Democrats & Liberals: Archives

Good article, Stephen

One suggestion (and I do mean this as a friend, since I respect your opinion) could you make it a bit shorter? My attention span comes from watching sitcoms in the 1960s. Beyond that, I blog between tasks, so my windows of opportunity open and close in about five minutes. Something about 400-500 words is about as much as I can take, especially because you tackle some intellectual questions.

Now my short comment. I fear more that the GOP has gotten too big and diverse, not too tight. As it has become the majority party, it has – like the Dems before – come to embrace a wide variety of disparate groups with sometimes conflicting agendas. It has become easier to attack Republicans because you can pick off one of the groups. For example, I am an economic liberal (original meaning) who believes in a strong defense. Abortion concerns me very little, either for or against, and I support same sex marriage. Yet in the interests of my allies, I am stuck with their positions too. What we agree on is the need to rein in activist judges, but for very different reasons, On the other hand, the values people are probably uncomfortable with my more or less religious faith in the efficacy of the free market.

Stephen,

This sounds alot like “reframe the message” to sell an idea to the voteing public that have rejected that ajenda everytime it has been put into understandable terms to the general public.

Jack said:

I fear more that the GOP has gotten too big and diverse, not too tight.

I think the GOP has managed to do both at the same time, actually. They’ve expanded the “tent” to collect more voters (specifically around defense), but at the same time have given the party reigns to a tight-knit, close-minded set of extremists.

Unless they can keep the public’s eye on the War on Terror (by invading Iran, maybe?), this arrangement can’t last. The moderates will either abandon the party or overwhelm it.

Jack-
I do my best, but here I felt I needed the length to go into the details of it.

I think any party of great size in a society as complex as ours is going to be a coalition of both regional and philosophical interests. It’s unavoidable. There is, of course, the impulse to conform these different elements together into a more cohesive party. But we’re not dealing with a simple system, that a few masters can control arbitrarily.

The trouble is that the Republicans base their notion of politics on a very oversimplified corruption of Darwin’s theory of evolution, speaking of survival of the fittest without due regard to the human capacity for choice, or nature’s complexity and denseness of interconnection.

They fail to realize that it is possible for a creature to be so aggressive its pursuit of its interests, that it consumes its way into starvation. They fail to see that equilibrium can be a source of strength and endurance.

Beagle-
If it does, you didn’t read closely enough. I was saying, we need to change as dynamically as our message. And besides, your message has not been as universally accepted as you would like to boast it is. There are a great number of people disagreeing with you too. I am simply saying that my party should not simply rest on the laurels of a party core, but instead branch out to those whose interests are somewhat aligned as well.

“We’ve got to create a movement, and bring along as many folks as we can.”

Isn’t this basically what the Reps did to get to where they are now?

Very nice piece SD. It will be interesting to see the reactions of your fellow party members on here. I know when a few of us even mentioned that maybe the Dems should come back towards the center, we were told we were crazy.

It’s also the movements of moderates towards us as well. That’s how the Republicans won. We can’t win just by becoming more right-wing. We Democrats must win by being better advocates of liberalism, as well as being able to accept the alliance of those more rightwardly oriented.

Clinton already took us closer to the center. Now we got to expand to either side of our party mainstream.

Stephen,

I can agree with what you say politically, but in politics it boils down to issues.
Hidden ajenda and hidden motives don’t sell very well. As much as some would like to call voters stupid if they don’t agree with the ajenda, It really comes down to; they DO understand, and don’t care for that, and vote accordingly.

Stephen~
That was one of the most compelling things I’ve read on watchblog yet(and to think you wrote it):)! I may not agree with every line but I will say that the structure of the plan is a good one, convince enough lefties of those same ideas and we’ll have a great run in 2008!!

Yeah, ask Al Gore.

Stephen,

Your article is quite interesting albeit lengthy.

I am curious as to how you would go about “creating a movement and bringing along as many folks as we can”.

Obviously information can be transmitted through a variety of media. You ultimately have to know if your message is getting through (physically and mentally). The part that interests me is how you actually get people believing your message and supporting the movement. Do you simply register and join the club, do you commit to participation in various activities, etc. How do you know when you have enough support (people actually standing with you) to take the next step.

Nicely written article.

Honestly, I don’t think the Left has ever had a problem with their message(s) — generally they’ve been good and decent ones and have always been very inclusive.

I think the greatest problem has come from the fact that the Right has a media machine at their disposal and the Left doesn’t. The Right has also not been shy about showing a great deal of distain for the Left, or of telling outright lies about us when it suits them. This is what people have been seeing for quite a few years now, and obviously, it’s been working very well for them.
The Left, on the other hand has yet dealt with this issue, and because of it, are still facing an uphill battle just to get their messages across — as well as be able to quickly counteract the lies that are being told, with the truth.

