Rightwing Reactionary Perception of (Modern) Liberalism

[Coloradomtnman]

From what I've read on USMB I have seen some posts which mischaracterize modern American liberalism. Here are some examples (not quoted):

Liberals want to increase the size of government.

Liberals want to increase government spending.

Liberals want to nationalize healthcare and the auto industry.

Liberals are extremists when it comes to the environment. They all have been bamboozled into the global warming and the green movements.

Liberals want to outlaw or oppress Christianity, but they're fine with Islam.

Liberals hate the military.

Liberals think that pedophiles should be protected under law.

Liberals want to control our personal lives, but conservatives want fewer laws regarding personal liberties.

Liberals are PC and want to legislate being PC with Hate Speech laws.

Liberal believe you can legislate social attitudes i.e. Affirmative Action, Same Sex Marriage, etc.

Liberals want to open the borders to immigrants, conservatives want to close them and enforce stricter illegal immigration laws.

Liberals are weak when it comes to enforcing laws.

And many more.

I would just like to address these mischaracterizations of modern American liberals and I'll try to be brief so you lazy-asses don't have to read so much.

Generally speaking:

#1. Liberals don't want bigger government. We want to do away with the Patriot Act. We want less police, FBI, CIA, and NSA. We don't want the FCC censoring anything. We don't want monitoring or phone tapping. Get the government out of our personal lives if we aren't doing anything wrong.

#2. We don't want to increase government spending, we just want to stop spending so much on the military (some of which is wasteful and unnecessary), unconstitutional and dishonest wars, oil subsidies, farm subsidies (to not grow crops), and take that money and spend it on the NSF, social progams (social programs reduce crime, poverty, and increase your educated population), education (did you use FAFSA? Yeah, it works), alternative energy, healthcare reform, infrastructure, and our wildlands and national parks. Our military budget is more than the entire annual budget of China! How much have we spend on Iraq and Afghanistan?! Why do we continue to subsidize oil companies when they make record profits? Why do we pay farmers not to grow food?

#3. Liberals want businesses that make shitty products to go out of business i.e. Ford, Chevrolet, Chrysler, etc. We don't want huge banks bailed out. They made business mistatkes and should pay for them. We don't want corporate welfare. We want equal opportunity for John Q. Taxpayer to start a business which under current regulation is extremely difficult beause of unfair competition from huge, multinational corporations like Wal-Mart, Pepsi-Co., etc.
We don't want nationalized healthcare unless it follows Norway's model or is similar, but if we can't we're okay with ensuring that every US citizen has a RIGHT to healthcare. If you're poor or middle class and you get sick or injured, you are taken care of without having your fragile financial life obliterated or your family's financial stability destroyed.

#4. Liberals tend to perceive life as part of nature. We also perceive things like pollution as potentially hazardous to our collective health. The Earth is a beautiful place, and its the only place we have to live, so we want it treated better for very selfish reasons: we want to live in a beautiful place and not die of poisoning or cancer. We don't want our children to have asthma. We don't want people being born without any limbs or blind or worse. There is overwhelming evidence supporting global warming. We may not be able to slow or stop it now, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try. If it continues like it has, the quality of life on this planet could be drastically lowered. Even if global warming is false, we still would rather live in a clean, healthy world then support oil company executives.

#5. Liberals strongly support freedom of religion, but with that comes freedom FROM religion. The women's right to choose, same-sex marriage, euthanasia for the terminally ill, stem cell research, etc. are all threatened by religion: namely Christianity, Judeaism, and Islam. We want religious-based legislation to be overturned and yet we want all religions free of government influence. Nobody can tell your church to marry same-sex couples and nobody can sue your church if it won't.

#6. Liberals support a strong military until a time when militarization is no longer a part of the human existence. Which is something we should be working toward. We don't support wars like the two we're in now, or Vietnam, or Korea. But we want a military for instances like WWII. We just don't like spending as much as we do on the military.

#7. Pedophiles are a natural occurrence in a human population. But, to act on the urge harms another human being. Pedophiles go to their own jails and are subjected to, if they wish to ever get out again, focused treatment. But until they are found guilty, they are assumed to be innocent. The Sexual Offender registry should be eliminated because not only does it do nothing, it violates people's right to privacy. If you don't want your children molested, raped, kidnapped and/or murdered (which is extremely highly unlikely to happen to them) then teach your kids not to talk to strangers and take better care of supervising them. And live in the suburbs or in the country. Its better for children than growing up in the city anyway.

#8. Liberals want more laws which protect society as a whole i.e. you don't get to drive your stupid Hummer because it pollutes the air we breathe. You don't get to exploit illegal aliens and pay them $3 a day. You don't get to kill someone simply because they are black, gay, or Muslim and get off easily. You don't get to execute people because you never know, you could be found guilty of a crime you didn't commit. Conservatives want laws that keep same-sex marriages from being recognized; keep women from having the right to choose; keep people from drinking, smoking pot, and eating psychotropic mushrooms; put people in prison for selling pot at a concert; keep prostitution illegal and therefore unregulated and dangerous even though it still happens and laws aren't preventing it; and conservative politicians railed against the Americans With Disabilities Act and funding the VA.

#9. Ever heard of the show "Politically Incorrect" with Bill Maher (who, if you didn't know) is VERY liberal? We don't want PC. I personally hate PC. It seems to me that many conservatives don't want swearing on TV. The people that want PC are both liberals and conservatives and we should really put a stop to their meddling. Hate Speech is more than just being PC. Hate speech is real, it harms people, and it should be a law to help prevent inciting violence against a group of people for something they can't help.

#10. Liberals don't want to legislate social attitudes, but legitimizing same-sex marriage extends to homosexuality and there's nothing wrong with being gay, unless you're religious. We don't want you to celebrate homosexuality with us, but you're welcome to. We understand that there will always be some who never even kind of accept homosexuality. But it shouldn't be considered deviant or abnormal. Racism and sexism still exist, but at least its looked down upon by the majority of US citizens.

#11. We don't want to "open" the border to illegal immigrants, we just want to find a way to have them contribute to society since stopping them is almost if not entirely impossible. Let's get'em to pay taxes! Conservatives seem to think illegal aliens are criminals, lazy, and harmful to society: it makes them they come off as xenophobic, ethnocentric, and misanthropic. It will grow our economy to increase our population in a way that the immigrants contribute instead of sneak under the radar. We should try to minimize immigration, but also accept it to a certain extent. How do we do that? Hell if I know. I'm no expert.

