Posted on 04/24/2005 1:36:24 PM PDT by CHARLITE
It is my belief that about half of the Americans who call themselves liberal do not hold the great majority of positions held by mainstream liberal institutions such as the New York Times editorial page, People for the American Way, and the liberal wing of the Democratic Party. So here is a test of this thesis to be given to anyone who believes he or she is a liberal. If you feel I have omitted a liberal position or have unfairly characterized any of them here, please email me. This is still a work in progress.
Thank you,
Dennis Prager
dennisprager@dennisprager.com
You say you are a liberal.
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.
20.Racial profiling for terrorists is wrong -- a white American grandmother should as likely be searched as a Saudi young male.
21.Racism and poverty -- not a lack of fathers and a crisis of values -- are the primary causes of violent crime in the inner city.
22.It is wrong and unconstitutional for students to be told, "God bless you" at their graduation.
23.No culture is morally superior to any other.
Those are all liberal positions. How many of them do you hold?
Good list. I think Prager could use some help adding some environmental criteria. Agenda21 comes to mind.
I think he will find more people saying "yes" than he anticipated.
Very nice.
24. Do you think we should defund the armed forces as they have done in France and Canada?
I scored a big fat zero. I do not agree with 23 out of 23. I must not have been paying attention in class.
Uh-oh. I scored two. What should I do?
1.Standards for admissions to universities, fire departments, etc. should be lowered for minorities.
3.Murderers should never be put to death. many conservatives are against the death penalty as well
22.It is wrong and unconstitutional for students to be told, "God bless you" at their graduation. They really don't want the word "God" mentioned anywhere in schools
This was the first time I've ever scored a Zero and been happy about it.
24. Do you think patchouli oil is a substitute for Right Guard?
I have pretty much come to the conclusions that "liberals" do not actually have any guiding principles at all. Guiding principles can lead you to any of the forms of conservatism, or perhaps to socialism, but not to liberalism, which means apparently nothing more that a desire to inadvertantly increase government power and responosibility in the service of foolish and random do-goodism.
I got zero too. Hurrah.
Excellent addition. Should have been part of Prager's list, but then theoretically, the list could be endless. No?
Char :)
It would be interesting to post this down at the DUmp. I can't do it myself as I am apparently much to stupid for such difficult tasks having scored a zero on this test.
to = too (DUh)
Technically, males are a minority.
It it time for males to rise up against the female chauvanist sows!!
Repent
I wish I could disagree with you.
Got my EyE on em.. (finger by left eye)...
My sure-fire way to tell if someone is a liberal is to ask them:
"Do you believe that the US Constitution is a living, breathing document that should change with the times or do you believe it means just what it says?"
and
"Do you believe that the Constitution grants the government the power to take money and property from people who have it in order to give to those that don't?"
Those two questions will give you a liberal every single time.
I got 2 as well....
Whew! Glad I'm not alone. ;)
Which two do you agree with?
Thank you for this posting.
Your post, and many of the responses, supports my Liberal Theory. My theory is that liberals are persons who, perhaps through no direct fault of their own, unfortunately, lack the gene required to allow them to process reality. While my theory is so far unproved, your post adds considerable empirical evidence to support the notion.
I am ambivalent about 4 of them, feeling neither completely comfortable with yes or no without caveats. Does that average out to a score of two?
2 & 20
I think bilingual education for children of (legal) immigrants is vital. If a kid gets behind in elementary school because s/he doesn't understand the language it sets the wrong stage.
And racial profiling isn't wrong in the sense that it's immoral. Just counter-productive/illogical. Google carnival booth algorithm.
First off, don't panic. Go back and make sure you read them correctly. If you did, then you can panic.
#7 vouchers, having 4 step daughters and getting $0 child support to help out, I'd love to send them to a better school, but lack of funds makes it impossible. The local public schools are okay, and I've got them thinking conservatively:)
#19 condoms, not providing them though, along with an education that stresses abstinance and responsibility. As I said above, I have 4 step daughters. I hate to use the "they're going to do it anyways" excuse, but any parent worries about it no matter how much we try to tell them what they should do.
0
Contact Karl Rove imediately and get your beeber stuned and Jesuss lever installed.
See post 34.
Proud owner of a big, fat goose egg!
Should have been"undr 30 and ARE not a liberal".
No. 9 should read....... any two or more people.
0
I'm 34 and was a moderate...liberal... until right around my 30th birthday. Since then I've rethought a lot of my positions and am now more conservative than most of my conservative friends and family. I changed from Independent to Republican on my voter registration.
I suspect you do not know any immigrant children. I have known many- know many now. Those whose families do not speak much English and insist on English only in the home and who have little English themselves raise children who have thick accents in their English and do not speak their parents' language. Those immigrants who speak only their own language in the home and whose children learn English at school and outside with no schooling in their parents' language raise bilingual children with the local accent in English and fluency in both lancuages. Those children who learn heir English strictly outside the home are in the top of their classes in high percentages from the first grades on.
"Bilingual" education teaches a child that learning English is an imposition rather than something natural and it retards their fluency in Engish and their education generally.
Dennis Prager is my favorite radio talk show host.
I guess the late pope was a liberal?
P.S.! "Remember , NONE of our SH-T applies to us. It's only for the peons we can flim-flam in."
A few the wife and I thought up, plus some of yours.
24.You think guns are the cause of crime and violence in inner cities.
25. You think we should defund the armed forces as they have done in France and Canada.
26. Do you think patchouli oil is a substitute for Right Guard?
27. You think animal rights are more important than human rights.
28. Eating meat is murder.
29. George W. Bush is a greater terrorist than Saddam Hussein or Binladin.
30. You believe in freedom of speech, but believe conservative talk radio and Fox News should be censored.
0
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