"Possessives." 8^) I like that.

Posted at May 19, 2008 10:25 PM in response to Where Does American Liberalism Stand Today?

Another example.

The KKK call themselves Christian. I'm an African-American, but I also self-describe as a fundamentalist evangelical charismatic Christian.

Should I not use the label "Christian" because the KKK used it?

Moreover, the terms fundamentalist, evangelical, and charismatic means different things to me than one might imagine.

Take evangelical as an example. The evangel, "good news," that Jesus spoke of was help for the poor. That's not how it's used these days. Instead, the meaning I used is called - get this - the "social" Gospel. Yes, as in "socialism."

I have graduate training in mathematical logic, kozmik, and I would suggest that there are two characteristics of a system of logic: consistency and completeness. Completeness is difficult to explain, but consistency is easier - it's effectively freedom from contradictions within a system.

I use and prefer meanings from a logical framework; I don't like blatant inconsistency; it interferes with my ability to use my short-term working memory (look up 7 +/-2). On that level, I could really care less what people think about the baggage of the terms I use, especially if the baggage doesn't apply to how I use them.

But then, I have Asperger's syndrome, like many in my industry.

Posted at May 19, 2008 9:47 PM in response to Where Does American Liberalism Stand Today?

OK, I'll bite, and not leave just yet.

You used the word "simplistic" to describe your use of the term "progressive," so let me give you simplistic.

Capitalism is motivation by or preference for capital, i.e., profit.

Socialism is motivation by societal benefit, e.g., "promote the general welfare."

I call myself socialist not because of how other people use the terms, or their "baggage." I use words to help me think. The simpler and more direct the terms, the more complex the ideas I can squeeze into my tiny brain (which managed to earn a technical Ph.D.).

Intellectuals in most technical terms do this - they favor the simplest available terms, making them up if or when they need to (acronyms, portmanteaus and the like). The issue isn't simply political acceptance; it's first about clarity of thought and expressiveness of language.

"Liberal" and "conservative" have simplistic meanings too. Liberal means favoring much; conservative means favoring little or opposing change. I think, frankly, most people understand the terms more in this simplistic frame than in the convoluted senses intellectuals use them.

I don't really care if you think I'm moronic, kozmik. I care if I think I am.

Posted at May 19, 2008 9:34 PM in response to Where Does American Liberalism Stand Today?

Funny joke. Forgive me for not laughing.

You've again made my point about discussion being cut off by dismissive labelling.

I'm not kidding around here, kozmik. But I'll consider this discussion over, per your implicit request.

C ya.

Posted at May 19, 2008 9:25 PM in response to Where Does American Liberalism Stand Today?

kozmik doesn't think I'm a real socialist Dan, so maybe this will help. I'm not a fan of minimum wage laws, at least not in isolation; I consider them a bandage on failed capitalist environments. Instead, I would prefer something more like the single-payer idea for health care, e.g., direct payment to lower-skilled workers from a public pool.

Surely in the past this kind of thing presented Mises' economic calculation dilemma, but that kind of problem no longer exists, I would suggest. Payrolls are pretty much handled by an oligopoly of software/service firms these days - some of them advertise on TV.

My real push, my pie in the sky ideal, would be full publicly financed employment and ownership within a market framework. Maybe that makes me a fruitcake. But unfettered free market capitalism is no less pie in the sky.

The problem in many areas, not just health care, is not markets - markets are effective as mechanism. The problem is poorly distributed private ownership. I don't want to throw the baby of markets out with the bathwater of exclusively private ownership - I just want to reintroduce a reasonable measure of public ownership back into the market environment, and mostly for those institutions with influence on the scale of govermment anyway.

And eminent domain is a constitutional mechanism. The founders, I think, envisioned it as a part of the collective system of checks and balances they established. We just need to understand how it could be used in that way.

Otherwise, I have heard any better ideas.

Posted at May 19, 2008 9:12 PM in response to Where Does American Liberalism Stand Today?

No, kozmik, I'm really a socialist, and you're making my point.

