Hi! I'm a progressive.

I like that better than Democrat -which, as we have discussed, I am not really - or liberal which I am, but which is primarily, I think, social & intellectual in its application rather than political.  

I think government is useful to regulate and support human endeavor and human society and while I am not at all anti-business, I am opposed to unchecked free markets because people are greedy and short-sighted in fairly predictable ways over the long term and free markets are a pretty accurate reflection of this.

I'm not good at arguing though - I haven't enough historical fact at my finger tips and I tend to get mad and froth at the mouth and frown stubbornly over the underlying ethics of policy, without necessarily having an ability to turn my thoughts and feelings into words (I know the difference between single payer and socialized health-care, but I can't always express it under pressure, for example).

I had dinner with friends Saturday, spent the evening arguing - in a friendly way - with M.  While he says he is a Republican, I would say he is in fact a free market conservative of the old school, rather than a modern Republican (I keep waiting for him to notice his party has abandoned him).  We agree about nothing, but I think in a respectful way.  It was fun.

I thought I would share some of the things I have been reading that left me saying - Dammit, THAT'S what I MEANT - since then. 

Jon Carroll on Rachel Maddow:  My love is not quite so true, but I do appreciate her for saying things with humor and impeccable calm and well informed decency. 

Obsidian Wings (a fantastic site) on the role of progressive politics in creating a society we can enjoy living in.  

Shakesville on misogyny and the Pennsylvania gym murders:  If I read one more thing that paints the shooter as having been victimized by sexual rejection I will spit upon who said it.  I expect he had trouble getting dates because he was exactly the kind of psychiatrically ill person who would say, commit murder to make a point, and was creepy as fuck.  Blaming the 30 million women (right) who turned him down is just another way of avoiding taking responsibility for his own life and actions; women are not to blame any more than the Easter Bunny was.  Feministing on the same.

Shakesville on the media complicity in breeding poorly informed hysteria about health care change:  WORD

Lance Mannion on civility and disagreement:  follow the links if you have time.

FiveThirtyEight.com on the conservative/liberal political distribution in the US, kind of fascinating.

I am noticing that Paul Krugman is a recurring theme in all of this.  Excuse me while I go follow his blog.

Shakesville on the potential for fascism in the US.  For the record, I find this extreme, but it's very interesting, and an idea worth incorporating into your mental filter.

Ta-Nahesi Coates - who may just be my favorite blogger of all time - on the intersection of fear/racism/misogyny that drives explosions of violent resistance to change.

We do live in interesting times.

Comments

[marylou]

Thanks for these thoughts and links. And this morning, I see that a number of Catholic Bishops are speaking out against health care reform.....silent screaming.....

[Kym]

Another chorus member. . . Mucho thanks for the links and info. :-)

[Norma]

Hi, I don't know WHAT I am in the political realm, and feel at a horrible loss to defend any of my thoughts/positions. At least you have narrowed it down to a word to describe yourself, so you are a bit closer to being able to articulate it. Thanks for the reading links. Maybe I can figure out what I am if I find the time to read them. Heh.

[Stash Haus]

Thanks for the lists. Another reminder that I need to read Paul Krugman's blog.

And I'm assuming you know that is an ancient Chinese curse - may you live in interesting times. (At least, according to my MIL who spent the first 12 years of her life in China.)

[Jocelyn]

Thanks so much for all of these links -- I'll be looking at them carefully over the next couple of days, goodness knows I can use a sense of community in outrage out here. Sometimes I think it's just me...

[ellen]

I'm foamy too, and will check out the links you have so kindly shared. I work in an office with about 300 people and (maybe) 5 of us are even registered Democrats, let alone progressives. There is a lot of head/desk action going on.

[Jackie]

I think there are a lot of free markets conservatives of the old school who either don't know the party has deserted them / don't know where else to turn even though they're disillusioned by the Republican party... I know that I and most of my family falls in this bucket.

(Please note, my politics are more ideal that practical. I believe in a lot of SHOULDS that don't exist. I know it.)

[Nic]

I have just put this post into a read me file. There is so much here to take in and review, that I want to do it when I can spend the time on doing it justice. Because different country, same sort of issues.

[Chandler]

Thank you for these—I too tend to be a foam-at-the-mouth-before-I-get-a-chance-to-articulate-any-facts types. My mother-in-law is very anti-health care reform (ironic, considering she's a retired nurse), and loves to repeat the fear-mongering meme of "Socialism! It's coming to get us! Socialismmmmmmm!" And then I love to remind her of the socialist highway she drove on, on her way to return her socialist library book, next door to the socialist public school from which her sons graduated. Oh, and that next year she's going to start drawing....wait for it...social security and Medicare! Yes!

Argh. Head-desk. See with the foaming? I need some ice in my veins, pronto.

Oh, and the misogyny thing? Again: head-desk. Sigh.

[JoVE]

Since Mel brought up shouting down vs. civil discourse, I thought maybe some folks would enjoy this: http://chriscorrigan.com/parkinglot/?p=2260 entitled "What we can learn from disrupted meetings?"

[evalyn]

Juno, you never fail me. Thanks for your concise, organized, spot-on putting-together-of-scattered-ideas.

[Mel]

At the risk of invoking Godwin's Law, I'd say the Shakesville article on fascism isn't that far off, which is worrisome. The trend, particularly on the Right, has been away from civil discourse and toward angry shouting-down of dissent. It doesn't bode well.

[Katie]

I took a media class a couple years ago and the professor showed us a few documentaries about how women are portrayed in the media. It was very disturbing and showed to me how women are brainwashed to believe the same things about women that many men believe.(not all)I don't think I can ever watch an Aerosmith (or many other artists) video again. They all objectify women because it's the men controlling the content.

[charli]

I often dub myself progressive as well, but I thought you should know, just as a factoid, that the conservatives of the democratic party started using that during the Reagan years as a term to distance themselves from the "liberal" or what you mean by "progressive" folks in the party. Bill Clinton and Al Gore were part of that more conservative Democratic party thing. (Remember in the '80s when Tipper wanted to ban rap music...)

[Bakerina]

I love you so freaking much. Thank you.

Thanks in particular to the link to Shakesville about the gym murders in Bridgeville. I am pissed off, but not surprised, to find that the article that opens with "George Sodini couldn't find love..." comes from the vile rag known as the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. Once again, I think about how far we have *not* come in 20 years. When I was in college in Pittsburgh in the 1980s, one phenomenon to which I became sensitized was of the woeful state of news reporting on domestic violence. Specifically: Couple is divorced. Ex-husband stalks his ex-wife. Ex-wife continually goes to court for protections ex-husband manages to skirt. Ex-wife begins dating again. Ex-husband shows up at her apartment, shoots her and her date to death, then turns the gun on himself. Headline in newspapers the next morning: "Three dead in love triangle murder-suicide."

Ah, well. Maybe in another fifty years we'll get it figured out.

[Lynn in Tucson]

Where's the "like" button?

[kmkat]

Hi, I'm a progressive, too. You summarized my thoughts (and frequent inability to express and defend them) perfectly.