ON the September 18 broadcast of Power of 10, a new game show on CBS, host Drew Carey asked contestant D. J. Burgduff this question: What percentage of Americans are willing to pay higher taxes for the government to provide universal health care? While Burgduff thought it over, Carey performed a comic riff: “Personally, I can’t wait for universal health care.” Then, in a mocking voice: “From the folks that brought you FEMA, the TSA, the DMV, the IRS, comes universal health care! It’s going to be fantastic, to have the government in charge of our health!”
Nobody who watched the program could have mistaken Carey’s opinion of socialized medicine: He thinks it’s a stupendously bad idea. Yet Power of 10 isn’t a talking-heads program on a cable channel-it’s a quiz show on a mainstream network with millions of viewers. Carey nevertheless has turned it into an occasional platform for his right-of-center libertarianism. It’s not his only platform. On October 15, when Carey succeeds Bob Barker as host of The Price Is Right, the Reason Foundation, a libertarian think tank in Los Angeles, will debut the first in a series of public-policy videos starring Carey. At the end of the month, Carey will attend his first meeting as a member of Reason’s board of trustees. Following years of success in stand-up comedy and on sitcoms, Carey is on the brink of becoming one of the Right’s most visible celebrities.
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