Posted on 03/05/2005 2:36:01 PM PST by neverdem
"Bush administration's guiding principle is a belief in military power, not a belief in human rights and democracy. It is why there has been no Marshall Plan since 9/11 by this administration."
What the hell is this guy talking about? Has he noticed the elections and popular democracy movements at the heart of the Bush Doctrine? And where does he think a Marshall Plan should happen? whew. Nuts they are.
This is why I am an Exdem
They refuse to see that it's not how they present and market their agenda that is causing them problems, but that the agenda itself is rotten to the core.
They had, what, 70 years to make their programs work? And all they brought was misery and dependence.
But instead of changing their agenda to suit the 21st century, they keep beating that old 19th century dead horse of "social and economic justice".
A liberal voice of reason speaks and notice the subject is immediately changed.
I concur with your thoughts. You might be as surprised to learn as I was that Katrina's rag, the NATION, has THREE TIMES the paid subcriptions of the New Republic..Tells you where the heart of te Dem party really is, eh?
If the GOP plays it right 2006 should be another disaster for the DEMS.
They're still in massive denial... like Communists who refused to believe the fall of the Berlin Wall had any significance.
So far, so good. Hopefully they will continue to delude themselves (strong UN a winning strategy ROFL) through the next few elections.
When has it ever been done better?
I am sorry. I tried but I could not finish reading this. Those people are in such denial they state the opposite of the truth. Let's be real quit and not wake them. They are doing just fine the way they are.
TOMASKY: I think the war in Iraq was a catastrophic mistake. It was not part of the war on terror. Somebody attacked us. We didn't get him. He's still at large. That's the war on terrorism to me. That's the heart of it.
...so let me get this right. Osama is the embodiment of every single terrorist organization, every suicide bomber, every Timothy McVeigh, and if he's taken out of the picture, all of these people will just put their hands up and walk away... Sounds like something the French might do, but somehow I doubt Hussein would have crumbled if we had killed/captured Osama... just a hunch. And this guy is a leader of a national party?!?!
VANDEN HEUVEL. I would begin with the unrelenting assault on the term liberalism by the right wing. It has been a project over the last few decades. And by failing to take their own side in the argument liberals have conceded -- to the point where John Kerry was wary of being associated with liberalism in one of the debates. Liberals have also paid a heavy price by allowing liberalism to be defined almost exclusively as social liberalism. So that you lost sight of economic rights, economic justice.
You know this is diametric to the democratic strategy of the democrats. Their strategy has been to move the far left into leadership positions, case in point the ascension of Pelosi and the selection of Dean. They should at least be consistent in their apologetics
I thinkI finally found out who Willie Green is.
He's VANDEN HEUVEL.
Because you’re not really “liberals”. Liberalism is supposed to be about social progress but “liberals” today are more about preserving entrenched bureaucracies that serve the current social order than they are about change. Face it, “liberals” only have two agendas – weakening America and taking money away from people who earn it to give to, well, other liberals.
What would a liberal foreign policy look like?
Liberal foreign policy is about weakening America, nothing more. One of the things “liberalism” is supposed to be about is opposition to extreme nationalism, yet “liberals” today have thrown their support behind every ultra-nationalist nut ball on the planet from Yasser Arafat to Hugo Chavez - as long as they pass the litmus test of hating America. If this is “principled realism”, we’ll not have any thank you.
To move on to domestic economic policy, the Bush administration pursues a more market-oriented philosophy while liberals tend to pursue a more government oriented philosophy. Is there some meeting ground?
Yes, become what we call “conservatives”, ie realist, centrist moderate nationalists who believe in god, the constitution and the essential goodness of America’s historic mission. We won't hold our breath.
Can the Democrats become the majority party in America again?
Sure, all that is needed is for the Republicans to screw up – something that, fortunately for the Democrats, they are quite good at. The Republican leadership’s continued failure to secure our borders and stop the profligate spending spree are two things that could weaken the Republicans by eroding their base. The important thing to remember is that the people who run the Republican Party went to the same schools, live in the same neighborhoods and belong to the same social set as the people who run the Democratic Party.
Hitlary's strategy.
I live in a community of about 400 senior cradle democrats who don't vote. Their disillusionment is the result of corrupt, undemocratic politics in the NE. They have never lived in a democracy, don't know how it is supposed to work, feel like they have always been lied to, and refuse to vote. They do beleive in the maffia, however.
I've got a feeling we're about to find out...
VANDEN HEUVEL. A majority of Americans support an America that works with international institutions, that wants a strengthened U.N., that wants to be part of a constructive multilateral engagement with the world.
I don't know a single individual who wants any of those things.
But on the gay marriage issue, for example, we are a more tolerant country than we were 20, 30 years ago.
Yep, there's one reason.
VANDEN HEUVEL. Again, we need to make the case that these are not our values, but without diminishing the liberal belief in free speech.
Yep, there's another.
It is why they have not seriously engaged with trying to create liberal currents in civil society in the Muslim world.
WTF?
TOMASKY. I think the war in Iraq was a catastrophic mistake.
Is he still addressing the questiong of Why Liberal is a dirty word?
Not on Social Security. Social Security returns efficiencies that very few private programs of its sort can return. It's the greatest social insurance program devised by any government, ever.
I wonder if this guy could, with a straight face, repeat this comment to someone trying to survive on social security income.
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