Classic Liberalism V.S. Progressivism.

[Bfgrn]

I am sure that you somehow can shoe that the soviet union and red china are littered with 'conservatives' right?

Sure...

When the ‘tea partiers’ say “we want our country back”, what do they mean by ‘our’?

What polls show us about the ‘tea party’ is that they are a fringe group diametrically opposed to mainstream America. Among all Americans, George W. Bush has a 27/58 positive/negative favorable rating. Among the ‘tea party’ he's viewed favorably, 57/27. An almost perfect diametrical difference.

Is there any precedent in history of today’s the ‘tea party’?

The answer is YES…a parallel to the 'Tea Party" occurred in Russia in the late 1980's. Russian conservatives, the Stalinists, wanted 'their' country back. It was an alliance including xenophobic fringe groups and nationalists who yearned for what they saw as the simple values of Old Russia and the Orthodox church.

And like today’s ‘tea partiers’, they wanted their authoritarian government back.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

February 27, 1989

Soviet Conservatives Try to Turn Back the Clock on Gorbachev's Policies

MOSCOW, Feb. 26— Russian conservatives, uneasy with the liberalization of Soviet society under Mikhail S. Gorbachev, have seized on the country's experiment in more democratic elections as a chance to fight for a return to more authoritarian ways.

While many candidates and voters say they view the elections to the new Congress of Deputies as a way to further the candor and freedoms allowed by the Soviet leader, conservatives in this city and around the country were boasting last week that they had already succeeded in blocking the nomination of several prominent people regarded as liberals.

A Disparate Alliance
The conservatives are a disparate alliance, including xenophobic fringe groups, like Pamyat, as well as large numbers of less extreme nationalists who yearn for what they see as the simple values of Old Russia and the Orthodox church.

At election rallies where speakers call out against the influence of ''Zionist forces,'' and in campaign leaflets decrying ''liberal yellow journalists''

Conservatives already claim credit for helping defeat certain candidates, most notably Mr. Korotich, editor of the liberal and popular magazine ''Ogonyok,'' and Andrei D. Sakharov, the physicist and Nobel Peace Prize winning dissident.

Nikita F. Zherbin, head of the Leningrad chapter of Pamyat, delighted in the fact that Mr. Korotich had been forced off the ballot in Moscow's Sverdlovsk region, and described this as the first successful step in the conservative campaign to use the elections as a vehicle for its political ideas.

'I Am a Stalinist'

''We brought our case to the people, and the outcome speaks for us,'' said Mr. Zherbin, whose group regards the liberalization of Soviet society as a conspiracy by Jews, Masons and Westernizers.

Soviet Conservatives Try to Turn Back the Clock on Gorbachev's Policies
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Russia is an ultra conservative country, and liberals are in danger there.

More than 300 journalists killed in Russia since 1993, says joint report

The murder of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya in October 2006 shocked the world. "Yet for every Anna, there have been many less widely known journalists killed for their work across Russia," says the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) in a groundbreaking report on the 313 Russian journalists killed since 1993.

More than 300 journalists killed in Russia since 1993, says joint report - IFEX

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

What Mao Zedong said about liberalism

"Liberalism is extremely harmful in a revolutionary collective. It is a corrosive which eats away unity, undermines cohesion, causes apathy and creates dissension.

It robs the revolutionary ranks of compact organization and strict discipline, prevents policies from being carried through and alienates the Party organizations from the masses which the Party leads."

Combat Liberalism - Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung

You are the one going backwards. When change improves upon what it, when it is qualified, it is a good thing. When change is just for the sake of change, and you are asking everyone else to bankroll it, that is another matter, and further, without consent, it is theft. Change towards Totalitatian Statism, I cannot support.

I am trying to decipher your point through your constant chanting.

But, thanks for giving the perfect description of Ronald Reagan, the Totalitarian Statist. He was not a conservative, his goal was to destroy everything generations of ancestors created. And he stole 3 Trillion dollars of wealth from the middle class and poor and gave it to the opulent. So Reagan was a Socialist Totalitarian Statist

 

[Bfgrn]

If true, that would be Libertarianism not "conservativism.


