What’s So New About Liberal Ideas?

Image via WikipediaThis is a great column by Frank J. Fleming over at Pajamas Media

So in this country we have the liberals — the progressives — and their new ideas to change the country and lead us forward. And not just lead us forward, but win the future. Their obstacles are the conservatives who are scared of change and stuck in their old ways of thinking. Conservatives get angry at the thought of change, but liberals love change, embrace the new, and break the status quo.

At least that’s the conventional wisdom: The right in this country preserves old, stale ideas while the left fights for new ones. Which leads me to what seems to be a really obvious question: What, if any, of the ideas of liberals these days are new?

Like with the election of Obama, it was supposed to be this big progressive revolution. It seemed to me more of a reactionary thing where people were sick of Bush and latched onto the first seemingly inoffensive guy they saw, but liberals assured us that this was the start of a new era — a new enlightenment. So what was the first big, new thing they did? With the economy hurting and people crying out for change, what brand new revolutionary idea did they get to first?

Have the government spend lots of money.

I’ll let that sink in for a moment. It’s a really new idea; it might take some time to comprehend a concept so novel and revolutionary as that one. I mean, it’s not like it’s the same solution the Democrats have had for everything for the past one hundred years. Maybe we should tell Europe about this brand new idea; let’s get this revolution of government spending lots of money to really spread.

And that wasn’t the only new idea the liberals had. They also had another innovative idea to save the failing car companies and fix health care. What was it? Well hold on to your hats, because it’s pretty crazy and fresh:

The government could take over private industry.

Obama on his embattled budget: Let's talk, but....

Obama on his embattled budget: Let's talk, but....

Sweeping hand gestures were the order of today as President Obama defended his budget at a news conference (full text below), reflecting widespread skepticism over the seriousness of his spending "cuts." At last, bipartisanship to believe in.

The Democrat invested 62 presidential minutes and about 8,000 chief executive words, many of them to defend his budget priorities. The first thing the nation needs to know is that President Obama is "confident." It's his new favorite phrase, supplanting "going forward."

But the Washington political community on both sides is also confident that the Democrat's immense budget is merely a placeholder for the real spending bargaining, which will come in the next two or three months over the budget and raising the debt ceiling.

Washington wonders why so many angry Americans talk back to the news on their TVs. Here's why: Federal spending the last two years has exploded. Never mind why. It has. Obama proposes cutting some of that increased spending. The result: Cuts to brag about but still more borrowed spending than before.

And for his next trick.....