Help! I’m Becoming A Liberal
My wife and I have always been at opposite ends of the political spectrum, but when she read my post last week on same-sex marriage, her first reaction was that I was beginning to sound like a progressive. Anyone who knows me well would laugh out loud at the mere suggestion. While I don’t identify with either of the major political parties, my leanings have always been well to the right on issues that I consider important. My vision of a perfect utopian society would be closer to something out of an Ayn Rand novel than the cradle to grave welfare state espoused by Ted Kennedy style progressives. I dream of a purely secular libertarian meritocracy, tempered with a degree of compassion for those who truly lack the physical or intellectual wherewithal to survive in a state of pure social Darwinism.
Most of what we consider to be progressive today is very much at odds with my personal values. I do not believe that the government is capable of solving major social problems, and I am vehemently opposed to anything resembling social engineering, class warfare, or redistribution of wealth. I am an unrepentant capitalist, and a true believer in the power of free markets. Unlike many politicians, however, I am also willing to reexamine my positions from time to time, and to make adjustments as new evidence comes to light. In general I would consider myself to be equal parts ideologue and pragmatist. As I get older, my pragmatic side plays an increasing role in the formulation of my thoughts and opinions.
One of the issues that I have reconsidered in recent years is capital punishment. While I still believe in the idea that society has every right to exact the ultimate revenge, the number of cases in which death row inmates have been exonerated by DNA evidence is sufficient cause to end the practice immediately. Given the irreversible nature of the punishment, the degree of certainty required to carry it out is beyond the capability of our current legal system. Ending the practice would also to serve to lessen the extent of our current alienation from our friends and allies throughout the world.
Minorities in this country have long complained about racism and corruption in our criminal justice system, and for the most part, their concerns have been ignored. My personal view of the situation was turned upside down by the events surrounding the Duke lacrosse rape case. If these privileged white students can be victims of such blatant prosecutorial misconduct, we can only wonder how many poor blacks and Hispanics have been wrongly convicted by overzealous cops and prosecutors for the sake of political expediency. Of the 217 post conviction exonerations based on DNA evidence since 1989, roughly 70% of those wrongly accused were minorities. This is clearly evidence of a problem that we cannot continue to overlook. Does belief in equal justice for all make me a liberal?
Healthcare is another issue which has me struggling with my ideological faith. I want with all my heart to believe that there is a market-driven solution to the problem, and as I have indicated in previous posts, the assertion of healthcare as a right is the wrong approach. Based solely on the condition of our Social Security and Medicare systems, I am convinced that our government is incapable of administering an even more ambitious program. On the other hand, my pragmatic side recognizes that we cannot rely solely on free markets, particularly in a global economy where every other industrialized nation offers some form of government run healthcare. We simply cannot compete on an equal footing in the world when U.S. employers carry the crushing burden of employee healthcare costs.
When considering solutions to our healthcare problem, we must take into account that the fundamental nature of the relationship between employers and employees is changing. This change will also have a major impact on the way we save for our retirements. Young people entering the workforce today are likely to have a dozen or more employers over the course of their working lives. Many of us are facing this new reality already. In addition, many workers are likely to spend a substantial portion of their working years either self-employed or as independent contractors. Given this new reality, it simply does not make sense to tie our lifelong needs for healthcare and retirement savings to our fleeting relationships with a series of employers. My hope is that we can develop a hybrid solution that allows for individual ownership of healthcare and retirement plans, combined with government subsidies for those who cannot afford to provide for themselves.
My greatest change of heart has been on environmental issues. I’m no tree hugger, but I recognize that our long-term interests are best served when we are responsible stewards of the planet and it’s resources. Unfortunately, the environmental debate is usually dominated by extremists elements from both sides. While a hysterical chorus on the left argues that the sky is falling today, right-wing nutcases continue to deny that our presence on the planet has any measurable impact. The truth obviously lies somewhere in between, and we must begin to develop common sense environmental policies, based on sound science and thorough cost-benefit analysis. This is another area where my confidence in market based is solutions is wavering. Selling bogus carbon offsets is not a solution.
I’m certain that I will continue to reevaluate my positions from time to time, and to change my mind when presented with new facts or conditions. In spite of my softening position on a number of issues over the years, I’m still a long way from becoming a liberal. While I am willing to look at things from a different point of view today, my fundamental values and beliefs have not changed.
