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Fister Roboto posted:It's also not a linear spectrum. Many aspects of American liberalism are completely at odds with leftism, such as the primacy of the market for determining economic outcomes. American liberalism would be a lot better if it did primarily rely on the market for economic outcomes and not the whims of oligarchy. The problem with capitalism isn't the market; market isn't even *in* the word, the problem is capital.
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Jun 18, 2023 19:23
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That's definitely false; lots of things about capitalism have evolved in order to continue to survive, capitalism can absolutely exist without racism.
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Jun 18, 2023 20:09
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Fister Roboto posted:Such as? Like I said, it doesn't specifically have to be racism, any other kind of discrimination will do as well. Capitalism is an inherently unequal system, so it requires some kind of inequality to function. You did but then changed your wording towards the end: "Racism can exist without capitalism, but capitalism cannot exist without racism." Which is what I am primarily responding to; in any case inequality doesn't automatically entail discrimination (insofar as we're referring to traits you are born with) insofar as we're referring to economic inequality which is fundamental to capitalism as the extraction of value from surplus labour requires there existing some sort of unequal class dynamic but this could theoretically exist in a society without racism or discrimination, these are just low hanging fruit in which the political class preserves their institutions, political power and so on and would use some other tool if it was more viable. And of course if you have a useful tool why not sharpen it? But likewise if the tool is no longer useful it may be left to rust away into nothingness. I think to an extent these sorts of claims come about because by virtue of living within a capitalist system its tempting to think since its always been this way that it's inherent, but I think looking at it more objectively it isn't really the case. e: Fister Roboto posted:Yes, that's exactly my point. Any economic system can be racist, but capitalism can't not be racist (or some other form of discrimination). Though we've had the discussion about "human nature" before about how it's a poorly defined concept and ultimately becomes an argument for futility. Depending on what you mean by "discrimination"; I'd still disagree with the claim that "capitalism can't function without (x/y)". I think these are entirely irrelevant to the core "gameplay loop" of capitalism. Raenir Salazar fucked around with this message at 20:58 on Jun 18, 2023 |
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Jun 18, 2023 20:50
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Fister Roboto posted:If you think it's theoretically possible, then demonstrate your theory. How would a capitalist society function without some kind of discriminated lower class? How would it determine who does all the lovely jobs for lovely pay? Furthermore, how would this determination be unaffected by the historical legacy of racism that preceded it? Slavery has been abolished but its effects still persist through generations. Again, this depends on what you mean by discrimination. Insofar as I assume you're referring to discrimination between groups of people based off of more intrinsic characteristics or xenophobia in the case of cultural characteristics, I think there's absolutely a possibility for some future hypothetical "Woke" capitalist society that's largely bulldozed the vast majority of discrimination in the name of profit. Classism, insofar as this can mean rich people disliking poor people I don't think is in the same category and is actually a good example because in the past you absolutely had a sense of there being a "virtuous poor" representing the core moral rural folk who are the backbone of the nation and the monarch's authority to rule over the nobility, etc. But this changed with the industrial revolution albeit with aspects of this continuing to persist like with the Protestant Work Ethic and so on. Clearly the views of groups of people are very malleable and intrinsically political which I think pretty substantially argues the point that this isn't something that's intrinsic to capitalism but is societal driven; capitalism intersects with and acts upon these societal trends in various ways, but more in service of largely political goals and aren't really something that's factored into the core of what makes capitalism a systemic influence on human history. Also slavery is a good example here, "capitalists" particularly the northern industrialists swung hard against slavery, and produced individuals who advocated for the rights and freedoms of slaves because slavery was an archaic institution that made it more difficult to extract surplus through mechanization. And of course in the more modern political discourse the capital class would love to have migrant workers to work agricultural jobs; and trade agreements like NAFTA make it even easier to enable this freedom of movement of people; but the political backlash against hispanic migration into the US is very much contradictory to what's in the interests of the capital class. Like its why we have free trade, if there's no one who works lovely jobs at home in the hinterland capitalism finds that labour somewhere else around the globe that can be exploited instead; capitalism isn't about "producing" an underclass through social-engineering as its modus operandi, but finding it. I feel like this isn't a very complete view of capitalism to boil it down to underclass/discrimination as inherent aspects of it, like it has an intention to it versus capitalism being a sociological paperclip factory. Fister Roboto posted:To me, the most important question of any economic system is: how do you decide who does the worst jobs, and how do you compensate them? In capitalism, the answer is by making people desperate enough that they'll do those jobs for very little pay. And what's the best way to make people desperate? Good ol' fashioned racism. Like this in particular I don't think makes a lot of sense