#12. Acts are bad, not people. Prisons do not rehabilitate people. Many people are convicted of crimes for which they aren't guilty or not as guilty as the rigid law makes them out to be. No one should do prison time for just selling pot. We have the second highest population of inmates in the world. The justice system needs to be reformed. One would think conservatives would agree considering just how much it costs to keep a person imprisoned: in Colorado for a prisoner to be kept in minimum security prison for one year is $29k! Maximum security: $66,000 a year (but that's worth the money since those guys probably did something violent).

Liberals don't want a nanny state, but we live in a modern, techologically advanced society fso why not enjoy the benefits of living collectively. We don't just want to spend tax dollars for no reason. We don't want to raise taxes but a flat tax isn't going to work without simplifying the system, and even then it wouldn't be a fair tax system. We don't want needless wars, but we still support our troops. We want religious diversity and not a de facto theocracy. We want racial diversity. We want a more open society. We want the government out of our personal lives unless what we're doing is harming someone else. We want justice. We want liberty. We want the American dream.

I hope that clears things up a bit for you partisans out there.

 

[garyd]

1.&2 You don't know what you want. You can't increase social spending without increasing the size of the government. We are already spending nearly four times as much money on the social side of things as we do on the military. FCC, NSA and CIA are relatively miniscule proportions of the budget that wouldn't increase social spending by enough to show up as a whole percentage point?

3. So do conservatives. But lets face it most of that has to do with industries kowtowing to Uncle Sam. It's damn hard to make a decent product and meet all the fed rules and regulations and keep the union bosses happy. And it's compounded by the fact that every time you stub your toe its front page news while similar fax pas committed by foreign competitors are buried somewhere between the Obituaries and the bridge column.

Everyone has a right to health care now. And I rather a few people go broke than all of us. Medial cost in this country are driven by 3 things tech, access and lawyers where do you want to make the savings?

4.Sorry until something changes unless you are involved in an accident you are going to die of something and like it or not something, once you get beyond fifty, is either cancer, most varieties of which have little or nothing to do with chemical contaminants, or cardiovascualr disease. In short your body wears the hell out. The rest of four is just blue sky crap that's supposed to obscure the inherent bias of your position against modern technology.

5. Almost all legislation is to some extent religion based including the welfare state. You just want to pick and choose like everyone else. I believe in the woman's right to choose too. We just disagree about the timing of that choice. To my mind the choice was made and likely a wrong one the moment you let the loser into your panties. Don't want to start a family don't screw around simple as that. If you aren't comfortable with the consequences of a particular deed don't do the deed. It's really simple.

6. So 21% of the budget is too much to spend on the military? FDR would have been apalled. Until the time militarization is no longer needed? Should be right after that big space rock with our name on it turns this place into several thousand smaller places, or Tuva and Yellowstone go off simultaeously and we all starve to death over the next ten fifteen years. That's another thing I like about liberals they think they know a lot about history while simultaeously understanding the ramifications of almost none of it.

7.The best treatment for paedophilia is a six foot rope and a seven foot drop. And it's the only one ever to have been proven to work. Recidivism rates among pedophiles are hgher than for any other criminal class. And they tend to get more violent rather than less over time. Of course if you don;t wish to get your hands dirty just hang a sign that says baby raper around there necks and throw them in with the general prison population. To be sure they might die with a butt hoile the size of China but some how that sounds like poetic justice to me. Sociopaths of any sort are a natural occurence within the human population. That doesn't make it a good thing.

8.So you do want big government, you just disagree with what that government should do?

9.Mahr you mean that flaming clueless idiot that's so eaten up with BDS that he can't hardly say the mans name withmout coming unhinged? Yeah good choice for a liberal role model.

10. Yeah right sorry but if you legalize gay marriage you are forcing your views on the rest of us the overwhelming majority of the rest of us. And it is abnormal since like 90 to 95% of the population is heterosexual.

11.45% of Califonia's prison pop are illegal aliens. It's worse I understand in Texas. By the way we can stop it anytime we wish to actually try. The easy way is to raise the fines on those hiring undocumented workers and then enforce it . If there are no jobs for undocumented workers then there will be no reason for them to come.

12.Almost no body does prison time for just selling pot. If someone says they are in jail for selling pot look in the background of the case and you will almost always find an extensive plea bargain deal. Quit making excuses for people who do inexcusable things and you will have far fewer people doing inexcusable things. The first step in reforming some one - that is in changing their world view - is to give them some reason to eschew their old view.

 

[Gunny]

From what I've read on USMB I have seen some posts which mischaracterize modern American liberalism. Here are some examples (not quoted):

Liberals want to increase the size of government.

Liberals want to increase government spending.

Liberals want to nationalize healthcare and the auto industry.

Liberals are extremists when it comes to the environment. They all have been bamboozled into the global warming and the green movements.

Liberals want to outlaw or oppress Christianity, but they're fine with Islam.

Liberals hate the military.

Liberals think that pedophiles should be protected under law.

Liberals want to control our personal lives, but conservatives want fewer laws regarding personal liberties.

Liberals are PC and want to legislate being PC with Hate Speech laws.

Liberal believe you can legislate social attitudes i.e. Affirmative Action, Same Sex Marriage, etc.

Liberals want to open the borders to immigrants, conservatives want to close them and enforce stricter illegal immigration laws.

Liberals are weak when it comes to enforcing laws.

And many more.

I would just like to address these mischaracterizations of modern American liberals and I'll try to be brief so you lazy-asses don't have to read so much.

Generally speaking:

#1. Liberals don't want bigger government. We want to do away with the Patriot Act. We want less police, FBI, CIA, and NSA. We don't want the FCC censoring anything. We don't want monitoring or phone tapping. Get the government out of our personal lives if we aren't doing anything wrong.

#2. We don't want to increase government spending, we just want to stop spending so much on the military (some of which is wasteful and unnecessary), unconstitutional and dishonest wars, oil subsidies, farm subsidies (to not grow crops), and take that money and spend it on the NSF, social progams (social programs reduce crime, poverty, and increase your educated population), education (did you use FAFSA? Yeah, it works), alternative energy, healthcare reform, infrastructure, and our wildlands and national parks. Our military budget is more than the entire annual budget of China! How much have we spend on Iraq and Afghanistan?! Why do we continue to subsidize oil companies when they make record profits? Why do we pay farmers not to grow food?

