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Being Liberal (1 Viewer)

Why are you a liberal ? Some will say they believe in social justice, equality, and compassion. Others are liberal because they support a higher minimum wage, abortion rights, reducing climate change, and affordable universal healthcare. Liberalism is often identified with open mindedness, flexibility, reason, and science too. None of these things are wrong, but liberalism is a distinct political tradition based on certain values. Paul Starr writes in the Oxford Companion to American Politics : Liberalism stands for a belief in the equal right to freedom and dignity, advanced by a government of constitutionally restrained powers. In different historical contexts, liberals have varied in their understanding of that ideal and the policies needed to achieve a free and prosperous society and secure world.

Author Edmund Fawcett is more concise defining liberalism as a belief in constitutional government and rule of law; hostility to concentrated power and authority; faith in progress; respect for individual rights; and tolerance. I am a liberal because I believe in it's values.

Individual freedom core value of Liberalism. Think about it as noninterference - being left alone. You can do what you want. The only legitimate exercise of government authority is to keep individuals from harming or imposing on each other. This is the basis for freedom of speech, thought, expression, religion, and privacy. It also protects your property from the government. In America these freedoms are enshrined in the Bill of Rights which are the first ten amendments to the Constitution. However noninterference isn't enough. Individuals must be able to choose and follow their own goals. We can't talk about responsibility or initiative in any meaningful sense without choice or making your own way in society. Each person must choose an occupation, where to live, their friends, and intimate relations. People make life plans and strive to accomplish all kinds of things based on their own thoughts, desires, and efforts. Oftentimes the state, social barriers, or other people deprive individuals of choice and hinder their goals. How does this happen ? Discrimination based on race, gender, religion, sexual orientation, or national origin undermines individual freedom. Poverty, hunger, home- lessness, unemployment, and the lack of affordable healthcare deprive people of all kinds of choices. This makes personal goals un- attainable too. Noninterference is often called negative freedom. The ability to choose and
pursue your own goals is called positive freedom. Individuals need both.

In Liberalism individual freedom is upheld by limited government, equality, tolerance, and pluralism.

Limited government means the state is constrained. There are things it cannot do and they are spelled out in a written constitution. Liberals oppose a government with too much power that acts arbitrarily. Such a state denies negative and positive freedoms. Imagine a government that imprisons critics, censors speech, or ideas. That government will restrict press freedom. If it owns the means of production, trade, and commerce it can mismanage the economy making life miserable for it's citizens. Moreover nobody would oppose that government because their livelihood depends on it. Limited government prevents this from happening. This is the liberal effort to control power. No government, faction, or interest group can be too powerful if power is diffused. This checks people's efforts. In America limited government depends on the separation of powers among it's executive, legislative, and judicial branches. Through a system of checks and balances neither branch is too powerful. Conservatives and liberals disagree about what constitutes limited government. Conservatives think the welfare state, progressive income taxes, and regulated markets are inconsistent with limited government. Liberals support these things while seeking to protect civil liberties, privacy, and personal freedom from government interference. It must also be pointed out that while liberals have supported a larger administrative state they work to keep it transparent and responsive. This is done through freedom of information, open records, public hearings, inspectors general, enabling, and protecting whistle blowers.

Equality is one of the most difficult yet essential parts of Liberalism. People want to be free, but they do not want the same thing for others. Liberals believe every individual has the same right to freedom. They must be equal before the law, have a voice in government, and a chance to make the most of their lives. To Liberals each person has worth and dignity so their rights and wellbeing matter. Equal protection shields them from state or private abuse. For all these reasons Liberalism gradually embraced democracy and universal suffrage. Furthermore straight, white, male, Liberals became more supportive of rights for blacks, women, and LGBT people. Liberal equality doesn't mean everyone will have the same wealth, income, prestige, or level of success. But everyone should have the same opportunity unhindered by class, race, or gender. Moreover economic inequalities should never be so great that most people struggle to survive on the verge of destitution while a few are extremely rich. Lastly liberal equality assures each citizen a voice in their government which means the monied can't dominate government officials or policy making. Without equality some individuals are free and others are not. Liberals rightly oppose this.

