Who are the true liberal politicians and what defines liberal? {Please Dems only}

Great Debates
21

Actually, the name of the party is the Social and Liberal Democrats. Apparently they wanted to be known as the “Social Democrats” when they first made that name, but the phrase “liberal democrat” caught on instead. And yes, they are now probably the most left-wing of the British parties, but this may change.

See, when the Libs. were founded, the Labour party was still hard-core socialist. They weren’t quite- not quite- advocating communism, but they weren’t far off, either. The 1983 Labour manifesto (known to some as “the longest suicide note in history”) proposed, among other things, complete and unilateral nuclear disarmament and the nationalisation of all key industries, from heavy manufacturing to services like transport. In response to the hard-left and unpopular Labour position, four Labour MPs left to found the SDP, which later merged with the Liberals. They were supposed to be centre-ground, breaking the mould of adverserial British politics, and offering, basically, what New Labour and the Conservatives are both struggling to offer now- management, rather than ideology.

Unfortunately for the SDP, after they started making real electoral progress (becoming, at one point, the effective opposition party), both the Conservatives and Labour began to re-organise and try to offer less divisive, centre-ground politics. The Conservatives ditched Thatcher, Labour got Blair, and both moved back into the centre ground (Labour, for example, ditched “Clause IV”, which had been party of the Labour Party Constitution, and basically promised they would try to bring socialism). This left the Liberals out in the cold, so they moved left, to pick up the voters that Labour had left behind by cosying up to big business and so forth. This led to the current liberals, who are definitely left of Blair, but may not be to the left of the rest of the Labour party.

In case you didn’t know, Blair has recently had great difficulty forcing through his Conservative-esque education reforms, and the majority of the (still strongly left-wing) Labour MPs, many of whom have Scottish or Welsh seats (both of whose constituents have very socialist tendencies) are grumbling and hoping that Blair will resign so they can get a more left-wing PM. At the same time, the Lib Dems have recently voted in a new leader (Sir Menzies Campbell), who is widely seen as a caretaker while the party undergoes an ideological struggle about which direction to go in now that the Centre may be opening up again. At the same time the new Tory leader, Campbell, is trying to move his party back to the centre and make them electable, possibly opening up the possibility of a more libertarian-style Lib Dem party co-operating with the Conservatives in the event of parliamentary instability.

There. More than you ever needed or wanted to know about the Lib Dems.

Oh, and there is still a dihictomy in the Liberals between the remains of the old Liberal party, whose concerns centre on civil liberties, over-regulation and so on, and the Labour defectors, who are mainly concerned with social justice policies (NHS etc.). The party has MPS and members of both stripes, and sometimes they agree (over the enviroment or the Iraq war*, for example.) They are also the only strongly-pro-Europe party, which is a somewhat unpopular position to take.

*Which is hugely unpopular here, far outstripping even the very worst American opposition. Both before and after, there have been millions who turned out to protest British involvement. The Iraq war is widely credited with lowering Blair’s majority from 179 to 60-odd. Without it, he probably could have won a third landslide victory.

22

Well, I got to learn a lot about British Politics, unfortunately no one cares to venture a list of Liberal US Senators. :wink:
**BrainGlutton ** thinks Clinton is something he doesn’t appear to be.
I don’t feel any closer to the understanding why some board members are claiming Kerry is not a Liberal.
I guess I am pleading for more help and hoping our British friends can go start there own debate in another thread. I am interested, but I was also hoping to learn something more specific.

Sorry,
Jim

23

I wonder about the Green Republicans, we seem fairly common in NJ. Are Green Republicans that rare in other states or do they just keep a lower profile?

Jim

24

From a quick review of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_clinton:

  • Clinton put through NAFTA.

  • Clinton put an end to “welfare as we know it.”

  • Clinton was an excellent fiscal conservative. Even Alan Greenspan backed his decision to raise taxes on the top 2% in 1993. By the end of his administration, there was a budget surplus. [sigh]

  • In 1996 he signed the Telecom Reform Act, eliminating major ownership restrictions for radio and television groups.

And what did he ever do for labor? Nothing comes to mind. He raised the minimum wage in 1996, but that was a crumb.

Seems pretty pro-business to me. But I’m looking at him from a democratic socialist’s perspective. Perhaps you see essential differences between his economic policies and Reagan’s that make the latter more pro-business.

25

The most important reason is that he’s never clearly come out against the war. In more general terms, I see no important differences between his politics and Clinton’s.

26

Reagan was out to remove regulations on everything and broke the Air-Traffic Controllers Union. The only major labor action Clinton took was to bring pressure on MLB and the Major League Player Association. He applied most of the Pressure on the MLB. He went after Tobacco and Microsoft. Not so Pro Business. You never answered those from earlier.
Is a budget Surplus Pro-Business? I thought it was just Pro-America?

