You have no idea how absolutely I agree with this.

I've always loosely labeled myself "Fiscal Conservative, Social Liberal," but maybe (after reading that) I've just been liberal all along. Yikes. Okay, now what?

Alex,

There are very few liberals, as Dean points out; but on the flip side there are very few conservatives. Smart liberals and conservatives live happily within the strictures of their time - ie, they don't seek either a liberal or conservative utopia, but instead seek to inject as much of their ideals as possible into the political debate.

Its my opinion that probably two thirds of the people who today self-describe themselves as conservative are actually liberals - its just that because they don't toe the bizarre "party line" of the self-described liberals they are in a sense forced to be conservatives. You can be in favor of higher taxes, gun control, abortion on demand but if you then turn around and say you want to end affirmative action, then you've become a conservative (well, truth be told, to our "liberal" friends, you've become a racist, but thats another post...).

True conservatives hark back to Edmund Burke and the fundamental underpinning of our beliefs are:

1. Change is constant; but change for the sake of change is destructive.

2. No man, or group of men, can acquire sufficient wisdom to enable them to pass judgement upon the organizations and traditions inherited from past ages.

3. The duty of government is to protect the minority - with the further clarification that we are all minorities. I may be of the white-skinned majority in the United States, but I am of the Catholic minority, the white male minority, the conservative minority, the Republican minority, etc, etc, etc...it is in what Burke called our "little platoons"; our churches, clubs, businesses and, since its 2003, our weblogs, that we find our primary defense against the tyranny of the political majority - thus the primary thing to do is to vigorously preserve the separate and independent characteristics of our self-selected groups - from this stems our abhorrance of welfare, state-funded education, nationalised health care, etc, etc, etc.

Conservatives are absolutely vital to the proper functioning of society - we serve as the memory of the body politic and the anti-body to radical change; liberals, properly understood, are the life-blood of a healthy society, without which a society degenerates for lack of change. Our problem in this modern age is to figure out how to purge the people who call themselves liberal, but are anything but liberal - they wreck all normal political discourse; they put liberalism in a bad light, and make rightist reactionaries seem reasonable in comparison.

Strictly speaking, "liberal" and "conservative" are names for emotional predispositions, not political positions or ideologies. To show the havoc these words wreak when used politically, Russian "conservatives" share an awful lot of convictions with American "liberals." American "conservatives" are nearly indistinguishable from French "liberals."

We also have the horror of "moderation." If Smith holds "conservative" positions on economics but "liberal" positions on social matters, he's a "moderate." But what's Jones if he holds "liberal" positions on economics and "conservative" ones on social affairs? Another "moderate" -- who shares not one opinion with Smith?

The two-dimensional "Nolan Chart" approach to political mapping, a highly useful tool as it stands, would become even more valuable if it were used to popularize some new terminology. Choosing the terms for the poles and getting people to agree on them? Ah, that's the hard part.

Dean:

One distinction I've sometimes drawn is between those who process liberalism adverbially, versus those who process liberalism adjectivally.

That is, is a liberal someone who actually conducts himself liberally? Or is a liberal someone who adopts stances that have been predefined as liberal stances, regardless of whether he conducts himself liberally or illiberally?

Likewise, is a tolerant person someone who actually conducts himself tolerantly, displaying an actual tolerant spirit toward others? Or is a tolerant person someone who adopts stances that have been predefined as tolerant stances, even if he habitually promotes these stances in a spirit of rabid, fire-breathing intolerance?

And is an open-minded person someone who actually considers other viewpoints open-mindedly? Or is an open-minded person someone who adopts positions which have been rubberstamped in advance as open-minded positions, and who is then rigidly closed-minded toward any stance which has not received in advance the stamp of approval?

I originally arrived at this adverbial versus adjectival distinction trying to understand how it could be that some proponents of tolerance I was acquainted with were quite tolerant people; while other advocates of tolerance I knew were among the most harshly and rabidly intolerant individuals I had ever met, habitually and viciously intolerant precisely on behalf of tolerance.

