Wall Street Journal (subscription) | The Danger of Progressives' Inhumanity to the Humanities - WSJ Wall Street Journal (subscription) Science moves forward; literature doesn'tand when it tries, the results can be monstrous. |
Go here to see the original:
The Danger of Progressives' Inhumanity to the Humanities - WSJ - Wall Street Journal (subscription)
Over and over again, political pundits and journalists make constant reference to the Democrats progressive base. Without heavy progressive turnout, we are told, the House wont flip in 2018 and Democrats will have to endure the most painful, humiliating victory Tweetstorm from President Trump.
This is likely true, but it raises an important question: What exactly is a progressive at this point?
The group of voters currently holding Democratic leaders (and lets face it, donors) hostage has made it clear that the partys next nominee for president must adopt certain policies, such as single-payer health care and a nationwide $15 minimum wage, to secure their support. Such policies will likely be sold by the press and Democratic leaders as a Strong Progressive Agenda, or something similar.
Yet such a description is vague at best and deceptive at worst. After all, Senator Bernie Sanders mainstreamed many of these policies in last years Democratic primary campaign, not as a Democrat but as an Independent who proudly calls himself a democratic socialist. Despite his outsider status, Sanders still received over 43 percent of the votes cast in his campaign against Hillary Clinton. And according to a poll done in 2016 by American Action Network, nearly 60 percent of Democratic primary voters viewed socialism as having a positive impact on society.
So one must ask why so many insist on using an outmoded nicety like progressive. While the term was originally used to describe those who supported a more active federal government and expansive welfare state in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, old-school progressives like Presidents Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson didnt advocate for government control of the means of production, as many socialists do today. Setting aside whether or not their policies of trust busting or expanding the role of the executive branch produced desirable outcomes, neither of these men sought to fundamentally dismantle the nations market economy.
Sanders was asked in an interview with The Nation in 2015 about whether a socialist could be president. He responded that he wasnt afraid of the word and had no problem defending its core tenets. So why are so many other people?
The answer likely has to do with marketing. Progressive remains a nebulous enough term that the average voter wont make any immediate historical connections to the phrase; the historical failures of socialism, meanwhile, are well documented. The root of the word progress has generally positive connotations for voters. Thus when presented with a progressive policy, voters will think of an improved future, rather than some sort of rigid ideology. (Simple, yes. But, then, most sales pitches are.)
Of course none of this makes the efforts by Democratic-party officials and their allies in the media to shy away from the S word any less disingenuous. When so many members of the party openly celebrate socialism and support socialist candidates, using any other word to describe this political constituency is an act of absurdity.
Perhaps in an earlier time when the country was less divided politically and Americans were more suspicious of liberal welfare programs, a rebranding was necessary. Now, on the heels of a primary campaign in which Democrats nearly nominated a socialist for president, its safe to say that that moment has passed.
Its time to move on as a society and retire progressive. Socialist might seem just as outdated, but if youre worried about how people might judge you, perhaps you should reconsider your beliefs.
Joe Simonson writes about politics and culture.
View post:
'Socialist' is a more accurate description of today's Democratic base. - National Review
The U.S. Senate rejected a Republican measure to repeal portions of former President Obama's health care reform law. Republicans John McCain, Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins joined the Democrats in voting down the measure, 49-51. (July 28) AP
Each week, USA TODAY's OnPolitics blog takes a look at how media from the left and the right reacted to a political news story, giving liberals and conservatives a peek into the other's media bubble.
This week, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., managed to upset both liberals and conservatives with his dramatic return to the Capitol from cancer treatment in order to vote on legislation to repeal the Affordable Care Act. McCain initially drew praise from conservatives when he arrived Tuesday and voted in favor of a motion to proceed on debating legislation. That vote enraged liberals, who said McCain had returned to rob health care from millions. He then infuriated the right-wing by casting the deciding vote against a "skinny repeal" early Friday. That vote failed to win over liberals, however, who thoughtRepublican Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins were the real heroes.
