Part of the problem as I see it is the perception of compromise as being “weak.” For Tea Party and NeoCons, blocking everything and “standing their ground” without compromise is a win. It tears the house down through neglect.
Compare and contrast with Democrats, who get criticized for compromising, when in fact that’s how politics gets done and the only way a democracy can function.
That’s the problem I have with Sanders and his most devout supporters; while I might agree with their positions almost across the board, the effect is the same as the TP nutjobs. Insisting on having it their way or no way at all just gives a lot of the latter.
True, but they didn’t pay a political price for it. In fact, you may have noticed that the GOP will now control the Presidency and both houses of Congress.
That’s the way bullies think: that offering to collaborate, to support the arts and ‘hippie causes’ like the environment or Native Americans are all signs of weak effeminate spinelessness. That to extend a hand to work together is the way weaklings do business.
Compromise done well is hard but worthwhile. Burning things down is easy.
I (along with may people) hoped we wouldn’t actually have to go through the pain of the ramifications of letting the Tea Party have their way, but it looks like we’re going to have to put our collective hands on the hot stove to figure that one out.
You’re right in theory, but the problem is that compromising won’t get the Democrats back into power. It’s time for them to stand strong and block, block, block every damn thing that comes out of Congress and the White House. Worked for the other side.
I’m under the impression (someone debunk if necessary, please) that during the world wars most soldiers wouldn’t fire their guns at the “enemy” even though they were being attacked. I think a lot of people in this world would fundamentally let themselves get killed rather than kill another person in their place.
You aren’t talking about “conscience” you are talking about Machiavellianism. Sometimes that’s the right approach, but if everyone agreed that it was all the time, rather than having their own tests that produce their own levels of false positives and false negatives, then we’d be fucked. Those people who voted their conscience might be a bulwark against something much worse. I’m sure historians will argue the point after we’re dead.
In this case they’re ducking and letting the unprotected civilians behind them get shot.
All politics is “Machiavellian”, we are not in a society that allows one to opt out of the need to have power in order to do good… or pretty much anything.
And in four years the other side will stand strong and block block block everything. And back and forth forever until it breaks.
I fear that nothing of any substance will get done for a generation due to this schoolyard level fighting, and Americans will get more and more angry and polarized.
really he’s more properly a social democrat, which is still fundamentally capitalist (private ownership of means of making stuff and whatnot) it just bothers with safety nets.
I had a dream last night that Trump was trying to nuke California and generals were telling people in the field not to do it and Congress was trying to rush to impeach him while he was trying to get people charged with treason. When I woke up I was pretty worried because I didn’t immediately recognize that it wasn’t reality.
I haven’t underestimated how bad Trump is. I just think that if you ask people to vote for someone who favours incinerating brown people in the Middle East because they aren’t as bad as the other person who will incinerate just as many brown people in the Middle East, I don’t see how you can say they don’t have a conscience for refusing to do so.
Because this is a man who brags about using our nuclear arsenal and lobbies for race related incitement.
Even if they were “equally as bad”, which they aren’t, they allow senior citizens to get robbed of Medicare, they allow women to get attacked by our government, they make the military industrials empowered by their decisions.
Nobody who brags about their vote-purity deserves any respect for their continued complicity.
We still get state sponsored violence and racial incitement and lose years of good, the country gets sold off and privatized, and they bask in their cloak of smugness.
Heck no, they’re dwelling in the swill with the rest of us Democrats.
While there are some things I would like to see the Dems change on, and their support of the working class hasn’t been stellar, this isn’t something I’d like to see them drop, I’m glad Pelosi said she wasn’t going to bend on that principle, and their lack of progress to get policy in place that could have more helped the working class has as much to do with GOP obstruction as anything else.
The problem is that’s a terrible summary of the positions of both. Trump’s warmongering was complex, but by his own words involved far more serious international conflict and death of innocents abroad (and far more severe/dangerous sorts of conflict), while the speculations about Clinton as a war hawk were primarily based on ignoring what she said, looking at a record as Sec. State and making false equivalences about that vs. Trump’s bloody bellicosity, embrace of the disintegration of internationalism, pacts, and diplomacy, and ideals that signaled a return to the kind of nationalism that got us into two world wars.
Still, if you decided to make that false equivalence, a voter really should recognize that given the the inevitability of one of two options, that if one criteria is a wash then one should look at the rest of the criteria rather than abdicate their responsibility in the face of a hard choice. In this race, I don’t think abdication is really voting one’s conscience so much as either being completely deluded, or not having a conscience.
It’s not about false equivalence, it’s about an unacceptable better choice. If you don’t shoot this kid then we’ll kill the kid anyway and we’ll go kill another kid for good measure. I think at least half of people wouldn’t do it, calling them the ones “without conscience” is totally bizarre to me. You are arguing they have an overactive conscience that they ought to get a grip on so they can stomach do something awful for the greater good.
It’s an effect of American foreign policy for decades now that will likely be continued by any Democrat or Republican. I don’t think body counts are reductionist. I think failure to think about the actual pain and horror experienced by every one of those people and every one of the people affected by their deaths is reductionist.
You know, I generally like what you have to say, but when it comes to Clinton, I’ve found you to be consistently biased and patronising.
I said she’s a fucking warhawk (which is based on more than her being SoS), and you focus on the adjective I put before that.
And anyone who’s been paying attention knows there were a great many factors in this ridiculous nightmare - what is it about the phrase ‘not to mention’ that makes you think it’s likely to precede an exhaustive list?
You make me roll my eyes when it comes to this subject.
A more accurate analogy would be: “You have a choice. We’re either going to kill this kid, or kill this kid and another for good measure. If you don’t choose, we’ll probably kill both. Which will it be?” There is no option that isn’t exercising a kind of agency in the outcome.
Well, OK then: I think that reducing her to “she’s a fucking warhawk” is also unhelpful, as it’s not based on fact. When we get into namecalling rather than looking at both sides more objectively, it tends to shut down debate. I’m not trying to patronize anyone, but you can be damn sure that I’m biased against the alternative to Clinton we got.
