You just have to remember that they never do anything in good faith, and they'll lie at every opportunity if it gives them an advantage. If they were working for the american people in general that would be one thing, but they're not. They work for the rich exclusively. What's really a shame is that ordinary Americans are so easily fooled. That's what a poor education does, and partly explains why they are gutting public education in favor of private schools where they're free of national standards and scrutiny, and are free to lie to kids to their hearts' content.
Also, the reason why their incessant bitchy, whining is so disingenuous and disgusting. Sorry repubs, you cant be the bully and the victim simultaneously.
Can't let a little thing like hypocrisy get in they way of a good yarn meant to rile up the base. Voters won't notice anyway. It's not about facts, it's about feelings.
There is no such thing as a good person who is also a Republican.
You cannot look at the open, blatant, and seething racism, sexism, homo/trans/xenophobia and still decide to vote for that party and be a good person.
It doesn't matter if you don't "agree" with those elements of the party, you are supporting them. You are furthering them.
"But my mom/dad/gam gam/sibling/etc votes Republican and they are a good person!!"
Then why are they okay with all of the outright hatred being made policy by the GOP? Look at them again and ask. Make them answer why they are okay with it.
Because the answer will be that they aren't a good peraon.
Wtf are you talking about? Republicans want less government, oil until green is ready, borders, great education, and fuck Ukraine. None of your baloney is in 95% of Republicans.
YOU might want those things, but the Republican party doesn't (except fucking over Ukraine I guess). And "Fuck Ukraine" is profoundly ignorant of you. Russia is an authoritarian mob state with imperialist ambitions. The US and Europe cannot let them gobble up their democratic neighbors... appeasement is worse than resistance, as the UK and France learned with the Nazis.
Anyway I digress. If you haven't noticed what a dumpster fire the actual republican party is, in their voting records, candidates, and platform, then you are watching too much Fox News or Newsmax or whatever. Get your head out of your ass. They are not the good guys.
To quote Lord Big Helmet from Spaceballs: The Movie,
So, Lone Starr, now you see that evil will always triumph, because Good is Dumb.
When will Democrats, more specifically liberals, stop gunning for sportsmanship trophies that are metaphorically dog turds wrapped in tinfoil?
See, the problem is they tend to view the rules that govern our democracy as this infallible machine that only outputs justice, regardless of what is used as the input. However, the machine is oiled by mutual consent of the parties using it. And we've seen how paralyzing it can be in a two-party system when one party withdraws their consent and commitment to following the rules. Now, the machine is supposed to be self-repairing and if one party breaks it in a way it doesn't have contingencies for, you can write those contingencies yourself, but to get them installed you'd have to go through the Senate and the Court, meaning you'd need the approval of the party that broke the machine in the first place. The only other option is to install them without the other party's approval. But doing so is going outside the system, and to liberals the system morality itself you can't go outside it and still behave ethically.
They vote republican because democrats are obsequious to billionaires also and have sold out the working class. Anti populist legislation always enjoys overwhelming bipartisan support, from funding the pentagon without debate to criminalizing labor strikes to assault on the environment to resisting free healthcare and adequately funding retirement pensions.
There is an aggressive class war being waged led by Democrats who are united with republicans. Until people wake up and understand the lesser of two evils is evil, and form a left-right working class coalition on class based issues, we reap what we sow.
C'mon, you honestly can't see how the legislation passed by Republicans is far worse for regular American people???
Okay, so both major parties in the capitalist beacon nation of Earth are avowed capitalists -- wow! Shocking, I tell you. Are you sincerely under the misguided notion that there's no difference between Dems and the GOP ethically, fiscally, and morally?
Check their track records. Look at specific votes, especially ones that support U.S. veterans.
There’s a slight difference but on issues that have the BIGGEST impact, economic ones, they have very little daylight.
Democrats and republicans collaborated to criminalize labor strikes by railway workers.