Last week:Health care fail has conservatives calling for McConnell's head
Liberal commentators began hurling venom at McCain Tuesday after he votedfor the motion to proceed. They assailed him as a fraud and hypocrite.
"McCain, that rascally maverick, flew into the upper chamber to vote on a motion to allow debate on his partys health care nightmare, despite being diagnosed with brain cancer only a few days ago," Sarah Jones wrote for the New Republic after Tuesday's vote. "He then had the gall to crown this reckless, horrible moveone that upends years of precedent in the Senatewith some Sorkin-esque pablum condemning the Senate for turning its back on the democratic process and calling for a return to regular order."
McCain has performed this gross two-step throughout his recent career, taking the high road in his rhetoric while going along with his party on whatever depraved route they take.He is not a maverick; he is a conventional Republican through and through.
Fox News Radio host Todd Starnes directed his ire for the failed healthcarevote directly at McCain.
"The only reason he flew back to Washington, D.C., was to stick it to the American people," Starnes said. "You see, I always knew this guy was a closet Democrat. Last night, John McCain came out of the political closet."
Sen.MCainhas built a reputation over the years for insulting his opponents. He gets pretty nasty sometimes. Just the other day, he called talk radio hosts bombasticloudmouths. He once called his conservative colleagues like Ted Cruz "wacko birds." He even went after Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson and Evangelical leaders. He called them agents of intolerance. Well, if it's all the same to you, ladies and gentlemen, I'd rather be a bombastic, intolerantwacko bird than a backstabbing liar.
Several progressive pundits and commentators were annoyed that McCain was getting the lion's share of credit in the news media for the failure of the Republican repeal effort. They felt Murkowski and Collins were the ones who deserved praise for killing the bill.
Jezebel's Prachi Gupta said there would not have been a vote at all on the repeal if McCain had voted with Murkowski and Collins to block Tuesday's motion to proceed.
"Thanks to his vote in support of this atrocious measure, Congress spent a week playing Russian Roulette with millions of peoples access to healthcare," Gupta wrote.
"It is also frustrating to see McCain reap the adoration when both Murkowski and Collins have been consistently bullied by their own party throughout this process," she said.
Former Fox News commentator Bill O'Reilly said it was "deeply surprising" that McCain "cast the deciding vote to kill health care reform."
"So, Obamacare lives on in full thanks to John McCain, and the Democratic Party wins a major victory," O'Reilly wrote in a column. "I have known Senator McCain for decades and respect him. But on a bill that would have diminished the failure of Obamacare, he let his country down."
"If you want to laud Senator John McCain for his military service, or for his occasional high-profile stabs at bipartisanship, feel free," wrote The Nation's Joshua Holland. "But it didnt take a lick of courage to vote against an ACA repeal bill that was supported by fewer than 20 percent of the electorate, and which would have killed off some unknown number of his constituents if it passed."
It isnt mavericky to fly into the capital on Tuesday to offer the deciding vote to take up a series of bills that would have stripped insurance coverage from between 16 and 23 million people, only to grab the spotlight with anovote two nights later during the final, decidedly operatic act.
Breitbart editor Joel Pollak took issue with McCain's claim that his vote against the "skinny repeal" of Obamacare was a vote for bipartisanship.
"In fact, it was the opposite, rewarding Democrats for passing Obamacare without working with Republicans in the first place, allowing them to establish a beachhead for government-runhealth care, which they will now be able to protect," wrote Pollak.
Pollak also disagreed with McCain's feeling that Democrats were left out of the process.
"Throughout the past seven months, Democrats had every opportunity to propose improvements to Obamacare," Pollak wrote. "They had the same opportunity for the past seven years."
Read more:
John McCain will begin treatment for brain tumor Monday
John McCain sinks skinny repeal. Way to represent, senator
John McCain's cancer: What is glioblastoma?
Read or Share this story: https://usat.ly/2vf6X8j
The rest is here:
The Bubble: McCain no hero, conservatives and liberals say - USA TODAY
Story Highlights
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Gallup's annual measurement of how Americans describe their views on social issues finds social liberals nearly tying with social conservatives for the fifth straight year. This is a change from 2001 through 2012 when social conservatives had the clear lead, including by 17-percentage-point margins in 2009 and 2010.
