Quote:
Originally Posted by MS Fowler
And yet many on this forum deny that today's liberals are the extension of the progressives of the post WW1 time.
As far as terms having no meaning...I am a firm believer in a smaller, as opposed to a larger, federal government. Yet I unabashedly support individual rights, including the freedom of speech especially for those with whom I disagree ( as opposed to the practice of limiting the speech of the opposition as tyrants always do.). I have been called a "classical liberal" , and perhaps I am, but I have nothing in common with today's liberals. I also have little in common with the republican party of the last administration who refused to limit their spending. To really foul up fitting into any particular party "box", I think I could be persuaded to bring all troops home and reduce the military to a simple home defense force with the technological ability it needs to keep foreign adversaries at bay, really reducing the federal budget, allowing lowered taxes, and more money for domestic spending.
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That "liberals deny they are the extension of the progressives" sounds like some sort of Glenn Beck meme. I have no idea where you would get that idea, and I know of no educated liberal who would deny it, of course we are their idealogical heirs. In fact, it was the mass exodus of Republican liberals after the defeat of T.R.'s "Bull Moose" party to the Democratic Party that turned the Democrats left and made Franklin Roosevelt and Wilson possible. The truly great tragedy of today's Republicans is their loss of their historical place in this country, in fact, they were the "liberals" up until that time. Goldwater swung the GOP hard right, and Nixon and Reagan played the racial politics necessary to bring in the conservative Southern Democrats.
If anyone is in denial about their heritage, it is today's Republicans, who are doing everything they can to drive out the last vestiges of liberal Republicanism and complete their transformation to a Southern White People's Party who are not the idealogical descendent's of Lincoln's liberals, they are in fact the descendent of the Confederate Southern Democrats. They have turned themselves inside out. Given your stated views, you yourself may find yourself being pushed out.