Burning, looting and mayhem. Plus you can never have enough commas.
Fair point.
Ahem,
Burning, looting, and mayhem. Plus, you can never have enough commas.
Pretty!
I found a bigger version where you can actually read the text:
But what point were you trying to make, if any?
You and K9befriender posted about whether we have now, or have had in the past, political commonality. This xkcd strip documents the history of how far apart the us political parties have been. At times dominated by light red and light blue, the parties were much closer, and worked together more. The growth of dark blue and dark red, and even more, of the extremely dark red in recent years (well, recent to when that was published. I would guess it’s gotten worse) show the growing separation in US politics, as least as mirrored by Congress.
I did not saying anything about the relative ‘bandness’ of one compared to the other. I agree that there is more bullshit from the right than the left, on balance. But there is bullshit on both sides. If saying that is some sort of indictment of bothside-ism and is upsetting to some people, then so be it. Pointing out that there is plenty to be critical of in this polarized climate - that things have gone too far - is precisely the point of the skewering I mentioned.
But both-sideism isn’t simply about acknowledging that your side isn’t perfect.
The both-sideism I object to is the theory that in order to present a balanced narrative you have to find an equal amount of bullshit on both sides.
In practice it turns into —- the ex-President of the United States, 20 US senators and 150 US congressman advocate for some horrible ill-thought out proposition and that’s bad.
But the assistant superintendent of education in Hippieville Oregon advocated for something equally horrible and ill-considered so that’s equally bad.
Therefore -BOTH SIDES are equally bad and no one can complain about the other side! Shut up about the ex-President and all those senators! As long as we can find a stupid Democrat in some position of authority, no matter how minor, we can do whatever we want!
No. You’re still missing the point. I’m not saying that criticism of both sides demands equality of bullshit. It doesn’t even demand the same amount or kind of criticism. But more important than that, all we hear anymore is vitriolic criticism from the extremes. There appears to be the large excluded middle of the socio-political spectrum that is finally starting to have their say about both sides. They, in my opinion, are emerging as the adults in the room.
Sure, it may be getting worse in some ways, but that divide has been there since the founding of our country. We even took up arms against eachother because of our disagreements.
Just saying that there was never really a time that I would say that the US has been cohesive socially, politically, or economically.
It became somewhat bipartisan because no one wanted to say that they were in favor of wasteful spending, but it was spearheaded and vilified by so-called fiscal conservatives. They pointed at all these millions of dollars that were going out to special interests and projects, labeling that as govt waste.
Of course, govt waste is money spent in someone else’s district, but wise fiscal policy is money spent in one’s own.
As a conservative at the time, growing up in a conservative household, I heard and agreed with the arguments against letting representatives trade votes for earmarks. Now I see that they were a tiny fraction of the budget, didn’t really go away, and cooperation between the parties plummeted. I’m sure that no one will admit this, but I do believe that a substantial part of the motivation behind pushing this was specifically to remove some of the grease that gets the govt work done.
They oppose them because they want the Democrats to look bad when they are in power. They didn’t oppose raises to the debt ceiling because they thought it was good for the country, they knew it would do a great deal of harm, but they opposed it because they thought it would be a politically expedient way of causing harm on a Democrat’s watch.
McConnel specifically said that his number one priority was to make Obama a one term president. Not to make sure that Obama governed well, not to make sure that he was held to conservative fiscal standards, but that that man and his party would be out of power.
In a democracy, people get the government they deserve. There are structural elements to our govt that I think magnify the problems, are things that those who seek power over governance can exploit, but yes, ultimately, the power comes from the people.
The problem is that a smaller and smaller minority of people are having a greater and greater influence over our govt, and it is those people who need to come to the realization that their actions are not just harming their opponents, but themselves as well.
Owning the libs is not a good governance philosophy, but it does seem to be their overarching political motivation.
To come back to the man of the hour, @asahi, he spouts off some pretty authoritarian shit sometimes, and is excoriated for it by nearly everyone on this left leaning board. In right leaning circles, he would be praised for his dehumanization of the opposing political party.
So yeah, the problem with the electorate is with the people who value hatred over cooperation, and the problem with the govt is a structure that rewards that divisiveness, rather than marginalizing it.
You don’t have a party called the “Republican Party”, but you certainly have conservatives.
Of course, you are seeing some of the same problems, since your conservatives are about where most of our Democrats are, and our conservatives are all the way out past Crazy Town, down Deranged Avenue, have leapt off the Unhinged Cliffs, and are drowning themselves in Maniacal Bay in order to own the libs.
Is there a significant movement to dismantle your UHC? I’m sure there are some people who are against it, but is it nearly the number that are against having a UHC in the US?
You have UHC, take it for granted, and think that it’s something that any nation should provide for their people. Our conservatives hate even the idea of it, and are willing to pay far more, for far worse outcomes, in order to ensure that the “wrong people” don’t get healthcare that they don’t think that the deserve.
And that is really the overriding driving force behind conservative thought. The terror that someone out there is getting something that they don’t think that they deserve.
As far as social issues, as an American, I suppose I should apologize that our nation occupies such a great part of the world psyche. I do think that a large reason for the right wing reactionary movements in Europe is led by the right wing movements in the US. Some of the sentiments have always been there, but they have been magnified and radicalized by social media, and popularized and legitimized by the rise of such groups in the US.
