Reading through several debates on this site, the epitath of "liberal" has been thrown about when disagreeing with a GW policy- regardless if that policy would ever fit the definition of a "conservative" policy- for instance, the medicaid drug bill was hugely expensive, in fact, the GW administration lied about it's price, in the war on Iraq threads is the most interersting- DR and Bill AZ55 have consistently called "liberal" - though both are long time republicans by thier own comments, and most of thier stands on issues would be considered conservative back in the 70s or early 80s.

On a great deal of issues, especially fiscal issues and crime and punishment and specific gun control legislation, if I was surveyed on those items only, no one would call me a liberal LOL- but since I am rabidly anti-GW and proud of it, I am labeled a liberal- at first, since I have really on one liberal issue (universal health care) and perhaps one green issue (riegning in the power of corporate entities) this angered and confused me back around 2000 and GWs election.

Now it seems, if you disagree with GW and his hundreds of ruinous policies, you are a liberal. Well, if that is the new definition, then I am a liberal and proud of it LOL

So my question is this (apologies in advance to Dayton Rocker- his case is the most glaring on the board to me)

Liberalism usually was applied to folks that were pro-"tax and spend" and ran up the debt and deficit- but now, it seems that it is okay to be CONSERVATIVE and be pro-"borrow and spend" and run up the deficit and debt?

Has liberalism morphed into a definition quite different from it's meaning in the early 80s, is it not really your stand on the issues, but rather, who you stand against? If you feel different, please explain.

[Has liberalism morphed into a definition quite different from it's meaning in the early 80s, is it not really your stand on the issues, but rather, who you stand against? If you feel different, please explain.

[/quote]

One one hand, I think we're running out of useful labels, and on the other hand, the current administration has changed the stance of the Republican Party while retaining the 'conservative' moniker.

I like to think of myself as a liberal in the classic sense of the word, associating the label with the likes of Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, and, of course, Henry George.

While I wasn't voting in the early eighties, I was, until recently, sympathetic with the 'conservative' values of the time. Reading and introspection have since shown me the error of their ways . . . though I still identify with many parts of the old conservative ideology. Likewise, I'm still antithetic to many parts of the then and still 'liberal' ideology.

Our current voting system, and the two-party system it supports, leaves me with few people to vote for, and many to vote against. It's particularly troubling when one party holds all the cards. Unfortunately for me, I have some specific issues I advocate, and neither party particularly supports them. In fact, the party that most closely proposes the specific issues I support is the Green Party, but I detest some of their stances on other issues.

Talking heads on the right have attempted to demonize the word 'Liberal', with some success. However, I support the ideas of individual liberties, economic opportunity, social safety nets, non-interventionist foreign policy, limited corporate charter, proportional representation, universal healthcare, ending corporate welfare, and the idea of the Commons; this pretty much makes me a liberal.

The devil, of course, is in the details.

To me a liberal is one who feels that big government has a valued place in the modern American system. One that protects us from the worst aspects of unrestrained capitalism and helps try to keep things on an even keel. Sometimes it works well, some times. like all other things it is not the best approach.

It was born in progressivism, it flourished in the New Deal and went a long way in stabilizing the country and its economy.

It pushed through in the area of Civil Rights and was pushed to its peak under LBJ with his War on Poverty.

I believe the remaining "liberal" program is a national health care system.

Along the way, they term liberal lost its varnish and become one of those words like feminism that is more a derogatory (sp?) term than a trophy. It is a task of protecting and defending which is nowhere near as fun or romantic as the dramatic battle charge. Liberalism is an important element of the Democratic party but it is now rudderless without a place to move forward.

I would go even further and say everything good our country has ever done, our golden ages if you will, was under classical liberal leadership- and never under conservative leadership. The "greatest generation" those that came through the great depression and fought WW2- started modern liberalism.

The founding fathers were radical liberals, perhaps some of the most radical in history.

So what happened? LOL

This is a very subjective question, of course, so I can only offer my own personal observations.

Since you mention the 1980's, I'll start there. The Presidential election of 1980, it seems, was when there began to be a shift in the emotional impact of the word "liberal." Before that, in my memory, it wasn't used in quite the same way. At that time, some campaigning conservatives began to use the word "liberal" as if it were synonymous with the word "evil." Perhaps a word like "socialist" or "pinko" would have been used in earlier campaigns in a similar way. This strategy worked brilliantly, I must say, and continues to be extremely effective.