In spite of all that though, I do think that many people are beginning to wake up to how bad things have gotten under our current leadership and of how harshly controlling they’ve become (or further wish to become). And I believe that what we’ve just seen happen in the Senate may well be an indicator that moderates on the Right are perfectly aware of the present change in attitude that is slowly taking place among their constituents. IMO, they wouldn’t be breaking the lockstep of their opinions now if they didn’t feel it was going to benefit them.
Only time will tell whether this will translate into more votes for the Left, or perhaps, more votes which support the moderates on the Right — but regardless of that, the Left still needs to acknowledge that they must do a lot more work building a media situation where they get to discuss their platform, and counteract all the negative spin that’s being aimed at them.

P.S. I won’t be able to answer any reply to this post because I’m off on a trip for the next week and a half, so until we meet again, happy posting to all — Left, Right and Center!

It’s a bummer your taking off Adrienne!

It is so very frustrating to me (from your comments above), that you honestly believe that the left NEVER lies, never does a dishonorable thing, and are all around better people than the right! For a party that claims it is their civic duty to question and be constantly on their toes when it comes to politics, you obviously don’t apply this to your own party! You then continue on about how bad this leadership is which proves my point. A truly compassionate person does not have to strike back at their so called attackers.

“Inclusive” I guess is in the eye of the beholder…..although I will admit yours are the more “PC” poor,minorities,non-citizens etc.! But I think the corporations and “Religious nuts” as you call them would feel differently.

For anyone who shall respond to this please understand that I am not trying to tilt this to the right either(If it comes off like that my appologies). I would just never dream of thinking that one WHOLE party over another bears any superiority!

As far as the media is concerned….neither side will ever agree on that!

Is there one person on the left willing to at least restore my view on this and be willing to say “I at least get the gist of your frustraion on this one tiny thing?”

Traci

I agree that both parties have their faults, and act partisan (they are parties, after all). As far as the media, the right has made concerted efforts over the last 30 years to create new media outlets it controls in order to advance its agenda. It justifies this because of its perception that the mainstream media had a liberal bias. Why? Because it presented the news in a way that did not acknowledge its ideological interpretation of events. This is not because there was a concerted effort by the left to gain control of media outlets or to create its own, but because the mainstream media were, by definition, centrist. To someone on the right, it sure looked like leftism. To me, during the same period (I was pretty lefty then), it looked like establishmentarianism, but there you go. And remember, this was the same media that took down Lyndon Johnson and Bill Clinton.

The unfortunate upshot of the right’s protracted efforts is that righties now watch righty TV, read righty newpapers and magazines, and read righty blogs (WatchBlog being the noble exception) and discredit any other sources. Their assumptions are no longer challenged in any meaningful ways, although there is some quibbling around the edges. As the clients for this media grew in number, America no longer has the common cultural focus it once had for most of the second half of the 20th century. It is analogous to the evangelical fundamentalists establishing their own media and thereby creating and reinforcing their view of America as a sin-ridden Gomorrah that needs a born-again president to bring her back to the Lord. All else is godless and secular and by definition suspect. As the message resonates around these chambers, it takes on an indisputable quality. Karl Rove’s genius was finally and firmly linking the two echo chambers to finally gain a majority for Bush at the polls.

The question is, will we ever have that common vision again, so that we can start with the same facts and argue about what to do with them? Right now, we don’t even agree on the facts. There are highly vigilant, systematic operations that purposely try to muddy facts and energetically spin perception on both sides. It has always been this way. But when the media no longer care about the facts, then the arguments become hopeless, based as they are on differing grounds.

I’m afraid our politics are doomed to become less enlightened and informed. We all have to learn to live with that.

Traci, I just reviewed Adrienne’s comments and I don’t see where she said what you think she said:

It is so very frustrating to me (from your comments above), that you honestly believe that the left NEVER lies, never does a dishonorable thing, and are all around better people than the right!

I think Adrienne would agree that Democratic Politicians have demonstrated the same human foibles in their attempt to have their way fulfilled as those on the right. But, I can’t speak for Adrienne.

For myself, I think politicians are politicians. That means they will push the ethical and legal envelope as far as they feel they need to to get their way. Corruption has existed in Democratic ranks as it has in Republican ranks. One only need to follow the DeLay ethics controversy to realize that neither side is clean on this wholesale bribery of politicians.

The major difference I see between the two parties is not the angelic natures of their members. It is their philosophy in implementation. Both sides believe their philosophy will be the best for America in the long run. But, in practical application, their are some real demonstrable historical differences.

The Right has a greater belief in military might as a positive influence in making the world safer for Americans here at home. The Left has a greater belief in military might as a last option for making the world safer.