#3. Liberals want businesses that make shitty products to go out of business i.e. Ford, Chevrolet, Chrysler, etc. We don't want huge banks bailed out. They made business mistatkes and should pay for them. We don't want corporate welfare. We want equal opportunity for John Q. Taxpayer to start a business which under current regulation is extremely difficult beause of unfair competition from huge, multinational corporations like Wal-Mart, Pepsi-Co., etc.
We don't want nationalized healthcare unless it follows Norway's model or is similar, but if we can't we're okay with ensuring that every US citizen has a RIGHT to healthcare. If you're poor or middle class and you get sick or injured, you are taken care of without having your fragile financial life obliterated or your family's financial stability destroyed.

#4. Liberals tend to perceive life as part of nature. We also perceive things like pollution as potentially hazardous to our collective health. The Earth is a beautiful place, and its the only place we have to live, so we want it treated better for very selfish reasons: we want to live in a beautiful place and not die of poisoning or cancer. We don't want our children to have asthma. We don't want people being born without any limbs or blind or worse. There is overwhelming evidence supporting global warming. We may not be able to slow or stop it now, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try. If it continues like it has, the quality of life on this planet could be drastically lowered. Even if global warming is false, we still would rather live in a clean, healthy world then support oil company executives.

#5. Liberals strongly support freedom of religion, but with that comes freedom FROM religion. The women's right to choose, same-sex marriage, euthanasia for the terminally ill, stem cell research, etc. are all threatened by religion: namely Christianity, Judeaism, and Islam. We want religious-based legislation to be overturned and yet we want all religions free of government influence. Nobody can tell your church to marry same-sex couples and nobody can sue your church if it won't.

#6. Liberals support a strong military until a time when militarization is no longer a part of the human existence. Which is something we should be working toward. We don't support wars like the two we're in now, or Vietnam, or Korea. But we want a military for instances like WWII. We just don't like spending as much as we do on the military.

#7. Pedophiles are a natural occurrence in a human population. But, to act on the urge harms another human being. Pedophiles go to their own jails and are subjected to, if they wish to ever get out again, focused treatment. But until they are found guilty, they are assumed to be innocent. The Sexual Offender registry should be eliminated because not only does it do nothing, it violates people's right to privacy. If you don't want your children molested, raped, kidnapped and/or murdered (which is extremely highly unlikely to happen to them) then teach your kids not to talk to strangers and take better care of supervising them. And live in the suburbs or in the country. Its better for children than growing up in the city anyway.

#8. Liberals want more laws which protect society as a whole i.e. you don't get to drive your stupid Hummer because it pollutes the air we breathe. You don't get to exploit illegal aliens and pay them $3 a day. You don't get to kill someone simply because they are black, gay, or Muslim and get off easily. You don't get to execute people because you never know, you could be found guilty of a crime you didn't commit. Conservatives want laws that keep same-sex marriages from being recognized; keep women from having the right to choose; keep people from drinking, smoking pot, and eating psychotropic mushrooms; put people in prison for selling pot at a concert; keep prostitution illegal and therefore unregulated and dangerous even though it still happens and laws aren't preventing it; and conservative politicians railed against the Americans With Disabilities Act and funding the VA.

#9. Ever heard of the show "Politically Incorrect" with Bill Maher (who, if you didn't know) is VERY liberal? We don't want PC. I personally hate PC. It seems to me that many conservatives don't want swearing on TV. The people that want PC are both liberals and conservatives and we should really put a stop to their meddling. Hate Speech is more than just being PC. Hate speech is real, it harms people, and it should be a law to help prevent inciting violence against a group of people for something they can't help.

#10. Liberals don't want to legislate social attitudes, but legitimizing same-sex marriage extends to homosexuality and there's nothing wrong with being gay, unless you're religious. We don't want you to celebrate homosexuality with us, but you're welcome to. We understand that there will always be some who never even kind of accept homosexuality. But it shouldn't be considered deviant or abnormal. Racism and sexism still exist, but at least its looked down upon by the majority of US citizens.

#11. We don't want to "open" the border to illegal immigrants, we just want to find a way to have them contribute to society since stopping them is almost if not entirely impossible. Let's get'em to pay taxes! Conservatives seem to think illegal aliens are criminals, lazy, and harmful to society: it makes them they come off as xenophobic, ethnocentric, and misanthropic. It will grow our economy to increase our population in a way that the immigrants contribute instead of sneak under the radar. We should try to minimize immigration, but also accept it to a certain extent. How do we do that? Hell if I know. I'm no expert.

#12. Acts are bad, not people. Prisons do not rehabilitate people. Many people are convicted of crimes for which they aren't guilty or not as guilty as the rigid law makes them out to be. No one should do prison time for just selling pot. We have the second highest population of inmates in the world. The justice system needs to be reformed. One would think conservatives would agree considering just how much it costs to keep a person imprisoned: in Colorado for a prisoner to be kept in minimum security prison for one year is $29k! Maximum security: $66,000 a year (but that's worth the money since those guys probably did something violent).

Liberals don't want a nanny state, but we live in a modern, techologically advanced society fso why not enjoy the benefits of living collectively. We don't just want to spend tax dollars for no reason. We don't want to raise taxes but a flat tax isn't going to work without simplifying the system, and even then it wouldn't be a fair tax system. We don't want needless wars, but we still support our troops. We want religious diversity and not a de facto theocracy. We want racial diversity. We want a more open society. We want the government out of our personal lives unless what we're doing is harming someone else. We want justice. We want liberty. We want the American dream.

I hope that clears things up a bit for you partisans out there.

Nothing you said changes the fact that the leftwingers in this country who favor all of the above define themselves as "liberal."

They give actual liberalism a bad name.

 

[Article 15]

From what I've read on USMB I have seen some posts which mischaracterize modern American liberalism. Here are some examples (not quoted):

Liberals want to increase the size of government.

Liberals want to increase government spending.

Liberals want to nationalize healthcare and the auto industry.

Liberals are extremists when it comes to the environment. They all have been bamboozled into the global warming and the green movements.

Liberals want to outlaw or oppress Christianity, but they're fine with Islam.

Liberals hate the military.

Liberals think that pedophiles should be protected under law.

Liberals want to control our personal lives, but conservatives want fewer laws regarding personal liberties.

Liberals are PC and want to legislate being PC with Hate Speech laws.

Liberal believe you can legislate social attitudes i.e. Affirmative Action, Same Sex Marriage, etc.

Liberals want to open the borders to immigrants, conservatives want to close them and enforce stricter illegal immigration laws.

