Posted on 03/29/2009 7:35:34 AM PDT by anniegetyourgun
WASHINGTON About as many left-of-center political groups in the nation's capital call themselves liberals these days as say they're Whigs. Instead, they call themselves "progressives."
What progressive means is "pretty murky," political historian Alan Brinkley said. Still, murky is an improvement over "liberal," a mainstream term in the 1960s that conservatives reduced to a dirty word in the 1980s.
Pollsters said the shift to "progressive" sheds the onus of the liberal label and enables left-of-center groups and candidates to fight again.
Although the term "progressive" has a distinguished early-20th-century history that includes reformers Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson, uncertainty about what it means today works in favor of erstwhile liberals.
Mary Helms, 54, whose family raises peanuts and cotton in Dothan, Ala., said she knew what a liberal was: "Someone who doesn't have very good morals."
And a progressive? "I don't really know anyone who says he's a progressive," Helms said. So she has nothing against them.
(Excerpt) Read more at seattletimes.nwsource.com ...
>>Do you remember when Blue states were Republican, and Red states were DemonRats? The media changed the nomenclature because it reminded people that the Rats were Commies!<<
YES, I do! Then suddenly at one presidential election, probably 1992 or 1996, all of a sudden all of the major networks switched the colors and virtually no one noticed or commented that I could tell. Anyone remember exactly when it happened? I’m pretty sure the 1988 election still had the Republican states in Blue.
Exactly! And now that they've disavowed the word “liberal,” let's begin a campaign to take it back. In a few years, they'll have destroyed the good connotations of “progressive” (by linking it to the disastrous policies of the Democrat Party today.) Meanwhile, we'll have resurrected “liberal” as a word that describes standing for individual liberty. We could start by describing ourselves as conservatives with liberal ideals. Or maybe the Libertarian Party has just had the door opened wide?
Anyway, it's galled me for years that they stole the word “liberal” and I'd like it back.
Although the term "progressive" has a distinguished early-20th-century history..Bull. The Communist Party USA starting calling themselves 'Progressives' in the 1930's. I consider that 'early-20th-century'. Google Henry A Wallace(1) and follow the links, not just Wiki, back to the Communist party and 'Progressives'.
(1) FDR's Veep 1941-1945. He was dumped from the last ticket (and RAT party for his radical (commmie) views) and replaced by Truman.
As others have pointed out, in the 1930-s-50's "Progressive" meant "Communist." Stalin sympathizer and former FDR vice president Henry Wallace ran for President in 1948 on the Progressive Party ticket. Some of his backers like Martha Dodd were active Soviet spies at the time. Progressive Insurance Company was founded by a Communist and his son, the present owner, vies with George Soros as a financial contributor to "progressive" causes.
Ultimately the term “Progressive” comes from the Marxist idea that the world is historically destined to progress toward communism. It is kind of a communist predestination. Therefore, any policy leading in the direction of communism is “progressive.”
From a book I am reading-The roots of Western Culture/Pagan, Secular, and Christian Options By Herman Dooyeweerd 1948
The principle of cultural economy is a guarantee that the view of
history developed so far is indeed on the course charted by the scriptural
motive of creation. The line of true historical progression is clearly
marked out by the creational ordinances themselves. Wherever a totalitarian
image of culture is pictured as the ideal that erases the hardwon
recognition of sphere sovereignty whether the appeal is to
ancient Germanic customs or to the medieval church one can be
certain that we are faced with a reactionary direction in history. We
should not be deceived by the adjective “progressive,” a label that any
new spiritual movement gladly claims for itself. It will be known by its
fruits!
reactionary
1840, on model of Fr. réactionnaire (19c.), from réaction (see reaction). In Marxist use, opposed to revolutionary and used opprobriously in ref. to opponents of communism (1858).
A Communist by another name will still be a thug.
After years of failed attempts to get the Communist Party - http://www.cpusa.org/ - or Socialist Party - http://www.sp-usa.org/ off the ground in America, leadership in the movement adopted a different, much more successful strategy.
Unable to compete openly with Americas two powerful political partys nationally on the merit of communist and socialist principles and values, leaders in the movement decided to work from within one of the two parties.
As both communism and socialism prey on the proletariat (working class) for political power, the old party of the people seemed like the best party to work within.
The Democratic Socialists of America http://www.dsausa.org/dsa.html The Democratic Socialists of America was formed as a spin-off of the Socialist Party USA for the stated purpose of working from inside the Democrat Party through its legislative arm, the Progressive Congressional Caucus. The Progressive Congressional Caucus, which now has more than sixty members seated in congress, all of whom played a significant roll in causing the current financial crisis.
PROGRESSIVE CAUCUS (DEMOCRATIC) (PC-D)http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/groupProfile.asp?grpid=6497 Through incremental victories from within the power structure of the Democrat Party, over an extended period, the Communist Party and Socialist Party agenda would be advanced below the radar of the average American voter, many of whom still vote Democrat just because their parents did, or because their fellow union employees do.
