I'm a biologist, B.S. from MIT.  I don't believe in evolution.  Don't get me wrong, though.  I think that the theory of evolution is correct, and there is more than sufficient evidence to back it up.  I don't believe in creationism either.

You shouldn't believe in evolution either.  In fact, you probably don't.  It is not a religion or something to be taken on faith.  When you look at the facts, weigh the evidence, and do all of that other stuff that you do to decide something, you will almost certainly come to the conclusion that the theory of evolution is correct.

At this point, you might be starting to get what I'm trying to say in an annoyingly round-about way: the theory of evolution is a scientific theory, not a religion or life philosophy-- though it is natural philosophy about life, but that's just confusing.  The distinction here is very important.

This topic is probably pretty dead until the Democrats regain control, and even then, it is probably still dead: welfare.  It's something that crossed my mind recently, though.  Being rather young at the time, I don't remember too much of the debate and policy decisions that lead to the breaking up of the system.

At the time, I understood that people were getting money for not working.  It made sense that we couldn't let people starve, but it did not make sense to me that people could perpetually be out of work (and lazy?) and still make money.  Granted, that money was very little, but still, they seemed like a drain.

I just finished reading an interesting piece academically written in an RPG e-zine.  You can find it here.

The subject of the article is the history of the moral backlash against role-playing games.  Role-playing is a hobby of mine, and given that liberals are having a slug-fest right now with the religious right, I thought that it was rather fitting for the day.

I have been thinking about the causes of the national Democratic defeat.  Most of us have.  I have been thinking about the candidate, the strategy, the voters...  One word keeps popping up in my mind: "bold."

Think about it.  The most romantic thing in American culture is this ideal of a bold individual (often a leader) making a bold decision and winning.  The second most romantic vision is of a bold individual making a bold decision and tragically losing.  Right or wrong, you have to respect the bold.

This is kinda like Frameshop, but I am not nearly the diarist that Jeffrey Feldman is.  Anyway, this little topic has irked me for a while.  Democratic politicians (I think, including Howard Dean) often like to state that they are "fiscal conservatives."

The term "fiscal conservatism" seems to mean a want to balance the budget.  To me, at least, it also implies that the people balancing that budget will prefer to do it through spending cuts (not military.)  That would make "fiscal conservatism" conservative, I suppose.  Still many of the Democrats who use the term aren't really into cutting domestic spending and preserving military spending in order to balance the budget.  They usually just want to balance the budget.  So why call it "conservative?"

When discussing how to get more votes for Democratic candidates, most discussions focus on posturing, getting out the vote, and other organized work.  I want to open up a discussion about converting Americans to liberalism in a personal and individual way.

I think that there are a lot of liberals out there who do not even know that they are liberals.  Many of them have a negative view on liberalism, or at least think that they do.  I say this, because there are a lot of poll results that indicate that most people have liberal perspectives on the issues.  How do we approach this group of people?

More beneath the line

Bear in mind that I'm a biologist and have never taken a class in economics, but I would like to open a discussion specifically about liberalism and capitalism.  Also note that I will ask many questions along the way within my text.  I won't answer most of them, as I do not know it (but figure that some of you will.)  I want to address what constitutes capitalism, and I want to discuss what modern conservatives do to undermine the capitalist system.  Finally, I want to discuss how modern liberalism can enhance the capitalist system.

First, let us address what capitalism is.

In previous diaries, I have noted the need to convert more people to liberalism and remove the stigma from the very word.  I also presented the idea of advertising nation-wide here:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/11/10/115511/37

Today, I thought of another idea: postering.  While I am not currently in school, I intend to return for graduate studies.  In the mean-time, I wanted to share my idea along with a couple of possible posters.  (Edit them for layout and personal opinions yourself.)

There has been significant talk about one of the reasons that Dean is being opposed by party establishment: the Democratic primaries.  Apparently, Dean wants to change the system.  I wanted to open up a little discussion about the merits and flaws of the current situation.

To start, I'll create a naive pair of lists about the ups and downs of the current system.

I have an idea that I cannot seem to shake out of my head.  I've mentioned it on blogs a few times with minimal success.  When I talk to people, however, it seems to have some legs.  That idea is to run commercials in the political off-season touting the virtues of liberalism.

The basic idea is simple.  We can tell people what liberalism really is through television and radio advertisements.  I think that there are a lot of liberals out there who think that they are independents and moderates.   Hell, there are probably some liberals who think that they are conservatives.

I've noticed a disturbing trend.  People are ceasing to use the word "liberal" and simply replacing it with "progressive."  I know that it has been happening for a while now, but really, it's gotta stop.

Put yourself in the boots of a liberal politician.  Your Republican opponent has just called you liberal.  You have three basic options:

I cannot blame the election's loss on Kerry.  He ran a strong campaign.  I cannot blame the loss on the media, though the media had a hand in it.  The blame truly lies in something else.  It was no conscious decision, but it happened a long time ago.

The conservatives were able to label liberalism as bad and, more importantly, immoral.  Since the days of the House Committee on Unamerican Activities, liberalism has been under a steady and relentless assault on its virtues.  Slowly, conservatives told everyone that liberals were weak on defense and security.  Liberals have radical views that will change our wonderful culture.  Liberals want a big government that meddles ineffectively in the affairs of the market.  Liberals want to destroy family values.  Liberals want to hand over power to other countries.  You know where all of this goes.