Posted on 05/05/2012 3:57:17 PM PDT by Maelstorm
Agreed.
I think she’s right - certainly about the polarisation of US politics anyway.
The definition may not have changed, but the “progressives” are far, far more openly following the logical conclusion of their mindsets.
If you don’t believe in labels, take all of them off your kitchen cleaning supplies and foodstuffs, then randomly rearrange them. Then, you will know why labels are a good thing.
Excellent point.
‘That kind of depends on how you define “moderation”.’
“..Decided only to be undecided, resolved to be irresolute, adamant for drift, solid for fluidity, all-powerful to be impotent.”- Winston Churchill
Sounds like a good definition of moderate to me- someone who stands for nothing.
Well, I dont define it like that.
I meant labeling people, not kitchen utensils. I like to think that people have a great deal more worth than egg whisks.
>>That system might work in smaller, more homogenous countries, but it’s a disaster in a nation this large and diverse.
This nation was never intended to work via top down “leadership” from Washington, DC. Power needs to devolve back to the states now that this experiment in centralized power, American style, has been shown to be an abject failure.
Perhaps I should not have used "right" or "left" for labels, but "good" and "bad". For instance, killing someone is bad. "Bad" is a label, but it easily conveys a meaning to the subject.
To go on, what about the terms "supply-side economics" or "Keynesian economics". Both are labels that quickly sum up two different economic schools of thought. Without the labels, I have to explain in detail what each means. With the label, I can quickly establish a starting point for a discussion.
So I don't understand your problem with labels.
Similarly, there are lots of people who call themselves "keynesian economists", but they range from total believers to people who admit that "supply-side economics" has a case too, through to folk who just admit keynesian economics has a point ot two going for it. Nor is this solely a matter of individual variation, because people argue over what the basic definitions are. What some people call "progressive", others call "socialist", and some no doubt call "reactionary". I admit, without the labels you would have to explain in detail what you meant, but I would argue that might not be too bad a thing. It might prevent a lot of misunderstanding, after all.
There's a further problem with labeling, and that is that certain labels become irretrievably linked to one another, but some kind of political osmosis. Thus, labels like "conservative" are linked to "NRA", "pro-life", "religious right", "republican", "capitalist" and "anti homosexual" (amongst many others). It has now got to the point that identifying yourself by one of those labels automatically (in the minds of others) gets you assigned to all of the others. But of course Conservative is a very broad term. Some are social conservatives, some are fiscal conservatives, to others political systems are what most needs to be addressed. Most would no doubt go along with many of the things on that list, but they wouldnt major on them. Few suited business investors are picketing abortion clinics. Some republicans ARE gay.
Does this matter? Well yes, because when labels are applied to people in that way, it denies their individualism and prevents them thinking through what they really believe, and that leads to trouble. Lumping people together into nice, neat little socio-economic groups is what leftists major on. This kind of thing stunts reasoned debate as well, which ultimately works to the detriment of the republic.
Whether you like them or not, labels are necessary. And how a label is used by a person say as much about him or her as it does the person being labeled.
For instance, if an author uses the word "vigilante" to describe a person using a gun for protection, I already know quite a bit about the author's frame of reference when it comes to guns and gun control. In fact, that is still more information than I get on the "vigilante".
So, not only are labels helpful, but how they are used says a lot about the speaker.
Jason Altmire and Tim Holden are “moderates” b/c they voted against Obamacare? Mike Ross of AR did the same thing after helping pass Obamacare out of committee and then voting against it. Ross was smart enough to quit, I guess these 2 weren’t.
Where are the Democrat moderates? They place the most partisan radicals on so-called important thoughtful committees like Judiciary and Foreign Relations whereas GOP always puts their moderates and “statesmen” on such. They get mowed down by the Kennedys, Turban Durbin, Kerry, Leahy
Davis was a good NRCC chairman but he needs to shut the hell up, all he does is trash conservatives now. He just ignorantly sounded off on the gay thing.
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