Tolerance is a widely misunderstood and controversial concept. Many on the Left define it as affirmation without value judgement. Those on the Right claim it is permissive undermining morality, values, and community. Yet tolerance is essential to a free society. It means putting up with someone or something we strongly oppose. Tolerance allows us to argue and disagree while respecting each other's lives and freedom. It is not avoidance or conflict resolution. It is the direct opposite of these things. We may never resolve our differences or deep disagreements; so we must live and govern ourselves together without tyranny or violent strife. All this leads to pluralism which is the coexistence of many different people, values, and lifestyles in one society.

This is the reality of a modern world connected by technology, a global economy, and immigration.
Liberalism doesn't strive to impose an ideal way of life. It enables different, conflicting, competing values, and thoughts to exist together.

The same thing is true in politics. Liberals want to win elections and gain political power to advance their agenda. But Liberals don't want to abolish or repress their opponents. That would betray everything Liberalism stands for. Liberals realize in a truly free political realm where reasonable people debate in fair elections they must lose sometimes. Then they adapt and make better arguments. They offer better policies the next time. For liberal pluralists the clash of political interests and views where power is checked drives the democratic process. It forces people to find political solutions they can all live with. Like limited government and equality individual freedom is not possible without tolerance leading to pluralism.

None of this is abstract to me. Liberalism informs how I think about the political economy, social equality, identity politics, and wokeness.

Our economy doesn't work well for ordinary people whether they are paid hourly or they're salaried. It's increasingly difficult to make ends meet and a health crisis can lead to financial ruin even when you have health insurance. Not to mention its hard for millions of seniors to live adequately. I personally don't know anybody who can afford to live on either their Social Security or 401K alone. Most people need both. We're working smarter and being productive yet almost all the money and wealth are going to a few people at the top. At the same time the largest corporations are getting bigger and bigger making markets less competitive which hurts consumers and makes the rich more powerful than everybody else. You can't ensure individual freedom or the material well-being on which it depends under these circumstances. I'm not against wealthy people. I don't think we can or should eliminate wealth/ income inequality. But if we are going to have a free and prosperous society for every individual we will have to be more equal. Some corporations will have to be broken up, and the political power of monied interests will have be greatly reduced to ensure political freedom and real democracy.

Nobody is free as an individual if they are unjustly treated as part of a marginalized group. Think about black people punished more harshly by the criminal justice system than whites for the same crime or dying in disproportionate numbers during the Covid pandemic because they lack adequate healthcare. Consider Women in the workplace paid less than a man for the same while often facing sexual harassment and abuse. Imagine how difficult that is for Single parent mother in a lower paying job. While Gay and Lesbian people can get married they lack basic Civil Rights protections in housing, employment, and public accommodations in most states and at the Federal level. For Transgender people it's even more bleak. They are more likely to be homeless, unemployed, suffer from anxiety, depression, suicide, and violent hate crimes. There struggles and demands for justice run to heart of Liberal Ideals about individual freedom and the equal right to it.

Right now too many Liberals and Leftists think we have to choose one over the other for ideological reasons and political expediency. This is a huge mistake. If we focus solely on the economy or class the only people who will benefit are straight white cisgendered men. Does this mean for example that blacks or women don't have the same material concerns as working class white men? Absolutely not. But some people bear the added burden of race, gender, sexual orientation, and gender identity.

Ultimately we must press for an economy that benefits working people as much as the rich or big business while also ensuring no one is denied or excluded based on race, gender, sexual orientation, or gender identity.

