liberalismos

And the difference over competing policies stems from a more fundamental disagreement between left and right about the primacy of the factors that menace freedom. Progressive liberals see inequality as the chief menace to freedom and government as an essential part of the solution. For libertarian liberals, who like progressives think that freedom yields progress and like conservatives stress that freedom depends on limits, it is government that is the chief menace to freedom, and the restraint of government is freedom’s essential safeguard. And for CONSERVATIVE LIBERALS, both of the traditional and neoconservative variety, it is the excess of freedom and equality that poses the biggest threat to freedom, and government is seen as both friend and foe in the battle to limit freedom and equality on behalf of freedom and equality.

Peter Berkowitz