Liberals are weak when it comes to enforcing laws.

And many more.

I would just like to address these mischaracterizations of modern American liberals and I'll try to be brief so you lazy-asses don't have to read so much.

Generally speaking:

#1. Liberals don't want bigger government. We want to do away with the Patriot Act. We want less police, FBI, CIA, and NSA. We don't want the FCC censoring anything. We don't want monitoring or phone tapping. Get the government out of our personal lives if we aren't doing anything wrong.

#2. We don't want to increase government spending, we just want to stop spending so much on the military (some of which is wasteful and unnecessary), unconstitutional and dishonest wars, oil subsidies, farm subsidies (to not grow crops), and take that money and spend it on the NSF, social progams (social programs reduce crime, poverty, and increase your educated population), education (did you use FAFSA? Yeah, it works), alternative energy, healthcare reform, infrastructure, and our wildlands and national parks. Our military budget is more than the entire annual budget of China! How much have we spend on Iraq and Afghanistan?! Why do we continue to subsidize oil companies when they make record profits? Why do we pay farmers not to grow food?

#3. Liberals want businesses that make shitty products to go out of business i.e. Ford, Chevrolet, Chrysler, etc. We don't want huge banks bailed out. They made business mistatkes and should pay for them. We don't want corporate welfare. We want equal opportunity for John Q. Taxpayer to start a business which under current regulation is extremely difficult beause of unfair competition from huge, multinational corporations like Wal-Mart, Pepsi-Co., etc.
We don't want nationalized healthcare unless it follows Norway's model or is similar, but if we can't we're okay with ensuring that every US citizen has a RIGHT to healthcare. If you're poor or middle class and you get sick or injured, you are taken care of without having your fragile financial life obliterated or your family's financial stability destroyed.

#4. Liberals tend to perceive life as part of nature. We also perceive things like pollution as potentially hazardous to our collective health. The Earth is a beautiful place, and its the only place we have to live, so we want it treated better for very selfish reasons: we want to live in a beautiful place and not die of poisoning or cancer. We don't want our children to have asthma. We don't want people being born without any limbs or blind or worse. There is overwhelming evidence supporting global warming. We may not be able to slow or stop it now, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try. If it continues like it has, the quality of life on this planet could be drastically lowered. Even if global warming is false, we still would rather live in a clean, healthy world then support oil company executives.

#5. Liberals strongly support freedom of religion, but with that comes freedom FROM religion. The women's right to choose, same-sex marriage, euthanasia for the terminally ill, stem cell research, etc. are all threatened by religion: namely Christianity, Judeaism, and Islam. We want religious-based legislation to be overturned and yet we want all religions free of government influence. Nobody can tell your church to marry same-sex couples and nobody can sue your church if it won't.

#6. Liberals support a strong military until a time when militarization is no longer a part of the human existence. Which is something we should be working toward. We don't support wars like the two we're in now, or Vietnam, or Korea. But we want a military for instances like WWII. We just don't like spending as much as we do on the military.

#7. Pedophiles are a natural occurrence in a human population. But, to act on the urge harms another human being. Pedophiles go to their own jails and are subjected to, if they wish to ever get out again, focused treatment. But until they are found guilty, they are assumed to be innocent. The Sexual Offender registry should be eliminated because not only does it do nothing, it violates people's right to privacy. If you don't want your children molested, raped, kidnapped and/or murdered (which is extremely highly unlikely to happen to them) then teach your kids not to talk to strangers and take better care of supervising them. And live in the suburbs or in the country. Its better for children than growing up in the city anyway.

#8. Liberals want more laws which protect society as a whole i.e. you don't get to drive your stupid Hummer because it pollutes the air we breathe. You don't get to exploit illegal aliens and pay them $3 a day. You don't get to kill someone simply because they are black, gay, or Muslim and get off easily. You don't get to execute people because you never know, you could be found guilty of a crime you didn't commit. Conservatives want laws that keep same-sex marriages from being recognized; keep women from having the right to choose; keep people from drinking, smoking pot, and eating psychotropic mushrooms; put people in prison for selling pot at a concert; keep prostitution illegal and therefore unregulated and dangerous even though it still happens and laws aren't preventing it; and conservative politicians railed against the Americans With Disabilities Act and funding the VA.

#9. Ever heard of the show "Politically Incorrect" with Bill Maher (who, if you didn't know) is VERY liberal? We don't want PC. I personally hate PC. It seems to me that many conservatives don't want swearing on TV. The people that want PC are both liberals and conservatives and we should really put a stop to their meddling. Hate Speech is more than just being PC. Hate speech is real, it harms people, and it should be a law to help prevent inciting violence against a group of people for something they can't help.

#10. Liberals don't want to legislate social attitudes, but legitimizing same-sex marriage extends to homosexuality and there's nothing wrong with being gay, unless you're religious. We don't want you to celebrate homosexuality with us, but you're welcome to. We understand that there will always be some who never even kind of accept homosexuality. But it shouldn't be considered deviant or abnormal. Racism and sexism still exist, but at least its looked down upon by the majority of US citizens.

#11. We don't want to "open" the border to illegal immigrants, we just want to find a way to have them contribute to society since stopping them is almost if not entirely impossible. Let's get'em to pay taxes! Conservatives seem to think illegal aliens are criminals, lazy, and harmful to society: it makes them they come off as xenophobic, ethnocentric, and misanthropic. It will grow our economy to increase our population in a way that the immigrants contribute instead of sneak under the radar. We should try to minimize immigration, but also accept it to a certain extent. How do we do that? Hell if I know. I'm no expert.

#12. Acts are bad, not people. Prisons do not rehabilitate people. Many people are convicted of crimes for which they aren't guilty or not as guilty as the rigid law makes them out to be. No one should do prison time for just selling pot. We have the second highest population of inmates in the world. The justice system needs to be reformed. One would think conservatives would agree considering just how much it costs to keep a person imprisoned: in Colorado for a prisoner to be kept in minimum security prison for one year is $29k! Maximum security: $66,000 a year (but that's worth the money since those guys probably did something violent).

Liberals don't want a nanny state, but we live in a modern, techologically advanced society fso why not enjoy the benefits of living collectively. We don't just want to spend tax dollars for no reason. We don't want to raise taxes but a flat tax isn't going to work without simplifying the system, and even then it wouldn't be a fair tax system. We don't want needless wars, but we still support our troops. We want religious diversity and not a de facto theocracy. We want racial diversity. We want a more open society. We want the government out of our personal lives unless what we're doing is harming someone else. We want justice. We want liberty. We want the American dream.

