Have you ever met someone who measures happiness solely by wealth? Neither have I, but the imaginations of my Left-wing friends teem with such people. Indeed, they often assume that I must be one of them — that conservatism is a kind of mental deficiency that leaves me unable to appreciate the good things in life.

I try to explain that, in 15 years as a right-of-center politician, I have yet to come across anyone who thinks that you derive more pleasure from a large bank balance than you do from, say, playing with your kids, or listening to Beethoven or going for a walk in the countryside. But I see that familiar look of skeptical boredom creeping across their features.