jericho, the libs' mythical barrier twixt church and state will come 'a tumblin down.
The PR of E will abolish grades (they stigmatize slow learners), stress socialization over education, distribute prophylactics in kindergarten, allow the National Education Association to establish educational policy at all levels and make Condom Joe Fernandez their education czar.
    The US of A will have a space-based missile shield, provide swift and strong response to aggression that threatens our national interests, maintain the integrity of our borders and withdraw from the United Nations.
    Barney Frank will be the PR of E's defense secretary.  Its military will only be deployed domestically, as a social service agency (planting posies in the inner cities, recycling, etc.).  Their armed forces will stress sensitivity and equal opportunity.  All combat platoons will be 50 percent female, and a quota of the handicapped will fly fighter planes.  They won't need a state department, having ceded foreign policy authority to the U.N. and American Friends Service Committee.
    After a decade, we'll be able to properly assess the results.  The US of A will have general prosperity, a government that's efficient and innocuous, a renaissance of learning, and tranquillity at home and abroad.  Canada probably will petition to join our union.
    The PR of E will have public school graduates who can't read their diplomas and can barely speak above guttural grunts, a nationwide crime rate to rival that of the Queens, the GNP of Bangladesh, work ethic of Peru, tax rate of Sweden and ambiance of Sarajevo.  Zimbabwe will be sending them foreign aid.  Cuba will be poised for invasion.
OF COURSE, WE OF THE US of A will generously allow reunification on the condition that the liberals maintain decorous silence on political questions for at least the next half century and undergo re-education by reading the collected works of Oliver North.