Michael Totten tries his hand at political taxidermy, separating the “liberals” from the “leftists.” It’s an interesting piece, and worth reading (Matthew Stintson provides his take on Mr. Totten’s piece — also very much worth reading — here.)
Although I’d quibble with some of the particulars,* I think that Mr. Totten is correct when he argues that there’s a difference in kind, not merely degree, between, say, the DLC (“liberals,” in his view) and the folks at ANSWER (“leftists”). These people do not share the same worldview — indeed, in many ways the gulf is even greater than that between so-called neo- and paleo- conservatives. It’s a mistake to suggest otherwise by falsely placing them on a right-left (or, in this case, left-lefter) continuum.
von
*Such as Mr. Totten’s statement that “even a polemicist like Ann Coulter must know, on some level, that the views of Noam Chomsky and Tom Daschle don’t differ in degree, but in kind.” Coulter’s entire career as a polemicist relies mistating the differences in kind between, say, the John Kennedys and the Rosenburgs of the world. (See, for example, her novel “Traitor.” What, you say it’s not a novel? Oh, my . . . . ) Calling her ignorant is far kinder than considering the alternative.
Hey, Von. Thanks for the link.
(The name is Totten, though, not Trotten.)
I wonder how the DLC would like being called “liberal”, but that’s not my main problem.
My main problem is that many people use “leftist” and “liberal” interchangeably, and “the Left” and “liberals” interchangeably. I call myself “on the left” and “lefty” all the time.
Using the terms as synonyms is probably even more widespread on the right. By way of illustration, google “left-liberal.” And for a more specific illustration, google it on Andrew Sullivan’s site–you’ll get 30 hits, most of it his own words rather than quoted sources. Now, “left-liberal” could be describing a political alliance between two different sets of people–but he calls Josh Marshall a “left-liberal” so that’s not how Sullivan uses it. (Other things that are “left-liberal”: the BBC, the “consensus that pervades elite media”.)
In general, I find a website worth reading in inverse proportion to the number of things it says about “The Left” (the capital L is key.) Not only because those generalizations are usually inaccurate, but because the term is defined so inconsistently as to be meaningless, to include anywhere from less than 1% to almost 50% of America. Sometimes I’m sure they’re not talking about me but I know many people will assume they are; sometimes I’m sure they are talking about me; sometimes it’s totally unclear; and sometimes (and this is what drives me craziest) they are deliberately shifting the definitions to attack the entire Democratic party but retain plausible deniability.
That’s all for now; I’ll probably do a full post on this subject later on.
(Oh, and Totten, not Trotten.)
Hey, Von. Thanks for the link.
Sorry to mispell your name; I’ve corrected it.
My main problem is that many people use “leftist” and “liberal” interchangeably, and “the Left” and “liberals” interchangeably. I call myself “on the left” and “lefty” all the time.
I certainly agree that Totten is redefining the terms “left” and “liberal” to fit his thesis. For most (maybe even “all but Totten”), left and liberal are used interchangeably. But the phenomenon he describes — the distinction between what could be called “mainstream” liberals and “out-of-mainstream” liberals — is real. Indeed, it’s at least as real as the distinction between Pat Buchannan and Richard Lugar. You could say that Buchannan and Lugar are both conservatives, sure, but this misses the fact that Buchannan and Lugar have profoundly different world-views, would pursue different policies, and disagree quite often and on both the big and small things.
Yeah, I thought Michael gave Coulter too much credit, also. She’s one of the writers I’m consistently ashamed to have on “my team.”
However, I DO think liberals and leftists belong in the category of “left-of-center” based on economic issues, though as I wrote, liberals and leftists are two extreme poles of the left, with liberals trying to help the poor and leftists trying to destroy the wealthy. Outside of economics, left-right is becoming increasingly meaningless, though, and liberals and leftists fall off the same continuum. Liberal feminism does not belong on the same plane as PoMo feminism; liberal internationalism has nothing in common with the ANSWER/Ramsey Clark/Chomsky crowd; liberal crime-fighting, which seeks to educate and rehabilitate, is completely different from the far left depiction of criminals as revolutionary heroes. And so on and so forth . . .
what’s PoMo feminism?
I disagree the difference really is one of degree and that Matt Trotten set up a strawman argument in which he ascribed the more unpalatable aspects of motives of many people on the Left in order to create a distinction without difference. What matters is policy views and the Left (including those who are wrongfully referred to as “liberals”) and Far Left generally have far more in common with each other than they differ.
Whether one favors a punitive income tax designed to tax people at a higher rate for being more productive is more relevant than whether one does it because they want to be “fair” (implying that there is something “unfair” about some people earning more money than others) or just because they “hate” people who earn more.
Whether one favors moving straight to a socialist health care system immediately or gradually by killing what little of it resembles a market-based system is merely a difference of degree not of substance.
BTW: I don’t think it is should escape anyone’s notice that while Trotten sets up the strawman of “Leftists support fringe candidates or a third party to the left of the Democrats,” he later labels Ted Rall as a leftists and tried to label Howard Dean as a liberal. Ted Rall of course endorsed Howard Dean and Howard Dean’s blog touted the endorsement which means that at least one of these individuals (most likely Dean) has been mislabled. 😉
My main problem is that many people use “leftist” and “liberal” interchangeably, and “the Left” and “liberals” interchangeably.