Conservatism
noun
1. racists and xenophobes who have the disposition to support and defend the welfare/warfare state

Are you THAT stupid? Here is your word for the day:

sarcasm

The Great Conservative Hoax

by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.

The conservatives denounce their presidents for the same reason that the left denounces Stalin: they want to evade responsibility for the results of the policies imposed by monsters that they themselves created. When the left does this, we know not to take it too seriously. If you give the state the right to expropriate all private property, you can't be too surprised when dictators take over.

Similarly, when the whole of your intellectual enterprise has been wrapped up in celebrating the nation-state and its wars, condemning civil liberties, casting aspersions on religious liberty, and heralding the jail and the electric chair as the answer to all of society's problems, you can't complain when your policies produce tin-pot despotic imperialists like Bush. You have no intellectual apparatus with which to beat them back.

The problem with American conservatism is that it hates the left more than the state, loves the past more than liberty, feels a greater attachment to nationalism than to the idea of self-determination, believes brute force is the answer to all social problems, and thinks it is better to impose truth rather than risk losing one soul to heresy. It has never understood the idea of freedom as a self-ordering principle of society. It has never seen the state as the enemy of what conservatives purport to favor. It has always looked to presidential power as the saving grace of what is right and true about America.

I'm speaking now of the variety of conservatism created by William Buckley, not the Old Right of Albert Jay Nock, John T. Flynn, Garett Garrett, H.L. Mencken, and company, though these people would have all rejected the name conservative as ridiculous. After Lincoln, Wilson, and FDR, what's to conserve of the government? The revolutionaries who tossed off a milder British rule would never have put up with it.

There are many libertarians I agree with on some, but, not all topics. Harry Browne was my favorite, and I agree with Lew Rockwell on this topic. So did F.A. Hayek

Why I Am Not a Conservative by F. A. Hayek

 

[Contumacious]

Are you THAT stupid? Here is your word for the day:

sarcasm

The Great Conservative Hoax

by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.

The conservatives denounce their presidents for the same reason that the left denounces Stalin: they want to evade responsibility for the results of the policies imposed by monsters that they themselves created. When the left does this, we know not to take it too seriously. If you give the state the right to expropriate all private property, you can't be too surprised when dictators take over.

Similarly, when the whole of your intellectual enterprise has been wrapped up in celebrating the nation-state and its wars, condemning civil liberties, casting aspersions on religious liberty, and heralding the jail and the electric chair as the answer to all of society's problems, you can't complain when your policies produce tin-pot despotic imperialists like Bush. You have no intellectual apparatus with which to beat them back.

The problem with American conservatism is that it hates the left more than the state, loves the past more than liberty, feels a greater attachment to nationalism than to the idea of self-determination, believes brute force is the answer to all social problems, and thinks it is better to impose truth rather than risk losing one soul to heresy. It has never understood the idea of freedom as a self-ordering principle of society. It has never seen the state as the enemy of what conservatives purport to favor. It has always looked to presidential power as the saving grace of what is right and true about America.

I'm speaking now of the variety of conservatism created by William Buckley, not the Old Right of Albert Jay Nock, John T. Flynn, Garett Garrett, H.L. Mencken, and company, though these people would have all rejected the name conservative as ridiculous. After Lincoln, Wilson, and FDR, what's to conserve of the government? The revolutionaries who tossed off a milder British rule would never have put up with it.

There are many libertarians I agree with on some, but, not all topics. Harry Browne was my favorite, and I agree with Lew Rockwell on this topic. So did F.A. Hayek

Why I Am Not a Conservative by F. A. Hayek

OK then.

So why are you still espousing the failed philosophy?

.

 

[Procrustes Stretched]

Liberalism versus Liberalism versus Progressivism

conservatives have hijacked part of liberalism and tied it to 'classic' liberalism which died ages and ages ago. they have tied traditional liberalism (liberalism of the last century) to progressivism.

 

[Intense]

Ah yes, your parochial indoctrination creates your ignorance and dogma.

YOU are the center of the universe. Every value, tenet, belief and orthodoxy YOU believe is used to calibrate all human existence.