The Right believes that laws which benefit just a few and the elite, will have spillover positive effects on everyone else (trickle down theory). The left believes that laws should insure that the fewest possible number of citizens fall through the cracks of best intentions economically.

The Right tends toward blending religion and government and law viewing just law as based on religious precepts. The Left tends toward ethics being fairly obvious on the basis of what is good for one should not be bad for others, and does not require a specific religious pretext to see what is ethical or right.

The Right tends toward the disconnect between society and those who are most blessed financially; relegating their success to personal attributes. The left tends to view financial success in terms of the combination of social and national conditions which fostered and supported an individual’s opportunities to succeed. This is a crucial difference since under Right’s view, those who are successful own little to nothing back to the society in which their success was grown. Under the Left’s view, those who are blessed with success have an obligation commensurate with their success to give back to the society that spent so much in blood, taxes, and sacrifice to create that society in the first place.

There have been Dem. liars and crooks, and Rep. liars and crooks. All people have weaknesses which under the right conditions will become self-evident in their behavior. But, there are some substantial differences in the philosophies of the Left and Right which, while not clearly understood and enunciated by most voting constituents on either side, are nonetheless grasped by many of those constituents to varying degrees.

That at least is what I think Adrienne was alluding to by her comments according to my reading of it and understanding of the differences between the two major camps.

Mental Wimp-
I wrote in particular about that sealed off aspect of GOP politics, but I think you nailed something I didn’t - the fusion of the two networks of closed in worldviews. But I’d have to add that it started with Reagan and only reached its most closed in apotheosis with Bush.

But I’d also have to disagree with you on your point of having to live with it. As a matter of fact, part of my point in my essay that we should take advantage of their rigid enclosement. One of the big topics of the book that I based this article on was groupthink, the tendency for a consensus to grow and for the members of the group to punish those who deviate from it.

Now is the time for us to change this, to push back against it for the following reasons:

1)It’s having an adverse effect on foreign and domestic policy. The political groupthink is compounding other kinds, getting us stuck in Iraq, and stuck with an irresponsible wartime fiscal policy, among other things.

2)The Republican party is experiencing the fallout from that and other groupthink driven fragmentation and infighting, so now is the time to pose ourselves as an alternative if we want to set the agenda in this country.

3)We need to break ourselves of groupthink, and free liberalism to become a force for growth and progress in American society rather than a fossilized ideology kept by a narrow priesthood of true believers.

and

4)American needs a new political paradigm built on dialogue rather than conflict between those on the right and the left. The divisions need to be healed. The culture war is sapping the energies we need to deal with the real problems, and we must rid ourselves of its darkly drawn bright lines of belief.

We cannot afford to get use to the notion of our political forums being this debased. We should not. Liberalism and progressivism are simply dusty fossils of philosophy if they are not supported by the hope that we can learn better, and do better if we put our minds to it.

Beagle-
These are the crucial paragraphs that answer your question:

We should not lie to do this. We should take the truth as our basis for operation and bend it as little as possible. In dealing with weak ties, where trust is not absolute, we should take care not to encourage people to back off from their tenuous connection. Spin is high effort, high cost, and quick way to lose people’s faith.

We should also respect our audience, treat them like they’re smart, moral, adult human beings. This is critical, because people in this country do not like to act from a position of being intimidated. We must make their choice to go along with us their choice.

I don’t know how much plainer I can make it than that. This is at heart a plan that works from the premise of openness. This isn’t about gaining supremacy through brute force, but rather gaining it through greater identification with the values of the party.

At it’s heart, we are meant to have a dynamic here. Perhaps, as you say, people are rejecting our agenda now. That is not set in stone, though, and the exercise of persuasion, coupled with a change in political strategy, may ultimately reverse the situation. People’s minds can be changed.

Steve Smith-
Our strategy, if we’re going by Small World theory, would be to put into play thinktanks of our own, to make compelling commentary alongside the folks the Republicans put out.

In describing the Conservative Media Network, it is fair to call it an aristocratic small world network. This is not a class warfare comment, but rather a description of a small world network where many of the connections run through some rather well connected nodes, rather than being more distributed. This is the famed talking points network, where the Talk Radio and FOXnews folks get their positions to play off of. I think Democrats should get going not imitating their pattern of activity, but rather by exploiting the liabilities of such a system.

An example in the book was the interactions of proteins in a Yeast cellIn mapping the interactions between proteins in a Yeast cell, they found there were some that had few connections between them, and others that had enormous numbers of connections running through them. when the network lost a few of the low connection nodes, the system stood up rather robustly to the abuse. But take out the most connected ones, and the result was death for the cell, two out of three times.

