Tag Archives: liberalism

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Liberal ain’t a dirty word

OK, kids, I’ve had enough of the epithets that come from the MAGA side of the great divide aimed at liberals who for too long have cowered under the threat of recrimination if they dare defend their political leanings.

I consider myself a center-left liberal. I am not a flamer the way some of us on the left have become. I want a strong military; I dislike spending more government money than we take in; I stand for the National Anthem; I have no problem with saying “one nation under God” while reciting the Pledge of Allegiance.

But political liberalism has become a whipping boy of the right.

The day that Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton got acquitted of those impeachment charges by the Texas Senate, he took a moment to blast “the liberal Texas speaker, Dade Phelan,” who happens to be a Republican from my old haunts in Beaumont.

Paxton meant to tar Phelan with what he considers a four-letter word in the contemporary political lexicon.

One contemporary definition of liberalism goes something like this:

A willingness to respect or accept behavior or opinions different from one’s own; openness to new ideas; “one of the basic tenets of liberalism is tolerance.”

I have to ask: What is so downright evil about any of those benchmark characteristics of political liberalism? My answer: Not a damn thing!

Yet, the MAGA cult that has perverted Republicanism into something not recognizable to those who followed the policies of Richard Nixon, Barry Goldwater or Ronald Reagan, has done an even more thorough job of perversion regarding liberalism.

They conflate liberal policies with “socialism.” They contend that anyone who adheres to liberal principles is somehow not American enough.

What’s equally maddening, though, is that liberal politicians stopped embracing their political benchmark. They gravitated to terms like “progressive,” seeming to avoid saying the word “liberal” out loud.

Well, they shouldn’t have to run like thieves from a noble political philosophy. Nor should those of us who share it with them.

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Political discourse needs cleansing

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This is what has become of honest-to-goodness political discourse in this country.

Or so it appears.

A Fox News talk-show host has compared liberalism to a “disease,” such as Ebola.

That’s the spirit, Eric Bolling, of the so-called “big tent” philosophy preached by your pals on the right and extreme right wing of the political spectrum.

http://mediamatters.org/blog/2014/10/06/foxs-bolling-calls-liberalism-a-dangerous-virus/201037

This kind of rhetoric is beneath contempt. Sadly, it seems to illustrate what has become of the state of political discourse in the United States. It’s “our way or the highway.”

Before you accuse me of being a liberal shill who’s taking on the righties of our great country, I want to toss a haymaker at the lefties as well. Listen to the tone of their commentary regarding those on the right. It is equally painful to hear. It suggests that conservatives are out to starve the very young and the very old, take away Granny’s retirement income and send our young men and women off to war with no clear purpose.

There once was a time in this country when conservatives and liberals could argue about ideas without trashing the other side. They were patriots of the first order. They loved their country. They merely argued over the best way to make lives better for all Americans.

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All of this reminds me of an interview I witnessed on what was then called the “MacNeill-Lehrer News Hour” on PBS.

Jim Lehrer was interviewing two genuine war heroes: liberal Democratic former U.S. Sen. George McGovern and conservative Republican former U.S. Sen. Barry Goldwater. They were commenting on the nastiness of the 1988 presidential campaign and wondered aloud to each other why liberals and conservatives no longer got along when they were off the clock.

These two political giants had earned their spurs the hard way. They both were aviators during World War II and had served heroically while fighting tyranny. They were friends and political adversaries. They shared a bond forged by fierce combat.

Goldwater became the father of the modern conservative movement in America, while McGovern became a champion for social justice and along the way became a hero to progressive all across the land.

It was at the end of the interview that Goldwater pitched an idea to McGovern: “Why don’t we run together, as a ticket, George. You and me.” McGovern and Goldwater then laughed out loud at the seeming preposterousness of the idea.

More than a quarter-century later, I wish it could have come to pass.

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Where have you gone, diversity?

The first three sentences of an editorial in today’s Las Vegas Review-Journal set the table for an interesting discussion about the state of intellectual diversity.

The paper opined: “Colleges and universities like to promote themselves as open-minded bastions of diversity. They strive to fill their campuses with people of different races and backgrounds.

“Encouraging diversity of thought is another matter entirely.”

http://www.reviewjournal.com/opinion/editorial-campuses-closed-diversity-thought

The paper examined a recent controversy at Rutgers University, which had invited former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to speak at its commencement, only to have her withdraw after students and faculty protested her scheduled appearance.

Students staged protests and carried signs, one of which accused Rice of being a “war criminal.”

I’ve written already on the Rice controversy at Rutgers. No need to revisit that issue.

What’s troubling though, and I say this as someone who is of the liberal persuasion, is that liberals are giving their political philosophy a bad name when they protest in such a manner.

By definition, the term “liberal” is meant in the political context to foster inclusiveness; it is intended to bolster the notion that those who lean liberal are open to others’ ideas, that they’ll hear them, consider them and take them under studied advisement.

Someone tell me if I’m wrong on that one.

However, when liberals rise up and protest the appearance of conservative thinkers and policymakers, they turn the very definition of liberalism into a myth.

What’s worse is that these protests occur — of all places — on college and university campuses.

As the Review-Journal editorial notes (see attached link), these institutions promote themselves as “bastions of diversity.” Students enroll there ostensibly seeking to broaden their horizons. Conservative students get exposed to liberal thought; the reverse is true for students with liberal leanings who are exposed to conservative thought.

The Condi Rice episode ought to become — to borrow a term — a “teachable moment” for university faculty and students all across this great land.

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JFK a liberal? Not so sure about that

David Greenberg, writing for The New Republic, posits a theory that President John F. Kennedy was a true-blue liberal.

http://www.newrepublic.com/article/115522/jfk-was-unapologetic-liberal

Interesting, eh?

The president, who was shot to death 50 years ago next week, cut taxes. He stared down the Soviet Union by flexing the nation’s military might. He also, according to Greenberg, believed government could be a force for good, not evil. Kennedy preferred diplomacy over armed conflict, Greenberg asserts, making him more liberal than conservative.

I suppose that’s all true.

Greenberg’s piece, though, doesn’t touch on some other key issues that defines liberals and conservatives.

How about abortion? I don’t recall much discussion over the years since JFK’s death about how he viewed women’s reproductive rights. The president was a practicing Catholic, after all. Even though he made it clear during the 1960 presidential campaign that church doctrine wouldn’t inform his public policy, many politicians before and since JFK’s time have relied on their faith to decide some of these critical matters.

Prayer in school? Did the 35th president oppose school-mandated prayer, which the Supreme Court essentially struck down in 1963?

Environmental protection is another favorite issue for liberals. It wasn’t until 1970 — during the administration of Republican Richard Nixon — that the federal government created the Environmental Protection Agency.

Kennedy did seek to further the cause of civil rights, but he had to be persuaded to do so. His death in Dallas prevented him from enacting the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act. That was left to President Lyndon Johnson, whose courage helped the Democratic Party “lose the South,” in the words of his good friend, Sen. Richard Russell, D-Ga.

My own view is that JFK was more of a centrist than a bleeding heart.

Given the extreme views that both parties have adopted in the past two decades, that isn’t such a bad thing.