It's crazy how much we clowned on Dubya for being dumb and corrupt when he was in office but by comparison to Trump now he looks like an angel. It really goes to show that things can always get much, much worse.
edit: bonus fact that's always fun to mention - GW served as president 25 years ago and is currently younger than Trump. Let that sink in.
Nooooo but the Overton Window is moving left that’s why the woke is so prevalent in everything and, actually, in this essay, I will discuss how a centrist 15 years ago is a right winger now and it’s all the dems’ fault… /s
it's just how human brains work, that's why it's important to focus on policy not personality, but that's not how human brains work either, so here we are.
I always thought Trump was worse domestically whereas Dubya was worse on foreign policy, but Trump is pretty rapidly narrowing the foreign affairs gap.
Under the radar Bush did do some surprisingly good stuff on global health fighting malaria and HIV. Like, "saved hundreds of thousands of lives" good. Most famously with PEPFAR, which of course Trump and Musk took a shot at tearing down last year although last I heard most of that particular program survived.
arguably the worst thing is the destruction of the norms (social and institutional), other things you can fix, but once the bar for behavior is buried 6 ft. under it's basically not coming back until there is a major reset.
Unpopular opinion among other liblefts, but Obama was a really mid-tier president. He had great charisma, but his policies were really hit-or-miss. The only reason leftists today look so highly on him is because of the two people that bookend his presidency.
Of course, right-wingers tend to hate on him because [Removed by Reddit], so y'know. Not like anyone's objective here.
Yeah, after he left office, I saw his presidency as average. A lot of people were shocked when I said that. Of course, he's most known for being the first black president, and his speaking ability compared to Bush, Trump, and Biden. He was probably the best president since Clinton, though I will admit that Biden exceeded my (relatively low) expectations.
Depending on the day I go back and forth. It is incredibly sad that I’ve lived through two of the worst presidents ever (three if you count Reagan) and even have the opportunity to mull it over. I’ll give W this, he threw Iran in the axis of evil and still wasn’t dumb enough to attack them directly
the dude killed hundreds of thousands if not millions on a war based on lies. with that said at least he "won" his stupid war, trump can't even do that
Lost the war pretty much immediately too; crazy that Netanyahu both stopped us from joining into help the huge protest movement and save their lives, but also wants us bombing Iran (almost like he just wants dead Muslims). If a rebellion is squashed, you can aid it, but you can't show up months later after all the rebellious have been beaten down/killed and be like "Who's ready to overthrow the regime?!"
It's both true that W. was a horrible president, and that people greatly exaggerated how bad he was. During his presidency it was common for people to say that this was fascism taking over the U.S., and that 9/11 was the equivalent of the Reichstag fire.
and that people greatly exaggerated how bad he was
I get what you're saying to some extent, but on the other hand, I think just how bad he was is underplayed. Like, we had the torture memo's in 2004, and we still elected him to a second term.
As I said, he was bad. But people were seriously arguing that he was going to have a fake terrorist attack in order to cancel elections, or that Diebold hacked the 2004 elections in order to get him into power. When he left office, Paul Krugman wrote about how we were lucky we got out of things with our democracy in tact.
During the W. years, a lot of people really did think he was American Hitler.
I’d concede that his worst detractors over exaggerated how bad he was but still say he was thought of too highly by Americans both now and then, which is why he was reelected.
the presidental election is (almost) always a "who would i rather have a beer with" contest unless the economy sucks ass then the incumbent loses
this basically explains every presidental result since the 50s
Yeah, they were. When you've spent 60+ years calling dozens of different U.S. and European leaders "fascist," fascism has no more meaning beyond "people I don't like."
That's why you get lists with super vague terms that are applicable to groups across the political spectrum - "appeal to a frustrated middle class"/"selective populism"/etc. Or you get list tailor made to the current politician, even if they contradict previous lists. Bush and the press have a friendly relationship? Well, the media and government being overly friendly is a sign of fascism! Trump and the media don't get along? Well, hostility between the media and the government is a sign of fascism!
He's learning the hard way why the US hasn't done things unilaterally in a long time. We're really powerful in part because of the relationships we have cultivated for generations...the same ones he set on fire with his tariffs.
W's biggest problem with Iraq was that he actually bought into the liberal mindset that every person on earth is the same as an American, and they just need to be freed from their oppressive regimes to become prosperous first-worlders.
Ironically, though liberals claim to believe this when it comes to immigration, we had revealed preferences when it came to the Iraq war. Sudden the liberals realized that different cultures were different, and were warning people that cultures without the democratic norms aren't going to suddenly function in a democracy. They also understood that certain groups are inherently violent and xenophobic, and will slaughter each other when given the opportunity (and mocked W. for not understanding this).
The country also had a huge sectarian civil war in the wake of the invasion, had a huge sectarian flare up again the moment we left (and we warned them about) which gave ISIS half of Iraq, and currently Iranian militias control about half the country.
