It's an important distinction to make, but I have a little quibble: Modern economics has shown (confirmed?) that the free market basically leads to the greatest social good, but that the government is needed to correct a number of "market failures" (not to mention to ensure the proper functioning of legal foundations of the market system). So while it is certainly important to recognize the contributions of the progressives to beneficial sorts of regulation such as antitrust law and environmental protection (which actually promote individual freedom if done correctly), we should at the same time not forget modern liberalism's roots in the classical liberalism of John Locke, Adam Smith, and many others.
"A liberal society allows an individual to do whatever he or she wants, provided it doesn't harm other people. You can choose to wear PVC hotpants or a veil. You can choose to spend all day praying, or all day mocking people who pray.
Where a multiculturalist prizes the rights of religious groups, a liberal favours the rights of the individual. So if you want to preach that the Archangel Gabriel revealed the word of God to an illiterate nomad two millennia ago, you can do it as much as you like. You can write books and hold rallies and make your case. What you cannot do is argue that since this angel supposedly said women are worth half of a man when it comes to inheritance, and that gay people should be killed, you can ditch the rules of liberalism and act on it.
The job of a liberal state is not to stamp The True National Essence on its citizens, nor to promote "difference" for its own sake. It is to uphold the equal rights of every individual – whether they are white men or Muslim women. It has one liberal culture, with freedoms used differently by different people."
"Progressivism" spawned from Victorian culture during the Victorian age. At this time, Europe's elite were still reeling from the brash but successful Jeffersonian challenge that aristocracy was not a matter of blood or race or station, but of merit, vitality, true industry, talent and courage. In desperation, Darwin had been hijacked and misbranded to support a false meme of competition and "survival of the fittest" as ad hoc justification for Royalist hegemony over Europe and for Imperialism as the continuing geopolitical doctrine. Haeckel typified the thinking of most of Europe's elite, and when infused with Hegel, this dominated the European political and governmental mindset.
Caught between the traumas of the French Revolution and the American Revolution, the elite and the royals of Europe became obsessed with notions of "the master race" and the utopian ideal of a two-class paternalistic society of elites and common volk with a noble savage or two thrown in for good measure. Comparatively, the Americans were lower than commoners; savage prattle and underbred. Upstarts who knew not their proper place. Horrifying, these Americans. Lower than even the Serbs and the White Russians, how could they possibly be equals.
Out of this storm of injured identity, the great masters of identity politics, Stalin and Beria, effectively seized the term "progressive" and romanticized it as both the meme and buzzword for the new 'master race' of morally and intellectually superior communalists arising in liberation from the elites and oppressors to form a modern utopian new society to lead the modern age (circa 1923) into the grand future. In this context the international socialist term "progressives" is synonymous with "aryans" used by national socialists of the same era. How ironic this has been forgotten. Combined, these "progressive" governments murdered their own citizens in numbers 6 times greater than were killed in all wars of the 20th Century.
So there is a grand difference between confiscational, collectivist dogma and Jeffersonianism. The magic of the American accident is the placement of the individual (not the group or institution) as the central organizing principle of society; an individual with private property and certain inalienable rights; an individual imbued with equal liberty and equal protection under the law, where my rights end where yours begin and vice versa. This, in the known history of the world, remains a most radical concept for distributing power and opportunity throughout a society.
The human issue from the beginning of known history has always been individual Liberty and equal protection under the law. The problem has always been totalitarianism and authoritarianism. If we do not use these terms properly, we will get lost. There are no other terms that take their place.
Whether a Liberal or a Conservative, a Totalitarian is still a Totalitarian. An authoritarian is still exactly that. Who cares what religion or political titles are in play?
The essence of our American society and its sustainability ultimately depends upon the preserving of the sanctity of the individual and the unalienable rights arising therefrom; preserving the inviolate right to private property, and equal boundaries and protection under the law. This is so precious, both in the history of the world and in the lives of each of us today.
So I say to hell with the authoritarians. To hell with the precautionists and prohibitionists. To hell with the utopians and the "experts" and 'institutionalists" confiscating our Liberty and meddling without reasonable basis in our pursuit of happiness. I don't just say this for me. I say it for you.
Radical? Hell yes it's radical. Over 200 years old and it still sounds radical as hell. What Jefferson and the founders set in motion over 200 years ago was the real revolution.
