this post was submitted on 02 May 2024
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Liberals aren't left. You guys have far right and neolib mid-right
I only ever see "both sides are the same" as a atrawman, here. I've never seen it presented genuinely, generally I see "I have issues with the Democrats" and the only response is either "but the other guys are worse" and "bOtH sIDeS aRe ThE sAmE!!"
ALMOST as if having an actual conversation about the problems people with the Democrats makes people uncomfortable.
If you really want to change the party, JOIN it, convince like-minded people to join, and start changing it from the inside.
You know, like the way Trump and MAGA changed the Republicans.
The DNC has made it clear they're not interested in moving to the left and that they're perfectly happy gradually meandering further right. Sure, 30 million Democrats might see it differently but the people voting aren't actually in charge.
MAGA had the support of moderate Republicans.
Leftists and progressives do not have the support of moderate and liberals. They made this clear in the 2020 primaries. Anyone to the left of Biden was too radical. Liberals and moderates made it clear again yesterday when they celebrated police breaking up the protestors. When Biden was asked if the protests have made him reevaluate his policies in Israel he simply said "No".
There's no room for us in the Democrat party so I'll be voting 3rd party.
Voting third party for president won't solve that problem, it will just help, in your case, a more right wing POTUS get into office, one who has proven to be especially dangerous to our democracy. It's a dumb idea because it's counter productive to your goals and virtually useless.
If you want better representation you'll have to work from the ground up by getting people into office that will move to end fptp voting.
You're trying to play the game with the rules you want it to have, not with the rules it actually has.
I'm aware I have no way of solving this problem. Never claimed otherwise.
Even if progressives and leftists managed to get a halfway decent candidate through the primaries all that would happen is that liberals and moderates would be the ones who vote Republican, vote 3rd party or don't show up. We're at an impasse.
Actually I think that's what you're doing. The rules that it has are I get to choose who I vote for. Not you.
Then it makes even less sense to vote for a third party because you know it doesn't do anything.
I'm not taking about the primary, i'm talking about how the vote is done. If we can get rid of fptp voting system, and replace it with something like star voting, then people are more free to vote for who they want instead of using reason and voting strategically. This is the way to increase the chances of getting more liberal people elected.
By no stretch of the imagination did I even remotely suggest I get to choose who you vote for.
I can stay home if that would make you feel better?
Never going to happen with the kind of candidates who make it through the primaries.
Ok then accept I'm going to vote 3rd party and stop trying to convince me to do something else.
This is the second bad faith argument you've made. Why?
Which is why I said you have to work from the ground up.
I'm defending being rational and reasonable. Even if it won't convince you, it might stop some other person who reads this from irrationally acting counter productive to their interests.
There is no course of action which is productive to our interests.
As an aside, hypothetically, if you had a choice between:
Which would you choose? You can only pick one and there is no third option in this purely hypothetical situation.
If you honestly believe this, then the only rational move is to use your vote strategically to increase the chances of the viable candidate - who most closely aligns with your belief - getting elected. Effectively throwing your vote away on an unviable candidate increases the chances of the candidate less like you will win.
Play the game you're playing, not the one you wish you were.
And to answer your question, definitely 2. Although I believe i'm missing something.
I am. I hope to demonstrate the Democrat party is non-viable when it refuses to make material compromises with leftists and progressives.
You admit it's not a way forward, but then argue as if it is. I don't follow.
It's a hail mary that will likely fail.
Not a bad faith argument, and characterizing it as that is disingenuous.
They're telling you: the ways in which they are willing to participate in the system is to vote for someone they actually care about, or to let the system run itself into the ground. It's kindof akin to "live free or die".
If the mentality of "live free or die" does not sound reasonable to you, you are welcome to pursue your own brand of reason. Clearly, they will pursue theirs.
The issue at hand is that the system stops working when people vote based on perceived power. Yes, we should also work to change the system. But the other person is not at all alone in having little faith in the system - and really, that's what's holding the system up, mostly - the faith it constantly breaks.
I've been doing that for 20 years. Between that and spit in my hand at least the hand with spit has something to show for the effort.
The only things liberals know how to do are using whataboutism to deflect all criticism of the Democrats by talking about the Republicans, and doing genocide apologia.
Liberal just means not conservative. There is no monolithic body called "the liberals" whose beliefs are all alike. It's a spectrum.
It's frankly incredible how often this needs to be stated.
Liberal has a very specific definition that's used in polysci.
There's distinct flavors of liberalism in political science. For example in Classical Liberalism most modern conservatives are included because they want a democratic government.
That's kind of my point. Saying 'liberal just means not conservative' is so vague that it's effectively meaningless.
I also think it's done intentionally to normalize/consolidate voting patterns for a set of people who share very little actual views or policy goals and enforce a political binary. In that way I think it's worse than meaningless - it's actively harmful.
A lot of us speak colloqial, speaking colloquial is more common. You cannot enter a discourse held by laymen, assume and use academic definitions, and expect to be understood or agreed with
Much of the English speaking world uses liberal to mean its formal definition, for example, the Liberal Democratic Party in the UK.
All peolpe who say all liberals aren't left are idiots who like to lump everyone into one box to make their point.
Neoliberalism is a far right ideology brought to mainstream politics by Ronald Reagan and Margret Thatcher. Later embraced by the most right wing of the american pseudo left like Clinton who abandoned their traditional union and grassroot support for the big banks and extra large corporate funding. This led to the embracement of neo conservativism by Newt Gingrich and the right in general to differentiate themselves from the new political shift from the pseudo left wings encroachment on their bread basket, the corporations. Enter the US downward spiral to our current political landscape as the neolibral wing marches ever right and the conservative wing courts the endless bag of batshit crazy.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism
Just because the word has the root liber in it does not make it left on a political spectrum.
Liberalism is pro-Capitalist, it was only ever considered left wing when it was revolutionary, ie in feudalism.
In the modern, Capitalist and Imperialist era, Liberalism supports the status quo and is right wing because of it.
Leftism is when you're in favor of a 3% increase in the marginal tax rate, an increase in the number of Pell Grants issued annually, and an expansion of eligibility for Medicaid under a new means testing regime..
What you're thinking of is the Far-Left, which is when you become an Authoritarian National Socialist and kill 6M Jews, like Joseph Stalin did when he illegally invaded Germany.
Its called Horseshoe Theory. And if you weren't so busy skipping classes to go protest Joe Biden, maybe you'd have learned about it.
Lol
Did you just blame the holocaust on the soviets? really?
Maybe, but it really reads like he is saying the soviets killed 6m jews when they "illegally" invaded germany
That's ironic. You obviously skipped political ideology at the 200 level.
Yes, it's literally a sarcastic comment.
I don't know how to tell you this but here goes. There are people who actually believe what they've said. It's not a modest proposal, it's Holocaust denial which is a central theme to modern fascists.
From the halls /r/libertarian to the shores of /r/anachy. Its weapon's grade radical centrism.
If this is a joke it's gone down rather poorly. At best it reads like Schroedinger's Joke Propaganda.
The number of people completely missing your sarcasm is unfortunately unsurprising.
Cool, one side is more to the left than the other side, so that makes them left. Comments like yours are both extremely fucking useless and getting old.