What Is a Liberal?

In his online column today, Howard Kurtz of The Washington Post quoted from a National Review column by the editors on the impending selection of Howard Dean as chairman of the Democratic National Committee.

The party is displaying an unquenchable thirst for irrelevance. Several theories have been advanced in the wake of Bush's reelection for the Democrats' troubles: a lack of seriousness on national security; an out-of-touch liberalism on social issues; an inability to sell its message in terms that connect with 'red state' voters. The DNC is about to reject all these theories in favor of one of its own -- all that ails the Democratic can be fixed by more of the same, only more so.

…the fact is that Dean did not run as a moderate in the Democratic primaries, when he cemented his national image as a ranter against the Iraq war and tax cuts, even before his infamous Iowa scream. He was so far left on social issues that he pledged — riffing off of Bill Clinton's status as "the first black president" — to be the first gay president.
…Say what you will about them, at least the Clintons have always been willing to accommodate American realities enough to win elections. But, in the meantime, there will be Dean, who would represent another step by the Democrats into the quicksand of outdated orthodoxies and self-pleasing emotionalism.

I have reservations about Dean’s discipline and organizing skills. But the idea that this guy is some left-wing ideologue doesn’t seem to fit. I would argue, as many conservatives have for decades, that not engaging in unnecessary foreign entanglements, a la Iraq, and fiscal irresponsibility, a la tax cuts, is hardly left wing. It’s not even moderate. It's conservative.

“Self-pleasing emotionalism” seems to be the calling card of conservatives. Even though the GOP has total control of the legislative and executive branches, it still trades in hyper-emotional rants against gays who want to marry and raise children and women who do not want to bring children into the world when they cannot raise them.

Since when are tolerance and nurturing “outdated orthodoxies”?

And what is a liberal?

Comments

[alan]

In today's world, a liberal (a) believes in government programs to solve problems; (b) will tend to favor equality over economic freedom; (c) libertarian on social issues; (d) believes deeply in Roe v. Wade.

I think a small government, policy-pragmatic, socially liberal Democratic candidate would do well. Such a politician would not fit the full liberal definition, and would be known as a centrist or moderate. Hey, wait a second, we recently had one of those, and he won the presidency twice in row.

I am afraid that Dean is the face of the type of liberalism that gave us Mondale/Dukakis/Kerry -- losers all.

We ought to be looking for the next Bill Clinton, not the next Kerry. (I would be excited by the other Clinton, except I think she has 0 percent chance of winning.)

[Jon]

This has nothing to do with your post, but:

The New Donkey says,

VA GOPer Attacks Church Property Rights
It was buried pretty deep in today's Washington Post, but there was a story about a Republican legislative initiative in Virginia that tells you a lot about how deep the cultural war mentality runs in today's GOP.

The bill, sponsored by state Sen. William C. Mims from exurban Loudon County, would give religious congregations seceding from their denominations control over church buildings, even if that violates longstanding denominational arrangements governing church property.

There's zero question what this initiative is about: the conservative effort to pull Episcopal parishes into breakaway denominations in response to the ordination of a gay bishop in New Hampshire. The Episcopal Church has consistently told potential break-away congregations they must be willing to leave behind their buildings if they refuse to maintain communion with their brethren. (As the name of the denomination might suggest, the Protestant Episcopal Church of the United States is not an alliance of independent congregations, but an organic union claiming its authority from the apostolic succession of bishops). A wide array of state and federal courts, up to and including the U.S. Supreme Court, have upheld this position as a matter of simple property law. Mims' bill would give Virginia the rare distinction of becoming the first state to force a reorganization of a major religious denomination.

So: for at least one Republican, the imperative of encouraging the demonization of gay people overrides both the independence of churches and private property rights.

As I recall, Virginia eliminated mandatory membership in or financial support for the Anglican Church (the precursor of today's Episcopalians) with the enactment of Jefferson's Statute of Religious Liberty in 1786. Those whose homophobic tendencies override their belief in the other tenets of the Episcopal Church have a rich variety of other devotional options available. (After all, what's two millenia of theology and liturgy as compared to the latest right-wing witch hunt?). They are entitled to take their views elsewhere. But they are not entitled to a nice little sectarian endowment in the form of property seized from the church they are repudiating, as a special gift from the Virginia Republican Party.