Political Update · 6:30pm Nov 7th, 2020
So... Biden won the presidency. That's something. I just hope he won't be another Obama Clone, Give me a break.
For the record I think Biden winning is going to end up being a very good surface level president, not so good deeper wise. He's just another politician who'll be another surface level good guy. I've done my research on Biden and when you look at it he's not been a completely honest person, not that Trump is any better but still.
Another thing about me is that I am not a Republican, but aside from Trump I do like a fair amount of things that Republicans and Libertarians do.
I'm going to show you just what I think about Biden, do I think he's a good president? I can't say that for sure, I've yet to say anything yet because he just got elected. He's certainly better than Hillary Clinton, idiots like her are why Trump won.
All I can hope for is the Green New Deal not passing in the Republican Senate which gladly, is very unlikely to pass.
Both options are shit
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True
Biden is probably going to be very mediocre, that is if the Senate lets him do literally anything. Get ready for the gridlock of the century.
As for the GND, I don't know enough about it to have super strong feelings.
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From everything I've read about it, it's a glorified woke smorgasbord of race and gender politics on top of the climate stuff started by wingnut Democratic Socialist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
From what I saw and heard. Biden is gonna make us go socialist, which is basically communism that is compatible with democracy. Plus, I heard he's gonna take our guns away, and The West is known for their guns; we don't give them up. Ever. Idaho especially, though we do have those who have differing opinions.
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Well, I guess?
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I don't see anything about race or gender. It seems focused on combatting global warming and poverty through aggressive investment, overhaul of transportation and manufacturing regulations, subsidized education and jobs and also universal healthcare tacked on.
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Biden is not in any form, a socialist. Biden can try with gun control, but he'll never get anywhere.
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This is a basis of my view on the GND.
Also, I don't think he was implying that Biden was a Socialist.
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Appealing to a specific minority group?
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Ugh, Joe Rogan.
Crenshaw is a piece of garbage, I wouldn't listen to him. He doesn't know much about Green Energy. The GND could be turned into good legislation with several alterations, I think, to make it less overly ambitious. Like dropping a jobs guarantee and replacing with a program to educate new workers for jobs in Green Energy.
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Unless she tries to target a specific group, no. Everyone gains from that. Even if she did, I don't see that much wrong with it.
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Fun fact: Biden never signed on to the Green New Deal. He, in fact, won the primary by opposing the Green New Deal. It would appear that the main reason you're worried about a Biden presidency is that you don't know where he actually stands on the issues.
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Oh, yeah. *facepalm* I can't believe i forgot about that. But that wasn't my only concern I have. I remember a clip of him saying something back in the 90s (94 i think) where he lied that he wouldn't cut social security.
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There are a bunch of propaganda clips passed around of various statements from various politicians that were taken out of context from decades ago; they're, in general, not trustworthy sources of what actually happened, because politics is complicated. Since Social Security is a perennial issue, there are a bunch regarding that and Biden. It's possible you are referring to the clip where he says he'd freeze Social Security spending. The context this was removed from was a budget crisis in the mid 1990s wherein the federal government was kind of going broke, and the partisans in the Senate couldn't agree on how to fix it. Biden made a statement about how they needed to temporarily freeze federal spending; all federal spending. He then listed a few specific things to indicate how serious he was about that all. He never singled out Social Security for cuts; that's what Republican Senators tend to do, as indicated by the actual voting records.
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Ah okay. I'm getting a lot of different views here and I don't know what to trust.
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It's worth noting that Electric Grace is either unfamiliar with the actual contents of the Green New Deal or playing it down. It does, indeed, focus on both race and gender.
-From House Resolution 109 of the 116th Congress, "Recognizing the Duty of the Federal Government to create a Green New Deal"
The Green New Deal as put forth by AOC and pals is an omnibus bill intended to address many of the left's pet issues under the guise of combatting climate change. (It's also worth noting that actual climate change organizations (as in, not those created by fans of the GND specifically to support it) have criticized it for being unrealistic.) It's unfortunate that the people who support it either don't know what's actually in it, or are willing to be less than honest about its contents.
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Thank you, NS.
Come to think of it, I think I'll leave the politics to you all.
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I did say I didn't know that much about it. I haven't skimmed through the whole thing. I guess I was wrong about the race thing.
What exactly is wrong with those sections though?
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It's because it's supposed to be a climate change plan, that's what it should've been. It's a ridiculous bill that we can't afford to pay. 90 mill.
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What's wrong with those sections is that climate change is an imminent issue that we can't afford to delay on, and the leftists decided to use it as a prop, hardening conservative opposition and guaranteeing that no climate-related deal would be reached. Those sections represent the extremist "theory" that winning brownie points from their base is more significant than actually getting anything done, and they're so up their own asses that they're willing to put the human race in jeopardy to do it. Legislation is not a magic wand; it does not automatically come into being once written. It needs to be approved and implemented, and both of those things require compromise and cooperation. This is not a dictatorship, no matter how much you may wish it was.
