There is no left-wing, right-wing or center, just Progressives and Authoritarians

George Lakoff gets it (mostly) right. The idea that there are political left-wingers, political right-winters and political centrists is a fiction, created by People who do not understand people or politics. The apparent linear spectrum is a creation of ignorant people who want unrelated things to be related.

There are two systems of values and modes of thought -- call them progressive and conservative (or nurturant and strict, as I have). There are total progressives, who use a progressive mode of thought on all issues. And total conservatives. And there are lots of folks who are what I've called "biconceptuals": progressive on certain issue areas and conservative on others. But they don't form a linear scale. They are all over the place: progressive on domestic policy, conservative on foreign policy; conservative on economic policy, progressive on foreign policy and social issues; conservative on religion, but progressive on social issues and foreign policy; and on and on. No linear scale. No single set of values defining a "center." Indeed many of such folks are not moderate in their views; they can be quite passionate about both their progressive and conservative views. [Snip]

Get rid of the very idea of the right and the left and the center. American ideas are fundamentally progressive ideas -- the ideas this country was founded on and that carry forth that spirit. Progressives care about people and the earth, and act with responsibility and strength on that care.

The progressive view of government is simple. Progressive government has two aspects: protection and empowerment. Protection is far more than the military, police, and fire departments. It includes consumer protection, worker protection, environmental protection, public health, food and drug safety; social security, and other safety nets. It also includes protection from the government itself, and hence a balance of powers, openness, fundamental rights, and so on.

Empowerment include roads and bridges; public education; government-developed communications like the internet and satellite communications systems; the banking system; the SEC and institutions that make a stock market possible, and the court system, mostly about contracts and corporate law. Progressive government makes business possible. No one makes any money in this country without the progressive empowerment by government. A progressive foreign policy is not based solely, or even mainly, on the state -- about the "national interest" defined as our military strength and GDP. Progressive foreign policy focuses on individual people's interests as well as national interests: on poverty, disease, refugees, education, women's and children's issues, public health, and so on.

These are simply American values. The progressive movement is a patriotic American movement. People who call themselves "centrists" share progressive views on important issue areas, but have conservative views on other major issue areas. The areas vary from person to person. There is no single moral perspective, no single set of agreed upon issues.

I disagree with Lakoff that there are progressives and conservatives. There are actually progressives and authoritarians. Progressives want to empower other people. Authoritarians, operating from fear of those who are different from them or who are not under their power, want to control and tyrannize others.

People who cannot understand comedy are authoritarians. Authoritarians cannot accept the ambiguity that is the bedrock of good comedy. They base their decisions and actions on fear of being wrong or of losing something, or on fear that someone else will get something they don't have. Authoritarians demand certainty and control of those near them. That's why the authoritarians like Tom DeLay have removed the progressive Republicans from their Party.

We Democrats have strayed too far from Progressivism. Instead of fear, progressivism is based on respect for others, curiosity regarding the unknown and a tolerence for ambiguity (assuming that it will be resolved in its own time.) It is time to return to the roots of America.