in context; it isn't about deciding who works those jobs, that's not what capitalism is. Capitalism oversees the ruthless creation and destruction of new modes of production; taking people who used to be in the bourgeoisie and plummeting them into the proletariat, from a early marxist overview of capitalism racism/discrimination has nothing to do with this process; it's an inevitability of technological and economic development; in fact its the opposite; because the core mission of capitalism is transplanting itself around the world, transforming, or rather, terraforming, entire societies into carbon copies of itself; racism and discrimination I think slow down this process. What matters is who has capital, who is a member of the bourgeoisie, etc. All humans are interchangeable under this process. This is what makes capitalism lovecraftian, because it is ammoral, unknowable, uncaring, and unassuagable. It has no need or care for petty bigotries to proceed with its processes; that's just a side effect of humans standing inevitably on a cliff is to grab someone else to plummet with them into the abyss; the abyss did not making them grab each other or care if they do or don't; all fall equally in the end. Raenir Salazar fucked around with this message at 22:35 on Jun 18, 2023 |
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Jun 18, 2023 22:28
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Fister Roboto posted:I don't have anything to add to the conversation right now, but I would just like to reiterate that the original point was that capitalism needs racism to exist, not the other way around. Capitalism depends on keeping the working class divided, and racism is one of the best ways to do that, so if you fight against racism then you are inherently fighting against capitalism's ability to divide and exploit. The point is not that identity issues are more important than class issues or vice versa, but that they are both part of the same struggle, and it's important for both sides to recognize that and unite. I understood your point FWIW but its still something I disagree with; using the "wave a magic wand and banish racism forever" hypothetical I think capitalism would still continue to exist; it'd simply evolve and continue to preserve its existence; and nothing would fundamentally change regarding labour relations. I think the key point that capitalism requires dividing the workclass via racial antagonisms is not an inherent aspect of capitalism; its a way capitalism gets implemented but it isn't the only way. Capitalism will simply find new and different antagonisms; the key thing isn't maintaining divisions within the working class, but divisions between classes as a whole. Capitalism as a system doesn't care if the working class hates other parts of the working class; but the political class that benefits from capitalism is what does; these are two completely different parts of the larger problem.
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Jun 19, 2023 19:32
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That quote does feel like it could be out of context; do we have context one way or another?
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Jun 19, 2023 19:55
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fizzy posted:CNN, ABC News and NBC News have each reported that upon hearing about McConnell's latest freezing incident, President Joe Biden called Mitch a "friend" and a "good friend" and that he (Joe Biden) would "try to get in touch with him later (McConnell) this afternoon". This is a bit of a false choice, and even if it were the case that these were the only two choices in how to analyze and interpret the situation; your choices as presented aren't the only ways they can be interpreted. For one has there ever been an honest politician? The idea that these statements have any relevance to Biden's campaign pledges (when his record for both good and for ill speaks much louder than words) seems a bit far fetched to me. And maybe you're not American, afterall I am merely a Canadian, but even I am aware it is deeply embedded within the "game" of US politics that even bitterly opposed politicians are "good ol' friends who mothers know each other." and means not much at all. Lincoln was good friends with a few Confederate politicians for example, and this had no bearing on his leadership during the Civil War, other than to bring the war to as swift a decisive close as possible via overwhelming victory on the battlefield. "Neither of the above" essentially. You need to read up more on US history and politics, particularly around the enactment of the Civil Rights Act, pretty sure LBJ was good friends with quite a few awful people (and was awful himself) but didn't stop him from enacting some pretty darn good domestic policy.
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Aug 31, 2023 02:26
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Yeah in my experience the amateur homeowner landlord has always been a massive disgrace to humanity. Incompetent, lazy, miserly, and distrustful of their own contractors in a way that makes me instinctively think it's projection (refuses to agree to suggestions because he thinks they're stealing from him). The corporate landlord company while constantly raised the rent at least took care of poo poo promptly and without issue. My landlord drags poo poo out for up to several months and blames his contractor because he refuses to hire whoever is available to do the job but waits for a specific guy who is the cheapest to be available and this takes months. I'm at the point I just threaten to do it myself and take compensation out of the rent to expedite things. (in my city this is legal)
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Sep 20, 2023 17:49
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My previous small time landlord initially refused to call an exterminator for roaches because it was "just a couple, they might go away, I can't afford an exterminator over nothing  "He ended up being forced to call them six to seven times until I moved to a new city. But yeah, we don't as mostly left leaning people object to the idea of a mom and pop store and some basic idea of private business and commerce, I'm not sure what the solution is for housing but I'm sure there's some solution that decommodifies it.
