Oh, go ahead and say it. On the internet, you're supposed to say that anyone with a different opinion or perspective from your own has no ability to think. It's standard procedure. :beatdeadhorse5: Correct. Their first priority is winning. Definitely a step down from Bill Clinton, who also had his share of shortcomings in that regard. But that doesn't make me not care if the GOP wins. Let's not overlook the obvious point that one of only two people is going to win this election. I can't imagine what Obama could do at this point to make Romney look like a better option to me. Two months before the general election, anyone's theoretical image of the ideal liberal candidate has nothing to do with anything. In this country, the incumbent president never gets a serious challenge from within his own party, so I've been knowing for the last four years that there was no chance of seeing a true liberal on a presidential ballot before the spring of 2016. And do you honestly think that a Democrat as liberal as me has any realistic chance of winning a national, general election? I don't. I expect that I'll always have to support a party nominee who is more conservative than myself. I'm not living in a fantasy world. Better than nothing. Politics is a dirty, pragmatic business. A small step in the right direction is better than any size step in the opposite direction. You have to take whatever you can get, whenever you can get it, no matter what the motivation. People who can't deal with that reality are better off not following politics closely. Idealism is for theoretical discussions. It is a tool that helps us assess where we are, and understand what direction we're going. It sucks. Especially, knowing that he was once a toker. :ssmokeit: Once again, go fuck yourself. Seriously.
To add: Right wingers fail to see the irony of their desire for less and less government (rules and regulations by same) that brought on the world-wide situation in which we find ourselves. I'm not refering to the 1%. There's no irony whatsoever in their actions. Except perhaps later when or IF they are able to reflect upon the results of what they've wrought.
There is no irony. It's just an incomplete phrase. They want less HELPFUL gubmint (let the poor starve) and more police governance (keep all of us in check, it's easier to have a father figure make all your decisions for you). I doubt that. I think you expect that only when it happens. Because you HAD a candidate as liberal and leftie as yourself. And it WAS Obama, when he ran. Every. Single. Liberal. Centrist. Voice. In America wasn't just sick of bushcheney, they "believed" in Obama the big huge L liberal. Then as soon as he won, it was fuck all of you fools I'm in the club and I likes my money and guns. And what I saw was the awesome spectacle of almost all his prominent supporters and ordinary citizens saying, "yeah, but waddya gonna do". Because they're so arrogant that they couldn't bear that they'd been made such fools of and were now powerless to change anything. A liberal can win in america and a liberal did win. But he figured it's more fun and easy not to be one. I'm sure you're bored by now, not just aware, of the "candidate obama/president obama meme". The problem with having given up and decided to support the democrats as they now are, after they abandoned the liberal promises that won them 2008, is that DEMOCRAT VOTERS have now made america much, much more corporatist and authoritarian. It's really sad. That's why I find it so silly to harp on Koch. They are a forceful interest group. But they're nothing compared to what lay-down-and-take-it democrat voters have done in continuing to support their party, after it abandoned them. That's why this is an election between two clones. And why it's so boring. And why since Romney isn't even that bad, and it was the republican primaries, the voices that were telling liberal critics of the democratic party to "stfu you'll cost us the election" were scare mongering NOT with Romney but with the spectre of Santorum. Do you want Santorum to be prez? Then leave Obama and the dems alone. Cut them some slack. And before there was a fear of an upcoming election, right when they swept 2008, it was, "the dems CAN'T do anything...or they're playing strategically". A lot of people make the meaning of their lives to never challenge their side. It isn't the fear of republican presidency coming back that drives many liberals (true liberals, not the reagan democrats who like pretty much every current democrat position) to go and "Vote Hope Back", it's because they let themselves be abused, where it counts. It's just their nature, that's all. Good luck with that. I'd rather fuck myself. At least I get off when I do it to me.
Actually, I wasn't still trying to call you out on my earlier point. I was objecting to you daring to suggest we kind of agree or have a consensus, in the same breathe as you totally reiterated your first position to which I'd objected. Don't tell me I agree with you, then ignore my contradictory point, and expect me to say nothing and support you. That's how people like you treat your candidates when they slap you around, remember? You may like an abusive relationship where you're belittled, but that's about you. Not my cup of tea.
Actually there do not seem to be many people with left wing leanings who are Obama fans on these forums and even Democrats seem lukewarm. The problem with US politics for those of the left is that it comes down to the terrible decision of necessity. I mean as I’ve pointed out the US has two dominant parties that are basically both right wing and that to one degree or another are in the pockets of wealth. So I’d say ‘a plague on both their houses’ I could not give my support to either and would prefer a third party to vote for - BUT while the policies of the Democrats are not very good those of the Republicans are dire so I’d have that horrible dilemma under the US system - voting for a third party (or not voting) could have the effect of letting in the dire and of course leading to dire consequences. Basically the system is the problem and it’s the system that needs changing. The question is how do you do that when it is not in the interests of the two dominant parties (and their wealthy backers), while keeping out of power those that would make a bad situation worse?
