How Liberalism Became an Intolerant Dogma

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Photo Credit: REUTERS / Jonathan ErnstAt the risk of sounding like Paul Krugman — who returns to a handful of cherished topics over and over again in his New York Times column — I want to revisit one of my hobby horses, which I most recently raised in my discussion of Hobby Lobby.

My own cherished topic is this: Liberalism’s decline from a political philosophy of pluralism into a rigidly intolerant dogma.

The decline is especially pronounced on a range of issues wrapped up with religion and sex. For a time, electoral self-interest kept these intolerant tendencies in check, since the strongly liberal position on social issues was clearly a minority view. But the cultural shift during the Obama years that has led a majority of Americans to support gay marriage seems to have opened the floodgates to an ugly triumphalism on the left.

The result is a dogmatic form of liberalism that threatens to poison American civic life for the foreseeable future. Conservative Reihan Salam describes it, only somewhat hyperbolically, as a form of “weaponized secularism.”

The rise of dogmatic liberalism is the American left-wing expression of the broader trend that Mark Lilla identified in a recent blockbuster essay for The New Republic. The reigning dogma of our time, according to Lilla, is libertarianism — by which he means far more than the anti-tax, anti-regulation ideology that Americans identify with the post-Reagan Republican Party, and that the rest of the world calls “neoliberalism.”

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Liberals Go To the Barricades to Defend Crony Capitalism

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Photo Credit: Getty ImagesThere’s nothing like a good fight over corporate welfare to bring out the Left’s love of Big Business.

In the current battle over the Export-Import Bank, Democratic politicians and liberal journalists have dropped their populist pretenses and openly embraced the corporate-federal collusion that Ex-Im embodies.

For some, it’s largely partisanship or disdain for the Tea Partiers who want Ex-Im dead. For others, it’s that increasing government’s role in the economy takes precedence over railing against Big Business. And for a shrewd few, it’s about raising money from K Street and Wall Street.

Liberal writer Michael Lind of the New America Foundation, who in 2013 mocked the notion of free-market populism as “Ayn Rand in overalls,” this year sees the free-market attack on Ex-Im as a grave danger to “Big Business,” and, by extension, all of America. Lind blasted “militants on the right.”

“Angry outsiders on the right are threatening to replace business-friendly market populism with real populism,” Lind warned. “And that, to the business community, is downright terrifying. It ought to frighten the rest of us, too.”

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US Presents: A Disconnected Administration

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Photo Credit: Getty ImagesWhile the world is busy watching the World Cup, the forces of evil in the Middle East are working overtime in Iraq, Syria and here in Israel as well. With the situation as volatile as it is, it was no surprise to find a headline in The Washington Times stating: “The ‘gates of hell’ ajar in the Middle East.”

The accompanying article was written by Dr. Monica Crowley of Columbia University, an expert on international relations and a former adviser on international affairs to several presidents.

Without hesitation, Crowley accuses the United States of having opened the “gates of hell” — and she is not alone. It seems that there is no argument that the old order in the Middle East has collapsed. In its place, we now have a lack of order. And to think that two years ago, President Barack Obama said in an optimistic address, “The core of al-Qaida … is on the way to defeat.”

In her article, Crowley wrote: “A little over two weeks ago, three Israeli teenagers set off for home from the Jewish seminaries, where they were studying near the West Bank city of Hebron. Hitchhiking is not unusual for Israeli teenagers studying in the West Bank, despite its dangers. And the three — Eyal Yifrach, 19; Gil-ad Shaer, 16; and Naftali Frenkel, a 16-year-old with dual Israeli-American citizenship — began the trek home.

“They were never heard from or seen again, until Monday, when their corpses were found in a shallow grave.

“What does this have to do with the United States? Everything.

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Liberals Hate Religion Because Government Is Their God

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Phtoo Credit: TownHall The liberal attack on religion stems from envy, greed, anger and hate, just like every other precept of liberalism. Liberals envy the loyalty and devotion that religion inspires. They hunger greedily to have it for themselves.

Mostly, they are angry because the religious dare to defy them and to reject the ugly and inhuman tenets of collectivism. And they hate God for having the temerity to define right and wrong. They consider that their sole prerogative.

