# Better Conservatives? Where?! (A response to Coffeecat) **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [September 30, 2018, 8:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208 "2018-09-30T08:43:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 44
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2018, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/861 "2018-10-13T23:47:59Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > In Charlottesville the counterprotestors outnumbered the Nazis. > [Dori: Portland police allowed Antifa mobs to take over the streets - MyNorthwest.com](https://mynorthwest.com/1141186/dori-portland-antifa-mob/) > > There are no counterprotestors in Portland. You know these guys took over the ICE building and locked it down. They had to send in the Federal government to get them out. > > Yes, one Nazi left his mob, got in his car and drove the other way into counterprotestors, but leftists have taken shots and nearly killed congressmen playing baseball. They have shot a police officer protecting them at BLM. They are openly doxxing people they dislike and the kids of people they dislike. A Georgetown professor is openly saying Republican Congressman should be castrated, and gets to keep her job. Mainstream Democrats are openly calling on their base to harass and accost their political opponents in public and chase them out of public areas. Conservative speakers have their speeches broken into by protestors who shout ‘shame.’ > > Up and down the discourse of the left it is now open strategy to shout down the opposition and not allow them to speak. > > Believe woman is a literal demand to ignore due process and repeal the presumption of innocence. > > This is not protesting. This is not political expression. People in masks harassing threatening bodily harm (and inflicting it,0 damaging property,ignoring laws and the rights of others. These are terrorist revolutionaries. They are on your side. You should, as a United party be denouncing them. Instead you are encouraging them as a party and adopting their tactics. > > Have you ever read Mein Kampf? Have you read the Gulag Archipelago? Have you studied history? > > Have you ever wondered what makes a populist movement turn into oppressive authoritarianism. The left is following the playbook of Germany, Russia, China, And Cuba. People are going to get killed, not just a couple from some meth addled skinhead. > > At some point there is going to be an actual battle, and a fair amount of people are going to get killed. The of antifa behavior is not one of protest, they are trying to lure someone who is a symbol of authority into a battle. They will provoke violence and a bunch of them are going to get killed as a result. The authority will be blamed and this will be a call for justified escalation and more violence. > > It has always existed in the fringes of the left, but it is now getting pretty mainstream. The problem with communicating with those that make an echo chamber is that whatever you are trying to say will be misinterpreted and drowned out. There may actually be a conflict between the two camps and I’m not sure the eventual outcome will result in a political state that is congruent with their expressed desires. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2018, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/862 "2018-10-13T23:48:35Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > The left didn’t nominate him for President, elect him President, and then continuously support and praise him as President, while he continues to say bigoted and otherwise awful things, in addition to the buffoonery (and great harm) in policy and rhetoric. ‘Yeah, but Trump…’ Is not an answer. Did I mention I don’t like him? We’ve spent 19 pages talking about the flaws of conservatives, Republicans, the fact that I once said slut 6 years ago. I came in here suggesting is that perhaps there is something wrong with the left and you should take a look. Nothing, except “yeah, but Trump.” ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2018, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/863 "2018-10-13T23:52:23Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > ‘Yeah, but Trump…’ > > Is not an answer. Did I mention I don’t like him? > We’ve spent 19 pages talking about the flaws of conservatives, Republicans, the fact that I once said slut 6 years ago. > > I came in here suggesting is that perhaps there is something wrong with the left and you should take a look. > Nothing, except “yeah, but Trump.” But you keep suggesting that the problem of violent and bigoted rhetoric is much larger in the left. When the president is Trump, and when the party is rock solid behind him, that dog don’t hunt. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2018, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/864 "2018-10-13T23:53:12Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Then why are you pointing fingers at the left – whose leaders don’t espouse rhetoric anywhere close to this – when the present leader of the more right party says such things routinely, and is continuously supported and praised by most in his party? ‘Yeah, but Trump” Because there are other things broken in this country that are not Trump. Because Trump is the danger we are watching, and expecting and afraid of. trump and Nazis. Because the the thing that you are watching, and expecting and afraid is usually not the thing that ends up hurting you. The thing that hurts you is the thing you are not paying attention to. You are not looking at what your extreme is doing? How many possible ways can I say this? ‘Yeah, but Trump.’ ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2018, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/865 "2018-10-13T23:54:29Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > When the president is Trump, and when the party is rock solid behind him, that dog don’t hunt. ‘Yeah, but trump” ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2018, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/866 "2018-10-13T23:55:51Z")
A bunch of people are going to get killed. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2018, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/867 "2018-10-13T23:55:54Z")
