Just sayin'
So somebody named Michael kindly pointed out that I misspelled a headline (which I have subsequently corrected) and the following comment exchange ensued:
Michael said...That would be "cries". We're all human, even liberals. 1:42 AM
Chris Dykstra said...awww...thanks for the heads up and for the nod to my humanity. I'm not really a liberal, though. 12:51 AM
Michael said...Oh no, not a (deluded) libertarian?!? 11:02 AM
Well! What do you say to that? I started to compose a short comment back, but decided to do it here.
I don't really consider myself a Libertarian. Libertarians value civil liberties properly but I don't resonate with the "Market will provide everything" take on the world. I think there are many things that are too important to be handed off to the market, as I get into a little bit below. I will never, ever support the GOP or anyone who supports the GOP in it's current incarnation under George Bush, Cheney, Rove and the cast of charlatans that have driven the country in the ditch. Pick any one of the beliefs I articulate below, and this administration and many of the gaggle of state and local republicans articulate and act in exactly the opposite manner. What is commonly referred to as the "culture war," is, in reality, the conflict created by the rise to power of a political party actively reinterpreting our constitutional republic to be less free, less transparent, less accessible, and more capable of transferring the money of its citizens to the coffers of corporations.
And the Democrats...sigh. They are complicit in our situation, guilty of navel gazing in the face of the specter of a stolen republic, architects of unbelievably poor campaigns, concubines of special interests, masters of meaningless outrage. I land in the Democratic Party by default, not necessarily because it stands for what I believe all the time. There is no question though, the Democrats (and individual Democrats I might add) are more consistently in line with my list of core beliefs than any other party.
So, Michael, I am not a deluded libertarian at all, not a Repbulican, not a Conservative, not a Democrat, not a liberal per se. If anything, the word progressive fits, but really, I am more like a nuts and bolts capitalist, husband, father and entrepreneur that believes:
a) There are some goods, services or features of the human condition that are best delivered and protected through collective effort and organization because every person has an equal stake in the outcome regardless of their financial position.
Practically speaking, that means that some things in society shouldn't be put up for sale - liberty, for instance, or clean water, or the nation's system of highways, or the ability to get a basic education, or the protection of property, or national security, or the mechanisms and processes through which votes are counted.....
Government is how society collectively addresses things that shouldn't be put up for sale. In light of that, It seems obvious that Government needs to exist. For all intents and purposes, good government is the best market solution for delivery of goods and services and attributes of life that society owns collectively.
b) Government should be small, effective and financially responsible.
c) Transparency in government, rule of law, and separation of church and state are fundamental American values and are supported by all of the founding documents.
d) Personal freedom is the most valuable civil asset the American citizen has.
e) Government should be funded by citizens to the degree necessary to provide shared goods and services. When citizens contribute to government, it's called taxes. Taxes are necessary.
posted by Chris Dykstra @ 1:01 PM |
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5 Comments:
"Practically speaking, that means that some things in society shouldn't be put up for sale"
Yes, some things should be managed by government, for example by GOP or Democrats ;)
"Government is how society collectively addresses things that shouldn't be put up for sale."
Government is for creating problems - for example by means of waging wars and maintaining welfare state.
"good government is the best market solution for delivery of goods and services and attributes of life that society owns collectively."
in other words: Involuntary institution using force and corecion is the best free-will, free-agreement soultion [...], right?
"Government should be small, effective and financially responsible."
You got that in 1776 (or so). It took (only) 150 years to destroy it.
"Personal freedom is the most valuable civil asset the American citizen has."
>>Freedom is the most valuable asset a human person has.<<
Fixed that for you :)
Government should be funded by citizens to the degree necessary to provide shared goods and services.
How about: "Private company should be funded by customers to the degree necessary to provide shared goods and services."
"When citizens contribute to government, it's called taxes."
How about "When government takes your money at gunpoint, it's called taxes." How many times have you heard about voluntary donations to government agncies, compared with donations to private agencies?
"Taxes are necessary."
To pay for war.
Anonymous Coward
Well, it looks like we pulled out at least one deluded libertarian!
Nice post, Chris. I almost completely agree with you. While arguing about terminology is somewhat beside the point, I would describe you as a liberal. I would be especially concerned if you tried to distance yourself from the word, because progressive and liberal are, to many people, including me, synonyms. The run from the word (e.g. Kerry) is lame and, IMHO, politically stupid.
The small part I disagree with is the word "small" in this sentence:
Government should be small, effective and financially responsible,
Ever seen an insurance company?
What would lead any rational person to conclude that the United States government could be small? We are a country of 3 billion people, 800 times bigger than, say New Zealand. We have a military and diplomatic presence around the world. We have a gigantic country, physically, compared to European countries and fund a bulk of the world's scientific and technological research. We have hundreds of thousands of miles of roads, some great national parks, controls over financial markets such as the SEC, controls over food and medicine in the FDA. We have the best military in the world, a sound legal environment that protects businesses and consumers and we invest fantastically little in the things normally considered "liberal big government" such as low-income housing, welfare and health care.
What here, to you, implies "small"?