The liberal freak-out over the Hobby Lobby decision is just the latest example of the left coming out of the closet and embracing its anti-faith bigotry.

It’s interesting to see how liberals approach the controversy, and how they fail to even accurately describe it. In the big picture, the Hobby Lobby case basically pitted the right of individuals to practice their religion even when they combine into closely-held corporations against a newly-minted pseudo-right of women to receive free birth control insurance coverage. Now, the right of religious liberty has been recognized for over two hundred years in the First Amendment. The pseudo-right of free birth control insurance coverage came into being when bureaucrats at the Department of Health and Human Services decided to mandate it following passage of Obamacare in 2010.

Naturally, the liberals side with the government bureaucrats’ four year-old whim over the established principle of religious liberty.

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What Makes You A Patriot?

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Photo Credit: The FederalistWhat makes you a patriot? There are so many things on the 4th of July that inspire us – today, we asked our contributors to share the odd little found elements of patriotic flavor which extend into our lives from surprising sources and inspire us on a day to day basis. Here are just a few, and we encourage you to share your own.

Neal Dewing

Most treacly paeans to America are odes to Sacred Freedom, our place in history, or (in a more immediate, personal way) our troops. All fine things to commemorate, very fine, and moving. But what impacts us day to day, after the bunting’s taken down and the haze from the fireworks wafts away? This question requires some thought.

I am tempted to cite my daily interactions with agents of the United States government as an inspiration to my patriotism. Lest that sound even remotely like a compliment, I assure you: few things stir revolutionary, patriotic fervor quite like attempting to wrestle money away from Leviathan. Give me Liberty or Give me Death – after going round and round with them, either is good by me.

Sorry – I have a real answer. As a matter of fact, I have caught myself feeling deeply grateful to have been born in this country. It happens most often when I’m out in my garden, digging in my dirt. I own the property. I can cultivate a plant, watch it grow, harvest and eat it – or I can do nothing. It’s all up to me. There are places where the government tells you what to grow, how much, and where. They labor not for their own benefit but for the State.

What I do as a hobby could just as easily be oppression. Sometimes I stand up, lean on my garden hoe, and marvel at that. I say a silent, brief prayer of thanks.

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"Crapitalism!"

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Photo Credit: Townhall“Crapitalism!”

There’s capitalism, and then there’s “crapitalism” — crony capitalism.

Capitalism is great because it lets entrepreneurs raise money so they can scale up and get their products and services to more people. If there is free competition, innovators with the best ideas raise the most money, and the best and cheapest products spread far and wide.

But it’s crapitalism when politicians give your tax money and other special privileges to businesses that are “most deserving of help.” Often those businesses turn out to be run by politicians’ cronies.

Many government agencies feed this crony capitalism. When there is scandal, such as when the Energy Department lost $500 million on Solyndra, we hear about it. But often we don’t. You probably didn’t know about the department’s other fat losses on businesses like Solar One, the Triad ethanol plant, FutureGen, the Clinch River Breeder Reactor and so on.

Even the Small Business Administration is an embarrassment. They loaned $1 million to a Lamborghini dealership and $3 million to a Rolex dealer. Is this where your tax money should go? Voters assume government handouts go to people who need help. But they usually don’t. Most government handouts go to the middle class and the rich.

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Martin Armstrong Warns Civil Unrest Is Rising Everywhere: “This Won’t End Pretty”

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Photo Credit: Zero HedgeThe greatest problem we have is misinformation. People simply do not comprehend why and how the economic policies of the post-war era are imploding. This whole agenda of socialism has sold a Utopian idea that the State is there for the people yet it is run by lawyers following their own self-interest. The pensions created for those in government drive the cost of government up exponentially with time. The political forces blame the rich and this merely creates a class warfare with no resolution for the future. Even confiscating all the wealth of the so-called rich will not sustain the system. Consequently, we just have to crash and burn and start all over again.

The Guardian reported that some 50,000 people marched in London to protest against austerity. They cried: “Who is really responsible for the mess this country is in? Is it the Polish fruit pickers or the Nigerian nurses? Or is it the bankers who plunged it into economic disaster – or the tax avoiders? It is selective anger.”

