Will conservatives here reflect on malign ties between conservatism, Republicanism, and Trump?

[Ambivalid]

@Isosleepy

The easy answer would’ve been that I would vote for Hillary. But unlike some (many) I believe voting for someone is an expression of agreement with them as a person and (much of) the platform they run on. And at the time, Hillary didn’t clear that bar for me. So then it becomes deciding between the concept of needing to agree to a decent extent with the person you vote for, or some strategy to minimize damage. Fortunately, in this country I can still, for now, make that determination and act on it as I see fit. In this particular (still hypothetical) example, going back with hindsight, I’m saying I don’t know. If you were to ask me to choose between eating a shit sandwich and being castrated with a rusty chainsaw, I’d probabl give the same answer, even if one of them has fewer long-term consequences and is at first sight less severe.

But to characterize the choice betweeen Clinton or Trump as a choice between eating a shit sandwich or being castrated with a rusty chainsaw is more bogus false equivalence and you know that. I cannot accept that as a good faith position. Cannot.

A more apt comparison would be deciding between being castrated with a rusty chainsaw, or developing a mild UTI for a couple weeks. Or in other words, no decision necessary, because not a single person, if no other outside influences were present, would ever choose to permanently, grotesquely and painfully disfigure themselves rather than deal with 10-14 days of potential mild unpleasentness.

And correct me if im wrong but arent you still undecided as to whether you are going to participate in the upcoming 2020 election, even tho you know for pretty much a certainty that Trump will be seeking re-election? I dont understand how you wouldnt feel a bit of individual responsibility, as small as it may be, to do all thst is in your piwer to ensure that Trump is by one means or another, a one term President.

[kaylasdad99]

@Velocity

The impression I get is that the anger stems from a perception that there is a “punch-up vs. punch-down” double standard. For instance, if a politician or Hollywood celebrity were to make fun of Christianity, there are few, if any consequences that such a person would suffer - but if that same politician or celebrity were to make fun of Islam, they’d be instantly lambasted as “Islamophobic.”

Am I to understand that punching up and punching down are morally identical? If not, please clarify.* TIA.

*(and if so, please explicitly state so, and provide the reason(s) you believe this to be the case, and why I would be ethnically and morally justified in also believing it. TIA )

[drad_dog]

@Isosleepy

The fundamental error here is trying to figure out the conservatives who support Trump. Trump got elected because a lot of rust-belt blue collar workers, who until then had been one of the most reliable Democratic voters (and vote organizers!) voted for him.
They voted for him not out of deeply held conservative beliefs (beliefs the man doesn’t have anyway). They voted for him because their way of life was (is!) under threat. They will likely not retire from a job paying 40 bucks an hour and with Union protection. Their kids certainly will not have that opportunity. Their way of life is evaporating. At the same time, the white middle aged male subsection of that contingent (a significant portion of the group) is being told they are and have been quite privileged, and it is implied or outright said, that it is time for them to hand over some of that privilege. Trump, by pushing every doorbell on the 50 floor apartment building of politics, hit on these issues, and rode them home.

Now it’s 3 years later. These people identified with him. They have been listening to media so thinly sliced that they will only ever hear stuff that aligns with their thinking. It is natural to have an us-vs- them mindset, especially if the other side is helping with the rhetoric for same. They may genuinely believe that the alternative to Trump is the end of the world. Good luck getting them back: moving further left isn’t going to get it done.

Another portion of the Trump voters are the religious right, they will vote for whoever the republican candidate is, no matter what, unless they advocate pro-choice policies.

Conservatives or Republicans who see Trump for what he is, don’t have much of an alternative. Some of us will write-in Bob Dole next election, if the man is still alive. And some of us will vote D, depending on the candidate.

How do attach voting for trump with union protections that are under threat, or lost?

The Rs and cons have been attacking unions for decades with great success and publicity. It was never a secret. Their union position is in the basic DNA of each party.

Why do you think that moving left is impossible? What is the factor that fixes them to their spot?

[Pantastic]

@Velocity

The impression I get is that the anger stems from a perception that there is a “punch-up vs. punch-down” double standard. For instance, if a politician or Hollywood celebrity were to make fun of Christianity, there are few, if any consequences that such a person would suffer - but if that same politician or celebrity were to make fun of Islam, they’d be instantly lambasted as “Islamophobic.”

