It's progressive as in "progressive income tax."
Reminds of the joke south of the border:
If the opposite of "pro" is "con," what's the opposite of "progress?"
I dealt with most of the semantic issues, anyway, at my place. When there was a simple unilinear notion of "moving forward," a kind of analogy to physical evolution, the word actually had a context that gave it meaning. Now it's simply a label, like "conservative." It stands for a constellation of values, but it's not a very clear term. Like "conservative." The latter can refer to John Diefenbaker, that human rights crusader--or to this.
It reminds me of the Progressive Conservative Party.
I keep thinking that they've just the Liberal ship and have joined the Conservatives.
You're asking really good questions here but you don't go far enough.
I've thought about this before and blogged about it but I ask you to consider that the "new progressives" (conservatives)are moving forward whilst the "old progressives" (Liberals, NDP, Green, etc) are stuck in neutral.
You're bookmarked and I'll address this situation again tomorrow on my personal site but I really like this entry.
"Ya done good."
My personal view of conservativism is to move forward cautiously. And sometimes, not at all. It's the "not at all part" that infuriates many ... but then, why fix things that work?
Today's conservatives are virtualy all libertarians, including social conservatives. One of the most "social" conservatives in the CPC is my MP ... yet he's incredibly libertarian on most issues.
As humans though, we must make sense of our surroundings, and to stereotype is a fundamental survival skills. (ie: lions kill ... run away)
In the modern civilized world though, that survival skill causes as much harm as good ... it's a tricky fence ride.
Progressive, Socialist, Marxist, Fascist are all interchangeable now. They all think that government is the answer to every question.
A "Progressive" is someone who:
* Believes that letting violent felons out of prison does not contribute to crime, but letting law-abiding citizens purchase guns to defend against recidivism does cause crime.
* Believes that diminishing property rights, more regulations and taxes, and government intervention in markets and the economy will encourage private business and legislate us into prosperity.
* Believes there were no self sustaining individuals or industry before government subsidy.
* Believe that big corporations create oppression but big governments create prosperity.
* Believe that disease, war, famine, are spread as a result of the lack of government funding.
You see "Progressivism" is quite popular because of its essentially justifying glamour, which appeals to and sanitizes all that is weak, broken and ugly in human nature:
If you are lazy, it offers a handout ( Taken from an unwilling benefactor at the end of a state held gun).
If you are stupid, it dumbs down your competition in the name of egalitarianism.
If you are socially worthless, it offers (false) self-esteem with it's dystopian mythologies....and public sector employment.
If you are confused, it says that certainty is the REAL confusion. relativism is king.
If you are evil or sociopathic, it offers a denial of guilt and blames society for your crimes.
If you are a liar, it offers a denial of the existence of truth by the relativist construct of justified situational morality.
If you are a coward, it offers its own false security by encouraging abdication of personal duty and responsibility to the state.
If you are a slave to the leviathan state it offers the lie that true slavery is individual FREEDOM. Now that's truly "progressive".
,
Wow, you people are dumb as dogshit.
"“Progressive” suggests exclusivity and elitism. If you are not within the clique and do not share the left of center utopian ideology of the club, you are not progressive, and hence, regressive and to be scorned. Those who proudly wear the badge ooze superiority (every single one of them), viewing those who are not “progressive” as backwards, or radical, or holding society back, as opposed to moving it forward. How utterly arrogant, pompous, elitist, and condescending a notion."
They don't suggest superiority, they EARN IT by holding all philosophies to the same level of scrutiny.
"Progressive, Socialist, Marxist, Fascist are all interchangeable now. They all think that government is the answer to every question."
Do you you even know the definition of any of these terms or are you just talking out of your ass to make yourself feel better? Socialism is a person that puts the whole of society before himself. The reality is that any law that does not allow corporations to keep 6-year olds as manual labor in unsafe factories for 5 cents per hour while selling unregulated, hazardous materials, marketed as health care products to the masses is a Socialist law. Deal with it.
Marxism is the same thing as Capitalism where the only significant difference is what the elite class through which all economic funds filter down to the lower classes, but doesn't answer directly to them is. In Marxism, it was the military. In Capitalism its the Corporate CEO's.
As for the "WL Mackenzie" bullshit.. where to begin with your dumbass?