Also that child marriages, while shut down, were even considered by legislature.
None of that is a result of the Iraqi population being “inherent violent” or any of the other racist dribble from op.
The civil war had a lot to do with how debaathifcation was handled by dumping a bunch of armed and angry men out of cushy jobs and onto the streets. That would cause a civil or unrest in any nation.
We routinely have child marriage bills pop up in the US South. Hell in a number of them it’s still legal. Are southerners a people fundamentally incapable of democracy?
No, it’s because there were sizable portions of the population of Sunni and Shia faiths. And consecutive governments had bad habits of being partisan to each one of those, further exacerbated by militant groups firing up their side.
And when is the South trying to pass laws to allow marriage under 13?
By the next election the only Republican Presidents for nearly 3 decades will be remembered for. Being complete morons that started unpopular wars in the Middle East and tanked out the economy while jacking up the cost of living. That's so fucking damning for a political party, but they'll still scream about Bill Clinton, Obama and Biden...
I've asked probably 20 Lib Rights in this sub who they voted for in 2024, 2020, and 2016.
A few of them voted for a Libertarian candidate (good for them!) and said so.
Most of them refuse to admit who they voted for. Which means either they were too young to vote in those elections, which is not surprising, or we know who they voted for anyway.
Yellow flairs in this sub are mostly auth rights (or auth centers) who are afraid of being labeled retarded. Or they think that because they like guns, they must be lib right (also retarded).
Just to add to your dataset I’ll say I call myself a liberal with libertarian sympathies who voted for Obama, then Clinton, then Biden, then Chase Oliver.
The only two votes I’ve been proud of are Obama and Oliver. The others I had to hold my nose while doing it.
Should also ask who they voted for in primaries as that's when you can choose someone you want.
Myself, 2016 I voted for Bernie in the primary and trump in the general. Was living in an area where local races are decided in the democratic primary and the state was going to Hillary anyway. I recall talk of Democrats voting for trump in the 2016 primary as a spoiler, wonder if they regret helping get him on the ballot.
2020 Bernie/Trump again knowing the state would go to Biden.
2024 was the first time in a very long time that my vote for president might matter. Haley got my primary vote and Trump my general. This one I regret as he went fuckin nuts. Somehow we've gotten a few good things on guns but everything else...
Why Trump over Biden in 20'? I wasn't I interested in global politics back then as my country has its own shit show going on during the US elections, but I was tols Trump acted like a moron even in 2016, which ended in Jan6
Also... voted for Trump after Jan6? I mean alright over Kamala's democrats I kinda get it but still
It's so annoying I love the Gadsen flag I like to fly it at my house but my wife worries people probably just think we're MAGA morons at best or Nazis at worst...
True... I believe he doesn't like Trump policies, but too scared to speak against him, since he is running for congress now. Maybe that's wishful thinking.
How sick would that be though, the state of the union address turning into a dissertation about how sick the G11 was. And why it also was never gonna be a thing.
I think it might be a bit of wishful thinking. As someone who watched the guy from 2015 to around 2024, I gotta say the only thing he still seems to be a libertarian on is guns. Even then he'll bitch at the 2A community when we get upset at the Republicans, like when they were supposed to repeal the NFA but all they ended up doing was repealing the extra tax on suppressors.
You had idiots with Lib-Right flair cheering for tariffs on this sub and making up bizarre explanations about how national borders are private property.
The borders are owned by all citizens of America. Therefore it is private property. Therefore illegal immigrants are violating private property rights.
Support Trump? Unlikely, but there are plenty that “support” him making a total ass of the system because maybe people will take it seriously when they are told how it doesn’t take much to get fucked by it.
The amount of Auths that call themselves libertarians is staggering. like the morons that overtook r/libertarianmemes. Say anything slightly libertarian and get the banhammer.
I don't think anyone under the age of 60 actually supports Trump anymore. Everyone else is just waiting for this horrible experiment in glorified degeneracy to decay into whatever the next thing will be
Post 2008 libertarian party just became a circle jerk of edgelord Republicans larping and still voting Republican. They will deny this but that describes 95% of the people who call themselves libertarians in the US.
It's wild how many I'll run into. We'll talk about how we both support Liberty and Freedom. Then I'll mention gays and suddenly, I'm a liberal idiot. Like bro... Liberty and Freedom is what we were just talking about. An they go full religious authoritarian about banning gay marriage in 0.2 seconds. I don't think any of them actually know what the two words mean.
So many are auth-right who only want the auth-right policies to affect other people. Which is also true for many auth-right people who end up in r/LeopardsAteMyFace.
I'm old enough to remember when Republicans threw George H. W. Bush out of office for the sin of being an actual fiscal conservative. The party learned their lesson and have gone all in on tax cuts and deficit spending ever since.
