You say you are a liberal.

T

The Libertarian

Guest
Do you believe the following?

1. Standards for admissions to universities, fire departments, etc. should be lowered for people of color.

2. Bilingual education for children of immigrants, rather than immersion in English, is good for them and for America.

3. Murderers should never be put to death.

4. During the Cold War, America should have adopted a nuclear arms freeze.

5. Colleges should not allow ROTC programs.

6. It was wrong to wage war against Saddam Hussein in the Gulf War.

7. Poor parents should not be allowed to have vouchers to send their children to private schools.

8. It is good that trial lawyers and teachers unions are the two biggest contributors to the Democratic Party.

9.Marriage should be redefined from male-female to any two people.

10. A married couple should not have more of a right to adopt a child than two men or two women.

11. The Boy Scouts should not be allowed to use parks or any other public places and should be prohibited from using churches and synagogues for their meetings.

12. The present high tax rates are good.

13. Speech codes on college campuses are good and American values are bad.

14. The Israelis and Palestinians are morally equivalent.

15. The United Nations is a moral force for good in the world, and therefore America should be subservient to it and such international institutions as a world court.

16. It is good that colleges have dropped hundreds of men's sports teams in order to meet gender-based quotas.

17. No abortions can be labeled immoral.

18. Restaurants should be prohibited by law from allowing customers to choose between a smoking and a non-smoking section.

19. High schools should make condoms available to students and teach them how to use them.

12. Racial profiling for terrorists is wrong -- a white American grandmother should as likely be searched as a Saudi young male.

13. Racism and poverty -- not a lack of fathers and a crisis of values -- are the primary causes of violent crime in the inner city.

14. It is wrong and unconstitutional for students to be told, "God bless you" at their graduation.

15. No culture is morally superior to any other.

Those are all liberal positions. How many of them do you hold?

Dennis Prager - Written by Dennis - Are You a Liberal?
 

Jones

fILE A GRIEVE!
Staff member
Do you believe the following?

1. Standards for admissions to universities, fire departments, etc. should be lowered for people of color.

2. Bilingual education for children of immigrants, rather than immersion in English, is good for them and for America.

3. Murderers should never be put to death.

4. During the Cold War, America should have adopted a nuclear arms freeze.

5. Colleges should not allow ROTC programs.

6. It was wrong to wage war against Saddam Hussein in the Gulf War.

7. Poor parents should not be allowed to have vouchers to send their children to private schools.

8. It is good that trial lawyers and teachers unions are the two biggest contributors to the Democratic Party.

9.Marriage should be redefined from male-female to any two people.

10. A married couple should not have more of a right to adopt a child than two men or two women.

11. The Boy Scouts should not be allowed to use parks or any other public places and should be prohibited from using churches and synagogues for their meetings.

12. The present high tax rates are good.

13. Speech codes on college campuses are good and American values are bad.

14. The Israelis and Palestinians are morally equivalent.

15. The United Nations is a moral force for good in the world, and therefore America should be subservient to it and such international institutions as a world court.

16. It is good that colleges have dropped hundreds of men's sports teams in order to meet gender-based quotas.

17. No abortions can be labeled immoral.

18. Restaurants should be prohibited by law from allowing customers to choose between a smoking and a non-smoking section.

19. High schools should make condoms available to students and teach them how to use them.

12. Racial profiling for terrorists is wrong -- a white American grandmother should as likely be searched as a Saudi young male.

13. Racism and poverty -- not a lack of fathers and a crisis of values -- are the primary causes of violent crime in the inner city.

14. It is wrong and unconstitutional for students to be told, "God bless you" at their graduation.

15. No culture is morally superior to any other.

Those are all liberal positions. How many of them do you hold?

Dennis Prager - Written by Dennis - Are You a Liberal?

Those aren't liberal positions, they are strawmen. The people you hear proclaiming those to be liberal positions are generally conservatives, like Dennis Prager.
 

Jones

fILE A GRIEVE!
Staff member
Which of these are not liberal positions?
All of them. Sure, you can find people who hold some of these positions, you can even find people who hold some of these positions and call themselves "liberals". Some of them are also held by people who call themselves conservative. The idea that all liberals hold all these postions is simply ludicrous, it's like saying that all conservatives are racists who hate poor people almost as much as they hate homosexuals. And no, I'm not a liberal, despite what you may have heard from BigArrowUp :laugh:. I just know BS when I see it. If you want to know what a liberal thinks about the issues, don't ask Dennis Prager, ask a liberal. Jeez.
 

Jones

fILE A GRIEVE!
Staff member
Sorry, but the Democratic Party, as a body, supports most if not all these positions. I would be ashamed too.
Really? Can you give me the link to the "Democratic Party Manifesto" where it it says they support all these positions? Or at least post up a statement from someone in a leadership postion at the DNC voicing support for "most, if not all" of these positions? Take your time finding them, I'll wait :wink:.
 

Leftinbuilding

Well-Known Member
Oh grow up! Of course no one has stood up and listed this litany as their platform. That would be suicidal. But to deny they are the offspring of liberalism is pure idiocy. Again, I too would be ashamed.
 

Jones

fILE A GRIEVE!
Staff member
Oh grow up! Of course no one has stood up and listed this litany as their platform. That would be suicidal. But to deny they are the offspring of liberalism is pure idiocy. Again, I too would be ashamed.

Aside from being ashamed of yourself (which doesn't really count), you're not doing too well in supporting your statement. Can you come up with anything? Anything at all?
 
T

The Libertarian

Guest
I found this well written piece from Dennis Prager to be insightful.

What makes a liberal?

