So the answer is to not engage in the kind of politics we’d like to see? I disagree on that point. Measured, slow incremental reforms have not helped. Things seem to be moving backward in some important ways - the gutting of the voting rights act and the continuous attack on women’s reproductive rights (at the state level, that slow chipping away) are just two examples. We’ve already had a massive shift to the right and it’s time to recenter our national politics.
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Are you making direct comparisons? Try it in the proper contexts. Manning’s party, if not Manning himself, was defined by the xenophobic, homophobic, racist, misogynist & any other intolerance you like, elements that it attracted and provided a banner for such elements to rally under. Your Wild Rose party was beset by the same elements and to it’s detriment. They’ll likely have to rebrand entirely for a shot at it in the future, unless their leadership can finagle a solution like the one that served Harper and his ilk so well, simply dominating more progressive conservatives and capturing their leadership positions through adept political cunning.
Those elements differ in language alone (and not always then) from their xenophobic, homophobic, misogynist, racist counterparts to the south, both occupy the extreme positions in their respective countries. While direct comparisons are iffy at best, the human elements and the intolerant views they hold will not differ far on the basis of a border and marginally different national cultures. Hate transcends borders when it bases itself in those forms of intolerance.
Pragmatism, Pragmatists, Pragmatist appear in the order you issued them, if you want to put 3 dots between each that’d be great. They’re there demonstrating as the reason you give that people should abandon a vote on their principles in favour of a fear/strategic vote you believe they should make. You’ve acknowledged pragmatism as your reason for doing such, so I can’t accept your complaint on the matter.
Believe me I wasn’t accusing you of feeling superior, rather of being incorrect and in a way detrimental to civic engagement in democracy in general, following as your suggestions do in the path of strategic voting/fear-based thinking.
I’m glad you’re not trying to be assholish about it, your framing particularly around UHC and your cynicism with your negativity on what is or isn’t achievable make your efforts difficult.
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And what if Bernie does turn out to be Bush level incompetent?
Bush’s screwups not only gave the US two terms of Obama and healthcare reform, but the intellectual crisis that triggered within the party has really crippled the Republican Party’s ability to supply sane candidates.
Bernie only helps you if it pursues your priorities and does it well.
[quote=“FunkDaddy, post:123, topic:74046”]
Are you making direct comparisons? Try it in the proper contexts. Manning’s party, if not Manning himself, was defined by the xenophobic, homophobic, racist, misogynist & any other intolerance you like, elements that it attracted and provided a banner for such elements to rally under.[/quote]
I was young enough to not really be attuned to that at the time. However, I don’t think the culture war aspect has entered Canadian politics the way it dominates the right in the US.
The rightmost party will always collect the right-most extremists but Wild Rose spent 6 years with a leader who is both pro-choice and in favour of gay marriage. Granted she quit because she was uncomfortable with those fringe elements in the party.
But the new leader Brian Jean is also avoid social conservative causes and is trying to purge the party of those fringe elements.
http://www.fortmcmurraytoday.com/2015/03/06/social-conservatism-a-non-issue-in-leadership-bid-says-jean
Perhaps they are just trying to hide a social conservative agenda, but the Republicans are actually running on it.
Is there anything at all about Bernie’s record that provides any suggestion of incompetence?
Bush Jr wasn’t just some random guy; he was the hyper-privileged scion of a political dynasty, who was well known in advance to be a simple-minded screwup. The left was horrified (globally; Australian politicians were publicly speaking of the dangers of a Bush election), the plutocrats thought he’d be an easy pawn (he was), the social conservatives don’t care how dim someone is so long as they hate the gays. Shrub would have never come anywhere near the levers of power if he’d been living on his own merits.
None of that is true of Bernie.
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From running the candidates through the test on politicalcompass.org. I will admit that the test is claimed to be flawed, in that the test has leading questions that tend to move people towards the libertarian left (It’s suspected to be funded by an anti-New Labour group).
2004
(I know that this is a poor graph without a clearly labelled axis)
Any clear patterns emerging? Is Hillary really getting roughly the same score as Margaret Thatcher and George W. Bush? And the Republican candidates seem to be channelling the ghost of Pinochet.
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That’s just what conservative looks like from planet Batshit…
Clinton was most certainly part of the neocon revolution that put the Left into a coma.
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#Actually - yeah!
If this stance became widely espoused - not settling for second-best by throwing the country to the wolves for a term if we can’t have Bernie…
#Think about it
Could help in the remaining primaries…
Plus, you don’t even have to mean it for it to work!
#BERN OR BURN
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I was going to suggest that Bernie supporters in any state where the Democrats got less than 40% of the states vote in 2012 switch their votes to the Green Party (or someone else left leaning if they are not an option). It won’t affect the end result as a Democrat win in any of the states is very unlikely but it will put Hillary in a very difficult situation.
