View From a Height

What Do They Stand For?

The folks over at ProgressNow are having a little identity crisis.

Some are talking about how we can "frame" our issues better. Others are arguing over a list of common values or positions. But it's really the same conversation -- What do we stand for?

So, in the spirit of the conservative manifesto The Wisdom of Crowds (although one might be tempted to question the wisdom of this crowd), they've thrown the floor open for suggestions.

Well, when an old boss like JB calls for help, how can I refuse?

• We stand for activist judges - when we agree with them.
  
• We stand with our enemies and against our country.
  
• We stand for the environment.
  
• We stand for interpreting "the environment" to mean anything we like, robbing it of practical value but not of practical effect.
  
• We stand for "fairness."
  
• We stand for income redistribution as fairness.
  
• We stand for racial preferences as fairness, even after they have long outlived their usefulness.
  
• We stand for the Victim Society as "fairness."
  
• We stand for the balkanization of the culture as "fairness."
  
• We stand for subsidizing poverty as "fairness."
  
• We stand for religion - cleansed from the public square.
  
• We stand for the socializing of as much of society as possible.
  
• We stand for income tax withholding as a means of hiding the true costs of that socializing.
  
• We stand for public education - according to our orthodoxies.
  
• We stand for the restriction of free political speech.
  
• We stand for the laundering of political money through unions.
  
• Finally, We stand for plausible deniability of this list. Which is where your suggestions come in.
  

"To succeed, we need to be able to answer such a question during an elevator ride."

No, not because by the time they finish, people will be fighting over the emergency phone and lifting each other through the maintenance panel on the ceiling.

Because with them, it really is still about words, not ideas.