reports of death premature.............
and exaggerated, mostly wishful thinking by absolutist, fundamentalist, and others aligned with the neocon mindset.
When you say, "If we're talking about the now-obsolescent definition of liberalism, .... It died in the West with the advent of PC speech restrictions ......"
You frustrate your own wishes ( I'm all for a return to that philosophy for the examination of ideas) by declaring liberalism obsolescent, and those brave liberals that survive right-wing villification, obsolescent--either physical, functional, or economic.
Publius