Some will read all of this and think of the Democratic Party. For some it will be a reason for hope and commitment to work. Others will see Liberalism as the problem. They will think negatively about Liberals as extremists whose.politics and policies are illegitimate and impractical. Both views are wrong because Liberalism and the Democratic Party aren't synonymous. The party is big tent with various groups, and I'm firmly convinced it's dominated by Centrist or Moderates. There are things Liberals must do to be relevant and effective regardless of what Democrats do. However a more relevant and effective Liberalism could have a positive effect on Democrats that would change our politics and our country for the better.

Whatever Democrats do history has shown what a reformist Liberal politics has done to make America more free and prosperous for all. From the New Deal in the 1930s through The Great Society of the 1960s and beyond. So much of what makes America livable from the forty hour work week and overtime pay to Social Security and Medicare are Liberal policy achievements. More is necessary and possible of Liberals will take a stand.
 
Thus, if you believe that the problems inner cities are due to government safetynet programs,
They are when there is not a sunshine date for able bodied citizens benefiting from those safety net programs.
you have believe there is something special about Black people that makes them negatively impacted by those programs in a way that white people are not.
You are the one bringing up race. If all you can do is project, I don't need to read any further.
 
The conservative formula of “I’ve got mine, you get yours” is inherently unsustainable. Human beings have a life span. There is only so much that is avaialbe to “get” via non combative means so that would mean that those who “have their” will be the only ones who “have” anything. As they die out...what happens? Logically the argument then becomes the lineage of the “haves” will become the new owners. Humans aint logical though...forgive the syntax.

This is conservatism...

  1. You have a factory that makes cars.
  2. The “haves" work there. And the factory makes cars that they sell to other “haves”.
  3. At some point the market becomes saturated and there are no more buyers. What happens then?
  4. The factory closes.
That is your red state model. This is why the South is still pretty much a barren wasteland (compared to the North) when it comes to economics. The notable exceptions are Florida and Texas because of globaliztion (aka ports) but they are too dumb to realize the thing they hate the most in the world is the thing that enriches them.

Here is liberalism.
  1. When you expand the base of “haves”...you end up selling more cars (and TVs, toasters, toothbrushes, mascara, houses, paper clips, lamps etc...) and the “haves” who work there keep their jobs. There is ineqalities involved in wealth distrubition but that is the bargain we make as a society.
What America failed at was when we no longer stressed ethics in business and decided that price was the only thing that matters when purchasing products. So now the factories are located worldwide because we support the low cost alternatives. And no...tariffs won’t bring back the jobs or lower your costs. If that were the case, the American made products would be much cheaper than the imported models after 4-8 years of tarrifed imports. What has happened was that when the price of the Chinese widget was jacked up by tariffs, the American manufacturer just raised their price too to rake in more profits. And it’s worked. The Dow is at 40,000.
 
I am not trying to make it a black or white thing. There are poor rural communities with intitutional poverty as well, however it's the inner cities that it's most obvious.

Doing enough requires a hand up rather then a permanent handout. There needs to be a level of tough love. Able bodied adults should have a sunshine date on their welfare entitlements just like ricipients of unemployment compensation. There are far too many families that have subsisted entirely on welfare entitlements for generations. Some states do emply what''s called a workfare program where you have to work for your benefits. In addition some of the yuppie businesses like Starbucks, who claim to want to have a race conversation, should put their money where there mouth is and open franchises in the inner cities and hire locally like McDonalds and Burger King do.

The difficulty with private charities and goverment programs is you need to know when they change from support to entitlement,
 
Okay.

Only I don't believe you.
What you believe or do not believe is up to you. I don't really care. Rather then going to a cheap woke gym like Planet Fitness, I go to a gym connected to a hospital system that is located in the inner city, which is also the only gym in my area with an indoor running/walking track. I go there three times a week. I just avoid the area after dark.
 
What you believe or do not believe is up to you. I don't really care. Rather then going to a cheap woke gym like Planet Fitness, I go to a gym connected to a hospital system that is located in the inner city, which is also the only gym in my area with an indoor running/walking track. I go there three times a week. I just avoid the area after dark.
Oh, so you do the Karen thing. Zip in, zip out, and then say you have knowledge of the area.
 
