Whether conjured up by something I ate before bedtime, or by the cheesy horror flick I watched a few nights before, or by something else, I just don’t know—but I tossed and turned through one of the most vivid dreams last weekend that I’ve ever experienced.

The Dream

I was in a classroom with all the 2020 presidential candidates, including the present occupant of the White House. My job was to introduce the guest speaker, none other than the late, great French economist and statesman Frédéric Bastiat, author of The Law and one of my “real heroes.”

It should have been a night of ecstasy. Every person vying for president schooled by the greatest storyteller the philosophy of liberty has ever produced! In real life, I’d almost give my firstborn to see Kamala Harris, Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Donald Trump, and the others enrolled in a “Bastiat for Beginners” course. Alas, it was a nightmare. I never spoke a word after the introduction. I could only observe as the master calmly instructed. Maddeningly, nothing he said seemed to sink in; the “students” wouldn’t even take notes. I remember sensing immense frustration.

Only two good things came out of this ordeal: I woke up before any of them could get elected, and I got the idea for this article. Why not gather a few of Bastiat’s very best lines in one place—the ones I would most want a presidential candidate to seriously think about?

Well, here they are. Imagine the difference it could make if even one of the candidates allowed the wisdom of only one or two of these snippets to truly sink in. Never again would they see the nanny state in the same way they did before: