RoR: Forum

Dennis Prager is of the religious right and for that reason I don't find much of interest in most his columns. (Parenthetically, he isn't an ordinary member of the religious right - he isn't a Christian, but a Jew and is sometimes fun to read when he parses an ethical issue logically rather than from the religious perspective.)

But this column is on a subject that interests me. How do we take back our country? I disagree with much of the content in his column, and I'm wondering what are our most effective steps? What steps are adequate? Necessary? How is this all likely to play out?

Post 1

Monday, April 12, 2010 - 12:28pm

I've listed Dennis Prager's ideas on what must be done, and commented on them:

1. Know and teach America's core values.

(I agree with the approach, but I don't agree with many of what he frames as core values.)

2. Recognize that we are fighting the left, not liberals.

(I don't agree with that formulation - we are fighting statists, the progressives, the big government advocates, Republican or Democrat or Marxist - those on both sides of the aisle. He is attempting to reclaim the term "Liberal" and that isn't the focus we need, although a better historical understanding in this area won't hurt.)

3. Democrats should be referred to as Social Democrats. (Seems like an ineffective approach. He is working to show the similarity of our current crop of democrats and the social democrats of Europe. More effective, I'd think, would be calling the democrats and the big government republicans (most of them) progressives.)

4. Work tirelessly to repeal the bill.

(I agree with that. First defund it, then after 2012 repeal it. But it has to be as part of a larger war - filibuster the supreme court appointment till Obama is out of office - reverse all executive orders - eliminate whole departments - etc.)

5. Our motto: "The bigger the government, the smaller the citizen"

(I'm with him here. We need to make the size of the government a major issue. Shoot for cutting spending by 50% and forcing a balance budget at that level. Shift taxes from business to individual. Kill regulations.)

6. Do not let other matters distract.

(Here is an interesting area. He is talking about people joining together despite lessor differences. So, you might be against illegal immigration but you stand along side of those who favor amnesty if you both share the small government issue. I agree with the 'big tent' approach to replacing all politicians who are not small government advocates, but I don't think we can ignore the danger of siding with those who don't understand that religion can never be a foundation for political system, or that it is okay to regulate in some areas - like morality, or like safety).

7. Aknowledge that we are in a non-violent civil war.

(I agree. This is a the clearest split in politics that we have seen. On one side are those who want government power over all individuals and they offer entitlements. Joining them are all the different factions wanting power for their own ends, and all those demanding entitlements. On the other side are those fighting for individual freedom, individual responsibility and Capitalism.

Not only is the line drawn in the sand clear, and in a way that lets us fight the right fight, but it is at the time when our nation is in imminent danger of total destruction.)

Post 2

Tuesday, April 13, 2010 - 7:12am

Steve,

I'd agree... except for calling social democrats "progressives". It is still suggestive of progress, How about "Aggressives" or "social aggressives"?

jt

Post 3

Tuesday, April 13, 2010 - 7:39am

I call them "retrogressives" instead.

(Edited by Luke Setzer on 4/13, 8:04am)

Post 4

Tuesday, April 13, 2010 - 9:25am

I like retrogressive, because I believe these people are precipitating a new dark age through the slow destruction of pro life values, it's the only logical conclusion.

Post 5

Tuesday, April 13, 2010 - 9:41am

There are even more reasons why "progressive" is a bad choce of name.

- The term is a euphemism for a variety of theoretically, popularly and historically discredited notions. It sends the message that one needs a euphemism and knows it.

- As a political designation in the US it's over a century old, and the underlying ontology date back to Victorian times, a couple of generations earlier. Thus it isn't a good name if you want to advertise yourself as with-it and forward-looking.

- If you have even a high school acquaintance with that part of American history (circa the first two decades of the twentieth century) you know that the original Progressives were thoroughly vile characters. They gave us our alcohol and heroin prohibitions, they got the US into the WWI, they gave us the wartime and postwar restrictions on freedom of speech that led to the founding of the ACLU (including the first campaign-finance restrictions), and they were crackpot racists who brought about Jim Crow, whites-only voting, the Oriental Exclusion acts in California and our original immigration restrictions. (Liberal Fascism by Goldberg, Wrong on Race by Bartlett and The Strange Career of Jim Crow by Woodward are all good sources.) If identifying with these people makes you look better you're in trouble.

Post 6

Tuesday, April 13, 2010 - 10:03am

Jay,

It isn't me that is calling progressives 'progressives' - it is an identification of what they once called themselves (at the turn of the century) and what they are starting to call themselves now.

Our educational system has handled our political education so poorly that this period is either unknown of wrongly understood. I owe my understanding of it to Glenn Beck's show.

My Objectivist principles have always given me an excellent frame for understanding politics, but this addition of the historical component made for considerable clarity. Nearly all of the elected democrats and a great many of the elected republicans are actually progressives.

Peter has it right in post #5 - his last point. As Beck pointed out, turn of the century politicians used up the political capital they had stolen as they abused the term "liberal" - making it into something totally different than it had been. They needed a new name to hide under and chose "progressive" - after a while the nature of a progressive became sufficiently well know to loose its popularity, and they went back to being "liberals" and now that pattern is repeating. The far left elected politicians are referring to themselves as "progressives."

Post 7

Tuesday, April 13, 2010 - 10:57pm

By itself, the term "progressive" means nothing. It has no content, and acquires meaning only in relation to an object. Towards what are you progressing? Towards greater freedom or greater government control? Today's so-called "progressives" are progressing all right, but it's towards some variant of a socialist/fascist state.

Post 8

Wednesday, April 14, 2010 - 12:02am

Progressives are progressing towards their goal of getting free of the constitution which is the only way they believe they can get to complete socialism.

There are two paths that will achieve socialism: One requires a revolution; the other is the slow but steady progress in the erosion of constitutionality - until there in nothing left to resist the passage of laws like single-payer health services.

Take a look at the Fabian Socialists - from what I understand, this was the beginning of the key aspects of the way socialism is pursued here in the states - first at the turn of the century and again with Obama and today's congress. And it has steadily been the nature of many of the professors in our universities. Fabian socialism lives in the academic world and infects the body politic from there.

Post 9

Wednesday, April 14, 2010 - 7:45am

I recommend The Metaphysical Club by Louis Menand for more insight into the history of progressive politics and pragmatism in America.

Perhaps most notable among the author's points is the genesis of Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes' open hostility to absolutes cultivated during his numerous near-fatal experiences as a soldier in the American Civil War.

(Edited by Luke Setzer on 4/14, 7:46am)

Post 10

Wednesday, April 14, 2010 - 11:46am

Luke,

Thanks, the reviews on Amazon looked good - I ordered it.

Post 11

Wednesday, April 14, 2010 - 9:58pm