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Liberalism Is Dead
American Spectator ^ | February 2011 | R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr.

Posted on 02/21/2011 8:35:41 PM PST by neverdem

IN THE TUMULTUOUS HISTORY of postwar American Liberalism, there has been a slow but steady decline of which the Liberals have been steadfastly oblivious. This pose has called for admirable discipline, for the evidence was all around them. Yet Liberals, who began as the rightful heirs to the New Deal, carried on as a kind of aristocracy, gifted but doomed. They dominated the culture and the politics of the country unchallenged from the beginnings of the Cold War to the first Nixon administration. With the general populace, however, they increasingly faltered. Now they are down to around 20 percent of the electorate. They have the nation's librarians, most of the professoriate, students so long as they remain relatively untaxed, labor leaders, and career Democrats. After that it gets tricky. Conservatives accounted for 42 percent of the vote in the recent election, maintaining roughly a 2-1 margin over liberals, which has been true for decades. In the last election, the independents, the second most numerous group, voted with conservatives. They were alarmed about the economy, and will probably remain alarmed for a long time.

Liberals are going the way of the American Prohibition Party. It is time for someone to tell them: "Rigor mortis has set in, comrades." They could be oblivious during the Nixon Crisis or while Ronald Reagan sleepwalked through history, as many Liberals still say; but today their obliviousness amounts to a kind of madness. The house is afire, but there is a whole string ensemble madly playing their fiddles.

AT FIRST GLANCE, the decline might appear to have begun with the 1961 inauguration of President John F. Kennedy when historians noted the first sightings of what was to become Liberalism's distinctive trait, overreach. At times Liberals promise too much. At times they attempt too much. Occasionally, they...

(Excerpt) Read more at spectator.org ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Foreign Affairs; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: emmetttyrrell; liberalism
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1 posted on 02/21/2011 8:35:44 PM PST by neverdem
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To: neverdem

I hope it’s true that liberalism is dead but I don’t believe it. :-(


2 posted on 02/21/2011 8:38:28 PM PST by deepthought (Keep working, dumbo needs the money!!)
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To: neverdem

way too early for an obit.


3 posted on 02/21/2011 8:38:46 PM PST by GeronL (The Right to Life came before the Right to Happiness)
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To: neverdem

Oh brother. I remember Emmett writing the same damn thing when the Lewinsky story broke.


4 posted on 02/21/2011 8:38:52 PM PST by yup2394871293
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To: neverdem

Liberalism is dead? Where have I heard that one before.

This Hayek quote from 1956 applies here: “Though hot socialism is probably a thing of the past, some of its conceptions have penetrated far too deeply in the whole structure of current thought to justify complacency.”


5 posted on 02/21/2011 8:39:31 PM PST by MichaelNewton
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To: deepthought

The corpse is still moving-reload and keep shooting!


6 posted on 02/21/2011 8:40:45 PM PST by mozarky2 (Ya never stand so tall as when ya stoop to stomp a statist!)
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To: neverdem

a bit naive..millions of illegals waiting for naturalization by anchorbabies or fake marriage, and welfare parasites will remain dems.


7 posted on 02/21/2011 8:41:43 PM PST by heiss
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To: neverdem

The headline is ridiculous. Liberalism has its claws deeply embedded into almost every institution in this country.


8 posted on 02/21/2011 8:43:05 PM PST by EternalVigilance (No President who performs his duties faithfully and conscientiously can have any leisure. - JK Polk)
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To: neverdem

Perhaps.

But now we have to sit around with it’s stinking, decomposing corpse.


9 posted on 02/21/2011 8:43:50 PM PST by PetroniusMaximus
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To: neverdem

Maybe we can look forward to someday putting liberals on their own Endangered Species List...

(Don’t you just love the way Bob Tyrrell writes...??)


10 posted on 02/21/2011 8:44:39 PM PST by Bean Counter (Stout Hearts...)
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To: neverdem

http://asmainegoeslolz.com/poster-hall-of-fame/tom-c-liberalism-is-dead/


11 posted on 02/21/2011 8:46:09 PM PST by Fido969 ("The hardest thing in the world to understand is income tax." - Albert Einstein)
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To: neverdem

Liberalism is not dead. It just ran out of money.


12 posted on 02/21/2011 8:52:56 PM PST by fhayek
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To: neverdem
Liberalism Is Dead

As long as there is still one person who believes that government is the answer; who believes that Marx had the right idea and who believes that "it takes a village", liberalism is still sucking oxygen.

13 posted on 02/21/2011 8:53:46 PM PST by DustyMoment (Go green - recycle Congress in 2012!!)
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To: neverdem

Geez,not only is he wrong, but he takes pages of nonsensical babbling trying to prove whatever the hell his point is.


14 posted on 02/21/2011 8:54:15 PM PST by GOP_Party_Animal
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To: neverdem
"Rigor mortis has set in, comrades."

If it weren't for rigor mortis, they'd have no rigor at all.

15 posted on 02/21/2011 8:55:00 PM PST by Paleo Conservative
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To: yup2394871293
Oh brother. I remember Emmett writing the same damn thing when the Lewinsky story broke.

I'm glad I decided to read the posts before posting my own because I was going to say the same thing.

16 posted on 02/21/2011 8:56:52 PM PST by Texas Eagle (If it wasn't for double-standards, Liberals would have no standards at all -- Texas Eagle)
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To: fhayek
Liberalism is not dead. It just ran out of money.

Brilliant, insightful and succinct!

17 posted on 02/21/2011 8:56:52 PM PST by The Duke
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To: neverdem

I won’t believe it until the corpse has been buried. Under a ton of rock at the bottom of the sea. Then I will believe it is dead. Maybe.


18 posted on 02/21/2011 8:58:59 PM PST by Danae (Anailnathrach ortha bhais beatha do cheal deanaimha)
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To: The Duke; fhayek
Liberalism Greenback Is Dead

There. Fixed it.
19 posted on 02/21/2011 8:59:15 PM PST by Milhous (Lev 19:18 Love your neighbor as yourself.)
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To: neverdem

If Liberalism is indeed dead, be looking for Moderate Republicanism (i.e., Chris Christie) to fill the void.


20 posted on 02/21/2011 8:59:21 PM PST by Texas Eagle (If it wasn't for double-standards, Liberals would have no standards at all -- Texas Eagle)
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