Oh, so you do the Karen thing. Zip in, zip out, and then say you have knowledge of the area.
I have known the area for 35 years. There are two major hospital systems there and I see an oncologist there every three months. I also did IT work in the area for 33 years. In fact my office headquarters was located in a nearby inner city are. Is that enough or does my time in inner city areas only qualify if I live there????
 
I am not trying to make it a black or white thing. There are poor rural communities with intitutional poverty as well, however it's the inner cities that it's most obvious.

Doing enough requires a hand up rather then a permanent handout. There needs to be a level of tough love. Able bodied adults should have a sunshine date on their welfare entitlements just like ricipients of unemployment compensation. There are far too many families that have subsisted entirely on welfare entitlements for generations. Some states do emply what''s called a workfare program where you have to work for your benefits. In addition some of the yuppie businesses like Starbucks, who claim to want to have a race conversation, should put their money where there mouth is and open franchises in the inner cities and hire locally like McDonalds and Burger King do.
After the Dark Lord deported all the undocumented, there will be a job market for the welfare royalty.
 
Equality is one of the most difficult yet essential parts of Liberalism.

Of all the ideological fluff and idealistic deception that undergirds liberalism, the concept of "equality" is maybe the most harmful.

Ideally everyone wants equality. It would be considered antisocial and crude to lobby for inequality (or, at this point) to even claim that inequality is baked into the cake of culture and civilization and not just the individual. But pragmatically speaking, this is not how civilizations or people operate. Everyone operates as-if resources are finite (which they are) and so the reality is that politics plays out as a knife fight between groups divided by race, class, culture, and nationhood. This remains true in even the most liberal societies. In these societies, the concept of equality and the doctrine of liberalism just becomes another tool to leverage against your political enemy to secure more resources.

I think my chief problem with most liberals is that they're extremely uncritical and refuse to examine what is pragmatic or what is natural in favor of some naïve assumption about human nature and society. For the rubes, realpolitik is considered crude and illiberal and yet those who rule and possess the most power still (rightly) utilize more perennial concepts of realpolitik to secure their resources and political vision.
 
Why are you a liberal ? Some will say they believe in social justice, equality, and compassion. Others are liberal because they support a higher minimum wage, abortion rights, reducing climate change, and affordable universal healthcare. Liberalism is often identified with open mindedness, flexibility, reason, and science too. None of these things are wrong, but liberalism is a distinct political tradition based on certain values. Paul Starr writes in the Oxford Companion to American Politics : Liberalism stands for a belief in the equal right to freedom and dignity, advanced by a government of constitutionally restrained powers. In different historical contexts, liberals have varied in their understanding of that ideal and the policies needed to achieve a free and prosperous society and secure world.

The idea that individual liberty for some can be maximized without infringing on the freedom or safety of others is silly. These are often fundamentally opposed ideals: the more you have of one, the less you will have of the other. Some people think that only if we were smart enough, or pious enough, or spiritual enough, or educated enough, etc, etc... that we would find the right solution to make these two things fit together perfectly. There isn't. Not even conceptually.

This is what the philosopher Isaiah Berlin called "objective pluralism": that many ideals are objectively good, but the reason for our ethical dilemmas as individuals and societies is that they don't fit together very well. Life is like a big puzzle where the parts are not even designed to fit together very well to create the perfect harmonious whole. You just have to painfully compromise and negotiate and juggle between them as best you can- and even though there may not be perfect ways to juggle between them, there are better and worse ways, and reason, judgment, knowledge, etc... still play an important role. Just don't expect perfect. That may not be the answer anyone wants to hear- but just the realization of that can sometimes be therapeutic. And it keeps people from getting too fanatical, or wasting their time too much thinking they are missing the perfect solution somehow. Work on making things better, but don't expect perfection.