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Sep 20, 2023 18:17
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Shooting Blanks posted:Has China actually transferred nuclear weapons technology to any other country in recent memory? I actually don't know the answer to this - I know they have a public no first use policy and they joined the Non-Proliferation Treaty a bit late, but had they been involved with proliferation prior to that? Some people have historically made hay about the possibility of China transferring various bits of equipment or technology to North Korea but largely there isn't any evidence to support it beyond coincidences. e: Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:China provided Pakistan with the tech and uranium it used to build its nukes. I did a quick google/wikidive but as far as I can tell this is something the DoD/US DoS claims but at a glance there doesn't seem to be any evidence beyond their say so? Raenir Salazar fucked around with this message at 17:58 on Sep 21, 2023 |
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Sep 21, 2023 17:53
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is pepsi ok posted:He absolutely would have invaded Iraq. I'm not sure where people are getting the idea from that Al Gore was some kind of anti-war crusader who would have stood up to the MIC. I don't believe in of itself that this means that if in office with the weight of the responsibilities of the office of the Presidency behind him, that this would mean he would proceed with an illegal invasion on a false pretext; it's very easy to shoot at the hip flippantly all kinds of foreign policy when you're not the leader of the free world. Not even George HW Bush invaded Iraq, a Republican, why would a Democrat do more? 9/11 was in 2001 and broke a lot of peoples brains, with access to real intelligence that indicated that Saddam had basically nothing to do with it, and was still thoroughly contained, why press the issue? I can forsee a scenario where he supports a Kurdish or democratic uprising like what Obama oversaw in Libya, but that's hardly the same thing. This isn't a scenario where the MIC wanted to invade and Bush complied, that's not how real life politics works. Also the article is to me paywalled, so its hard to look at what the context was.
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Sep 26, 2023 00:54
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Neurolimal posted:If the greens were a viable and distinct alternative they wouldn't be allowed to exist, we didn't get where we are via the two parties being vulnerable to challenges. Electoralism is a dead end, vote for whatever you can live with. Or don't vote, who cares. I don't think any of this is particularly true. If the greens were viable they would actually get votes and win elections, they would of course be allowed to exist because the United States is a democracy and a open and free country. It is relatively easy for a major political party to have lawyers to file paperwork correctly, the issue is that they only appeal to a small subset of dissatisfied or single issue niche voters and lack widestream appeal and don't seem to be "serious" about winning. They could do many things to seem serious and gain support but they don't because they're grifters. Voting matters, Biden is like the most pro-union pro-labour President the US has had in our lifetimes and has passed legislation that's helped a lot of people and has proven even better than Obama by wide margins. I feel like this sentiment, that nothing matters, electoralism is a dead end, really just belongs in the dustbin of history.
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Sep 26, 2023 17:32
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World Famous W posted:people can just admit they don't mind using underhanded tactics for political purposes, this time delaying a vote to get longer to read a bill by causing an evacuation I'm actually legit surprised by some of the criticisms when I thought in general Democrats haven't been showing enough spine and now that someone has some backbone to do what needs to be done for their principles suddenly this is a big issue? I'm very confused.
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Oct 1, 2023 21:17
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If voting for them causes Trump to win isn't that by definition letting perfect being the enemy of good?
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Oct 5, 2023 20:27
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It's never going to be the case that a major political party will just stop enforcing borders. Not even a socialist party would do so, historically after all most socialist governments were actually quite big on border walls and border security. The metric here isn't "are they enforcing the borders" but are they doing so humanely? It seems like under Biden this has seen significant improvement and with a larger majority perhaps even larger improvements can be seen. World Famous W posted:if only the handful of people yall think would vote for west causes trump to win, biden was hosed long before then I'm not sure what you're responding to, I'm responding to someone saying that they would be okay with West's platform overall and would be willing to vote for them because "perfect shouldn't be the enemy of good" (paraphrasing) and I'm just pointing out that in principle this seems like a contradiction in terms, because by in pricinple theoretically being willing to split the vote, they are accepting some risk that they are indeed risking good enough in an effort to get soemthing that is more perfect.
