American Feud Notes
Thomas Frank—Republican vision cast as something real
2000 Election Bush won the White working class vote-guns and religion. Chomsky. Are
those things that are highest in the issues. There is a red/blue split. But on the narrow
array of topics.
G Gordon Liddy. Brings out point about coasts being where liberals are.
Howard Zinn—In every state there is a division.
Chomsky—meanings have been so corrupted.
Michael Kazin—historian. Liberalism began with robber barons. American liberalism
response to robber barons. Guilded age.
1893 Depression William Jennings Bryan—defined Dem Party as redistributing wealth
for whole society. ―you shall not press down this labor crown of thorns…‖
McKinley won. Republicans took number of things he stood for in next couple of
decades—they had to. McKinnley assassinated.
Up until William Jennings Bryan, pretty much libertarian.
Under Teddy Roosevelt, progressivism. Excesses of urbanization, immigration,
industrialization, could be mitigated by rationality of human affairs. City planning, public
health, public education, institutionalization of possibility.
PM—we‘re against the people who push other people around.
Lee Edwards—John Stuart Mill? British philosopher and economist. The only freedom
worth the name is that of pursuing your own god.
Conservative and liberal meant classical liberalism. Freedom of trade, limited of trade,
free markets.
Liberalism definition at 15 minutes
Michael Kazin—liberal mugged by historical reality.
Zinn claims himself a radical. Because he questions the very idea of war.
Through FDR people claimed liberals and said they were against what FDR was doing.
New liberalism came along with FDR, activist government, not limited government.
FDR—idea that govt should help people in trouble. Taxes should be raised on rich.
Golden area of liberalism.
Roosevelt took progressive Republicans into
David Stoesz—FDR New Deal—stacking the Supreme Court, Configuration of Social
Security Act negotiated two groups exempt to get it passed—domestic groups and
agricultural workers exempt. Those two groups were African American.
Labor Unions organized.
Adrian Wooldridge. Labor unions. Law and order league.
Cold War—Edward R. Murrow. ―The state will run his life. What we oppose is the state
running his life.‖
The Birth of Modern Conservatism—David Stoesz. Social programs consumed more and
more of budgetary resources. Every social welfare program was an entitlement.
Conservatives had every reason to be concerned. No restraint on costs.
Reagan—govt bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we‘ll ever see on earth.
Private corporations are tyrannies. Do you see any objections on the part of
conservatives? –Chomsky (computers, micro chips, Internet, etc. all developed by
government and then given to corporations)
Conservatives started to fight back against new deal movt. Veterans movt. Predominantly
conservative movt. Against what they saw as soft liberalism on communism.
Mona Charen—―conservatives put liberty above equality and liberals put equality above
liberty.‖
What are traditional American values? God, family, community.
Thomas Frank—free market party. Let the market do its thing
Edmund Burke. British statesman who watched French revolution and opposed it. Bush
almost Jacobian in itself. ―Bring ‗em on.‖
Lee Edwards—French revolution was a break with the past; Russell Kirk said American
Revolution was a conservative revolution. Conservative patrimony that goes back to
1700s.
David Boaz—Cato Institute. What is it you want to conserve? Especially in a country
created in revolution.
G. Gordon Liddy.—what in his life made him a conservative. Studied American history
and realized what a boon we had received from the founding fathers early on.
David Stoeze—recovering liberal (radical pragmatist)—want to move toward the best.
Michael Barone—conservative. Used to be a liberal
Thomas Frank—Democratic socialist or a populist.
David Katz said labor movt did not support health care.
1950s and liberalism. John Kenneth Galbraith ―liberal hour‖
Overwhelming accomplishment of liberalism was to invent the middle class.
1950s hardly anybody would call themselves conservative.
In 1950s liberals were the architects of the Cold War.
JFK
Liberal Democratic in 1960 a firm anti-communist, pro Civil Rights,
1960s and the peak of liberalism. Lyndon Johnson‘s Great Society, rolled back death
penalty, legalized abortion, civil rights advances, affirmative action.
