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Books in Review
The House of Liberalism
(Page 2 of 2)
The net effect of Wolfe’s uneven critique can be unintentionally humorous. Wolfe unfairly ascribes to opponents of illegal immigration “no generosity of spirit,” “no heartwarming accounts” of the American dream realized, “no sense that all cultures have something to value,” “no appreciation of the underlying universality of all people,” and “no acknowledgement” that we “could use an injection of new ideas and entrepreneurial energy.” In practice, however, “from the perspective of a Kantian commitment to openness, the least an American can do is to welcome a certain amount of immigration from Africa”—hardly a point, at least as stated, on which the average border security activist would argue.
Behind the sneering, perhaps, Wolfe isn’t so bad after all—nor, relative to the commandments of the extreme left, is his liberalism. “There is a liberal bargain with respect to immigration as there is with respect to religion,” he reasons. “Its basic premise is this: we will be open to you if you are open to us.” Wolfe points to Britain’s liberal foreign minister, Jack Straw, who “felt that something is seriously wrong when, in conversation with another person, he cannot engage in face-to-face interaction.” Saying so would have made a nice ecumenical touch, but Wolfe has left out more than one voice that would greatly strengthen his argument. The exclusion of Tocqueville, especially, is deeply perplexing, given how central Wolfe makes the inevitability of equality and modernity to his thesis.
In sum, The Future of Liberalism is seriously flawed as a book, but as a book that contains a timely, nuanced, and even brave message: liberalism is not undifferentiated leftism; its best ideas are in its past, not its future; and liberals today must reject blind progressivism if they wish to recapture their convictions. A book that fundamentally fails in its subsidiary task of tarring conservatism with a single brush, The Future of Liberalism succeeds in its primary, more important, task: reminding the political left of its deep roots in a cultural tradition right at the heart of Western civilization. Wolfe may frequently frustrate, but he seems to be heading away from the outrageous in favor of the simply arguable: good territory on which to fight political battles between fellow citizens.
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Michael Tomlinson| 5.12.09 @ 10:12AM
What Wolfe and Democrats fail to recognize is that their political party is not a traditional liberal party, but is instead a neo-fascist party based on the principle of rule by an oligarchy of self-serving politicians (illustrated most effectively by Barack Obama) and a faceless and mindless bureaucracy bent on increasing its power and insuring its jobs whether necessary or not.
As we watch BO seize control of companies, brow beat medical provider into turning their patients over to his "tender" care and observe the 1st, 2d, 10th, 11th and 14th Amendments become doormats we're witnessing modern fascism in all its subtlety attempt to subvert our democrat republican traditions.
If we want to see where BO wants to take the US we need only look at once communist China (now a fascist state run by a political oligarchy). The Democrat/liberal ideal is exactly what China is -- a state that controls or manages every aspect of life and business while oppressing free thinkers, Christians and any who stand in its way.
Hopefully, since BO is mirroring anti-Semite Jimmy Carter his fate will be the same as self-interest causes the American people to rebel at the polls as rampant unemployment, skyrocketing inflation, declining health care and a weak dollar lead to a rapidly collapsing standard of living. Then the 40 year "Democrat Reich" prophesied by James Carville (the Cajun Goebbels) will join its German, Italian and Japanese forefathers in the ash bin of history where it deserves to be.
Old Texican| 5.12.09 @ 2:35PM
2010 will be way too late to turn the country around.
Peaceful Civil disobedience ,right now,seems to be the only answer. I am looking for suggestions about how we just sit down on the job or something. The tea parties were a splendid first step. What can we do to pnish the statists where they live? (on our money)
Old Texican| 5.12.09 @ 2:37PM
OOPs! typo: "punish" was intended.
ben| 5.12.09 @ 4:58PM
Quit. There'syour answer. Quit your jobs, shutter your businesses. Then go to DC with the demand that all of our elected officials resign immediately. We will need a federal government and can discuss how to reestablish one in accordance with the constitution but first things first, get the crooks out. Without our money or willing submission the governmnet has no power. We the people of this country have the power to do whatever we want, we should use it.
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