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Oct 6, 2023 14:27
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World Famous W posted:good god This is the kind of thing I get annoyed with when it comes to leftist messaging. Biden is not a leftist, he is ostensibly pro-labour within a capitalist framework but ultimately like most liberals doesn't think the problem with "capitalism" is its existence; billionares are "fine" as long as they don't run away with power; that is inherent and core to most liberals. If you strike it rich as long as you pay taxes you've "earned" some proportion of your wealth, it's yours. So its really kind of silly to complain and criticize Biden on this because its a complete non-sequitor, it's irrelevant to the actual material conversation. You and I know that billionares are inherently bad, but he, and most people who voted for him, and participate in US politics definitively do not believe this and by engaging in this line of criticism you just isolate your position into irrelevancy. The fact he supports increasing taxation on the rich is good in the context of US politics where this is a viable policy position that people can vote for and get implemented, you're never in your lifetime are going to get "Eliminate the Billionare Class" as a platform plank from the major parties. FDR New Deal 2.0 Democrats is basically the most you're going to get from electoral politics. I just can't fathom thinking this is something that matters to criticize Biden for, it's like criticizing them for not being socialists when that's the entire anthropothic point.
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Oct 8, 2023 22:07
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Twincityhacker posted:Gotta defend the accusation he's a pinko commie before it starts. This isn't about votes in North Carolina, but even in California and anyone Dems vote. Especially California come to think of it. You're average blue collar worker isn't on board with guillotines.
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Oct 8, 2023 22:11
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MrYenko posted:I mean, we’re not against guillotines, either. Going to be frank here and point out that average SA users are probably significantly more class conscious than the average working class American. Whenever I see news of labour disputes its always "We just want a little help thats all" and never "gently caress the bosses". I think we're a far distance away back from when unions were willing to fight dirty and cut telegraph lines and so on.
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Oct 8, 2023 22:26
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If McCarthy was smart he would've preemptively resigned being Speaker when Gaetz started signalling and pull a Mao/Achilles and then just go radio silent/no comment until the Republicans come back to him hat in hands after flailing around for a few rounds unable to elect a new speaker; only agreeing to be speaker if given full confidence. No matter how long it takes. That's the only way to win this sort of brinkmanship in my opinion if "regular" horse trading wasn't going to suffice to give a secure enough speakership.
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Oct 10, 2023 02:54
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davecrazy posted:Can someone explain like I’m 5 why Chuck Schumer can’t get 50 senators tomorrow to confirm an abasador to Israel and promote all the necessary flag officers? It can't be done with just a simple majority, because for most official business anyone can say "No" and it takes 60 votes to tell the guy saying no to sit down. So essentially any business that doesn't have the approval of at least 8 Republicans including Mitch doesn't get to be done unless its one of the few crazy exceptions to the rule; such as Supreme Court nominees and so on or Reconcilliation Bills. Flags officers and Ambassadors while fairly critical aren't quite critical enough that 51 Dems are onboard with supporting changing the rules.
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Oct 11, 2023 00:44
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Ravenfood posted:Citation extremely needed. I have small business owner family and yeah I can attest to this. They work crazy hours.
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Oct 11, 2023 14:57
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mannerup posted:quorum call is wrapping up now, next will be nomination speeches and then the first vote Is this voting voting for the Speaker with the whole House or pre-voting like the GOP is doing before?
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Oct 17, 2023 17:56
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My opinion as someone who doesn't live in the US but nonetheless feels the full impact of US foreign policy whenever it swerves on and off the wagon is that americans voting for team blue has significantly better outcomes for most of the world. Like sure the US still finds ways to muck about even with sane leadership because that's what big countries do, that's always the case, but at least there isn't this element of utter insanity. I could easily have seen Trump trying to support a coup in Brazil for example, while Biden largely seemed to have recognized the results and completely deflated the outgoing Presidents hopes of getting US support? I think the sad fact is politics is complicated, and there's no way to not have bloodied hands somewhere. Someone supporting revolution in Russia in the 1920s couldn't have predicted all the things Lenin and Stalin would ultimately do, or the nations they would support who were equally bloody; even if you think in terms of left wing movements, revolution and organizing and "replacing structures", politics are going to keep doing politics stuff, its unavoidable. Arguing in terms of wanting to avoid supporting something that might be bad on principle, instead of the utilitarian approach of looking at reducing harm and maximizing benefits, is definitely barking up the wrong tree as this would mean not supporting left wing movements under the same principles, because even left wing movements, and in fact every remotely successful left wing movement, have all had to make difficult