Thanks again to unfutz for guiding me to the most concise and clear statement of my liberal beliefs I’ve yet seen (emphasis mine):

The difference between Republicans and Democrats isn’t about who cares more for the people. All politicians say they care about the people and the people are always justifiably skeptical. The difference between us is how we believe the good of the people is best achieved and liberals have a fundamentally different philosophy than the Republicans. Government is our preferred method to advance progressive ideals. Capitalism cannot substitute for a democratic government that answers to all the people. The invisible hand doesn’t give a shit if children starve or old people have to work until they are eighty or if half the country has to work at slave wages to support the other half. Only government can guarantee its citizens the equal right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. We believe that progress toward that end requires that the government be active and engaged in delivering those things.

I was initially going to post this bit on a progressive frame to replace the scary one our country is currently using to view the world, then The Green Knight led me to the above..

A man walks into a swank top-story bar in a high-rise building and sits at the bar next to a man who is obviously three sheets to the wind. After he orders a drink, his stool neighbor slurs “I bet I can jump from that window over there and survive the ten story fall to the street below.” Incredulous, the man looks to the bartender who says “I ain’t getting involved in this bet again. You’re on your own, buddy.” The man decides to call his bluff and says to the stranger “I bet $100 you are not even sober enough to get the window open much less jump out the window.” The stranger stands immediately from the stool, walks to the window, opens it and leaps out. The man rushes to the window just in time to see the stranger’s descent rapidly decrease just before he would hit the pavement and he flies back through the air and through the window he had jumped through only moments before. The man dumbfoundedly pulls $100 from his wallet and asks “How did you do that?” “Simple,” the stranger replies, “there is a unique updraft at the base of this building that can catch a man and carry him right back through that window. For a hundred bucks, I’ll do it again.” The man pulls two more $100 bills from his wallet and gets the stranger to do it twice more. “Do you think it would work for me?,” the man asks. “Sure,” says the stranger, “give it a try.” The man steps to the window and flings himself out and falls flat to the pavement, dying instantly. The stranger returns to the bar, orders another drink and as the bartender delivers it he says “Superman, you sure are a mean drunk.”

That joke wasn’t that funny when Andy Leon told it to me in the 6th grade and it hasn’t really improved with age. Of note, though, is that Superdickery.cam has documented evidence that Superman is not as nice as we give him credit.