The exploitation by the bankers has been really a disaster. They have been their own worst enemy and in the end, they have become the symbol that inspires class warfare if not revolution. They are not the representatives of those who produce jobs…

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Restoring Balance Among the Branches of Government in Washington

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Photo Credit: Brendan Smialowski / GETTY IMAGESThe controversy over President Obama’s decision to exchange five high-ranking Taliban leaders for Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl last month focused largely on the price paid. There was less focus on Obama ignoring a federal law that required him to notify Congress 30 days in advance of releasing detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Laws such as this have been enacted to allow vital oversight of actions of such consequence. If this were an isolated instance, it could be dismissed. It is not.

After announcing that he intended to act unilaterally in the face of congressional opposition, Obama ordered the non-enforcement of various laws — including numerous changes to the Affordable Care Act — moved hundreds of millions of dollars away from the purposes for which Congress approved the spending and claimed sweeping authority to act without judicial or legislative controls.

A growing crisis in our constitutional system threatens to fundamentally alter the balance of powers — and accountability — within our government. This crisis did not begin with Obama, but it has reached a constitutional tipping point during his presidency. Indeed, it is enough to bring the two of us — a liberal academic and a conservative U.S. senator — together in shared concern over the future of our 225-year-old constitutional system of self­governance.

We believe that people of good faith can likewise transcend politics and forge a bipartisan coalition to examine these changes. In our view, the gridlock in Washington is not simply the result of toxic divisions. The dysfunctional politics we are experiencing may in part be the result of a deeper corrosion — a dangerous instability that is growing within our Madisonian system.

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Religious Freedom in the Workplace: Statement on Amicus Brief Filed at US Supreme Court

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Photo Credit: RZIMAs responsible citizens who love Jesus Christ and love our country, we want to express our deep conviction on matters of our faith and expression. No one ought to be compelled to so amputate their belief that it is meaningless except in private.

The faithful Christian cannot separate his life into sacred and secular, worship and work. A Christian does not cease to worship the Lord when he or she goes to work or opens a family business. Romans 11:36 says, “For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever. Amen.” As Christians we are called to do all things to the glory of God, including – perhaps especially – our work. This amicus brief – which includes my signature – was filed at the U.S. Supreme Court on behalf of Protestant theologians in support of the appeals by Hobby Lobby Stores and Conestoga Wood Specialties, and demonstrates how the holistic nature of the Christian faith extends to a believer’s vocation.

Sadly, over the years, the Christian faith has been targeted by a rabid secularization and evicted from any or all public expression. The encroachment upon our civil liberties is frightening and we ought to take a stand. The cases of Hobby Lobby and Conestoga highlight the extreme dilemma that results when Christians are forced to choose between violating the government’s regulations and violating his or her sincerely held religious beliefs in the workplace. These beliefs are planted in our conscience.

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Egos And Infighting: The GOP’s Biggest Opponent In November

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Photo Credit: TownHall Stars are aligning for a big Republican victory this November – solidifying and expanding the GOP’s majority in the House and perhaps gaining one in the Senate. This is a best-case scenario, and any majority in the Senate would be a slim one. But the importance of removing Harry Reid as majority leader cannot be overstated. That’s why Democrats will pull every dirty trick in their deep bag to hold the Senate, and sadly many Republicans will help them in that quest.

President Obama will have two years left to wreak havoc on the country after the next election, but he can only throw stones into the river of time, not permanently change its flow. The ripples from his stones will have consequences, but they will be nothing compared to the lasting damage he can do with more Supreme Court appointments. Obamacare, oppressive EPA regulations, executive orders, all of it can be changed or repealed, but not with a more activist progressive Supreme Court.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is 81 and suffering from pancreatic cancer. So far, she’s resisted progressives’ calls for her to retire so the president can replace her with a younger reliable vote, but no one knows if that will continue. Justice Anthony Kennedy is the key swing vote on the court right now. He’s 77 and in seemingly good health. But he’s also an unreliable vote for the Constitution. If they, or any of the other justices could be replaced by a younger, unchecked Obama appointee, the chances they’d bastardize the court’s rulings to permanently enshrine unconstitutional unilateral presidential actions rises exponentially.

Harry Reid spared SCOTUS nominees when he changed the Senate filibuster rules, but he could close that loop quickly. The Supreme Court is key and it’s their goal. Pack it with progressives, particularly young ones with decades to serve, and it’s game over.

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