# Will Centrist Politics Ever Return?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056
**Category:** Politics & Elections
**Created:** [November 20, 2015, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056 "2015-11-20T06:31:38Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 4
### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [April 7, 2016, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/61 "2016-04-07T19:28:18Z")
> [@DerekMichaels00](#):
>
> The anti-Semitism in the far-left . . .
. . . is nonexistent. There is indeed considerable sympathy for the Palestinians as against the Israelis, but that is neither anti-Semitic nor unreasonable nor unjust.
---
### Author:  [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)
#### Post date: [April 7, 2016, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/62 "2016-04-07T22:56:44Z")
> [@adaher](#):
>
> Another problem is two consecutive shitty administrations and so everyone’s pissed off.
Psst! It’s 2016, not 2008.
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### Author:  [@Procrustus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Procrustus)
#### Post date: [April 7, 2016, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/63 "2016-04-07T23:17:05Z")
> [@DerekMichaels00](#):
>
> now that the ADL has [called out Bernie’s lies](http://www.adl.org/press-center/press-releases/israel-middle-east/adl-calls-on-sen-bernie-sanders-to-correct-misstatement.html#.VwZjN6QrKCg), which were obviously meant to pander to the far-left, I wonder if the bark will be peeled off this self-hater.
>
> The anti-Semitism in the far-left, that self-hater Bernie panders to, needs to be stopped before it reaches critical mass as it has in Corbyn’s Labour Party.
Bernie got his numbers wrong. I don’t see how that’s a “pander to the far left.”
From your link:
> [@](#):
>
> In an interview with the editorial board of the New York Daily News, Senator Sanders said, “I believe 100 percent not only in Israel’s right to exist, a right to exist in peace and security without having to face terrorist attacks.”
>
> But he then called Israel’s actions during the 2014 war in Gaza “disproportionate” and greatly overstated Palestinian civilian casualties, saying “my recollection is over 10,000 innocent people were killed in Gaza.”
There is plenty of room for honest disagreement about Israel, and its actions. There’s no need to call Senator Sanders a “self-hater.”
---
### Author:  [@CaptMurdock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CaptMurdock)
#### Post date: [April 7, 2016, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/64 "2016-04-07T23:28:32Z")
> [@DerekMichaels00](#):
>
> I mean if a French socialist President (a President in a country with a lot more Islam than America, and a party with a lot more Muslim voters) can use the term (which Obama has censored), so can Obama…
Amazing how far we’ve come in a dozen years, isn’t it? The French back then were poncy spineless cheese-eating surrender monkeys who refused to saddle up with us when we were going all John Wayne on the Camel Jockeys. “Freedom Fries,” anyone? :smack:
---
### Author:  [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)
#### Post date: [April 8, 2016, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/65 "2016-04-08T01:26:09Z")
> [@DerekMichaels00](#):
>
> now that the ADL has [called out Bernie’s lies](http://www.adl.org/press-center/press-releases/israel-middle-east/adl-calls-on-sen-bernie-sanders-to-correct-misstatement.html#.VwZjN6QrKCg), which were obviously meant to pander to the far-left, I wonder if the bark will be peeled off this self-hater.
>
> The anti-Semitism in the far-left, that self-hater Bernie panders to, needs to be stopped before it reaches critical mass as it has in Corbyn’s Labour Party.
You do realize Sanders is a left-wing Zionist who worked at a kibbutz for some years in his youth?
---
### Author:  [@Johnny\_Ace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Ace)
#### Post date: [April 8, 2016, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/66 "2016-04-08T01:40:09Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#):
>
> You do realize Sanders is a left-wing Zionist who worked at a kibbutz for some years in his youth?
Any number of American Jews do that. It’s a chance to get in touch with their history. So what?
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### Author:  [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)
#### Post date: [April 8, 2016, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/67 "2016-04-08T01:56:35Z")
> [@Johnny\_Ace](#):
>
> Any number of American Jews do that. It’s a chance to get in touch with their history. So what?
The point being he’s not a “self-hater”. There are a non-trivial number of Jews who espouse rubbish about Zionism being “settler racism” or whatnot, Sanders is not one of them. The AIPAC crowd hates him though because he does not shill for Likud Party line.
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### Author:  [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)
#### Post date: [April 8, 2016, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/68 "2016-04-08T03:45:18Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#):
>
> . . . is nonexistent. …
That is simply an ignorant statement to make **Brian**.
No question that there is left wing sympathy to Palestinian perspectives and antipathy to Israeli positions that is _not_ based on anti-Semitism.
And there are left wing anti-Semites who use Palestinian sympathies as cover for anti-Semitism. It is ignorant and insulting to a high degree to pretend that such does not exist.
When a student hoping to become a member of UCLA’s student council judicial board is [questioned](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/06/us/debate-on-a-jewish-student-at-ucla.html) and initially rejected, explicitly because she is Jewish and belongs to Jewish organizations, that is anti-Semitsm.
