By LEE BALLARD

I never called myself a “progressive.” It seems contrived by liberals to avoid being liberals. I’ve been a “moderate” in recent years because liberals push private issues as fiercely as right-wingers push theirs. 

 But in fact, when I examine my deep beliefs, I’m definitely a liberal – in the historic sense.

 I’m a liberal like Abraham Lincoln.  I think if I had been around in the 1850s, living in the South, I’d have worked against the stupid idea of leaving the great United States over slavery. Maybe I’d even have ridden with WNC’s 3rd North Carolina Mounted Infantry in the Union Army.

 I’m a liberal like Theodore Roosevelt.  I’m with him in preserving wilderness for future generations and making selfish corporations think more of the public good.

 I’m a liberal like Woodrow Wilson.  I argue that America must lead the world – not like McCain interventionists want but as a shining lamp to the world for peace and humanity.

 I’m a liberal like Franklin Roosevelt, who gave us Social Security, minimum wage, weekends and so much more.  He was not content to watch working people and the elderly be treated with disrespect.

 I’m a liberal like Woody Guthrie.  I like to think I’d have joined with factory and field workers, singing myself hoarse on “You can’t scare me, I’m stickin’ to the union!” As Woody said, “I made up songs telling what I thought was wrong and how to make it right.” A man for today.

 I’m a liberal like Harry Truman.  He took on the corporate war profiteers, integrated the military – and turned back the tide of world communism.  He had a sense for what is right, and he did it, no matter what. 

 I’m a liberal like Earl Warren, the Eisenhower-appointed chief justice of the Supreme Court. He went individually to the justices and challenged each one to do the right thing on school integration. The decision was unanimous.  He was a leader when leadership was needed.

I’m a liberal like Lyndon Johnson, who strong-armed the Civil Rights Act through Congress, even though he knew it would mean the South would be Republican for decades.

 Don’t call me a bleeding-heart.  That says I’m a sucker for a sob story.    

 I’m in the long tradition of liberalism, dating back to the Old Testament law and prophets, that says people should treat other people fairly and justly, honoring the poor.  And I have no question that I’m on the right side. 

And I don’t doubt that right will prevail.  The rich and powerful control North Carolina now, but the people cannot be deceived for long. North Carolina’s government will side with working people over the privileged. We will take on our role once again as protectors of the earth.

Our sick, elderly, children and mentally ill will be cared for. Elections will be fair once again. Our schools and teachers will have what they need to prepare our children.

Until then, we must work. This year we must work to elect candidates who favor people like us, not the rich and powerful....    

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Lee Ballard lives in Mars Hill.

Another view: Reader says columnist on the wrong side of history

In answer to Lee Ballard’s (April 2014 Daily Planet) article, “Conservatives cling to wrong side of history,” a lot of caution is needed in Ballard’s advice as to what is his correct way for our USA society, such as Proverbs chapter 14, verse 12, which tells us: “There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but in the end thereof are the ways of death.”

Plus , chapter 16 of the book of Proverbs, verse 25, is nearly the same. “It must be very important to have two verses of the same warning.”

Like most liberals, Lee’s article twists God’s Word in Ephesians 6 and 5, saying, “As if they were obeying Christ.” No, Mr. Lee, Christ knew there were slaves. He advised them to obey their masters, so it would go well for them — less welts on their backs.

You kooks today forget or choose not to remember when the Democratic Party really was for the poor. Now you kooks (as you so loosely say) use the Democratic Party for everything that is against God’s Word, and you’re too blind to see it is killing everything good our USA once stood for.

Yes, opinions of church members will change, as they mostly were lukewarm anyway.

The word of God tells us, “Many are called but few are chosen.” Like our military, “they’re looking for a few good men.” They are getting harder and harder to find.

An example of how you kooks twist things away from truth... I remember when the lifestyle of the homosexual was spreading diseases, AIDS being chief of them, their lifespan was 49-52 years, they had 400 to 500 lovers during those active years and they had a very high suicide rate. Nothing gay about that, Mr. Lee Ballard, but then don’t tell.

You probably are of the mindset of the killing of unborn human babies, the act called abortion, known as pro-choice, or pro-abortion. Really it’s killing your common sense.

You act and sound like you have a degree in education behind you, but your malice toward conservatives gives you away.

I don’t think you would accept the truth that abortion is really the murder of a human baby (unborn human baby). Because the law says it’s OK or it’s legal, etc., doesn’t make it right. In Hitler’s Germany, it was legal and lawful to kill Jews, but after the war, many German people went to their early death because the Allies’ courts called it murder.

In short, that’s why we have the Holy Book called the Bible. It is what guided our Founding Fathers in forming the Constitution of our USA and its amendments, etc. It gave us a near-perfect government. Now that the U.S. Constitution is being misrepresented, twisted, called a “living Constitution,” therefore open to change, and our society is falling apart — a chaotic mess. Sort of what you (Ballard) are proposing.

Look what your liberal nonconservative Democratic Party, along with traitors from other parties, did. You stopped prayer in schools — took out the Ten Commandments. Now you have a human jungle in the schools.

Lawsuits abound against Christians and their lifestyles, etc., etc. What did you get? A giant — supposed legal — mess ... an assinine society gone amok upon itself.

 Example... A nine-year-old boy in McDowell County is kicked out of school because he wrote a story about his grandfather writing a letter home during the war, telling how he prayed to God for a safe return home. The boy’s big crime? He used the word GOD. See what all your new rules and regulations have accomplished?

Sort of like (President Barack) Obama’s war against the chaplains in the military — the National Day of Prayer gone and more.

When a nation wants to do away with God and His Word, his Commandments, HIS people, you have declared war on God. Guess what? That nation, that people, that society will lose and become a part of history.

Go back in history, Mr. Ballard, and check it out. It is you who is on the wrong side of history.

JEROME PETERS

Marion

EDITOR’S NOTE: Peters added a postscript to the aforementioned commentary, stating: “Mr. Lee Ballard, pray for our nation. It’s pretty well gone completely out of a civil society. You need to know.”