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Politics : Just the Facts, Ma'am: A Compendium of Liberal Fiction
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To: Joe Btfsplk who wrote (53932)12/5/2006 3:21:18 PM
From: Solon  Read Replies (2) of 90947
 
I don't think so. The mindset that Big Government is the answer to social inequality and that special interest groups may ethically curry special favor with Big Government has a genesis in a belief system pertinent to modern liberalism (which is really more properly termed socialism). That belief system may be unconsciously held, but it nevertheless informs the pandering to bureaucracy and Government as a means to achieve a certain "sharing" of resources--human resources that is to say.

In order to justify such a belief there must be an underlying outlook on the nature of man. In classical (or Jeffersonian)liberalism, that outlook valued freedom above all things and relied on the essential value of man both for the distinction of freedom as value and for the practice of freedom (hands off). Without this belief in the essential worth, dignity, and competence of man to earn his own station in life, there would be no reason to honor freedom as the highest value. When the value of freedom is trivialized by the active support of intrusive interference and exploitation of human resources, it supposes a fundamental contempt for the individual. It is the mindset of the tribe or the hive. I don't think this mindset prevails in libertarianism--which is the original liberalism. Nor do I think it constitutes a "plurality" in conservatism.

I think socialism (modern liberalism) embodies an ACTIVE embracement of totalitarian ideals--with government and special interest sharing the duties of dictator.
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