Revolution. Change takes a long long time. Most likely a bloody revolution The USA is a young country. It is naive to think we would never have another civil war in the States. The system is so broken. Voting is like a suggestion box for slaves. All politicians (except perhaps Bernie Sanders) answer to the same corporate puppet masters. They keep the masses arguing over irrelevant shit while the pillage and plunder.
The influence of the Koch family is at least now well known for a long time it was an open secret, with them pulling strings out of the limelight. Basically they have been following what I call the ‘Mont Pelerin plan’ (see below) which involves setting up right wing think tanks that pay people to promote right wing/neoliberal ideas (they are basically PR/lobbying groups) and support academics who write to order. These people then produce supposedly ‘independent’ reports that are then used by the wealth financed media as ‘proof’ that right wing and neoliberal ideas are the best. These idea then become the ‘common sense’ of many ordinary people who come to forums like this and try and push that right wing agenda – only to discover that they a totally unable to defend it from criticism, because it is indoctrinated ‘evidence’ that seems to have involved no real though on their part. Some of the Koch founded think tanks 1970s - Center for Market Processes (predecessor to the Mercatus Center) 1977 - Cato Institute 1978 - Reason Foundation 1984 - Citizens for a Sound Economy (now FreedomWorks) and Citizens for a Sound Economy Foundation (now Americans For Prosperity) 1989 - rescues and restructures Tax Foundation 1991 - Institute for Justice founded with seed money from Charles G. Koch 1999 - Mercatus Center first emerges as a brand from what was Center for Market Processes 2003 - Independent Women's Forum affiliates with Citizens for a Sound Economy 2003 - CSE and CSEF split; CSEF becomes Americans For Prosperity 2004 - CSE and Empower America merge to become FreedomWorks (Sourcewatch) ** The Mont Pelerin Society When the Mont Pelerin Society first met, in 1947, its political project did not have a name. But it knew where it was going. The society’s founder, Friedrich von Hayek [Austrian Economist], remarked that the battle for ideas would take at least a generation to win, but he knew that his intellectual army would attract powerful backers. Its philosophy, which later came to be known as neoliberalism, accorded with the interests of the ultra-rich, so the ultra-rich would pay for it. (George Monbiot) Oh and Charles Koch is a society member.
Nyxx The problem with revolutions is that you don’t always get what you want or would like. As I’ve pointed out many times here the US was basically purged of ‘leftwing’ ideas and been indoctrinated with right wing ideas for many decades. As it stands I think any American revolution would probably result in a right wing dictatorship or oligarchy. So I’d strongly argue against it. To me before any move for the good is possible the right wing/neoliberal ‘common sense’ that seems so prevalent in the US needs to be challenged, countered and changed.
I agree with you for the most part. But I think most people miss understand what Obama has been doing. Obama has been trying very hard to stay in the middle, that is to say, not in with the far left. Obama figures that if he appears "in the middle" he will appeal to more of the voters. if he wins in November, you will begin to see the "liberal" Obama. If he loses, you will see "nazi" America.
rjh First I don’t think in terms of Obama and Romney it is too personality based I think in terms of political parties, political groupings so it is the Democratic Party and Republican Party. And as I see it ‘liberal’ is not left, the Democratic Party as a group is politically right of centre liberal, and in that it is similar to the right of centre Liberal Party we have in Britain. In simplistic terms it seems to me that in the US any real left wing thought was smeared as communist and was purged (the red scares), then the right of centre liberals became the ‘left’ in a US political context. Since then there have been those on the right that have tried to smear liberal thought as socialist, in an effort to push US politically even further to the right, and it has worked within the Republican Party were the liberal moderates have in large part been marginalised or driven out.
That's kind of what I've been saying about the republicans trying to turn the word "liberal" into a dirty word, like the way the nazis did to the word "jews". It's a strategy to deflect attention from their fanatic right wing goals. And sadly, there's a lot of unsuspecting ignorance in America. But either Obama or Romney is going to win in November. So what ever Obama's personality is or isn't, it's got to be better than nazi America.