If we were only discussing ideas and not labels, you'd call me a socialist. But I don't mind - I call myself that. One doesn't have to be an extreme case to warrant the label, especially if it's self-imposed.

Let me use race as an example.

Is Barack Obama a white man? If not, why not? His mother is white, and she and her white family raised him, not his absent black father. But even he doesn't try to call himself white.

I met Alex Haley once upon a time, and he in the Autobiography of Malcolm X (which he did before Roots), he noted that a person with only a few drops of ancestral black blood would be labelled as black, even if they had no physical manifestations of being anything but white. I have relatives like that, and have had others who have spent their lives trying to "pass for white."

People who call themselves capitalists claim the middle ground if they think it's in their favor to do so; they reject it otherwise and call it socialism. It doesn't seem to matter that "real capitalism" hasn't existed anymore than has "real socialism."

I'm reclaiming that middle ground. The definition of socialism doesn't preclude market economies, and the definitions of capitalism, socialism, and communism are all about ownership - motivation, not mechanisms like markets or states.

I'm really a socialist. And I have been for a really long time.

Posted at May 19, 2008 8:54 PM in response to Where Does American Liberalism Stand Today?

Andrew, that's not true racism, I can tell you from firsthand experience.

But I don't think it matters much anymore.

As an older African-American with a technical Ph.D., it doesn't matter to me if I get laid off first because I'm black, or because I'm older, or because I'm "more expensive" than an a college intern who may not only get paid less, but whose college may be paying for them to do the work that I would get paid to do. It's all the same to me.

I think capitalism is a greater evil than racism, truth be told. Capitalists use racism as an excuse to disadvantage people, just like they use age and educational experience against people. But the problem is not an individual's problem; I don't blame companies who think they have to offer me a certain income and then find they can't afford to pay it. I blame the system that puts them in that position, without any alternative for people like me.

I've spent all but 10 months of the last 8 years without income. This is not hypothetical for me. This is not a liberal complaining about things that don't affect him - I'm not a liberal in either the American or European sense, I'm a socialist.

Posted at May 19, 2008 8:41 PM in response to Where Does American Liberalism Stand Today?

kozmik.

Honest attempts to discuss real ideas about issues that might be labelled as socialist ideas, get dismissed without intellectual consideration in the US, simply with the response, "that's socialism." End of discussion.

So those ideas don't get discussed at all; indeed, there's little evidence they get thought of much at all.

I understand why the ideas get dismissed without discussion. I just don't like it at all, and I think it's counterproductive.

I don't buy "road to serfdom" presumptions that are taken up without being spoken. I can argue against such presumptions, but I'm not given that opportunity.

If real issues are discussed anywhere in the US (I have my doubts), there's a sign on the door that says "socialists not welcome."

So let me through the door and then listen to what I have to say about real issues, before you dismiss me for not talking about real issues.

Posted at May 19, 2008 8:12 PM in response to Where Does American Liberalism Stand Today?

I would note (this gets off topic) that it's too late to avoid monopoly here; we need ways to reverse it.

I've been proposing the use of eminent domain, to convert private monopolies first into public institutions, and then dealing with them case-by-case democratically. I would have no problem, for example, with distribution of monopolies of the sort that was applied to AT&T.

But the breakup of AT&T, and the failed attempts to breakup IBM and Microsoft (in my industry) didn't require prolonged, expensive court cases. Eminent domain would have worked just as well.

Haven't read the link; thanks for the tip.

Posted at May 19, 2008 7:58 PM in response to Where Does American Liberalism Stand Today?

Thank you for this, FreeBubba.

I didn't know about Henry George, but I'll certainly be researching him.

Socialists don't all have to agree about everything, just as Democrats don't. But avoiding the label has us avoiding even the ideas the label appropriately represents. I find that tragic, especially now, when socialist ideas may hold the only workable solutions to the messes we've gotten ourselves into.

Posted at May 19, 2008 7:50 PM in response to Where Does American Liberalism Stand Today?