"Liberty and equality, spontaneity and security, happiness and knowledge, mercy and justice - all these are ultimate human values, sought for themselves alone; yet when they are incompatible, they cannot all be attained, choices must be made, sometimes tragic losses accepted in the pursuit of some preferred ultimate end."
-Isaiah Berlin

”True pluralism... is much more tough-minded and intellectually bold: it rejects the view that all conflicts of values can be finally resolved by a neat and tidy synthesis, and by which all desirable goals may be reconciled. It recognises that human nature generates values which, though equally sacred, equally ultimate, exclude one another, without there being any possibility of establishing an objective hierarchical relation or resolution among them. Moral conduct may therefore involve making agonising choices, without the help of universal criteria, between frequently irreconcilable, but equally desirable, values.”
-Isaiah Berlin

“If you are truly convinced that there is some solution to all human problems, that one can conceive an ideal society which men can reach if only they do what is necessary to attain it, then you and your followers must believe that no price can be too high to pay in order to open the gates of such a paradise. Only the stupid and malevolent will resist once certain simple truths are put to them. Those who resist must be persuaded; if they cannot be persuaded, laws must be passed to restrain them; if that does not work, then coercion, if need be violence, will inevitably have to be used—if necessary, terror, slaughter.”
― Isaiah Berlin

"If, as I believe, the ends of men are many, and not all of them are in principle compatible with each other, then the possibility of conflict—and of tragedy—can never wholly be eliminated from human life, either personal or social. The necessity of choosing between absolute claims is then an inescapable characteristic of the human condition. This gives its value to freedom as Acton conceived of it—as an end in itself, and not as a temporary need, arising out of our confused notions and irrational and disordered lives, a predicament which a panacea could one day put right."
_Isaiah Berlin
 
Of all the ideological fluff and idealistic deception that undergirds liberalism, the concept of "equality" is maybe the most harmful.

Ideally everyone wants equality. It would be considered antisocial and crude to lobby for inequality (or, at this point) to even claim that inequality is baked into the cake of culture and civilization and not just the individual. But pragmatically speaking, this is not how civilizations or people operate. Everyone operates as-if resources are finite (which they are) and so the reality is that politics plays out as a knife fight between groups divided by race, class, culture, and nationhood. This remains true in even the most liberal societies. In these societies, the concept of equality and the doctrine of liberalism just becomes another tool to leverage against your political enemy to secure more resources.

I think my chief problem with most liberals is that they're extremely uncritical and refuse to examine what is pragmatic or what is natural in favor of some naïve assumption about human nature and society. For the rubes, realpolitik is considered crude and illiberal and yet those who rule and possess the most power still (rightly) utilize more perennial concepts of realpolitik to secure their resources and political vision.

Doesn't mean you cannot guard against the worst excesses of that "knife fight". It can be tempered and mitigated so it's not like the law of the jungle. There are better and worse ways to do it, even if not perfect.

See post #37.
 
Doesn't mean you cannot guard against the worst excesses of that "knife fight". It can be tempered and mitigated so it's not like the law of the jungle. There are better and worse ways to do it, even if not perfect.

See post #37.

I don't think liberalism "tempers" or "mitigates" the knife fight at all, it merely obfuscates it and that is debatably more harmful in the long term.

Most people seem to have a very charitable understanding of history. They seem to forget that the flagship nation for liberalism - America - only secured its recent relative peace with a path of economic and military conquest spanning 250 years where war almost never ceased. Victories in civil rights and pluralism happened not because of some abstract political philosophy (although it was certainly used as the casus belli) but because often civil rights struggles made the most sense to the market and capitalists.

Simply put I think the reality is that liberalism was coopted by merchants and capitalists a long time ago, leaving its ideologues in the 18th century. It's been an extremely useful tool to generate wealth and optimize capital. Pluralism and a stacked bureaucracy ensure that people with the wealth and power to influence can dissipate any resentment from the masses into the multi layered bureaucracy and sports team politics.
 
