What Do Progressives Really Stand For?

[native]

What do modern "Progressives" really stand for?

[BlueHen86]

What do modern "Progressives" really stand for?

Same thing as Conservatives...getting votes .

[youngterrier]

to use the government to help those who can't help themselves, the problem is that the taxes raised to do so make more people that can't help themselves and each new generation wants to help people in a new way

[native]

... im just saying when you compare people at the top of the slope to the evil ones who were at the bottom less swing-voters if you will. will join your side because the misrepresntation of others goals. thats why i dont like beck, he says progressives want to control every aspect of peoples lives when that is not true

good people hate us because we compare them to fascists

Perhaps if we are to save the future, some good people need to be jolted out of their comfort zone.

Beck uses the example that a frog thrown into a pot of boiling water is smart enough to jump out, while a frog already in the pot while is is slowly brought to the boil feels all warm and comfortable until it is too late to jump out.

In my opinion, the situation is an emergency and there is barely enough time to jump out of the boiling pot before it is too late.

Therefore, the fact that some progressives share noble thoughts for sympathetic ends should not be sufficient reason to allow them to avoid harsh criticism.

It is also important to note, as T-man has done, that not all progressives are just innocent and naive do-gooders.

[native]

What do modern "Progressives" really stand for?

Same thing as Conservatives...getting votes .

Which makes it hard to craft enduring solutions, Mr. Blue Pants.

[native]

to use the government to help those who can't help themselves, the problem is that the taxes raised to do so make more people that can't help themselves and each new generation wants to help people in a new way

In my view the problem is more complicated. Those who cannot help themselves are a tiny fraction of those who receive unearned government assistance. Instead of providing a safety net only for those who cannot help themselves, we have subsidized lifestyle choices for almost everyone, far beyond the minimum requirements for a safety net.

[BlueHen86]

Same thing as Conservatives...getting votes .

Which makes it hard to craft enduring solutions, Mr. Blue Pants.

Agreed.

[native]

Which makes it hard to craft enduring solutions, Mr. Blue Pants.

Agreed.

If we had not done such a smashing job of destroying the Constitution over the past 100 years and still lived in a libertarian society, then the government would not be so damm big and it wouldn't matter.

Fantasy, I know, but true nonetheless.

[kalm]

The middle class.

[native]

The slow destruction of the middle class while feeding it narcotics and telling it lies.

FIFY!

[Grizalltheway]

The slow destruction of the middle class while feeding it narcotics and telling it lies.

FIFY!

Reaganomics have done more to destroy the middle class than anything else.

[kalm]

The slow destruction of the middle class while feeding it narcotics and telling it lies.

FIFY!

The middle class grows when labor is justly rewarded and the wealth gap is reduced. The middle class shrinks when wealth and power are consolidated. In europe the middle class grew out of feudalism. In modern America, the middle class grew as a result of fair labor practices and government spending on infrastruture, and is shrinking as a result of Reaganomics.

We've been through this before Native, and you clearly are a neo-feudalist.

[catamount man]

FIFY!

The middle class grows when labor is justly rewarded and the wealth gap is reduced. The middle class shrinks when wealth and power are consolidated. In europe the middle class grew out of feudalism. In modern America, the middle class grew as a result of fair labor practices and government spending on infrastruture, and is shrinking as a result of Reaganomics.

We've been through this before Native, and you clearly are a neo-feudalist.

[native]

FIFY!

The middle class grows when labor is justly rewarded and the wealth gap is reduced. The middle class shrinks when wealth and power are consolidated. In europe the middle class grew out of feudalism. In modern America, the middle class grew as a result of fair labor practices and government spending on infrastruture, and is shrinking as a result of Reaganomics.

We've been through this before Native, and you clearly are a neo-feudalist.

It wasn't labor unions and government social programs that created the greatest advances in the middle class, kalm, it was entrepreneurial visonaries like Henry Ford and Thomas Edison.

[travelinman67]

YT's missing in action.

Gotta be either spaghetti or turkey stew in toast cups.


Grew up in a Methodist Church. Sunday potlucks...

