Doing research for my “Three Speeches” paper (which has been expressed so far in my Marxism of Barack Obama posts), I noticed a defining difference between progressives and conservatives. The jumping-off point is actually a line from the Gettysburg Address, which at any rate is worth reproducing in whole as often as possible:
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow — this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
I started with the glib joke that Barack Obama also believes in a government of the people, by the people, and for the people–he just thinks that those are three different groups of people. And yet, that is the whole thing. That is exactly the difference between conservatives and progressives.
Progressives believe that the most intelligent or most moral of society must be in charge, and must have the power to compel the development of those more backward or more simple than themselves. They believe that society is a black box the output of which is improved by improving the input. They favor leaders who carry accredited status as smart or moral and see little room for difference there. To progressives, “qualified to lead” means something quite different than to conservatives, who value wisdom over intelligence, and who do not feel that intelligence is synonymous with morality. Conservatives favor leaders who carry validation of bravery or experience dealing with adversaries. Conservatives see society as a black box the output of which is improved by tuning the workings of the box, given arbitrary input. Conservatives believe that human development cannot be compelled, and that the qualities of a leader are not found in credentials.
At any rate, the great task and the cause spoken of by Lincoln at Gettysburg is that government (not “a government”, but “government”) of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth. This sets up three points for analysis, which is what each of those prepositions (of, by, and for) really means. We can also take a look at the parallel replicated object of those prepositions: the people.
We will take “government of the people” to identify those people who are governed; “government by the people” to identify those people who govern, and “government for the people” to identify those to whom the benefits of the arrangement are supposed to accrue.
Obviously, if these are all the same people, then this is a magnificent system, consistent with the ideals of the Declaration of Independence and the methods in the Constitution. Anything else is less than our Republic, but should still define a different method of organizing a people and its government.
The key difference here is that conservatives see one group of people mentioned three times, and progressives see more than one group. There are five ways to combine three entities into one, two, or three collections: perhaps all three are the same (one group), all three are different (three groups), and perhaps two are in a group while the other one is left out, a group of one (two groups). There are three ways to get two groups (depending upon which of the three is the left-out), and we add that to the one-group and three-group possibilities for a total of five ways to combine these things.
[table id=3 /]
I mentioned my little joke about progressives reading that line as referring to three groups of people, but as an analytical point, that’s not quite true. It is literally true, however that they see it as two different groups of people, in that the consent of the governed is not required for a government to be legitimate in their eyes. In fact, the more progressive they are, the less likely they are to gain that consent, and this only bothers them as a logistical issue, not a moral one, because the more progressive they are, the less they even want that consent. If Progressives believe that the smartest and best must compel the bulk of society to conform to their system of government and not the other way around, then consent is not only not required, it is probably a sign that they are not progressive enough to get the job done.
This is what people mean when they talk about the radical left. “Radical” is not a term devoid of meaning, equally applicable to any number of things unpalatable to you. If you’ll bear with me a moment, the root of the word radical is the word radix, which means root. A radical change is one which does not build upon existing things, but which replaces them from the roots. Radical change implies a towering contempt for the thing so changed. It is synonymous with “fundamental transformation”, which is a phrase that President Obama has used more than once, and this is no accident.
The Marxist radicals of the progressive Obama administration see themselves as having finally achieved a “Type III” government in which “a people is governed for its own benefit by other people”. They are the smart and moral “other”, and the more alien they see themselves to us, the better. Their outsider status is to them a commendation not a weakness, a qualification to lead, not a disqualification.
This is exactly what these people have in mind when they say things like “But we have to pass the [health care] bill so that you can find out what is in it,” and an incredible assortment of similarly chilling statements. Those of us who do not accept being governed by a separate group will draw no distinction* between type III and type IV, seeing any government by a foreign body as necessarily oppressive. We insist upon a type I government, where the people who are governed are also those who govern, as the only guarantor that those who are governed are the major beneficiary of that government.
A Type I government requires a market and demands capitalism as the only reliable method to steer the thing and stay true to all the groups being the same. A Type III government cannot abide a market and will not survive capitalism. Type III relies upon the smart and moral central control to identify, analyze, and solve any problems the society might have, from wage and price issues on up to life and death decisions, whether war, health care, or nutrition.
* with one exception, and that is the precise meaning of American Exceptionalism. The United States is the only power in the history of the world which has a proven record of fighting to protect one external group from a hostile other group, and then claiming NEITHER as spoils, but setting both on a higher path. It doesn’t always work, and we have not always lived up to it, but the entire world knows that when the professors stop talking, the newspapers stop printing, and the food stops moving, it is America who will help them, and will not demand payment or servitude in return. That is the exception often spoken of, and little understood.