Yes, government should be as small as possible but no smaller! As small as possible, for a country our size with our ambitions, is not very small. We have all the wealth in the world to draw from and yet we are constantly arguing with rich people about why they need to pay taxes. Health care is a prime example where the "small government" argument is lettings us down.
Like I said, we probably agree on many, many things politically, but I detect a bit of that liberal=wasteful nanny state mentality. Am I wrong?
I am not comfortable with "liberal" because I don't know what it means any more. It has more value as a right wing straw man than it does as a definitive term for my political philosophy. I have no particular interest in defending the word. So the decision not to accept a label that is meaningful to other people (you) but not to me, is not lame, or politically stupid, or anything at all - except a clear statement not to engage at the level of pre-conceptions.
Yes, at its extremes liberalism = a nanny state. However, all ideologies at their extremes, result in a nanny state. The thing that changes is what gets nannied. "Liberals," if you will, nanny towards society leveling. Neocons nanny social behavior and shovel money into corporations. Both are two sides of the same coin.
You are right to point out that small is a relative term. When I use it, I mean that government should be lean. The government has expanded under Bush more than any previous president. The Medicare Bill, Homeland Security, Iraq, No Child Left Behind, blah, blah. They all added layers of unwanted and unnecessary bureaucracy. It takes $.70 of every welfare dollar to deliver $.30 of benefit. I don't have anything against the concept of welfare, but any non-profit would be judged most harshly if it delivered so inefficiently. Small means lean and efficient, protecting the investments of tax payers by being good stewards.
I've never read something on here that I've agreed with to such an extent, before. Great commentary!
Chris is right that strict categorical labels often fail to take into account the nuanced political views that many people hold. In addition, "liberal" and "conservative" have been so misused in political discourse that they frequently fail to mean anything at all. Because of this, it's worth taking time to break these terms down into their component parts.
In my view, American political ideologies are comprised of six basic categories. Most people tend to fall somewhere between the positions described below, rather than being ideological purists, but these definitions provide a good starting point for discussion. These six categories encompass the following:
1. Government's role in providing for the common good.
This category charts one of the basic metrics of the liberal-to-conservative ideological spectrum. In general, conservatives favor limited government intervention on behalf of the public welfare, preferring free market and charitable solutions to many social problems. Libertarians tend to share these same proclivities. Contemporary liberals, on the other hand, view private sector initiatives as insufficient to address many social ills, and advocate for proactive, state-sponsored solutions to problems like endemic poverty or environmental degradation. Conservatism's newest iteration - neo-conservatism - tends to fall somewhere in the middle of this debate. The neo-conservatives, due to their ideological roots on the left (witness the late Pat Moynihan) have made a certain amount of peace with aspects of the modern welfare state, but they wish to constrain its growth (witness the Clinton-era welfare reforms). Some argue for the existence of yet another classification - neo-liberalism; a political posture that seeks to enlist government aid on behalf of large corporate institutions, while attempting to shed state entitlement programs for individuals.
2. The proper scope of the federal government.
This category deals less with what government should do, and more with what level of government should do it. Libertarians and traditional conservatives favor a federalist arrangement - a small central government tasked with limited duties, with state and local governments carrying out most other functions. Many conservatives, however, have carved-out an exception to their small government preference in the arena of national security (see the Reagan administration). Libertarians, by comparison, are more skeptical of governmental bloat in this area. For their part, the neo-conservatives are not adverse to a sizable federal government - either in the form of the national security state, or in the form of federal programs like No Child Left Behind.
Modern liberals have long been comfortable with an expansive federal government, as they were its chief architects during the New Deal period. The Cold War liberal consensus over a large national security state, however, broke down during the Vietnam War, when the New Left became skeptical of the purposes to which this enterprise was being put. This "New Left" variant of liberalism is often called "progressive" today. "Progressive" is a slippery term, though, and subject to mis-use, with candidates such as Hilary Clinton (who is in many ways a neo-conservative) trying to claim it as their own. Interestingly, some of today's Green Party progressives advocate vigorously for local control, not unlike the Barry Goldwater conservatives of decades ago.
3. Methods of Constitutional interpretation.
One's degree of fidelity to the original understanding of the Constitution has consequences for one's choices in the policy realm. Conservatives tend to favor "originalism", meaning that they choose to tie the meaning of Constitutional provisions to their understanding at the time of ratification. Originalism, then, limits the realm of possible interpretations, and precludes Constitutional protection for activities not expressly addressed by the document - such as abortion. Originalism also takes a narrow view of federal power, holding that Congress, for instance, only has the ability to pass laws that fall within the limited categories set out in Article I of the Constitution.
Liberals have largely embraced a "living" view of the Constitution, wherein new rights (or powers) can be inferred from the document, even if they do not appear in the original text. For instance, the much cited "right of privacy" does not flow from the specific language of the Constitution, but the Warren court found such a concept therein, and used it to protect certain activities (such as buying contraceptives) from legislative restrictions. Liberal jurists have also expanded the Constitution's Commerce Clause power, allowing Congress to pass laws in areas beyond those expressly set out by the Constitution.
