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American Ideology - Conservative vs LiberalConservativeismIn the beginning of this country, it was every man for himself, to hunt, to fish, to build his own log cabin, to farm with a wife, to make his own fur clothes with the help of a wife, and to defend his homestead, and some with the help of indentured servants, and, yes, some with the help of slaves. The pioneer paradigm entailed self-sufficiency.The conservative Republicans still believe in this paradigm.The Republican conservative premises:
The Republican agenda:
LiberalismAs population grew, towns and interdependencies grew. We all know the historical stories of the Massachusetts Pilgrims creating stores of commonwealth supplies for sharing during the early hard New England winters."Commonwealth" means sharing the wealth of the country with the Common People. Sharing and caring - not hoarding and abandoning. It bears repeating: "Sharing and caring - not hoarding and abandoning." Never mind the propaganda labels being hurled. Never mind the flashy personalities, Never mind the comics and clowns, who are sure to be "fun". A true Democracy is both conservative and liberal, both democratic and republican, that balances capitalism and socialism principles in order form a synthesis of opportunity and support, of freedom and responsibility, of strength and compassion, of courage and safety, of individuality and the common good, and thus revitalises the values that the United States of America was founded on and has matured to become, a true commonwealth that enables anyone to realize his or her dreams as a member of our unique and common heritages. Everyone who is able contributes to the commonwealth in proportion to their ability, so that everyone who is not fully able will be provided for in proportion to their need - all their basic needs - without discrimination.2 ContrastsCapitalismIn pure capitalism there is no public property and no commonwealth. The primary paradigm is the evolution of barter, trading something for something - quid quo pro (Latin for "something for something"). Each person expects to get something - usually of equivalent value for something else, be it material or non-material. Money is the evolved medium of exchange. In the context of government, which manages services funded with taxes, the capitalist orientation expects to personally get relevant value for taxes paid. "Quid pro quo" is meaningless for those who do not immediately use a particular service. "What's in it for me?" dominates the personal attitude about taxes. For example, conservatives without children resent paying school taxes, because they see no "return on their investment" - they don't think they get anything back for their tax dollars. Trades should be fair.
Equal value for equal value must balance the equation.
What I give (negative) plus what I get (positive) adds up to zero.
Otherwise one person loses while the other gains. This means barter trading should be zero sum.
However, when power and wealth differences abound, they affect the
trading without regard for equality, especially when motivated by the
belief in self-sufficiency coupled with an aversion to being controlled
by others. Survival meant fighting for one's needs and desires.
Self-sufficiency became "selfish-sufficiency" whenever there was
competition for resources. Often such conflict ended with one or
both parties migrating to less or un inhabited locations, where
resources abounded sufficiently that competition was minimal. Both
parties then survived through the dint of their own hard work.
While the reality differs, the legends and cinema hype of Davy Crockett
and Danial Boone epitomized these perspectives. Our semantic
environments1 are created by our exposure to culture, not to the
independent physical reality. SocialismIn pure socialism there is no private property and no individual ownership. Everybody works under state assignment and planning. Everybody lives in state provided housing. Everybody gets all the same and only the same benefits according to state determined distribution. It practice, the power of administrators succumbs to personal preferences that corrupt the system, as was shown by the 70 year Soviet Union "experiment". Moreover, the lack of differences in payment for work done tended to reduce work to the lowest common denominator. Without individualized incentive to produce, production drops to the output of the slowest worker. "If I don't get any more pay than 'himer', why should I work any harder that 'himer'?"CommonwealthSocial services, police, fire, infrastructure, Medicare, social security, Medicaid, public education, emergency medical care, the National Guard, Coast Guard, the Judiciary, elected officials, the military, and more are all Socialism structures that make up the common wealth we all pay for with taxes. None of these can equitably be provided by free capitalism. They can only be provided by Democratic Socialism. [See the Commonwealth Party.] Notes
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