We have to throw the strongest of the Republican talking points sources off balance to do this. If we successfully counter these strongly connected nodes, there will be a point where the balance of stability shifts. If we Democrats play our cards right, it could shift our way.

Excellent article Stephen, and an excellent post David.

It really does look like the problem is getting the message out. That’s the whole point of setting up a network. Dean seems to be doing a pretty good job setting up nodes in every county in every state. I also like the way he’s talking about liberal issues. Let’s hope his network can drown out the Republican noise machine and allow Democrats to define themselves.

We should allow pro-life Democrats more prominent roles, while making our policy more friendly to alternatives to abortion.

We need to be better at getting the message out to Democrats too. It sounds like you’re unaware that Harry Reid, our Senate leader - the highest role for our party in this administration - is pro-life. It doesn’t get any more prominent than that.

Abortion is bad. The Democratic agenda on abortion is to make abortion unnecessary.

The problem isn’t that you aren’t getting your message out. Your message is loud and clear. The problem for you is that people are rejecting your message.

Umm… Nope.

“We Democrats must win by being better advocates of liberalism, as well as being able to accept the alliance of those more rightwardly oriented”

Lose the LIBERALISM and become Democrats again and watch the millions more votes you would get.

Well said TOMD.
The Democrats see and know it but the liberals in control ignore it.

David~
Thank you for the reply.
Now, the way you made comparisons (whether I agreed with them or not)was quite different from Adriennes comments!
I have read and re-read her post several times and still feel the same way, maybe the next time you read it you should switch all the comments about the right with left terminology and maybe then you will see!
Maybe she didn’t mean to one sidedly blast the opposition. But generally I don’t tend to blast someone for something I also am guilty of! In an instance where I find myself doing such, I at least try to explain my reasoning for which I believe the ideas or such are different!

Anyways….thanks for at least responding without attacking!

Stephen

Thanks for your follow-up. I agree with you on the effects of the phenomenon I addressed. The only hope I see to address those ills is that your small-world theory is close enough to reality to be useful (helpful quote from G.E.P. Box: “All models are wrong, some are useful.”). Shaving off the thoughtful ones through understanding their underlying motivations could eventually restart the dialog. Perhaps abortion is the right place to start: “let’s approve OTC plan B, because it will prevent abortions.” The danger to the closed networks is novel, synthetic (as in stemming from synthesizing disparate ideas) thinking. As you note, this cuts both ways; it will shake progressives out of their doldrums as well.

David

You encapsulate the differences between the left and the right very well. I appreciate your clarity.

kctim

Liberalism is what this country was founded on, not reactionary thinking. It is the RWEC (right wing echo chamber) that has striven to turn it into a dirty word.

kctim,
This country was not founded on liberalism. This country was founded Freedom…The freedom to practice our own form of religion without persecution.

David R. Remer:

“There have been Dem. liars and crooks, and Rep. liars and crooks. All people have weaknesses which under the right conditions will become self-evident in their behavior. But, there are some substantial differences in the philosophies of the Left and Right which, while not clearly understood and enunciated by most voting constituents on either side, are nonetheless grasped by many of those constituents to varying degrees.”

If more people from both sides understood this very principle, we would be progressed beyond our dreams right now. I think most people have a pretty good feel for the messages from both parties from their persepective. Everyone has a different persepective as a result of environment and upbringing. I have great respect for anyone who at least has the courage of their convictions regardless of how distorted I think the message may be.

tomd

Yes, that is one of the extremely liberal ideas on which the founding fathers based their new form of government.

I don’t consider freedom to be liberal.

Reports of our rejection have been greatly exaggerated!

Sure, we don’t win every battle or hold any majorities, but our values are more strongly a part of American politics than ever. First, Bush’s win was no landslide. It was One state by 100,000 votes, and a popular vote margin of only two percent. Almost half the country voted to put a Massachussetts Liberal in office.

I think if you really take a look at American values, you’ll see much more liberal values here than thirty years ago. On race, women’s liberation, the content on television, how people dress, what kind of music gets played (even in Christian circles!).

Just take a look at this site, and seen in how many places liberal positions win out over conservative. The influence of liberalism has become so pervasive its hard to escape it. Only on a few issues do Americans take the GOP line.

Additionally, Americans are not satisfied with current Republican governance. An NBC/WSJ Right Track/Wrong Track Poll Shows that 52% of this country believes the nations going in the wrong direction, as compared to 35% who believe we’re on the Right Track. It gets no better when you look at this CBS News poll concerning Bush’s priorities. Almost two thirds of this country believes Bush doesn’t share their priorities.

On the issues that matter to people now, such as Stem Cell Research, Bush’s handling of Social Security, The filibuster issue, abortion and Iraq most people believe Bush is out to lunch.

