A question about the differences between conservatives and liberals

[Asmodean]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui


Interestingly, aside from the capital punishment and 2nd Amendment positions, I agree with you. We should start our own party (and they we can be all acrimonious and split over our capital punishment positions ).

Yeah...good idea. To give you an idea of how mixed my oppinions are, when I took an online test during the primaries, the result came back that I should vote for Clinton, with Giuliani a close second

Asmodean

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui

China under Mao and Cuba under Castro were hardly beacons of liberal thinking or liberal acting.

And yet their economic programs and view on the role of the state in the economy were very far to the left.

Not something I can recall denying....

Of course when Conservative regimes redistribute land to large international/transnational corporations, members of the junta, political backers, et cetera, this isn't known as Socialism or a leftist economic programme.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by molly bloom
Not something I can recall denying....

Which is hardly conservative

Of course when Conservative regimes redistribute land to large international/transnational corporations, members of the junta, political backers, et cetera, this isn't known as Socialism or a leftist economic programme.

Do you consider Mao's or Castro's redistribution to be not socialist or non-leftist?

One can say many things about Mugabe's land reform. However, what one cannot say is that it was for the benefits of large corporations or the rich. They actually tossed the rich off... which also caused the collapse of the agricultural economy.

[Dauphin]

molly, are you defining conservative as "anything that is not liberal"?

[Imran Siddiqui]

It seemed to me like he was using American definitions (liberal = left, conservative = right)... since the original post he was responding to described Mugabe as socialist.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui


Do you consider Mao's or Castro's redistribution to be not socialist or non-leftist?

That would depend on whether it went to 'the people' as a whole, or to some of the people and to some favoured comrades or cadres.

There's a world of difference between Cuba, China and say Social Democratic Sweden or the U.K in 1945 under the Clement Attlee government, so it's pretty pointless trying to say that all those regimes are 'liberal' or 'leftist' in the same way.

They actually tossed the rich off... which also caused the collapse of the agricultural economy.

That's a rather simplistic view of the agricultural/ecoonomic situation in Zimbabwe, ignoring as it does the long term drought in the region.

I certainly do agree though that the occupation of Zimbabwean tobacco farms by supposed war veterans (some of whom must have been in combat in 1979 in the womb) will not have helped matters.

Nonetheless, it's failry absurd to try to make out that Mugabe isn't socially conservative, and an opportunistic dictator. He's not interested in sharing power, or in an equitable redistribution of the means of production or a liberalisation of civil rights- he's simply interested in maintaining himself in power.


In his views on homosexuality he has much in common with Iran and the Vatican for instance.

[GePap]

Maybe the problem is the spectacularly ignorant notion that there are just two single world viewpoints and that these are somehow completely tied to the single discipline of economics, and one's view on private property. Even that dubass political compass recognizes two axis, not just one.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Dauphin
molly, are you defining conservative as "anything that is not liberal"?

No, I'm simply pointing out the absurdity of blanket definitions of 'Left= liberal' where Left or Leftist seems to include everyone from John Stuart Mill through Karl Marx, Sylvia Pankhurst and Klara Zetkin to Robert Mugabe, Stalin and Kim Il Jong.


It's entirely possible, as Stalin proved, to be exceedingly unliberal in social terms- ethnic cleansing of Tartars, Ukrainians, Volga Germans, repeal of 'liberal' laws regarding the rights of women, homosexuality, press freedom- which actions would have sat quite nicely with either Franco's Church and Army backed conservative regime or any other number of Rightist regimes from Salazar's dictatorship to the Colonel's junta in Greece.

[Dauphin]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
It seemed to me like he was using American definitions (liberal = left, conservative = right)... since the original post he was responding to described Mugabe as socialist.

I was asking as his rebuttals seemed to be a long list of examples covering a raft of political standpoints, left and right, that qualify as "not liberal", but with the added implication that they must therefore be "conservative".

I just wanted clarification as it is not clear to me what the basis of his argument is, and so I can't tell if it is valid.

[Dauphin]

Originally posted by molly bloom


No, I'm simply pointing out the absurdity of blanket definitions of 'Left= liberal' where Left or Leftist seems to include everyone from John Stuart Mill through Karl Marx, Sylvia Pankhurst and Klara Zetkin to Robert Mugabe, Stalin and Kim Il Jong.


It's entirely possible, as Stalin proved, to be exceedingly unliberal in social terms- ethnic cleansing of Tartars, Ukrainians, Volga Germans, repeal of 'liberal' laws regarding the rights of women, homosexuality, press freedom- which actions would have sat quite nicely with either Franco's Church and Army backed conservative regime or any other number of Rightist regimes from Salazar's dictatorship to the Colonel's junta in Greece.

Ok, you are responding to a charge against 'liberals', not making the charge against 'conservatives'.

Carry on.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
...since the original post he was responding to described Mugabe as socialist.

Yes, Mugabe as a Socialist, just like Denis Healey, Helmut Brandt, Francois Mitterand and Keir Hardie.

What I wonder might be the major flaws in such a definition ?

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Dauphin
I was asking as his rebuttals seemed to be a long list of examples covering a raft of political standpoints, left and right, that qualify as "not liberal", but with the added implication that they must therefore be "conservative".

Sounds about right.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Dauphin
Ok, you are responding to a charge against 'liberals', not making the charge against 'conservatives'.

Carry on.

Actually he was responding to a charge against liberals by making a charge against conservatives... two wrongs making right and all that.

[Dauphin]

You missed my sarcasm.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by GePap
Maybe the problem is the spectacularly ignorant notion that there are just two single world viewpoints and that these are somehow completely tied to the single discipline of economics, and one's view on private property. Even that dubass political compass recognizes two axis, not just one.

It makes the thread title a bit easier to discern. I mean, could you imagine a title of "A question about the differences between social conservatives, social liberals, economic conservatives, and economic liberals"?

I don't even think that'd fit.