Posted on 05/28/2002 3:08:38 PM PDT by logician2u
Edited on 07/12/2004 3:54:08 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
Democrats have been socialist for the most part since the turn of the last century. They make no bones about it, which provides a good target for Republican jibes.
It's unforgivable that people we elect to office who say they oppose these left-wing policies turn out to be in too many cases "socialist lite."
Their main difference with the Denmocrats is who's going to be in charge of the new fascist state.
OTOH, when's the last time Richard Rahn was on a Sunday morning talk show? Or, for that matter, anyone who has an opinion at variance with the duopoly parties in Washington?
The Internet and, to a lesser degree, talk radio, offer about the only alternative for most Americans, unless they live in one of the few areas with more than one newspaper.
Without doubt, the Republicans didn't earn the sobriquet "The Stupid Party" for nothing.
Why pro-lifers, pro-gunners, pro-right-to-workers continue under the delusion that the Republicans are ever going to do anything to their liking -- even when they have the Presidency and both houses of Congress -- is beyond my comprehension.
Republicans in office are so afraid of being given the B-1 Bob treatment they have all but forgotten who it was that put them there.
Which U.S. is the author speaking of? Certainly not the one I live in.
As far as I can tell, conservatives in America stand for bigger government (but not quite as big as the RATS want), higher taxes (but not quite as high as the Rats want), more regulation (but not quite as much as the RATS want), devaluation of the currency (how else will the "war on terrorism" be paid for), using the First, Second, Fourth, and Fifth, Ninth, and Tenth Amendments as toilet paper, and liberty for all (except when carying a nail file on an airliner).
By the 1980s, all but the most slow-witted or dense could see that socialism and communism were failures.
True, their is no longer any excuse for a moral person to embrace socialism.
Talk to most scientists, and you'll find that they endorse a creator.
Do you know the probability of DNA just developing by chance? It's 4.9 x 10 to the -191 power. OR 49 followed by 190 zeros! Care to see the number?
That's 490,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000.
Yes, that's right. I discovered this from a scientist who addressed our group. He is with SEAO- Science Excellence for All Ohioans.
I wonder what the derivation of the description "Third Way" is? Is it from "Third Reich"
And he's the one who said that if W wins we'd have to hold his feet to the fire to make sure that he keeps to a conservative agenda.
Of course, Dornan was good enough to carry water for the Bushes, just not good enough to use the front door.
THEY say it's a "third way" between socialism and capitalism. I say its one third socialism, one third communism, and one third fascism.
Therefrom comes most of the "trilateral comissariat-niks" who are running the show in ClintonLand, formerly known as our capitol, Washington, D.C., but of course now the control center of HomeLand.
The "tri-lateral-istas" who supposedly do not exist; and of course they do not, when you are looking under the wrong set of rocks.
I like that term. Might I use it?
Freedom by itself can rage dangerously like a forest fire. In fact, the appearance of "free market" in housing has left us nothing but "for profit" architecture that has abandoned the private in property. We used to build our own houses; they used to have charm:
A genuie article of fine material, put together by that craftmanship which is oblivious of time, is almost certain today to be in the super-luxury class, if indeed it is not already a museum exhibit . . .A most eloquent example may be seen in the story of housing. A hundred years ago, more or less, when men built houses to live in themselves, they were constructing private property. The purpose was one to be honored, and they worked well, with an eye at least to the third generation. This is a simple instance of providence. One can see those dwellings today in the quiet villages of New England and in remote places of the South, the honesty of the work that went into them reflected even in a grace of form. A century or a century and a half goes by, and they are both habitable and attractive. Let us look next at the modern age, in which houses are erected with an eye to profit margins. A certain trickiness of design they often have, a few obeisances to the god comfort; but after twenty years they are falling apart. They were never private except in a specious sense; no one was really identified with them.
-- Richard Weaver, Ideas Have ConsequencesFor conservatives the thought of a corporation like AT&T prior to recent divestiture, as big as many a sovereign government on earth, with employees numbering many hundreds of thousands and with several million stockholders, can be as difficult to accept as is the whole federal bureaucracy. –Robert Nisbet, Conservatism (1986)
If you mean that freedom lived without virtue can decay into license, then we have some common ground. The founders believed that a democractic republic could not survive without a virtuous citizenry, meaning at a minimum people living under God, doing their duty to their families and community. We will see whether political freedom can survive an era where fulfilling one's responsibilities to one's children, spouse and community is not viewed as love or virtue, but perversely as a kind of oppression or vicitimization.
Like you, I prefer the handcrafted buildings of the past to modern buildings produced by industrial methods. But the plain fact is that before the industrial revolution the ordinary person didn't live in those lovely, spacious Victorians, most people lived in houses little better than shacks. Free markets and the industrial revolution have produced a level of wealth and comfort for the ordinary person not dreamed of before the 19th Century.
And, you see, the wonderful thing about freedom and free markets is that if you don't want one of those industrial houses built out of the profit motive, you are perfectly free to build your own, lovely, handcrafted home.
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