Progress, as progressives understand it, means advancing away from, up from, something. But from what?<\/p>\n
\nFrom the Constitution\u2019s constricting anachronisms. In 1912, Wilson said, \u201cThe history of liberty is the history of the limitation of governmental power.\u201d But as Kesler notes, Wilson never said the future of liberty consisted of such limitation.\n
Instead, he said, \u201cevery means .\u2009.\u2009. by which society may be perfected through the instrumentality of government\u201d should be used so that \u201cindividual rights can be fitly adjusted and harmonized with public duties.\u201d Rights \u201cadjusted and harmonized\u201d by government necessarily are defined and apportioned by it. Wilson, the first transformative progressive, called this the \u201cNew Freedom.\u201d The old kind was the Founders\u2019 kind \u2014 government existing to \u201csecure\u201d natural rights (see the Declaration) that preexist government. Wilson thought this had become an impediment to progress. The pedigree of Obama\u2019s thought runs straight to Wilson.<\/p>\n
And through the second transformative progressive, Franklin Roosevelt, who counseled against the Founders\u2019 sober practicality and fear of government power: \u201cWe are beginning to wipe out the line that divides the practical from the ideal\u201d and are making government \u201can instrument of unimagined power\u201d for social improvement. The only thing we have to fear is fear of a government of unimagined power:<\/p>\n
\u201cGovernment is a relation of give and take.\u201d The \u201crulers\u201d \u2014 FDR\u2019s word \u2014 take power from the people, who in turn are given \u201ccertain rights.\u201d<\/p>\n
This, says Kesler, is \u201cthe First Law of Big Government: the more power we give the government, the more rights it will give us.\u201d It also is the ultimate American radicalism, striking at the roots of the American regime, the doctrine of natural rights. . . .<\/p>\n
As Kesler says, the logic of progressivism is: \u201cSince our rights are dependent on government, why shouldn\u2019t we be?\u201d This is the real meaning of Obama\u2019s most characteristic rhetorical trope, his incessant warning that Americans should be terrified of being \u201con your own.\u201d<\/p>\n
Obama, the fourth transformative progressive, had a chief of staff who said \u201cyou never want a serious crisis to go to waste.\u201d More than a century before that, a man who would become the first such progressive said that a crisis is a terrible thing not to create. Crises, said Wilson, are periods of \u201cunusual opportunity\u201d for gaining \u201ca controlling and guiding influence.\u201d So, he said, leaders should maintain a crisis atmosphere \u201cat all times.\u201d<\/p>\n
Campaigning in 1964, Lyndon Johnson, the third consequential progressive, exclaimed through a bull horn: \u201cI just want to tell you this \u2014 we\u2019re in favor of a lot of things and we\u2019re against mighty few.\u201d He learned this progressive vernacular from his patron, FDR, who envisioned \u201can unlimited civilization capable of infinite progress.\u201d Poet Archibald Mac\u00adLeish, FDR\u2019s choice for librarian of Congress, exemplified progressives\u2019 autointoxication: America has \u201cthe abundant means\u201d to create \u201cwhatever world we have the courage to desire\u201d and the ability to \u201ctake this country down\u201d and \u201cbuild it again as we please,\u201d to \u201ctake our cities apart and put them together,\u201d to lead our \u201crivers where we please to lead them,\u201d etc.<\/p>\n
via George Will: Obama\u2019s desire to transform the United States \u2013 The Washington Post<\/a>.<\/p><\/div>\n<\/blockquote><\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In line with the \u201cObama as Messiah\u201d post, here is another example of secularism turning into paganism.\u00a0 Godless people, trying to fill the void, can also invest the state with divine power and authority.\u00a0 Drawing on Charles R. Kesler\u2019s I Am the Change: Barack Obama and the Crisis of Liberalism, George Will shows that progressive […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1281,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,19,20],"tags":[300,1722,1813],"class_list":["post-12581","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-america","category-government","category-history","tag-big-government","tag-philosophy-of-government","tag-progressivism"],"yoast_head":"\n
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, George Will shows that progressive politics, from the beginning, has an intrinsic connection to the belief in unlimited government power that can then solve all problems:<\/p>\n