I don't think liberalism "tempers" or "mitigates" the knife fight at all, it merely obfuscates it and that is debatably more harmful in the long term.

Most people seem to have a very charitable understanding of history. They seem to forget that the flagship nation for liberalism - America - only secured its recent relative peace with a path of economic and military conquest spanning 250 years where war almost never ceased. Victories in civil rights and pluralism happened not because of some abstract political philosophy (although it was certainly used as the casus belli) but because often civil rights struggles made the most sense to the market and capitalists.

Simply put I think the reality is that liberalism was coopted by merchants and capitalists a long time ago, leaving its ideologues in the 18th century. It's been an extremely useful tool to generate wealth and optimize capital. Pluralism and a stacked bureaucracy ensure that people with the wealth and power to influence can dissipate any resentment from the masses into the multi layered bureaucracy and sports team politics.

This story doesn’t jibe with history. The founding ideals of American democracy were articulated before the Industrial Revolution.
 
The idea that individual liberty for some can be maximized without infringing on the freedom or safety of others is silly. These are often fundamentally opposed ideals: the more you have of one, the less you will have of the other. Some people think that only if we were smart enough, or pious enough, or spiritual enough, or educated enough, etc, etc... that we would find the right solution to make these two things fit together perfectly. There isn't. Not even conceptually.

This is what the philosopher Isaiah Berlin called "objective pluralism": that many ideals are objectively good, but the reason for our ethical dilemmas as individuals and societies is that they don't fit together very well. Life is like a big puzzle where the parts are not even designed to fit together very well to create the perfect harmonious whole. You just have to painfully compromise and negotiate and juggle between them as best you can- and even though there may not be perfect ways to juggle between them, there are better and worse ways, and reason, judgment, knowledge, etc... still play an important role. Just don't expect perfect. That may not be the answer anyone wants to hear- but just the realization of that can sometimes be therapeutic. And it keeps people from getting too fanatical, or wasting their time too much thinking they are missing the perfect solution somehow. Work on making things better, but don't expect perfection.

"Liberty and equality, spontaneity and security, happiness and knowledge, mercy and justice - all these are ultimate human values, sought for themselves alone; yet when they are incompatible, they cannot all be attained, choices must be made, sometimes tragic losses accepted in the pursuit of some preferred ultimate end."
-Isaiah Berlin

”True pluralism... is much more tough-minded and intellectually bold: it rejects the view that all conflicts of values can be finally resolved by a neat and tidy synthesis, and by which all desirable goals may be reconciled. It recognises that human nature generates values which, though equally sacred, equally ultimate, exclude one another, without there being any possibility of establishing an objective hierarchical relation or resolution among them. Moral conduct may therefore involve making agonising choices, without the help of universal criteria, between frequently irreconcilable, but equally desirable, values.”
-Isaiah Berlin

“If you are truly convinced that there is some solution to all human problems, that one can conceive an ideal society which men can reach if only they do what is necessary to attain it, then you and your followers must believe that no price can be too high to pay in order to open the gates of such a paradise. Only the stupid and malevolent will resist once certain simple truths are put to them. Those who resist must be persuaded; if they cannot be persuaded, laws must be passed to restrain them; if that does not work, then coercion, if need be violence, will inevitably have to be used—if necessary, terror, slaughter.”
― Isaiah Berlin

"If, as I believe, the ends of men are many, and not all of them are in principle compatible with each other, then the possibility of conflict—and of tragedy—can never wholly be eliminated from human life, either personal or social. The necessity of choosing between absolute claims is then an inescapable characteristic of the human condition. This gives its value to freedom as Acton conceived of it—as an end in itself, and not as a temporary need, arising out of our confused notions and irrational and disordered lives, a predicament which a panacea could one day put right."
_Isaiah Berlin

