#liberal

We are all familiar with intellectuals who speak only on behalf of their country, class, religion, 'race,' 'gender,' or 'sexual orientation,' and who shape their opinions according to what they take to be the interest of their affinity of birth or predilection. But the distinctive feature of the liberal intellectual in past times was precisely the striving for universality; not the unworldly or disingenuous denial of sectional identification but the sustained effort to transcend that identification in search of truth or the general interest. . . . In today's America, neoconservatives generate brutish policies for which liberals provide the ethical fig leaf. There really is no other diifference between them. ↗

— Tony Judt

#intellectual #liberal #religion

If Islam was to be saved, it would be saved by the crazy ones. ↗

— Michael Muhammad Knight

#liberalism #religion #religion

When Republicans recently charged the President with promoting 'class warfare,' he answered it was 'just math.' But it's more than math. It's a matter of morality. Republicans have posed the deepest moral question of any society: whether we're all in it together. Their answer is we're not. President Obama should proclaim, loudly and clearly, we are. ↗

— Robert B. Reich

#class-warfare #conservatism #economics #liberalism #mathematics

In essence I find that the foundation of modern conservatism is driven by a clinging to God in fear of the world, whereas the foundation of modern liberalism is a clinging to the world in fear of God; albeit, the true foundation should be one's clinging to God in fear of God. ↗

— Criss Jami

#belief #clinging #conservatism #conservative #essence

Justice is the first virtue of social institutions, as truth is of systems of thought. A theory however elegant and economical must be rejected or revised if it is untrue; likewise laws and institutions no matter how efficient and well-arranged must be reformed or abolished if they are unjust. Each person possesses an inviolability founded on justice that even the welfare of society as a whole cannot override. For this reason justice denies that the loss of freedom for some is made right by a greater good shared by others. It does not allow that the sacrifices imposed on a few are outweighed by the larger sum of advantages enjoyed by many. Therefore in a just society the liberties of equal citizenship are taken as settled; the rights secured by justice are not subject to political bargaining or to the calculus of social interests. ↗

— John Rawls

#individuals #justice #liberalism #philosophy #social-institutions

At the heart of liberalism really is a hatred for God and a belief that government should replace God. ↗

— Todd Akin

#god #government #hatred #heart #liberalism

I hate liberality - nine times out of ten it is cowardice, and the tenth time lack of principle. ↗

— Henry Addington

#hate #i #lack #liberality #nine

Every fundamentalist movement I've studied in Judaism, Christianity and Islam is convinced at some gut, visceral level that secular liberal society wants to wipe out religion. ↗

— Karen Armstrong

#convinced #every #fundamentalist #gut #i

I can't believe the pro-choicers attitude toward unborn children-to me it's the ultimate liberal cause, to defend those without a voice. ↗

— Michael Aston

#believe #cause #defend #i #liberal

Good for you, you have a heart, you can be a liberal. Now, couple your heart with your brain, and you can be a conservative. ↗

— Glenn Beck

#conservative #couple #good #heart #liberal