01 April 2005
Freedom and Progress
It is often said that the first step is always the most difficult to take. Months of contemplation of what to do about our current state of affairs has ultimately led to this author's present endeavor; Freedom & Progress. After the 2004 Presidential election, it was clear that something had to be done. A new line of thinking needed to emerge in the public discourse. New ideas and common sense need to be heard, thought that transcends the dogma of the false Left-Right debate.
The Republican's reaction to the outcome of the election, i.e. declaring a "mandate" based on the notion that "moral values" was the guiding compass of the majority of American voters, was flawed and dangerous. It also ultimately and recently exposed the Republicans' silent weakness. It has long been this author's opinion that the majority of Americans as well as Republicans do not equate "moral values" with extreme right wingism. The Democrats' collective reaction to President Bush's reelection has been even worse. The supposedly internal debate among Democrats has been especially external, and it is the observation of this author that the momentum seems to be on the side of extreme left wingism. After all, the Left expressly alleges that they "bought" and therefore "own" the party. (Incidentally, this is a humorous characterization coming from a group who seeks to impose control on capitalism.) So, rather than accepting a legitimate defeat, regrouping and replanning, the Democrats' collective reaction has been to merely react to anything that the Bush Administration or their Republican counterparts offer.
It is amazing that we have reached a time when one can hear friends on the Left urging realism in foreign policy and friends on the Right invoking the call for global democratic rights. Indeed, the circle is not round. Why have the Democrats stop believing? Woodrow Wilson was a Democrat, after all. As was Franklin Roosevelt when he sent armies around the globe and liberated populations in Europe and Asia. And President Clinton, who Americans elected twice as President, was surely a Democrat when he used military intervention in the name of global rights in Kosovo. The Left now calls an end to this proud tradition and act instead in the name of stability because the latest messenger of our historic calling is not only a Republican, but the figure that they most loathe, President Bush.
Almost invariably, the Left always invokes cultural relativism to justify its tolerance of oppression and acts of terrorism. Similarly, it is cultural relativism that justifies the lack of political and economic freedom in Arab parts of the world, particularly the lack of any iota of womens' rights. The friends on the Left who fashion themselves feminists when it comes to a woman's right to choose to abort a fetus, or affirmative action to add more women to the Harvard's math and science student roster, cry "cultural difference," as they watch women in the Arab and South Asian world denied the right to vote or drive or choose to marry someone not designated for them.
This author expects that should any of my friends on the Left read this first entry of Freedom & Progress, they will call me ethnocentric. I submit to you all that it is better to be called ethnocentric and be on the side of both Freedom and Progress, than honor cultural relativism and tolerate oppression and terrorism.
Domestically, we have reached a time when Republicans are the only ones offering new ideas that address concrete problems. In areas such as taxation and social security, where real, systemic problems threaten our long-term security, Republicans are not only the only party with ideas on how to solve these problems, but also seem to be the only party that recognizes such problems exist to begin with. Of course, in Republicans' overreaching pattern, they seek to privatize social security without addressing its long-term solvency problem, and want to do away with the progressive tax code without considering the immediate effects of such reform on the working classes. Rather than advocating new ideas of their own to counter Republican shortfalls, Democrats instead offer nothing substantive, but resistance. Resistance, not only to the ideas offered by Republicans, but resistance to even the acknowledgment of the problems themselves.
There are false imperatives alive in the present public discourse. Is it progressive when the Left argues to conserve the foreign policy status quo in the name of stability? Can it be called conservative to advocate global rights of freedom? Can it be called progressive when Democrats advocate conserving the present model of social security - a system over eighty years in age? Is it conservative for Republicans to completely abandon programs that historically brought a leap of progress to American culture; programs that Americans have come to rely on and trust? Why are these phrases so misused, and so mangled in our ongoing conversation? Freedom & Progress aims to reclaim and clarify the use of these terms and to add to the public discourse new ideas, clear perspective, and common sense.