I think this adverbial versus adjectival distinction points to a dynamic far deeper in the human psyche than mere surface matters of "self-contradiction," or the (predictable, stale, tired) charge of "hypocrisy." It points rather to how apparent polar opposites can be united in a person's character in such a way that these opposites egg each other on to further and further extremes. Look around you— I think most of us have known people who are like this, and they are usually people who are (in my sense of the term) "adjectivally" driven. I find it a fascinating human phenomenon.

As you can tell, my own preference lies strongly in the "adverbial" direction. And I would guess that most of the liberal/leftoids you're bemoaning, Dean, tend to process matters in an almost entirely "adjectival" fashion.

Real liberals= libertarians. It is a term that was hijacked by the left as a euphemism for socialist. Much of what so-called liberals call for is illiberal in extremis. In most cases what is more accurate is right of centre statist (conservative) or left-of-centre statist (socialist). Both seek to use the state to achieve their own goals, one driven by religious goals and the other mostly driven by "social-justice" goals (which can be religious as well such as Christian socialists).

I have actually written a book on this very subject called Statism Sucks! Ver. 2.0

Dean, there is something not right here. If a classic liberal (and yes, I understand your point) is an individual who is for forward progress, open to new ideas, willing to challenge old conventions etc., then part of that liberalism of philosophy must also be the recognition that the train has left the station on the term "liberal."

You cannot simultanously require forward progress and not get the term caught up in that same momentum.

The word liberal has been usurped and it no longer means what you want it to mean.

I tried for years to demand that others respect the term feminist to mean "an individual who supports and advocates for equal opportunity for women." By my definition it was gender-neutral and didn't require an infringement of male rights to achive it. I gave up. It's pointless. The term is gone.

You might as well argue that "gay" means happy.

You're going to have to come up with a new term to describe yourself. Otherwise, you're guilty of the same conservatism you find to be reactionary.

At one point, I called myself a "radical conservative" which on the face of it is oxymoronic.

And while I really do like much about Libertarianism--The Philosophy of the Adolescent Mind (c) Cheap certainties for easy use (TM), I don't think calling it true liberalism is okay.

A very good post, which I have linked.

But I'm afraid that the meaning of the word "liberalism" has changed, and true liberals won't be able to get it back.

"Building Bridges of Understanding" links "bridges" and "understanding" in a phrase that tends to be suggestive of the idea that if you can only understand, there will be a way to connect to the "other". On the surface this is a great idea, reaching out to each other and forming bonds of respect and love and peace and etc.

HOWEVER, having understanding is about knowledge. It is perfectly possible to understand something and disagree completely. Or worse, disrepect it or actively seek its destruction.

I think the notion of bridges and understanding plays to the assumption that there is sufficient common ground to overcome the differences. I'm not sure there is anymore, based on the nature of the issues.

In another post, Dean says that "What I can't figure out is if any of this says something profound about our politics today, or whether it's always been like this, and the internet is only making it more apparent". I started thinking about the issues separating politics today. What comes to mind is that it seems many hot-button are not about being "smart" versus "stupid" but are about issues that can be identified as "moral" or "immoral".

Telling someone they're immoral is significantly stronger than telling someone they're wrong. When the issue is about personal values, the discussion of the issue must necessarily become personal. This is not to say that I call people that believe in abortion "babykillers". That would be rude and judgemental and hostile. Yet, the very fact that I believe abortion is killing babies must sink in on some level as a personal condemnation of the people that support abortion, whether I mean it that way or not (and I usually don't).

Its much harder to find comprimise on moral issues. What happens when the facts are concrete, but the decisions about how to value those facts are different? Combativeness, bitterness, perhaps namecalling. Think about it: you can't change them, you can't join them.

For many people, supporting Bush is a moral choice. Its NOT about the economy (although I think he's doing a good job), and its not about supporting his overseas actions (that didn't make me support Clinton). I think that he's a decent man who is trying to do the right thing. But, thats according to my values. There are whole herds of people who have different values. They aren't overly pleased with Bush. They will NEVER be overly pleased with Bush and if they were then I wouldn't be.