Conservatives in Russia and China firmly believe embrace and defend capitalism, Thomas Jefferson, the US Constitution and America values. They couldn't POSSIBLY embrace and defend communism, Marx and Russian or Chinese values.


Conservatism (Latin: conservare, "to preserve") is a political and social philosophy that promotes the maintenance of traditional institutions and supports, at the most, minimal and gradual change in society. Some conservatives seek to preserve things as they are, emphasizing stability and continuity, while others oppose modernism and seek a return to "the way things were"

Conservatism
noun
1. the disposition to preserve or restore what is established and traditional and to limit change.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Conservative Russia

People simply do not realize that Russia is a deeply conservative country.

Fiscal policy is buttressed on a low, flat rate of income tax (13%), and there is virtually no social safety net, with spending on unemployment security, medical provision, disability aid, infrastructure, the environment, and urban regeneration far lower, in both absolute terms and as a percentage of GDP, than its G8 contemporaries.

Similarly, military spending is high in comparison — and growing — medical care is available free in theory, but requires private insurance or additional cash payment in practice, and businesses are in reality pretty un-regulated.

If that doesn’t sound to you like a set of policies Newt Gingrich or William F Buckley would support, then you don’t know your dyed in the wool conservatives from your woolly jumper wearing liberals.

We've been led to believe by pinko sociology teachers in college that communism taught progressive views on gender, race, immigration and class, so it therefore came as a shock to find when one moved there that after 80 years of Marxist indoctrination, young ladies in Russia often reject feminism, men ooze with unrepentant machismo, and the population appears to generally support a penal code that could have been based on Dostoyevsky’s work.

And you really need to bone up on your terminology. Modern Aemrican Conservatism, i.e. classical liberalism, is the complete opposite of Russian conservatism while Russian liberalism is not that much different from our modern day American conservatism. You can find out things like that if you read books and stuff.

WHAT??? First of all, stop saying you are a liberal. You are a right wing social Darwinist who believes punishment must be applied so people LEARN to worship wealth. Modern day American conservatism is NOT liberalism in any way, shape or form. You can keep parroting that until the day you die, but it will NEVER, EVER be true.

Classical liberals assume a natural equality of humans; conservatives assume a natural hierarchy.
James M. Buchanan

You have repeated ad nauseum your social Darwinism and worship of a hierarchy every time you talk about social programs. Survival of the richest and punishment for the middle class and poor.

Second, Russia is a deeply conservative country. Why it is the VERY MODEL of what American conservatives and tea partiers want to create in this country...

RUSSIA today:

Fiscal policy is buttressed on a low, flat rate of income tax (13%), and there is virtually no social safety net, with spending on unemployment security, medical provision, disability aid, infrastructure, the environment, and urban regeneration far lower, in both absolute terms and as a percentage of GDP, than its G8 contemporaries.

Similarly, military spending is high in comparison — and growing — medical care is available free in theory, but requires private insurance or additional cash payment in practice, and businesses are in reality pretty un-regulated.

If that doesn’t sound to you like a set of policies Newt Gingrich or William F Buckley would support, then you don’t know your dyed in the wool conservatives from your woolly jumper wearing liberals.

We Each have different measures, that is Providence. We Each are Unique, not indiscriminately interchangeable. We Each have Value, both realized and unrealized. It is for Each to live one's own life to the best of ability, answering to Conscience, before Society. There are variables in both the Classic Liberal Stance and the Conservative Stance, you miss. Easily understood, considering the Propaganda you are fed. Careful not to stray too far, or you might be the next one thrown under the bus. Marching in lock step, you might fail to see what's coming. You should try marching in Locke Step.

 

[Intense]

Liberalism versus Liberalism versus Progressivism

conservatives have hijacked part of liberalism and tied it to 'classic' liberalism which died ages and ages ago. they have tied traditional liberalism (liberalism of the last century) to progressivism.

Not exactly, We have tied Classic Liberalism to the Defense of Individual Liberty, and Progressivism to the Sacrifice of Individual Liberty. Plain and simple.

 

[Foxfyre]

Liberalism versus Liberalism versus Progressivism

conservatives have hijacked part of liberalism and tied it to 'classic' liberalism which died ages and ages ago. they have tied traditional liberalism (liberalism of the last century) to progressivism.