"Romney's going to need a mandate if he wins. A mandate can't be tied up in "Obama's a nice guy, just misguided" or any of that. I'm not saying go out and say Obama's a bad guy, but he's got to be tied to this economy. His policies, his ideas, his ideology. "Liberalism" is still a dirty word in this country. Use it! Don't let them get away with "progressive." It's liberal."-Rush Limbaugh
Yeah, this: Liberalism (from the Latin liberalis) is a broad political ideology or worldview founded on the ideas of liberty and equality. Terrible, destructive notion this "liberty and equality". I wish I had a dime for every time someone hurled that word at me, in an effort to insult me.
There are limits to free speech. You can't go in a movie theater and yell fire when there isn't one. You're not allowed to talk about killing the POTUS. You can't try to start a riot with hate speech. And you can't say fuck, shit, cocksucker, or **** on tv. This site is pretty tolerant.
Who gave you permission to write that? I may have to report it. Okay, Karen? Just keep thinking that if you stick to "your people", you'll be a-ok, despite their flaws. As you can see here, if you just keep accepting their bad faith and nonsense, they turn on you as soon as you break their rules too. There's no point in "standing by" those who don't stand by you. You're just deluding yourself. And Balbus, you're obviously too far over the pond to understand anything about the states. Your labour party does not equate to the dems. The dems are considerably to the right of your labour and more like equal to your conservatives or even to the right of them. I heard one briton say very accurately that the republicans are like your impotent and marginalized UKiNPENDENCE party ukip, being xenophobic fascists. The mccarthyism is long over. People are just jerks now.
The modern democratic party, just within the past decade, has come to the very grim realization that as far back as Nixon, maybe even before. The dems and the repubs were playing the same game by two very different sets of rules, and they were getting their asses handed to them - the chief of which is, you don't pit yourself against the military-industrial complex, the banking cartel, or U.S. imperialism and expect to find yourself in any kind of position to create meaningful domestic reform. That's the reality of the two-party system in the United States. This is the source of disillusionment and anger that many once self-proclaimed liberals are experiencing, and it is a huge catalyst for the Occupy Movement. I have friends who are experiencing a huge identity crisis because they want Ron Paul's foreign policy and Obama's 2008 domestic policy. I think Obama would like to have his pre - 2008 domestic and foreign policy back, but the leader of the "free world" does not have the freedom to pursue those policies, especially under the circumstances left to him from his predecessor. The fact is Obama or Romney is going to be your next president. The fact is, you live in a nation that kills innocent people everyday in the pursuit of Empire - or maybe just sustain the gluttonous monster of Empire that we've already established. This is as true today as it was 4 years ago, and 4 years before that and so on. And it will be true 4 years from now and 4 years after that. But to reject a progressive President simply because he's not creating all the change you want, all at once, or following policies that you find repugnant, but that he is actually powerless to deviate from - is fucking stupid - especially when rejecting that progress essentially means strengthening the position of the polar opposite and emboldens the very same powers that pursue these repugnant activities to begin with. The world is not going to end if Romney becomes President, nor will it under a second term with Obama. The President most of us here want, does not exist, cannot exist under the current conditions of this corrupt government. The Executive Branch is deliberately ascribed far too much importance and emphasis than it realistically has in the first place. It's a diversion, leading your eye away from the people really making policy in Washington. The President does NOT have the power to introduce legislation. He can propose, but so you can you and I. How many of you know how your legislator voted on NDAA? If you're against it, and your legislator is up for re-election, are you going to the polls to fire him/her? Change/Progress works at a snail's pace - the alternative is bloody revolution. That is a fact that stretches out through the entire history of mankind. But bloody revolution is always a gamble, and the house odds that something even more insidious will result are favorable (and yes, there is something more insidious than imperialism - plenty). The people of the contemporary United States are the most ill-prepared in the world (perhaps in the history of the world of men) to suffer through a violent revolution or a 2nd civil war, and the obligatory social collapse that accompanies it - and remember, the house of cards extents well beyond the borders of the United States. We would not weather the storm as well as the Russians during the Soviet Collapse (and that is an understatement). That's something to keep in mind when we cry foul and yearn for uncomprimising leaders. Are you prepared to take your incontinent, bedridden and senile mother/grandmother into your household and see to it that she doesn't become riddled with bed sores, urinary tract infections, sepsis, or accidentally burn your house down all while you're working a full-time job just to keep food on the table? Medicaid and Nursing Homes won't be much of a priority during that kind of upheaval. Or would you leave grandma to fend for herself? Would your marriage survive? The whole "you did that" during the President's DNC acceptance speech is a not-so-subtle hint at what it's going to take to wrestle control of this government back into the hands of the people, where it belongs. There is an entire subtext to that speech, if you listen to it from the perspective of a government held hostage by those who would seek to privatize it entirely.