I don't hold out much hope for "bridges of understanding" leading to anything other than a certainty that I am indeed different from those liberals on the other side of the chasm.

Note: This does NOT mean that I hate liberals. Some liberals are sweet people, and I've even invited liberals to dinner at times.

I don't think so, and I'll tell you why.

There are a growing number of feminists who are questioning and repudiating the gender-nazi party line found in groups like NOW and academia.

Furthermore, most dictionaries still list "open minded" and "not rooted in orthodoxy" and such as the primary definitions for "liberal." We still speak of liberal democracy, liberal education, and liberal attitudes as positive things.

Indeed, I view with anger the smug condescension of political leftists who say, "Yes, I'm a liberal! That means I'm open-minded and tolerant, and people who disagree with me therefore by definition are not!" You still catch left-leaning bloggers and people like Gerry Trudeau peddling this kind of cant even when it's patently obvious that these folks are often the very opposite of thoughtful, open-minded, or liberal.

There are liberal leftists. But they are a shrinking minority, and it's high time we say so.

Words can be taken back. I am NOT a Rush Limbaugh dittohead, a Liddy-worshipper, or a follower of ANYONE'S party line. I don't vote party line, I don't think party line, and I don't argue party line. I don't hate all tradition, but I despise the way tradition substitutes for thought among so many conservatives, and I think conservatives are just plain wrong on many issues. I am not a rightist, because I am not an authoritarian. I am not a libertarian because I am not an anarchist and I despise the petty ways that libertarians engage in their own ridiculous one-upmanship games as to who is the "true" libertarian or not depending on how closely they hew to anyone's orthodoxy.

I am a liberal. I strive for open-mindedness and tolernace, and the maximum possible degree of individual liberty consistent with a just society. I believe in respecting and listening to all points of view. I believe in helping those who find themselves in desperate straits through no fault of their own, and in protecting the innocent. I believe in tolerance for all races, colors, and non-violent, non-coercive creeds, sexual orientations, and other activities. I believe in defense of the homeland, and that the best defense of the homeland has been shown in the last generation to be working to spread the liberal values of democracy and individual liberty that this country has done so much to protect and promote throughout its history.

And by the way, people who want to call me a "neocon" are showing themselves to be fools, unless they believe all of the above are the exclusive property of neocons.

Some want to call me a "classical liberal." I suppose I can deal with that. But even there, I take issue. Makes me sound quaint, old fashioned, some kind of secret conservative-at-heart. Bah.

I no longer refer to the left as liberals, because too many of them are the exact opposite of liberal. I refuse to give up. This word has been hijacked by right-wingers and left-wingers alike for their own purposes, and I plan to take it back--even if I'm the only person fighting the battle. ;-)

"Its much harder to find comprimise on moral issues."

As a liberal, I thought I'd throw in an idea about moral issues. It may not change people's minds but it might reduce the pitch of the rhetoric. And that is, not just discuss the particular moral issue but discuss the very basis by which the two contesting sides make moral claims in the first place. I suspect if there was some understanding of moral systems, and ways of getting to these claims, it'd be harder to demonize the other.

"Real liberals= libertarians. It is a term that was hijacked by the left as a euphemism for socialist"

I think there was a recognition that classical liberalism was aiming at targeting concentrated power. Originally this was aimed at government, but by the late 19th century there was a recognition that concentrated corporate power was just as destructive. I'd recommend John Dewey's 1935 work Liberalism and Social Action as one of those texts which mark such a shift.

Semantically, liberal is left and conservative is right, right? So that seems to leave anyone not a fascist (yes I know what Nazi is short for) or communist only the molecule-wide balance point on the spectrum. Obviously this is ridiculous as all statists put together are a distant minority to those who simply want to pursue their lives with the benefits of liberty, even if they don't fully understand its provenance. Rather than a spectrum; one dimension, a more apt model is a polymer. Each individual has a myriad of opinion, some intellectually formed but most are a sort of auto-pilot of human interactions that may intersect, intertwine, run in parallel or never get within a mile of those of any particular other individual. This strongly favors what Dean calls "liberalism" in that any dealing with other primates is going to go MUCH smoother with tolerance, patience and solidarity. This is why I am so optimistic over the long haul. This space age wonder polymer resists shattering, abrasion, sunlight and exposure to most common chemicals. It is far more durable than the brittle shale of ideologies that can stand no more than five seconds of rational scrutiny.

