Why Do Democrats Want Power?
Thu Feb 24, 2005 at 12:51:54 AM PDT
It seems that there are quite a few people bemoaning how Republicans, both nationally and in states such as
Indiana and
Missouri are "doing damage that may never be repaired". However, to listen to some people, we would think that the one reason to elect Democrats to office is so the Republicans won't be in office. This was the basic philosophy behind "Anybody But Bush" - the main qualification for being President was simply not being George W. Bush.
Since the Democrats don't define what they would do in office, only what they wouldn't do, they leave the Republicans to define them. And the Republicans have risen to the bait, claiming Democrats want power in order to make you less safe, raise your taxes, kill your babies, take your bibles, and force you to have gay sex.
My question is simple: Why do Democrats want power?
The main difference between "social liberals" and "social conservatives", IMO, is that social liberals feel that that the power of government should be used to help those among us who are less fortunate; who have by no fault of their own been put into a hopeless situation; who can and will succeed on their own but need help getting started. Social conservatives, on the other hand, feel that the power of government should be used to improve the nations morality.
However, there is far more to the equation to that. Another dimension is (to borrow terms from Imre Lakatos) "progressive v. degenerative". "Progressive" politicians tend to have new plans that they are trying to enact, while "degenerative" politicians try to maintain the status quo and prevent any changes.
A third dimension is the "how much power should government have" dimension. Libertarians are on the low end of this dimension, and totalitarians and fascists are on the high-end. However, there is nothing particularly partisan about this. We can have totalitarian states that try to help the less fortunate (Communism, at least originally), or that try to promote a moral society (Nazism, by it's twisted definition of morality). I believe that the main problem most liberals have with the Bush Administration isn't the fact that it is promoting "faith-based charities", it's the fact that it has decided that the government can invade Iraq because "Sadaam Hussein was bad", and can torture terrorists because they are evil and we need to do anything we can to stop them.
One of the greatest triumphs of the conservative movement was to identify "progressive" plans for change with "liberal" ideology. Thus, any "progressive" plans to expand the conservative agenda ironically are more "moderate" than the original plans. And "liberals" wishing to become more "moderate" do so by attempting to suggest as few new ideas as possible. Ironically, the conservatives have become "progressive" and the liberals have become "degenerate".
More specifically, "social conservatives" are now the ones who are coming up with new, different ways to promote their policies. "Social liberals" are mostly simply attempting to protect their progress of the past 150 years, and not really attempting to push any new ideas.
Where are the new "socially liberal" ideas? What are we still fighting for? Gay rights would fall in this category, but a good portion of the "socially liberal" part of America still does not support gay rights. But what are we proposing to help the blue-collar family struggling to make ends meet? What are we proposing to help the homeless alcoholic? What are we proposing to help small businesses dying to predatory practices by large corporations? What are we proposing to help the family farmer? What are we proposing to help the laborer in Thailand making our clothing? What are we proposing to help the first-year divinity student working part-time at McDonalds to pay tuition?
If magically the Democrats were to suddenly be in power, what would they do to use the power of government to help Americans who have been put in bad situations so they can succeed?
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