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Notes -
This is one reason why, as a progressive, I believe that a strong and vibrant conservative movement is not just desirable but necessary for progressivism to succeed. Progressivism is supposed to be about progress (I think the term has been mostly redefined due to use by its own proponents to mean something else in recent years), and progress isn't the same thing as change - for change to be progress, it has to be forward in some meaningful way, in this context something like better. Anyone is going to have the bias that the change they want will accomplish something better than before, and so progressives can't be trusted to accurately assess whether the changes we're calling for is actually progress or just change that we genuinely believe is good. So we need people to argue and fight against us so that the strongest, most correct changes are the ones that stand up to scrutiny and are actually implemented, while the weakest, most misguided changes get trashed. It's highly imperfect and messy, but that's the best way I can see for us to even make a sort of attempt at achieving actual progress rather than merely change that I've convinced myself is progress.
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