Right-wingers say that labor unions are corrupt, so we should get rid of them. Yes, some unions have been corrupt, but the right wing's desire to get rid of them has nothing to do with their corruption, and everything to do with the corruption of the owners of what Marx quaintly called the means of production. Governments grow from little acorns into giant oaks; their shade kills as well as shelters. It is true.

Perhaps you should read Paul Rosenberg's last comment again. The administration of the human enterprise, and the institutions of power which permit it are always fraught. You can't escape the twenty-first century. Our institutions of power these days, centralized, rationalized, and equipped with the all the modern instruments science and engineering have crafted for them, appear impervious, whether they clothe themselves in the guise of government or global capitalism. Their only weakness is that they have human beings at the helm, and arrogant ones at that.

Jefferson's popular democracy is under attack from all quarters; what we call government is only one of its enemies. Still, if we accept the idea that politics can -- and should -- trump economics, we might be able to employ government to better ends. We have no such hope with corporations empowered by laws once intended to nurture the entrpreneur.

That's what scares me about Ken Wilber and Integral Politics:

According to Wilber, Buddha was the Ultimate Republican.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQRUu_4W2j8

I enjoy reading your posts and want you to continue to participate, but in this particular argument, your viewpoint has an unfortunate disadvantage in that it's just plain wrong.

Go ahead, and let it out; do you think I am wrong? :-)

This is a debate I had with my best friend (very liberal Catholic) over several years. He came to see my side over time, as he realized we are not all that far apart.

Walmart has used (no, I mean abused) the government to do things that they could not have done otherwise. We can agree that they should be punished for that, no?

Further, we believe that any monopoly contains its own seeds of destruction, but that topic is a long one, and I do not have the time just now.

I can say --- I hate that damn Walmart. I can also say that we must make them abide by the rules of the game. But, I do not see using government to punish them simply because I dislike them so much. (I mean, hey --- some guys here don't like me much) ;-)

-b1

Michael Harold wrote:

"Conservatives seem to be asking themselves and others the question, "What is a liberal? Am I a liberal? Are you a liberal?" Rather than construct a list of attributes, I would like to offer a short list of familiar names of individuals who are unquestionably liberals:

"Franklin D. Roosevelt, John Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, Teddy Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Gloria Steinem, Jimmy Carter, Martin Luther King Jr., Coretta Scott King, Virginia Woolf, Joan Baez, Woody Guthrie, Oprah Winfrey, Allen Ginsberg, Susan Sontag, Bob Dylan, John Lennon, Hunter Thompson, Gore Vidal, Annie Sprinkle, Andy Warhol

"So, if you are currently conservative and wonder if maybe you were actually a liberal all along, compare yourself to these people and if you still think you're a liberal, well maybe you are.

"Also, Jesus was a liberal. So was Buddha."

Michael, I hate to rain on your celebrity parade, but I must respectfully disagree. I'm very familiar with the biographies of every one of the people you list, and I know for a fact that they are each and every one, politically, Jacobin syndicalists, except for Jesus, Who is a Neo-Conservative from way back.

What the hell, you might ask, is a "Jacobin syndicalist"? If I responded that it's anyone who holds the political views of the people on the list, from Oprah to Woody Guthrie, but not Jesus, would you know anymore than you did before I responded?

Um, no, you wouldn't.

You've brought up a good point, however, in that I've not seen in this forum any serious attempt to define what liberalism, fascism, or any other -ism that's been bandied freely about like people knew what they were talking about.

In the absence of definitions, it's helpful to direct people to political theorists whose extant writings may provide insight into a political school of thought's principles, goals, programmes, etc., and that has happened to some extent in these discussions with respect to "libertarianism" and "individualism," and to a lesser extent to "conservatism," but not with respect to "liberalism."

So, to return to your original question, what *are* "liberals," or what do they do that makes them distinguishable from "Jacobin syndicalists," say, or "Imperialist Neocons with Narcissistic Personality Disorder"?

Ken R.

But, I do not see using government to punish them simply because I dislike them so much

Are zoning ordinances and minimum wage laws "punishment" or are they simply ways that communities impose standards of behavior on their otherwise disembodied neighbors?

I do agree with L.W.M. that it's a neat trick to claim Jefferson as the paterfamilias of these so-called libertarians and anarcho-capitalists, rather like the one that LDS geneologists pull on their unsuspecting ancestors. It's vile, as vile as claiming that Stalin was my ancestor.

All credit goes to Mike Huben.

http://world.std.com/~mhuben/libindex.html

Especially for his authorship of the hilariously funny and indefeatable "Libertarianism in One Lesson".

http://world.std.com/~mhuben/onelesson.html

Introduction

One of the most attractive features of libertarianism is that it is basically a very simple ideology. Maybe even simpler than Marxism, since you don't have to learn foreign words like "proletariat".

This brief outline will give you most of the tools you need to hit the ground running as a freshly indoctrinated libertarian ideologue. Go forth and proselytize!

Philosophy

In the beginning, man dwelt in a state of Nature, until the serpent Government tempted man into Initial Coercion.

Government is the Great Satan. All Evil comes from Government, and all Good from the Market, according to the Ayatollah Rand.

We must worship the Horatio Alger fantasy that the meritorious few will just happen to have the lucky breaks that make them rich. Libertarians happen to be the meritorious few by ideological correctness. The rest can go hang.

Government cannot own things because only individuals can own things. Except for corporations, partnerships, joint ownership, marriage, and anything else we except but government.

Parrot these arguments, and you too will be a singular, creative, reasoning individualist.

Parents cannot choose a government for their children any more than they can choose language, residence, school, or religion.

Taxation is theft because we have a right to squat in the US and benefit from defense, infrastructure, police, courts, etc. without obligation.

Magic incantations can overturn society and bring about libertopia. Sovereign citizenry! The 16th Amendment is invalid! States rights!

There's more but it's quite devastatingly succinct and to the point. Just one page

"...L.W.M.'s supposed personal faults."

What "supposed" faults? That's me, warts and all.