When I was a child, then a teenager, and then a young adult, the words liberal, moderate and conservative meant something far different than what they mean now.

In those days, a liberal was a person who stood for human rights, and was a staunch supporter of Israel, and of democracy. A liberal tended to think that the government was the ‘answer’ to many problems then, just as now, but in no other respect is there any similarity. Liberals then stood up for the rights of the oppressed, advocated women’s rights, and defended freedom of speech and of the press. They were lovers of their Country - just as much so as their conservative brethren.

Back then, a conservative was one who believed in fiscal restraint and private enterprise. They advocated that the government not spend beyond its means, and promoted the idea that human needs should be met by the Church and by private charities and individuals. They always had as their major goal a balanced budget for the government.

The one thing that was pretty much taken for granted in those days was that the Democrats and Republicans in Washington expressed their differing views in a gentlemanly manner, and then set about to do constructive things in a spirit of give and take, and compromise. Senators and Members of the House could do battle on the floors of Congress and then go out to dinner together as friends.

Now everything is topsy-turvy. Oh, there are a few old traditional liberals and conservatives out there, but they’ll seldom, if ever, be found in Washington, D.C. No the ‘liberals’ of today are a different breed, and the ‘conservatives’, too. Now battles are waged between the Neo-Cons (or ‘new conservatives’), and the Far-Left. Battles are vicious, based on mean-spirited personal attacks and outrageous lies from both sides. Regular citizens are left wondering who is what, and what to believe. And with no real news media left in America, they can’t even find out what’s going on from that now-vanished source. The so-called media of today are merely alternate entertainment channels and propaganda machines for their right or left points of view. Where is truth?

The so-called liberals of today may say they are interested in human rights, but they give the lie to the statement by favoring terrorists over law-abiding people, and terrorist organizations over duly-constituted democratic governments. The prime example is their advocacy on behalf of organizations like Hamas and Hezbolah over the government of Israel. They cry over the rights of those who killed 3,000 people in the World Trade Center in 2001, but turn their heads when the Taliban hangs, or shoots in the back of the head, women who are not completely covered in cloth. It concerns them not at all that women are treated as chattel property under Taliban rule, or that these barbaric thugs kill doctors, teachers, lawyers, and others who have an education, wishing to plunge the territories they occupy back into the Dark Ages. They defend the freedom of speech only of those who agree with them, and seek to silence by intimidation, character assassination, and threats anyone who dares disagree with them. Any woman who disagrees with them is not entitled to the defense of her liberty to believe differently, or to express her views or lead a different life-style. Instead, she will be personally attacked by a pack of left-wing she-wolves and ripped to pieces.

Going beyond the old liberal belief that the government was the answer to many problems, they now advocate a system whereby the government is the where-all and end-all, controlling all segments of our society in such a way that initiative and free-enterprise shall no longer exist. They now, rather than expressing love for and pride in their Country, would rather berate and demonize it, refusing to call terrorists by that name while ascribing it to patriotic American citizens who don’t believe as they do. They no longer advocate freedom of speech, having replaced it with political correctness. In the same manner, they wish to silence all media that is not left-wing in its dogma and remove them from the airwaves.

The so-called modern conservatives are likewise nothing like their forebears. When recently in power for twelve straight years, and absolute power for the last six of those twelve, they spent money like the most liberal of liberals, running up the largest government deficits in history and indebting our Country to such counties as Communist China into the trillions of dollars. That the liberals, under Obama, are now quadrupling that debt does not diminish the magnitude of their folly, and of their betrayal of their own professed ideals and beliefs. The only difference is in the identity of the principal  recipients of their welfare payments. Strangely, they seem to be greater advocates for the freedom of expression and exchange of ideas now than the old advocates of such things - the liberals. Topsy-turvy.

The neo-conservatives of today engage in the same extremist, hateful and misleading gutter politics as their far-left counter-parts, twisting the facts to suit their own political agenda, and lying to the American people to arouse them to attack the opposition. They often talk the talk of the old conservatives of yesteryear, but they seldom walk the walk, just as the far-left verbalizes but then betrays the old liberal ideals, betraying their Country and her people in the process. Rhetoric, on both extremes, is not backed up by corresponding actions, but by behaviors that betray their very words. These ‘neos’ mix false rhetoric and false premises in with genuine conservative values in order to lead their hearers into traps which cause them to follow or defend these sooth-sayers in ignorance of the truth.  Who among them is to be trusted? None! Who on the ‘new left’? None!