The left has flaws, and no one is denying this. There are plenty of assholes on the left. But in the present, the problem of bigoted and violent rhetoric is much, much larger on the right, and it’s ridiculous to say otherwise (as you have done so on multiple occasions). > [@Scylla](#): > > A bunch of people are going to get killed. If so, the rhetoric of the right is far more likely to cause this than anything from the left, at present. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tooth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c67d28/32.png) [@The\_Tooth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tooth)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2018, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/868 "2018-10-14T00:01:43Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > In Charlottesville the counterprotestors outnumbered the Nazis. I’m not sure how this supports your claim that the right isn’t violent. Speaking of which, some of your fellow Republicans wandered through New York last night beating on people for no reason. > [@](#): > > There are no counterprotestors in Portland. You know these guys took over the ICE building and locked it down. They had to send in the Federal government to get them out. Yes, civil disobedience often involves violating the law. But the problem isn’t committing acts of civil disobedience because Republicans are kidnapping people and keeping them in camps, the problem is that Republicans are kidnapping people and keeping them in camps. You remind me of the louts who had a bigger problem with Bush being called a torturer than Bush actually being a torturer. > [@](#): > > Yes, one Nazi left his mob, got in his car and drove the other way into counterprotestors, At a nazi rally, yes. And don’t forget the beating of DeAndre Harris at that same march to save statues. Oddly enough, despite the right-wing aversion to violence, they came prepared with clubs and shields and guns. > [@](#): > > but leftists have taken shots and nearly killed congressmen playing baseball. Plural? One guy did, and he wasn’t at a parade full of like-minded right-wingers. > [@](#): > > They have shot a police officer protecting them at BLM. I’d have to look into that, but given the source (you), I would guess you’re not painting a complete - or accurate - picture. > [@](#): > > They are openly doxxing people they dislike and the kids of people they dislike. A Georgetown professor is openly saying Republican Congressman should be castrated, and gets to keep her job. Mainstream Democrats are openly calling on their base to harass and accost their political opponents in public and chase them out of public areas. Oh noes! Did they promise to torture their prisoners and murder their families like the leader of your party did? > [@](#): > > Conservative speakers have their speeches broken into by protestors who shout ‘shame.’ Oh noes again! Maybe conservative speakers should take the hint. Tell me, where is the internment camp these protestors are keeping children in? I know where your party keeps its kidnap victims, but these protestors? Can’t say I’ve heard much about where they keep theirs. > [@](#): > > Up and down the discourse of the left it is now open strategy to shout down the opposition and not allow them to speak. And yet, here you are. Being allowed to speak. > [@](#): > > Believe woman is a literal demand to ignore due process and repeal the presumption of innocence. Bullshit. The state owes it to you to presume you’re innocent until proven guilty; people can hold any opinion they please. I don’t recall anyone insisting their assailants be jailed without trial, either. On the other hand, your fellow Republicans insist Secretary Clinton be jailed without trial and in fact without her having even committed a crime. You must live in some mirror universe. By any chance does your Hillary Clinton have a goatee? ---
**Author:** ![BlankSlate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blankslate/32/80_2.png) [@BlankSlate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlankSlate)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2018, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/869 "2018-10-14T00:04:22Z")
Yeah, one side is inclusive. A coalition. A big tent. A party that reflects the actual population of this country. Progressive. The other side is all identity politics. White identity. White politics. Exclusive. Always on the wrong side of history. Regressive. Guess which side will prevail? ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2018, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/870 "2018-10-14T00:13:29Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > “yeah, but Trump” is not an answer. > > It’s terrible. He’s a horrible, hateful imbecile. He constantly says the most bizarre insane things. > > Like I said, I voted against him. You guys put forth as a candidate the one person that he could beat. > > For 20 years you guys have been saying that every Republican candidate is a misogynistic intellectually bereft egomaniacal blowhard. The Republicans took a former Democrat who is literally and without exaggeration every one of those things and ran him against you, and won. > > Hoist by your own petard. > > You had him for the first 63 years of his life. He was broke when we got him. Hey, dumbass; I’m not a leftist. And Clinton didn’t lose the popular vote. It was an archaic and flawed compromise solution that got him into office, not his actual popularity, ability, or factual comoarison to Clinton. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2018, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/871 "2018-10-14T00:17:38Z")
> [@BlankSlate](#): > > Yeah, one side is inclusive. A coalition. A big tent. A party that reflects the actual population of this country. Progressive. > > The other side is all identity politics. White identity. White politics. Exclusive. Always on the wrong side of history. Regressive. > > Guess which side will prevail? Mainstream left. I rest my case. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tooth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c67d28/32.png) [@The\_Tooth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tooth)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2018, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/872 "2018-10-14T00:18:35Z")
About fucking time. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2018, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/873 "2018-10-14T00:23:03Z")
