Being a democrat/progressive/liberal doesn't equate to wanting strong central planning. To me it equates to not having an immediate knee-jerk reaction against solutions that involve government. Contrary to popular conservative opinion the government does some things quite well.
Hope you stick around for some personnel insight by me, but I don't make the rules around here.
Jim loves me because I'm an adorable little scamp. ;)
(inb4 Jim says, "ksen who?")
The government does almost nothing well. And beside that point, government has no RIGHT to do half the things it does. It powers are clearly enumerated in the Constitution, and exceeding those powers — regardless of how attractive the outcome — is not an option we can permit. Doing so is what got us to the obamaphone government we have now!