Yeah, a fruitcake??
what below is NOT rational
whereas i can list endlessless the irrationality and its ever growing prominence in our 'elected' officials and their actions--and a governemtn without a clear logical consistent basis free of hypocrisy has no anchor and no way to be taken serioously
anyway --besides that it is an interesting read, especially for some of the youger members here i think
from his website:
LIBERALISM
I don't recall when it all began. When did "liberalism" become, in
the opinion of at least some people, a term of opprobrium? I I think
it must have happened sometime after I graduated from college (1955)
because I never knew anyone when I was in high school or college who
didn't think of himself as liberal, regardless of his politics. We
knew that not to be liberal was to be illiberal, and who, in his right
mind, would boast of that?
In the late 50s socially controversial programs became more prominent.
Abortion, welfare, affirmative action were hot topics as they had
never been in the 40s and most of the 50s. (In the 50s, most abortions
were obtained, not by unwed teenagers but by married women over the age
of 35 who, having two or three children, unintentionally got pregnant.)
Although it is not clear that any conceptual links exist between being
in favor of the right to abort and favoring affirmative action, these
programs tended to be supported by the same people. They made common
cause on these and a bewildering wide batch of other issues. For
whatever obscure reason, they became associated, too, with the
"Lefties" - socialists and communist sympathizers. It is hard to see
why a communist should be more inclined, say, to gun control than a
capitalist but let us charitably turn our heads away from the painful
sight of this grouping. When the Vietnam War happened, "peaceniks"
were everywhere - despicably unclean, unshaven youth (in Nixon's eyes)
- who, once and for all, consolidated the Left (once a purely political
philosophy) with the outcries for social upheaval of so-called
"Liberals". In other words, we took a GIANT step from "liberal" to
"Liberal". Now, then, Liberals were fair game. We can easily
imagine that often in the privacy of the Oval Room, (if we ignore the
mystifying taping) Nixon proclaiming loudly to all nearby (except
Kissinger), "Fucking Jewish Liberals!"
By Reagan's time, "Liberal" was certifiably an insult. Today's
Democratic candidates are usually at pains to disavow any strong
Liberal sentiments. They like to think of themselves as centrists,
moderates or just to the left of center and prefer not to bring the
guardians of decency down on their heads. They like terms like
"N-word" in lieu of "nigger" and eschew anything that vaguely has a
radical odor. They proclaim loudly against pornography, prostitution
and the use of drugs. They wrongly and dumbly buy into the absurdity
that these are radical leftist ideals. Even George McGovern's
liberalism consisted of nothing much more than devotion to ending a
war.
PHILOSOPHICAL LIBERALISM
Philosophical liberals preach indidualism and autonomy. For example,
Robert P. Wolff has written that it is ALWAYS wrong to obey any law,
however sensible it is. To obey to to accept subjugation, to do as
one is told. This doesn't mean we should not conform our conduct to
the requirements of law. For, as I said, some laws are sensible and
wise. One adopts them from one's own sense of rightness. One never
says, "Well, it's the law so we have got to obey it." Yet this idea
is widely accepted. One who accepts this idea that "law is law" is
not a Liberal. Laws may be civilly disobeyed if they are wrong and we
don't have to wait for them to be changed. It is by challenge that
they get changed. That was Martin Luther King's credo and he was
absolutely right. (And it is by challenging the idea that we must
remove Bush whatever Democratic incompetent we need to replace him that
we are assured that a good person will never be President.)
Philosophical liberals are quick to seek remedies for social
injustices and they believe that fundamental human rights have priority
over the good of the community. Thus they hold that the recent
infringement upon civil liberties by the Ashcroft/Ridge cabal that are
undertaken in the name of pressing security concerns are misguided not
only because they are unnecessary but simply because they are morally
wrong, and morality cannot be sacrificed for speculative social
causes.
In contrast, philosophical conservatives believe that people are not
entities-in-themselves but are defined by their membership in a group.
America is a thing over and above the individuals who are its citizens
and it deserves our unconditional love. "Right or wrong but my
country." Individuals have no true identity except as they are
Jewishor Christian, patriots or spies, black or white. Conservatives
put great store on the accumulated wisdom of experience and think that
elitists are trying to impose their radical vision on the "average man"
- "the man on the 5th Avenue bus". Morality can change, they
confess, but it must change slowly. Laws must reflect custom and not
lead us away from what we are most familiar with. Laws can shift but
this must come after they have gained the approval of the majority and
must not hit us over the head. Conservatives believe, for example,
that since homosexual marriage is widely disapproved of, the courts are
wrong to call them constitutional. There may be a time when
homosexual marriage will seem benign to most of us; that will be time
enough to change the law.
Philosophical liberals deny that a strongly held prejudice reflects a
moral value. A moral value is something that must be argued for in
favor of yet more basic values. It must be reasoned. One who says
"I hate niggers" is not expressing his personal value; he is expressing
only his prejudice. Prejudices are not entitled to constitutional
protection, no matter how widely held. It may be that once upon a
time, for all I know, that most Americans felt blacks were disgusting
creatures, undeserving of freedom. We cannot be overly tolerant and
say, "Well, that was their opinion." It was not their opinion, in
the view of the liberal, it was a feeling, and an ugly one at that.
The "elitists" were right to force a change and even go to war in the
face of resistance to change.
The philosophical conservative places great store in tradition,
stability and order and is opposed to piecemeal engineering. The
various 5-year or billion year plans by the U.S.S.R. were disasters
and we should learn by their mistakes. The trouble with this
conservative notion is that the U.S.S.R. was never a communist state
but only a totalitarian regime headed one after another by ruthless,
egomaniacs with no sense of, much less commitment to, the the
egalitarian ideal of communism as find it in Engels. The plans were
rigid and flawed, and this proved nothing whatsoever about the general
thesis that long range planning is a bad thing.
Philosophical liberalism is secular. It takes no position on whether
the world is godless. Instead, it adopts the credo of humanism.
People are free to worship a god or to be atheists, and the state must
not in any way take sides. Conservatives (not all) tend to believe
that Christianity has a stranglehold on truth and (smugly) tolerate
other religions but not atheism as the right of all of us. Thus,
Congress opens its daily sessions with an invocation of God's
blessings. Presidents announce that "With God's help we shall
prevail." We "trust in God" and collect pennies. Democratic
candidates are fearful to alienate. None ever says, "Obviously there
is no God.." That is the kiss of political death. It is believed
that Americans won't stand for it. "God hates the sin but loves the
sinner"; nevertheless, literally, a dozen people said that my son's
death from AIDS was God's curse upon him. Others stood up and
cheered. Arch conservative "mentality".
Most of all, philosophical liberals believe that reason should always
take ascendancy over custom and tradition. We take no a priori stands
on war, gun control, abortion, welfare, the use of drugs, capital
punishment, affirmative action. multiculturalism or anything else.
We try to think it through. Some of us come down on one side of an
issue and others come down on the opposing side. This is good. This
is right. I am proud to be a philosophical liberal. Aren't you?