I hope that clears things up a bit for you partisans out there.

Excellent post!

Gotta spread some rep now ...

 

[DamnYankee]

That was brief?

BTW, is mischaracterization of modern American liberalism anything like mischaracterization of modern American conservatism?

 

[Xenophon]

Considering the thread title, there is irony about the OP trying to clear the air about misconceptions.

 

[Article 15]

Considering the thread title, there is irony about the OP trying to clear the air about misconceptions.

How so? It seemed like a fair thread title to me. He layed out several misconceptions that some on the right have about liberals. He didn't broadbrush except for a couple of lines in the body of his post.

 

[DamnYankee]

That was brief?

BTW, is mischaracterization of modern American liberalism anything like mischaracterization of modern American conservatism?

Considering the thread title, there is irony about the OP trying to clear the air about misconceptions.

How so? It seemed like a fair thread title to me. He layed out several misconceptions that some on the right have about liberals. He didn't broadbrush except for a couple of lines in the body of his post.

The thread title isn't a "broadbrush"?
Rightwing Reactionary Perception of (Modern) Liberalism

Sure did attract attention, didn't it? And if they are only misconceptions that some on the right have about liberals, why bother including (Modern) [a.k.a. progressive] in the thread title? After all, those would have the same perceptions about any liberals, wouldn't they? Including leftwing liberals?

It would be the reason my response was brief, rather than laying out the various misconceptions that some on the left have about conservatives. It really is the same....

 

[Article 15]

The thread title isn't a "broadbrush"?
Rightwing Reactionary Perception of (Modern) Liberalism

I figured that the word "reactionary" was what made it not a broadbrush ... had he just said "rightwing" I think it would have been a broadbrush.

Sure did attract attention, didn't it? And if they are only misconceptions that some on the right have about liberals, why bother including (Modern) [a.k.a. progressive] in the thread title? After all, those would have the same perceptions about any liberals, wouldn't they? Including leftwing liberals?

I'm not sure I'm following you here. I think the OP was talking about his own peer group. Today's liberals are different from the liberals of yesteryear. Which is again, narrowing the discussion.

It would be the reason my response was brief, rather than laying out the various misconceptions that some on the left have about conservatives. It really is the same

As to your specific response, I would say yes, I think that there are certain liberals or those on the left who hold many misconceptions of today's conservatives to be true.

 

[JBeukema]

#1. Liberals don't want bigger government. We want to do away with the Patriot Act. We want less police, FBI, CIA, and NSA.

Only to spend the money in other areas- mostly socialized healthcare, feeding the world, lining their own pockets, and giving 'minorites' jobs they aren't qualified for

We don't want the FCC censoring anything.

-except conservative talk radio

#2. We don't want to increase government spending,

Yet every liberal politician does. today's iberals are not Classical Liberals

Why do we continue to subsidize oil companies when they make record profits?

Because they pay off the Republicans

Why do we pay farmers not to grow food?

Because idiot libs thought it'd drive up the price of crop and increase profits, ending the Great Depression.

#3. Liberals want businesses that make shitty products to go out of business i.e. Ford, Chevrolet, Chrysler, etc.

Actually, you want to prop them up and pay for it with taxpayer dollars

We don't want huge banks bailed out.

yet the libs pushed it through...

he women's right to choose,

Noone has a 'right' to end another life for their own convenience. The Libertines had to lie about being raped to pass that law: that shows the character of the movement

Nobody can tell your church to marry same-sex couples and nobody can sue your church if it won't.

True, IF it's a non-legally-binding ritual. If they want it to be legally binding, they act in the State's stead.

The Sexual Offender registry should be eliminated because not only does it do nothing,

That's simply not true.

#9. Ever heard of the show "Politically Incorrect" with Bill Maher (who, if you didn't know) is VERY liberal? We don't want PC. I personally hate PC

You are not most libs

#10. Liberals don't want to legislate social attitudes,

Both sides want to legislate morality. The Rights, under the influence of the religious idiots, rail against drugs, sex, 'foul language'.... The left wants to rail against junk food, 'right-wing hate radio', alcohol...

#11. We don't want to "open" the border to illegal immigrants, we just want to find a way to have them contribute to society since stopping them is almost if not entirely impossible.

Stopping murderers is not entirely possible. Let's decriminalize it!

Conservatives seem to think illegal aliens are criminals,

They are.

it makes them they come off as xenophobic,

Only because ignorant libtards play the race card and make it a race issue. Racism is rampant among the Left

Liberals don't want a nanny state,

All evidence to the contrary

 

[DamnYankee]

Considering the thread title, there is irony about the OP trying to clear the air about misconceptions.

How so? It seemed like a fair thread title to me. He layed out several misconceptions that some on the right have about liberals. He didn't broadbrush except for a couple of lines in the body of his post.

The thread title isn't a "broadbrush"?
Rightwing Reactionary Perception of (Modern) Liberalism

I figured that the word "reactionary" was what made it not a broadbrush ... had he just said "rightwing" I think it would have been a broadbrush.

Sure did attract attention, didn't it? And if they are only misconceptions that some on the right have about liberals, why bother including (Modern) [a.k.a. progressive] in the thread title? After all, those would have the same perceptions about any liberals, wouldn't they? Including leftwing liberals?

I'm not sure I'm following you here. I think the OP was talking about his own peer group. Today's liberals are different from the liberals of yesteryear. Which is again, narrowing the discussion.

It would be the reason my response was brief, rather than laying out the various misconceptions that some on the left have about conservatives. It really is the same

As to your specific response, I would say yes, I think that there are certain liberals or those on the left who hold many misconceptions of today's conservatives to be true.

Sorry, but "rightwing" implies anything right of center, just as "leftwing" implies anything left of center. The inclusion of "modern" in the thread title, along with "rightwing" is an attempt to disengage the "modern liberal" with the "leftwing" -- meaning that they are, really, the center. So, what the OP, with the title, did was assume that liberals who now call themselves "progressive" (because liberal has become a stigma) have no conservative counterparts, and lumped all conservatives into "rightwing".

 

[Article 15]

JB, check this thread out by the same OP

http://www.usmessageboard.com/politics/76409-could-we-please-stop-calling-obama-reid-and-pelosi-liberals.html

 

[Article 15]

Considering the thread title, there is irony about the OP trying to clear the air about misconceptions.

