Is "progressive" the new "liberal?"

[Gonad the Barbarian]

Is this just a new word for the same old evil ruining the country or is this a separate evil country-ruining animal? I haven't been listening to Rush lately nor have I seen this month's RNC news letter so I'm unsure. Or is this some tea party invention that I need to watch Fox News' "editorial programming" to understand?

 

[Tristicus]

Can the troll be successful? Stay tuned to find out...

 

[Gonad the Barbarian]

Several of you guys started throwing this word around, I want to know why and what you mean by it. Did you just wear "liberal" out or is this something else?

 

[yllus]

I actually think it's the far left who started up with "progressives" around the start of last year. They did this to separate themselves from the regular old left, which is now considered corporatist or otherwise sellouts because those people are generally happy with the halting actions the Obama administration have undertaken.

 

[MotF Bane]

Seems to be the latest term for those who desire large government and hate corporations, the idiots who believe that government is the cure for everything.

 

[PJABBER]

yllus and MotF Bane are spot on. SOSDN.

 

[Fear No Evil]

I don't know if Obama has used the term Progressive yet, but his underlings certainly have.. usually when they don't think they are being recorded it seems.

 

[Craig234]

Is this just a new word for the same old evil ruining the country or is this a separate evil country-ruining animal? I haven't been listening to Rush lately nor have I seen this month's RNC news letter so I'm unsure. Or is this some tea party invention that I need to watch Fox News' "editorial programming" to understand?

I use them pretty synonomously.

I suspect a couple main reasons people might say progressive are:

- It's clearer. The word liberal has a long history and people have different definitions. LBJ was a 'liberal' and yet he had aggressive foreign policy with Viet Nam, Dominican Republic...

- The word 'liberal' has stronger mindless knee-jerk negative reaction from some people in the public who were conditioned by demonization since Reagan.

I disagree with that and think education is needed against the right-wing lies.

It's not totally unlike the way 'conservative' is less clear now - does it mean the Buckley types or the Neocons? The Libertarians or the religious right? All have used it.

With the decline of the right, 'liberal' has more and more simply been 'rational' and 'not lying', hence right and left being less opinion differences than 'crazy versus not crazy'.

IMO, generally the right now is basically sold out to the interests of the rich, the minions who fall for the propaganda, while the lest - while some who say they're left have sold out as well - is more about the people's interests, our own and the world's. It understands better the harms of a few owning, controlling, too much and protects opportunity and rights for the individual American.

 

[lothar]

Several of you guys started throwing this word around, I want to know why and what you mean by it. Did you just wear "liberal" out or is this something else?

The only person I know who uses that word here is Craig234.
Why don't you ask him?

 

[PJABBER]

The only person I know who uses that word here is Craig234.
Why don't you ask him?

I sometimes use it when I forget how to spell communist.

Or when Trotskyite seems just a bit too formal.

Or when collectivist anarchist just doesn't have the right ring to it.

 

[Double Trouble]

I disagree with that and think education is needed against the right-wing lies.

Yes comrade, to the 'education' camps with them, we must "educate" them to get rid of this non-conformism with the liberal ideals of the state!

Bottom line, the left didn't like the stigma -- sometimes deserved, sometimes not -- associated with the term "liberal", so it appears they substituted the term "progressive" now. Same drivel, different name for it.

 

[Atreus21]

In all seriousness, does the right ever change the names for its issues?

Like global warming to climate change, liberal to progressive?

 

[Schadenfroh]

Like global warming to climate change, liberal to progressive?

Do not forget that "Cap and Trade" is now "Pollution Reduction Targets."

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6284M120100309

Like a savvy Madison Avenue advertising team, senators pushing climate-control legislation have decided to scrap the name "cap and trade" and rebrand their product as "pollution reduction targets."

I do not know about you guys, but when I think "progressive," I think about Theodore Roosevelt rather than modern liberals.

 

[Craig234]

In all seriousness, does the right ever change the names for its issues?

Like global warming to climate change, liberal to progressive?

It's more consistent at saying the same things, and doing the same opposite things.

Consistent at not using honest labels for its policies to help the rich and screw the public.

We've got Reagan railing against 'big governnment' while the only cuts he'd favor are ones to things benefittingthe public while skyrocketing government to pay his cronies.

We've got him railing against 'negotiating with terrorists' while secretly and illegally selling them weapons to raise fund to pay for other illegal terrorists, and sponsoring yet more.

Similar for others - you get the Republicans under Bush complaining about spending and deficits while their two top priorities were to borrow massive tax cuts while skyrocketing the deficits to benefit their rich cronies, while passing Medicare Part D that actually hurt many seniors but enriched their #1 donor industry, big pharma with non-negotiated prices on yet more debt.