There hasn't been another one since. The other "revolutions" so claimed have merely been an exercise to establish totalitarian order by means of an authoritarian elite.
2.20.2008 4:28am
Commenting on Dean's World is a privilege, not a right. Dean is your host, you are his guest, and you should behave in that fashion. Dean is not your babysitter, nor is he your punching bag. Please remember this. In general, you are free to disagree with anyone on any subject you wish, but abusive behavior will not be tolerated.
Of course we all lose our tempers now and then. Dean freely admits to being imperfect in this regard, which is why regulars to this establishment will generally be cut more slack than people who we don't know very well.
Still: behave like an adult, or go find somewhere else to play. Thanks.
"A liberal society allows an individual to do whatever he or she wants, provided it doesn't harm other people. You can choose to wear PVC hotpants or a veil. You can choose to spend all day praying, or all day mocking people who pray.
Where a multiculturalist prizes the rights of religious groups, a liberal favours the rights of the individual. So if you want to preach that the Archangel Gabriel revealed the word of God to an illiterate nomad two millennia ago, you can do it as much as you like. You can write books and hold rallies and make your case. What you cannot do is argue that since this angel supposedly said women are worth half of a man when it comes to inheritance, and that gay people should be killed, you can ditch the rules of liberalism and act on it.
The job of a liberal state is not to stamp The True National Essence on its citizens, nor to promote "difference" for its own sake. It is to uphold the equal rights of every individual – whether they are white men or Muslim women. It has one liberal culture, with freedoms used differently by different people."
maybe, only offering this, its because the conservatism i embrace is akin to classical liberalism, not that birchian shit.
Caught between the traumas of the French Revolution and the American Revolution, the elite and the royals of Europe became obsessed with notions of "the master race" and the utopian ideal of a two-class paternalistic society of elites and common volk with a noble savage or two thrown in for good measure. Comparatively, the Americans were lower than commoners; savage prattle and underbred. Upstarts who knew not their proper place. Horrifying, these Americans. Lower than even the Serbs and the White Russians, how could they possibly be equals.
Out of this storm of injured identity, the great masters of identity politics, Stalin and Beria, effectively seized the term "progressive" and romanticized it as both the meme and buzzword for the new 'master race' of morally and intellectually superior communalists arising in liberation from the elites and oppressors to form a modern utopian new society to lead the modern age (circa 1923) into the grand future. In this context the international socialist term "progressives" is synonymous with "aryans" used by national socialists of the same era. How ironic this has been forgotten. Combined, these "progressive" governments murdered their own citizens in numbers 6 times greater than were killed in all wars of the 20th Century.
So there is a grand difference between confiscational, collectivist dogma and Jeffersonianism. The magic of the American accident is the placement of the individual (not the group or institution) as the central organizing principle of society; an individual with private property and certain inalienable rights; an individual imbued with equal liberty and equal protection under the law, where my rights end where yours begin and vice versa. This, in the known history of the world, remains a most radical concept for distributing power and opportunity throughout a society.
The human issue from the beginning of known history has always been individual Liberty and equal protection under the law. The problem has always been totalitarianism and authoritarianism. If we do not use these terms properly, we will get lost. There are no other terms that take their place.
Whether a Liberal or a Conservative, a Totalitarian is still a Totalitarian. An authoritarian is still exactly that. Who cares what religion or political titles are in play?
The essence of our American society and its sustainability ultimately depends upon the preserving of the sanctity of the individual and the unalienable rights arising therefrom; preserving the inviolate right to private property, and equal boundaries and protection under the law. This is so precious, both in the history of the world and in the lives of each of us today.
So I say to hell with the authoritarians. To hell with the precautionists and prohibitionists. To hell with the utopians and the "experts" and 'institutionalists" confiscating our Liberty and meddling without reasonable basis in our pursuit of happiness. I don't just say this for me. I say it for you.
Radical? Hell yes it's radical. Over 200 years old and it still sounds radical as hell. What Jefferson and the founders set in motion over 200 years ago was the real revolution.
There hasn't been another one since. The other "revolutions" so claimed have merely been an exercise to establish totalitarian order by means of an authoritarian elite.
Of course we all lose our tempers now and then. Dean freely admits to being imperfect in this regard, which is why regulars to this establishment will generally be cut more slack than people who we don't know very well.
Still: behave like an adult, or go find somewhere else to play. Thanks.