Totally with Katherine on this one. I don’t profess to know how prominent truly Left-Wing politics is in the US (it’s still pretty strong in the UK, no matter what New Labour would have you believe), but sometimes it seems as though certain, shall we call them ‘pundits’, imagine that anyone not Right Wing is automatically Left.
It’s as though, because there is no Left in the sense it exists elsewhere in the world (I’ve always presumed this is due to the strong anti-socialist/communist mindset in the US), the political scale has been redefined for simplicity’s sake.
“Whether one favors a punitive income tax designed to tax people at a higher rate for being more productive is more relevant than whether one does it because they want to be “fair” (implying that there is something “unfair” about some people earning more money than others) or just because they “hate” people who earn more.”
Classic. Never let it be said that you even bother trying to view anything from a disagreeing viewpoint.
Whether one favors a punitive income tax designed to tax people at a higher rate for being more productive is more relevant than whether one does it because they want to be “fair” (implying that there is something “unfair” about some people earning more money than others) or just because they “hate” people who earn more.
Thorley, you’re using the term “punitive” in a novel sense, and your assertion that the basis for progressive taxation ranges from “fairness” to “hatred of the rich” relies on a caricature of economics. Not all dollars are equally valuable; indeed, of a $100,000 wage, the first $10,000 is far more valuable than the last $10,000 because the first $10,000 tends to go to necessities while the last tend to go to luxuries. (The theory is called that of marginal utility, and holds that the utility of each additional dollar is generally less than the utility of the dollar that preceeds it.)
A progressive tax rate accounts for the fact that the formula of “dollars to utility” actually varies, and accordingly taxes the high-utility dollars less than the low-utility ones. A truly flat rate doesn’t account for this variance, and therefore taxes incorrectly.
Now, we can quibble over where the rates should be set, what constitutes a necessity or luxury, etc. But progressive taxation really is the only game in town because it’s the only manner of taxation that is capable for accounting for the true value of the dollars being taxed. (Some, for instance, have proposed imposing a flat tax after the first $20,000-or-so in income — but this is essentially a modified progressive tax, not a true flat tax. It’s still “penalizing,” in your words, people who earn more than $20,000/year.)
Michael Totten tries his hand at political taxidermy, separating the “liberals” from the “leftists.”
Taxidermy? Taxonomy? Aw, who cares?
Taxidermy? Taxonomy? Aw, who cares?
Shhhhh, Slartibartfast.
(I kinda liked the mental image of the ANSWER people of the world stuffed and displayed on Mr. Totten’s walls.)
Katherine (watch me bold like von, wee), PoMO feminism is Postmodern feminism, which is really just Marxism repackaged as feminism: gender is “socially constructed,” society should be radically remade, the “patriarchy” must be smashed, etc. Liberal feminism says “society can be better,” “men and women are different but should have equal rights,” etc.
Thorley, you keep using that phrase “straw man.” I do not think it means what you think it means. And you lost me on the rest of that comment. For what it’s worth, I have no interest in setting up a “straw man” to say liberals are good and leftists are bad. I’m a conservative, and liberals are generally going to disagree with me on most issues. I liked Totten’s article because it’s an attack on fringebaiting, a particular bugaboo of mine.
Stinson gets a five-point bonus for the Princess Bride reference.
I hate to quibble, von, but my long-ago undergrad econ memory suggests to me that that’s a novel concept of marginal utility that you’re using. Marginal utility, as I remember it, refers not to a total $100,000 basket of goods, but of individual items. I have a lot of use, for example, for one Lexus, but not a lot for a second, and almost none at all for the third, fourth and fifth.
But in dollars, assuming your $100,000 salary and $10,000 in necessities, each of those remaining $90,000 might have nearly equal utility, because I might spend each dollar, or set of dollar, on different things. I might buy a Lexia, and a big-screen TV, and a vacation in France, all of which carry an approximately equal number of utils.
I could be way off-base here, but is marginal utility really applied to increasing salary itself as you put forth? I can’t imagine an upper bound of utility on salary; in fact, my utility for salary increases with each additional dollar, because I can then purchase something that my previous prioritizing and opportunity costs had prevented me from purchasing before.
Now, we can quibble over where the rates should be set, what constitutes a necessity or luxury, etc.
Luxuries are things I have that you want and can’t afford. Or vice-versa. 🙂
I could be way off-base here, but is marginal utility really applied to increasing salary itself as you put forth? I can’t imagine an upper bound of utility on salary; in fact, my utility for salary increases with each additional dollar, because I can then purchase something that my previous prioritizing and opportunity costs had prevented me from purchasing before.
This hardly seems logical or sensible. Are you seriously arguing that the money a person requires in order to pay their rent or buy their food carries lesser or equal weight than what they have left over for entertainment?
No, I’m arguing that salary, or income, is not subject to decreasing marginal utility as individual goods are. All individuals have their preferences for leisure time vs. work time, or high- vs. low-stress jobs, and might make decisions on jobs/salary on that basis.
But I have never — ever, ever, ever — encountered an actual human being who said, “No, please do not increase my income, because I can’t think of a single thing to spend the additional dollar on. Every dollar I make over and above my current salary is less and less useful to me.” If nothing else, they can spend it on savings or investments.
Something tells me that, for the legendary Economic Man, and ceteris paribus, dollars of income are subject to increasing marginal utility. If they aren’t, then my understanding of microeconomics is even farther gone than I thought.
None of this is to agree or disagree with von’s contention that a progressive tax is “the only game in town,” just that I don’t think decreasing MU is the reason why.