It's all one great big Liberal Conspiracy

[matgb]

Reasons why Mat should pay more attention to those messages he's got marked as "reply to when you've time"...
Liberal Conspiracy

That contributors list? That's a who's who of left-of-centre British blogging. Some I virtually always agree with, some I vehemently disagree with on most things. Suspect it'll be an interesting site. And I can pretty much guarantee that a fair few of the contributors will fail to understand Chris Dillow on more than one occasion. There are far too many people out there that think support for markets=right wing. Guys? It's the Tories that are supposed to be Stupid, remember? Except the liberal ones, who really ought to realise they're in the wrong party.

I barely have time to read my friends page, let alone comment, or update here. So why am I thinking of contributing to two super-blogs and maybe starting something else as well? Given the huge number of half-started projects on my to-do list...

Oh, wait, it's because I'm a lunatic. We knew that. Sleep? What is this sleep thing of which people speak?

Comments

[tyrell.livejournal.com]

I've set it up as liberalconsp_fd.

[miss-s-b.livejournal.com]

Thanks for that. Will be watching with interest.

[matgb]

That was what I meant to be doing, yes. Danke.

[tyrell.livejournal.com]

I'm quite excited, since as far as I can see there's no-one even left of centre in politics right now except the Greens, so there's certainly room to talk about it.

[burkesworks.livejournal.com]

Looks interesting, though I'm not sure what to make of it; see the eminently sensible comments by Anthony Barnett and "Gordon" as why I'll be initially treating this with some caution. It will be a feed I'll be keeping an eye on though; let's see how it pans out.

[matgb]

Aye, caution is the word, it does seem a little Labour centric, but then, the media is rather Labour centric, and given we need to either get Labour to remember what liberal means or persuade the genuinely liberal Labourites that they're in the wrong party, it might be a good plan.

[getawaywithit.livejournal.com]

I'm very sceptical about it to be honest - and might even post about it - as I find the assumption amongst some that 'liberal' and 'left' are synonymous to be very lazy and often wrong. They seem to be following the American definition whereby 'liberal'='not conservative' (and,of course, 'conservative'='not liberal') and defining yourself in terms of reaction to something is a bit dodgy, IMO. I think I also find the fact that they won't give a definition of what the 'liberal-left' is but expect to help work out 'what the liberal-left position should be' a little weird.

Still, might be worth watching for the moment when those who find it hard to complete a sentence without using the word 'progressive' get into a row with Daniel Davies (http://d-squareddigest.blogspot.com/2006/12/i-shit-on-progressives-of-this-planet.html).

[matgb]

Oh, I agree completely--any belief Sunny has that it'll be all sweetness and light is going to be scotched as soon as some of the illiberal left read Chris Dillow, or as soon as any of them try to figure out DD.

But pretty sure DD and Chris would be on board in order to attempt to persuade "lefties" that a Liberal answer is best, and given that's also our shared position for most things, it'll be worth trying out, even if it's more than likely doomed to fail. Regardless, it's a nice idea for a project, and almost certainly more likely to succeed as a 'super blog' than CiF or The Sharpener.

[raggedhalo.livejournal.com]

I'm still not convinced that markets operating without regulation (ie free ones) do anything other than concentrate power and incentivise oppression. I'd love you to convince me of it, but...

And if you're in favour of regulated markets, how is that different from the social democratic position?

[thapunkprincess.livejournal.com]

I didn't get your last post when you complained about people equating markets with the right wing, and I don't get this one. What sort of markets? Free markets? Regulated markets? Globalised markets? Internal markets? Flea markets?

Assuming you mean the former, what the hell is a free market anyway? Something that exists in theory, that may well be theoretically neutral politically... but not something that exists in reality, surely? All markets in reality are political on every level, and they tend to favour the Right. The reason that real markets favour the Right is simply that they exist to serve the profit motive and provide capitalism with its dynamic, not to engender mutually-beneficial contracts between groups with differing interests. I mean, you could have a society with some kind of Potlatch system and I guess that would qualify as a left-wing market in some sense...

[rhythmaning.livejournal.com]

Is there an LJ feed for Liberal Conspiracy? I just looked for one, but couldn't find it.

Otherwise I'll just have to use the RSS feed...

[matgb]

Two already, see Steve's comment above. on mobile

[rhythmaning.livejournal.com]

Ta. I really should have read the other comments, guess...