As a self-admitted liberal, I find that, before I can even discuss the merits of a liberal opinion compared with those of a conservative opinion, I have to defend the right of such opinions to exist at all. In my local newspaper, for example, one half of the editorial pages is on the liberal side of most issues, and one half is on the conservative side of most issues. (This is because two newspapers joined together into one for economic reasons.) The left page has columns by syndicated liberals, the right page has columns by syndicated conservatives. I read both. On the left side, I very rarely see direct attacks on conservatism itself. (I see strong attacks on the current administration, of course.) The closest thing would be on attacks on "neo-conservatism." On the right side, I often see attacks on liberalism as a whole. Thomas Sowell and Walter Williams, for example, do this all the time. Their columns are full of things like how liberalism is harming African-Americans, or discussions of whether liberals want to destroy America or are just stupid. The local editorial is full of things like "So-and-so is a fine politician with an outstanding record, but she should be removed from office because she is liberal." No doubt such things appear from time to time on the left page, but it's not anywhere near as common.


As I say, this campaign has been brilliantly successful. The typical middle American -- Joe Six-Pack, a perfectly decent fellow -- is likely to think that liberalism is not just mistaken on the issues, but a horror which needs to be destroyed. In local elections in my area, the campaign often consists of each candidate claiming to be the real conservative.

To answer your question directly, liberalism is not "who you stand against," I think, but who stands against you.

Of course the greatest things this country has ever done have been done by liberals. If you go back and go over history, anyone who made a progressive change to the world can be called a liberal, by definition, and those are the ones we venerate. Indeed, anyone who makes any change is either liberal or reactionary. But was Lenin not a liberal? What about the prohibition movement? The second is bound to cause some argument, but if not for the consequences of prohibition, surely those who began it would be remembered as forward-thinking reformers. You could use the argument that prohibition is an impingement on freedoms, rather than an advancement of them, but is harsher regulation of cigarettes a liberal or conservative position today?

Also, don't overestimate the liberalism of the founding fathers. The Declaration of Independence is often pointed to as the beginning of democracy, but what it is primarily is an indictment and sentence of the Crown. The principles, while fairly liberal, were not as radical as many make them out to be; much of the preamble is taken verbatim from earlier sources, some of which were centuries old. The secession is the only thing that makes the document more important than "Bush's Résumé." (This is not to say that they were conservative by any stretch; much of the Bill of Rights, the first and eighth in particular, was downright fanatical by the standards of the time.)

However, there is a very deep error in pointing to those in the past as examples of the good of liberalism, and that is that when liberals succeed, they cease to be liberal. An end to slavery was once considered radically liberal, indeed, all the way until the Civil War. Imagine a politician suggesting anything but today! While many of Roosevelt's programs still bear debate, suggesting an end to the minimum wage laws or the SEC would hardly be center-right. And the first federal minimum wage laws were called unconstitutional! There was a time when drawing and quartering was a common punishment, and only the most adamant of death-penalty supporters would even dream of that. Liberals of the past cannot be used to justify liberal reform today, unless the reforms are related.

However, the liberals in this country know that liberalism is considered a universal good among the youth and the upper class (excluding businessmen), and that that which was considered liberal decades ago can still be called liberal today, even if it has become the standard. Two key examples are abortion and social security. The former has been decided by the courts for more than thirty years, but the prevention of any review of that decision has become a liberal shibboleth. The latter has been established for seventy years, but to prevent a change to it remains a left-wing position.

As such, liberalism has lost all literal meaning, and can only be defined by a specific set of positions. A few, such as abortion, are monolithic, and one cannot be a liberal without holding the liberal position. Others are more loose, but enough deviation and one cannot be considered a liberal. These positions all are literally liberal or once were, but, of course, all conservative positions were once literally liberal, and some still are (such as privitization of social security).

Well said- though I think you were kind of paraphrasing Mark Twain (who might have paraphrased from someone else himself, who knows?)

and I paraphrase once again "todays conservative is just appropriated ideas of yesteryears radical when they are all worn out"-

today's liberal has moved forward, and hold out against moving backwards- I don't think protecting an idea that has worked for "70 years" from a step backwards would be considered conservative, or if engaging a holding action against taking steps backwards would be considered conservative either.

Prohibition were certainly NOT the liberals of their day- in fact, the opposite- they wanted to codify religion into an amendment, which they did.

Privatization of social security IS NOT a liberal or radical idea- but a wish to return to the status quo prior to the great depression- when all retirement was privatized. It is regressive and conservative- and, in fact, pretty much all modern, meaning last 20 years, of the conservative movement is heavily regressive, a wish to return to the status quo prior to the great depression.

Any attempt to re-visit abortion is also regressive- an attempt to once again subjegate women to a subserviant position of the 50s. Taking away the rights of individuals is anti-liberal- unless it is business vs individual- the liberal will pick the individual.

Has liberalism morphed into a definition quite different from it's meaning in the early 80s, is it not really your stand on the issues, but rather, who you stand against? If you feel different, please explain.