[...] conservative and elder figure in Roanoke’s relatively young blogosphere, Chris Berry submitted a comment to our previous post hyperbolically calling for the sale of Countryside Golf [...]
“This is another area where my confidence in market based is solutions is wavering. Selling bogus carbon offsets is not a solution.”
There have definitely been big flaws in carbon markets as deployed so far. That being said, they could be very efficient mechanisms for minimizing the cost at which any level of emission reduction could be achieved. Crucial to them working properly in that role is resisting the urge to design them in a way that gives the people running them the most scope to reward friends and supporters. Instead, providing a single price of carbon to the whole economy is the best way of ensuring that cuts happen where they can be achieved most cheaply.
More on carbon trading:
http://www.sindark.com/2008/08/16/international-emissions-trading/
http://www.sindark.com/2008/06/11/cap-and-dividend/
Hello Chris
I’m old school – or just old; and I’m not much into this blogging (yet) but can’t help feeling connections with some of your comments. Interesting …
I’m a conservative (small “c”) and will probably remain so for the rest of my life. However, I changed my political affiliation from Republican (large “R”) to Independent during the Regan administration. I always vote my brain and think my emotions must know and keep their place in this most crucial responsibility of a citizen. I would never consider politics as team sport or vote Mr or Ms Congeniality into office simply due to celebrity status or a winning smile. Most days I consider myself a progressive conservative.
I’m not sure you’re becoming “a liberal” (whatever that means) … maybe more progressive as opposed to regressive. That has happened to me over time as well … increased experience and a deeper understanding of the issues will do that to us IF WE’RE PAYING ATTENTION. And that’s a big “IF” in this culture of attention diversion and denial. But there are those among us who can’t help noticing because we’re wired that way.
It’s clear you have a sharp sense of what is just and unjust and it bothers you when injustice reigns unchecked. Me too. That might have something to do with your Myers-Briggs score — INTP. I’m an ENTP. “NP’s” are a relatively small part of the population. We never stop revising our positions. We don’t stop reconsidering since there’s always more to know (our intuitive side tells us so – the “N”) and we never call a halt to learning more (and that’s the open perceiving part “P”).
Much of our learning (as Intuitive Perceptives) takes place post academia once we can experience the world and the way it really is – because we trust our ability to perceive the way it works. So – as rational and thinking beings, we stand out against the background of insipid industrial/corporate propaganda that seems to direct our culture. We’re principled; we can’t help it. It doesn’t mean we always follow our principles. But we can’t put them to bed either. In a culture ruled primarily by capital greed, we will differ because we feel the discomfort of “going along to get along”. Hardwired; sorry. We’ll have to live with it.
At our age we’re lucky. As NP’s we may have had our difficulties with formal education but we were out of school by the time the drug corp’s convinced the psychiatric dunderheads that a perfectly normal brain hardwiring is diseased – one that requires drugging. There’s a lot of profit to be made with those prescriptions. (I’m sure you’ve noticed that our culture is pharmacologically optimistic.) You and I would have been branded ADD. Attention Deficit disordered. “Deficit Disorder” … hmmmm. Can we just throw in one more negative term and make the kid feel really bad? Like ADD and bow-legged too!
The fact is “ADD” is a fiction promoted by the drug industry and perpetuated by an educational system malaise that allows what is actually a curriculum deficiency to be posited on helpless kids who are then branded pathological. Well it’s pathology alright. But it ain’t the kid who’s sick.
ADD has become a political football. If you don’t think so, follow the money. If they insist on calling a perfectly normal response to life ADD, then let’s reframe the situation to a more accurate read of what’s happening. ADD is an “Acknowledged Developmental Distinction”. Neutral; not pejorative. And the only reason the distinction (or group of distinctions) is acknowledged is due to the fact that the path through the educational system is arbitrarily narrow. In other words most pedagogy favors kids who are wired one way (the way most in agreement with the curriculum, accepted teaching methods, and corporate textbooks) and punishes those who are wired differently (those least likely to learn within a limited classroom experience). Only those of us who are wired the ADD (NP?) way know how truly punitive the current educational system can be.
It’s interesting to me that the kid branded ADD is the only kid who can actually see what’s happening within the educational system. He/She is the kid who by his/her own failure is forced to pay attention to the bigger picture and notices there is an overarching problem. “I’m telling you, the damned Emperor is naked!”