I think it’s hubris to believe that Republican power here stems from a wholesale rejection of liberalism, because obviously Americans are taking the liberal side on many issues.

I don’t consider freedom to be liberal.

TomD-
What else is liberalism than a political system based on free thinking and free living? It’s what most of America practices: free-thinking. We don’t let authorities and leaders tell us what to think or do, we decide for ourselves.

Free thinking and free living?…Is it a liberal idea to limit the type and number of guns we can have? Is it a liberal idea to stop my kids from praying in school, Is it a liberal idea to keep me from knowing if my daughter has an abortion? Is it a liberal idea to tell me I can’t build a house on my property because a kangaroo rat lives there? Need I go on? I see all of these and more liberal ideas as taking away my freedoms.

tomd
“kctim,
This country was not founded on liberalism. This country was founded Freedom…The freedom to practice our own form of religion without persecution.”

I’m sure you got me and mental mixed up on this. LOL!!!

SD
“I think if you really take a look at American values, you’ll see much more liberal values here than thirty years ago.”

Not in “red” areas.
Saying the liberal agenda is what everybody wants is alot different than how the majority voted.
As long as Democrats are associated with liberalism, most of us in the middle will never vote for them.

“obviously Americans are taking the liberal side on many issues”

They are taking the Republican side on many issues also or they wouldn’t control all 3.

I wasn’t trying to derail your great topic.
I was simply pointing out that many moderates refuse to vote for somebody if they are liberal, even if they normally vote for a Democrat.
You can blame the media for making liberal a dirty word. I’m not quit sure how, but you could if it makes you feel better. And you can also say Americans are liberal if you want to believe that.
The FACT is that the majority of Americans are moderates.

“We don’t let authorities and leaders tell us what to think or do, we decide for ourselves.

You are kidding right? Liberals want us to decide for ourselves as long as it agrees with the liberal way of thinking.
From spanking our own children to smoking to seatbelts to gun ownership to praying to etc… the govt and special interest groups dictate how we must behave.

Decide for ourselves?
Not in the real world.

kctim,

Yes I did…Please accept my apology

kctim-
Not in Red Areas? Check the Fox line-up. Check out what gets put out on the red-state oriented Spike TV. Take a ride around my area: largest per capita distribution of both strip clubs and megachurches. The notion that some part of liberalism hasn’t soaked into the red-states is not supportable on the facts. Your average Republican is not that much more of a prude than your average Democrat. In fact, the reputation for uptightness about such things seems to be going more in our direction.

I’m not telling you that Liberalism is in control. But the polling data I posted indicates one thing isn’t true: the current liberal agenda, as presented is not being rejected. The war is unpopular with most Americans, Americans don’t trust Bush on Social security, nor do most share his sensibilities on Terri Schiavo, Abortion, or Embryonic Stem Cell research. Americans believe, by an large that Bush’s Priorities are not theirs, and that this country is headed in the wrong direction, both by about two thirds. The Republicans may be in power, but they’re priorities are not necessarily that of the average voters, and their direction in governing this country is not that which most Americans want.

These Moderates you talk about are people with combinations of Liberal and Conservative beliefs. To paraphrase Tommy Lee Jones from The Missing, the strain of philosophies that win are that which the moderates feed the most. My point would be that the Republicans are doing a good job of encouraging the moderates to move leftward. My advice to my party is to spread out the party’s interests and encourage the moderates to meet us halfway.

As for free-thinking, there’s a term that is almost a paradox in and of itself. Free-thinking isn’t the encouragement of every point of view, but rather the will to depart from established ones, and in the context of my party it is tied to the Utilitarian tradition of thought- The greatest good for the greatest number of people.

There are certain freedoms that are not granted, for the good of our society. The freedom to endanger oneself and one’s passengers in a motor vehicle is one such right typically denied us. The freedom to pollute the air with cigarette smoke in enclosed spaces like restaurants and other buildings is another freedom denied.

In other cases, certain restrictions are applied to those in power, to ensure that other freedoms are not sacrificed. A student should be able to gain a public education without having their public officials oversee their spiritual formation, regardless of the wishes of the parents.

As for Special interests, I believe all the “free-thinking” that you say resists the dictates of special interests, are themselves the subjects of some pretty powerful interests. From the Christian Coalition, to the NRA, to the Detroit automakers, to Big Tobaccos, these were not undefended issues, nor ones raised on public outcry. A great deal of your free thinking seems to be special interests driven itself.

In the real world we do have the chance to decide for ourselves, so long as we don’t let others make that decision for us in terms of their interests alone. It’s fine if their interests coincide with ours, but if the sides of the debate just shape up to be public interests versus private everytime, just accepting the company line, like the GOP notoriously does, will not suffice.

