# Leftist Roll Call! **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 19, 2002, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978 "2002-03-19T02:52:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Jurhael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/cab0a1/32.png) [@Jurhael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jurhael)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/1 "2002-03-19T02:52:43Z")
Who here considers themselves a “Leftist”? That is, from a Liberal(Social Democrat/Reform Capitalist) to flat out Communist. And why are you a Leftist? Why do you wish to reform capitalism or abolish it altogether? ---
**Author:** ![Ringo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/779978/32.png) [@Ringo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ringo)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/2 "2002-03-19T03:04:51Z")
This is probably [IMHO](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/forumdisplay.php?forumid=12), at best. BTW, not leftist at all (I’d be embarrassed, at the least, to be a leftist). ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/3 "2002-03-19T03:14:17Z")
I’m a moderate Libertarian, which can be considered leftist in some respects, and very conservative in others. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/4 "2002-03-19T03:18:56Z")
I’m for the environment, feminism, workers’ rights, democracy, antiwar, and steering globalization away from multinational corporate profits to the benefit of the workers. I think the conventional left/right spectrum is overrated, but if based on my principles you want to call me leftist, go ahead, knock yerself out. I believe the principles are more important than labels or party affiliation. I’m Green but tend to vote Democrat most of the time (lack of Green candidates where I live). Either Green or Democratic works for me, as long as it opposes the extreme conservatives who have taken over the RepubliKKKans. My heroine is Hillary Clinton \. She’s the one who should have been president. Looking forward to Chelsea in 2014! ---
**Author:** ![Jurhael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/cab0a1/32.png) [@Jurhael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jurhael)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/5 "2002-03-19T03:26:03Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Jomo Mojo \* > \*\* I think the conventional left/right spectrum is overrated, but if based on my principles you want to call me leftist, go ahead, knock yerself out. I believe the principles are more important than labels or party affiliation. \*\* Indeed. I think pigeonholing people is part of the problem. It’s just all too easy to do and people tend to get taken in by them. But, I was just curious. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![John\_Kentzel-Griffin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ccd318/32.png) [@John\_Kentzel-Griffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Kentzel-Griffin)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/6 "2002-03-19T03:45:11Z")
General Questions is for questions with factual answers. IMHO is for opinions and polls. Since this is more of a poll, I’ll move this to IMHO for you. **DrMatrix** - General Questions Moderator ---
**Author:** ![mangeorge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d78d45/32.png) [@mangeorge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mangeorge)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/7 "2002-03-19T04:06:18Z")
I want my limo. Peace, mangeorge ---
**Author:** ![Big\_Kahuna\_Burger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Big\_Kahuna\_Burger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Big_Kahuna_Burger)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/8 "2002-03-19T04:32:11Z")
DLC Democrat checking in. ---
**Author:** ![Jurhael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/cab0a1/32.png) [@Jurhael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jurhael)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/9 "2002-03-19T04:57:49Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by BigKahunaBurger \* > \*\*DLC Democrat checking in. \*\* What is DLC? ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/10 "2002-03-19T05:15:26Z")
My ideal would be for governments everywhere strive to maintain, as much as possible, the free market envisaged by Adam Smith. Unfortunately, the economically powerful have sold the idea that Adam Smith meant to say that if you keep your hands off business, things will sort themselves out somehow for the benefit of most ordinary people. Have you ever heard anything so ridiculous in your life? ---
**Author:** ![Donovan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ea666f/32.png) [@Donovan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Donovan)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/11 "2002-03-19T05:15:39Z")
DLC = Democrat(ic?) Leadership Council ---
**Author:** ![Big\_Kahuna\_Burger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Big\_Kahuna\_Burger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Big_Kahuna_Burger)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 5:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/12 "2002-03-19T05:27:51Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Donovan \* > \*\*DLC = Democrat(ic?) Leadership Council \*\* Yeah, it’s the moderate wing of the party, and it has been chaired by Bill Clinton, Joe Lieberman, Al Gore, Sam Nunn and Dick Gephardt. I interned there last summer. ---
**Author:** ![sqweels](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f19dbf/32.png) [@sqweels](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sqweels)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 5:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/13 "2002-03-19T05:51:40Z")
Define it, dammit! ---
