Liberals and Others

K. Anthony Appiah has a Slate article on the essence of liberalism. He was reviewing a book by Alan Wolfe, and one or both of them came up with seven qualitites that they thought characertized the liberal:

Four of these dispositions will be quite familiar: "a sympathy for equality," "an inclination to deliberate," "a commitment to tolerance," and "an appreciation of openness." We're used to the portrayal: liberals as talky, tolerant, open-minded, egalitarians. It's not surprising, then, that these types are at home in the garrulous world of the academy—or that bossy preachers, convinced they have the one true story, do not care for them much. But Wolfe's sketch of the liberal adds three unfamiliar elements to the picture: "a disposition to grow," "a preference for realism," and "a taste for governance."

The disposition to grow is really not the best slogan for the element of the liberal tradition that Wolfe is trying to capture with this phrase. What he means to resurrect is the faith that we can remake ourselves.

The two the especially interest me are tolerance and openness - because those are the qualities most missing in the ideologues of extremes. Facist, communist, and religious fanatic abjure and abhor these qualities. Such people seem compelled to divide the world into us and them, ally and demon. These qualities are what make them so dangerous - they are always trying to fight battles. They are incapable of seeing common purpose or goals.

Rush Limbaugh is typical. At a time of maximum danger for the country, he sees only an opportunity to damage his internal foes - and to hell with the country in the process. His ideas have failed, so all he thinks of is taking America down with him. That's why he and his fellow wingnuts want Obama to fail, even though the future of the country is at stake.

Of course such people exist in every sort of political context. Even, oddly enough, in science.