Neither should the Democrats be falling into that trap. It shouldn’t be industry that decides these things, but the facts at their most reliable, with the least conflict of interest inherent in the reporting. We don’t need the foxes guarding the henhouse, the corporations deciding what rules they will follow or disregard. The government should be a third party able to discern and determine things as representatives of the public’s interest.

As I thought Stephen,
We can have all the freedom we want as long as it coincides with your beliefs.
I won’t accept that and will fight that notion till I die.
And with that response, I’m going to bed
Good night all and GOD BLESS AMERICA.

We can have all the freedom we want as long as it coincides with your beliefs.

You guys need to make up your minds. Are liberals equivocating and relativist? Or draconian and tyrannical. We’re a big tent, but not that big. :)

Every new idea in history was met with some form of criticism when first introduced. Where would we be if the Caveman who invented the wheel, had listened to his critics and given up? Think about that!! No, SUV’s Why not you ask? Well for one thing, we wouldn’t have wheels for it, and so on. I am sure you can get my ideas.

THIS IS NOT AN ATTACK ON ANYONE

“kctim,
This country was not founded on liberalism. This country was founded Freedom…The freedom to practice our own form of religion without persecution.”

Well, I have a problem with this entire statement because of the following…A) Was founding your own country, from where there was none not sound like a liberal thing to do? B) Did you miss the entire section in H.S. history about the Salem Witch Trials? Doesn’t sound very open to me or am I missing the point?

tomd
Free thinking and free living?… a liberal idea to stop my kids from praying in school, Is it a liberal idea to keep me from knowing if my daughter has an abortion? Is it a liberal idea to tell me I can’t build a house on my property because a kangaroo rat lives there? Need I go on? I see all of these and more liberal ideas as taking away my freedoms.

A liberal idea to stop my kids from praying in school? Now there is a simple enough question in and of itself? Your childs teacher does not share your beliefs, What do we do then? If you say that little johnie doesn’t have to say the prayer you have just put a label on him…oh, he’s different from the rest of us. Children can be the cruelest people on the planet. Just, give them a reason.

I realize that this is a touchy issue with many people. IT IS NOT MY INTENTION TO OFFEND ANYONE WITH MY COMMENTS. I APOLOGIZE BEFOREHAND

Is it a liberal idea to keep me from knowing if my daughter has had an abortion?
Why do you need to know now, you obviously were not interested before hand. What will you do? Raise the child for her? Teach your children about Birth Control and how to use it. Maturing, what it does to the body, both males and females. Then we won’t need to have this arguement/discussion.

Is it a liberal idea to tell me I can’t build a house on my property because a kangaroo rat lives there? First off, ask yourself this, did that rat have a say so when you bought your property? Secondly, if XYZ corporation owned the property on all sides of you, decides to build a megafactory all around your house. I’ll bet the first phone call you make is to a Liberal Attorney. You will be all upset when they inform you that they can’t take your case. Too Busy, Why? They inform you that some conservative has tied up the courts with trials defending your daughter’s right to choose, and my right not to have your religion forced down my throat.

Wayne, I really don’t think your response deserves an answer. You’ve shown your colors and I don’t agree with you.

tomd-
We can have all the freedom we want so long as it coincides with the law of the land. We all wish to see our attitudes writ large on the canvas of government. Even you. Being a free-thinker in my party, if you don’t remove it from its historical background, means freedom from having to think along traditional lines, not simply some vague notion of indecision about what one’s values are, and what one would like to see change or be done in government. By your definition, even you cannot be considered a free-thinker.

I hear you guys say that we want to keep kids from praying in school. That’s utterly wrong. Most Liberals I know would not begrudge a child their prayer. It is the leading of prayer by teachers and administrators in an public school environment that concerns us, and not merely among the atheists. In fact, officially-led school prayer was voted down based on a case involving Jehovah’s Witnesses.

The key is, who decides for your children who they will pray to, and how they will express their faith? Modern Jurisprudence sets that it is alright for a child to pray in school, and that the last Democrat President affirmed this in his policies.

But if you want more than that, you are out of luck, and I have no sympathy for you. You cannot argue for freedom of religion, and turn around and have yours favored over all others by the government.

I think to some degree, it is a good thing that our government does not support any one religion, nor determined by law how individuals can worship and pray. It means that men in our country have less power to turn the Worship of God or whatever else to worship of them and their position. It means we are praying less to please somebody else, and more to please the one who sees us in our most secret of places.

Do not found the hopes and dreams of the religious of this country on a government of men. The more you give Government the means to favor and promote religion, the more you give it the power to destroy it.

Wow… Excellent post, Stephen. Totally agree.

