This is a messy topic folks. The Progressive Movement was a jumbled mess of ideas taken from many more classic political systems. Progressives could never agree on what Progressivism actually was, who was a genuine Progressive and who was not, and any firm planks in their platform. They never jelled as a political party, but instead became a philosophy with no guiding leaders. They exist, but like the venerable “independent” there is a murkiness to who these people are and what they are actually all about.
While many Progressive tenets are very freedom oriented, some of them are exactly the opposite. Due to the vastness of the topic I will suspend my normal manner of editorial presentation and list some Progressive tenets, as the AC format does not lend itself to a comprehensive review.
Progressivism believes government should evolve as society does. For me this is problematic because as we can clearly see, a loud minority can create the impression that a majority of people desire something. For example, all the gay marriage rancor, and despite what its proponents will publicly argue, 72% of those polled in the entire nation are against gay marriage.
Based on all the gay marriage noise made, only a minority actually favor it, but based on the reporting of most media, one would never know that. As well the proponents of gay marriage misrepresent the truth. They argue only a hater is against it when clearly the statistical evidence does not back their play.
In short progressive beliefs argue for shifting standards depending upon the morals of the society as of this moment. As well, such a position is tacit embrasure of any future societal shifts. Essentially this translates to no firm and hard standards. Is it just me or does this sound like a recipe for disaster?
Progressivism is all about a dislike of corporate America and a need for government to control commerce. Progressives love regulation like a hungry dog likes a pork chop – ummmm . . . good eats! Progressives basically believe that Man is flawed and the need for social, economic and political justice AS DETERMINED BY THEM, should override any natural order. With that in mind they demand corporatism must be controlled and is generally frowned upon. And listening to these folks opine, indeed they do not like anything corporate, except of course GE.
Progressives are all about Big Government! Government is their chosen tool for making society comport to what the movement desires. The inner-city blight of the poor is a direct result of Progressives, as is their belief that there must be a dedicated class of social workers within government to watch out for us because we cannot be trusted to look out for ourselves. It was the Progressives that favored Prohibition, and that led to black markets and organized crime. Thanks, big thinkers!
They are hugely in favor of organized labor. We see this proven out in the Detroit unions getting a bigger per dollar payout than did the secured creditors to the car companies. What a Progressive crock.
They demand social justice, whatever that is and however that can be legitimately and quantifiably measured.
They scream for reform of nearly everything, as if the US were the wart on the face of an otherwise beautiful Humanity. The reality is Progressives were the first to embrace and weave into their platforms, such as they are, Marxism and all that delightful philosophy entails.
Most every tenet of the current “non-traditionalist” movement in the US as we see it manifest today is a Progressive initiative. And Progressivism does encapsulate many Marxist concepts, ipso facto, these people are Marxist Lite. That means they are at least Socialists, and that’s just me being kind. If I wanted to spend my days arguing the point, and I do not, I could accurately and fairly make stick more pejorative nomenclature.
And to sum up the general philosophy of Progressivism, it is a “political movement that addresses ideas, impulses, and issues stemming from modernization of American society. Emerging at the end of the nineteenth century, it established much of the tone of American politics throughout the first half of the century.”(Wikipedia) (my emphasis)
Clearly a great deal of the mess we enjoy today is a result of Progressive involvement in formerly efficient systems and the resulting clusterf&$% as the Progressive mindset has entrenched itself in this unholy amalgam of government and big thinkers. Instead of the accepted axiom, “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” these people live by the axiom “What, no Progressive thought went into “X”? Well, we need to rectify that post-haste.” And WHAMO! We have a big mess on our hands.
As I stated this is a vast topic and the AC format does not lend well to a complete presentation. I have Jonah Goldberg’s “Liberal Fascism” next in the pile of books to read, and I will offer “progress reports” as I read that book which very exhaustively looks into Progressivism as we know it today. Believe me, what I have offered herein is not even the tip of the iceberg. I just wanted to give folks a “heads up” as to what it means when one claims, as did Hillary during the campaign, “I am an American Progressive.” (paraphrase)
Only to a Left partisan or an uninformed fool is her proud proclamation anything to write home about. For us common sense folks this is a most definite shoving of a stout stick between the spokes of our moving bicycles’ wheels, no?
SOURCES: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_progressivism
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Thought/fp12.cfm