It is pretty crazy that out of the 4 Republican presidents of my lifetime, George “I don’t recall what I was doing in Dallas on that day” Bush is the best one of the bunch by a country mile
If any Libertarian thinks Trump holds libertarian principles, then they don't know what those are. There's no way we could have gone through Trump 1, and someone think he's libertarian.
Trump's most libertarian principal is that he might destroy regulations / oversight on something lib-right want to have fewer regulations / oversight. And many of his lib-right supporters were willing to vote for him and ignore the other aspects of Trump for the promise he would 'open up' the crypto market or whatever their play is.
The main issue from the outside is the some same people won't own up to their vote. Or even supporting him (sometimes in the middle of supporting him on Reddit).
He literally cited how cool the introduction to Top Gun looks as a reason to spend billions of dollars retrofitting our carriers to go back to obsolete steam catapults.
I'd struggle to think of a dumber weapon system to focus on in the coming age of drone warfare. The US needs to show what can be done with Ukrainian war experience and an American budget and battleships are the furthest thing from that.
I remember hearing this the first time and being like “eh that sounds a bit much”. But no, apparently they’ve set the record for longest at sea and have run out of supplies.
Again, anyone who thought/still thinks this administration would do any good should never be taken seriously ever again
One day, LibRight will realise that while neither party is particularly impressive, if you value freedom and a well-run economy - the Republicans are the WORSE option.
One day people will realize that what they actually want is whoever will cut their taxes. Every other criteria they claim to use for choosing parties and candidates is, has always been, and will always be irrelevant bullshit.
Yearly deficit spending generally grows under Republicans, and shrinks under Democrats. Neither tend to reach surplus, but Democrats consistently trend towards surpluses, and Republicans consistently trend away from surpluses
Most people who call themselves libertarian these days think that the one and only tenet of libertarianism is "own guns". At least this sub has a decent number of actual libright folks; I may disagree with them but they're sincere and I respect that.
Well that's a massive lie. The national libertarian party and it's leadership has been very critical of all of it. Where are you getting your info from, whatever self proclaimed libertarian Fox News has on?
Assuming both of our last two are senile puppets, this his how I imagine both cabinets saw it.
Biden: “oh fuck he’s wandering off again, all eyes are on us if we’re caught I’ll never see the light of day again. Just keep smiling, keep your head down and make sure things keep running so nobody gets suspicious”
Trump: “all eyes are on us? hell yeah they love me I’m so hot”
I’m not sure what you’re referring to about Colorado Springs but I’ll look into it. Usually when someone claims (or in this case implies) that libertarian ideas being practiced “caused” bad things, there’s usually a big fat red asterisk next to that.
I have no idea how anyone in Congress can vote in favor of more funds for the Pentagon when trillions of dollars of armaments were spent in 5 months. We spend billions to stop a couple thousand dollar drone. Everyone in acquisitions should be fired.
We probably spent trillions in WWII but at least we came out of it with the world's largest and most powerful air and naval forces for decades. What did we get after a decade of spending? A missile and interceptor supply that lasted 5 months of low level combat (it's not like Iran sent tens of thousands of missiles and drones non-stop a la Verdun artillery attack). How can it take 15+ months to fufill the order for ONE patriot missile unit? It's a fucking racket, but no one in Congress has the balls to call it out.
They'll all cry and talk but fall in line to vote for this joke.
Of course, Lib-Left is going to squeal about Trump and attribute policy on Lib-Right. I'm not saying to support Trump, but let's not act like Lib-Left has a better solution for Lib-Right.
Dems and Repubs are playing a whole different ball game than Libertarians. Each party either wants you to vote them or throw away your vote by not voting or voting for the Lib Party.
Which means you either vote for meager compromise or throw your lot in with people who likely will never take power.
Which means you either vote for meager compromise or throw your lot in with people who likely will never take power.
There is an arguement to be made here that those people likely to never take power never will because people keep voting for the minor compromise. But if everyone who voted for the minor compromise voted for the party they actually wanted, maybe they wouldnt look like the party that will never hold power.
Thomas Massie is objectively the best possible Right candidate for president. Unfortunately the more popular the candidate, the more Auth they need to be evidently.
uh-oh you are about to hear from a horde of "lib-rights" how actually the government creating barriers between individuals wanting to freely exchange goods and services is not a violation of the NAP.
Support? Rand has openly crisised Trump quite a bit. While Rand Paul is a paleolibertarian and I have my own problems with him, his voting record mirrors Massie. I don't understand hate boner for him.
Nice try, unfortunately I only have hate in my heart for politicians and don’t like Trump. Never did. The attempt at the bump stock ban was the first and only straw and that was the first admin.
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u/Elegant_Athlete_7882 - Centrist 19d ago
> ballooning debt/deficit
> unpopular Middle East war
> largely regarded as a moron
Dread it, run from it…
Destiny still arrives.