|
Baron Porkface posted:To clarify, is Obamacare evil by this threads exacting standards? It’s probably not worthwhile to discuss it in terms of good vs. evil. Much more constructive would be deciding whether or not it has overall been a positive step in terms of giving all Americans access to health care without barriers (including financial barriers) And as we make that assessment, we have to take into account the opportunity cost the ACA represents vs. a strong public option, single payer, etc. Those may or may not have been possible in the 2009-10 political climate, but because Obama et al. didn’t push all too hard for either, we’ll never know. Then you have to mix in the fact that the ACA, in spite of how moderate it is, still provoked the same level of rancor from the Right-Wing Scream Box that MFA would have earned, in all likelihood. That backlash has probably set back the cause of universal health care by quite a few years. The ACA has done some good, don’t get me wrong. But when you view it through the lens of whether or not it laid the groundwork for achieving the broader goals that all of us, I think, wanted it to achieve - well, then its record is decidedly mixed. And in that sense, it works as a pretty apt case study for where the Dems have made strategic mistakes that have discouraged voters whose support they need from turning out to the polls. Why should anyone be enthusiastic about voting for an ineptly-led party that comprises with their maximalist enemies at the drop of a hat, and then compromise on even that compromise down the road?
|
#
¿
Feb 14, 2018 08:40
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 10, 2024 07:36 |
|
|
Owlofcreamcheese posted:On many issues they are the good guys and you should vote for them with no hesitation until whatever full communism now party you support actually succeeds at being a realistic contender in any race anywhere. You do realize that people who criticize the Democrats from the left still tend to turn out for the Dems, right? 
|
|
#
¿
Feb 15, 2018 07:28
|
|
|
Baron Porkface posted:I'm not convinced of that. This thread, for example. Well, I think that’s probably not the best barometer for that sort of thing. The fact that only 12% of Bernie voters didn’t turn out for Clinton, while somewhere in the vicinity of 25% of Clinton ‘08 supporters refused to vote for Obama. It’s almost as if...centrist Dems...are less interested in social AND economic justice than leftists? 
|
|
#
¿
Feb 15, 2018 07:55
|
|
|
Owlofcreamcheese posted:Yeah right, they mostly turn out for smugly telling you they didn't vote and for rushing into every conversation they can find to parrot every republican fox news talking point they can manage to sand down enough to pretend they are saying it because they are actually so woke and leftist I'd still like to see evidence of them parroting Fox News talking points, besides Jimmy Dore, who is not really left wing - he's just a loving moron.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 15, 2018 17:09
|
|
|
Owlofcreamcheese posted:Cool, weird that that wasn't the issue that got brought up and instead the original go to attack was some incorrect lie about them not having a platform people want to vote form even though they have gotten the most votes in nearly every election in decades. Almost like people bringing it up are disingenuous or something! They didn't have a platform that got enough people, in the states that mattered. How are you so ignorant of how presidents get elected?
|
|
#
¿
Feb 15, 2018 17:15
|
|
|
So not a drat thing, in other words. Thanks, OOCC!
|
|
#
¿
Feb 15, 2018 17:20
|
|
|
Owlofcreamcheese posted:Nah, as I said "the republicans say a lot of true stuff and I agree with them a lot" is always a huge element of whiney faux leftist internet culture. Now you're just blatantly making poo poo up. This is getting sad.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 15, 2018 17:38
|
|
|
Baron Porkface posted:But I thought Obama was the EEEEEvil centrist. Obama ran to the left of Clinton on a lot of issues. Also I don't tend to call centrists evil - just out-of-touch. I used to be one, so I would know. quote:edit: and Turmp is an enormously different candidate from McCain. Mmmmm, not as much as you'd like people to believe. His voting record's been pretty Trumpian over the last few years, and he tried to put Sarah cocking Palin a heartbeat away from the Oval Office. The fact that the PUMA crowd would back him shows how incredibly shallow their feminism really was. quote:and Bernie supporters raged across the internet spreading anti-clinton propaganda I certainly don't remember that in 2008 after the convention. Clinton surrogates spread Birther conspiracy theories pretty widely in 2008.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 15, 2018 18:33
|
|
|
Owlofcreamcheese posted:I seriously believe that a group of people have declared themselves "leftist" while holding no significantly or particularly leftist ideas and doing nothing but amplifying a bunch of right wing narritives by believing everything they half heard from their conservative dad. The people you're talking about make up a fraction of a percentage of Bernie supporters and left-wing critics of the Dems.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 15, 2018 18:36
|
|
|
Owlofcreamcheese posted:I am sure that a conversation where the starting point is that everyone in every election is always "evil" was going to be a totally great conversation and not a total circlejerk Mmmmm yes, that always is the starting point. They don't begin with valid criticisms of bad candidates or anything. 
|
|
#
¿
Feb 15, 2018 19:16
|
|
|
Mister Fister posted:Bill Clinton acted like a Republican as president, way before Citizens United happened. Lets not pretend that the Democratic party will magically become progressive once you fix CU. I don't know how you can say that. It's not like he himself literally said, "Where are all the Democrats? I hope you're all aware we're all Eisenhower Republicans [...] We're Eisenhower Republicans here. Here we are, and we're standing for lower deficits and free trade and the bond market. Isn't that great?"
|
|
#
¿
Feb 15, 2018 19:18
|
|
|
Ytlaya posted:There's a subset of people who identify as leftists (and it's not really fair to pull a "no true scotsman" here, since "leftist" as a term is somewhat vaguely defined) who seem to base their views mostly on a sort of anti-establishment sentiment and are composed of people similar to those who voted Ron Paul in previous elections.  , but it's telling that Owlofcreamcheese can't put up or shut up even when I set the bar that low.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 15, 2018 19:55
|
|
|
Bring back "Moonbeam City."
|
|
#
¿
Feb 15, 2018 20:06
|
|
|
Owlofcreamcheese posted:Because I have no actual belief that many of the people actually hold any particularly left wing beliefs Mmmm yes indeed, the enduring popularity of Medicare for All (as well as Sanders even after the election) certainly isn't evidence of this or anything. quote:The negative effect of that is reading yet another ten page essay on the evils of shillary clinton that largely calls for her to support policies she already supports and denounce things she already denounced mixed all in with real criticism in a way that makes it harder to address real criticism than if they had not helped in the first place. I'm not seeing much evidence for this being a decisive factor in the '16 election. If it's so clear, you should be able to find that evidence easily. But you can't, because it's actually not true.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 15, 2018 21:45
|
|
|
God bless Hoyer for spelling it out that clearly, I guess! 
|
|
#
¿
May 1, 2018 00:53
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 10, 2024 07:36 |
|
|
self unaware is NewForumsSoftware. I would advise against arguing with him.
|
|
#
¿
May 2, 2018 20:35
|
|