Stephanie Miller came on C-SPAN's Q&A and was asked what the term liberalism means to her.
Lamb: Are you worried about whether or not things are going to get tougher for liberal talk show hosts? And by the way would you rather be called a liberal or a progressive?
Miller: I don't care. I'm not afraid of...
Lamb: What's the difference...
Miller: I'm not afraid of that liberal word.
Lamb: What's the difference between them?
Miller: I don't know. I think, I know. I feel like Republicans succeeded in making liberal a dirty word so everyone went oh, we're progressives but I'm like ahh I'm a liberal. So what? I think I briefly stunned Sean Hannity into submission once when he said "Oh you're a liberal" and I'm like "Yes! And I'm proud of it." And then he was sort of shocked for a minute. He wasn't sure ah, you know if you reclaim like you know the, John F. Kennedy wrote a great thing about what it means to be a liberal and you know, there's a lot of great ideas that came from, not all of them, but a lot of great ideas that came from liberal thought.
So you know..... Brian we've had a year when Colin Powell spoke very eloquently about why he is for Barack Obama what does liberal mean any more?
Lamb: So what does that mean to you?
Miller: Well I think it speaks to a lot of Barack Obama has been speaking to and that is an inclusiveness. You know when you talk about where is the comedy. Well the comedy is still on the Republican side because you still hava a party that claims moral values and family values populated by the David Vitters and the Ted Haggerts and it's just, you know, and besides the fact that they're so over the top in their rhetoric, that now we're on defense. I mean literally, apparently we're in the middle of the Obama recession, after the Obama stock market crash and apparently this Obama bailout is really going to be a bitch. And I'm like "What?". He's not even President yet. This is the rhetoric that we've heard already and he's not even in office. So you know if you thought it was over the top, the rhetoric about him during the campaign, just wait.
Lamb: So what does it mean though to you to be a liberal? Define the steps along the way that make you a liberal.
Miller: Oh my gosh you know, I think it's interesting Barack Obama personally got elected on the power of we. He never said I. You know he quoted that we're the ones we've been waiting for, um, yes we can, and I think that's what people have been so thirsty for. To me that's what it means to be a liberal. And now it's caring about everybody. It's really trying to bring everybody along. It's a quality, you know, regardless of your race or sex or gender or sexual orientation.
I have to tell you when I heard his speech at the 2004 Convention, you know we have gay friends in the red states and we worship an awesome god in the blue states and there's no red America, there's not white, you know, blue America, I remember, I think I literally stopped breathing. Brian I said, and I remember thinking, I said, "This is our first black President". You know, and I'm sure a lot of people thought it at that moment but there is something that he embodies to me about what it means to be a liberal.
Update: For anyone who would like to watch the entire hour long program I see someone else put it up at You Tube. Enjoy if you're a Stephanie Miller fan. She had Brian Lamb cracking up throughout the entire interview.