[JohnStOnge]

Managing the human population as though it were a herd of cattle. Except, of course, the cattle can do whatever they want sexually.

Delusional egalitarianism. Earth worship environmentalism. A belief that the Earth without humankind would somehow be "morally" better. Denial of real Liberty when it comes to questions of being allowed to associate or not associate with whom one chooses. That sort of thing.

That's my answer to the question before having read any of the posts. Now I'll read the posts.

[Skjellyfetti]

I drink Cappuccinos and like arugula. I read cutting edge novels, love a good Malbec, and can't wait until Volvo makes a hybrid with an interior that matches my Chocolate Lab, Piper. I own a lot of burnt sienna clothing, keep a dream journal, and could really go for some good Nepalese tonight. I think the healthcare bill is great. So should you. Unless you wear Ed Hardy or something...

[native]

I drink Cappuccinos and like arugula. I read cutting edge novels, love a good Malbec, and can't wait until Volvo makes a hybrid with an interior that matches my Chocolate Lab, Piper. I own a lot of burnt sienna clothing, keep a dream journal, and could really go for some good Nepalese tonight. I think the healthcare bill is great. So should you. Unless you wear Ed Hardy or something...

Most pure malbecs have an unsatisfying finish, but when blended with the right cabs and other varietals, the effect can be quite wonderful.

Don't know what Ed Hardy is but sounds like I'll have to find out...

[JohnStOnge]

The middle class grows when labor is justly rewarded and the wealth gap is reduced.

Labor, which is a service, is worth what someone is willilng to pay for it just like any other commodity is. It is a supply and demand situation. Take flipping hamburgers. If McDonald's offered people 1 cent per hour to flip hamburgers no one would do it. So they'd have to offer more. At some point what they'd offer would result in them getting enough people to flip hamburgers to sustain their business.

Same with any other "labor" task. And if government steps in and FORCES buisness to pay more than what would result from that process for a particular task the result is that the cost of labor is artificially inflated. People are paid more for their labor than it is actually worth. Requiring that more be paid for labor than it is worth is not "justly" rewarding people for their labor. It is "unjustly" forceing people who purchase labor to pay more for it than it's worth.

Then there is wealth. The implication of the statement quoted is that "wealth" is something bestowed from above...a static pie that everyone has a right to some share of. That is not reality. The total level of wealth is a dynamic quantity depending on what people do to generate it. No one has a "right" or an "entitlement" to some particular share of the wealth.

Suppose I have an idea for something everybody wants. When I find a way to translate that idea into reality I create wealth. And if I can find the labor I need to implement that idea for a low price that's the way it is. Those whose labor I purchase don't have a "right" to some particular share of the wealth. They have a right to set their price for their labor. But if I can find others who will do the same thing for less I have...or should have...a right to do that.

There is no great pie in the sky of which everybody "deserves" a share.

[kalm]

The middle class grows when labor is justly rewarded and the wealth gap is reduced.

Labor, which is a service, is worth what someone is willilng to pay for it just like any other commodity is. It is a supply and demand situation. Take flipping hamburgers. If McDonald's offered people 1 cent per hour to flip hamburgers no one would do it. So they'd have to offer more. At some point what they'd offer would result in them getting enough people to flip hamburgers to sustain their business.

Same with any other "labor" task. And if government steps in and FORCES buisness to pay more than what would result from that process for a particular task the result is that the cost of labor is artificially inflated. People are paid more for their labor than it is actually worth. Requiring that more be paid for labor than it is worth is not "justly" rewarding people for their labor. It is "unjustly" forceing people who purchase labor to pay more for it than it's worth.

Then there is wealth. The implication of the statement quoted is that "wealth" is something bestowed from above...a static pie that everyone has a right to some share of. That is not reality. The total level of wealth is a dynamic quantity depending on what people do to generate it. No one has a "right" or an "entitlement" to some particular share of the wealth.

Suppose I have an idea for something everybody wants. When I find a way to translate that idea into reality I create wealth. And if I can find the labor I need to implement that idea for a low price that's the way it is. Those whose labor I purchase don't have a "right" to some particular share of the wealth. They have a right to set their price for their labor. But if I can find others who will do the same thing for less I have...or should have...a right to do that.