In Gallup's latest update, conducted May 3-7, 34% of Americans describe their views as conservative or very conservative while 30% identify as liberal or very liberal. Another 34% call themselves moderate and 2% are unsure. Gallup measures Americans' ideology on social issues annually as part of its Values and Beliefs survey, conducted each May.
Democrats' Fueling Rise in Social Liberalism
The increase in social liberalism has not been universal, but has occurred mainly among Democrats. The percentage of Democrats describing themselves as socially liberal increased fairly steadily from 36% in 2001 to 53% 2015 where it has since held.
By contrast, Republicans' propensity to identify as socially liberal has hardly changed, consistently registering around 10%.
In order to see whether the liberal shift in Democrats' social views is universal within the Democratic ranks, or limited to certain subgroups, Gallup has grouped its annual data into four time periods, allowing for larger sample sizes to evaluate the trends in Democratic subgroups. The earliest time period is from 2001 through 2005 when an average 37% of Democrats identified as socially liberal. The most recent period is from 2015 to 2017 when the figure held at 53%.
As shown in the accompanying table, social liberalism has risen among all major demographic subgroups of Democrats, as well as in the four main regions of the country. However, there are some notable differences:
Democrats' Views on Social Issues -- % Liberal
Implications
The increase in social liberalism in the U.S. seen since the early 2000s is the result of increasing liberalism among Democrats, and particularly among white, more-educated and older Democrats. The changes by age mean that various age groups of Democrats are now in greater political alignment. However, the changes by education and race have widened the divide on social issues between Democrats with and without college degrees, as well as between white and black Democrats.
This doesn't necessarily mean Democrats are at odds with each other. Indeed, despite the widening gaps along race and education lines, 89% of Democrats supported the Democratic Party's nominee for president in 2016. However, as Democratic leaders debate how to redefine the party post-President Barack Obama these data suggest that moving any further to the left on social issues could risk alienating Democrats with lower levels of education.
Those are the kinds of voters President Donald Trump might try to attract in a second-term bid, particularly if his GOP base is faltering. On the other hand, with most of these lesser-educated Democrats describing themselves as moderate on social issues rather than conservative, that would be a hard sell.
Historical data are available in Gallup Analytics.
The latest national results are based on telephone interviews conducted May 3-7, 2017, with a random sample of 1,011 adults, aged 18 and older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. For results based on the total sample of national adults, the margin of sampling error is 4 percentage points at the 95% confidence level.
All reported margins of sampling error include computed design effects for weighting.
Result based on combined years have larger sample sizes
Each sample of national adults includes a minimum quota of 70% cellphone respondents and 30% landline respondents, with additional minimum quotas by time zone within region. Landline and cellular telephone numbers are selected using random-digit-dial methods.
See the article here:
Social Liberals Nearly Tie Social Conservatives in U.S. | Gallup - Gallup
The United States is evolving into a one-party country; that being Republican with support from independents and pro-Trump Democrats. The once proud party that cared for and supported the working middle-class, union workers and minorities, has decimated long-standing traditions and plunged itself into a sewer of antipathy and vulgarity. They sail merrily and rudderless toward the insanity of the ultra-left, socialism and political correctness.
It has become a party of destruction, hypocrisy, hate and obstruction. There is no denying that. And there is no end in sight. In a few short months, we will be blessed with the mid-term elections where Republicans will win a super-majority in the Senate. Contributors to the Democrats will be pouring millions of dollars into slimy, snarky attack ads.
All the self-centered, malignantly narcissistic celebrities will return spewing their vile hatred and morbid sophomoric soliloquies. I imagine we will even see our former president and former secretary of state on the stump for the liberals.
None of that mattered in 2016 and certainly will not matter in 2018. To make matters worse, the liberal virus appears to have infected a few Republicans who have concluded their egos are more important than their loyalty to the country, the president and our Grand Old Party.
I am comforted however, with the knowledge that time wounds all heels.