and morally compromising choices. There's no one you can support, whether it is a political party, a movement, or any politician who doesn't have to at some point make this kinds of hard and difficult and morally compromising decisions. It didn't use to be the case that the US were this automatically supportive of Israel, the Camp David Accords and the Oslo Accords were by US administrations actively supporting and trying to get Israel to agree to a two state solution. And even under Obama you saw reluctance, probably complicated because Bibi didn't like him and played politics in ways that likely equally annoyed Obama in the same sort of way Biden being Irish annoys the UK and complicates the "special relationship". The problem is that the US political scene has become so increasingly polarized that even minor wedge issues could affect electoral outcomes, the Democrats can't afford to utterly alienate AIPAC with even minor policy disagreements, if the GOP rapidly lost influence and lost over 100 seats and over a dozen senate seats, I don't think Israel would be as critically necessasary for the US to show such deference towards. Politics sucks because doing the right thing is just so rarely something that actually helps you win elections. It's also a lot less convincing given everything Biden has managed to pass, all of the good things his administration has just objectively managed to do, to argue as if its still 2018 that they won't do anything to help people when it seems like they've done a lot? Despite some of the disappointing compromises with BBB or the IRA, its insane how much better with domestic politics Biden has been over Obama, with how much more pro-labour he's been, if he manages to get the House back and a larger senate lead this November there's no telling what he might accomplish at their current trajectory, especially if Sinema is replaced with a vastly better Dem. It sucks whats happening to Gaza, but it's not going to be any better under Trump, and at the very least if Dems can keep holding national office and making gains and try to out wait the Republicans, if they collapse then maybe that opens up the opportunity for something better, not just domestically but internationally. It's also a little strange to me, like there's a lot of genocides happening around the world, some more directly impacted by whose in the whitehouse than others. Should we not also care about what's happening in Ukraine? Supporting Biden means Ukraine is more likely to avoid Russia genociding them. Then there's the Uyghurs or Tibetans in China who Dems more recently tend to be more consistently and competently "tough" on China; or what about the Kurds? Trump tried to leave them to die to Turkey which a Democrat wouldn't have removed the tripwire force protecting them. Then of course when it comes to foreign policy Obama did try to normalize relations with Iran and Cuba which had it continues would have saved tens of thousands of lives if not hundreds of thousands (imagine if Trump's actions escalated into a war with Iran back then); Biden has not been as good as Obama on this specific matter but its hard to know how much that is just Menendez's fault. Foreign and domestic policies in a nation like the US is constantly an ever shifting confluence of competing interests and making any choice is inevitably going to be lovely; even if the US as an "Empire" ended, the choices would still be lovely for someone somewhere. Voting is important, especially in local level politics often dominated by affluence retirees with too much free time; participate, organize, and vote to do even small amount of harm reduction. It really isn't a great moral stand to not participate.
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Oct 29, 2023 21:04
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What does the system being "broken" mean though? To me, the system is "broken" because it is highly polarized, and the minority party is able to very successfully obstruct what the majority wants, such that the majority needs either a super majority of its caucus 100% unified. There's also a lot of money in politics, its skewed towards the wealthy. Land has more voting power than people, although in theory if population trends continue the Presidency will be locked in to whomever can reliably win the largest most populace states; which is maybe another way of being broken; and of course the Senate and the way even some liberals balk at say, DC statehood and doing hardball politics to "win". The media and the way it can sometimes serve to "manufacture consent" is also problematic, but not on its own. But mainly the way it sets the idea that it is "normal" for Dems to be expected to "fix things" the Republicans do and treat Republican being dysfunctional as a given that isn't ever questioned. And of course FPTP voting which increases the dangers of spoilers and reinforces the need to strategically vote, and punishes people who live in stronghold non-swing states. Gerrymandering which further dillutes the peoples right to vote and right to be represented (Single Transferable Vote would fix this of course, expanding the House would also help). The debt ceiling is also a little bit broken, most functional governments don't have this, especially since it exists for political football. And of course one party is openly fascistic and genocidal without the people outright rejecting them; due to a combination of the above. But to a large extent the problem does lie with a majority of the populace, simply decided that it is willing to tolerate some combination of the above to some tolerable degree, and not vote in a government whose mandate is to fix those problems. I don't think the problem that indicates that government is broken is because Biden won't be punished by the electorate that frankly doesn't see him doing anything wrong. The problem is the combination of factors that led to this, and not voting isn't going to fix it. I'm not really convinced given the past nearly 4 years that it is inevitable that things just get worse; it seems to me whether its climate change, or improvements to social services, and the judiciary, there's a lot that can be done to improve things. It's unfortunate that foreign policy except in some aspects are only likely to improve last.