This tactic may also work in DC as it is so overwhelmingly Democrat leaning
Edit: it may also work in Hawaii and Vermont but it’s a little more risky there. I wouldn’t try it anywhere else.
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Except all this will go out the window with Trump as the GOP nominee. Expect to see Bloomberg or someone similar running for the sane GOP votes and/or larger success for Gary Johnson/the Libertarian candidate. If so, I’d also expect to see more Green votes from disaffected Sanders supporters.
Maybe a Trump presidency will provide enough incentive to burn the whole thing down and come up with an electoral system that fits the 21st century?
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I guess there is a silver lining in that very dark cloud. I could envision the GOP being moved to serious electoral reform if Trump gains the nomination, and somehow win the general. Could be the first strong bi-partisan effort we’ve seen from our Congresscritters in nearly a decade. I could also envision President Trump getting impeached quite easily if not quickly.
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I think he’s a true believer with a unrealistic world view, I posted this article earlier that explains it nicely.
No, you have to mean it. The only way to be taken seriously is to be serious. I know it sounds like I’m doing some kind of reverse causation here, but it’s not a psychology study in a white room, it’s real life with real people making decisions based on how seriously they take one another. Clinton might win, and if she does it will be partly because the party doesn’t believe that Bernie supporters will actually throw the country to the wolves.
It’s not impossible, but I find it more likely that a large number of politicians will say, “Oh, that’s what works, that’s what wins” and emulate him rather than fighting him. People are unimaginative and quick to extrapolate from anecdote to generality. Politicians are especially unprincipled and unlikely to stand up for something they believe in if they think it will cost them anything to do so.
Yeah, what if? What if Clinton does? Why would you think that would be the case?
Rather than spending his life doing coke and running every business he was handed by his rich family into the ground (as Bush did), Sanders has spent his life organizing people and running things. Sanders is regarded as very successful as both a mayor and senator from everything I’ve read (popularity among constituents, initiatives he started/finished).
What has Clinton spent her life doing? Saying whatever polls say 50% of people believe (unless her wealthy donors disagree)?
Clinton looked damn presidential in those Benghazi hearings, so I know she’s tough and composed, but Sanders is both of those things too. I also know that she can’t take advice about proper IT practices, which from my personal experience is a huge red flag. I honestly can’t think of any objective reasons to guess she would be a more competent president than Sanders.
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Other countries have Social Democracy, there’s nothing other than American’t attitudes and spending entirely too much tax revenue on warhawking preventing it from working in the US.
@anon50609448: I feel similarly about Cruz. These guys are horses asses to anyone who doesn’t stroke, ney, fellate their egos.
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Clinton will just be a slightly less ambitious, slightly more hawkish, slightly more corporatist copy of Obama.
She’ll be…okay. If you’re fine with nothing changing much, or if anything, getting a little worse. Her biggest achievement will be being the first woman elected to the position.
She’ll do a good job of being presidential, though. I just don’t really care about that.
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I didn’t mean to say I think Clinton would be incompetent. Rather, I just can’t think of any reason to think she’d be especially competent, or any reason to think that Sanders might turn out to be some kind of massive screw up. The comparison to Bush irked me. Anyone who was paying attention knew that Bush was an unreal incompetent screw up well before he was elected.
If Clinton is broadly incompetent, then she is damn good at faking it, which is probably good enough.
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I hear this all the time from Clinton supporters. Where did this get started? Anyone that does even a cursory survey of Sanders’ career would not ask that question. It seems like one of those language viruses/urban legends that somehow get artificially inseminated into the collective consciousness and then propagates. It’s just such a non-sequitur. Do people generally doubt the intellectual soundness of someone who has been successful, consistent, and unwavering their ENTIRE career?
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Not to mention that those stances he’s been unwavering on through his career were right. He was on the right side of gay rights way before it was popular. He was on the right side of civil rights. The majority of the American public thinks he’s on the right side of taxing the rich and single payer healthcare, and the rest of the developed world agrees too. It strikes you that he’s pretty good at getting things right.
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Facebook? [I’m guessing, seems to be where all the easily falsifiable balloneyshit originates.]
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I think you mean “neoliberal”?
https://drneevil.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/and-monkeys.gif[quote=“Kimmo, post:128, topic:74046”]
throwing the country to the wolves for a term
[/quote]
It’s not a term. It’s putting 1 to 3 SCOTUS seats out-of-play for ~20 years.
I don’t like the thought of voting for HRC. aside from breaking the glass ceiling. But WJC gave us RBG and SGB, some fucking great justices, and I’d fully expect HRC to do well by the court.
Also, by the way, as much as I like debating over the internet with y’all, you don’t have to live here.
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