American political thought is narrow, like a thin blue line.On one side of that line is the Right and on the other the Left. On one side of that line are Republicans and on the other Democrats.
The Right and the Left in the United States each like to think that they are morally superior to the other.
Republicans and the Right tend to think of Democrats and the Left as weak and stupid and immoral.
Democrats and the Left tend to think of Republicans and the Right as brutish and stupid and immoral.
But both consider the other to be as a dumb as a bag of hammers.
The truth of the matter is that American political thought is largely defined by the preamble to the Constitution of the United States, which reads as follows:
We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.It is the greater good versus individual liberty.
This is what outlines American political conflict.
I would argue that the ongoing slog of American political history is wrapped around this notion of promoting the "general welfare" in tension with the effort to secure the "blessings of liberty."
The inclination on the Left is toward the general welfare or social good. The American Left wants to see those who are held down, lifted up. In the tradition that goes from nineteenth-century abolitionism and progressivism to the New Deal and the Civil Rights Movement to the New Left, what drives the American Left is standing for the underdog and they thereby see themselves as standing within a noble political tradition ongoing into the future, the very political tradition that freed the slaves.
The inclination on the Right is toward individual liberty. The American Right wants to see those who are held down, lifted up. In the tradition that goes from Edmund Burke and European Enlightenment notions of democracy to the anti-slavery movement and the rise of regulatory capitalism and, thus, the American middle class, what drives the American Right is standing for the individual, and her family, and they thereby see themselves as standing within a noble political tradition ongoing into the future, the very political tradition that freed the slaves.
Democrats and the Left tend to be more about the general welfare, while Republicans and the Right tend to be more about the blessings of liberty, but it is not quite so simple due to the fact that libertarians are the joker in the deck.
Democrats and Leftists tend to be social libertarians. That is, they believe that the government should stay the hell out of their bedroom... and that goes double for Gay people.
Republicans and Rightists tend to be economic libertarians. That is, they believe that the government should stay the hell out of their bank statements... and that goes double for the IRS.
But, in a nutshell, that is basically it. The United States has a very narrow political outlook and both sides of that outlook are liberal. American conservatives and American Republicans and American leftists and American Democrats are all liberal. Henry Kissinger famously said, and I paraphrase, that university-academic politics are so nasty because the stakes are so small. What I would suggest is that American politics, in general, are so nasty because the ideological differences between us are so small.
The United States is not Europe and it sure as hell is not the Middle East.
In Europe they have significant political differences. There is communism on the Left and fascism on the Right. There is hard-line left-wing socialism and there is hard-line right-wing conservatism, although most people are somewhere in-between. In the United States almost everyone is in-between.
We are all liberals. From Ronald Reagan to Eleanor Roosevelt, we are all liberals.
Black-White, Left-Right, This-That, we are all liberals.
The word "free" is popular on both sides of the aisle. We believe in a free press and freedom of speech. We believe in freedom of religion. We believe in the free exchange of goods and ideas.
Left-Right, This-That, we believe in the freedom of the individual to pursue his or her individual life, liberty, and happiness so long as the individual remains within the law.
And this leads me to Baltimore.
Any political party or political movement or political individual that sides with rioters against the cops is making a very big mistake because there is nothing the least little bit liberal about Molotov cocktails and violence in the streets.
Those kids from Baltimore and the local neighborhoods may have had a pretty fun time for a couple of nights, but the adults need to take charge because Lord of the Flies does not for a democracy make.
From an electoral perspective most Americans are going to stand with the cops.
Standing up for the violent children in Baltimore is like standing up for the Occupy Whatever Movement from 2011 or promoting Cindy Sheehan for Vice President or paying San Francisco State University instructors to promote terrorism.
It is pure stupidity.
Michael Lumish is a blogger at the Israel Thrives blog as well as a regular contributor/blogger at Times of Israel and Jews Down Under.