I was born into a heavily Democratic family, but I was born into a Catholic family as well, and that didn't stick.
I was born into a heavily Democratic family, but I was born into a family with a pile of books, and while the occasional ancient tome rubs me the right way, I could do with a house without books so long as I had access to them online, so that didn't really stick.
I was born into a heavily Democratic family, but I was born into an intellectually elitist family, and my friend who has her GED and my friend who couldn't properly use a semicolon until she was 55 know at least as much of use as any professor I had in college, so that totally didn't stick.
I am a liberal because the Catholic in me, lo even (yea verily) these many years later, hates the idea that anyone should have to have an abortion because money or social acceptance or health care or any other controllable factor is too great a burden. If we as people want to talk about protecting life, we should take care to think about something other than the delivery. The Catholic in me will die believing that caring for people starts at implantation, and the biologist in me is far less concerned with personhood than with the health of productive life regardless of how many genes it has or what they do. I hate the idea of abortion, but I loathe the idea of a child growing up knowing she wasn't wanted, that she was and is a burden, that she's the reason the family can't have nice things. I hate the idea of the necessity of abortion, but I loathe the idea of a child whose growth is stunted because he didn't get enough to eat. I hate the idea of anyone not wanting a pregnancy, but I find my soul slowly crushed by the idea that we have all this wealth and we have women despairing because they don't have the support they need to carry pregnancies to term.
I am a liberal because I grew up with information as a default. I slept inches from a Latin-English dictionary thicker than the 20-year-old English dictionaries the public schools put in classrooms. Today, I do English for a living, I could do French for a living, I can figure out what the average Spanish sentence says and I can do calculus — and it doesn't take two decades of private school to get to where I've gotten intellectually. It takes two decades of good schools. Public, private, home, charter, whatever. Give your kids a good education and you will spend the rest of your life learning from them because they will never stop finding stuff out.
I am a liberal because while I am in the 95th or 99th percentile in terms of global education (and if you have a four-year degree, you're right up there with me), I want to be smarter, I want my friends to be smart, and I want my enemies to be smart -- if your enemies are dumb, you're going to languish. And you get smart by listening and reading and speaking and sometimes being wrong, but not -- absolutely not, not ever, at all -- being afraid of being wrong because how the hell else are you going to figure out what's right?
I am a liberal because I like arguing. It's fun. (It's not so much fun for the wife or my mother.) I learn. I adapt. I change. I wonder how I didn't know this or that. I make fun of people for not knowing about obvious stuff like the Great Vowel Shift.
I am a liberal because "to form a more perfect union" is a journey, not a destination; because promoting the general welfare gets forgotten too often; and because Susan B. Anthony's scholarship -- "It was we, the people; not we, the white male citizens; nor yet we, the male citizens; but we, the whole people, who formed the Union." -- is as learned as any you'll find in the halls of Congress, sitting on the Supreme Court, teaching law at Harvard or Yale or Wellesley or anywhere else. We, the people. All of us. Deny any of us and we become less and fewer at once. It is on us -- we, the people -- to be forever seeking out that more perfect union.
I am a liberal because Clinton wasn't perfect, and Eisenhower (pursued by both parties) before him, and Truman was far from it, and FDR did many wonderful things and let one giant horrible thing keep on keeping on, and TR wasn't the second coming of Jesus, and Lincoln was not a saint, and Washington and Jefferson and the rest of that crew had property that spoke English, and not because it was Mr. Ed. Our history is full of people who did great things and horrible things, and we only know we're closer to that more perfect union when we look at the imperfections of old.
I am a liberal because I was born into a family where everyone was straight, except 28 years later, hello, I have a bisexual aunt, a gay cousin (once removed or something) and my own half-fabulous self, and not a single person in my family who knows has a problem with the gay cousin or the half-fabulous brother/cousin/nephew/whatever. (The aunt is mostly not out to people, and that's her business.) Are they universally thrilled with the demographic? No, but then, sometimes their mothers dress them funny, and I don't complain.
I am a liberal because when my grandfather gave this country 30 years of his life and asked his wife to do the same and they dragged their kids along, they got what was owed them. Thirty years or three years, it shouldn't matter. You take a bullet for me, you bloody well ought to get benefits I don't get. Raise my taxes to pay for them. Fine by me. If you are willing to go risk getting shot, you damn well deserve to be put back together in one piece once you get back. Anything else insults both of us.