There is no great pie in the sky of which everybody "deserves" a share.

Riiiiigth, because the cost of labor can't also be kept artificially low, that businesses don't externalize costs, that dynastic wealth doesn't consolidate power.

I'm all for creating your own wealth to a point, but the reality is we are better off as a country when we have a strong middle class. The concept of a free labor market is utopic.

Teddy Roosevelt said it well:

SOCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL JUSTICE TO THE WAGE-WORKERS

I especially challenge the attention of the people to the need of dealing in far-reaching fashion with our human resources, and therefore our labor power. In a century and a quarter as a nation the American people have subdued and settled the vast reaches of a continent; ahead lies the greater task of building upon this foundation, by themselves, for themselves, and with themselves, an American common wealth which in its social and economic structure shall be four square with democracy. With England striving to make good the human wreckage to which a scrapheap scheme of industrialism has relegated her, with Germany putting the painstaking resources of an Empire at the work of developing her crafts and industrial sciences, with the Far East placing in the hands of its millions the tools invented and fashioned by Western civilization, it behooves Americans to keep abreast of the great industrial changes and to show that the people themselves, through popular self-government, call meet an age of crisis with wisdom and strength.

In the last twenty years an increasing percentage of our people have come to depend on industry for their livelihood, so that today the wage-workers in industry rank in importance side by side with the tillers of the soil. As a people we cannot afford to let any group of citizens or any individual citizen live or labor under conditions which are injurious to the common welfare. Industry, therefore, must submit to such public regulation as will make it a means of life and health, not of death or inefficiency. We must protect the crushable elements at the base of our present industrial structure.

The first charge on the industrial statesmanship of the day is to prevent human waste. The dead weight of orphanage and depleted craftsmanship, of crippled workers and workers suffering from trade diseases, of casual labor, of insecure old age, and of household depletion due to industrial conditions are, like our depleted soils, our gashed mountain-sides and flooded river bottoms, so many strains upon the National structure, draining the reserve strength of all industries and showing beyond all peradventure the public element and public concern in industrial health.

Ultimately we desire to use the Government to aid, as far as can safely be done, in helping the industrial tool-users to become in part tool-owners, just as our farmers now are. Ultimately the Government may have to join more efficiently than at present in strengthening the hands of the workingmen who already stand at a high level, industrially and socially, and who are able by joint action to serve themselves. But the most pressing and immediate need is to deal with the cases of those who are on the level, and who are not only in need themselves, but, because of their need, tend to jeopardize the welfare of those who are better off. We hold that under no industrial order, in no commonwealth, in no trade, and in no establishment should industry be carried on under conditions inimical to the social welfare. The abnormal, ruthless, spendthrift industry of establishment tends to drag down all to the level of the least considerate.

Here the sovereign responsibility of the people as a whole should be placed beyond all quibble and dispute.

The public needs have been well summarized as follows:

1.We hold that the public has a right to complete knowledge of the facts of work.
2.On the basis of these facts and with the recent discoveries of physicians and neurologists, engineers and economists, the public call formulate minimum occupational standards below which, demonstrably, work can be prosecuted only at a human deficit.
3.In the third place, we hold that all industrial conditions which fall below such standards should come within the scope of governmental action and control in the same way that subnormal sanitary conditions are subject to public regulation and for the same reason--because they threaten the general welfare.
To the first end, we hold that the constituted authorities should be empowered to require all employers to file with them for public purposes such wage scales and other data as the public element in industry demands. The movement for honest weights and measures has its counterpart in industry. All tallies, scales and check systems should be open to public inspection and inspection of committees of the workers concerned. All deaths, injuries, and diseases due to industrial operation should be reported to public authorities.