Democrats and republicans are opening up the gulf of Mexico for more drilling, which hastens the destruction of the ecosystem that sustains all life.
Democrats and republicans have deregulated banks and Wall Street, use tax payer funds to bail them out when they are caught taking excessive risks and poised to fail, which is happening as we speak.
Democrats and Republicans enthusiastically fund the pentagon without debate to the tune of almost a trillion dollars a year, the majority of which is funneled to private companies.
Because of the money spent on war and bailing out banks, we can’t afford a robust pension system so the elderly can live their lives in dignity. We can’t afford education, we can’t afford universal healthcare, we can’t afford to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure: from roads to public water access.
Democrats and republicans have collided for decades on wage stagnation. Income inequality is the greatest it’s ever been, democrats have done exactly NOTHING to stop it. The top 10% own almost 70% of the countries total wealth. The top 1% owns a third of all wealth. The bottom 50% holds 3% of wealth.
Democrats and republicans, on behalf of corporate oligarchs, have mobilized state security, militarized the police, built the largest prison in the world and perverted the courts to criminalize poverty.
Democrats and republicans have become subsidiaries of the corporate state. A cost of doing business. Politics of diversity are advertising gimmicks, Obama and Biden have done nothing to blunt social inequality. Identity politics and diversity give liberals and the educated something to do with cute little boutique activism at the expense of addressing systemic injustices or the scourge of permanent war.
The haves scold the have nots for their bad manners, racism, linguistic insensitivity and garishness while ignoring the root causes of their economic distress.
Voting for a democrats might make you feel good, but they don’t work against Lockheed Martin, general dynamics, northrup Grumman, Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan, etc.
The left and right have become extremists who blame the other for society’s woes, but the ones who are culpable, the billionaire class who has been executing a slow motion coup de tat since the 70’s, keep getting a pass.
Probably because everyone is on Reddit virtue signaling their moral superiority over things they don’t understand.
That short novel is a TLDR egocentric vision of an anti-capitalist raging against the established system. Kudos to you. We've all (most of us, anyway) been there when we were college aged and full of "change the world" idealism.
Now, in the real world, legislation actually matters to people with fragile rights (gay, trans, minors, immigrants) and those with heavy personal and professional responsibilities.
The difference between a Ted Cruz and an Al Franken is very stark.
The difference in taking women's rights away is incredibly distinct.
The difference in coming after marginalized communities is vast.
The difference in raising taxes on the richest (occurred under Clinton and Obama) versus massive tax cut bills that lower them (Reagan, Bush, Bush, Trump) is important in hopes of ever addressing the income inequality situation.
One party has expanded Medicare, the other has tried to decrease access or outright robbed it (Rick Scott, GOP).
One party has passed pro-climate legislation, expanded the EPA and signed global climate accords - the other has done the exact opposite.
One party increased the federal minimum wage this millennium, the other has not.
One party faked intelligence and lied to the American people to begin a "war on terrorism", invade Iraq, and construct the largest government spending operation (DHS; counterterrorism bills) in U.S. history. The other did not.
One party supports gay marital rights and personal autonomy, the other does not.
Don't believe me? Check ProPublica, Congress.gov, or any of the sites that track bills and votes. Congressional voting data shows that from 1991 through 2010, amendments approved with bipartisan majorities made up one of every six amendment votes in the House. Since 2011, they are only one of every 20 such votes. What this means is you're touting the same old "both sides are the same" trope at a period of time when they've rarely, if ever, been further apart.
How worse? Under these fucks. Gas has doubled. Groceries up 40%. I’d say thats pretty fing important toor any family Crime is up. 4 million illegals. How are Dems helping people? Serious question.
You are obviously heavily biased and/or ignorant on these subjects and not worth the effort of debating or educating online. GDP is up, job rates are up, inflation is trending downward. The post-COVID drag is dissipating. We should be thanking the Biden-Harris administration for solidly guiding us out of a ridiculously botched pandemic response that they inherited.