This highlights what I mean about people being divorced from reality, despite the constant claims by conservatives that they’re the level-headed ‘real world’ people. Politicians who make fun of Christianity generally don’t get elected. Can you name anyone holding national office who makes fun of Christianity and holds their seat? Or even State level office (I’m sure there are some in local offices, but that’s a really low bar)? Meanwhile there are plenty of (mostly Republican) congresspeople who denigrate and make fun of various non-Christian groups routinely, and the president of the US constantly denigrates Islam.

The weird double standard where on one hand politicians up to the president don’t just ‘make fun of’ non-christians, but actively discuss how they’re bad (in addition to the occasional mockery) and attempt to implement laws and policies to hurt them, exclude them, and prevent them from practicing their religion, but on the other hand Christians are the real opressed group because, a politician might be able to make a joke about them and still get elected.

Also cranking the snowflakeness up to 10 to whine that you’re oppressed because someone might call you Islamophobic when that’s how you act while telling other people they’re snowflakes if they object to actual slurs is similarly impressive. Especially when your original post and their position is that the libs are a bunch of whiny snowflakes who should stop with all of this PC bullshit and are glad to have someone in the White House ‘telling it like it is’. It appears that what you and your ilk really want is ‘to be able to insult queers, gays, muslims, foreigners, and all of those people whenever and however we want, to discriminate against them, assault them, kick them out of the country without anyone ever objecting, while forbidding people saying anything at all untoward about our sick, twisted perversion of Christianity, and to call ourselves oppressed if someone ever complains about anything we do’.

[octopus]

@kaylasdad99

Am I to understand that punching up and punching down are morally identical? If not, please clarify.* TIA.

*(and if so, please explicitly state so, and provide the reason(s) you believe this to be the case, and why I would be ethnically and morally justified in also believing it. TIA )

How about don’t punch?

[The_Tooth]

@Velocity

The impression I get is that the anger stems from a perception that there is a “punch-up vs. punch-down” double standard. For instance, if a politician or Hollywood celebrity were to make fun of Christianity, there are few, if any consequences that such a person would suffer - but if that same politician or celebrity were to make fun of Islam, they’d be instantly lambasted as “Islamophobic.”

A Hollywood celebrity - or one from anywhere else, I suppose - might get away with it, but a politician? In the United States? Not a chance.

[Atamasama]

@octopus

How about don’t punch?

You hippy. :mad:

[Ambivalid]

@octopus

How about don’t punch?

No potty fists or potty mouths.

[anomalous1]

@septimus

Thank you divemaster ! You and I would find much to agree on — I also thought TPP was a good idea — even though I’m an agnostic social moderate. I support Women’s Choice but would rather leave this to the states than have the Federal Roe v Wade. We’d find much to disagree on, but it sounds like we’d unify against putting criminals in charge!

You support Pence. What do you think of allegations that Pence participated in the criminal dialog with Ukraine?

Thanks anomalous1 ! I think many of your ideas are mistaken, but you seem righteous and sincere. It would be good to have a polite debate with you. Your comments confirm what I and others worry about — that social progressivism is pushing some voters into the arms of the right-wing.

Even some R’s now agree that Trump’s call to Ukraine was criminal, and that he should be removed from office. How do you feel about that?
Hive mind? Gulags? Oh right, you’re the oaf that Googled “left-wing” and found a Biden=Stalin equation or some such.

You’re welcome to make posts which aren’t content-free, if you’re capable of it, commenting on the Ukraine criminal or whatever. Meanwhile: how’s the weather where you are? Got your doorknob fixed yet?

In the 0.99999… = 1 debate you’d be the guy arguing that 0.99999… = 43. In a physics thread you’d complain that quarks are enslaving leptons and that Van der Waals force wouldn’t exist if the statists hadn’t used violence. Welcome back!

Thank you! I am sincere. Trump’s call was of questionable legality (fancy for he should not have done it) but behavior was questionable on the other end as well, but the ends do not justify the means in any case.

@HeweyLogan

Damn fine Post #84, anomalous1. I was reading along going ‘…yep, yep, yep. Nailed it’.

For me at least. Thanks!

Thanks. It really is just how it went. How it was interpreted for myself and which way the wind blew.

