Tag Archives: US liberals

The Weekly Standard: A Few good liberals

Liberalism stands strong in the United Kingdom.

“WHO TODAY IS CALLED a liberal for strength and confidence in defense of liberty?” Harvey Mansfield asked this question almost 30 years ago in the preface to his Spirit of Liberalism, and the answer was almost self-evident. This was during the Carter administration, and things haven’t gotten better since. There have been some exceptions to the rule of liberalism’s weakness, but these exceptions have been fleeting, and the rule seems stronger than ever in the America of 2006.

“Not so in Great Britain. There, Tony Blair has shown strength and confidence in defense of liberty, and it turns out he is not alone. A couple of weeks ago, a group of “democrats and progressives” released the “Euston Manifesto” (eustonmanifesto.org) proposing to draw a line between a soft and relativist left and the strong and confident democratic left that the signers seek to invigorate.”

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The American Spectator: Going back to Euston

I am European. I am liberal. I am a supporter of the U.S.-led intervention in Iraq.

Sometimes it feels like a meeting attended by every person who shares those traits could be held in a closet.

“But that feeling, it has transpired, is wrong. Late last month, a group of left-of-center academics, journalists, and bloggers in Britain published “The Euston Manifesto.”

“The manifesto—which I played no part in formulating, but to which I am a signatory—displays clear-sightedness, realism and moral consistency. Those are precisely the values that I believe large swathes of the Left, in the U.S., the UK, and elsewhere in Europe including my native Ireland, have abandoned.

“The Euston Manifesto is not officially a “pro-war” document. The group that drew it up included some people who disagreed with the invasion. But the signatories are united in their recognition that the overthrow of Saddam Hussein’s “reactionary, semi-fascist and murderous” regime was “a liberation of the Iraqi people.”

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