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Many of us would love to live in a neighborhood where we could work, live, and shop all within walking distance

If you were a cowboy living on a ranch maybe. But what if you work in a factory? Do you want to live next to it,with the 24/7 traffic, deliveries and movement of trucks? Would you want your kids to play in a front yard next to a factory? How about if you live next to a nightclub but your job makes you get up at 4 or 5 am in the morning? Would you be able to sleep? Would you get any rest on the weekends when everyone around you is drinking, getting rowdy and wants to party? What if you worked in an FedEx terminal. Would you be happy living next to such a busy airport? Some people like to hear planes, but if it was your job, would you want to keep listening to it after you got home from work? What if you worked at the train station. Do you think your kids would find good places to play next to the busy tracks while you are working there? What if you worked at a prison? Again, is this a good place to where you'd have kids playing in the yard while you went off to work? Would you feel comfortable with that?

All of those are good reasons we as conservatives should work for a truly free market in housing as opposed to defending the suburban sprawl brought to us by government planning and zoning. I trust the individual to be able to make those choices in a free market.

The choice isn't, and shouldn't be, the old government way versus the new government way. There are many better options we creative and inventive Americans can come up with if government would get out of the way.

(For the record, there are all sorts of jobs from shopkeeper to banker where living near where you work would be quite enjoyable. Have you ever lived in a prosperous, busy urban environment?)

Many of us would love to live in a neighborhood where we could work, live, and shop all within walking distance

I think they were talking about latte servers, music store owners and book stores.