 

[CaptainGoodnight]

Progressives are the Liberal's Neocons.

 

[Zebo]

Liberal was never really applicable. Those are the guys at mises.org.

Socialist is not applicable either since they don't believe in labor controlling all means of production.

Communist is not applicable because they don't believe in state controlling means of production.

It's really a third way between capitalism with socialist undertones. Progressive sounds about right.

 

[Craig234]

Do not forget that "Cap and Trade" is now "Pollution Reduction Targets."

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6284M120100309



I do not know about you guys, but when I think "progressive," I think about Theodore Roosevelt rather than modern liberals.

A lot of what Teddy Roosevelt did WAS progressive - the same kind as today. He saw unfair treatment of labor and abuses by the rich and wanted to take action to fix them.

You need his quotes posted about the fortunes of the rich having to serve society's interests that today's progressives would be cautious to say?

His recognition of dissent against corrupt governmnent would have fit right in with the progressives under Bush, while the right was happy to infiltrate groups of grandmas for peace to 'protect' us. That's a much more progressive value that right-wing - even if the right is now in it's nutty 'the government is out to get us' paranoia, corporate-sponsored phase to oppose things like health-care reform.

 

[sandorski]

Seems to be the latest term for those who desire large government and hate corporations, the idiots who believe that government is the cure for everything.

Both those who think "Government Cures All" and those who think "Government Sickens All" are Failures.

 

[Atreus21]

Both those who think "Government Cures All" and those who think "Government Sickens All" are Failures.

I agree.

So what, to a liberal, is government's proper role?

 

[Zebo]

Teddy wouldn't even get a nomination today with him favoring huge graduated taxation, he was pro-union, anti-monopolist, "trust busting", and single payer Universal Health Care - let alone the Republican one. Our country is so far right relative to 100 or even 50 years ago.

 

[cubby1223]

With the decline of the right, 'liberal' has more and more simply been 'rational' and 'not lying', hence right and left being less opinion differences than 'crazy versus not crazy'.

You must practice saying these things with a straight face, don't you

Liberal used to be more along the lines of Libertarian, but, uh, yeah, ain't no one ever gonna mistake today's Democrats for Libertarians.

 

[Craig234]

I agree.

So what, to a liberal, is government's proper role?

Representing the welfare of the society on behalf of the people, able to stand up to powerful interests who want to excessively further their own interests against the people.

That means things like having policies under which the people prosper the most - tax policies that result in a prosperous society, enough but not too much inequality, etc.

The government facilitates a strong economy - so that productive activities are encouraged and rewarded while harmful ones are discouraged or prohobited.

Sometimes that means getting out of the way, other times intervening. The discussion is more difficult because of the warped nature of activity since Reagan's shifts.

It also means protecting individual rights, from abuses by private forces or the government.

In short, there are two basic models - the high concentration of wealth with a few rich and powerful and the masses serving them in relative poverty, or a strong middle class.

Liberals are for the strong middle class, the doing well by as many as possible.

Freedom, prosperity, peace are the goals of the liberal government.

The liberal recognizes the danger of private tyrrany, not only public tyrrany like the right. Liberals are not anti-well off, they're anti-robber baron rich hurting the public.

 

[MotF Bane]

Progressives are the Liberal's Neocons.

Hahaha.

Representing the welfare of the society on behalf of the people, able to stand up to powerful interests who want to excessively further their own interests against the people.

That means things like having policies under which the people prosper the most - tax policies that result in a prosperous society, enough but not too much inequality, etc.

The government facilitates a strong economy - so that productive activities are encouraged and rewarded while harmful ones are discouraged or prohobited.

Sometimes that means getting out of the way, other times intervening. The discussion is more difficult because of the warped nature of activity since Reagan's shifts.

It also means protecting individual rights, from abuses by private forces or the government.

In short, there are two basic models - the high concentration of wealth with a few rich and powerful and the masses serving them in relative poverty, or a strong middle class.

Liberals are for the strong middle class, the doing well by as many as possible.

Freedom, prosperity, peace are the goals of the liberal government.

The liberal recognizes the danger of private tyrrany, not only public tyrrany like the right. Liberals are not anti-well off, they're anti-robber baron rich hurting the public.

Fairly close, and yet those goals are nothing like what the so-called liberals in this country follow.

 

[Jaskalas]

Seems to be the latest term for those who desire large government and hate corporations, the idiots who believe that government is the cure for everything.

So in other words, communists and socialists. Government is good, private is evil type.

 

[Tristicus]

And....success!