Not exactly, We have tied Classic Liberalism to the Defense of Individual Liberty, and Progressivism to the Sacrifice of Individual Liberty. Plain and simple.

Correct. And whatever other definitions people wish to use really doesn't apply to modern day American conservatism that parallels Classical Liberalism, or modern day American liberalism/progressiveism is the statist, political class, big government, nanny state group, authoritarian government group.

The definitions in America are quite different than most of their European, African, or Asian counterparts.

 

[Bfgrn]

The Great Conservative Hoax

by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.

The conservatives denounce their presidents for the same reason that the left denounces Stalin: they want to evade responsibility for the results of the policies imposed by monsters that they themselves created. When the left does this, we know not to take it too seriously. If you give the state the right to expropriate all private property, you can't be too surprised when dictators take over.

Similarly, when the whole of your intellectual enterprise has been wrapped up in celebrating the nation-state and its wars, condemning civil liberties, casting aspersions on religious liberty, and heralding the jail and the electric chair as the answer to all of society's problems, you can't complain when your policies produce tin-pot despotic imperialists like Bush. You have no intellectual apparatus with which to beat them back.

The problem with American conservatism is that it hates the left more than the state, loves the past more than liberty, feels a greater attachment to nationalism than to the idea of self-determination, believes brute force is the answer to all social problems, and thinks it is better to impose truth rather than risk losing one soul to heresy. It has never understood the idea of freedom as a self-ordering principle of society. It has never seen the state as the enemy of what conservatives purport to favor. It has always looked to presidential power as the saving grace of what is right and true about America.

I'm speaking now of the variety of conservatism created by William Buckley, not the Old Right of Albert Jay Nock, John T. Flynn, Garett Garrett, H.L. Mencken, and company, though these people would have all rejected the name conservative as ridiculous. After Lincoln, Wilson, and FDR, what's to conserve of the government? The revolutionaries who tossed off a milder British rule would never have put up with it.

There are many libertarians I agree with on some, but, not all topics. Harry Browne was my favorite, and I agree with Lew Rockwell on this topic. So did F.A. Hayek

Why I Am Not a Conservative by F. A. Hayek

OK then.

So why are you still espousing the failed philosophy?

.

There is nothing failed about pragmatism and a very healthy dose of human capital that are the foundation of my beliefs. Conservatives are the modern day Pharisee. The irony is the right tries to hijack God, when they are as far from God and Jesus' teachings as you can get. They espouse social Darwinism, and thankfully this nation has not implemented their draconian ideas. Their solutions require some group of humans to evaporate.

"In all those things which deal with people, be liberal, be human. In all those things which deal with people's money, or their economy, or their form of government, be conservative."
President Dwight D. Eisenhower

 

[Bfgrn]

Liberalism versus Liberalism versus Progressivism

conservatives have hijacked part of liberalism and tied it to 'classic' liberalism which died ages and ages ago. they have tied traditional liberalism (liberalism of the last century) to progressivism.

Not exactly, We have tied Classic Liberalism to the Defense of Individual Liberty, and Progressivism to the Sacrifice of Individual Liberty. Plain and simple.

Correct. And whatever other definitions people wish to use really doesn't apply to modern day American conservatism that parallels Classical Liberalism, or modern day American liberalism/progressiveism is the statist, political class, big government, nanny state group, authoritarian government group.

The definitions in America are quite different than most of their European, African, or Asian counterparts.

That is the biggest pile of horse shit on this thread. Conservatives have NEVER given us less government, and they never will. The ONLY people conservatives want less government for are the opulent who they worship, polluters, doctors and the Wall Street bankers who destroyed our economy. And if you are an honest working stiff who lost his job due to the opulent greed, conservatives will give you a LOT more government. You can piss in a cup and have GOVERNMENT decide your fate.

 

[Foxfyre]

Not exactly, We have tied Classic Liberalism to the Defense of Individual Liberty, and Progressivism to the Sacrifice of Individual Liberty. Plain and simple.

