i am not a 'liberal'
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several people on this website have implied that i am a 'liberal' whatever that means. i want to set the record straight once and for all. i am not a 'liberal'
'liberalism', as defined by Encarta, is
Liberalism, attitude, philosophy, or movement that has as its basic concern the development of personal freedom and social progress. Liberalism and democracy are now usually thought to have common aims, but in the past many liberals considered democracy unhealthy because it encouraged mass participation in politics. Nevertheless, liberalism eventually became identified with movements to change the social order through the further extension of by social change is conceived of as gradual, flexible, and adaptive, and radicalism, in which social change is seen as fundamental and based on new principles of authority.
The course of liberalism in a given country is usually conditioned by the character of the prevailing form of government. For example, in countries in which the political and religious authorities are separate, liberalism connotes, mainly, political, economic, and social reform; in countries in which a state church exists or a church is politically influential, liberalism connotes, mainly, anticlericalism. In domestic politics, liberals have opposed feudal restraints that prevent the individual from rising out of a low social status; barriers such as censorship that limit free expression of opinion; and arbitrary power exercised over the individual by the state. In international politics, liberals have opposed the domination of foreign policy by militarists and military considerations and the exploitation of native colonial people, and they have sought to substitute a cosmopolitan policy of international cooperation. In economics, liberals have attacked monopolies and mercantilist state policies that subject the economy to state control. In religion, liberals have fought against church interference in the affairs of the state and attempts by religious pressure groups to influence public opinion.
A distinction is sometimes made between so-called negative liberalism and positive liberalism. Between the mid-17th and the mid-19th centuries, liberals fought chiefly against oppression, arbitrariness, and misuses of power and emphasized the needs of the free individual. About the middle of the 19th century many liberals developed a more positive program stressing the constructive social activity of the state and advocating state action in the interests of the individual. The present-day defenders of the older liberal policies deplore this departure and argue that positive liberalism is merely authoritarianism in disguise. The defenders of positive liberalism argue that state and church are not the only obstructors of freedom, but that poverty may deprive the individual of the possibility of making significant choices and must therefore be controlled by constituted authority.
this definition of 'liberalism' is not, i think, the definition of 'liberal' that people who are far from 'liberal' mean when they say, 'liberal'. so what do they mean, anyway? i have researched the Cato Institute, the Heritage Foundation, Rush Limbaugh's website, and several other like-minded websites and have come up with much information, such as:
Marketplace of Ideas Would Free Universities from Liberal TyrannyNovember 2, 2004 by Edwin J. Fuelner, PhD (from The Heritage Foundation)
...Liberals, on the other hand, don
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