“3. The duty of government is to protect the minority - with the further clarification that we are all minorities. I may be of the white-skinned majority in the United States, but I am of the Catholic minority, the white male minority, the conservative minority, the Republican minority, etc, etc, etc...it is in what Burke called our "little platoons"; our churches, clubs, businesses and, since its 2003, our weblogs, that we find our primary defense against the tyranny of the political majority - thus the primary thing to do is to vigorously preserve the separate and independent characteristics of our self-selected groups - from this stems our abhorrance of welfare, state-funded education, nationalised health care, etc, etc, etc.”

Trouble is, Mark, that doesn’t answer the fundamental question of which rights and minorities get priority when the rights and interests of certain minorities (or individuals) collide with the rights and interests of other minorities (or the minority of one). It seems that if the government is going to try to protect the rights of “natural persons” to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, then access to food, healthcare, or an education is essential. Should the government protect those rights or the rights of other individuals or minorities not to be affected by taxes? What if the political majority is correct when it decides that it is, in fact, better guaranteeing the rights of all minorities by making sure that every individual has the ability to prosper and contribute to society?

As political definitions, “conservative”, “liberal”, libertarian”, often delineate which group or individual rights one believes deserve protection from “the tyranny of the political majority” or some other “minority”. The ostensible philosophy that is used to justify the choice of which minorities should be protected by government can be little more than political branding or individual rationalization. At least those are the only reasons to intentionally wear or try to affect the definition of these sort of labels.

Shep,

Conservatives answer that with the statement that no one has a right to the lawful property of another - ie, you may be starving to death while I feast at table, but you have no right to my food. As a person, I believe it my Christian duty to share my bounty with the putatively starving you, but this is another matter entirely separate from human rights.

Conservatives worry that if we start circumscibing the rights of people to their own (or of organised groups to their own), then we have stepped off on to a path which will eventually lead to government determining precisely what each individual gets and can do. You'll be the first to acknowledge my right to believe what I wish to believe, but as a conservative I stake out the position that any interference in my believing is tantmount to taking my right away entirely. As an example, if you take something I say to he hateful and then further demand that the groups I belong to eschew the supposedly hateful things I believe (or that the groups believe) regardless of the reason or manner in which you do this, then you have abrogated my right to believe as I believe.

Thus when the government demands that a school which gets federal money adhere to certain principles, it is violating the rights of that school and the people who attend it to believe as they wish. Similarly, if you take away the federal money because the school chooses not to adhere to the federal mandate, then you are also violating the rights of the school and its people - you are, in effect, dictating what is to be considered correct ideas and punishing people for holding what you consider to be bad ideas.

Now, you and I would agree that the KKK University of the South Rising Again would not be a good thing - we'd mutually abhor its concept and condemn it on a regular basis. But if federal money is given to students to attend school, then you cannot justly say that this one, particular school is out - its the government telling people what they can believe. Wrong, wrong, wrong. The conservative solution to this sort of conundrum is to simply not have the government involved - if the government is not passing out the taxpayer cash to schools, then there's no worry that the cash in question will go to vile, inhuman organizations propagating hatred.

Now, all that I've written is a bit of an extreme example given out to illustrate a point. But the truth of it holds even for something like providing food for starving babies. Start passing out the federal cash for starving babies and the federal government, susceptible to either majority tyranny or minority pressure, will start demanding that the actual instruments of baby feeding conform to certain established norms...even though some baby-feeding groups, who feed babies just fine, don't agree with established norms on one or more points.

This also points out why there is an affinity between conservatives and libertarians - both groups have a long list of things they want government out of. Libertarians and conservatives, however, part company when it comes to what constitutes a well-ordered society. Conservatives are of the opinion that the basic human is a presumptive savage who must be tamed - this being especially true of the way we view children and how they are to be reared. Boiled down, what this part of conservatism says is that while you have the right to be as dissolute as you want, you have no actual right to do it in public where it essentially robs the young of the right to a good example as their morals are being formed.

