> ----Platt, Sunday, July 08, 2007 10:36----- > The freedoms that matters to conservative besides the free market are > freedom of speech, religion, trial by jury, etc. as described by Pirsig as > intellectual values, guaranteed in the U.S. by the Bill of Rights. > "Liberal" in the U.S. has come to mean left-wing communism/socialism. > ------ > Thanks for the laugh, Platt.
Likewise, Keith > I'm afraid that I completely disagree that in the U.S. conservative = > guardian of liberty & liberal = communist. > > Current U.S. "conservatives" may value the free market, but those in power > certainly have little respect for freedom of religion (see the blurring of > church & state that is Faith Based Initiatives now defended by the > conservative Supreme Court), How does this prevent you from exercising your freedom of religion? How does this "establish" a religion? > trial by jury (suspension of habeas corpus, > anyone?), You mean for terrorist prisoners who are non-citizens? nor freedom of speech (disagree with the President's Iraq policy > == not supporting the troops == unpatriotic). What law abridges your free speech? (Agree with the President's Iraq policy = imperialism = stupid.) What about speech codes on many college campuses? > On the other hand, while U.S. "liberals" may not be in love with an > unfettered free market, they tend to support the other of Pirsig's > intellectual values and donate money to the ACLU and Freedom From Religion > to defend them. Do you think the liberal's call to reinstate the Fairness Doctrine an example of defending free speech? Conservatives supporting Pirsig's intellectual values include the Heritage Foundation and the Federalist Society. > Really, though this conservative/liberal dichotomy is all but useless to > have a meaningful conversation. Let's talk some specifics. Questions above are specific and relate to the liberal/conservative outlooks. > If we were to > identify the subpopulations within these over-broad categories, we might > have something to talk about. Libertarians do support all of the freedoms > you spell out, but they are a minority "conservative" party in the U.S. Yes, Libertarians are more conservative than many Republicans who have in some cases abandoned conservative principles, like enforcing immigration laws and spending taxpayers money like liberals.. >The > majority of the Republicans in power appear to be Christian social > conservatives who seek to legislate their religious values and thereby > shred those Constitutional freedoms. Can you cite specific legislation offered by Christian social conservatives that shreds Constitutional freedoms? > Within the "liberal" flank, there are > those on the "left" who lean toward democratic socialism. Most centrist > Democrats, however, want to promote the social good through government > regulation and incentivization of private industry and public-private > partnerships with respect to medical care and the New Deal social safety > net programs. Yes, examples of socialist programs -- defined as government interference in the private sector -- intended of course for the "public good." Medicare is rapidly going broke to be followed by Social Security, a Ponzi scheme. > The number of communists in the U.S. must be vanishingly > small, however, as I don't hear anyone talking about turning over the means > of production to the state. Not directly. But imposing regulations on business amounts to the same thing and is socialistic in nature. Example: recent proposed legislation requiring auto companies to manufacturer 35 mpg auto engines by 2018. The one freedom not mentioned by Pirsig and overlooked by the Founding Fathers was the freedom to spend your own money as you see fit. But, that's a goal for the future, although I wouldn't suggest, like some people, that we sanction a "temporary bloody tyranny" to attain it. :-) Platt moq_discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