@Der_Trihs

Except that’s a right wing propaganda line, deliberately created during the Reagan administration to deflect attention from their lies. The media is and always has been overwhelmingly right wing, and more so all the time.

Ah, libertarians; “anarchists who want police protection from their slaves”. Parasites who feed off of society and expect that society to protect them from their victims, who think the only proper function of government is to serve as iron boots to stomp the underclass down.

Like the rest of his supporters, your motivation is malice. You support bigotry, rape, torture, tyranny and murder. Every time somebody browner than you suffers, it is a victory for you. You are the exact opposite of fair minded; you are cruel and bigoted.

Not a single decent human being voted for Trump, because voting for Trump automatically disqualifies someone as a decent human being.

How many times must we have this discussion? Your reply is the exact attitude that is pushing people toward the Right, and the absolute reason why so many loathe the new Left Wing. Thank you for making my point. FYI Your stereotyping of a large group of people is contraindicated for your progressive political disposition. You completely made Shodan’s point, telling someone else what they believe. He is absolutely correct. I really don’t understand how you have really lost your sense of reality. Your post is frighteningly ignorant, stereotypical, disparaging and illogical to the point that it almost seems contrived and issued just to make my point. Give the propaganda a rest, please.

[Voyager]

@Velocity

The impression I get is that the anger stems from a perception that there is a “punch-up vs. punch-down” double standard. For instance, if a politician or Hollywood celebrity were to make fun of Christianity, there are few, if any consequences that such a person would suffer - but if that same politician or celebrity were to make fun of Islam, they’d be instantly lambasted as “Islamophobic.”

Pray tell who has made fun of Christianity - which is not the same as making fun of creationist fundamentalist morons, who don’t own Christianity.
I think people make fun of Saudi restrictions on women’s liberty, which is also not the same as making fun of Islam.

[drad_dog]

@octopus

How about don’t punch?

Fox News is becoming a good safe space. They are reminding their audience every 10 minutes or so that there are people who are really being mean to the president and they are punching him so much that it’s not fair.

“Not fair…”

“Stop punching him and being so mean!!”

Can conservatives reflect on this reality having something to do with their movement? Or are they afraid to be real for even one second?

[anomalous1]

@GIGObuster

But, what it is looking to be then is that the swing actually ended confirming a lot of what the ones on the other side (and even conservatives that looked at Trump) warned you about.

How Trump's Economic Chickens Are Finally Coming Home To Roost
Turns out that one point of accusing others of crying wolf, (the critics of economic injustice, racism, etc) misses one point of the story. That there was a wolf, just like in the original tale.

@GIGObuster

“For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.”

H. L. Mencken

Thanks for the link, but it is filled with fallacies that ignore typical economic cycles, and how one decision has a cascading effect that may rebound as well. Even the arguments against a wall are poorly constructed and are outright based on weasel words. The entire segment about immigration and it’s impacts is unbelievably short sighted.

Just a small example of fallacious argument from just one small paragraph. “There is no significant evidence of terrorists or drugs entering illegally through the Southern border. Most of the illegal immigrants and drugs coming into the country come in through legal points of entry.”

I highlight two weasel words. and the last part about legal points of entry… now if that is true, what is the alternative? Criticize it without doing anything? Or improve the barrier and system as a whole. Legal entry or not, illicit goods/smuggling are invariably coming from one direction in majority. It is not as much Canada or from The Pacific or Atlantic, So is the article suggesting we do nothing? Do not try to improve the situation? Leave it as is, with all of its flaws and restrict security through legal points so nothing comes through but have no wall? Where do you think it will wind up coming through? If people cannot get in legally, where would they come in? What is the purpose of the statement (of the likes, the article is filled, in respect to illogical arguments).

The author of that article should be ashamed of himself.
As for the Mencken quote, it works both ways.

[drad_dog]

@Velocity

The OP is rather vague, I’m not quite sure what you are wanting here. As a fiscal liberal but social conservative who voted third party in 2016, I’ll give it a stab:
Many Republicans have yearned for someone like Trump, but what they really want is someone like him, but not quite him (but even they themselves don’t realize it.) They want someone who boldly stands up and tells the politically incorrect offensive truth. But Trump isn’t the 3D chess player they want - he is not a highly intelligent, cunning, savvy strategist - his brain’s thought process is “six fireflies blinking randomly in a jar,” as a NY Times editorial put it. But he sounds close enough to what they want, that they thought he was what they want.

