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Musicmystery -> RE: Please welcome Sanity to the Center! (3/13/2010 8:15:06 AM)
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When I talk of moderate Democrats, liberal Democrats, conservative Democrats, for example, these are not empty labels, but positions assignable to actual people and representatives. On health care, for example, moderate Democrats want an affordable compromise. Liberal Democrats want a public option--so strongly that they'll threaten to vote against any measure without it. Conservative Democrats oppose a public option--so strongly that they'll threaten to vote against any measure that contains it.
So when people talk about being "center-right," to the left of them should be moderate positions, center-left positions, liberal and very liberal positions--not just "liberal," and to their right should be "conservative" and "very conservative" positions. REAL positions that many real people hold, not possibilities like corporal punishment in schools that are not in fact being advocated.
The Gallup poll shows 40% of people identifying as conservative, 31% resisting the "very conservative" label. Why? What are these "very conservative positions they just can't support?
Then we've got a substantial chunk, 35%, more than a third, identifying as "moderate"--not liberal, and not conservative either. What are their positions? It's all fine to say labels don't mean anything, but clearly they do---especially when we talk about electing moderates, or voting out moderates. Look at conservative Republicans and their "rino" hunt--what about those moderates is the problem (although the hunters use the term liberal instead)?
And if you accept the poll results, only 21% are liberal, including the "very liberal"--roughly one fifth. This hardly paints a picture of left vs. right. Yet all the opposing views from the "center right" appear to be "liberal." Just going by numbers, just going by common sense when looking at sides and middles, clearly there's uncovered territory there.
Yet when asked, so far, the "center right"--go ahead and call it conservative if you like--can't (or won't) point to more conservative positions held by either people or their representatives. Guess what? If there's no one to the right of you, you are one end of the continuum. And if liberals are just a fifth on the end, almost twice as many moderates hold positions other than those "center right" positions that are not liberal, but moderate. Where do those distinctions stand?
That's my problem with center right. It sounds just like right wing conservative.
Or, as most people would use the term, perhaps this means the part of the moderate 35% toward the right side of that moderate group. OK. Then there should DEFINITELY be conservative positions too right for these people, along with moderate ones that lean left, then liberal.
In short---this "center right" designation is meaningless. It buys into the left/right paradigm by pretending the right IS the middle, and therefore there is no middle.
And that makes no sense--logically or to Gallup. It's a way to pretend conservative views are mainstream. They aren't. It's another way to pretend moderates don't exist.
If you're moderate, or center right, what's to your right? If nothing really, you aren't moderate, and you aren't center right. You're just conservative.
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