Great writing. Interesting.
It shows the problems with one party that isolates itself, and gives rise the the other party. However, I think it’s wrong to assume the solution is for the Democrats to now take advantage of the Republicans mistake. Especially, since neither party lives up to their promises.

The article actaully points to a more fundamental problem. Not just one party or the other. The government as an entity that is irresponsible and unaccountable. It’s a great gig…talk a lot, blame the other party, seduce voters into the petty partisan politics, spend like crazy, and never really do much work to solve problems (especially, not worth $2 trillion per year).

So, we’d be better off without any parties, since the two main parties no longer represent the people, and both parties have created many barriers to prevent non-main-party-candidates from getting on ballots.

I used to be a Republican, because I thought they were more fisically responsible.
Ha Ha Ha ! That’s a joke.
Actually, the joke is on all of us.

After stepping way back and looking at the problem, I noticed it’s a problem that exists and flourishes anywhere there is oppression by a controlling minority. The level of oppression varies greatly. Oppression in the U.S. is not nearly as bad as other countries (such as Saudi Arabia, Iran, North Korea, etc.). However, it is slow and gradual, which has allowed the problems to grow larger and more numerous. Once the oopression gets a foot-hold, it’s like a virus that replicates itself over and over and it always has the potential to undo everything.

It’s a natural tendency for some to want to control others, while gradually chipping away at the rights of the people, and profiting unfairly for what they portray as hard work and leading the people. They really believe that control by the people is a bad thing, and don’t really believe in democracy and laws to simultaneously protect individual rights. The interesting contradiction is that the elitists seeking control over others are not necessarily smarter than the people they control. Because, they fail to realize that their desire to control others will bring about the very opposite result. Eventually, it destroys the nation they’re attempting to control.

Time is running out. Problems we face are nearing the point of melt-down.

Perhaps we should start ignoring parties, partisan politics, and force government to be responsible and accountable for these many pressing problems and focus on the solutions.

Perhaps the people should create a check-list and demand government start working on the check-list, and stop wasting so much time and money and resources trying to win another seat in Congress or Executive branch.

Hey d.a.n, are you the guy who used to post as OSI?

Yes. I’m not allowed to post as OSI anymore, because it was too blatantly advertising the web-site.

d.a.n.-
I offer no panaceas. I believe there aren’t any, when you’re dealing with issues as complicated and as human-factors rich as government.

This country already tried going without parties. Truth is, that’s not the way people work- they develop substantial differences in opinion, and group together along those lines. The problem is permanent, whether the parties that create them now are or not. The better idea, and the more practical one, in my view, is to reach out to people who are weakly allied to the Republican Party or out on their own, and persuade them to offer us support.

You can speak of oppression, but no government functions without the ability to deny some of the people their wishes some of the time. There is no virus here- this is simply the nature of human government. Instead of treating it as an inevitable infection of a pure system by a foreign virus, we should recognize it for what it is: a Chronic tendency in government that should be confronted by vigilant questioning of authority. You can talk about checklists, but I think there is where your solution runs into problems: it requires that everybody be on the same page. How do you manage that?

We do have serious problems, and we do need serious solutions, but the everything cannot hinge on everybody agreeing because that will never happen. It cannot hinge on a mass changeover of representatives, because that will never happen. It cannot hinge on any number of utopian ideas of people just doing something, because the required political force to do that would ultimately just takes you back to square one. Such revolutionary change requires so much browbeating,consensus building, and political organization, that you end up having to build a party and empower it to get anything done in that direction.

I don’t call for a permanent Democratic Majority, though I think a temporary one at this juncture in history would be useful. What I call for is the consideration of issues and truths above rhetoric and deception.

What I suggest also acknowledges that people have a choice in what they believe, and that choice is best made when freely given.

What I say is take another look at the world around you- not everything is as it seems. The party you are in, the one that you oppose- these are more complicated, more malleable than you might think. The debates do not have to follow the same lines and should not appeal to just the people who agree with you wholeheartedly.

In the end, what I exhort people to is not some stern application of a radical solution, but rather the gentle awakening of awareness about the illusory nature of much of what we consider to be hard and fast political wisdom. Once we get people past that, things can change. New illusions will develop, but hopefully people will remember that these political restrictions are all in our heads.

SD
My earlier post said this:

“Lose the LIBERALISM and become Democrats again and watch the millions more votes you would get.”

then you said:

“My advice to my party is to spread out the party’s interests and encourage the moderates to meet us halfway.”

