Wednesday, July 22, 2015

just another thought...and i think it requires it's own post.

you point out in the video that you have to give conservatives credits for sticking to their guns and pushing their points without compromise. but, you're glossing over a larger strategic realty, which is that we've seen a role reversal. this is summed up in the term "radical right".

the language here gets messy, because we think of conservatives as representing the status quo and liberals (or socialists) fighting against it. but, that hasn't been true in a long time - since roosevelt, really. socialism is still outside the status quo, but liberalism has been the norm for a long time. the conservative movement has made a lot of progress in undoing the liberal status quo since the 1980s, but the process continues. well, it's weird because they adopted some liberal ideas (like free trade) and warped them for their own purposes. but it's still an ongoing process of reforming conservatives in battle against status quo liberals. you can see that in this debate - you are on the defensive, and standing up for the existing system. that puts you at a strategic disadvantage that you're confusing for a lack of strength in resolve.

in the process, liberals have conceded any impetus for reform to the right. liberals today rarely fight for anything to change; they fight for things to stay the same. it's conservatives that are fighting for change.

it's suggested here that the strategic shift should be to put your heels in and stand up for the status quo. that's not going to work. it's never worked. it just exposes the flaws in the status quo. again: you're confusing a strategic disadvantage for a lack of resolve.

rather, the strategic shift that liberals need to embrace is to get back to fighting for their own initiatives. human organ trafficking is a serious issue that liberalism has a lot to say about. but, instead of pushing reforms on our own terms, we're sucked into this position of standing up for the status quo. on issue after issue, there is always a strategy that can convert the debate out of defending an attack and into an attack of our own, but we tend not to take that option. we should.