Here come the labels.
“Barack Hussein Obama opened his second term on Monday with an assertive inaugural address that offered a robust articulation of modern liberalism in America,” wrote Peter Baker for the New York Times.
Baker went on to define liberalism for himself: advancing gay rights, showing tolerance toward illegal immigrants, preserving Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security and acting to stop climate change.
In addition to these specifics, a liberal thinks that government should act and he quoted the president: “Progress does not compel us to settle centuries-old debates about the role of government for all time — but it does require us to act in our time. For now decisions are upon us, and we cannot afford delay. We cannot mistake absolutism for principle and substitute spectacle for politics or treat name-calling as reasoned debate. We must act.”
Reading these comments over again, one must wonder how many of us are “liberal” and how many are not. Granted, there are still a good many Americans who believe that climate change is a natural part of the way things are and can’t be altered by what people do or don’t do. There may be just as many who are emotionally unable to accept homosexuality as natural and can’t grant homosexuals full equality. Both of these positions lie contrary to the discoveries made by long years of careful study, which is why public opinion on both has shifted so dramatically in recent years.
But for the rest of Mr. Baker’s definition of liberalism, well, it seems to describe what Americans think governments should do for their citizens — and, for that matter, what the peoples in all of the world’s rich countries expect from government.
Without putting on a frock and mounting a pulpit, Mr. Baker could have gone on to say that “liberalism” in today’s nations of the west comes straight from the New Testament.
The belief that those with power and means should feed the hungry, clothe the unclothed, house the homeless, tend the ill, take special care of children and chase the money-changers out of the temple lies at the heart of Christianity. And Christian thought has played a dominant part in forming the values by which Americans, Europeans and growing numbers of Asians and Africans live.
If we can agree on these things, then the challenge is to govern responsibly.
Rather than debate whether government should guarantee universal health care coverage, the discussion should be how best to provide it and pay for it.
Rather than question where the responsibility lies to create effective schools to educate each generation for the increasingly challenging demands science and technology put on the work force, all of us should agree that the national community must meet that imperative and then decide how best to do it and pay for it.
The same can be said of each of the challenges our nation faces.
The American way should be liberal, in that its goals should embrace every citizen.
The American way should be conservative, in that each generation should pay its own bills
The American way should be communitarian, in that the good of the whole is given priority.
The American way must be practical, which recognizes that politics is the art of the possible and that good government can be achieved and maintained only through thoughtful compromise.
— Emerson Lynn, jr.
