Tuesday, July 22, 2003

LT Smash has another great post, this one his analysis of the Blair speech. Yes, he’s a little late on this, but give him a break - he’s fighting a war.

Snippety snippet:

It occurs to me, upon reading these words, that the current British Prime Minister is indeed a rare specimen among modern politicians:

Tony Blair is a liberal.

Well of course he’s a liberal, you say. After all, he’s the leader of the Labor Party in Britain, and they are the party of the left, and as we all know, liberals are leftists, right?

This is where the meaning of words becomes important. “Liberal” does not mean “leftist.” Indeed, most leftists aren’t liberal at all. The word “liberal” comes from the same root as the word “liberty,” which is synonymous with “freedom.” In the Eighteenth Century, when it first came into popular usage, it described those brave souls who struggled against authority to achieve greater freedoms for their fellow men. Visionaries like Thomas Paine, Benjamin Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson.

UPDATE (Wed AM): Sorry about the lack of the link. It’s been fixed…