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Now, if you’re a libertarian, and you believe that centralized power is dangerous, then it’s obvious that state control over finance and mass mobilization of social resources for warfare or other ends are two sides of the same coin. If you fear social spending, you could also be persuaded to believe that any financing mechanism for mass social spending is problematic. Creditors might just dislike the possibility of any state power centers that could challenge their hegemony and privilege labor/human rights over their property rights, though they do support captive state systems they control. If you are a white supremacist, centralized power can easily be viewed as a threat to racial homogeny, since historically it has acted as such in the past. But if you are against war, or you believe that a centralized state is likely to act in an unjust or repressive manner (as it also has in the past), then war financing is a reasonable target.

Modern liberalism is a mixture of two elements. One is a support of Federal power – what came out of the late 1930s, World War II, and the civil rights era where a social safety net and warfare were financed by Wall Street, the Federal Reserve and the RFC, and human rights were enforced by a Federal government, unions, and a cadre of corporate, journalistic and technocratic experts (and cheap oil made the whole system run.) America mobilized militarily for national priorities, be they war-like or social in nature. And two, it originates from the anti-war sentiment of the Vietnam era, with its distrust of centralized authority mobilizing national resources for what were perceived to be immoral priorities. When you throw in the recent financial crisis, the corruption of big finance, the increasing militarization of society, Iraq and Afghanistan, and the collapse of the moral authority of the technocrats, you have a big problem. Liberalism doesn’t really exist much within the Democratic Party so much anymore, but it also has a profound challenge insofar as the rudiments of liberalism going back to the 1930s don’t work.

This is why Ron Paul can critique the Federal Reserve and American empire, and why liberals have essentially no answer to his ideas, arguing instead over Paul having character defects. Ron Paul’s stance should be seen as a challenge to better create a coherent structural critique of the American political order. It’s quite obvious that there isn’t one coming from the left, otherwise the figure challenging the war on drugs and American empire wouldn’t be in the Republican primary as the libertarian candidate. To get there, liberals must grapple with big finance and war, two topics that are difficult to handle in any but a glib manner that separates us from our actual traditional and problematic affinity for both. War financing has a specific tradition in American culture, but there is no guarantee war financing must continue the way it has. And there’s no reason to assume that centralized power will act in a more just manner these days, that we will see continuity with the historical experience of the New Deal and Civil Rights Era. The liberal alliance with the mechanics of mass mobilizing warfare, which should be pretty obvious when seen in this light, is deep-rooted.

What we’re seeing on the left is this conflict played out, whether it is big slow centralized unions supporting problematic policies, protest movements that cannot be institutionalized in any useful structure, or a completely hollow liberal intellectual apparatus arguing for increasing the power of corporations through the Federal government to enact their agenda.

ALPHAGRIZ1 wrote:Didn't read it, I all ready know what the problem is.......

Ivytalk wrote:I read it. It just looked like a Graysonite's lament that the age of Eleanor Roosevelt muscular liberalism are over.

kalm wrote:

Ivytalk wrote:I read it. It just looked like a Graysonite's lament that the age of Eleanor Roosevelt muscular liberalism are over.

It painted Paul in a positive light showing how he stood by his convictions regarding the Fed, the military industrial complex, and the war on drugs while highlighting liberal hypocrisy regarding the military industrial complex, war financing, and debt. Lots of historical background too.

AZGrizFan wrote:Still laughing at your implication that the problems with liberals can be narrowed down to just ONE.

Ivytalk wrote:

kalm wrote:
It painted Paul in a positive light showing how he stood by his convictions regarding the Fed, the military industrial complex, and the war on drugs while highlighting liberal hypocrisy regarding the military industrial complex, war financing, and debt. Lots of historical background too.

I said on an earlier thread that there's not a dime's worth of difference between Ron Paul and Bernie Sanders on most of those issues. This article just proved me right.

CID1990 wrote:

Ivytalk wrote: I said on an earlier thread that there's not a dime's worth of difference between Ron Paul and Bernie Sanders on most of those issues. This article just proved me right.

Dude when I retire from the foreign service or Bernie Sanders goes off to his reward remind me to tell you my story

Ivytalk wrote:

CID1990 wrote:
Dude when I retire from the foreign service or Bernie Sanders goes off to his reward remind me to tell you my story

When Bernie goes off to his reward, he'll probably ask the taxpayers to pay for it.

Cluck U wrote:

AZGrizFan wrote:Still laughing at your implication that the problems with liberals can be narrowed down to just ONE.

Thread winner.