"it essentially robs the young of the right to a good example as their morals are being formed."
Huh? I'm on the hook to demonstrate proper deportment to everyone's snot-nose? You are flat barking up the wrong tree there!

So what do conservatives think when they read Aristotle since he does speak of distributive justice?

megapotamus,

Yes - you see, another part of conservatism is to realise that we are not a mere collection of individuals in space, but also a succession of individuals in time. If the only thing we had to worry about was how people are today, then that would be easy - but we have to have a mind, at least a bit, for the future.

Among the many rights of human beings, is the right to live up to the heights of their talents, if they have a mind to exercise them to the full. If you take someone in the developemental stage of life and deliberately twist their perceptions of reality, then you have robbed them of that ability to choose to develope and exercise their full talents - you have, in effect, denied them their right to pursue happiness.

Its one of those innumerable "gotcha" moments of life, you see; your right to individual expression is, indeed, a right...but as with all rights, they may only be exercised in as much as the exercise of said rights does not interfere with the rights of others. I guess this is a good time to put in that any conservative will tell you that you are overwhelmed with responsibilities, while the exercise of your rights is actually just the cherry topping on the sundae of life - necessary for the full effect of life to be experienced, but not nearly as vital as all that ice cream of responsibility holding it up.

What I'm explaining here, of course, is the conservative viewpoint - if you disagree, I'll call you mistaken, but not evil or anything like that. As I've said elsewhere in this thread, what I attempt to do is inject as much of my ideals into the debate as possible, knowing that I'll never get to that conservative utopia.

So, yes, you are responsible for proper deportment in front of the snot nose's of others. I may be barking up the wrong tree, but its this insistence upon public probity which builds citizens who wont break into your house and take all you have; thank the boring that you have the ability to behave boorishly in public.

Dwight,

Its been a looong while since I read any Aristotle; run distributive justice, as a concept, by me for a moment so I'll be sure I know what I'm talking about....

As a conservative that read Aristotle, I think he's not perfect. That is not to condemn him, just not deify him. He was just a guy, a smart guy, but still ... Being old and being widely read does not make you infallible.

I also think Freud and St. Augustine were creepy, but thats an entirely different post :)

Allison,

St Augustine creepy?

Dean, you're complaining about the liberal with as much passion as someone like myself could argue about how you've impugned Conservatism. You didn't care that you were insulting in how you used the term. It has become culturally acceptable, and PC, to attack anyone who calls themselves "Conservative."

What's the difference?

You seem to be suggesting that "Conservative" is evil, yet it is a tradition and a mode of operating that is equally deep, equally thoughtful, and can be backed up with as much fact and reason as your definition of "liberal."

Are Liddy, Coulter, and Limbaugh the only conservatives you can name? Did you do that on purpose or are those really the only names that come to mind? What about Thomas Sowell, Charles Krauthammer, William F. Buckley, Michelle Malkin, Heather MacDonald, Dinesh D'Souza, Peggy Noonan, Victor Davis Hanson, etc. You just said, “I think conservatives are just plain wrong on many issues.” Do you disagree with or think these people are wrong all the time because they are conservatives? These are self-identified conservatives. Why do you list only the most extremist and obnoxious of conservatives? Do you really believe that the list of people I’ve just named argue solely from a basis of tradition?

Do you know what Conservative means to someone like me who uses it to describe myself? Do you care? You want people to care what liberal means. Do you offer the same in return?

Classical conservatism means people who are cautious about change, without having all the facts first. They demand proof of a need, a firm and thought out basis or argument before they'll consider the matter. The default is "leave it alone without good reason." That does not mean they will not accept change or consider it. But it means they will refuse to be required to prove a negative. "What will it hurt?" is not the question. But that’s the question that keeps getting put to them. Then they’re accused of being immovable. We’re not immovable. We’d just like a little back up before we’re willing to meddle with things.