To the second end, we hold that minimum wage commissions should be established in the Nation and in each State to inquire into wages paid in various industries and to determine the standard which the public ought to sanction as a minimum; and we believe that, as a present installment of what we hope for in the future, there should be at once established in the Nation and its several States minimum standards for the wages of women, taking the present Massachusetts law as a basis from which to start and on which to improve. We pledge the Federal Government to an investigation of industries along the lines pursued by the Bureau of Alines with the view to establishing standards of sanitation and safety; we call for the standardization of mine and factory inspection by interstate agreement or the establishment of a Federal standard. We stand for the passage of legislation in the Nation and in all States providing standards of compensation for industrial accidents and death, and for diseases clearly due to the nature of conditions of industry, and we stand for the adoption by law of a fair standard of compensation for casualties resulting fatally which shall clearly fix the minimum compensation in all cases.

In the third place, certain industrial conditions fall clearly below the levels which the public today sanction.

We stand for a living wage. Wages are subnormal if they fail to provide a living for those who devote their time and energy to industrial occupations. The monetary equivalent of a living wage varies according to local conditions, but must include enough to secure the elements of a normal standard of living--a standard high enough to make morality possible, to provide for education and recreation, to care for immature members of the family, to maintain the family during periods of sickness, and to permit of reasonable saving for old age.

Hours are excessive if they fail to afford the worker sufficient time to recuperate and return to his work thoroughly refreshed. We hold that the night labor of women and children is abnormal and should be prohibited; we hold that the employment of women over forty-eight hours per week is abnormal and should be prohibited. We hold that the seven day working week is abnormal, and we hold that one day of rest in seven should be provided in law. We hold that the continuous industries, operating twenty-four hours out of twenty-four, are abnormal, and where, because of public necessity or of technical reasons (such as molten metal), the twenty-four hours must be divided into two shifts of twelve hours or three shifts of eight, they should by law be divided into three of eight.

Safety conditions are abnormal when, through unguarded machinery, poisons, electrical voltage, or otherwise, the workers are subjected to unnecessary hazards of life and limb; and all such occupations should come under governmental regulation and control.

Home life is abnormal when tenement manufacture is carried on in the household. It is a serious menace to health, education, and childhood, and should therefore be entirely prohibited. Temporary construction camps are abnormal homes and should be subjected to governmental sanitary regulation.

The premature employment of children is abnormal and should be prohibited; so also the employment of women in manufacturing, commerce, or other trades where work compels standing constantly; and also any employment of women in such trades for a period of at least eight weeks at time of childbirth.

Our aim should be to secure conditions which will tend everywhere towards regular industry, and will do away with the necessity for rush periods, followed by out-of-work seasons, which put so severe a strain on wage-workers.

It is abnormal for any industry to throw back upon the community the human wreckage due to its wear and tear, and the hazzards of sickness, accident, invalidism, involuntary unemployment, and old age should be provided for through insurance. This should be made a charge in whole or in part upon the industries the employer, the employee, and perhaps the people at large, to contribute severally in some degree. Wherever such standards are not met by given establishments, by given industries, are unprovided for by a legislature, or are balked by unenlightened courts, the workers are in jeopardy, the progressive employer is penalized, and the community pays a heavy cost in lessened efficiency and in misery. What Germany has done in the way of old age pensions or insurance should be studied by us, and the system adapted to our uses, with whatever modifications are rendered necessary by our different ways of life and habits of thought.

Workingwomen have the same need to combine for protection that workingmen have; the ballot is as necessary for one class as for the other; we do not believe that with the two sexes there is identity of function; but we do believe that there should be equality of right; and therefore we favor woman suffrage. In those conservative States where there is genuine doubt how the women stand on this matter I suggest that it be referred to a vote of the women, so that they may themselves make the decision. Surely if women could vote, they would strengthen the hands of those who are endeavoring to deal in efficient fashion with evils such as the white slave traffic; evils which can in part be dealt with Nationally, but which in large part can be reached only by determined local action, such as insisting on the widespread publication of the names of the owners, the landlords, of houses used for immoral purposes.

No people are more vitally interested than workingmen and workingwomen in questions affecting the public health. The pure food law must be strengthened and efficiently enforced. In the National Government one department should be intrusted with all the agencies relating to the public health, from the enforcement of the pure food law to the administration of quarantine. This department, through its special health service, would co-operate intelligently with the various State and municipal bodies established for the same end. There would be no discrimination against or for any one set of therapeutic methods, against or for any one school of medicine or system of healing; the aim would be merely to secure under one administrative body efficient sanitary regulation in the interest of the people as a whole.

