Somebody: I feel like part of the problem is that we're using two different definitions of liberalism. Sometimes it seems as if we're talking broadly about classical liberalism, in which case everybody from Adam Smith to Friedrich Hayek is a liberal.
On the other hand, we have the 20th century American tradition of liberalism, which is a distinct subspecies of classical liberalism, which modifies the older tradition in part out of a response to working class demands, and in part simply in response to the changes brought about by modern society. I mean, we can either differentiate between these two definitions of liberalism or not, but it's clear to me that self-identified liberals, especially amongst the public, subscribe to the latter political philosophy. In other words, liberals *don't* believe in money as equivalent to freedom of speech or to corporations having the full array of human rights. And truthfully, it's hard to argue that liberalism is much more amorphous a concept than socialism, or for that matter, fascism. These are all abstractions, and should be used merely as a form of useful short-hand.
^^^^^ CB: Yes. American Liberalism becomes essentially contradictory with FDR-New Deal "Liberalism". It basically combines the opposites of classical liberalism -which is the political tradition of the Bourgeois Free Traders breaking with feudalism - and 20th Century Social Democracy , which represents the rising working class movement but as reform within capitalism, not revolutionizing out of it.
Neo-liberalism is something of a negation of the FDR negation of classical liberalism, a return to the elevation of Freedom of Trade and Enterprise as the highest freedom.
"The bourgeoisie, wherever it has got the upper hand, has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations. It has pitilessly torn asunder the motley feudal ties that bound man to his “natural superiors”, and has left remaining no other nexus between man and man than naked self-interest, than callous “cash payment”. It has drowned the most heavenly ecstasies of religious fervour, of chivalrous enthusiasm, of philistine sentimentalism, in the icy water of egotistical calculation. It has resolved personal worth into exchange value, and in place of the numberless indefeasible chartered freedoms, has set up that single, unconscionable freedom — Free Trade. In one word, for exploitation, veiled by religious and political illusions, it has substituted naked, shameless, direct, brutal exploitation."