"Progressive values ARE traditional American values.
We are proud of the victories for equality and against hierarchy: the emnancipation of the slaves, women's suffrage, the union movement, the integration of the armed forces, the civil rights movement, the woman's movement, the environmental movement, and the gay rights movement.
We are proud of FDR's conception of government "for the people" and his rally for hope against fear.
We are proud of the Marshall Plan, which helped to erase the notion of "enemies."
We are proud of John Kennedy's call to public service, of Martin Luther King's insistence on nonviolence in the face of brutality, of Cesar Chavez's ability to bring pride and organization to the worst treated of workers.
Progressive thought is as American as apple pie. Progressives want political equality, good public schools, healthy children, care for the aged, police protection, family farms, air you can breathe, water you can drink, fish in our streams, forests you can hike in, sognbirds and frogs, livable cities, ethical businesses, journalists who tell the truth, music and dance, poetry and art, and jobs that pay a living wage to everyone who works"
Progressive activists—for living wages, women's rights, human rights, the environment, health, voter registration, and so on—are American patriots, working with unselfish dedication to making a better world, a world that fits fundamental American values and principles."
"And that our nation can no more survive as half democracy and half oligarchy
than it could survive "half slave and half free" – and that keeping it
from becoming all oligarchy is steady work – our work."
Bill Moyers