How so? It seemed like a fair thread title to me. He layed out several misconceptions that some on the right have about liberals. He didn't broadbrush except for a couple of lines in the body of his post.

[/COLOR]

I figured that the word "reactionary" was what made it not a broadbrush ... had he just said "rightwing" I think it would have been a broadbrush.



I'm not sure I'm following you here. I think the OP was talking about his own peer group. Today's liberals are different from the liberals of yesteryear. Which is again, narrowing the discussion.

It would be the reason my response was brief, rather than laying out the various misconceptions that some on the left have about conservatives. It really is the same

As to your specific response, I would say yes, I think that there are certain liberals or those on the left who hold many misconceptions of today's conservatives to be true.

Sorry, but "rightwing" implies anything right of center, just as "leftwing" implies anything left of center. The inclusion of "modern" in the thread title, along with "rightwing" is an attempt to disengage the "modern liberal" with the "leftwing" -- meaning that they are, really, the center. So, what the OP, with the title, did was assume that liberals who now call themselves "progressive" (because liberal has become a stigma) have no conservative counterparts, and lumped all conservatives into "rightwing".

Yeah, I didn't interpret the thread title like that at all.

 

[DamnYankee]

Considering the thread title, there is irony about the OP trying to clear the air about misconceptions.

[/COLOR]

I figured that the word "reactionary" was what made it not a broadbrush ... had he just said "rightwing" I think it would have been a broadbrush.



I'm not sure I'm following you here. I think the OP was talking about his own peer group. Today's liberals are different from the liberals of yesteryear. Which is again, narrowing the discussion.


As to your specific response, I would say yes, I think that there are certain liberals or those on the left who hold many misconceptions of today's conservatives to be true.

Sorry, but "rightwing" implies anything right of center, just as "leftwing" implies anything left of center. The inclusion of "modern" in the thread title, along with "rightwing" is an attempt to disengage the "modern liberal" with the "leftwing" -- meaning that they are, really, the center. So, what the OP, with the title, did was assume that liberals who now call themselves "progressive" (because liberal has become a stigma) have no conservative counterparts, and lumped all conservatives into "rightwing".

Yeah, I didn't interpret the thread title like that at all.

I can see that.

 

[editec]

We cannot generalize philosophically about today's liberals v conservatives because neither of them seem to stand for anything philosopically.

Oh they both talk about their philosophical underpinnings, but when you look at the policies they BOTH created, neither of them STANDS FOR WHAT THEY CLAIM TO STAND FOR.

Both sides have issues they stand for, but not any philosophical premise support their policy decisions.

This MUST be obvious to any of us who are not partisans.

Neither party stand for conservative or liberal principles, that's for DAMNED sure.

 

[DamnYankee]

We cannot generalize philosophically about today's liberals v conservatives because neither of them seem to stand for anything philosopically.

Oh they both talk about their philosophical underpinnings, but when you look at the policies they BOTH created, neither of them STANDS FOR WHAT THEY CLAIM TO STAND FOR.

Both sides have issues they stand for, but not any philosophical premise support their policy decisions.

This MUST be obvious to any of us who are not partisans.

Neither party stand for conservative or liberal principles, that's for DAMNED sure.

That's why they're called "progressives". It has become un-PC to be liberal or conservative, and each one is trying to out-do the other for the sake of votes and supposed bipartisanship.

 

[editec]

We cannot generalize philosophically about today's liberals v conservatives because neither of them seem to stand for anything philosopically.

Oh they both talk about their philosophical underpinnings, but when you look at the policies they BOTH created, neither of them STANDS FOR WHAT THEY CLAIM TO STAND FOR.

Both sides have issues they stand for, but not any philosophical premise support their policy decisions.

This MUST be obvious to any of us who are not partisans.

Neither party stand for conservative or liberal principles, that's for DAMNED sure.

That's why they're called "progressives". It has become un-PC to be liberal or conservative, and each one is trying to out-do the other for the sake of votes and supposed bipartisanship.

Replacing the word liberal with the name progressive means absolutely nothing.

What does the DNC really stand for?

Frankly, I don't know.

Obama is doing much to mitigate the worst problems associated with the depression we're in, but unless he goes directly at the heart of the problem, it's all just liberal (or progressive) window dressing.

 

[midcan5]

"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."


In order to define or to understand any ideology, context is required. Context in the case of the United Sates is a constitutional democratic republic that grew out of enlightenment liberalism of the 17th and 18th centuries. Womankind finally realized that there had to be something better than religious oligarchy, monarchy, and superstition. The idea that progress was possible created a system that has at its core the values of the preamble set forth in the Constitution. The preamble set some high expectations but liberal political philosophy believed individual freedom and a government of checks and balances would work best. Now to the points - as a liberal I disagree in part with many.

1) Liberals work for and expect government to be efficient and to serve the purpose G was created for and that is work for the goals set forth in the preamble. Washington said it best here: Quote DB :: Speeches :: George Washington :: George Washington's Farewell Address Speech "...it is a main pillar in the edifice of your real independence, the support of your tranquillity at home, your peace abroad; of your safety; of your prosperity; of that very Liberty, which you so highly prize."

2) G spending is essential in modern society. Who would build the infrastructure that we all depend on every day. Again though, it must serve all people and be reasonable. Reducing military spending is probably is best place to start IMO.

3) As a liberal I want no American business to go out of business. Since our cars were mentioned, we have always purchased American cars and our latest Buick is number one in quality so 'shitty' is in the eye of the beholder. See these two pieces. Buy American - Support Yourself – Political Pass and The Conservative Nanny State

And anyone who looks at our healthcare and its statistics, and doesn't realize it needs improvement is nuts. UHC would create a better America but it must be done in layers and levels.

4) I agree.

5) Liberals believe in individual rights and equal rights, so personal choice is up to the person, and marriage as a right should be and really is guaranteed by that preamble above. Responsibility must reside with the person, the family. Religion needs to remain separate from the state as much as possible.

6) Our military is the strongest and best already, it is time to close military installations that serve no defensive purpose and concentrate on the world and its evil in the ways they exist today.

7) I don't agree, you need to live in the real world and while privacy is an American value, safety is essential for all that follows. Weird but I have read that rural areas are worse for people than cities as cities offer more in the way of counseling and support. Nutcases are everywhere.

8) Justice is part of our core values so all these items should seem obvious. Law must fit the crime and the drug war was a complete loss. But we have too many people in jail for too long for crimes that are not threats to others. The Prisoning of Americans seems to be a business in our country!