Correct. And whatever other definitions people wish to use really doesn't apply to modern day American conservatism that parallels Classical Liberalism, or modern day American liberalism/progressiveism is the statist, political class, big government, nanny state group, authoritarian government group.

The definitions in America are quite different than most of their European, African, or Asian counterparts.

That is the biggest pile of horse shit on this thread. Conservatives have NEVER given us less government, and they never will. The ONLY people conservatives want less government for are the opulent who they worship, polluters, doctors and the Wall Street bankers who destroyed our economy. And if you are an honest working stiff who lost his job due to the opulent greed, conservatives will give you a LOT more government. You can piss in a cup and have GOVERNMENT decide if your fate.

The Founders did give us MUCH less government, secured our rights, and gave us the liberty to govern ourselves. The American liberals, as they are currently defined, have been trying to undo that ever since.

 

[Bfgrn]

Correct. And whatever other definitions people wish to use really doesn't apply to modern day American conservatism that parallels Classical Liberalism, or modern day American liberalism/progressiveism is the statist, political class, big government, nanny state group, authoritarian government group.

The definitions in America are quite different than most of their European, African, or Asian counterparts.

That is the biggest pile of horse shit on this thread. Conservatives have NEVER given us less government, and they never will. The ONLY people conservatives want less government for are the opulent who they worship, polluters, doctors and the Wall Street bankers who destroyed our economy. And if you are an honest working stiff who lost his job due to the opulent greed, conservatives will give you a LOT more government. You can piss in a cup and have GOVERNMENT decide if your fate.

The Founders did give us MUCH less government, secured our rights, and gave us the liberty to govern ourselves. The American liberals, as they are currently defined, have been trying to undo that ever since.

REALLY?

Debate and argument over the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Federalist papers has been going on for over 200 years by and between citizens, scholars, theologians and polemics. It is nothing new, and our founder's true intent on many issues has not become any closer to being resolved.

So when we have an example of how those same men applied all those principles, beliefs and ideas to actual governing, it serves as the best example of how they put all those principles, beliefs and ideas to use. Their actions carry the most weight.

Our founding fathers did not subscribe to Adam Smith's 'invisible hand'. They believed in very heavy regulations and restrictions on corporations. They were men who held ethics as the most important attribute. They viewed being paid by the American people for their services as a privilege not a right. And they had no problem closing down any corporation that swindled the people, and holding owners and stockholder personally liable for any harm to the people they caused.

Early laws regulating corporations in America

*Corporations were required to have a clear purpose, to be fulfilled but not exceeded.

*Corporations’ licenses to do business were revocable by the state legislature if they exceeded or did not fulfill their chartered purpose(s).

*The state legislature could revoke a corporation’s charter if it misbehaved.

*The act of incorporation did not relieve corporate management or stockholders/owners of responsibility or liability for corporate acts.

*As a matter of course, corporation officers, directors, or agents couldn’t break the law and avoid punishment by claiming they were “just doing their job” when committing crimes but instead could be held criminally liable for violating the law.

*Directors of the corporation were required to come from among stockholders.

*Corporations had to have their headquarters and meetings in the state where their principal place of business was located.

*Corporation charters were granted for a specific period of time, such as twenty or thirty years (instead of being granted “in perpetuity,” as is now the practice).

*Corporations were prohibited from owning stock in other corporations, to prevent them from extending their power inappropriately.

*Corporations’ real estate holdings were limited to what was necessary to carry out their specific purpose(s).

*Corporations were prohibited from making any political contributions, direct or indirect.

*Corporations were prohibited from making charitable or civic donations outside of their specific purposes.

*State legislatures could set the rates that some monopoly corporations could charge for their products or services.

*All corporation records and documents were open to the legislature or the state attorney general.

The Early Role of Corporations in America

The Legacy of the Founding Parents
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What caused the Progressive movement

We tried unregulated corporations in America. The closest experiment to total deregulation in this country occurred between the end of the Civil War and the beginning of the 19th century...it was called the Gilded Age; an era where America was as far from our founder's intent of a democratic society and closest to an aristocracy that our founder's were willing to lay down their lives to defeat.

It was opposition to that same Gilded Age that was the genesis of the Progressive movement in this country. When you study history, almost always just cause is behind it.