Donna Brazile—what are you going to do for me in the future?
Liddy—―do good things for people with other people‘s money‖
1960s and the seeds of conservative power. 1964 first serious candidate—Barry
Goldwater. ―Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice.‖
1964 first Southern strategy—appealed to deep South that had heavy ratios of white/black
divisions. Goldwater too extreme.
Humphrey in 1968.
Reagan gave speech 1964 ―A time for Choosing nationally televised‖
1960s beginning of conservatism‘s rise—Nanny state over-reaches.
Jerome Cavanaugh—Detroit‘s 1968 riots. When cities went up in flames in 1968, many
white Democrats blamed liberals for not helping them, but helping ‗blacks‘ who
shouldn‘t be helped. Conservatives seized on this frustration.
Chomsky related that stagflation resulting from the huge costs of Vietnam were to blame
for the government not solving the problems it had promised under the Great Society.
Kevin Phillips thought LBJ was radical and irresponsible.
Nixon seized on this discontent. 1968 won easily. Silent majority theme.
Liberals—‗being politically stupid is in some ways worse than being politically immoral
because you lose.‘
Nixon overwhelmingly won in ‘72, beating McGovern.
Lee argues that liberalism was an aberration.
Donna Brazile said that we were at the end of the 40 year conservative plan. We started
losing elections because people grew disenchanted.
Rise of Conservatism: National Review, think tanks, creation of new brand of
conservatism, more radical and bold than anything in Europe.
Liberals never go away—offensive tv shows, everything encountered is evidence of the
perfidy of liberalism. Conservatives organized the ways liberals had organized decades
earlier. By 1970s academies with research –conservative.
―Intellectual anarchy‖
Conservatives like to say they are traditionalists. But at the same time conservatism reacts
to changes more than liberalism does in many ways.
Jimmy Carter emblematic of failed government. 1976 won. Sixties distrust in authority
scared ruling classes.
Ronald Reagan—face three grave threats to our existence, economy, defense, energy
policy. Reagan critical to conservatism because he could capture the idealism of
conservatism. Attractive and brilliant communicator. Vision of limited government.
Chomsky—opposed to free trade, protectionist, introduced. To call this conservatism is
ironic.
Kevin Phillips—41 & 43. ―If they‘re conservatives I‘m basically not.‖
Conservatism—values more focused.
Zinn—by 1980s, radio talk shows kept persuading people that liberals were dangerous.
Death of Liberalism. ―liberalism‖ pejorative term—
Public believed in liberal ideals but politicians retreated from liberal labels.
Democrats in last 20 years decided to change appeal, and they started to reach to new
coalition—students, professionals, Democrats have to become more centrist. Example,
Bill Clinton signing off on NAFTA.
In the US liberal has shifted its meaning.
Political activists are bitterly divided more than the country is divided.
Culture War, Florida Controversy, Bush ran saying ―I‘m a uniter not a divider.‖
Katrina, 2006 Midterm, Address to Nation on Iraq 2007—change strategy in Iraq.
Made a dirty word out of conservative. Present conservative movt is invasion of the body
snatchers. Bush admission not Goldwater, Reagan conservatism but country club
conservatism. Fear of US mounted internationally.
Kevin Phillips—reckless and counter productive is exemplified by conservative (Bush).
Ironic. Just as it was by liberalism (LBJ) in 60s.
9/11 changed everything—(Lee).
Bush was a big government conservative, oxymoron.
Are wheels coming off of conservatism?
Clare Boothe Luce Policy Institute—investment example in the future. Train future
conservatives. Ken Starr, Michelle Malkin,
Politics is a matter of persuasion. You do this by giving people what they need and want.
Not just telling them things. (Obama in New Orleans)
Beyond Liberalism and Conservatism—
Move from grassroots to paid staffers.
Chomsky—PR industry runs elections. Focus elections on qualities not issues. Image
Idea of third party—post liberal and post conservative to affairs.