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It's an omnibus bill with a lot of different stuff in it. The climate stuff is the focus, but there's a lot more too. Like the New Deal in that regard.
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I can see no reason to actually object to it since I doubt conservatives would have been much kinder if those sections weren't there. Half their party thinks global warming is made up. You know, I don't think we necessarily disagree as much you might think.
lol what
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I've explained this to you earlier, and you've ignored it: Compromise is the only option. There is no unilateral progress without 40% of the population. You can't justify not trying to compromise by claiming that the other side wouldn't compromise if given the chance*, because the alternative to compromise is failure. The Green New Deal failed, and nobody was surprised. Not even the people who wrote it; they expected it to fail, and didn't give a damn because feeling like they administered a verbal beat-down is more important to them than saving people's lives.
*It's also immensely hypocritical, which I have made clear I don't approve of.
This is the second time you've said that, but you've yet to highlight what you think that I think we disagree on which you think I am wrong about.
I cornered you into either admitting that you admire a genocidal dictator, or apologizing for casually quoting said genocidal dictator. You chose to bail on the conversation altogether. That tells me all I need to know about you. Not to mention your continued harping on the nonsensical idea that this country can move forward without even trying to cooperate with conservatives, which only makes sense from the mindset of an authoritarian who believes they have a route to grabbing power and forcing people to do what they say.
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You did not "corner me", I just haven't responded yet. I haven't chosen to bail, I've been pretty short on time lately, and you leave really long comments.
The quote I left was pretty darn tame, dude. It was just an observation that sometimes, history-making events occur in a very short amount of time.
Valuing pragmatism over feeling good about ourselves is what I mean. Believe it or not, it's important to me. That's why I voted for Biden even though I don't like him that much. I'm not a self-defeating Bernie Bro or something.
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Then why are you suggesting we should pay for a 90 million dollar bill, do you know how much debt America is in?
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Because I think the cost is well worth it and will end up benefitting America and saving us money and strife overall in the long run. Like the original New Deal. We need huge change right now.
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That was my base assumption, but then you left multiple replies here, indicating that you did, indeed, have time to comment.
And I would have apologized for the false assumption, except this does not lend me towards believing the assumption to have been false. I gave you another perfect opportunity to distance yourself from a genocidal dictator, and you choose instead to dance around the issue by downplaying quoting a genocidal dictator.
All of your exchanges with me so far have been the exact opposite: You failing to comprehend the very essence of pragmatism and insisting that your feelings that conservatives are mean should translate to not trying to cooperate with them. You follow the full cadre of far-left extremists on this site, some of which have posted blogs calling for political violence, and one of which just posted this amazing, in-depth explanation of how liberals should be viewed as enemies of the "true" left even more than conservatives and how being allies is a temporary thing while the far left is poised to stab moderates in the back the moment it looks like they can take control. At this point, "we agree on more than you think" sounds less like an attempt to find common ground and more like an attempt to pull me into your ideology.
You are still free to try to convince me otherwise; but be aware that I'm not some gullible lost soul looking for a home that you can persuade through emotional pleas like "we're not that different".
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Your comment over there was much longer, and your comment here annoyed me.
For posterity's sake this is the quote Narrative Style takes so much issue with:
“There are decades where nothing happens, and there are weeks where decades happen.” — Lenin
As you can see, it's evidence I'm an authoritarian for using it.
I have not attempted to defend Lenin or anyone else, I was just making an observation that sometime history moves very quickly. People can quote others they hate who have done terrible things. If someone was talking about the power of propaganda, I wouldn't fault them for quoting Goebbels, for example.
I think the Dems should try to find ground with those they have more in common with, not try to expand our appeal to the right-wingers. Maybe we can do that with conservatives who aren't attached to Trump, but it would be a recipe for failure to repudiate progressives.
You're not a "gullible lost soul". You take a different approach, one I think is incorrect, but we both value pragmatism. I've supported Biden, and I've supported the Lincoln Project. We do have some common ground. When I respond again, I'll likely do it on your blog.
The left-wing figures I follow here I follow for a few reasons. I despise the Soviet Union, and I hate Marxism-Leninism. They should remain relics of history.
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Who a person chooses to quote says something about the sorts of things they tend to read (otherwise how would you know the relevant quote) and the sorts of things they tend to admire (quotes from famous people are generally intended to borrow the gravitas of those famous people). The particular sentiment provided by the quote in question is present in dozens of other quotes from dozens of other people... yet you chose the one from Lenin. You should really consider what that means about your mentality.
Fun fact: Everybody has things in common that we can build on for cooperation. Things like "not wanting to die", just for starters.