Oh sure. Where we were once labelled as bleeding hearts, now we are devil spawn. The continuing redefinition of liberals by conservatives is an attempt at creating straw people to knock down with shakey arguments.

Tax and spend liberals went away with Clinton balancing the fed budget and GWB coming in and busting it. Oh well, try something else, eh?

Un-American stuck for a while, as did activist liberal judges. The flag burning thing came back recently, and to me that's a sign of running out of ideas. The vilification of liberals is getting harder than ever because it has gone on so long. Eventually the well runs dry.

But is making anyone against Republican policy a liberal very effective? I don't think so. Lots of conservatives are against Republican policy too. Obstructionist has been tried, but that's like saying a football game consists of offense and defense. Politics have obstructions to policy as just part of the game.

The definition has changed over the years, but the changing might be at an end due to the lack of ideas and imagination.

Has liberalism morphed into a definition quite different from it's meaning in the early 80s, is it not really your stand on the issues, but rather, who you stand against? If you feel different, please explain.

I think many core features of liberalism have remained the same. Particularly, the view that government tempers capitalism that we see during the new deal era. I agree wholeheartedly with Eeyore when he says:




However, I would say since the tenure of the Warren Court and the subsequent 1960s social revolution of sorts, liberalism has taken another defining characteristic. That defining characteristic would be a pronounced distaste for majority rule. How many times do we hear the phrase "tyranny of the majority" thrown out from the liberal camp on any number of social policy issues? I would say that the deeply defining trait of a liberal today is a hard core distrust of the majority. The majority is viewed as potentially oppressing any group that is not perceived as mainstream. All social policy issues are articulated within this paradigm. Gay marriage is a constitutional right because traditional marriage discriminates against the minority (gays). Affirmative action is not violative of the 14th amendment because it furthers a compelling state interest in diversity (because the majority cannot be trusted to remedy problems facing minorities) Etc etc.

Moreover, this relatively recent distrust of majority rule is abundantly evident from the emphasis on obtaining social policy change through the courts instead of through the normal legislative process. When conservatives say that the legalization of gay marriage must come by way of legislative change and not judicial fiat, the response is unanimous: we cannot trust the majority to do what is right by the minority.

IMO this distrust of the majority is what defines liberals today, just as much as their preference for larger government to temper capitalism.

I don't entirely disagree with you there hayleyanne- but it is really hard to determine what is the majority, and often like in the Schiavo case, the majority would be considered to be clearly in the "liberal" camp, and by a large margin. When you have a 51-49% majority/minority split, the majority MUST protect the rights of the minority, or you will have social upheaval and instability- Northern Ireland is an excellent example of the "tyranny of the majorityh"- northern catholics make up a 49% minority last I checked.

A truly free republic isn't defined by how well the majority takes and keeps power, but how well and respectful it treats it's minority, especially when the balance of power is so very slim.

Michael Moore had it 100% right when he said "nobody wants to be called a liberal, but when you take things issue by issue, most would be firmly in the liberal camp on most issues, but would not admit to being liberal" abortion, the majority clearly favors a womans right to choose, but the moderate does allow some restrictions, which, last I looked some months ago, makes a pretty sizable majority. Then go down the list of issues, and instead of saying things like "Do those lazy welfare poeple deserve your tax dollars" say "do those that need a temporary hand up deserve some goverment help, to get themselves back on thier feet"- most would say yes.

What I am showing here is that conservatives have become very good at sound bites and bumper sticker slogans, but very , very bad at actually wielding power.

Liberal thought and goverment, love them or hate them, were very effective at attempting or providing for thier ideology- were the conservatives have provided mostly lip service to some of thier sacred cows, while using the most base of emotions to put forth thier social agenda- fear and hatred of those different than themselves.

I roll my eyes at some of the more silly liberal causes, but I fear the conservative causes- there is really no difference between a conservative in America and a conservative in Iran- thier social complaints are the same- and even focused in the same place- America. If you took the president elect of Iran, and the president today, and compared thier stand on social issues, there would be no real difference- they both oppose gay marriage, favor stiff penalties for "sin" crimes, such as prostitution, drug use etc, want to codify marriage into religious law etc etc.

Liberals in America definately distrust the "tyranny of the majority" in america, and distrust this slight majority of americans for a good reason- they wish to make liberals and thier constituents second class citizens to themselves, with less rights than themselves- definately something to fear!

CR-- shall we mark this as a red letter day then? I just wanted to add, that in addition to the simple majority/minority split you describe that relates to any issue, I was also referring (and perhaps more importantly) to the majority/minority split that relates to groups. The paradigm I was describing was referencing the perceived power struggle between groups, i.e. the majority cannot be trusted to pass legislation protecting minority groups, whatever the label (blacks, women, gays, etc etc).