1. Guns neither stop nor start crime. They only serve to delay it and promote its escalation.
2. Its not about encouraging private business. Its about regulating the economic interactions of these organizations because, just like people, they can not be trusted to interact responsibly through self-regulation.
3. You've never met a dairy farmer in your life, have you, dipshit?
4. The whole big government/big penis myth. If smaller governments actually meant a lesser amount of power within government, then why do terms like Monarchy and Dictatorship go hand-in-hand throughout history? If size actually had anything to do with the amount of power within government, then the more government there is, then the less power any official within the government would be able to have at any given time.
5. Disease is the evolution of viruses. War is caused politicians that can't sell their ideas on their own merit or greedy assholes that just want more for themselves. Famine is what happens when small governments with totalitarian power decide not to care for their people anymore.
6. Same old libertarian "taxes are theft" bullshit. Granted, simply tossing money at the poor without promoting socialist programs to teach these to better handle their finances and perhaps make their own. At the same time, taxes are not theft. You have an obligation to the society that allows you to prosper. Don't like it? Leave the society or go to prison. Those are your alternatives. You Libertarians are just like a perpetual four-year old that whines about how your mommy and daddy spent hundreds of dollars on your brother's glasses instead of buying you a new toy - if the money doesn't benefit you directly, you whine and bitch about it.
7. This isn't even intelligent enough to be qualified as bullshit. Egalitarianism is holding all philosophies and cultures at the same level of equality. Lowering standards for students is the individual school's response to farcical conservative education programs set to undermine the Department of Education instead of strengthening it.
8. Not accepting conservative or religious stupidity as scared notions is not confusion. Its acknowledging that all ideas must be maintained, which includes honest and rational explorations of previous ideas to newer ones. Labeling something as "sacred" is just intellectual cowardice. This includes your god, your guns and your flag.
9. There is no such thing as objective evil or good. There is no action that is so abusive that it is not beneficial to at least one individual - usually the one committing the action.
Sociopaths are those people with no concept of social value. They're conservatives without the pretense of economic, social or spiritual values.
Ethics and philosophies are subjective and as all ideas, they also must be questioned, challenged and maintained without falling back on the intellectual cowardice called "Sacredness". Application of ethics, however, must be objective and apply to all people, regardless of wealth, equally.
10. You should know about lying, you conservatives do it daily to find comfort even though it is you that are causing the woes in the world that liberals have been cleaning up. You fuck ups thrive on the notion that if some form of exploitation isn't directly illegal, then it must be ethical by default. Then you label judges as "activists" when they see through your bullshit and rule against you.
11. I assume you are talking about serving the military, because there's no way you could be including paying taxes with your mindless version of "responsibility to the state". Leave it to the dipshits to believe that liberals aren't patriotic because they don't mindlessly throw their lives away at the whim of whackjob politicians. You want to play that game, then fine. Get this through your head, dipshit, If you haven't died for your country, then you have no business talking down to people as if you had. Not getting shot in a war that could have been avoided altogether, does not make you an expert on any subject matter except that of not getting shot in a war.
12. The ultimate Libertarian bullshit. The willing confusion of freedom within society with the freedom from society. Freedom within society is the freedom that exists for all people equally and exists as long as society is maintained (yes, with taxes that help out ALL of its people, and not just the programs that benefit you directly). Freedom from society is unregulated anarchy. And the only reason that seems attractive to rednecks living in towns with a population less than 1000, is because they don't acknowledge that there is a social order that keeps neighboring towns from coming in and burning your homes to the ground, raping your women and killing your children.
Its a lot of reading, but simple answers are only beneficial to simplistic minds.
You know, its really hard not to have an air of superiority when you conservative dumbfucks can't even explain your positions without being ass-end wrong.
Wow Zenrage no wonder it's so hard to like liberals. Grow-up raving and having a tantrum, is no way to get people to listen to your point of veiw.
Zen: Gear down there big rig ... you're proving the thesis of this post right. I'll have to introduce you as exhibit A.
Geeze, zen. Where did you copy that from? I think you should give appropriate citations so as to avoid a charge of copyright infringement.
You don't know what "begs the question" actual means do you? Because you sure as shit don't use it right in this post. Try "raises the question", you won't look quite as dumb next time.
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