Yes, I see a difference between Reagan’s Pro-Business and Clinton’s more moderate road.

On Preview: So all good Liberals should have been against the war to start with, even when they were operating under mis-information from the Bush Admin?
Should they also be against the Afghan war?
Should they all have voted against the Patriot Act?
Please narrow this down even more, I really don’t see voting in favor of the war as disqualify you from being a liberal by itself.

Jim {BTW: I liked both Clinton & Reagan, I don’t like either Bush}

27

Sorry. Actually. No.

The name is the Liberal Democrats:

http://www.libdems.org.uk/media/documents/const05p.pdf

28

The standard gibe against Kerry is that in order to be a liberal, he would actually have to stand for something. And like most political gibes, this one has some truth to it. Kerry has a special knack for being both in favor of something and against it – the Iraq war being a salient example.

In terms of actual liberal senators, I’d say Kennedy and Feingold by reputation, but in order to do this exercise, you’d have to create a scorecard – much like the liberal lobbying group People for the American Way has done. As a liberal, here’s a grab bag of issues, in no particular order, that I’d expect a liberal congressman to vote my way on:

Universal healthcare coverage: Yes
War in Iraq: No
Gun control: Yes
Increased funding for clean/renewable energy: Yes
Patriot Act: No
Gay marriage: Yes
Progressive taxation: Yes
Saving the whales: Yes

Abortion is not one of my issues, though I think most people would agree that liberal senators would be pro-choice. Affirmative action, similar deal. But I have no expectation that even a liberal senator would vote my way 100% of the time. From which you could conclude either that I’m not that liberal, or that he/she is not that liberal.

29

Sam I like your list and definitions and the link. By your standards I am a liberal and yet I am a Hawk and Pro-military. I like the idea of Police Man to the world, I just don’t like or trust the current Chief of Police. Of everything you listed I probably would have voted for the War in Iraq when the vote came up, and I would have regretted it later.

Where do the following play in?
A balanced Budget.
Maintaining a strong military.
Considering a draft.
Increasing College Funds for the Military to encourage both.
Seperation of Church and state.
Intelligent Design.
Building new Nuclear Plants to replace Coal burners.
etc.

Jim

30

Ah, thanks for the response, BrainGlutton. I see where you’re coming from now. I can agree that Clinton certainly would not have been labour’s favourite president, but, well, two observations about this.

First, Clinton might not have given labour a lot, but Reagan’s actions in the air traffic controllers’ strike (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_Traffic_Controller’s_strike) was almost certainly the most anti-labour action in recent memory. Clinton’s more pro-labour than that.

Second, the business vs. labor axis is only one way to evaluate how pro-business a president was. There’s also business vs. consumer, business vs. environment, business vs. society, etc. I can’t think of any axis where Clinton was more pro-business than Reagan, even if they were closer on some than others.

Anyway, this is all veering a little off-topic anyway. I’m certainly not to trying to make the argument that Clinton was some kind of great liberal hero. Just that classing him with Reagan, Thatcher, and Greenspan seems a bit weird.

31

What Exit?, some of these are a little squishy from the liberal perspective. Here’s my take:

A balanced budget: No strong feelings either way.

Maintaining a strong military: I’m a bit of a pacifist. As the current situation in Iraq shows, the temptation with a strong military is to use it, with unfortunate results. You said, “I like the idea of Police Man to the world, I just don’t like or trust the current Chief of Police” and to me the crux of the problem is right there. I actually think we need to start moving in the direction of a less militarized world, with more emphasis on cooperative problem solving – and actually, I think the world has moved in that direction. The U.S., not so much.

Considering a draft: This again is one of those issues that crosses partisan lines. There’s a strong liberal argument in favor of it, as well as a strong conservative one. I guess personally I’m not in favor. The most I’ll commit to is that registration for the Selective Service should make no distinction between men and women, as it does at present.

Increasing College Funds for the Military to encourage both: Again, no real opinion.

Separation of Church and state: Yup, very much so.

Intelligent Design: See above.

Building new Nuclear Plants to replace Coal burners : I’m actually in favor of this, especially with newer-generation nuke plants. Liberals have traditionally been against nuclear power, though I wonder whether the whole issue of global warming has changed some minds. To me, even with wind, solar, geothermal, etc. nuclear could still play an important role. That and conservation – which ought to be just as much a conservative issue as a liberal one.

