Reply #1: "America is now more liberal than it has been since the early 1960s" [View All]

I have said this several times on DU -- most recently during the survey of DUers on the Political Compass -- only to be met with a Grand Silence (and a small group of courageous souls who saw the point I was trying to make).

There's no question that we've elected people who are far to the right of the mainstream ... further to the right than ever before in our history, imho.

All the marketing of labels and vitriolic rhetoric has served to mask the basic 'mainstream' attitudes of the vast majority. People are notoriously unwilling to call themselves 'liberal' despite some baseline values that make it inescapable. As long as one stays away from "trigger language" it becomes obvious in virtually any conversation regarding values. Despite this, we've been sold a bill of goods that inclines us to see an elected politician needing some "other" posture ... somehow a bit different from us ... as though our own values aren't somehow good enough to get elected or accomplish anything. It's sad.