Julian Sanchez notes that Glenn Beck has taken a liking to Thomas Paine and comments: “I recommend a dramatic reading from The Age of Reason. Or would inducing that level of cognitive dissonance be cruel?”

I say that if Julian really wants to see Glenn Beck enter into a world of cognitive dissonance, then Beck should perform a dramatic reading of Thomas Paine’s Agrarian Justice, especially this bit:

Having thus in a few words, opened the merits of the case, I shall now proceed to the plan I have to propose, which is,

To create a national fund, out of which there shall be paid to every person, when arrived at the age of twenty-one years, the sum of fifteen pounds sterling, as a compensation in part, for the loss of his or her natural inheritance, by the introduction of the system of landed property:

And also, the sum of ten pounds per annum, during life, to every person now living, of the age of fifty years, and to all others as they shall arrive at that age.

Yes, that’s Thomas Paine, advocating old age pensions and for money to be provided to every adult upon reaching the age of majority. Why? Because he believed that the ownership of land was unjust, that land should belong in common to all, but since it did not, the owners of property owed that money to everyone, and that money was to be paid through estate and property taxes.

Read the whole essay, by the way, which is really fascinating.