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Oct 29, 2023 21:53
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I also want to push back a little more on the framing of this as a "whether to vote for the lesser evil" which I actually think is disputable and does a grave disservice to the many policy achievements Dems have done that we've basically not seen since the 1940's or 1960's. It's not "New Deal" levels of transformative but that's maybe an excessively high standard before we allow ourselves to admit that maybe just maybe "Dems... Good?"
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Oct 30, 2023 23:25
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Heck Yes! Loam! posted:The banality of good men doing nothing Pardon? Can you explain?
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Oct 31, 2023 00:00
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Josef bugman posted:"The only thing required for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing" is a quite famous quote attributed to Burke I believe. I'm pretty sure that wasn't my question, and very obviously so. "How does this relate to what is being said/argued?" WHO is doing nothing, what is the evidence that nothing is happening?
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Oct 31, 2023 00:06
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Retro42 posted:Personally think Douglas Adams has the better quote here: Alien Lizards would've absolutely have been an improvement under Trump but I'm not sure how this relates to anything. The analogy seems to me to break down here because to be more accurate to real life one of the lizard rulers (democratically elected it seems I might add) is actually doing something to fix human mistakes like climate change, student loans, and poverty, is funding new green energy and reversed damaging policies of the previous lizard while the other lizard actively wants to eat you. Also reptiles are objectively cool and cute, so another way this quote just doesn't seem very applicable, I'd absolutely vote for a lizard for office and use my lap for body heat whenever it goddamn wants AND it's going to invest in green energy!? Heck Yes! Loam! posted:That no, they were not in fact ... good. I think the point here is I'm broadly addressing the larger issue, which is how broadly speaking especially considering domestic politics but also broadly regarding foreign policy the Dems do a lot of good things; their policies regarding Israel with the current ongoing tragedy is at best incredibly disappointing but I think it says something that this is what you have to focus on to say that they aren't "good" for whatever that means and however its quantified. A nuanced and hollistic assessment should I think consider everything else, and also foreign policy regarding other issues, like the Kurds, or support for Ukraine, confronting China, and so on. If this is the only issue you care about and no other issue you do you, but I don't think its fair to dismiss that other people ultimately need to consider a wider range of policies and outcomes and when considering these other outcomes maybe they aren't actually bad; or maybe as I said earlier, sometimes politics is disappointingly messy and a lot of sucky awful things are going to happen, and there's a gap between ones ideals and ones reality. Ms Adequate posted:Pretty obvious that the contention is the Dems are doing nothing to rein in Israel. I don't agree that it was obvious since that wasn't what I was specifically addressing in my original post, which would mean that it's a bit of a non-sequitor to reply to me with that. Nix Panicus posted:What was the thinking behind the democrats letting Mike Johnson take the house speaker position? Did the democrats believe Johnson is going to be easier to work with or less of a threat? Did any Dems vote for him? If not then I don't think they "let" Johnson be the speaker.
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Oct 31, 2023 00:28
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Nix Panicus posted:Was the vote unanimous from the start? I recall there being an ongoing leadership crisis for house republicans. Surely the democrats could have exploited that through strategic voting? Jeffries was never going to be Speaker, why vote for him at all? A protest vote? Which candidate in your view should the Democrats have supported?
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Oct 31, 2023 01:13
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Nix Panicus posted:Even if the republicans had explicitly said accomplishing the democrats preferred policy goals was off the table, surely some republicans held better positions than others, or do you believe republicans are an undifferentiated mass? So seeing the point that you're trying to insinuate here, surely you understand the difference between voting as an individual in an election, and voting as an party in Congress/Parliament for Speaker? Can you point to a single Republican representative, who was running for the role, who offered anything as substantiative to the Democrats in the House as Biden and Dems at large offers to the American people or is this a false equivilence you're arguing here?