I am a liberal because we bomb terrorists at night and millions of American kids wake up the next morning and they're hungry and cold, and the only good meal they're going to get is at school. I've been to that school. First period is 15 minutes longer'n the rest of the periods so the kids can eat. For 15 minutes. Anyone here ever get full in 15 minutes? Me neither.
I am a liberal because Joe Biden talks about the dignity of work and my father talks about doing a proper job, and they're different words for the same thing: You do what you do, you do your best, and you get paid fairly for it.
I am a liberal because my mother raised me to be not a feminist but gender blind. I can't get pregnant, the wife can't make sperm, and that's the extent of our reasonable physical limitations. My boss is a woman, two of my fellow editors are women and our assistant sports editor is a woman. I am reminded of that when I look at them or hear them speak, but not when I see the result of their work.
I am a liberal because Ted Kennedy was my senator too.
I am a liberal because when roads and bridges and highways and national parks and public benches and 911 and EMS and social workers and public schools and libraries and sewer systems and lighthouses and health care and national defense work as they should, I get to focus on doing what I do best, and so does everyone else. You want me doing what I do best, and I want the same from you.
I am a liberal because I enjoy paying taxes for things like roads and bridges and social workers and district attorneys and all of that stuff. I like knowing the streets are safe and that kids in the foster care system are being treated properly. All of that stuff makes this country stronger. Public goods are good for the public.
I am a liberal because even as an atheist, I couldn't help but shed a tear when presidential candidate John McCain talked about seeing the hand of God when he visited the Grand Canyon. We're going to disagree. We're going to disagree on fundamentals. I see no God with every bit of sincerity that you see God or gods or whatever else. But we can see the beauty in life, share it, even as we disagree on the cause.
I am a liberal because I don't care, to the point where I don't want to know, what you do when your curtains are drawn. And what I do becomes your business when I tell you or when I break the law.
I am a liberal because finding another way to the Orient became Lewis and Clark became the transcontinental railroad became flight became beating the Nazis became putting a man on the moon became going to Mars and landing on an asteroid (probably not in the same trip). And still we don't know where life came from, but in science, keep your eyes open during the journey and you'll find so much more than the destination.
I am a liberal because if the wind is going to keep blowing all the hell over the place, we might as well use it, and if the sun's going to heat the pavement around here to 110 degrees, we might as well use it, and if we can find any other ways to use nature without disrupting it, full steam ahead. And while I'm at it, the oil companies have enough money and have polluted and destroyed far more of the Earth than anyone ought to be allowed to get away with, and I would rather massively reward a smaller company for advancing solar tech than give money to a billion-dollar gas company to crawl along with solar tech, trying to time the realization of that tech with the point at which more drilling is not profitable.
I am a liberal because pot doesn't bother me a bit. Legalize it. Tax it. Regulate growth. All of that stuff. Same with sex work. If it's already around, and it's not hurting anyone, legalize it, tax it, and put the money toward health care or remedial classes for high school dropouts.
I am a liberal because everything liberals want to do in government keeps being talked about as the end of the world, and I have to admit ... I'm a little disappointed that we haven't succeeded yet. C'mon, admit it: It would be pretty fascinating if taxing people was the butterfly effect that sent society and nature into a free fall.
I am a liberal because absolutely, explain creationism in classes, and point out that it's a belief system, not science, and do the same with intelligent design. The only way we are going to get smarter is by being introduced to crap and being able to diagnose it as crap.
I am a liberal because I recognize that the same people who talk about the myth of evolution are the people who grow amazingly quiet whenever anyone talks about MRSA or H1N1 or other diseases that evolved to be tougher to kill.
I am a liberal because of how many people tried to make that a bad word.
I am a liberal because my ancestors were sent here to work or came here to work or came here to live, and they did their part, and the people who have come here to do their part over the last, oh, 30 or so years should not have to fight nearly so hard to be taxed like the rest of us, and if we're going to sell their food all over the place, the least we could do is be a little more grateful to them for giving it to us to sell in the first place.
I am a liberal because the people who founded this country left it to me and mine to do with as we think best.
I am a liberal because the company that makes $20 million a year really doesn't need a tax break, but the person who makes $20,000 a year needs that money and more.
I am a liberal because the more you help people, the more they can help you.
I am a liberal because tell me I can't do something and I want to know why; tell me I can do something and I want to know how much; tell me I should do something a certain way and I'll find a better way; tell me what the status quo is and I'll show you how much better it could be.