9) PC is often the result of the chronic complainers who are on all sides of the political spectrum. But being polite or not blowing smoke in my face is kinda nice. Hate crime legislation: Ethics and civil rights concerns

10) Equal rights for all.

11) So long as there is work, they will come. This could be stopped but the effort does not help some seasonable businesses that can be both exploitative and helpful. Having a sanctioned way to support where needed would work, but today many exploit these people as Mexico's salaries are still too low. I don't think we have a fix for this.

12) Too many Americans in prison for non violent social taboo crimes such as drugs. A tough question is why do we have so many in prison?

Conservatives already have a nanny state for corporations so a safety net for people seems a good idea. The recent study on happiness and nations should tell us something.


"What improves the circumstances of the greater part can never be regarded as an inconveniency to the whole. No society can surely be flourishing and happy, of which the far greater part of the members are poor and miserable."

The Wealth of Nations, Book I Chapter VIII

 

[WillowTree]

From what I've read on USMB I have seen some posts which mischaracterize modern American liberalism. Here are some examples (not quoted):

Liberals want to increase the size of government.

Liberals want to increase government spending.

Liberals want to nationalize healthcare and the auto industry.

Liberals are extremists when it comes to the environment. They all have been bamboozled into the global warming and the green movements.

Liberals want to outlaw or oppress Christianity, but they're fine with Islam.

Liberals hate the military.

Liberals think that pedophiles should be protected under law.

Liberals want to control our personal lives, but conservatives want fewer laws regarding personal liberties.

Liberals are PC and want to legislate being PC with Hate Speech laws.

Liberal believe you can legislate social attitudes i.e. Affirmative Action, Same Sex Marriage, etc.

Liberals want to open the borders to immigrants, conservatives want to close them and enforce stricter illegal immigration laws.

Liberals are weak when it comes to enforcing laws.

And many more.

I would just like to address these mischaracterizations of modern American liberals and I'll try to be brief so you lazy-asses don't have to read so much.

Generally speaking:

#1. Liberals don't want bigger government. We want to do away with the Patriot Act. We want less police, FBI, CIA, and NSA. We don't want the FCC censoring anything. We don't want monitoring or phone tapping. Get the government out of our personal lives if we aren't doing anything wrong. lLess police, less Cia and No Patriot Act... equal no national security.. will lead to anarchy without police..you are gonna let us keep our g-u-n-s aren't you?

#2. We don't want to increase government spending, we just want to stop spending so much on the military (some of which is wasteful and unnecessary), unconstitutional and dishonest wars, oil subsidies, farm subsidies (to not grow crops), and take that money and spend it on the NSF, social progams (social programs reduce crime, poverty, and increase your educated population), education (did you use FAFSA? Yeah, it works), alternative energy, healthcare reform, infrastructure, and our wildlands and national parks. Our military budget is more than the entire annual budget of China! How much have we spend on Iraq and Afghanistan?! Why do we continue to subsidize oil companies when they make record profits? Why do we pay farmers not to grow food? You need to build a strong military to handle the anarchy for when you do away with the police and FBI. you cannot possible have the social entitlements you propose without increasing government.

#3. Liberals want businesses that make shitty products to go out of business i.e. Ford, Chevrolet, Chrysler, etc. We don't want huge banks bailed out. They made business mistatkes and should pay for them. We don't want corporate welfare. We want equal opportunity for John Q. Taxpayer to start a business which under current regulation is extremely difficult beause of unfair competition from huge, multinational corporations like Wal-Mart, Pepsi-Co., etc.
We don't want nationalized healthcare unless it follows Norway's model or is similar, but if we can't we're okay with ensuring that every US citizen has a RIGHT to healthcare. If you're poor or middle class and you get sick or injured, you are taken care of without having your fragile financial life obliterated or your family's financial stability destroyed.

#4. Liberals tend to perceive life as part of nature. We also perceive things like pollution as potentially hazardous to our collective health. The Earth is a beautiful place, and its the only place we have to live, so we want it treated better for very selfish reasons: we want to live in a beautiful place and not die of poisoning or cancer. We don't want our children to have asthma. We don't want people being born without any limbs or blind or worse. There is overwhelming evidence supporting global warming. We may not be able to slow or stop it now, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try. If it continues like it has, the quality of life on this planet could be drastically lowered. Even if global warming is false, we still would rather live in a clean, healthy world then support oil company executives. Stop making and using plastic stop making and using disposable diapers

#5. Liberals strongly support freedom of religion, but with that comes freedom FROM religion. The women's right to choose, same-sex marriage, euthanasia for the terminally ill, stem cell research, etc. are all threatened by religion: namely Christianity, Judeaism, and Islam. We want religious-based legislation to be overturned and yet we want all religions free of government influence. Nobody can tell your church to marry same-sex couples and nobody can sue your church if it won't.

#6. Liberals support a strong military until a time when militarization is no longer a part of the human existence. Which is something we should be working toward. We don't support wars like the two we're in now, or Vietnam, or Korea. But we want a military for instances like WWII. We just don't like spending as much as we do on the military. So if some other nation needs our help like Kuwait you are ok with saying kiss off?

#7. Pedophiles are a natural occurrence in a human population. But, to act on the urge harms another human being. Pedophiles go to their own jails and are subjected to, if they wish to ever get out again, focused treatment. But until they are found guilty, they are assumed to be innocent. The Sexual Offender registry should be eliminated because not only does it do nothing, it violates people's right to privacy. If you don't want your children molested, raped, kidnapped and/or murdered (which is extremely highly unlikely to happen to them) then teach your kids not to talk to strangers and take better care of supervising them. And live in the suburbs or in the country. Its better for children than growing up in the city anyway. Bullshit apologist

#8. Liberals want more laws which protect society as a whole i.e. you don't get to drive your stupid Hummer because it pollutes the air we breathe. You don't get to exploit illegal aliens and pay them $3 a day. You don't get to kill someone simply because they are black, gay, or Muslim and get off easily. You don't get to execute people because you never know, you could be found guilty of a crime you didn't commit. Conservatives want laws that keep same-sex marriages from being recognized; keep women from having the right to choose; keep people from drinking, smoking pot, and eating psychotropic mushrooms; put people in prison for selling pot at a concert; keep prostitution illegal and therefore unregulated and dangerous even though it still happens and laws aren't preventing it; and conservative politicians railed against the Americans With Disabilities Act and funding the VA.