You say that you are seeing many of the same problems. Did you have an attempted insurrection within the last year as we did? Be interesting to see if and when Boris Johnson loses the next election, if you will have right wingers storming Westminster in a bid to keep him in power.
There isn’t?
Sure, not all Black people, not in all places, but no one has said that, if that is the hyperbole that you are “debunking”, then it is a strawman that you have made up here.
But in many cities and neighborhoods, yes, they are. Even if an individual is not accosted every day, they live with the constant fear that they can be, that they can be tormented, tortured, and even killed, and there will almost never be any consequence.
The reports of shootings and killings are just the tip of the iceberg. Every day, police dehumanize and denigrate the people that they are supposed to be protecting.
And to a greater extent, it’s not just about the racial inequities and biases in policing, it is about the overall militarization of the police force, and the us vs them mentality that they exhibit towards all of the “civilians” that they look down on. All lives can’t matter until Black lives matter.
OTOH, no one has ever been raped by CRT, no one has ever been choked out by CRT, no one has ever been falsely imprisoned by CRT, no one has ever been shot by CRT, no one has ever had their door rammed down with cops guns and grenades blazing by CRT. The complaints about CRT are based on hyperbole alone. The complaints against militarization of police forces and racial bias are based on reality. Your attempt at bothsidesism falls extremely flat here.
Your ray of light are celebrities who use their platform to play the both sides game? To dismiss the actual concerns of a populace that lives in fear of those who are charged to protect them as being no more real than made up fear mongering of an academic subject that no one would have even heard of if it were not for the right wing outrage machine?
Dismal ray of light indeed.
Did I?:
That’s you in just one recent thread.
And it isn’t as if I’m trying to argue against the reality of systemic injustice. I’m not. But I’ll be accused of it nevertheless in… 5…4…3…
Ah, enlightened centrism. Not exactly new, but it’s nice that you’ve found a happy middle between paranoid delusion and reality.
It means that you have to reject reality and adopt paranoid delusion, but that’s a small price to pay to get that sweet feeling of superiority.
Where did I say all Black people in all places?
I’ll wait…
If I say I want to eliminate animal abuse, am I claiming that all animals are abused?
Ah, the condescending superiority of uncompromising moral virtue.
Go on… have the last word…
Your words are like limp noodles, and you wield them as one who has seen a few minutes of a Bruce Lee film.
It is not uncompromising moral virtue to want to end terrorism and oppression of our fellow citizens. It is not superiority or condescension to point out the glaring flaws in your argument.
Both sides are not the same. To make the claims as you have is to simply deny reality in favor of delusion.
ORLY?
Go on then. Say more things I already fucking said.
From what I can tell (and taking asahi’s own word for it), the described sentiments get posted ONLY after substantial elbow-bending. Earlier in the day you never see anything about re-education camps from asahi.
Having had my own elbow-bending periods of time, here and there, I’m not inclined to be overly judgmental. I’ll say just that Sober-asahi is always worth reading. Sozzled-asahi—like Sozzled-Anyone—produces quality that’s much more varied (shall we say).
In vino veritas.
I think our biggest problem is our biggest strength, i.e. the dual-sovereignty of the States and Federal Government, and how certain powers were granted TO the Federal Government, and not the other way around.
Whether or not we have a parliamentary democracy or a presidential democracy isn’t nearly as hampering in a crisis as having to try and herd 50 cats all of whom only have a limited obligation to even listen to you for the vast majority of things.
Let’s hope that doesn’t happen again.
Would he? I have no idea. But I do know people regularly attribute bad motives to the opposing political party on this left leaning board. For example:
There’s a good and obvious reason for anyone to support ending earmarks, and you say you agreed with the arguments yourself at the time. So why assume a nefarious motive?
Re Obama, a few years ago I was debating a conservative, and said the Republicans had always refused to cooperate with Obama because they didn’t want him to achieve anything - a point I had heard many times from the left. He said it wasn’t true, so I looked it up, and he was right:
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2017/01/16/obamas_unsung_bipartisan_legacy_132798.html
What I heard before was an oversimplified story.
As for the debt ceiling, I agree they didn’t care if they were causing harm, but that’s different to saying that was their purpose. IIRC the crisis reduced the Republican’s popularity more so than Obama’s.
We don’t have the culture war in the same way, and no, there isn’t a significant fraction of the country that wants to dismantle the NHS, although plenty suspect the current government of wanting to sell it off to US corporations in a trade deal with America. But we do have a large fraction who are not doing well in current society, most especially after 2008. And they feel they aren’t well represented by the ‘governing classes’, that their needs are ignored and their voices aren’t heard. And this was a big factor in the Brexit vote.
And in many other European countries, we are seeing the rise of the right: in Denmark, in Germany, Poland, Austria, Marine Le Pen reaching the second round in the French presidential election. I don’t believe this is all coming from the US, by any means.
You used to be a conservative. Is this what you believed?
It’s not as bad as the things you mentioned, but people have lost their jobs and livelihoods, been ostracised, harassed and even physically attacked because of the ideology of the progressive left. I won’t call it CRT because you’ll object, but it exists, and complaints about it are certainly not based on hyperbole alone.