The only enemies of the Constitution are those who try to wield it as a weapon against the living, by using the words of the dead.
Me

 

[C_Clayton_Jones]

There is nothing failed about pragmatism and a very healthy dose of human capital that are the foundation of my beliefs.

Correct, the pragmatic approach is always best, predicated on facts and reason, as opposed to the failed dogma of the right, predicated on fear and ignorance.

 

[Intense]

There is nothing failed about pragmatism and a very healthy dose of human capital that are the foundation of my beliefs.

Correct, the pragmatic approach is always best, predicated on facts and reason, as opposed to the failed dogma of the right, predicated on fear and ignorance.

Yep, surrendering your self will to the collective is so..... grown up. Idiot. Blame it in fear and ignorance, while submerging yourself in it. Good one. Here is a tip for you, Sherlock..... Miss Scarlet, in the Conservatory, with the wrench.

Advocates of Totalitarian Government accusing us of fear and ignorance. Precious.

 

[Foxfyre]

There is nothing failed about pragmatism and a very healthy dose of human capital that are the foundation of my beliefs.

Correct, the pragmatic approach is always best, predicated on facts and reason, as opposed to the failed dogma of the right, predicated on fear and ignorance.

Yep, surrendering your self will to the collective is so..... grown up. Idiot. Blame it in fear and ignorance, while submerging yourself in it. Good one. Here is a tip for you, Sherlock..... Miss Scarlet, in the Conservatory, with the wrench.

Advocates of Totalitarian Government accusing us of fear and ignorance. Precious.

My now inactive thread on the addictive effects of free stuff dispensed by the government was intended to illustrate the negative consequences of that for a society based on individual liberties.

This thread has illustrated in spades how most modern day liberals/progressives are absolutely incapable of even understanding the principles underlying classical liberalism, much more so they seem incapable of articulating it or a rebuttal against it. Further they are unable to discuss any such principle at face value but think only in the context of non sequiturs, red herrings, and straw men.

I cannot imagine how the human spirit would not embrace liberty and self governance once they understood the principle. Is the corruption of free stuff/nanny state so strong that it destroys the natural human longing for liberty? Or are they so addicted to the free stuff that they are emotionally incapable of saying anything that might jeopardize that free stuff even if they do understand the principles of classical liberalism?

 

[Intense]

Not exactly, We have tied Classic Liberalism to the Defense of Individual Liberty, and Progressivism to the Sacrifice of Individual Liberty. Plain and simple.

Correct. And whatever other definitions people wish to use really doesn't apply to modern day American conservatism that parallels Classical Liberalism, or modern day American liberalism/progressiveism is the statist, political class, big government, nanny state group, authoritarian government group.

The definitions in America are quite different than most of their European, African, or Asian counterparts.

That is the biggest pile of horse shit on this thread. Conservatives have NEVER given us less government, and they never will. The ONLY people conservatives want less government for are the opulent who they worship, polluters, doctors and the Wall Street bankers who destroyed our economy. And if you are an honest working stiff who lost his job due to the opulent greed, conservatives will give you a LOT more government. You can piss in a cup and have GOVERNMENT decide your fate.

You are profiling, very inaccurately, at that. I am Conservative, I am Classic Liberal. I refuse your characterization. It's more Character Assassination, for Anyone or Anything that refuses to conform to the will of the hive. There are many types of people in this world, that cross all over your boundaries. You fail to see that, and that is your loss. It is not about control, at least, not about the way you want to control. Until you see that, you will fall short every time. You need to spend more time developing your own Unique Perspective. Measure twice, cut once. Don't believe everything you are told.

 

[Intense]

Correct, the pragmatic approach is always best, predicated on facts and reason, as opposed to the failed dogma of the right, predicated on fear and ignorance.

Yep, surrendering your self will to the collective is so..... grown up. Idiot. Blame it in fear and ignorance, while submerging yourself in it. Good one. Here is a tip for you, Sherlock..... Miss Scarlet, in the Conservatory, with the wrench.

Advocates of Totalitarian Government accusing us of fear and ignorance. Precious.

My now inactive thread on the addictive effects of free stuff dispensed by the government was intended to illustrate the negative consequences of that for a society based on individual liberties.

