Kansas Drug Addiction

“Liberal” is a social/political position that is predicated upon the idea of the individual as the atomically basic unit of such discourse. It can run the gamut of “laissez-faire” approaches that (in the US, at least) came to be viewed as as “conservatism” — *NOT*, it is to be noted, the morph’d contemporary olio known as “neoconservatism.” It is not immediately evident to me that this latter has anything like a principled center to it. What we in the US refer to as conservatism could more properly be referred to as “classical liberalism.”

More progressive flavors of liberalism retain the focus upon the individual as the atom, but approach social and economic problems with a more meliorative and, to varying degrees, interventionist approach.

You did not specifically ask in the above about the contrast of liberalism with other theories. Why is that? It seems rather obvious to me that one cannot say what a position is without saying what it is not.

Socialism has no single definition, but I would note certain salient features. First, in stark contrast with liberalism, socialism is more holistic and emphasizes the social unit as basic, the “individual” being an emregent construct. (There is some historical, anthropological, and psychological legitimacy to this claim. We all begin as members of a community and only later “find ourselves” as individuals.)

This emphasis on the atomic nature of the community is itself something that plays out in a spectrum of positions, from an absolute focus on the whole and more or less total disregard of the emergent individual, to variously balanced foci on both that view the holistic social unit as a stage in augmenting the emergent individual. Chavez, in his apparent grab at unbridled power, seems to be very much of the former variety.

In addition, there are other features that can and do play out. “Socialism” can be more in the way of philosophical approach to, and methodology of, critiqueing power relations, especially as these present themselves through inequable distributions of property and money. Or again, it can be a legal system in which the laws favor the providers of labor and service rather than the holders of money and capital.

It is worth noting that socialism is not automatically antithetical to market economy, any more than capitalism automatically assumes a market or precludes a planned or command economy. We have seen instances of combinations of all the above.

I am trying to imagine which is more ignorant: characterizing Peabody Energy or Hugo Chavez as “liberal.” The one is a fossil fuel company that is almost certainly as self-servingly neocon as it is possible to be, while the other is a (on his most reactionary days) a socialist who despises liberals (on a principled rather than only pragmatic basis) almost as much as a neocon.

Have I just missed something here — not that that is such an uncommon an event, I admit — I mean, in the alcohol induced fog of a Friday evening, is there a third party that slipped in and that I missed? Or are you folks really that absolutely clueless about what the word “liberal” means?

Sorry to be snarky; its been a long week. I get as impatient with my own confusion as other people’s, if that is any comfort.

My back wasn’t up — just amused that you went straight for that oh so sophisticated “Liberals do it too, (nya nya ya nya, so there!)” argument.

I would say the number one reason that liberals engage in deception and spinning to consolidate or gain power — but they want power for different reasons than conservatives. Most liberals have some notion of government as a force for good … conservatives focus on private gain.