I haven't seen the part of the liberal definition that squares up how people who are "open to new ideas", "tolerant of the ideas and behavior of others" and "broad-minded" could be so down on Tea Party people. Did they happen to explain that part to their son?
Perhaps a more appropriate definition of the type of "liberal" whose words I read daily on this site might be, "tolerant of the ideas and behaviors of others as long as those ideas and behaviors are exactly like theirs". Or maybe, "broad-minded except in the case of conservative thought".
I'm still trying to square the accepted definition of "liberal" I read in dictionaries with how the "liberal-minded" people on this site react to the "new ideas" or the "behaviors of others". Something doesn't match up. Or am I missing something here?
lionshead2010 wrote: Perhaps a more appropriate definition of the type of "liberal" whose words I read daily on this site might be, "tolerant of the ideas and behaviors of others as long as those ideas and behaviors are exactly like theirs".
That shoe fits nicely on both the left AND the right feet. Funny you should mention only the left.
What your definition of liberal is missing is that liberals are fiercely patriotic and will speak out against and work to defeat anyone who threatens this country...and that includes conservatives.
Isn't it interesting how the conservatives think they "own" the word(s) "patriot"/"patriotic"...
I consider myself pretty patriotic...and that includes protecting the country from the right-wingers, nutjobs, and neo-cons; and supporting the troops by bring them home from unnecessary wars.
archer wrote: What your definition of liberal is missing is that liberals are fiercely patriotic and will speak out against and work to defeat anyone who threatens this country...and that includes conservatives.
Some liberals are patriotic but others I know are embarrassed by the 200 year plus history of this republic.
Thomas Sowell: There are no solutions, just trade-offs.
Republicans Abandon ‘Government Doesn’t Create Jobs’ Mantra In Fight To Preserve Military Spending
Defense industry-backed Republicans are so desperate to stave off the automatic military spending cuts that they’re trying to scare Americans about job losses and an ensuing nose-diving economy should the military spending cuts hold.
Except there’s one problem. Republicans aren’t supposed to believe that government spending creates jobs. But in this last act of desperation, however, it seems that Republicans pushing to preserve America’s bloated military budget have come to a pretty significant epiphany. Next week, three right-wing think tanks will co-host Sens. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) and Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) and Reps. Howard “Buck” McKeon (R-CA) and Randy Forbers (R-VA) to “discuss the dangers of deeper defense cuts.” All four lawmakers are warning about job loss because of sequestration, yet they’ve all previously argued that government spending doesn’t create jobs:
Everyone has heard the statement, “Government does not create jobs.” This phrase is patently false. Instead, government has directly or indirectly created more than 90 percent of all jobs in Las Vegas.
Government created Hoover Dam, Interstate 15 and McCarran International Airport. Does any rational person really believe the MGM, Mirage or Venetian hotels are responsible for more jobs than these three government projects? Lake Mead supplies 90 percent of the water used in Las Vegas. Would these hotels have been built without the water source?
Furthermore, government creates more than 80 percent of all professional jobs via public institutions like the College of Southern Nevada and UNLV. The private sector seldom creates engineers, nurses, historians and dozens of other professionals.
The extreme anti-government statement even has a false premise. It is like saying Venus, air and dirt do not create jobs. It is not the function of street cleaners, postal workers, librarians and dozens of other professions to create jobs. It is more accurate to say the function of government is to create needed public services.
Government similarly creates such employment in all 50 states. It is impossible to have a modern nation without a wide array of government jobs. Places without a multitude of government jobs have names like Ethiopia and the Amazon jungle.
Statements like, “Government does not create jobs,” should be subject to elementary scrutiny.
How ironic is it that Jamie Boles and Harris Blake just voted to slash spending for the public schools that gave them both their starts?
Cops — federal, state and local — are part of their economies, even when they’re not doing their jobs, which protect commerce. When the state builds roads, it takes bids from private contractors, creating jobs in the private sector. It then maintains those roads, facilitating commerce that in turn creates jobs. Of all the absurdities promulgated by the right, the idea that governments do not and cannot create meaningful jobs has to be the most ludicrous.
First, according to USA Today, our taxation for 2010 was the lowest in 60 years. By the reader’s reasoning, we should be in the mother of all bull markets.
Second, when governments cut spending, they cut jobs — jobs that the private sector will not make up in a stagnant economy. There is a false equivalency among some conservatives that says cutting public sector jobs creates private sector jobs. It just doesn’t work that way.
Third, everybody hates regulations until a Lehman Brothers collapses or a Deepwater Horizon Explodes. How many jobs did those private sector ventures add to the economy in 2008 and 2010? There is such a thing as too much red tape, but corporations need government regulation because they will not regulate themselves. Free markets exist to reward shareholders. There’s nothing altruistic about them.
Last, the certainty that the private sector needs, at least the small businesses that keep jobs in this country, is people — working people — coming through their doors.
Tax cuts, the right believes, produce rapid economic growth. Economic growth, maybe, but not for everyone.
Non-farm labor compensation has decreased almost 8 percent since the implementation of the Bush tax cuts (about half of that since the recession), according to economist Mark Thoma, even as we added another $2.6 trillion to the deficit.
Since 1979, the percentage of wealth accumulated by the top 1 percent of wage earners has increased 130 percent, almost 30 percent for the top 20 percent of wage earners. For the second 20 percent and below, wealth has declined.
I could keep posting articles that explain the fact that government DOES create jobs all day long. It will fall on deaf ears. Or it will be deflected as "stuff that could be better done by the private sector", or "stuff that IS done by the so-called private-sector, under contract to private contractors"... I really don't care... The bottom line is that the statement "The government doesn't create jobs" is a right-wing lie / talking-point that is sinking under its own weight. Even the GOTP is having to abandon it in the name of political expediency: "Republicans Abandon ‘Government Doesn’t Create Jobs’ Mantra In Fight To Preserve Military Spending"
There... And you're right... I DON'T care if others understand or agree. I'm not going to convince anyone on the Right to change their vote; and no one on the Right is going convince me to change mine.
I see the GOTP and Romney/Ryan as the biggest threat to this nation since Richard Nixon defiled the presidency and resigned.