> [@Monty](#): > > Hey, dumbass; I’m not a leftist. And Clinton didn’t lose the popular vote. It was an archaic and flawed compromise solution that got him into office, not his actual popularity, ability, or factual comoarison to Clinton. The Confederate argument against Lincoln! Well done. You are in great company. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2018, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/874 "2018-10-14T00:30:59Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > There are none. If they were good they would not be conservatives. How can they be better? Is there such a thing as better liar? Rapist? Nazi? Full stop, you really are not trying. > **[Conservative Columnist: 'I Want Democrats To Take Over'](https://www.huffpost.com/entry/max-boot-democrat-midterm-takeover_n_5b3d7b35e4b09e4a8b29d1cb)** > > "The Republican Party must be destroyed before it can be rebuilt." > [@](#): > > Conservative columnist Max Boot, a frequent critic of President Donald Trump, says he’s now rooting for a Democratic takeover of both houses of Congress in November’s midterm elections. > > In a Washington Post column, Boot said the GOP was once a conservative party with a white nationalist fringe. > > “Now it’s a white-nationalist party with a conservative fringe,” he wrote. > > Boot, who left the Republican Party and became an independent after Trump was elected president, said he is more convinced than ever that he made the right decision. > > He wrote: > > > [@](#): > > > > “The current GOP still has a few resemblances to the party of old — it still cuts taxes and supports conservative judges. But a vote for the GOP in November is also a vote for egregious obstruction of justice, rampant conflicts of interest, the demonization of minorities, the debasement of political discourse, the alienation of America’s allies, the end of free trade and the appeasement of dictators. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2018, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/875 "2018-10-14T00:44:45Z")
Monty: But to answer the issue you have brought up with a consideration you don’t deserve. 1. Insisting the rules were unfair after you lose is s nonstarter if you knew and agreed to the rules beforehand. You are espousing the traditional whine of sore losing assholes everywhere. Again, nice company. 2. If you read your Federalist papers you’d know that the Electoral college was specifically created to protect against mob rule, or a case where a concentrated population in a small section of the country, could inflict it’s views on the larger portion of the country. Or, too put into language that you may grasp. They did it so Pan em in the Hunger Games can’t happen. You’ll recall that the rich high population center of the capitol exploited the more sparsely inhabited districts. The founding fathers were worried about that (this is true. They really were. James Madison discusses it, but I forget which paper.). So, what the founding fathers did was to create the electoral college, which has the effect of giving the Districts enough political power that the capital can’t walk over them. So, the electoral college actually did the very thing that the founding father’s wanted it to do, and it successfully protected against the very thing they were afraid of when they designed it 250 years. Pretty fucking prescient, hmmm? Now you might not like it. Perhaps you are looking forward to the Hunger Games and want to know what the box up is. Lobby and get it changed before the next election. The founding fathers put in a mechanism for that, because they hated whiny sore losers like you, too. But don’t say outmoded. They planned it to work this way 25o years ago, and it did. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2018, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/876 "2018-10-14T01:09:57Z")
You should know what you’re talking about before you try being a condescending jackass. What you prove yourself to be is just a jackass. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2018, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/877 "2018-10-14T01:18:07Z")
> [@Monty](#): > > You should know what you’re talking about before you try being a condescending jackass. What you prove yourself to be is just a jackass. Are you planning a devastating response, proving me wrong because James Madison never read the Hunger Games Last post I was “dumbass,” this post “jackass,” Do you know words that don’t end in “ass.” ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2018, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/878 "2018-10-14T01:39:59Z")
Morass? Like this thread? ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2018, 1:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/879 "2018-10-14T01:42:40Z")
Wiseass ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2018, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208/880 "2018-10-14T02:56:01Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > 1. If you read your Federalist papers you’d know that the Electoral college was specifically created to protect against mob rule, or a case where a concentrated population in a small section of the country, could inflict it’s views on the larger portion of the country. Uh-huh… > **[Trump’s “Rule of the Mob” Panic](https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/trumps-rule-mob-panic)** > > It’s a rhetorical strategy that for centuries has been used to thwart popular democracy. > [@](#): > > Trump’s “Rule of the Mob” Panic > > It’s a rhetorical strategy that for centuries has been used to thwart popular democracy > **[The Troubling Reason the Electoral College Exists](https://time.com/4558510/electoral-college-history-slavery/)** > > The Founding Fathers had something particular in mind when they set up the U.S. presidential election system: slavery > [@](#): > > Standard civics-class accounts of the Electoral College rarely mention the real demon dooming direct national election in 1787 and 1803: slavery. > > At the Philadelphia convention, the visionary Pennsylvanian James Wilson proposed direct national election of the president. But the savvy Virginian James Madison responded that such a system would prove unacceptable to the South: “The right of suffrage was much more diffusive [i.e., extensive] in the Northern than the Southern States; and the latter could have no influence in the election on the score of Negroes.” In other words, in a direct election system, the North would outnumber the South, whose many slaves (more than half a million in all) of course could not vote. But the Electoral College—a prototype of which Madison proposed in this same speech—instead let each southern state count its slaves, albeit with a two-fifths discount, in computing its share of the overall count. > > Virginia emerged as the big winner—the California of the Founding era—with 12 out of a total of 91 electoral votes allocated by the Philadelphia Constitution, more than a quarter of the 46 needed to win an election in the first round. After the 1800 census, Wilson’s free state of Pennsylvania had 10% more free persons than Virginia, but got 20% fewer electoral votes. Perversely, the more slaves Virginia (or any other slave state) bought or bred, the more electoral votes it would receive. Were a slave state to free any blacks who then moved North, the state could actually lose electoral votes. > > If the system’s pro-slavery tilt was not overwhelmingly obvious when the Constitution was ratified, it quickly became so. For 32 of the Constitution’s first 36 years, a white slaveholding Virginian occupied the presidency. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208.md?page=43) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-conservatives-where-a-response-to-coffeecat/822208.md?page=45)