Freedom & Progress welcomes your respectful comments, critiques, and suggestions. If something here provokes you in one way or another, please share this page with your friends and associates. In the end, we are all in this together. Thank you and welcome.
The Republican's reaction to the outcome of the election, i.e. declaring a "mandate" based on the notion that "moral values" was the guiding compass of the majority of American voters, was flawed and dangerous. It also ultimately and recently exposed the Republicans' silent weakness. It has long been this author's opinion that the majority of Americans as well as Republicans do not equate "moral values" with extreme right wingism. The Democrats' collective reaction to President Bush's reelection has been even worse. The supposedly internal debate among Democrats has been especially external, and it is the observation of this author that the momentum seems to be on the side of extreme left wingism. After all, the Left expressly alleges that they "bought" and therefore "own" the party. (Incidentally, this is a humorous characterization coming from a group who seeks to impose control on capitalism.) So, rather than accepting a legitimate defeat, regrouping and replanning, the Democrats' collective reaction has been to merely react to anything that the Bush Administration or their Republican counterparts offer.
It is amazing that we have reached a time when one can hear friends on the Left urging realism in foreign policy and friends on the Right invoking the call for global democratic rights. Indeed, the circle is not round. Why have the Democrats stop believing? Woodrow Wilson was a Democrat, after all. As was Franklin Roosevelt when he sent armies around the globe and liberated populations in Europe and Asia. And President Clinton, who Americans elected twice as President, was surely a Democrat when he used military intervention in the name of global rights in Kosovo. The Left now calls an end to this proud tradition and act instead in the name of stability because the latest messenger of our historic calling is not only a Republican, but the figure that they most loathe, President Bush.
Almost invariably, the Left always invokes cultural relativism to justify its tolerance of oppression and acts of terrorism. Similarly, it is cultural relativism that justifies the lack of political and economic freedom in Arab parts of the world, particularly the lack of any iota of womens' rights. The friends on the Left who fashion themselves feminists when it comes to a woman's right to choose to abort a fetus, or affirmative action to add more women to the Harvard's math and science student roster, cry "cultural difference," as they watch women in the Arab and South Asian world denied the right to vote or drive or choose to marry someone not designated for them.
This author expects that should any of my friends on the Left read this first entry of Freedom & Progress, they will call me ethnocentric. I submit to you all that it is better to be called ethnocentric and be on the side of both Freedom and Progress, than honor cultural relativism and tolerate oppression and terrorism.
Domestically, we have reached a time when Republicans are the only ones offering new ideas that address concrete problems. In areas such as taxation and social security, where real, systemic problems threaten our long-term security, Republicans are not only the only party with ideas on how to solve these problems, but also seem to be the only party that recognizes such problems exist to begin with. Of course, in Republicans' overreaching pattern, they seek to privatize social security without addressing its long-term solvency problem, and want to do away with the progressive tax code without considering the immediate effects of such reform on the working classes. Rather than advocating new ideas of their own to counter Republican shortfalls, Democrats instead offer nothing substantive, but resistance. Resistance, not only to the ideas offered by Republicans, but resistance to even the acknowledgment of the problems themselves.
There are false imperatives alive in the present public discourse. Is it progressive when the Left argues to conserve the foreign policy status quo in the name of stability? Can it be called conservative to advocate global rights of freedom? Can it be called progressive when Democrats advocate conserving the present model of social security - a system over eighty years in age? Is it conservative for Republicans to completely abandon programs that historically brought a leap of progress to American culture; programs that Americans have come to rely on and trust? Why are these phrases so misused, and so mangled in our ongoing conversation? Freedom & Progress aims to reclaim and clarify the use of these terms and to add to the public discourse new ideas, clear perspective, and common sense.
Freedom & Progress welcomes your respectful comments, critiques, and suggestions. If something here provokes you in one way or another, please share this page with your friends and associates. In the end, we are all in this together. Thank you and welcome.
# posted by Publicola @ 12:00 AM 