You neo-feudalists crack me up.

[Baldy]

Plain and simple:

Control.

[Skjellyfetti]

Plain and simple:

Control.

You could just as easily say "social conservatism" = "control."

They want to control a woman's reproductive system, who one can marry, whether or not a plant should be legal to posses and consume, etc.

[Baldy]

Plain and simple:

Control.

You could just as easily say "social conservatism" = "control."

They want to control a woman's reproductive system, who one can marry, whether or not a plant should be legal to posses and consume, etc.

Sorry, you're gonna have to do better than that.

Personally, I couldn't give a rats ass about abortion, gay marriage, etc....

BUT:
One of the main tenets of Conservatism is personal responsibility. The VAST majority of people who get abortions are using it as a means of birth control. If you are going to have sex, you should better be prepared for the consequences.

I love your "plant" analogy BTW, because it is so similar to the PROGRESSIVE proposed salt ban in NYC restaurants and the current law on the books in NYC that bans transfatty acids. Do you really want to compare marijuana, cocaine, and heroin (yes those come from "plants" too), to salt and trans fats?

It's not just our salt and trans fat intake that the PROGRESSIVES want to control. They just took the first step tonight in the government taking over our health care system. Don't forget that the legislation passed tonight also nationalized the student loan industry. They also want to control what we drive....hello GM an Chrysler. The same thing goes to education, universal preschool, commercial banking industry, cap and trade, card check, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc.......

[kalm]

You could just as easily say "social conservatism" = "control."

They want to control a woman's reproductive system, who one can marry, whether or not a plant should be legal to posses and consume, etc.

Sorry, you're gonna have to do better than that.

Personally, I couldn't give a rats ass about abortion, gay marriage, etc....

BUT:
One of the main tenets of Conservatism is personal responsibility. The VAST majority of people who get abortions are using it as a means of birth control. If you are going to have sex, you should better be prepared for the consequences.

I love your "plant" analogy BTW, because it is so similar to the PROGRESSIVE proposed salt ban in NYC restaurants and the current law on the books in NYC that bans transfatty acids. Do you really want to compare marijuana, cocaine, and heroin (yes those come from "plants" too), to salt and trans fats?

It's not just our salt and trans fat intake that the PROGRESSIVES want to control. They just took the first step tonight in the government taking over our health care system. Don't forget that the legislation passed tonight also nationalized the student loan industry. They also want to control what we drive....hello GM an Chrysler. The same thing goes to education, universal preschool, commercial banking industry, cap and trade, card check, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc.......

And corporatism doesn't seek control? You're painting with a rather broad brush. There are many progressives that have a libertarian streak as well.

[Baldy]

Sorry, you're gonna have to do better than that.

Personally, I couldn't give a rats ass about abortion, gay marriage, etc....

BUT:
One of the main tenets of Conservatism is personal responsibility. The VAST majority of people who get abortions are using it as a means of birth control. If you are going to have sex, you should better be prepared for the consequences.

I love your "plant" analogy BTW, because it is so similar to the PROGRESSIVE proposed salt ban in NYC restaurants and the current law on the books in NYC that bans transfatty acids. Do you really want to compare marijuana, cocaine, and heroin (yes those come from "plants" too), to salt and trans fats?

It's not just our salt and trans fat intake that the PROGRESSIVES want to control. They just took the first step tonight in the government taking over our health care system. Don't forget that the legislation passed tonight also nationalized the student loan industry. They also want to control what we drive....hello GM an Chrysler. The same thing goes to education, universal preschool, commercial banking industry, cap and trade, card check, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc.......

And corporatism doesn't seek control? You're painting with a rather broad brush. There are many progressives that have a libertarian streak as well.

Sorry you don't like my brush, but the fact is that the Obama Administration is the engineer driving the "Progressive" train off the cliff. They are running the show, please brighten my day and name me one "progressive" on Obama's team who has even a hint of a libertarian streak in them.

I won't hold my breath.