WALTER RUSSELL MEAD: Liberalism and the Future of the State. “The decline of the blue model calls into question the structure of many of our social programs and government institutions. The post office may be on the way out; the public school systems of the 20th century will probably not survive in their current form. The welfare state faces a complex demographic and financial crisis. All these changes are linked in some way to the decline of the Fordist social model, and they are informing some heated national debates over the future of social policy and the size of the state. To supporters of the New England school, these debates lead directly to some unsettling questions.”