Now I don't want to get off on a rant here...

As liberal as I am, I have to agree with your remark about liberals offering no substantive alternatives. I can understand and agree with the liberal way of thinking, but today's liberals seem more content to whine than come up with an alternative course of action. On the flip side, I'm sure there are liberals out there with great ideas, but in today's society there often needs to be a large financial backing to make one's ideas heard. Not sure I expressed that effectively, but you probably get the gist of what I'm trying to say. On a smaller scale, I see the same thing in local government. O'Malley is quick to publicly bemoan things that don't go his way when what we'd rather hear is his plan to make things work.

I think it's great to question the government, we have checks and balances for a reason, but to disagree and do nothing is a coward's stance, of which I am just as guilty as the next person. The lack of trust we presently see in leadership, stems (in my opinion) from a lack of exploring alternatives. So often we hear about a plan, not many plans, and wonder what our representatives were doing when the problem arose. Do we think about contacting those representatives with our opinions? Not often enough. Government is set up to work for the people, but we rarely take advantage of the power we have in the process, usually because we feel we are not all that influential and it's easier to whine. Sad, but often true.

Jeff, I find it hard to believe that you believe the current agenda set by the GOP is in any way "conservative." Here's a quote from John Derbyshire of the NRO:

"I'm an old Tory. I don't want anyone telling me how to live, and I think society will keep its shape well enough if we all cleave to some common, traditional understandings, support a strong executive leadership on the rare occasions it's called for, give over our minds to communal religious observances for an hour or two per month, and mind our own businesses the rest of the time. I don't want anything to do with the law, unless I get mugged and need to stand witness, or my neighbor starts dumping his garbage in my yard. I think Congress should sit no more than ten days a year, 15 max. Leave us alone, for Pete's sake. The purpose of law is (a) to suppress private feuds, and (b) to identify and punish criminals. It's not to tell me how or where to live, or when to die. Let me figure that stuff out for myself. Otherwise, leave me alone. This used to be bedrock Americanism. Nowadays it's come to sound eccentric."

And yet you support government telling people how to live their lives, who to marry, who not to talk to, threatening judges for ruling by the law ... the GOP isn't the party of the conservatives anymore, it's the party of the arrogrant [expletive deleted] who betrayed what they still claim they stand for. The more they continue on their current course, the more they alienate their core voters - conservatives & libertarians - the more it will become difficult for the GOP to rebuild itself as a credible conservative organization. Hey - no problem here - if the Republicans want to destroy their party, I'm all for givin' 'em a loud "Woohoo!" I just don't like you painting yourself as a conservative when clearly you're not.

Rachael - Thanks for interacting with what I actually wrote and for giving me some insight into your admittedly liberal perspective. I think you are describing the criticism that is lacking critical thinking. Critical thinking would breakdown the opposing viewpoint and offer an alternative. Critical thinking leads to better government and is vital. Criticism adds absolutely nothing. You are right to encourage checks and balances with thoughts and reason.

I also agree that it is unfortunate that many of us feel so powerless to affect change in government. It does seem to be a lot easier when you have money and that is something that both liberals and conservatives are guilty of engaging in the aristocracy of politics. The government is supposed to be by the people and for the people, which is difficult to see sometimes.

Snay – Thanks for laying the ground work for libertarian principles here. Perhaps I will do another series outlining my issues with those as well. As I stated in this post, Republican doesn’t always equal Conservative; Conservative doesn’t always equal Christian. I am a Christian before I am anything else. My view of conservatism, liberalism & libertarianism will all come from that perspective. It is a worldview issue as C.S. Lewis put it, “I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.”

Jeff,

I'm sorry I'm late on the continuation of your series. I haven't been by in a while (sort of ignoring blogs in general, including my own to some extent, for personal reasons). Anyway, I think your point about criticism is well taken. Certainly plenty of liberals - myself included - don't offer positive proposals very often, at least not these days. I would say that Robert Reich does a pretty good job of it, but his books don't reach much of a wide audience. I know on my blog I'm not particularly positive, but that's because the blog is there for me to practice writing and express my annoyance. Every once in a while I have an actual idea but that's pretty rare.

I think this is siituation exists on the left beause many on the left feel that they have to immitate what they think the right has done. For instance, you don't hear(and have never heard) anything but "anti-liberal" from the major spokespeople for conservatism. Coulter, Limbaugh, Hannity and Gingrich, among others, have made their careers on being negative; portraying anyone who disagrees with them as traitors, freaks, buffoons etc. Michael Savage's new book is called "Liberalism Is A Mental Disorder", or something like that. They don't make much of a case for anything positive(Gingrich might be an exception, but "eliminate the New Deal and the Great Society" isn't exactly positive). This strategy appears to be successful, so people on the left now look at that and think "dang, we need to do it that way!". There was a time when liberals called for substantive debate on policy, but that time, alas, is over. For instance, Paul Krug*man wrote a very clear analysis of the proposed Bush tax cuts in 2001, and offered alternative stimuli for the economy. It sank without much comment. However, his "Great Unraveling" - which consists of nothing so much as screeds against Bush, Alan Greenspan and Tom Delay - has sold millions of copies and gotten him all kinds of reknown. In short, I think when the public starts demanding - through the market - substantive policy debate, we'll get it. Until then, a pox on both houses, and us.