The last several years of the Democratic party show that it has been a recipe for failure to listen to progressives in their demands to exclude conservatives. You want to know where Trump came from? Ask any Trump supporter: They'll tell you about how horribly they've been treated by the radical left. Trump would never have risen if Democrats hadn't given so much leeway to the left-wing radicals. I can support this with piles of evidence from statements of actual people who voted for Trump and polls of radicals versus moderates, as well as explain it by basic, well known systems of psychology.
Was that really so hard? Because it felt like pulling teeth.
*Also, it's not just a "relic of history". There are places, such as Cuba, that continue to run on oppressive, authoritarian-communist principles. Hence why the expatriate Cuban vote won Florida for Trump: The far left has made Democrats hesitant to clearly condemn communism, and those people have friends and family who are still suffering under communist rule right now.
Edit: It's worth noting that Bok and a number of other people you follow are openly Marxist-Leninist. Note the profile description referencing Leningrad. Super Trampoline has had blogs taken down for calling for political violence, and yet you're somehow surprised when he keeps doing it. These people are just as toxic as people who glorify Nazis... so why are you hanging out with one while denouncing the other?
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I don't have a repository of quotes lying around. I get what you're trying to say, and I've made similar arguments myself, but you're really reaching here.
I'll address this back on your blog.
To them I would say: "how?". What has the radical left done that has pushed them to embrace a wannabe fascist? I don't think the so-called radical left has much of a presence in America, let alone power. If Bernie and AOC are the scary radicals, we really don't have much to worry about. The radical left wasn't pulling the strings during the Obama administration, unless you think the ACA and gay marriage are "radical".
I have a much different hypothesis for how Trump became such a phenomenon. In part, he is the symptom of a political system and culture that has grown decayed and dysfunctional. This led to conservatives embracing a populist strongman who lashed at all their "enemies" with no restraint. He is also the symptom of an increasingly extremist GOP that has become more and more extreme ever since Reagan. This was not the fault of the "radical left", which has been in heavy decline since the end of Cold War. Communism as we knew it is dead and gone, scant exceptions aside. Bill Clinton was was practically a Democrat In Name Only, and Obama was no radical either.
You could have just asked, dude. The best evidence had for me supporting stuff like that was fairly benign Lenin quote.
No, I doubt the real reason they supported Trump was because of Communism. I thought the same thing as you at first, but I doubt they're dumb enough to believe Biden or Kamala is anything like a communist. They had no issue supporting Democrats before 2020, and Dems were slandered as "socialists" then too.
On the topic of the people I follow. I don't "hang out" with them. I don't like Super Trampoline's violent rhetoric, but I think he's far more misguided then malicious. A few conservatives here seem to think the same thing, actually, so I'm not alone here. He's naive. Doesn't mean I'll put up with his tankie bullshit though. I'll denounce it when he does it, but he's an outlier. I don't think Bok is an ML.
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Have you ever been falsely accused of something? It hurts. A lot. Being falsely accused of something imparts a strong emotional impetus to oppose the position of whoever is falsely accusing you, which in turn leads to comradery with anybody else being attacked by that person or group; ironically, often pushing people into believing and embracing the things that they were falsely accused of in the first place because of the false accusation. It's become a sport of the left to see racism, sexism, homophobia, and every other form of bigotry in the most innocuous of things. That has consequences, and they aren't the consequences you think they are.
I did ask. Multiple times. You dodged it for a while, and continue to play it down.
Violence is inherently malicious. It's never okay to advocate it. Your defense of violent rhetoric, frankly, puts you on the edge of extremism yourself.
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Let's keep this on your blog from now on, kay?
Yes, I've been falsely accused, but I never became a bigot or a Trumper because of it. I myself am somewhat doubtful of the true extent of false accusations of bigotry. I have only ever been accused of being racist, sexist, or anything else a handful of times in my life, and some of those times were from right-wingers, ironically enough. The zealous social justice types are a problem of course, but I harbor some skepticism toward all these people complaining they're "under attack" just for being white or straight.
Racism (and other forms of bigotry) these days has necessarily become more subtle. It doesn't appear in the form of burning crosses, but in how our biases color our actions in things like policing, housing, or employment. Racism has become less obvious because it had to. You can't call people the n-word anymore, so you call them "violent thugs", try to blame them for crime, and downplay or deny the struggles they face. Racism is far better disguised, but it's the same underneath.
Because bigotry has become much more covert, leftists mess up a lot. It's a lot easier now to see when it's not really there. I don't like the zealous social justice crowd who do more harm than good. I call these people "wokescolds" because they seem more interested in chastising people and ideological purity than achieving true social justice. At the same time though, we'd see a lot less bigotry if we weren't constantly being gaslit by conservatives who wouldn't see injustice if it was right in front of them.
No you did not. Please point me to where you asked if I was a tankie or supported Lenin. What you did was insinuate that I could be a horrible authoritarian based off a fairly innocuous quote in a blog of mine, and then you doubled down when I rightly argued that it was irrelevant.
Don't twist my words. I'm not defending it, I explicitly told ST to quit it with the tankie shit!