This thread has illustrated in spades how most modern day liberals/progressives are absolutely incapable of even understanding the principles underlying classical liberalism, much more so they seem incapable of articulating it or a rebuttal against it. Further they are unable to discuss any such principle at face value but think only in the context of non sequiturs, red herrings, and straw men.

I cannot imagine how the human spirit would not embrace liberty and self governance once they understood the principle. Is the corruption of free stuff/nanny state so strong that it destroys the natural human longing for liberty? Or are they so addicted to the free stuff that they are emotionally incapable of saying anything that might jeopardize that free stuff even if they do understand the principles of classical liberalism?

Some People Never make it to the point where they can see through their own eyes. It's about conditioning, needing to belong taking precedent over Honest Witness. There is a First Principle hidden in there. Sometimes too, the Abused resist being Liberated.

 

[Foxfyre]

Yep, surrendering your self will to the collective is so..... grown up. Idiot. Blame it in fear and ignorance, while submerging yourself in it. Good one. Here is a tip for you, Sherlock..... Miss Scarlet, in the Conservatory, with the wrench.

Advocates of Totalitarian Government accusing us of fear and ignorance. Precious.

My now inactive thread on the addictive effects of free stuff dispensed by the government was intended to illustrate the negative consequences of that for a society based on individual liberties.

This thread has illustrated in spades how most modern day liberals/progressives are absolutely incapable of even understanding the principles underlying classical liberalism, much more so they seem incapable of articulating it or a rebuttal against it. Further they are unable to discuss any such principle at face value but think only in the context of non sequiturs, red herrings, and straw men.

I cannot imagine how the human spirit would not embrace liberty and self governance once they understood the principle. Is the corruption of free stuff/nanny state so strong that it destroys the natural human longing for liberty? Or are they so addicted to the free stuff that they are emotionally incapable of saying anything that might jeopardize that free stuff even if they do understand the principles of classical liberalism?

Some People Never make it to the point where they can see through their own eyes. It's about conditioning, needing to belong taking precedent over Honest Witness. There is a First Principle hidden in there. Sometimes too, the Abused resist being Liberated.

The addicted almost always resist being liberated. Such is the nature of addiction. Which, in my opinion, is the overt or subliminal motive in making more and more Americans addicted to illusions of government freebies, benevolence, promised protection, etc. As each one is mezmerized or brainwashed into accepting tentacles of government closing around them, the power, prestige, influence, and personal wealth of those manipulating the tentacles is significantly increased.

It was specifically that threat/danger/reality that the Founders worked so hard to prevent. And little by little the leftists/liberals among us chip away at the protections offered by freedom and embracing increasing servitude to a governing authority.

 

[Intense]

My now inactive thread on the addictive effects of free stuff dispensed by the government was intended to illustrate the negative consequences of that for a society based on individual liberties.

This thread has illustrated in spades how most modern day liberals/progressives are absolutely incapable of even understanding the principles underlying classical liberalism, much more so they seem incapable of articulating it or a rebuttal against it. Further they are unable to discuss any such principle at face value but think only in the context of non sequiturs, red herrings, and straw men.

I cannot imagine how the human spirit would not embrace liberty and self governance once they understood the principle. Is the corruption of free stuff/nanny state so strong that it destroys the natural human longing for liberty? Or are they so addicted to the free stuff that they are emotionally incapable of saying anything that might jeopardize that free stuff even if they do understand the principles of classical liberalism?

Some People Never make it to the point where they can see through their own eyes. It's about conditioning, needing to belong taking precedent over Honest Witness. There is a First Principle hidden in there. Sometimes too, the Abused resist being Liberated.

The addicted almost always resist being liberated. Such is the nature of addiction. Which, in my opinion, is the overt or subliminal motive in making more and more Americans addicted to illusions of government freebies, benevolence, promised protection, etc. As each one is mezmerized or brainwashed into accepting tentacles of government closing around them, the power, prestige, influence, and personal wealth of those manipulating the tentacles is significantly increased.