But also, Trump is the social conservative that many have yearned for - someone who will say things like, “Men are discriminated against, Christians are discriminated against, etc.” - because, let’s be honest, to a certain extent, there ***is ***a considerable amount of anti-men-ism or anti-Christian-ism that goes on in America. And when conservatives found someone who actually scratched that mental itch for them - Trump - the relief and joy he gave them was so intense that they’d go to any extent and do anything for him. It was almost indescribable delight - finally, someone who speaks for us! Many liberals are utterly baffled and confounded by the zeal of this passion - why Trump scratches the itch of these conservatives so satisfyingly. Because everyone wants a leader who they think speaks for them. But even Trump isn’t a truly zealous social conservative; he more or less figured out how to scratch these people’s itch for political gain.

The nature and extent of that itch is the thing to explore. anti-menism and anti-christianism is something that needs explanation to say the least.

If the itch is based on identity then, well that’s identity politics. If those on the right can partake of this identity politics while basing their politics on anti-indentity politics, well doesn’t it need more study?

[drad_dog]

@DrFidelius

I am a small c, New England, William F. Buckley conservative.
I have no fucking idea what the current Republican party is thinking. Their actions do not align with anything I have held to be conservative values.

Tax cuts, extreme law and order, right wing judges. They are chasing the same conservative gold rings they have forever.

There was no body snatcher moment when the party switched. It became this while conservatives watched.

[drad_dog]

@Shodan

Not on the SDMB, no. You guys can’t stand to read it - you feel the immediate need to substitute what you think (so to speak) and then rant against that.

Besides, it isn’t necessary - there is no shortage of posters who will tell me what I think no matter what I say.

Regards,
Shodan

This is illogical to me. You can write it no matter what we do with it. and secondly, telling you what you think is not what you want from others, so it is sarcastic, but not to the OP.

[drad_dog]

@Shodan

But it’s what the OP was gonna get no matter what.

Like I said, threads like the OP get mostly two kinds of responses - liberals telling other liberals what conservatives really think, and liberals telling conservatives what conservatives really think.

If thoughtful reflection were going to come from such a poisoned well as the OP, Bone would not have moved it to the Pit. Yet here we are.

Regards,
Shodan

Can you cite another thread like this one? (Check the title)

[D_Odds]

@enipla

Bolding mine. Um What?

Eh… IMHO, not voting only sends the message that you don’t care. Your voice is not lost by voting. It is lost when you don’t.

In many parts of the US, that’s BS. Certainly it is in my part. Because I don’t register with either party, I don’t get to vote in primaries, and after the primaries, the general election in my area is simply a rubber stamp. I still vote - despite thinking “there had to have been better choices than Clinton and Sanders”, I pulled the knob for Clinton, but it didn’t give me a voice. And NYC is not unique in this. If one is a liberal in Wyoming or Oklahoma, one’s voice isn’t being heard when one votes blue. Voting or not voting will have the same effect, even often at the most local levels.

[drad_dog]

@anomalous1

I would also like to say I actually wholly endorse and echo nearly everything Velocity said. Very well said!

Ambivalid makes a very strong and good argument as well.
Well I’ll keep up with the OP here.

I’ll start out with personal anecdotes, and a little history. I had been left leaning for most of my life, most of the friendships I’ve had throughout my life were with left-leaners/Democrats. While I’ve always payed attention to the political arena, and wanted some change, the complacency and ineptitude of career politicians bothered me. I voted for Obama in his first term hoping for that. I was very disappointed. More ineffectual, what was I thinking voting for some Chicago Politician, I should’ve known better being born and raised in the same city.

I started getting disturbed about how many people I knew personally and of that were voting left-wing because it was the “cool thing to do” rather than actually knowing anything even elementary about politics. I wondered where they got their ideas from, what motivated them. TV. Media. 90% of it was left wing. The teachers, the bands/concerts, the college instructors, the newspapers.