32

Strange, you consider yourself Liberal, I consider myself Moderate but we agree on almost everything but the Hawk issues and a balanced Budget.
Maybe I am a liberal Hawk. I seem fairly liberal on most Social Issues and Green Issues but I lean heavily right on Foreign Policy and Military Issues.

BTW: One advantage I see to the draft is that I have seen signs our military is becoming more devout and more to the right and the draft would bring more liberals and non-devout into the ranks.

**I still looks like the term Liberal has no definate meaning. **

BTW: Kerry registers liberal on the People for the American Way Site. Just not as much as Kennedy.
If I am reading the results correctly.

Jim

33

Bill or Hillary?

Anyway, as I briefly mentioned in a previous post, determining exactly who’s a “true liberal” or “true conservative” depends on a relative and shifting scale. The election of Ronald Reagan (and the other Republicans who rode in on his coattails) in 1980 caused the whole American political spectrum to shift to the right. For example, Richard Nixon was regarded by many as a conservative but during his presidency he advocated a government-funded medical plan that was far more liberal than anything Clinton proposed, established the Environmental Protection Agency, and called himself a “Keynesian” on economic matters–an outright heretical admission in today’s Republican party. And the shift rightward hasn’t stopped. That’s why someone like Bill Clinton, who was far more conservative than the last Democratic president Jimmy Carter (who was considered a moderate liberal) and even Nixon on some matters, is regarded by many as a flaming “leftist.”

As for who I think are “true” liberals (in the pre-1980 sense) and are still active politically, the first names that come to mind are Ted Kennedy, Russell Feingold, Barry Sanders (I know he’s not a Democrat), and probably Barbara Boxer.

34

I’ve always called myself a liberal and thought of myself as a liberal, but maybe it’s just a label of convenience. I don’t feel like I’m a strongly ideological person, much more of a pragmatic one – the greatest good for the greatest number, that sort of thing.

35

The Americans With Disabilities Act was passed and signed by George H.W. Bush in 1990.

36

I agree with John Mace, “liberal” is an ambiguous term and, since the 1988 presidential campaign, usually pejorative (although President-elect Matt Santos embraced the label on The West Wing!). Often the most useful yardstick is a relative comparison of politicians of that general stripe.

You asked, where do the following play in? All answers are general and, almost necessarily, oversimplistic. YMMV.

A balanced budget - I think most liberals are in favor of this, at least in theory, although deficit hawks tend to be conservative (e.g. John McCain, George Voinovich, Phil Gramm, Warren Rudman). Most liberals tend to place greater importance on meeting social needs than on balancing the budget, but with the massive deficits we now “enjoy,” this may be changing.

Maintaining a strong military - You’ll never find a liberal who’ll say he’s against this, but it’s a question of priorities and spin. Liberals will generally say a strong military depends upon improving military pay and being smart in how we structure our forces and what weapons systems we buy. Conservatives will generally support higher spending without being especially nitpicky as to where the money goes, IMHO. All things considered, most liberals will not support defense spending nearly as high as most conservatives.

Considering a draft - As noted above, there are both liberal and conservative arguments for this, arising from rather different principles/priorities. I think it’s pretty much dead as a policy prospect right now, in any event.

Increasing College Funds for the Military to encourage both - Most liberals would support this, I think.

Separation of church and state - Embracing Jeffersons’s views, most liberals strongly - and correctly, IMHO - support this.

Intelligent Design - Most liberals oppose this.

Building new Nuclear Plants to replace Coal burners - Most liberals oppose this, too. Liberals tend to place greater emphasis on clean energy, better fuel economy and conservation, and are viscerally opposed to nuclear power. Since 9-11, there also seems to be a greater awareness of the danger of terrorist attack on nuclear power plants (such as the one just north of NYC). Most liberals - hell, most Americans - don’t support building more such prospective targets.

Al Gore and others have also made the argument that developing better clean-coal and clean-energy technology is in the national interest, and that environmentally-safe energy technology is something we can sell to others - to China, for instance, in which economic development and pollution go hand in hand.

37

Forgot to add: off the top of my head, prominent politicos who could accurately be described as liberal include Russ Feingold, Tom Harkin, Ted Kennedy, and Barbara Boxer in the U.S. Senate, and Bernie Sanders, John Conyers and Barney Frank in the House.

38

By “current Chief of Police,” do you mean Bush, or the United States?

If the later, what entity or organization would be better suited to the role?

39

FWIW, I’ve maintained that liberalism is the freedom to disregard established political or cultural dogma or mores. I define leftism as support for policies designed to remedy perceived past inequities.

40

Thank you everyone for the replies, this debate is really back on target.
It looks like the list of Liberals is very small and I tend to lump in Liberal leaning with liberals.

I meant Bush and his cabinet.

Jim