Sheldon Whitehouse for President!

[honorentheos]

Trump's policies were an economic nightmare that we will pay for for a generation.

I won't argue that there aren't plenty of terrible economic ideas being pushed by progressives, too. But it isn't a case where one party is good for the economy and the other bad. The details really, REALLY matter.

Details! Har, har.

That's where your case will fail with people like ajax18. What matters is a Fox News headline. And that's as far as it goes.

One of the challenges of politics in general is the system is set up so we basically hire people to handle the details so we can live our lives and do our own jobs. We want people in office who can focus on the details and make decisions that are in our interests in the same way we want people to build our homes, cars, and mobile phones while we focus on our own areas of expertise.

That trust is essential to society.

But we tend to have oversimplified things down to what is now practically warfare between two sides we believe represent good and evil, right and wrong, corruption and virtue. The shorthand has taken over to the point we aren't capable of unpacking it back out into coherent political ideas. We no longer believe we all share underlying values with differences of opinions but are instead combating opposed value and belief systems.

Ajax should try to unpack the details so he can realize just how realistic his belief is that Trump was representing his, Ajax's, interests. But so should all the rest of us when we listen to whomever is presenting arguments for policies tied to the side we agree with who are using phrases and claims that are buzzwords for progressives, too.

This thread started out espousing the virtues of two progressive politicians. Where were the details of their positions engaged in the thread?

[Chap]

But we tend to have oversimplified things down to what is now practically warfare between two sides we believe represent good and evil, right and wrong, corruption and virtue. The shorthand has taken over to the point we aren't capable of unpacking it back out into coherent political ideas. We no longer believe we all share underlying values with differences of opinions but are instead combating opposed value and belief systems.

Please include me out of your "we". Show me a coherent political idea that I don't agree with, and I am pretty capable to seeing the grey areas between it and my own point of view. I have voted for both right and left shaded parties in my fairly long political life.

The problem is that in Trump and his clique, public life in the US faces a group of people life who try deliberately to avoid presenting the complexity of things to their supporters, and insist that they are the only force of light and truth in a world of darkness, evil and lies. Truth, for them, is always expendable in pursuit of power.

Trump is a powerful corrupting influence that seems to have taken over a political party that once used to do some good things for all Americans, but now seems interested only in destroying all opposition even at the cost of the subversion of democracy and ending the representation of the US people through fair electoral institutions. I don't think there is a 'value and belief system' there at all: just a naked and shameless lust for power and riches at any cost.

[ajax18]

Trump is a powerful corrupting influence that seems to have taken over a political party that once used to do some good things for all Americans, but now seems interested only in destroying all opposition even at the cost of the subversion of democracy and ending the representation of the US people through fair electoral institutions. I don't think there is a 'value and belief system' there at all: just a naked and shameless lust for power and riches at any cost.

Florida would be very happy now to allow California to govern as they desire if they were to allow Florida to govern as the people democratically see fit. But that isn't good enough for the left in California. The authoritarianism is coming from the left. If we don't allow men into women's bathrooms, or participate in these crazy ecoomic shutdowns, they're going to do everything in their power and through the federal government to get men into women's bathrooms and keep our people prohibited from going to work.

[honorentheos]

But we tend to have oversimplified things down to what is now practically warfare between two sides we believe represent good and evil, right and wrong, corruption and virtue. The shorthand has taken over to the point we aren't capable of unpacking it back out into coherent political ideas. We no longer believe we all share underlying values with differences of opinions but are instead combating opposed value and belief systems.

Please include me out of your "we".

Why? You did it in the post I quoted. You have reduced the discussion into the binary and focused on an oversimplified version of Ajax to do what, exactly? Use up bandwidth for kicks? Or was it to enforce the oversimplification? Ding ding! That last one is a winner.

[honorentheos]

The authoritarianism is coming from the left. If we don't allow men into women's bathrooms, or participate in these crazy ecoomic shutdowns, they're going to do everything in their power and through the federal government to get men into women's bathrooms and keep our people prohibited from going to work.

Ajax,

Would you mind sourcing arguments, please? The comment above asserts a lot of things without backing those assertions up. Those include:

The political left in America is asserting authoritarianism over democratic processes and principles. (This is a complicated topic I doubt actually exists coherently in a way that ties to your claim but I'm curious how you ground it in substantial facts and political theory).

The political left want men in women's restrooms. Move past the charged incorrect jargon and make a supported argument related to this.

The left is seeking to prohibit people from working. Again, the idea that the pandemic was a partisan ploy should be supported with actual facts and evidence rather than reliance on partisan pep rally chants.

[Chap]

Please include me out of your "we".

Why? You did it in the post I quoted. You have reduced the discussion into the binary and focused on an oversimplified version of Ajax to do what, exactly? Use up bandwidth for kicks? Or was it to enforce the oversimplification? Ding ding! That last one is a winner.

Nope. Trump is not like Bush or Reagan, with whom one might disagree on rational grounds, on the assumption that they wish the country well, but may not necessarily be right about the best way to go about it.

Trump recognises no interest apart from his own, and has no respect for truth. He has no political position to which he adheres - he just wants to win unrestrained power at all costs. He is unlike any American president in my not particularly short lifetime.

Sorry if you find that upsetting, but that is the way it is.

[Gunnar]

Nope. Trump is not like Bush or Reagan, with whom one might disagree on rational grounds, on the assumption that they wish the country well, but may not necessarily be right about the best way to go about it.

Trump recognises no interest apart from his own, and has no respect for truth. He has no political position to which he adheres - he just wants to win unrestrained power at all costs. He is unlike any American president in my not particularly short lifetime.

I agree! I fail to see how any fully rational, honest and well-informed person can escape coming to that conclusion about Trump. He has openly, literally expressed admiration for absolute despots like Kim Jong Un, and envy of the absolute, unquestionable power Kim wields over the people he rules. There is no question in my mind that he aspires to acquiring that same degree of power and influence, if he could somehow achieve it.

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

Is it any surprise Xanax and his ilk don’t have a coherent political ideology? Look at Trump with regard to the vaccine:



Trump is a symptom of political and scientific ignorance, not the root cause. Honor is correct that this is also a problem with the Left. I see this with dEmOcRaTiC sOcIaLisTs all the time in the sense they truly believe that people will somehow become altruistic and fair with their labor when they’re in control - obviously it’s more complicated than that, but the people that advocate for political supremacy rarely have a grasp on things like economics, philosophy (outside of their niche area of interest), government operations, business, ethics, so on and so forth.

I don’t know how any of this is overcome when people tenaciously hold to ideals that don’t make sense.

- Doc

[Moksha]

Trump is a symptom of political and scientific ignorance, not the root cause.
- Doc

I suppose those two conditions can exist without Trump, but he does seem to have a definite deleterious effect on his followers. He can wind them up and turn them into insurrectionists.

[Gunnar]

I can't understand what there is about Trump that makes him seem at all believable even to some of the most poorly educated and informed among us, let alone anyone with a higher, university education. I think this kind of gullibility among as as many as a third or more of our population is a much greater danger to us all than even the covid-19 pandemic is or ever was. I saw him as the ignorant buffoon and liar he is long before he ever ran for President, and I continually marvel at how many seem unable to see him for what he is. I wish there were an effective vaccine against Trumpism!

I wonder how many of those who voted for and still support Trump are also flat-earthers. I would not be greatly surprised if Trump himself turned out to be a flat-earther. I would be even less surprised to find that some of the Congress critters most supportive of Trump (especially Qanoners like Marjorie Taylor Green) found the flat earth hypothesis to be plausible.