This was saturating people with only one sided ideas. I decided to think for myself, look up different media sources, as well as those from other countries, read different books and compare fact vs. fiction, plausible vs. implausible, and perhaps most importantly, common sense. and I came to find myself as a libertarian. I believe in charity, but towing your own weight, less regulation, free thinking, free speech, right to defense. I decided that the policies conjured by the left were in the realm and fantasy and were not feasible, repeating the same mistakes repeated elsewhere in the 19th century. I decided that I didn’t like Democracy as they defined it. I realized that I live in a Republic. Then I decided I do not like many Conservatives for their evangelical on sided thinking that infringed on free speech, I did not like Republicans (the NeoCon RINO’s) who caved to the pressures of the other side of the aisle and wanted to push shit like the PATRIOT ACT. I found where I fit, libertarian (“Don’t fuck with me, I won’t fuck with you, and I don’t owe you SHIT!”)

As for voting for Trump, I never thought I would.

It was fully reinforced and pushed me further to the right when the Obama era racial obsessions of the media began to unnerve me. It culminated with them almost saying outright “White Male Heterosexuals Are Evil” to today where it is plainly said without reservation, where illusions and logical fallacies such as “white privilege”.

I noticed what it started to become, using race to start arguments and calling someone racist to end them/when the argument wasn’t going as intended. I noticed that the media (not just the news) and college professors were actually supportive of radical ideas such as forcefully taking money from those who earned it, and giving it to those who did not. I noticed that Merit was no longer existent. I started noticing people could not take a joke, so bored with their lives they look for a reason to complain. Political Correctness, a poison to society, went unchecked.

This is where I, a normally fair minded person, one who would actually get along with everyone on this message board, who would give the “shirt off his back” (if you can accept that cliche) to someone in need and always practiced being an egalitarian… voted for Trump. The pendulum had to swing the other way to even it out.

If you would say that 90% of the media is left wing and that people vote that way because it’s cool, then you probably would not be inclined to reflect about the conservative/trump nexus. You already are on record here as saying or else implying that the real problems in the US in 2019 are liberals, Obama, and political correctness. Is this really a deep enough dive into your own state of mind? That’s the end of it?

[asahi]

@Ambivalid

But to characterize the choice betweeen Clinton or Trump as a choice between eating a shit sandwich or being castrated with a rusty chainsaw is more bogus false equivalence and you know that. I cannot accept that as a good faith position. Cannot.

Indeed, it cannot be good faith, and there will be a moment of truth in this country when there is a test of righteousness, at which time we shall decide who is worthy of citizenship and liberty, and who is not, and those who posit such anti-factuals should be incarcerated and reeducated.

[drad_dog]

@anomalous1

Thanks for the link, but it is filled with fallacies that ignore typical economic cycles, and how one decision has a cascading effect that may rebound as well. Even the arguments against a wall are poorly constructed and are outright based on weasel words. The entire segment about immigration and it’s impacts is unbelievably short sighted.

Just a small example of fallacious argument from just one small paragraph. “There is no significant evidence of terrorists or drugs entering illegally through the Southern border. Most of the illegal immigrants and drugs coming into the country come in through legal points of entry.”

I highlight two weasel words. and the last part about legal points of entry… now if that is true, what is the alternative? Criticize it without doing anything? Or improve the barrier and system as a whole. Legal entry or not, illicit goods/smuggling are invariably coming from one direction in majority. It is not as much Canada or from The Pacific or Atlantic, So is the article suggesting we do nothing? Do not try to improve the situation? Leave it as is, with all of its flaws and restrict security through legal points so nothing comes through but have no wall? Where do you think it will wind up coming through? If people cannot get in legally, where would they come in? What is the purpose of the statement (of the likes, the article is filled, in respect to illogical arguments).

The author of that article should be ashamed of himself.
As for the Mencken quote, it works both ways.

Do you want a wall on the whole southern border?

I can’t help but think of the gun situation as a comparison. People make the arguments all the time that: knives kill too; and most of all that: criminals will get guns anyway, so ergo there should not be an atttempt to reduce the guns in the street. They avoid the issue of trying to make the situation better at all. For instance in making it harder to get a gun, that may reduce incidents. They just deny this aspect of reality. This is because they are against any law around guns no matter what, period.

Here you seem to be saying that there is such a big problem on the SB that the wall is critical to the nations security. (You are placing it up with the emergency of having trump in the white house itself for instance to someone like me, I am assuming? You won’t truck with lies about it.) I honestly don’t see it. What state are you in? How much are you focused on illegal immigration in your world view?

Where are you on regulating firearms?