These voters have no idea what they are actually supporting in todays Democrat Party, even though the Democratic Socialists of America have been very open about their plans and their advances.
In a PDF file issued by the Democratic Socialists of America, they answer the question,,,,
What is Democratic Socialism? (188 k)
http://www.dsausa.org/pdf/widemsoc.pdf
The lie in the leftist campaign is the notion that socialism/communism are somehow acceptable, if achieved via democratic process. But its actually worse... Being thrust into chains by force is one thing; but voting yourself into bondage is something quite different...
Hat tip: APFTE
http://apfte.net/
You can Irradiate Poop but it’s still Poop
What's the next euphemism for socialism?
"Forward".
That's what I've seen in certain leftist enclaves here in my mostly conservative town.
Start looking for it, you'll notice it.
The Progressives were keen eugenicists. And California was one of the earliest supporters of Eugenics laws and in fact provided the model for Hitler’s laws. — as it says here:
Under the banner of “national regeneration,” tens of thousands, mostly poor women, were subjected to involuntary sterilization in the United States between 1907 and 1940. And untold thousands of women were sterilized without their informed consent after World War II. Under California’s 1909 sterilization law, at least 20,000 Californians in state hospitals and prisons had been involuntarily sterilized by 1964. California, according to a recent study, “consistently outdistanced every other state” in terms of the number of eugenic sterilizations..
California not only led the nation in forced sterilizations, but also in providing scientific and educational support for Hitler’s regime. In 1935, Sacramento’s Charles M. Goethe praised the Human Betterment Foundation for effectively “shaping the opinions of the group of intellectuals who are behind Hitler.” In 1936, Goethe acknowledged the United States and Germany as leaders in eugenics (”two stupendous forward movements”), but complained that “even California’s quarter century record has, in two years, been outdistanced by Germany.” In 1936, California eugenicist Paul Popenoe was asking one of his Nazi counterparts for information about sterilization policies in Germany in order to make sure that “conditions in Germany are not misunderstood or misrepresented.”
California’s eugenicists could not claim ignorance that Germany’s sterilization program was motivated primarily by racial politics. For example, in 1935, the Los Angeles Times published a long defense of Germany’s sterilization policies, in which the author noted that the Nazis “had to resort to the teachings of eugenic science” because Germany had been “deprived of her colonies, blessed with many hundreds of defective racial hybrids as a lasting memory of the colored army of occupation, and dismembered all around.” Not only did California eugenicists know about Nazi efforts to use sterilization as a method of “race hygiene” — targeted primarily at Jews — they also approved efforts to stop “race-mixing” and increase the birth rate of the “Northern European type of family.” The chilling words of Progressive reformer John Randolph Haynes anticipated the Nazi regime’s murder of 100,000 mentally ill patients: “There are thousands of hopelessly insane in California, the condition of those minds is such that death would be a merciful release. How long will it be before society will see the criminality of using its efforts to keep alive these idiots, hopelessly insane, and murderous degenerates. . Of course the passing of these people should be painless and without warning. They should go to sleep at night without any intimation of what was coming and never awake.”
The Frightening Agenda of the American Eugenics Movement
By Tony Platt
http://hnn.us/articles/1551.html
And Hitler’s view that some people — including Jews — were vermin was in fact typical of the LEFTISTS of his day — American Leftists such as Margaret Sanger in particular. And it was none other than that great darling of the Leftists, Bertrand Russell, who said this:
“Thee might observe incidentally that if the state paid for child-bearing it might and ought to require a medical certificate that the parents were such as to give a reasonable result of a healthy child — this would afford a very good inducement to some sort of care for the race, and gradually as public opinion became educated by the law, it might react on the law and make that more stringent, until one got to some state of things in which there would be a little genuine care for the race, instead of the present haphazard higgledy-piggledy ways.”
There is NOTHING progressive about the modern day liberals. Modern day liberals are nothing but REGRESSIVE SOCIALIST DARWINIANS. (I appologize to Darwin) There has always been more progresion under conservative and republican ideals. The founding fathers were NOT SOCIALISTS. They were about conserving individual rights in the face of government opression. They lived in a time where monarchy was virtually absolute and the so called “progressives” would subjugate every man, woman, and child to the monarchy of political correctness.
It only proves that the leftist must hide who they are. Today they steal the phrase progressive. Yesterday they dumped communist for socialist and then dumped socialist for “liberal”. Their ideas are rejected so they repackage the same mantra under a different name. Its like having a strange friend constantly involved in multilevel marketing schemes under various names. Sorry not buying. Time for the left to join the ashheap of history.
“Progressive”?It means Bolshevik.Since the term liberal is out of favor and Communist still scares people,the Reds have found the ideal word to smokescreen their activities.A devoted so called progressive will also be a devoted follower of the ideals of Karl Marx,Fredrich Engels,and Vladamir Lenin.
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