One problem with liberalism
Kevin links to this post by Calpundit that touches upon why some people are liberal. Calpundit says:
I believe that the purpose of government (and civilization in general) is to force people to act like decent human beings even if they don’t want to.
Kevin says:
That is part of the reason why I am a liberal, because I believe the rules of society can, eventually, set the internal “rules” for individuals.
It is also why the current nasty incarnation of conservatism bothers me so much. If you reward nasty, brutish, unsociable behavior, then you will get nasty, brutish, unsociable people. If you weaken the social contract, you create a society with a set of rules that allows for unpleasant behavior to be seen as acceptable.
SayUncle says:
A premise that our government is based on is minimal impact of said government into the lives of citizens. The Constitution does not grant citizens rights. The Constitution assumes that these rights are God-given (or natural for you atheists, maybe the better term is preexisting) and serves to limit the government’s ability to infringe on these rights.
In essence, Kevin and Calpundit are stating that because a few people can’t handle or abuse their preexisting freedom, that the government needs to intervene by force. This is the type of thinking that leads to the infringement of our rights. In addition, it sets a precedent that the many must suffer for the few. Or that many must pay for the few.
The facts are that no matter what sort of social contract is in existence, there will be people inclined to abuse their rights and the system. And you can not legislate around that in every instance. What should society do? Instead of taking a shotgun approach to solving the problem (i.e., mandating penalties for everyone), an effort should be made to identify the specific abusers and punish them instead of the whole population.
Kevin, you’re no longer leaning left, you fell left and hit your head.
