Reply #10: Great post-- the Democrats are the party of compassion

[AmericanLiberal]

"We must be able to articulate clearly the principles that drive us and make us feel the way that we feel -- the seminal motives upon which we rest our certainty of our own goodness."

What a great post, deignan. That should be one of the best posts I've seen yet here.

You've already articulated what drives me personally to be in this party. Democrats are the party of feeling. Based on policy alone I would NOT be a Democrat. I'll be here because I see no difference between morality and compassion when it comes to politics. George Bush has to add "compassionate" to his conservatism only because conservatism is inherently anti-compassionate. Why else would he need to add the adjective to his label? He likes to talk about freedom. But I support freedom because I feel compassion for the oppressed. I support support equality because I feel compassion for the weak. And I support morality because I feel compassion for the wronged. The Democratic party has historically been, and still is, the party that cares more about protecting and advancing the less powerful and less established, and advancing the interests of all people based on need. This is what it needs to affirm most of all, and remember in any policy debate arena.

***
Separate rant:

If Republicans are not the party of compassion why are they the party of moral values? I'll tell you why, because the word morality has been completely twisted around by recent changes in American politics, just about the same time the Democrats started losing. What changed is that the progressive, liberal part of this country forgot that it is rooted on morality and compassion, and stopped believing in itself. This happened some time around 1970. I was not alive then, but I know that is when it happened. Up until 1970, American liberalism had always been about making things better. Perhaps at that time many liberals thought they had won all their causes. Perhaps they saw that large government programs weren't working as well as they hoped. Whatever it is that happened, one generation of liberal activists passed away, and another generation failed to take its place. Instead what happened is that liberalism splintered off into a series of interest groups, focusing on single issues such as the environment, minority and womens' rights, unions and workers' rights, welfare, etc etc. These became tied down in separate debates each with a separate philosophical justification on the liberal side. On the conservative side, on the other hand, a (seemingly) consistent philosophical justification was tried on each separate debate. Since conservatism was the only ideology that tried to apply a uniform philosophical system to all its policy debates, it was by definition of its behavior the only out of the two ideologies that could assume the mantle of morality. But, with the significant exception of belief in economic freedom from government interference, their connection with morality is specious, and the basic tenet of conservatism is and has always been strengthening the established and powerful, and opposite to, rather to aligned with, the basic idea of compassionate morality.