Am I striking a chord here?
So what does this have to do with your topic.
Of course the government can’t solve major social problems. What a “liberal” or “conservative” government with conscience can do is help level the playing field. (I think the government should be advocating to “normalize” kids branded “abnormal” ADD – my opinion). Naturally, if you’re on the “winning team” you will object – for obvious reasons. And you’ll complain that the government has gone too far this time! If you’re on the losing team you’ll also object because the government hasn’t gone far enough. You want remuneration for all the time you spent playing on that uneven field while the winners were taking all the prizes and you were left eating their dust. All seems to go to the lucky and the strong. The weak and the unlucky get eaten. This is what Darwin noticed about “the fittest”; indicative of “nature red in tooth and claw”.
Unfortunately, the “winning team” has the biggest claws – the most money, the strongest lobbyists, the most effective public relations agencies – and it is this power that leads to continuing and growing inequity. So, what causes our social problems to begin with? Basically, greed. And who among us are the greediest? Those with no conscience to balance it.
And who among us have no conscience? Those who are built that way. And one would be the Corporation. The Corporation (a fictional but legal “person”) is the bastard child of capitalism and has one abiding mission and one and only one value (if it is to succeed): And that is: To make a profit. When your mission and your value are one and the same, that is very potent. Anything that is perceived to help the Corporation make a profit is considered desirable and anything that is perceived to stand in the way of making a profit is considered undesirable. Ask the Stockholders, they’ll be happy to tell you. Of course, you and I know there can be a vast difference between short term and long term profit. But the Corporation will choose the short term unless they are forced (by government mandate and public opinion) to do otherwise.
We need government (and government regulation) in part to help balance the sociopathic tendencies of the powerful Corporation. Powerful, in part, because it is not limited like you and I by that little something called conscience. If government doesn’t level the corporate playing field (and these days it’s all corporate playing field) … then what will? I would turn your attention to The French Revolution, etc., etc.
I think it’s clear from your essay that you desire to strike a balance with fair play for all – including the not-so-lucky and the not-so-strong. You’re not necessarily Liberal … not necessarily Conservative. Those big L and big C terms are just constructs of team mentality with little meaning beyond propaganda and crutches for failed feelings of individual self worth.
I think in the end your desire to play fair makes you someone who cares deeply and considers deeply. You’re growing more fully human and more fully alive.
Welcome to the “Family of Man”
Claire,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I agree with you 100% about ADD being a deficiency of the curriculum and not the student. I’ve only got a few years until my own son starts school, and I am fearful that he will be one of the kids that the school systems prefer to drug instead of figuring out how to provide a stimulating curriculum.
Chris
I stumbled upon your blog from someone else’s blog. It’s very nice looking and your posts are interesting. I’m dying to read the article “Coming Out of the God Closet.” What’s that about?
I like what that poster above said about ADD. I agree.
I used to call myself a Libertarian. I don’t think I’ll call myself anything anymore but I like the Democrat’s policies and I am definitely voting for Obama. I am starting to realize that we need to build our country from the bottom up. Think good foundation. That doesn’t mean giving handouts. I like Obama’s plan for college students–they get a tax break to pay for school in exchange for doing community service. This is a good man with good ideas.
http://www.GreenerPastures–ACityGirlGoesCountry.blogspot.com
I’m becoming more of a realist as I get older.
I am a firm believer in voting the issues. I am register as independent. A lot of Republicans (my husband included) would guess that makes me a Democrat. The Democratic solutions are always the more attractive ones to me, but (and this could be a big BUT), I think the Republicans have cornered the market on the more realistic solutions.So, which are you? An idealist or realist?More often than not, I choose the later – but don’t tell my husband!
I like your dartboard analogy. I guess in today’s world, an anti-government bleeding heart is no stranger than a godless conservative. We’re either both freaks, or the parties have truly outlived their usefulness.
I suggest that we ditch the left vs. right paradigm and replace it with a dartboard. I’ve always considered Ayn Rand’s work to be motivational but unattainable. I’ve been inspired by her views, yet have emerged on the far left of the spectrum, at least as far as the issues that matter most to me. Still, I’m a pro free market, anti-government bleeding heart liberal.So, Chris, I guess I’m just as conflicted as you. Sign of the times, maybe.