When a left wing professor of rhetoric at Oberlin [posts](http://forward.com/opinion/335007/inside-the-twisted-anti-semitic-mind-of-oberlin-professor-joy-karega/) that Jews are behind 9-11, ISIS, Charlie Hebdo and the Paris attacks, that Jews control the U.S. government, that Mossad engineered the downing of a Malaysian airliner over Ukraine in 2014, and that Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan has got it right … that’s not “considerable sympathy for the Palestinians” … that’s anti-Semitism.\* When the protests are [graffiti](http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/03/19/berkeley-s-swastika-problem-are-america-s-liberal-colleges-breeding-anti-semitism.html) that state “Zionists should be sent to the gas chamber.” … that’s anti-Semitism, not merely sympathy for Palestinians.
There is _considerable_ left wing anti-Semitism and your blanket statement that it is _nonexistent_ is simply false.
Sanders? Nah. No self-hater. He’s bread and butter irreligious leftist American Jew. His main problem is his tendency to not know what the hell he is talking about but to spout off anyway like he actually does. Any statement that comports with what he already believes will just be said as if it is true, no matter how fictional it may be. This time justifying his belief that Israel was “indiscriminate” with their use of force in Gaza by spouting off a number that was a made-up one exaggerated minimally five-fold from reality. This time he has at least owned up to … making a false statement … and apologized for it. More than he usually has done.
\*Let me go on record defending her right to her speech as long as it is not in the classroom or in an official capacity. She should not be disciplined by the university for her public activity outside of her job, hateful or not.
---
### Author:  [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)
#### Post date: [April 8, 2016, 7:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/69 "2016-04-08T07:33:20Z")
Just had to throw in this brilliant Bill Clinton rebuttal to BLM activists:
> [@](#):
>
> “You are defending the people who killed the lives you say matter,”
Clinton was referring to all the killers he put behind bars for longer sentences with his prison reform bill, which BLM opposes.
That’s what centrist politics looks like, which I think says more about how insane the fringes have become than anything else. Of course, the Salon writer finds his statement “cringe-worthy”:
> **[Black Lives Matter protesters heckle Bill Clinton — and his terrible response...](https://www.salon.com/2016/04/07/protesters_get_to_bill_clinton_and_his_terrible_response_was_cringeworthy_you_are_defending_the_people_who_killed_the_lives_you_say_matter/)**
>
> Clinton was visibly irritated by BLM protesters who criticized his 1994 Crime Bill that led to prison overcrowding
Sometimes I wonder these days if being right is offensive if it disagrees with the preferred narrative of a minority activist group.
---
### Author:  [@DerekMichaels00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DerekMichaels00)
#### Post date: [April 8, 2016, 10:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/70 "2016-04-08T10:14:53Z")
> [@adaher](#):
>
> Just had to throw in this brilliant Bill Clinton rebuttal to BLM activists:
>
> Clinton was referring to all the killers he put behind bars for longer sentences with his prison reform bill, which BLM opposes.
>
> That’s what centrist politics looks like, which I think says more about how insane the fringes have become than anything else. Of course, the Salon writer finds his statement “cringe-worthy”:
>
> [http://www.salon.com/2016/04/07/protesters\_get\_to\_bill\_clinton\_and\_his\_terrible\_response\_was\_cringeworthy\_you\_are\_defending\_the\_people\_who\_killed\_the\_lives\_you\_say\_matter/](http://www.salon.com/2016/04/07/protesters_get_to_bill_clinton_and_his_terrible_response_was_cringeworthy_you_are_defending_the_people_who_killed_the_lives_you_say_matter/)
>
> Sometimes I wonder these days if being right is offensive if it disagrees with the preferred narrative of a minority activist group.
it was brilliant, and that the major left-leaning sites are attacking him is everything wrong with our politics these days. You have to go with stupid narratives instead of the truth.
Bernie Sanders run has created the environment for a left-wing Tea Party. One reason I embrace the Clintons is that they’re the antithesis of that.
---
### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [April 8, 2016, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/71 "2016-04-08T14:35:55Z")
> [@DSeid](#):
>
> That is simply an ignorant statement to make **Brian**.
>
> No question that there is left wing sympathy to Palestinian perspectives and antipathy to Israeli positions that is _not_ based on anti-Semitism.
>
> And there are left wing anti-Semites who use Palestinian sympathies as cover for anti-Semitism. It is ignorant and insulting to a high degree to pretend that such does not exist.
>
> When a student hoping to become a member of UCLA’s student council judicial board is [questioned](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/06/us/debate-on-a-jewish-student-at-ucla.html) and initially rejected, explicitly because she is Jewish and belongs to Jewish organizations, that is anti-Semitsm.
>
> When a left wing professor of rhetoric at Oberlin [posts](http://forward.com/opinion/335007/inside-the-twisted-anti-semitic-mind-of-oberlin-professor-joy-karega/) that Jews are behind 9-11, ISIS, Charlie Hebdo and the Paris attacks, that Jews control the U.S. government, that Mossad engineered the downing of a Malaysian airliner over Ukraine in 2014, and that Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan has got it right … that’s not “considerable sympathy for the Palestinians” … that’s anti-Semitism.\* When the protests are [graffiti](http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/03/19/berkeley-s-swastika-problem-are-america-s-liberal-colleges-breeding-anti-semitism.html) that state “Zionists should be sent to the gas chamber.” … that’s anti-Semitism, not merely sympathy for Palestinians.