Neo-conservatives, while ostensibly arguing for an originalist view of the Constitution, in fact give wide berth to federal authority, by broadly interpreting the President's Article II "commander-in-chief" powers to extend beyond those set forth in the text of the document.
Libertarians fall into two camps - those who adhere to an originalist Constitutional view, and those who adopt a uniquely libertarian Constitutional analysis. Some libertarian Constitutional theorists - like contemporary liberals - argue for an expansive interpretation of the Ninth Amendment, seeing it as a generator of "unenumerated natural rights" that do not appear explicitly in the document.
4. Government regulation of consensual activity.
This category is, admittedly, an imperfect catch-all. It is, to some degree, a gauge of where one falls in the various "culture war" debates. Conservatives often seek to enlist the government's aid in banning consensual activities that are seen to offend Judeo-Christian moral sensibilities, such as gay marriage. Liberals hold a variety of positions along this spectrum - many supporting the legality of expressive activities such as gay marriage, but at the same time seeking to ban consensual activities that pose a public health risk, such as smoking. Illicit drug use is condemned by conservatives, but tends to split liberal opinion. Libertarians, by and large, oppose the regulation of most activities that only impact direct participants - ranging from dug use, to seat belt use.
Neo-conservatives generally side with conservative attempts to restrict public behavior that risks offending the socio-religious sensibilities of the majority culture. However, neo-conservatives are more likely to accept certain personal behaviors (such as homosexuality), so long as they remain private, and do not threaten to change cultural institutions.
5. The reach of the national security apparatus.
Debates over the scope of the government's search, detention, and surveillance powers have come very much to the fore in recent years. As such, this area of discussion deserves its own category. On one hand, this area is a subset of one's views regarding Constitutional interpretation. On the other, it is a gauge of one's opinions about the propriety of a whole range of policy choices. On the Constitutional issue, the category breaks down like so:
Without explicitly saying so, neo-conservatives have applied the principles of the "living Constitution" to the arena of Presidential power - something which liberals have been hesitant to do in recent years. Although the President's enumerated Article II powers are limited, the neo-conservatives have chosen to cull many more from the document, divining "inherent" powers to conduct certain types of wiretapping for national security purposes, for instance. The neo-conservative Constitutional analysis also places some expressly legislative powers within the President's purview, such as the powers to declare war, or to suspend habeas corpus. A sub-set of "hard-line" or "law and order" conservatives have also been won over to these views since 9/11. Their results-oriented approach was responsible for Iran-Contra and the War on Drugs in years past. What neo-conservatism has added to their perspective is a more complex intellectual framework.
The opposition to this form of Constitutional analysis comes from many quarters: from liberals of all stripes, from libertarians, and from strict, originalist conservatives as well.
The policy choices that frame this debate turn largely upon questions about the collateral effects of national security policy. Hard-liners and neo-conservatives tend to advocate for more vigorous (and sometimes invasive) security measures, and they consider the resultant loss of some liberties as a necessary price to pay for the preservation of social order. Consequently, concepts such as individualized suspicion and due process tend to be impacted under this regime, as political policies are adjusted to allow for expansive surveillance, preventative detention, and "enhanced interrogation techniques." These policy choices are justified by the argument that the present enemy is so cunning, ruthless, and cruel, that extraordinary measures are needed to vanquish it.
As with the Constitutional issues at work here, liberals, libertarians, and originalist conservatives find much common ground in opposing these policies, and tend to advocate for more narrowly tailored security measures.
6. The proper international role of the United States.
This category measures one's views about the proper relation of the United States to the rest of the world. Liberals once endorsed a proactive, internationalist posture for the United States, wherein American military might was viewed as a global stabilizing force. The era of Cold War containment drew heavily upon this vision. In the decades since Vietnam, however, liberals have tended to be more circumspect about U.S. military intervention abroad. This is particularly true of progressives. At the same time, there are some liberals who advocate for foreign military intervention in the context of humanitarian missions.
Libertarians are largely suspicious of foreign military deployments, unless there is a direct threat to the nation that requires them. An older, isolationist view of conservatism joins them in this, while hard-line conservatives tend to support a muscular, results-oriented foreign policy, in service to both economic and geo-political objectives.
Neo-conservatives hew to the hard-line approach, but they attach a more involved ideology. For the neo-conservatives, the United States has a duty to use its military might to not only fend off present enemies, but also to transform recalcitrant regions of the globe which might spawn future threats. Theirs is a nation building enterprise, with all the challenges which attend that effort. Despite its costs and difficulties, retreating from this duty is not an option for the neo-conservatives, who believe that American military predominance must be maintained for the good of the United States, as well as the world.
In large measure, these categories describe the major trends in American political thought today. However, there are many people who don't fall neatly within these boundaries. Because of this, these categories can (and often should) be mixed, in order to best match one's unique political profile. For instance, one can be a liberal with some libertarian leanings. Or the converse can be true. Moreover, it should also be noted that the profiles created by these categories do not necessarily hue to partisan structures. A neo-liberal, neo-conservative can find a home in either the Democratic or Republican party, as the past two administrations have demonstrated.
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