#9. Ever heard of the show "Politically Incorrect" with Bill Maher (who, if you didn't know) is VERY liberal? We don't want PC. I personally hate PC. It seems to me that many conservatives don't want swearing on TV. The people that want PC are both liberals and conservatives and we should really put a stop to their meddling. Hate Speech is more than just being PC.

Hate speech is real, it harms people, and it should be a law to help prevent inciting violence against a group of people for something they can't help

. Then you should do something about Air America and MSNBC

#10. Liberals don't want to legislate social attitudes, but legitimizing same-sex marriage extends to homosexuality and there's nothing wrong with being gay, unless you're religious. We don't want you to celebrate homosexuality with us, but you're welcome to. We understand that there will always be some who never even kind of accept homosexuality. But it shouldn't be considered deviant or abnormal. Racism and sexism still exist, but at least its looked down upon by the majority of US citizens. So now you feel you can tell people what to think? and that's not big government?

#11. We don't want to "open" the border to illegal immigrants, we just want to find a way to have them contribute to society since stopping them is almost if not entirely impossible. Let's get'em to pay taxes! Conservatives seem to think illegal aliens are criminals, lazy, and harmful to society: it makes them they come off as xenophobic, ethnocentric, and misanthropic. It will grow our economy to increase our population in a way that the immigrants contribute instead of sneak under the radar. We should try to minimize immigration, but also accept it to a certain extent. How do we do that? Hell if I know. I'm no expert. why are librals so dishonest,, we don't want open borders but,,,,,, what bullshit,, that's exactly what you want and anyone who disagrees with your positions get branded with your special little names of racist, bigot and xenophob..

#12. Acts are bad, not people. Prisons do not rehabilitate people. Many people are convicted of crimes for which they aren't guilty or not as guilty as the rigid law makes them out to be. No one should do prison time for just selling pot. We have the second highest population of inmates in the world. The justice system needs to be reformed. One would think conservatives would agree considering just how much it costs to keep a person imprisoned: in Colorado for a prisoner to be kept in minimum security prison for one year is $29k! Maximum security: $66,000 a year (but that's worth the money since those guys probably did something violent).

Liberals don't want a nanny state, but we live in a modern, techologically advanced society fso why not enjoy the benefits of living collectively. We don't just want to spend tax dollars for no reason. We don't want to raise taxes but a flat tax isn't going to work without simplifying the system, and even then it wouldn't be a fair tax system. We don't want needless wars, but we still support our troops. We want religious diversity and not a de facto theocracy. We want racial diversity. We want a more open society. We want the government out of our personal lives unless what we're doing is harming someone else. We want justice. We want liberty. We want the American dream.

I hope that clears things up a bit for you partisans out there.

I don't think conservative repsonse to your nonsene is reactionary at all,, it's right on target.

 

[Coloradomtnman]

In response to garyd. Shortened for reading and response convenience.

What about unnecessary and dishonest wars? How much do we spend on social security, medicare, medicaid, welfare, education and job training programs in comparison to Iraq and Afghanistan? How much have we spent on Wallstreet and Auto Industry bail outs? Oil subsidies?

This is a capitalist economy and I'm not going to buy a piece of shit car. There's probably a lot which should be done by the US auto industry to come out of this stronger and better than before and I hope that's what happens. Considering how things work in the bewildering confusion of American politics and its constant meddling in the markets, I doubt that it will.

I really think we should limit the amount of litigation that happens in the US if just because of medical costs. I don't think all of us will go broke keeping many of us from filing bankruptcy because of medical debt.

I have no bias against modern technology. I love my Ipod, my cell phone (I want an Iphone), I love my laptop, I like cable tv, I like well-designed climbing gear that I can use to save my ass when I get into really dangerous situations, I like satellite radio, the internet (which Al Gore invented...!), air conditioning, planes, the ability to drive around the continent in just a few days. What I don't like is not being able to see the mountains from Denver because of pollution, or seeing the forests die from pine beetle infestations because of rising temps in the mountains (and when these forests burn, which they will, the damage to the central Rocky Mountain ecosystem won't recover for hundreds if not thousands of years). Or the mighty Colorado River fade out into a polluted rivulet before it even reaches the sea. Or the accelerated melting of glaciers in Canada, Alaska, and the Alps. I don't like seeing animals die because we build stupid stick frame piece of shit houses on mountain sides so that the animals can't migrate or find food. I love wilderness. I think you may not have truly experienced it because had you, you would change your mind about business being more important than the very environment which is the only thing which sustains all known life. Money is not more important than the very thing which keeps us all alive. And beauty is more important than factories and oil refineries. If you don't think so, then you don't appreciate life.

Its too simplistic to think, "Well, if you don't want kids don't screw around!" Sure, we'd all like everyone to be that responsible but good luck with that one! Legislation shouldn't be religious-based but fact-based and researched and studied to align our laws more closely with reality. There are lots of ignorant people out there. And stupid people. Let's educate them and maybe they won't get pregnant irresponsibly. Liberals don't want to encourage abortions, we just think they should be legal. I don't think terminating a pregancy is the same as killing. It isn't yet alive.

Should be right after that big space rock with our name on it turns this place into several thousand smaller places...

That's pretty funny! Reminded me of something Douglas Adams would write.

I do know about history, I've studied it in school, I read about frequently. There's nothing wrong with hoping and working toward living in a peaceful world. Yeah, it may never happen, but isn't it a worthwhile endeavor? What that has to do with the defense budget...? Who is going to take on the US military? No one. In order to maintain and even keep advancing our military do we need to spend as much as we do now? No.

Of course if you don;t wish to get your hands dirty just hang a sign that says baby raper around there necks and throw them in with the general prison population. To be sure they might die with a butt hoile the size of China but some how that sounds like poetic justice to me.

Ha ha! That made me laugh. Butthole the size of China...heh heh heh.

However, that isn't very humane. I would rather act with compassion than with murder.

I want laws which protect people from ignorance and harm. Is that big government or just what government should help the rest of us in doing?

Maher isn't politically correct, that's the point I was making. Conservatives think liberals want to legislate PC and it isn't true.

"Legalizing" same-sex marriage doesn't force anyone to accept it other than the government.

45% of Califonia's prison pop are illegal aliens. It's worse I understand in Texas.

Prove it.

Ever heard of mandatory sentencing? There are people doing 20 years for selling pot. Lots of'em! I'm not excusing anyone of their responsibility if they have committed a crime, I'm just saying that there are better ways to deal with them than the ways we have now.