A misnomer that American liberals like to use to make themselves feel good about their beliefs and policies. Their reasoning: since conservatism (in their minds) represent the old, and the old ways always suck, they must be the progressives, the ones who want to change things, the "good guys". Wrong again.

The term "progressives" originated at the dawn of the 20th century to represent the leftists, who back then were actually correct on certain issues. Worker conditions back then were horrendous, and the movement to improve working standards was sparked by several events, such as the publishing of the book The Jungle, and the brutal crackdown laid on striking workers, etc. It also came to represent diverse groups such as women's suffrage groups, and other groups that were truly progressive. Until the 1960's, when black civil rights groups named themselves progressive, the usage of the term "progressive" was still correct.

For some odd reason, liberals today in the 1990's still feel that society is still just as crappy as it was in the 1900's, and they are still "progressive". They don't seem to realize that not all change is for the better. For instance, I don't think forced redistribution of wealth is exactly for the better, and the encouragement of killing fetuses is not progressive, it is regressive. Political correctness is anything but progressive, it is turning the entire nation into a bunch of hypocrites. And yet, these people still call themselves progressives. Many liberal college newspapers that advocate ultra-liberalism are called "the Progressive", but their words represent regression into blind radicalism. Progression means "moving forward", but liberals always seem to attach moving forward to changing everything they can. Big government is the future? Bullshit.

I wonder what honest citizens feel when the government robs them in broad daylight and it's called progressive policy. I'm not suprised there are angry white men in America. Perhaps they should reconsider their usage of labels since America has changed since the 1900's. Or maybe they're still reading Upton Sinclair and spouting idealistic rhetoric about changing society.

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Why bring Aussie politics into this? Having lived there for several years, I can honestly say that Australian politics is so different from American politics that they should not be mentioned in the same sentence. John Howard and his posse of do-nothings are just waiting for his term to expire, and nobody cares what's going to happen next. Aussies just want to hit the rubbity dub with the blokes and then go to the beach. Politics is different there. Besides, the liberal triumph is so complete in every province except for Queensland that there is no point arguing any more.

What liberalism is all about.

Definition from my "Living Webster" Dictionary, since Webster 1913's definitions kinda suck on this matter:
liberal: ...not literal or strict, as a translation; tolerant or open-minded, esp. in religion or politics....a member of a reformist political party.

So DMan is incorrect about liberals being wrong to want reform; by definition, liberals are for reform. If they were to not want reform all of a sudden, they wouldn't be liberal any more.

This isn't to say he's wrong about reform. That's an opinion, and he's entitled to his. (I disagree, and think we can stop changing when we're dead, but that's my opinion)

The final logical problem with his argument is that he seems to think the Democrats in office now are liberals. Now that cracks me up. Democrats are no longer liberal. They are sitting in the multinational's pockets, with the Republicans and the mainstream press.