The leftist party that achieved some success in the USA in the 1920's was called the Progressive party. It was based in the upper midwest and its claim to fame was Socialism. When some of its ideas were adopted by the Democratic party the Progressive party disbanded. But by that time most Americans had rejected the beliefs of Progressives, so Democrats chose to call their newly adopted leftist philosoply Liberalism.
They had to do so, since the word Progressive had acquired a bad connotation with most Americans. The Progressives in hopes of masking their true beliefs and thereby gaining acceptance started to refer to themselves as Liberals.
Now that Liberalism has garnered such a bad reputation they are starting to refer to themselves once again as Progressives.
The left never understands, socialism will always be rejected in the United States. They can call it Socialism, Liberalism or Progressivism... it does not matter. It is the philosophy that is rejected.. not the name they choose to use to refer to it at any given moment in time.
***.....Peggy Noonan is right. The focus of Hillary Clinton's ambition is not her country. But it is not just herself either. It is also a place that does not exist. It is the vision of a world that can only be achieved when the Chosen accumulate enough power to change this one.
That is why Hillary and Sid Blumenthal, her fawning New Left Machiavelli, call their own political philosophy the politics of "The Third Way." This distinguishes it from the "triangulation" strategy Dick Morris used to resurrect Bill Clinton's presidency. Morris guided Clinton, in appropriating specific Republican policies towards a balanced budget and welfare reform as a means of securing his re-election. Hillary Clinton was on board for these policies, and in that sense is a triangulator herself. But "triangulation" is too merely tactical and too morally crass to define a serious political philosophy. Above all, it fails to project the sense of promise that intoxicates the imaginations of self-styled "progressives." That is why Hillary and Sid call their politics "The Third Way."
"The Third Way" is a familiar term from the lexicon of the left with a long and dishonorable pedigree in the catastrophes created by messianic socialists in the 20th Century. It is the most ornate panel in the tapestry of deception I described at the beginning of this essay.
In the 1930s, Nazis used "The Third Way" to characterize their own brand of national socialism as a equidistant between the "internationalist" socialism of the Soviet Union and the capitalism of the West. Trotskyists used "The Third Way" as a term to distinguish their own Marxism from Stalinism and capitalism. In the 1960s, New Leftists used "The Third Way" to define their politics as an independent socialism between the Soviet gulag and America's democracy.
But as the history of Nazism, Trotskyism and the New Left have shown, there is no "Third Way." There is the capitalist, democratic way based on private property and individual rights-a way that leads to liberty and universal opportunity. And there is the socialist way of group identities, group rights, a relentless expansion of the political state, restricted liberty and diminished opportunity. The Third Way is not a path to the future. It is just the suspension between these two destinations. It is a bad faith attempt on the part of people who are incapable of giving up their socialist schemes to escape the taint of their discredited past.
Is there a practical difference in the modus operandi of Clinton narcissism and Clinton messianism? I think there is, and it is the difference between "triangulation"-a cynical compromise to hang onto power until the next election cycle, and "The Third Way"-a cynical deception to ensure the continuance of Us, until we acquire enough power to transform everyone else. It is the difference between the politics of getting what you can, and the politics of changing the world.
A capsule illustration of these different political ambitions can be found in the book Primary Colors , which describes, in thinly veiled fiction, Bill Clinton's road to the presidency. Primary Colors is an admiring portrait not only of the candidate, but of the dedicated missionaries-the true believing staffers and the long-suffering wife-who serve Clinton's political agendas, but at the price of enabling the demons of self.
These staffers-political functionaries like Harold Ickes and George Stephanopoulos-serve as the flak-catchers and "bimbo eruption"-controllers who clean up his personal messes and shape his image for gullible publics. But they are also the idealists who design his message. And in the end, they enable him to politically succeed.
It is Primary Colors' insight into the minds of these missionaries that is revealing. They see Clinton clearly as a flawed and often repellent human being. They see him as a lecher, a liar and a man who would destroy an innocent person in order to advance his own career. (This is, in fact, the climactic drama of the text). Yet through all the sordidness and lying, the personal ruthlessness and disorder, the idealistic missionaries faithfully follow and serve the leader.
They do it not because they are themselves corrupted through material rewards. The prospect of fame is not even what drives them. Think only of Harold Ickes, personally betrayed and brutally cast aside by Clinton, who nonetheless refused to turn on him, even after the betrayal. Instead, Ickes kept his own counsel and protected Clinton, biding his time and waiting for Hillary. Then joined her staff to manage her Senate campaign.
The idealistic missionaries in this true tale bite their tongues and betray their principles, rather than betray him. They do so because in Bill Clinton they see a necessary vehicle of their noble ambition and uplifting dreams. He, too, cares about social justice, about poor people and blacks (or so he makes them believe). They will serve him and lie for him and destroy for him, because he is the vessel of their hope.
Because Bill Clinton "cares," he is the vital connection to the power they need to accomplish the redemption. Because the keys to the state are within Clinton's grasp, he becomes in their eyes the only prospect for advancing the progressive cause. Therefore, they will sacrifice anything and everything-principle, friends, country-to make him succeed. ...***
http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a39611fde5615.htm
Amen!
I prefer the word and ideals called .... Conservative!