General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: The United States is the most hated country in the world. [View all]NCTraveler
(30,481 posts)"The liberal believes that the group has a right to control every aspect of everyone's life. He may permit many freedoms, but only those of which liberals approve. Abstract or general freedom holds no appeal for him. The limbic instinct of the inveterate liberal is to harry, regulate, and stifle the individual, of whose penchant for independent action he is profoundly distrustful.
Of course he does not think that he is stifling and imposing, but improving and instructing. For the unwilling he has no patience. The liberal is a creature of the homiletic herd, like a gnu wielding tracts, and believes in the the masses, in their infinite plasticity and potential for uplift and betterment, guided by him. Particularly he wants to uplift those who do not want to be uplifted, as their independence might be infectious. He sees himself in the capacity of the patient mother of a society of wayward two-year-olds who must be diapered, formed, and taught.
Thus his love of government in all its meddlesome intrusiveness, pedestrian witlessness, and unrestrained drive for dominion. He or rather more often, she knows that without coercion, some people will not do as they ought: that they will besot themselves, behave wrongheadedly, teach their children heaven knows what, and march off in all different directions. They must be restrained. And since the restrained usually find ways of evading the constricting tentacles, ever more and more-detailed laws must be enacted to thwart each new escape. Thus the government will eventually come to dictate the altitude, material, color, shape, texture, and compressive strength of toilet seats.
Liberalism is a feminine creed, embodying the kindness, short horizons, modest familiarity with reason, and placidity of the sex. It wants to buy people nice things without reflecting on how to pay for them. It believes in goodness but doesn't often get much further, being benevolent while falling short of beneficence. As good mothers will, it tries to protect everyone from everything."
http://www.lewrockwell.com/reed/reed53.html