The Liberal Center

I just read an article where the current occupant of the White House has basically taken over the Kennedy Center Honors, its annual gala. It was reported that the president would not be inviting any “wokester” celebrities. This, of course, gave me a headache.

I have written a bit about “woke” on my blog, but I thought I would (again) remind folks that the public discourse on this is a mess.

“Woke” was originally Black American slang that entered the mainstream lexicon, and it simply means “an awareness of social and political injustices, particularly those related to race and inequality” (Google). When we consider this in the light of the public opinion polls, we discover that the majority of the country is, um, woke.

Because I’m the laziest devil to ever stand in shoe leather, I have copied and pasted this data from my most recent book, No Politics, No Religion?. A majority of Americans support:

• Raising the minimum wage: 70 percent
• Free public college: 55 percent
• Addressing “now” the rich-poor gap: 65 percent
• Raising taxes on people earning more than $1 million per year: 68 percent
• Medicare-for-all universal healthcare: 58 percent
• A US–Iran diplomatic agreement: 55 percent
• The right to a legal abortion (including “certain circumstances”): 85 percent
• Loan forgiveness for students: 66 percent
• Background checks for all gun buyers: 89 percent
• More stringent gun laws: 57 percent
• Who feel corporations pay too little in taxes: 69 percent
• Disagreement with the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision allowing corporate money to flood the political process: 78 percent
• Legalization of marijuana: 69 percent

So, this is the political center. We calibrate the center according to where the majority of people stand on the major issues. If we take an average of all these numbers, we come to 67 percent.

We can conclude that:

• Most Americans are liberal.
• Most Americans are woke.
• Most Americans are progressive.
• Most Americans would prefer Bernie Sanders as president.
• Most Americans are anti-MAGA

Into the bargain, we should also bear in mind that there are no leftists in Congress. The left-most politicians on Capitol Hill (Bernie, AOC, et al.) are indeed centrist liberals. For those in the cheap seats: THERE ARE NO LEFTISTS IN CONGRESS.

Moreover, there really is no leftist politics in the United States. Yes, there are some small lefty political parties, but they receive basically no votes. The actual left exists only in books. There are legitimate leftists out there (ahem), but it’s not part of the public discourse, nor is it part of the media discourse.

So, congratulations, you’re most likely a wokester.