How many powerful Lobbies WOULDN'T Barkey piss off as President?

Don't get me started on planned obsolescence; there's a reason why my shop teacher never drove anything made after the 50's.

He was made of money and didn't need to worry about gas?

OP, I guess you are so cool for having non-mainstream beliefs that are remniscent of many people in their teens and twenties.

Most of the policies suggested by Barkey are extremely mainstream if you go by opinion polls, but neither of the big parties supports them in the US.

Also:I suppose he didn't care about carbon emissions, either.

edited 10th May '11 7:35:36 AM by BestOf

Once again, why does mainstream opinion not reflect in the main two parties? There are votes to be won there.

edited 10th May '11 8:05:05 AM by GameChainsaw

And that is the $27 question.

Because while they pander to the mainstream for votes, the real power is not served by such things.

I have Michael Moore's Stupid White Men, and at the start, he offers a list of polls that prove that the main problem with American politics is that they don't have a big party that's Leftist enough. Most opinion polls seem to point that the Democratic party is simply too right-wing for a majority of Americans, but people are still voting for them to avoid an even worse candidate winning.

Granted, Moore probably picked his statistics for a purpose, but still, the statistics are valid.

Course, thats a problem in itself in that any party more left than the Democrats would quickly be painted as the second coming of Stalin by the right

From time to time, I see and hear people saying that Barack Obama is a Socialist.

For comparisons, from the Political Compass, here's the US Presidential candidates from 2008, this chart has European governments and here's me.

As a side note: I think Finland's a bit too much to the Right on that scale - if Obama were to run in Finnish elections, he'd be the most right-wing candidate in the country.

edited 10th May '11 10:06:41 AM by BestOf

I've actually seen quite a bit of evidence that in terms of policy people are to the left of both parties, but in terms of ideological self-identification they identify as being more conservative.

Hell, it happens here a lot.

I think it's possibly because they self-identify their own chosen policy preferences as being conservative. The thing is that I think they're right. I actually think that leftist policy is actually much more little-c conservative than rightist or even (I'll be honest. I'll say ESPECIALLY) centrist policy.

Funny that all the Republican candidates are authoritarian, yet their the party all the so-called Libertarians vote for.

edited 10th May '11 12:06:51 PM by Alichains

That's because the great majority of Libertarians are members of the demographic the Republicans would hand authority to—i.e. white, middle-class or wealthier males. Libertarians actually don't have a problem with coercion provided they aren't the ones having to do the knuckling under. What they hate about government isn't that it's coercive, but that it's relatively even-handed in its coercion, laying down rules for Us and Them alike.

^

How do you figure that? Not trying to be a smartass, I'm genuinely curious how you can specifically target those other groups. I'd say it's more about the upper class alone, as opposed to them being white or male.

Except that the Republicans screw over the middle class no matter the their skin color or gender. It's only the wealthy that benefit.

A great many middle-class and lower-middle-class people in this country either identify as richer than they are, or fully expect to become rich. That's why you get so many people voting against their own economic self-interest—they identify more with the wealthy people who would be taxed than with the less wealthy people, including themselves, who would benefit from the taxes.

And in the process, they ironically make it less likely that they will ever be able to become any wealthier than they are.

I honestly hesitate to accept that this is what motivates the majority of those who vote. I would think it comes more from the fact that so many social issues are wedded with economic issues in the modern Republican party, and candidates have recognized that this garners more support even from people who would be opposed to their economic and taxation policies.

You are right, of course. But we were talking about why Libertarians would vote for an authoritarian party, not why poor people would vote for the party of the rich.

Good point. Carry on ^^;

I suspect that it's because these Libertarians think their smarter than they actually are and vote for the Candidates with the talking points they want to here instead of actually looking at the issues.

edited 10th May '11 1:12:50 PM by Alichains

I thought most voters did that, anyway.

It's most jarring with Libertarians, what with the complete disconnect between their beliefs and their voting record.

To be fair, how many candidates not named Paul could actually be called Libertarians? It's almost as unrepresented in the potential candidates as genuine Communism.

Ardiente's theory on the matter

Your right, neither party is really Libertarian, but then you vote for the less authoritarian party, not the more'' authoritarian party.

This has really nothing to do with Barkey's presidential ambitions or lobbyists. Probably should move any more posts on the subject on a different thread.