I believe these are one in the same. Democrats can easily gain millions of votes by simply losing the liberal tag.
I was not trying to argue about how wrong liberalism really is, I have done that enough and everybody here knows how I feel about liberalism.
There are millions of voters out there who will never vote for a liberal, that is a fact.
Right? Wrong? or whatever, that is how they vote. Meeting them halfway would be a great start. So far, they only way has been to agree with the liberal agenda.

kctim-

There are millions of voters out there who will never vote for a liberal, that is a fact.

First, my advice was not just to spread in one direction. Appealing to the more liberal of the folks out there is no less important to our party than appealing to the conservatives.

How do you do that? Well, it works on the same principle: compromise and recognition of commonality, in addition to persuasion of individuals to move towards your positions.

You however are stuck on this idea that the problem with liberals is that they are not conservative enough, and there are people who will never vote for one of us.

Granted, there may be folks who will stubbornly resist any and all appeals, but I think that there are many more folks who would be willing to deal with Democrats and Liberals if a few objections were dealt with or if they were convinced to lay those objections aside.

I don’t think people’s beliefs are necessarily written in stone. I don’t think they should be. I think this insistence that political success in America comes through movement to the right is more a product of the Right’s campaign of propaganda and image cultivation than it is a product of any inherent trend in American politics. I do believe we have to recognize the concerns of those farther to the right than us, but I think that’s hardly a reason to trend more conservative than we already have, declaring the defeat of our principles before we’ve had the chance to compete in the marketplace of ideas. You think we have no chance of winning. Well, I disagree, and don’t see the point in giving up so easily.

SD
Liberals have a very good chance of winning more in the future as more and more people become dependent on govt.

If liberals are really naive enough to believe that everybody else needs to change and agree with them, then nothing we say will change your minds.
My advice was that Democrats need to lose the liberal stigma to become the dominate party and I still believe that.

_____________________________________________
A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largess from the public treasury. From that time on the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury, with the results that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world’s great civilizations has been 200 years. These nations have progressed through this sequence:

(1) from bondage to spiritual faith
(2) from spiritual faith to great courage
(3) from courage to liberty
(4) from liberty to abundance
(5) from abundance to selfishness
(6) from selfishness to complacency
(7) from complacency to apathy
(8) from apathy to dependency
(9) from dependency back to bondage. — Alexander Fraser Tytler (1742-1813)
_____________________________________________

Where are we now? (6), (7), (8) ?

Fiscal Irresponsibility, single handedly, may be our biggest problem. Shall history repeat itself? Look like it. How many times will it take to learn the lesson? We’ve already been through this cycle twice.

Democracy must be constrained by laws that protect rights, enforce transparency, to ensure fiscal responsibility and accountability.
Currently, the U.S. is missing the transparency, and thus, missing fiscal responsibility and accountability, and sufficient enforcement of the laws, and all the dysfunction that comes with the corruption it breeds. Voters might be able to fix this, or wait and let it run the cycle again.

Stephen Daugherty wrote: d.a.n.- I offer no panaceas. I believe there aren’t any, when you’re dealing with issues as complicated and as human-factors rich as government.

Thanks for your analysis. I know my idea may not be taken seriously by many, but it’s simplicity and benefits are what give it some merit and worth a closer look, because:

Perhaps the wisest thing all voters could do:
(01) it make our vote count the most;
(02) it peacefully forces government to reform;
(03) it forces politicians to police their own ranks;
(04) it is very simple; which increases likelihood of success;
(05) it is very easy to understand;
(06) it will increase transparency, yielding accountability and responsibility
(07) it costs nothing; doesn’t require a lot of money
(08) it doesn’t need a party affiliation;
(09) it would eliminate pork-barrel
(10) it would reduce pandering;
(11) it would reduce waste;
(12) it would reduce greed, and corruption;
(13) it eliminates the need for term limits and eliminates bad career politicians;
(14) it sends a clear message to politicians that can not be ignored any longer;
(15) it would make elections less expensive;
(16) it will reduce negative campaigning;
(17) it will reduce apathy and sense of futility;
(18) it ends voters foolishly empowering politicians to continue the abuse and corruption;
(19) it proves that politicians don’t have any power except for the power voters give them;
(20) it would might be fun to watch even if it doesn’t work; why not? nothing else is working anyway;
(21) it would cure the jelly-brain disease that befall some politicians soon after being elected;
(22) it would quickly identify the truly irresponsible and corrupt within government;
(23) etc…… there’s many more good reasons….

It it only needs one thing each of us already has: our vote

Also, it helps to peacefully force a correction to the current imbalance of power between the people and government and the few currently controling government. There will always be a power struggle since there are always some who want to control others.

The problem with trying to determine what politician will be responsible and accountable is very difficult (perhaps impossible).
What isn’t difficult or complicated are the problems and solutions. Those in government should be able to easily agree on most of the pressing problems facing the nation and also agree on the solutions. If not, what good are they?