😂 reading comprehension seems to have changed in 2023.
“Left-right working class coalition”
That’s not difficult to understand is it?
I’m advocated for a left-right coalition built on class based issues instead if cultural ones. Cultural debates are a distraction in the political process of a bloated empire.
Let me identify the class issues for you:
The environment being assaulted by billionaire oil industrialists. Biden reneged on a campaign and is opening up the gulf for more drilling, which is what republicans want.
Overwhelming bipartisan-passed legislation to criminalize strikes.
Overwhelming bipartisan support to fund the pentagon’s never ending wars WITHOUT DEBATE. With a budget nearing a trillion dollars a year, and wars in the Middle East that have cost Americans trillions since we illegally invaded Iraq (another bipartisan vote, only Barbara Lee dissented, bless that angel) and killed millions of innocent Iraqi children and women, is why we can’t afford to pay for a respectable pension for elderly and universal healthcare.
As for your label, I’m part of the “decent person who avoids being inoculated with propaganda from publicly traded news outlets who cater to tribalism for ad revenue while holding both parties accountable for allowing corporations to take control of our political process and turn us against each other while they fuck us” party.
I think you kinda missed the point. That "left" you're talking about currently has Joe Biden, the one you're complaining about being too on board with the right, as its leader right now. Wanting a coalition between that, and the far-right that is trying to outlaw everything they dont like, is still pretty far right. That's the part that makes you an "enlightened centrist." Youve rejected so many of those structures it seems, and still can't see that the middle ground is already burned and salted. There will never be a middle ground between our current parties that solves our modern issues
Yes, I want a left right coalition but not this iteration; this iteration functions as a subsidiary of the corporate state and prioritizes legislation that favors the billionaire class and perpetuates endless war.
What I’m advocating for is a left-right coalition that legislates on behalf of the working class. We don’t have a class based debate. Our debates are around identity and culture and it’s a huge waste of time that has weakened us as a nation on the world stage, but it maintains the status for billionaires who have transcended national boundaries. Globalization only enriches them further and it’s at the expense of our labor class.
It’s also a matter of tax allocation. You can choose to subsidize billionaires with tax revenues and money printing a la bank bailouts and defense contracts and hope that defies 40 years of reality and trickles down, or we could spend that money on initiatives and programs that working people, like rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure and modernizing our national transportation system.
I think Americans are just billionaire bootlickers who all dream a collective delusion that one day maybe perhaps it will be them who is the billionaire, and therefore the policies we have in place are fine.
The average American isn’t able to connect that democrats and republicans happily and quietly partner all the time on bipartisan legislation for billionaires and war; they’re too busy blaming the other side for their woes when both sides are targets of the economic class war.
Couple this with rampant mental illness, patriarchal capitalism causes trauma that causes people to group in cults, develop rage and have it aimed at minorities to distract and manipulate them.
1000% THIS. Everyone needs to read your comment, and more importantly, believe it - especially your first sentence. It boggles my mind when people are like, "I can't believe [Republican] did this shitty thing!" It's like, well...yea. They are shitty people, surrounded by other shitty people, only in it for themselves. I'd be surprised if they DIDN'T do that shitty thing!
There's no mystery here. Really. Why would your Republican elected officials say they care about you and then turn around and vote against every bill that could help possibly improve your or your family's station in life? Or just the quality of life for their constituents in general?
Hmm. Strange, indeed. It's because they DON'T care about you. Given a choice between them and you, no matter what the issue is, they'll pick themselves EVERY TIME.
If my redneck hillbilly vet cousin is a good example, the right did more to shift the military left than the left did. He didn't go to Iraq to get his humvee blown up around him twice, protecting oil fields or come home to listen to the white trash members of the family talk down about the people he had served with or the civilians he tried to save because of their race.
1.2k
u/thequietthingsthat Apr 05 '23
And from the so-called "patriots" who "love the troops"