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Oct 31, 2023 01:21
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Elephant Ambush posted:I know you're probed and can't respond to this but this is for the thread in general. The governor of California, a Democrat, recently vetoed a law that would protect trans kids. I know that's just one state but it's always brought up as the most progressive state that chuds hate the most. And to extend that to women, the Democrats got leaked a Supreme Court decision that was going to overturn Roe vs Wade and they did nothing. They had a majority and could have codified abortion as being legal nationwide but instead they said "hey donate a bunch of money and maybe we'll do something". They did not codify abortion as legal in this country because they did not want to. Democrat party leaders are also on record multiple times endorsing anti-choice Democrats who are running against pro-choice Democrats in certain House races I see only a couple of posters have thus far directly responded to one or two points, so I'll start off with that every claim in this post is either wrong, misleading, or otherwise has made a lot of unsupported assertions already addressed in previous discussion. IIRC "a Democrat, recently vetoed a law that would protect trans kids." is incorrect and as I understand it from what I can remember because the law passed was more of a feel good "optics" law that didn't meaningful increase protections over what was already in law? But if I'm incorrect I'm sure there's evidence somewhere to that effect. Regarding Roe vs Wade as I understand it many Dem controlled states worked rapidly to codify such protections into law, and seems like Dems did try to codify abortion rights into law, but Manchin blocked it and two Dems, not Dems as a whole, prevent the chamber from overcoming the filibuster in order to pass the law. I think its fair to be disappointed that the political will doesn't exist to force through good things like DC statehood to try to entrench Democratic control over the Senate over the GOP but it's also unfair to blame Dems as a whole when US politics doesn't work like that. And as had been mentioned multiple times before that you didn't respond to, until recently the right to have an abortion was settled law, why codify something that was already a legal right? IIRC "as others have mentioned that whole things started under Trump" is also not quite accurate, it is technically correct that in theory it "started" under Trump, but others pointed out that Trump was hardly likely to have kept his word, Biden was the one to ultimately hold to the deal and stick by a difficult process to its end, which matters way more. Additionally the earlier part of the sentence, "has done nothing good for this country on a grand scale" is also incorrect, billions of dollars was spent in landmark legislation that hasn't been seen since the Great Society and the New Deal which has done clearly a lot just looking at the economic data Leon posts in the thread. How are you even defining grand scale at this point? As a result, "Voting for Democrats does not result in good things. It results in slightly less bad things" unsupported opinion, see above. "we have the Parliamentarian that nobody ever mentioned" Your ignorance in the American political system is not the fault of the Dems. "they don't want to piss off the billionaires that control every single one of them. " I don't think this is true either. "All of their kids can get abortions if necessary with no problems. If any of them have LGBTQ family members they're perfectly safe because of money and power. They do not actually care about you or the women in your life or any of the immigrants at the Mexican border because all those camps are still there under the "less bad" party" This seems to just be opinion, and not really anything anyone can really reply to because it isn't a falsifable position and just seems to be polemnics.
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Oct 31, 2023 14:52
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He couldn't actually buy any guns past that point though? It sounds like he had the guns from before his symptoms.
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Nov 2, 2023 16:24
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Fuschia tude posted:They let Dobbs "happen on their watch" by...believing SCOTUS has the last word on legal and Constitutional questions? How exactly can the legislature "undo" a Supreme Court ruling? And SCOTUS was perfectly willing to declare Roe had no Constitutional basis, but you think it being a law would have been a bridge too far for them to overturn? So in fairness the US is three *co-equal* branches of government. If Congress absolutely wants to they have ways of forcing the issue over SCOTUS. However it basically hasn't happened in all of US history and would at a minimum require Dems having a huge gently caress off majority in Congress and presumably control of the executive branch. They can mess with Scotus's funding, expand the court, potentially remove jurisdiction, etc. They can pass a law and potentially this is unlikely to get overturned because the Conservative SCOTUS was simply reversing precedent that was based on implications of constitutional law, as bullshit as that move was its much harder for them to overturn an explicit law. But passing that law is also hard as they don't control the house currently and don't have a filibuster proof majority of the senate. But yeah it's still not correct to say they "let" it happen either anymore than they let "poverty" continue to happen because the US is ruled currently by a tyranny of the minority and most of the system is biased in the favour of republicans and empty land.
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Nov 8, 2023 15:11
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Bel Shazar posted:I would be more amenable to this argument is Democratic leaders weren't on the record saying how important it is that the US have a strong Republican party. They're not out there condemning the system. That was (a) Pelosi and (B) you've completely stripped out the context of that soundbite. Which was IIRC more about criticizing the way Republicans are facing irrelevance due to their extreme and alienating views. A de facto one party state would be bad because do you really trust Dems to still do good things if republicans have exploded so hard that they don't even have to try to win majorities? That's the point being made, it wasn't "republicans good", it was "stop shifting yourself to the point you implode because you refuse any and all responsible governance."