It was specifically that threat/danger/reality that the Founders worked so hard to prevent. And little by little the leftists/liberals among us chip away at the protections offered by freedom and embracing increasing servitude to a governing authority.

Exactly, at least until the power structure shifts, the tables turn on them, and Soft Tyranny turns hard.

 

[Mr.Nick]

Liberalism versus Liberalism versus Progressivism

conservatives have hijacked part of liberalism and tied it to 'classic' liberalism which died ages and ages ago. they have tied traditional liberalism (liberalism of the last century) to progressivism.

You may as well deny we have a Bill of Rights why you're squawking that bullshit.

Classical liberalism is alive and well - you're reading a classical liberal's post right now... I subscribe to Thomas Jefferson's sociopolitical philosophy.

BTW, progressivism is not liberalism at all - it's the exact opposite as a matter of fact..

 

[Intense]

That is the biggest pile of horse shit on this thread. Conservatives have NEVER given us less government, and they never will. The ONLY people conservatives want less government for are the opulent who they worship, polluters, doctors and the Wall Street bankers who destroyed our economy. And if you are an honest working stiff who lost his job due to the opulent greed, conservatives will give you a LOT more government. You can piss in a cup and have GOVERNMENT decide if your fate.

The Founders did give us MUCH less government, secured our rights, and gave us the liberty to govern ourselves. The American liberals, as they are currently defined, have been trying to undo that ever since.

REALLY?

Debate and argument over the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Federalist papers has been going on for over 200 years by and between citizens, scholars, theologians and polemics. It is nothing new, and our founder's true intent on many issues has not become any closer to being resolved.

So when we have an example of how those same men applied all those principles, beliefs and ideas to actual governing, it serves as the best example of how they put all those principles, beliefs and ideas to use. Their actions carry the most weight.

Our founding fathers did not subscribe to Adam Smith's 'invisible hand'. They believed in very heavy regulations and restrictions on corporations. They were men who held ethics as the most important attribute. They viewed being paid by the American people for their services as a privilege not a right. And they had no problem closing down any corporation that swindled the people, and holding owners and stockholder personally liable for any harm to the people they caused.

Early laws regulating corporations in America

*Corporations were required to have a clear purpose, to be fulfilled but not exceeded.

*Corporations’ licenses to do business were revocable by the state legislature if they exceeded or did not fulfill their chartered purpose(s).

*The state legislature could revoke a corporation’s charter if it misbehaved.

*The act of incorporation did not relieve corporate management or stockholders/owners of responsibility or liability for corporate acts.

*As a matter of course, corporation officers, directors, or agents couldn’t break the law and avoid punishment by claiming they were “just doing their job” when committing crimes but instead could be held criminally liable for violating the law.

*Directors of the corporation were required to come from among stockholders.

*Corporations had to have their headquarters and meetings in the state where their principal place of business was located.

*Corporation charters were granted for a specific period of time, such as twenty or thirty years (instead of being granted “in perpetuity,” as is now the practice).

*Corporations were prohibited from owning stock in other corporations, to prevent them from extending their power inappropriately.

*Corporations’ real estate holdings were limited to what was necessary to carry out their specific purpose(s).

*Corporations were prohibited from making any political contributions, direct or indirect.

*Corporations were prohibited from making charitable or civic donations outside of their specific purposes.

*State legislatures could set the rates that some monopoly corporations could charge for their products or services.

*All corporation records and documents were open to the legislature or the state attorney general.

The Early Role of Corporations in America

The Legacy of the Founding Parents
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What caused the Progressive movement

We tried unregulated corporations in America. The closest experiment to total deregulation in this country occurred between the end of the Civil War and the beginning of the 19th century...it was called the Gilded Age; an era where America was as far from our founder's intent of a democratic society and closest to an aristocracy that our founder's were willing to lay down their lives to defeat.

It was opposition to that same Gilded Age that was the genesis of the Progressive movement in this country. When you study history, almost always just cause is behind it.

The only enemies of the Constitution are those who try to wield it as a weapon against the living, by using the words of the dead.
Me

Your end is the transfer of power, not the end of injustice. The Totalitarian changing hats or shirts is not the solution. Individual Liberty, the establishment of Justice, is. You are fighting over the Reins.