"What will it benefit?", "What proof do you have that it will work out the way you think?" and most importantly, “What does the historical record teach about things like this that have been attempted in the past?” are the Conservative thinkers default positions. It doesn't mean they won't advocate for it if a need arises. Liberal has come to mean the opposite of that--change things first, ask questions later, and then blames someone else if it doesn't work out the way it was supposed to.

Conservatives, like me, watched as a whole lot of progressives decided to muck with things. We not only don't see any improvement in a lot of these areas, we think things are a lot worse. I want to undo more than I want to proceed. But putting the cork back in the bottle is nearly impossible. That's the premise of conservatism. You must take the time to consider an idea before you adopt it or advocate for it. Resistant or reluctance to change the status quo does not mean ANTI-change. We're just more careful--EXTREMELY careful. We’re fucking with people’s lives and livelihood’s here. That’s deserving of a little conservatism, caution, and respect.

I like this post a lot.

I think these descriptions are accurate. I think of myself as a "liberal" under your description, though I am certainly a "conservative" under the traditional definition, and do love to toss the word "liberal" around as a pejorative.

I think of myself as open-minded and not 100% predictable (as for example in my post challenging 3 typical conservative positions). This doesn't mean I change my mind often; I don't. But I don't live to cut down the other guy's argument. I find political argument interesting because I often *do* learn something.

This is the best thing you've written in a long time, Dean...the key is to give yourself, as a thinking individual, an honest assessment of your thoughts and beliefs. How did you arrive there? What assumptions do you make? How did the "other guy" arrive at his?

I call this the politics of first principles. In mathematics we can peel back the layers, proving our way down reality's protocol stack.

Socially, we need to do the same thing. There's so much distortion and so much bias; the media is untrustworthy from every angle and from every perspective. We must rely on ourselves.

I think we're up to the job.

Liberals can stop talking about Liddy, Coulter, and Limbaugh when Conservatives stop pretending that Michael Moore, Ted Rall, and Robert Fisk represent a significant number of people.

For the record, a Limbaugh dittohead is not one given to blind agreement, merely one who enjoys the program. Any number of times, I've wanted to take him by the lapels and shake some sense into him, but I consider myself a dittohead nonetheless.

I discovered myself to be conservative over 40 years ago, when I began to notice how incredibly stupid some famous and important people can be, who describe themselves as "liberal," but mostly are dreadfully illiberal. Exhibit One: The Hero of Chappaquiddick.

Ross,

Coulter hasn't won a Pulitzer and is highly unlikely to do so....Moore has won an Oscar, for what amounts to a string of intentional lies.

The Oscar award, aside from being an entertainment item, is also a seal of approval akin to the Pulitzer; in other words, its the acknowledgement of the elite that they like a certain thing. Lets just say that the Hollywood elite is of the "liberal" strain of thought - meaning that the elite of liberalism just loves it when a fellow "liberal" lies through his teeth, as long as he's skewering the other side.

Hypocrisy; thats the main thing one sees in the gripes about Coulter.

Mark Noonan:
"I may be barking up the wrong tree, but its this insistence upon public probity which builds citizens who wont break into your house and take all you have; thank the boring that you have the ability to behave boorishly in public."

And people content with safe work-a-day lives can thank the imaginative risk-takers for giving them more options and gizmos to use in living them. Of course, that doesn't include breaking and entering.

Mark, you perceive an Oscar to be "akin" to a Pulitzer? Are you nuts?

That's like comparing an MTV award to a Nobel.

Hollywood has nothing to do with...anything. It has zero relevance.

The political terms have been juggled out of context beyond repair. To be on the safe side, identify your positional views:

For example, I am a fiscally (classically, not neo) conservative, socially progressive libertarian-leaning independent.

The political terms have been juggled out of context beyond repair. To be on the safe side, identify your positional views:

For example, I am a fiscally (classically, not neo) conservative, socially progressive libertarian-leaning independent.

The political terms have been juggled out of context beyond repair. To be on the safe side, identify your positional views:

For example, I am a fiscally (classically, not neo) conservative, socially progressive libertarian-leaning independent.