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Nov 8, 2023 15:59
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TheDeadlyShoe posted:The accusations of rigging really jumped the shark when it was decided that 'candidates quitting and their voters picking Biden' counted. Like, cmon. Real Freep-level 'its rigging because we lost' energy. It was definitely amusing seeing the conversation go from being dismissive of centrist voltron possibly being a threat to complaining about centrist voltron actually working in Biden's favor as being unfair. The fact of the matter was the race very early was allowed to become a clear choice between Biden and Sanders and the primary electorate chose who they chose, none of that can be reasonably considered rigging; its just how a reasonable democracy can be considered to function.
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Nov 9, 2023 00:32
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TGLT posted:If Biden wanted to put actual pressure on Israel he could, instead of letting Blinken go out there talking about how there are no red lines while they pointedly refuse to call publicly for a ceasefire. He did it in 2021 and it worked, because at the end of the day Israel is a client state. Israel cannot do this without US backing. It's a bit more complicated then that because of how polarized US politics is, that the Israeli lobbying is disproportionately effective. See for example what went on under Obama where Bibi was interfering a lot in domestic US affairs and relations between Obama and Bibi were very cold.
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Nov 11, 2023 17:02
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BUUNNI posted:I don’t think it’s accurate to say that the major US political parties are polarized on the issue of military aid to Israel, or to any other regime that we support for that matter Sure they are, its a zero sum game where whichever party is less "strong" on issues regarding Israel and supporting them are hurt more electorally. If Dems were much more dominant, Israeli lobbying would be much less effective.
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Nov 11, 2023 19:00
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Misunderstood posted:Look, I don't agree with Biden, broadly, about Israel. I didn't on October 6, either. Biden, like most people his age, is a Zionist - that's a problem. He takes "Israel has a right to exist" as an axiom and has never bothered to ask himself the "...wait, why?" follow-up question most people born since 1980 have. You are never going to have the right approach to the conflict if you are a true believer in Zionism. Even if the entire over-50 portion of the American body politic didn't have lovely views that made anti-Zionism politically toxic, Biden has his own lovely views that would be standing in the way of doing the right thing. I don't think Biden is a believer in justice for Gaza, I just don't think he has to be to be horrified by what has gone on the last month. I'm not sure I understand this paragraph or what it has to do with anything. Ostensibly all countries have a right to exist, that's what it means to recognize states as being meaningfully sovereign entities. You don't need to be a zionist to look at a map and agree that Israel should be a name that exists on it with some recognized boundary; Biden's support for Israel isn't couched in some "zionist" ideology or some true belief in Zionism, but in a basic set of facts that Israel currently is (a) a country (b) a US military ally/partner (c) generally friendly to the US and broadly a part of being "the West". Ostensibly the US would as an "Empire" would like it if there was some ostensible "peace in the Middle-East" because being an Empire in decline, the US's energies and resources are finite, and it would be a lot less resources if Israel wasn't antagonizing its neighbours. Biden's not doing the right thing because the right thing is contrary to his political interests; which is winning reelection and also not alienating a key partner/ally in the region. Where decades ago Reagan was apparently with a single phone call able to reign in Israel excessive military force; the US was much stronger and the leadership of both Israel and the US were more rational in this sense. Bibi is a far right true believer and Biden is sadly not all that strong as a US political leader, and most people unfortunately buy into rather simplistic narratives about the IP conflict which has contributed to Israel's far right government getting away with a lot more literal murder. In any case the right approach to the conflict in a more perfect world would've been to force Israel to stay on course for the Oslo Accords roadmap and in respecting the two-state solution and punishing the government for expanding illegal settlements; this could be accomplished while still supporting Israel's "right to exist" and legitimate security concerns.
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Nov 12, 2023 23:01
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Misunderstood posted:Oh gosh, I just keep getting all kinds of heat for word choice today. I think though that most people have a different idea of what "Zionist" means. Much like how "Socialist" has many different meanings from Maoist to social democrats, I suspect Biden probably doesn't think it means anything more than "wants a safe secure homeland for jews in Israel".
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Nov 13, 2023 01:35
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Professor Beetus posted:"no ethical consumption under capitalism" I say, as I go to punch the clock at the violence factory and get back to making puppy kicking boots You realize that every remotely successful socialist revolution was thanks to the military supporting it right? "Red Army" has the word "army" in it. The point about "no ethical consumption under capitalism" is to avoid these sorts of unproductive conversations that don't actually advance any goals of material positive changes. Because there is no job that you can do that doesn't ultimately up hol ld capitalisms power structures outside of sustinence living off the land off the grid. The difference between being an infantry, or a doctor, or a computer toucher or a farmer or a factory worker means nothing on a macro level because they all contribute to capital.
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Nov 13, 2023 18:53
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