Why Progressivism is a Mental Illness

by Lewis Loflin

What is a Progressive? As I watched Hillary Clinton during the 2008 election she said she rejects the term liberal and prefers to be called a Progressive. She also said she was an admirer of Neo-Marxist Saul Alinsky (1909-1972), the inspiration behind ACORN. In fact she was offered a job by him. In 1969 she wrote There is Only the Fight...

An analysis of the Alinsky model. To quote Hillary on page 74 of her thesis which in many ways I believe she was speaking for herself: "The middle class is fertile ground for organizing, and Alinsky thinks, for radicalizing...(their frustration)...could be channelled into achieving radical goals. The secret...is that such goals must be perceived as paralleling self-interest."

The Republicans have turned the word liberal into a dirty word without really knowing what it used to mean. So perhaps she wants to avoid a negative label being pinned on her for political reasons during an election. If she is a Progressive and I believe her when she says so, then what exactly is a Progressive? They deny labels such as Marxist, leftist, and fascist, and I believe the labels are inaccurate. Progressivism seems to borrow a little of everything from all of them and combine them with a mob-style democracy. The idea is to "radicalize" but control the mob. But it's simply more than just a lust for power.

So what do Progressives believe? According to Michael Schwalbe (Common Dreams, May 30, 2008), a professor of sociology at North Carolina State University, you might be one if:

• You think health care is a basic human right, and that single-payer national health insurance is a worthwhile reform on our way toward creating a non-profit national health care service.
• You think that human rights ought always to trump property rights.
• You think U.S. military spending is an obscene waste of resources, and that the only freedom this spending protects is the freedom of economic elites to exploit working people all around the planet.
• You think U.S. troops should be brought home not only from Afghanistan and Iraq, but from all 130 countries in which the U.S. has military bases.
• You think political leaders who engage in "preemptive war" and invasions should be brought to trial for crimes against humanity and judged against the standards of international law established at Nuremberg after World War Two.
• You think public education should be free, not just from kindergarten through high school, but as far as a person is willing and able to go.
• You think that electoral reform should include instant run-off voting, publicly-financed elections, easy ballot access for all parties, and proportional representation.
• You think that electoral democracy is not enough, and that democracy must also be participatory and extend to workplaces.
• You think that strengthening the rights of all workers to unionize and bargain collectively is a useful step toward full economic democracy.
• You think that as a society we have a collective obligation to provide everyone who is willing and able to work with a job that pays a living wage and offers dignity.
• You think that a class system which forces some people to do dirty, dangerous, boring work all the time, while others get to do clean, safe, interesting work all the time, can never deliver social justice.
• You think that regulating big corporations isn't enough, and that such corporations, if they are allowed to exist at all, must either serve the common good or be put into public receivership.
• You think that the legal doctrine granting corporations the same constitutional rights as natural persons is absurd and must be overturned.
• You think it's wrong to allow individuals to accumulate wealth without limits, and that the highest incomes should be capped well before they begin to threaten community and democracy.
• You think that wealth, not just income, should be taxed.
• You think it's crazy to use the Old Testament as a policy guide for the 21st century.
• You believe in celebrating diversity, while also recognizing that having women and people of color proportionately represented among the class of oppressors is not the goal we should be aiming for.
• You think that the state has no right to kill, and that putting people to death to show that killing is wrong will always be a self-defeating policy.
• You think that anyone who desires the reins of power that come with high political office should, by reason of that desire, be seen as unfit for the job.
• You think that instead of more leaders, we need fewer followers.
• You think that national borders, while sometimes establishing territories of safety, more often establish territories of exploitation, much like gang turf.
• You are open to considering how the privileges you enjoy because of race, class, gender, sexual orientation, and/or physical ability might come at the expense of others.
• You believe that voting every few years is a weak form of political participation, and that achieving social justice requires concerted effort before, during, and after elections.
• You think that, ideally, no one would have more wealth more than they need until everyone has at least as much as they need to live a safe, happy, decent life.
• You recognize that an economic system which requires continuous expansion, destroys the environment, relies on rapidly-depleting fossil fuels, exacerbates inequality, and leads to war after war is unsustainable and must be replaced. Score a bonus point if you understand that sticking to the existing system is what's unrealistic.

I think he says it pretty well. Most of it seems to be Marxism, but not outright state ownership of everything. There is no tolerance for individual autonomy, responsibility, or personal freedom, no respect for private property, and secularism/humanism as a religious creed. Much of the same thinking is found in the Humanist Manifestos put out by the Humanist Society mostly written by a disgruntled communist known as Paul Kurtz. In his tract In Defense of Eupraxophy he says, "Marx was no doubt the greatest humanist thinker of the nineteenth century..." He goes on how terrible it was that the Soviet Union couldn't wipe out the belief in God after 70 years of terror. While his focus is mostly promoting atheism, his various manifestos mimic much of the above but on a global scale.

So just what are Progressives like Hillary, Alinsky, Michael Schwalbe, Paul Kurtz, etc. really looking for and just what is a Progressive? None of these people have ever worked a real job in their lives being mainly academics, lawyers, etc. and have never struggled to put a meal on their table. They like Karl Marx have never set foot on a factory floor other than to visit or grip about those working there. They mostly hold them in contempt.

So why would they so want to destroy what gives them material comfort and freedom unknown anywhere in the world? Because they are the disgruntled and radicalized upper/middle class brats that believe they know what's better for everyone else. It's about them and their desire for a purpose in life. Marxism is the opiate of these disgruntled rich and middle-class brats. A Progressive is simply a disgruntled Marxist looking for a way to make the pseudo-religion of Marxism work in the real world without starving everyone to death or becoming a dictatorship. They deny reality. In other words Progressivsim is thus a mental illness.