>
> There is _considerable_ left wing anti-Semitism and your blanket statement that it is _nonexistent_ is simply false.
Och, laddie, but they Jew-haters, they are nae **True** Leftists! 😉
---
### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [April 8, 2016, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/72 "2016-04-08T14:37:35Z")
> [@adaher](#):
>
> Just had to throw in this brilliant Bill Clinton rebuttal to BLM activists:
>
> Clinton was referring to all the killers he put behind bars for longer sentences with his prison reform bill, which BLM opposes.
>
> That’s what centrist politics looks like, which I think says more about how insane the fringes have become than anything else. Of course, the Salon writer finds his statement “cringe-worthy”:
And it is. Look at the results, at how packed the prisons are now – and not with killers.
---
### Author:  [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)
#### Post date: [April 8, 2016, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/73 "2016-04-08T20:49:59Z")
Clinton’s Sista Soulja moment, the 2016 version.
---
### Author:  [@DerekMichaels00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DerekMichaels00)
#### Post date: [April 8, 2016, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/74 "2016-04-08T21:03:12Z")
> [@asahi](#):
>
> Clinton’s Sista Soulja moment, the 2016 version.
If only Barack Hussein Obama had a Sister Souljah moment, we wouldn’t have the kind of polarization and creeping socialist extreme-left out there.
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### Author:  [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)
#### Post date: [April 8, 2016, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/75 "2016-04-08T21:09:29Z")
> [@DerekMichaels00](#):
>
> If only Barack Hussein Obama had a Sister Souljah moment, we wouldn’t have the kind of polarization and creeping socialist extreme-left out there.
LOL. No surprise that someone with no grasp of the facts would blame the polarization on Obama, much less call him a socialist. At the moment, based on the polling, he’s probably the single most popular sitting office-holder in the country right now.
---
### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [April 8, 2016, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/76 "2016-04-08T21:23:53Z")
> [@DerekMichaels00](#):
>
> If only Barack Hussein Obama had a Sister Souljah moment, we wouldn’t have the kind of polarization and creeping socialist extreme-left out there.
Barack Obama does not have the power to delegitimize Bernie Sanders.
---
### Author:  [@DerekMichaels00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DerekMichaels00)
#### Post date: [April 9, 2016, 1:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/77 "2016-04-09T01:03:41Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#):
>
> LOL. No surprise that someone with no grasp of the facts would blame the polarization on Obama, much less call him a socialist. At the moment, based on the polling, he’s probably the single most popular sitting office-holder in the country right now.
I never called him a socialist, but his not reigning in the far-left (on many levels) has created the environment where a socialist can win primary states.
---
### Author:  [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)
#### Post date: [April 9, 2016, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/78 "2016-04-09T01:17:41Z")
> [@DerekMichaels00](#):
>
> I never called him a socialist, but his not reigning in the far-left (on many levels) has created the environment where a socialist can win primary states.
Can you explain just how he’s supposed to rein (note the spelling) in the “far-left”? I mean, I don’t take orders from him, and I don’t think anyone who isn’t actually a civil servant/cabinet member does, either.
ETA: Besides which, I certainly don’t see anyone in the GOP reining in the batshit right.
---
### Author:  [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)
#### Post date: [April 9, 2016, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/79 "2016-04-09T01:38:45Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#):
>
> :rolleyes: If that’s all ya got, ya got nuttin’.
The goofiness of what DerekMichaels00 is saying is difficult to understand.
It’s like there are magic words, and if you don’t intone them, some bullshit conservative ceremony isn’t complete. HOW DARE OBAMA NOT COMPLETE THE RITUAL!!!
---
### Author:  [@DerekMichaels00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DerekMichaels00)
#### Post date: [April 9, 2016, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-centrist-politics-ever-return/738056/80 "2016-04-09T01:41:00Z")
> [@jayjay](#):
>
> Can you explain just how he’s supposed to rein (note the spelling) in the “far-left”? I mean, I don’t take orders from him, and I don’t think anyone who isn’t actually a civil servant/cabinet member does, either.
>
> ETA: Besides which, I certainly don’t see anyone in the GOP reining in the batshit right.
triangulation against the left’s extreme elements with views out of America’s mainstream, like on cross-dressers and Israel-demonizers. Also, criticizing the SJWs. Bill Clinton did the equivalent with the Sister Souljah moment, welfare reform, etc… Such things empower moderates and take the steam out of the far-left sails. Bill Clinton also said about affirmative action “mend it, don’t end it” instead of “I could’ve appointed a black lesbian” as if that should matter for SCOTUS.
Also, he should’ve triangulated against OWS, hard.
While yes, the GOP has its own problems, I never bothered with them anyway; and plus, Dems should be the adults in the room. They’re doing better than the GOP in this respect, but with Bernie around, it doesn’t look like it will last.
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