**Author:** ![Kyla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/eada6e/32.png) [@Kyla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyla)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/14 "2002-03-19T06:05:12Z")
I’m a member of the Green Party. I was a Democrat from 1996 (when I turned 18) to 2000, when I got so pissed off at both main parties that I ran off and joined a third party. I think many Greenies are not living in the reality part of the world when it comes to some party platforms, but I like it better anyway. They’re at least steadfastly against the death penalty, unlike the wishy washy Democrats. ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 6:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/15 "2002-03-19T06:58:37Z")
I’m a full-on pinko. Yep, Commie scum. It just seems that every time I analyse this world it boils down to communism. Save the lectures on how it will never work in the real world- It’s not like I have the personal power to turn the world commie so you don’t have to worry. ---
**Author:** ![kase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/a5b964/32.png) [@kase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kase)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 8:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/16 "2002-03-19T08:38:23Z")
Green-thinking, labour-voting, pro-abortion, anti-discrimination of believe, color or gender preferences, I don’t know, Is that leftish? ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 10:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/17 "2002-03-19T10:44:22Z")
Yeah, I’m a leftist. 🙂 For me, it’s all about the corporations. I think they’re a marvelous mechanism for wealth creation - and I think calls to do away with that form of ownership, whether from the far left, or from libertarians, is ridiculous. But I believe the USA is headed in a direction analogous to one of those old-fashioned sci-fi comics where the robots - our creations - eventually become the masters, and we, the humans, become the servants. Replace ‘robots’ with ‘corporations’, and look at the power that corporations have in American politics, and it ain’t that farfetched. Quite simply, I believe for-profit corporations, and entities funded by them, should have no right to free speech. The individuals that run them, that own them, that profit from their existence - _they_ can speak, on their own dime and their own time. But as long as they have more or less the same free-speech rights we do, the advantage is to them, because for us, the time, money and energy in taking a political stand is simply subtracted from the rest of our lives - a net loss that we accept as our contribution to the common good. But for corporations, it’s a net gain, because it’s an **investment**. So they can always raise the ante, and will always win most of the political battles, as long as the rules are the way they are. I’ve written a bit more about this [here](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=31942) if you’re interested. Since I believe in government of the people, by the people, and for the people, as opposed to of the people, but by and for the corporations, I see this as a bad thing. I believe that corporations should fundamentally be our servants and not our masters. On other issues, I come down in various places - much more left than right, but far from always. But to me, this is the overarching issue. When I’m debating gun control, or posting the Nine Commandments in schools, at least it’s _people_ on the other side of the issue, and that’s what politics should be all about. But on so many other issues, from health care to worker protections to the environment to trade pacts, there are mostly people on one side of the issue, and mostly corporations on the other side. And on those issues, they’ve got one hell of a track record, in a game where they should have no right to even be playing. ---
**Author:** ![yojimbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yojimbo/32/232_2.png) [@yojimbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yojimbo)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 10:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/18 "2002-03-19T10:50:12Z")
I believe in strong unions, state provided health and education, good safety nets for people who are unemployed, liberalisation of drugs laws. A fair taxation system that will pay for it. If the services are there I have no problem paying for it out of my wages. So am I a leftist? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![TwistofFate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/cdc98d/32.png) [@TwistofFate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TwistofFate)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 11:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/19 "2002-03-19T11:03:12Z")
consider me singing from the left wing hymnsheet. Ringo, why would you be ashamed to be a leftist? ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_Wright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/848f3c/32.png) [@Steve\_Wright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_Wright)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 11:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978/20 "2002-03-19T11:40:50Z")
I believe in social justice, equality for all under the law, that poverty should be abolished and wealth distributed fairly, and that the rewards of industry should go to the people who do the work. In short: up the workers! Power to the people! I _suppose_ that makes me a leftist… [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/leftist-roll-call/98978.md?page=2)