As I look back, I see now that our Country has moved so far away from her heritage, her principles, her core beliefs, and the heart-swelling patriotism of old that those who were once considered middle of the road, moderate people are now observed to be on the far-right fringes by the mainstream media. They are even called, by some in Washington, ‘dangerous’ and ‘a threat to national security’. Those who were once looked upon as liberals are now traitors to the socialist cause, and the subject of attacks from the far-left. And the conservatives of old are no more, gone like the dinosaur. Once upon a time, virtually all Americans were patriots, believing in the principles set forth by the Founding Fathers and having a deep and abiding love for their Country, regardless of whether they were liberal or conservative in philosophy. How have we gone so far astray? And why? America desperately, like a patient on life-support, needs to return to the honest values once taken for granted here.

No one in those days was labeled a traitor, or unpatriotic, or an extremist, and neighbor did not attack neighbor just because their political beliefs or views were a little different. There was a widely held, almost universal, belief in the principle of fair play. All believed in democracy and the democratic process as a given fact. It was the way, the system. No one thought any different, but for a few in the lunatic fringe, and those few were tolerated as such. Now, the open expression of one’s views in this Country can bring vicious ridicule, invasion of one’s private life, and even death threats. Worse, these threats often extend to one’s spouse and children. Attacks are merciless, personal, and crude. There is no shame. There is no decency.

People several decades back, but well within my lifetime, had a basic decency which would be unrecognizable to many in today’s society. There is little decency, or even morality, now. The behavior of the rudest and crudest of people is now excused on the basis of “that’s just the way he is”, and expressions of hatred are rampant. Almost insane ranting issues from all corners, spewing out hatred and intolerance. Such behavior, and attacks upon Christianity, upon private charity, upon personal dignity, even upon tolerance itself, would be a shock to the conscience of our Country just a few decades ago and would be soundly denounced from all across the spectrum of society.

Left in the dust of today’s political arena are average, hard-working and moderate-thinking American citizens. The voices which are being heard are shouting from the extreme fringes of our society, left and right, while those in the middle are ignored and even made fun of, or simply dismissed as irrelevant. Even our President haughtily laughs at, ridicules, and brushes aside those Americans who make this Country what it is - or was. Our very liberties are hanging in the balance. Our Constitution and Bill of Rights are being sacrificed upon the alters of political expediency and one-world government. If this movement is not arrested, all that our forebears fought and died for us to enjoy will be no more. Few in Washington seem to understand even the basic tenants of democracy and of those once-sacred rights we citizens once held so dear - the right to bear arms in order to safeguard our liberties, freedom of speech and of the press, the right to peaceably worship as we choose, and to have that right respected, not ridiculed and attacked.

And then there are our children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren who, in our ignorant and short-sighted greed, and in the carnage being created in our head-long rush to create a Socialist State, will be buried under a debt so staggering, so huge, that they will remain buried under its onerous weight for a life-time, being thus deprived of the promise which once was there for all Americans. Our sense of ‘entitlement’ and our insatiable appetite for instant gratification, combined with our wimpish demands not to have to suffer pain, economic or otherwise, will rob them of their future and their potential.

Where are the liberals, conservatives and moderates of old, who sat down together and hammered out legislation, and a society, that respected the rights and opinions of all, and saw this as one, indivisible, great Nation? Where are those in politics who put our own citizens first, ahead of illegal immigrants and bloodthirsty terrorists? Where are those who held the ‘great experiment’ that was America sacred? Let me tell you, they are still there, only not in Washington, D.C., nor on Wall Street, nor in Hollywood. The salvation of America is not in those places but in our own communities, and within our own hearts. We must stand up for America and, as the song says “defend her still today”. We, the American people, are the only hope for the future of America and for our children’s children. We must take the high road of patriotism, selflessness and sacrifice, as so many of our forebears have done before us.

God bless America. Let us “defend her still today”. Let us do so together, as in days gone by - Americans all, respecting one another’s differences but also observing our commonality. America is deserving of more than we have given her of late. Let’s do better, for love of Country and our fellow man.

Copyright April 23rd, 2009, by Tom Woodard

NOTE: The reader will notice that I avoided the appellations ‘Democrat’ and ‘Republican’. My belief is that using those terms would detract from the deeper meaning and message of ‘Topsy-turvy’, and if you read the article with those terms in mind, I ask that you go back and read it again, excluding them from your thought processes as you do so. The concerns and observations I express here go more to the core of who we are, and who we should be, as a people, than mere political party affiliation.

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