Thanks for bringing up Isaiah Berlin. There's a lot to learn from him, and disagree with at the same time. He rightly points out the danger to negative freedom posed by government overreach, the demand for final solutions, and the illusion that perfect harmony is possible and desirable.
However Isaiah Berlin is wrong to downplay or dismiss the importance of positive freedom. Think about it people don't want to be interfered with. They want to be left alone because they know what they want. They make choices. They go their own way. If they don't how is Negative freedom possible or meaningful ? Furthermore, if we can separate equality from any of this whose free ? America and Western Europe have limited the scope freedom based on class, race, gender, sexual orientation, and gender identity. It's not always a matter of maximum liberty for one versus the other. It's about freedom for one and bondage for another. How you negotiate any compromise or get anything constructive done depends on power, struggle, and finally politics. Berlin doesn't really consider these things because he was narrowly focused on societies impacted by World War Two and the fight against Fascism, and then the Cold War struggle against Totalitarian Soviet Communism.
 
That is flawed thinking IF in stating: "Liberalism stands for a belief in the equal right to freedom and dignity, advanced by a government of constitutionally restrained powers..." it presumes other forms of political ideology can't have the same values.

I am a fiscal conservative and Left of Center leaning social policy individual. I believe in equal rights for all, freedom and dignity ingrained in the framework of our Constitutional Republic. I believe that government should have restrained powers, and that it should be subject to "We the People".

I am sure most Libertarians feel similarly.
 
It has not been all good. It has created a welfare state in the inner cities that has insitutionalized poverty and has spawned gang violence and drug trade.

Racist housing policies created the inner cities.
 
That is flawed thinking IF in stating: "Liberalism stands for a belief in the equal right to freedom and dignity, advanced by a government of constitutionally restrained powers..." it presumes other forms of political ideology can't have the same values.

I am a fiscal conservative and Left of Center leaning social policy individual. I believe in equal rights for all, freedom and dignity ingrained in the framework of our Constitutional Republic. I believe that government should have restrained powers, and that it should be subject to "We the People".

I am sure most Libertarians feel similarly.

I remember when libertarians supported a woman's right to control her own body.
 
I remember when libertarians supported a woman's right to control her own body.

I can remember when Conservatives supported free enterprise, were against monopolies and cartels, supported; "pay as one goes" economics, entrepreneurialism, innovation and free access to opportunity.

I can remember when Liberals supported First Amendment rights and unions.

Seems things have changed quite a bit on multiple political fronts.

I can't, and I don't, say I like it.
 
I can remember when Conservatives supported free enterprise, were against monopolies and cartels, supported; "pay as one goes" economics, entrepreneurialism, innovation and free access to opportunity.

I can remember when Liberals supported First Amendment rights and unions.

Seems things have changed quite a bit on multiple political fronts.

I can't, and I don't, say I like it.
Liberals still support first ammendment rights and unions.
 
Liberals still support first ammendment rights and unions.


Really. I just had my very liberal cousin ask me to sign a petition to have a Columbia University professor fired for his pro-Palestinian stance.

I agree with her whole heartedly in her support for Israel but I am not signing a petition to have someone fired for expressing of their political views. That is one slippery slope I have no desire to slide on.
 
That is flawed thinking IF in stating: "Liberalism stands for a belief in the equal right to freedom and dignity, advanced by a government of constitutionally restrained powers..." it presumes other forms of political ideology can't have the same values.

I am a fiscal conservative and Left of Center leaning social policy individual. I believe in equal rights for all, freedom and dignity ingrained in the framework of our Constitutional Republic. I believe that government should have restrained powers, and that it should be subject to "We the People".

I am sure most Libertarians feel similarly.

You can support Liberalism and Democracy and believe in other political traditions. But what separates Liberals from other political ideas is that Liberalism puts individual freedom (Liberty) at it's center. Conservatives and Socialists don't. Moderates do not approach politics in the same particular way Liberals do either. As for your point about Libertarians they along with Classical and Modern Liberals are all part of the same family.
 

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