Why do people hold liberal-left positions? (Liberal and left were once very different, but not anymore.)

This question has plagued me because I have long believed that most people, liberal or conservative, mean well. Very few people wake up in the morning planning to harm society. Yet, many liberal positions -- I emphasize liberal positions rather than liberals because most people who call themselves liberal do not hold most contemporary liberal positions -- have been wreaking havoc on America and the world.
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member
You could write volumes on this term alone and still never see the true end. You really have to go back IMO and study the ages of mankind and how mankind developed the systems of governance and society and among that would included it's various social, religious and cultural beliefs & growth.

In the case of western European man of which American society was developed from, one needs to understand past European governing systems and beliefs as well as the impact of the religious and cultural aspects. What we call liberal today and it's implied meanings would standout as vastly different from what was called liberal 200 plus years ago during the "age of Enlightenment."

IMO and using the classical definition, there is no "liberal" movement today to speak of as it pertains to the powers that rule Washington and when I say powers I mean the Democrat and Republican parties on equal scale. One may hold more power during a time frame but the end result over time for the nation as a whole varies little. The democrat party would be what I would call interventionist and maybe social interventionist is a better term but that is not totally accurate and the same is true of the republicans but I'll get to that.

The democrats see issues out in the public sphere and how to use gov't and it's force of law via gov't bureaucracy to solve these issues. Also the thinking being as these issues are addressed and hopefully with some satisfaction to the persons effected that they will endear themselves to the democrats and on election day vote accordingly. Human nature being what it is that tends to hold true.

The republicans themselves are quite the same as they see gov't as the mechanism for good and solving problems but with a slight twist to it. They do mandate by law and force of law but they use the so-called "privatized" model to give the illusion of seperation from gov't. This is in truth an illusion and the recent changes to 401k's are a good example. Now by federal law, an employer can compell an employee into a 401k plan. Now I'm not against 401k's, I have one and I've even advocated elimination of our pension system in exchange for the 401k vehicle (I also know I'm outnumbered too, LOL!) but what we have today is gov't by force using interventionism but the maintenance of the vehicle is by private means, in this case the employer and employee. Social Security Privatization? Still force and compelling to participate but the maintenance vehicle is in private hands but overseen by federal law.

In other words, both sides are interventionist and rarely differ that much when you look at it from both sides but the real difference is the democrats would maintain all control of the vehicle from creating it to driving it whereas the republicans would create the vehicle, detail driving and maintenance instructions but then in effect, hire someone else to drive it under the illusion of saying this solution is a free market economic solution when in fact the market was falsely created by gov't in the firstplace or at best they took a real market and manipulated it to their own ends. Does this endear them to a voting block as well? Absolutely.

So at the end of the day both sides as I see it really are the same thing as under either one gov't grows bigger and bigger. It just the means of how that differs, that's all. So the labels conservative and liberal IMO really have no application because in reality they both are conserving a system that grows the size and scope of gov't. They both in effect are really conservatives in the truest meaning of the word.

Personally I think Lew Rockwell summed it up best in a speech to democrat and republican Congressional aids by in Dec. 2005'

The Impossibility of Imposed Freedom by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.
 

CTOTH

Not retired, just tired
In my opinion, labelling people is pointless. It's not until we stray from the idealology that we must fall into one category or another, that we can have a true democracy.
America is not democratic anymore.:sad:
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member
In my opinion, labelling people is pointless. It's not until we stray from the idealology that we must fall into one category or another, that we can have a true democracy.
America is not democratic anymore.:sad:

Do you really want a "true democracy" where the majority always rules?

I propose we kill CTOTH immediately and seize his lands and property and I just got a majority of people here to vote and support my proposal. The measure is now passed so CTOTH stand up and now proclaim, "We who are about to die salute you!"

Pure and true democracy is not a good system of governance IMO because someone who is in the minority for whatever reason will be forced to live according to majority rules. You may not be old enough to remember when certain folks had to sit on the back of the bus but I do and it was according to the will of the majority. The only option at that point for a minority of many or even 1 would be to either convince enough to make a majority of people to move to the minority position in order to protect them/himself or get inside the majority and work to manipulate it or swing deals under the table allowing him to maintain his "priviledge" (notice I didn't say rights because those are beyond the control of others) in order for them/him to continue a certain form of lifestyle or just ordinary being in life which they have decided works best for them.

I'm pretty sure you didn't mean this extreme form of democracy in your statement as I would never offer to harm you in any way but in many respects the only reason we don't have that extreme in America at this point is the people in the majority haven't realized the potential and coalesced into a united front that smashes all opposition to it's desires and goals. If you think it impossible I suggest you look at the history of mankind and from a western European standpoint this has been our history time and time again especially when the reigns of power are at stack! Also if you think the court system would overrule then I hope you never see that nightmare scenario get smashed to the 4 winds. Congress has the power to legislate jurisdiction and can forebade the courts from hearing such cases that challenge such issues. Also the executive branch has certain powers that allow it to circumvent not only the courts but the Congress as well. If one looks now we can see it routinely use in the halls of power in DC.

Your point of labeling people being pointless is very true and from what I see they do so in order to demean and shame in order to use psychological force to make you bend to their will. And your point that America in not democratic is true just as America is not really free anymore either. We just live with the illusion or what's left of a shadow of freedom and liberty that we once had and were.
 

Overpaid Union Thug

Well-Known Member
It is not impossible for someone that is a liberal to disagree with some of the positions on that list. I think that most of us would agree that if someone agrees with the majority of it then they ARE a liberal. At best it's a generic representation of liberal views. That is how I look at it.
 
Top