So, sticking with what I know best(being critical), I have to say that I totally object to what you characterize as liberal principles. I think I've probably said this before in previous liberal principles posts, so I won't rehash. However, I will address the current principle under consideration.

I really think that "don't trust your government" is not a liberal principle, but an American one. It really chaps me when people cry "obstructionist!"(it doesn't matter who says it - it bugged me when Clinton - not my idea of liberal, btw, but he'll do - said it too!) because the whole system is designed as one big series of obstructions. It's supposed to be difficult to pass laws. It's supposed to be painstaking and subject to an amount of debate that would bore to death any sane person. This is the only way that sensible consensus can be reached. I think the founders intended lawmaking to be a "first do no harm" proposition: If you can't make good laws, don't make any. This stems directly from their notion that the country would and should be made up of a people rationally attempting to advance their own self interest. If lawmaking were too easy, then it would be too easy for one special interest to control individuals unjustly.

As Snay pointed out, distrust of the government is as much a conservative principle as it is liberal. Conservatives have made a cottege industry out of distrusting the government. That's one of the major points of conservative thought: the government doesn't have business regulating the economy.

I would also point out that a majority does not equal unanimity. Last I checked Bush won a very narrow margin of the popular vote, and although the margins in congress currently favor the Republicans, nearly half the country doesn't want to "just get on with it", whatever "it" is.
And that's as it should be.

(Why is g*man questionable content? Certainly hard to mention Paul Krug*man when his name is considered questionable).

I am not a big fan of pride and most of the forms it takes. The conservative “spokespeople” you list are certainly overflowing with it. What the left has failed to mimic here with their form of criticism and occasional critical thinking is the optimism for a brighter tomorrow found in conservative thought. Those “spokespeople” do offer more than “anti-liberal” sentiment because they do focus on policy issues and building up conservative thought. You will see them challenge both parties to focus back on the policy issues and be just as critical of liberal republicans as they are of liberal democrats.

Doing a search of the Constitution, I see no use of the words obstruct, impede, retard or hinder. While it is not supposed to be easy to pass a law and it certainly should only occur after debate and deliberation, as it is no small matter of responsibility. The view of what is “good” and what will not “do harm” is obviously not always universally agreed upon. That is why they vote.

Limited government versus socialist government is very different from trusting versus not trusting. Snay points out libertarian views, not conservative views. Limiting the role of government in our free market economy is not the same as not trusting the government. I believe I will touch upon this more in my next liberal principle on the enforcement of financial equality.

To put your 2004 election results into their proper context understand that since the 1900 election, 10 races have yielded a lower margin of victory. These include democrats Kennedy (1960), Wilson (1916), Carter (1976), Wilson (1912), Truman (1948) and then Roosevelt’s margin in 1944 was within 1 million more than the 2004 margin. While you may like to concentrate on the 48% that voted against Bush, you cannot ignore the 51% that voted for him. Majority does not need to equal unanimity to accomplish the goals that the people of the United States voted to have accomplished by reelecting George W. Bush. That is what is being obstructed, that is how liberals show their distrust of the government and the distrust of the people that put them there. No optimism, no ideas, no critical thinking.

(I have no control over what is questionable content or not. That is a baltiblog issue, probably with its blacklist of comment spammers. Maybe Krug*man has written more than just books on the economy?!)

The point I was making in giving any statistical analysis was to refute your perception that the margin was that slim. When more than a third of the prior elections had slimmer margins than this previous one you see the election in that context and understand that the majority is not that slim. Since there has been a trend since 1994 of the margin to grow even wider in both houses of Congress, the more democrats obstruct government the more they marginalize themselves and keep the trend on course for 2006. Perhaps they will be successful in preventing the President from bringing his agenda to fruition until 2006. Will they be even more marginalized then and voted out of office?

Without knowing what specific Goldwater or Reagan sources you are referring to, I would rather not speculate on your misreading or not.

Limited government doesn’t mean complete and absolute distrust of the government as trust in the government doesn’t mean complete and absolute government. There is a balance that must be struck between trust/distrust, absolute/limited and empowerment/skepticism. As I see this principle of, “Don’t trust your government”, liberals are falling more and more and to a larger degree into the trap of distrust, limited to the point of useless and skepticism when it comes to all things Dubya. And no amount of wishing is going to change the fact that he is the President of the United States. That being the case, why not be seen as true bridge builders for the future and work within the agenda he is setting forth, that the American people gave him the right to set forth? “To disagree, one doesn’t have to be disagreeable.”

My intention here is not to defend conservative talk show hosts because they are not a part of the government. They are as free to have their thoughts and opinions as you and I. And neither them nor us is free of mistakes and faults.

(Yes, I do believe that Maphet has issues with the Feds, but you'll have to ask him about that yourself!)