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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
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Democrats governing from a center-right/right position was arguably necessary because left positions had been thoroughly discredited in the early post-soviet world (at least the English speaking part of it).
It's also a pretty interesting observation about this election being a referendum on Bill's legacy, even though both candidates were ultimately running against at least parts of it.
Funny how left positions get discredited quicker than racism in America. But I disagree...NAFTA wasn't entirely consensual even at the time. More Republicans than Democrats agreed to it, since it was a Reagan-Bush I holdover that landed on Clinton's desk, to which Bill admittedly added provisions on environmental regulations for what its worth.
Clinton's whole "end of welfare as we know it
" and other stuff repeated and re-legitimized Reagan's mendacious candidacy and legacy and the series of lies and corruption that stuck to his rotten Presidency.
There's no destiny that said that left goals end with the USSR especially since anti-communists like LBJ and Nixon supported those platforms. And even in the case of Clinton towards the end, the healthcare initiative that he proposed was far more comprehensive than Obama's, so it was a Faustian short-term bargain made by Bill anyway.
The 2016 Election is a referendum on Bill Clinton for many reasons. For one NAFTA and Free Trade was a talking point in this election and that is rightly and wrongly an albatross around his neck. Then there's the whole Neoliberal consensus which Obama himself was was slowly moving away from, which Sanders was raging against, and of course Hillary being Bill's wife and seen as part of that. The Clinton Foundation became an embodiment of that, you know money to good causes and important investments but at the price of wining and dining corporate fat-cats. I mean the optics of it made it look bad. Then the whole Republican nothingburger scandals of the 90s: Whitewater and others and all those endless investigations which began with Bill and now shifted to Hillary. Mass incarceration was also an issue as well, (even if Bernie also signed on for it). Then the sex scandals and the whole idea of hypocrisy...if Democrats defended Bill why can't Republican voters look the other way on Trump. And of course the white working-class constituency which once got behind Bill now went Trump,,,or at least that's what the optics looked like at the time.
As for Obama, well the Republicans are already walking back about gutting ACA, the Iran N-Deal and so on. So I think that will still stick for some time. And I have no doubt that if the Democrats might rebrand themselves as the "party of Obama", they'll be back soon. Their big mistake in the 2014 Midterms was trying to distance themselves from him. Now he's their last best chance.
I still find amusing that passes for left in the US.
The Democrats are more closely related to the classical definition Liberal Capitalism and have a socially progressive platform. Meanwhile the Republicans are neo-conservatives and focus more on Chicago School of economic thought.
Both are still on the right wing, but the Democrats are socially liberal while the republicans are socially conservative.
Inter arma enim silent legesWell that's how things go in America. America's attitude to democracy and evolution of systems and norms diverged sharply from Europe and that divergence became more pronounced in the 20th Century when USA had to play a global role. The fact that some systems like Electoral College still exist is proof of that.
Globally speaking, Modern Democracy begins with The French revolution which in 1792 introduced universal male suffrage with no property distinction, no religious and racial preference. They also abolished slavery in 1794. And "one man, one vote" was codified there.
Leftist policies and government had power only in select moments in US History. The Republican Party of 1855-1876, The Democrat Party of FDR from 1933-1945. That's pretty much the closest you find policies, platforms and policies that parallel the contemporary Left Wing of Europe. Marx and Garibaldi saw Lincoln and the Republicans as their allies on another continent.
Every other administration is conservative/centrist/moderate on some level or the other...And Obama is the first president to bring back social democracy after Richard Nixon. Nixon wanted to provide health care too.
edited 3rd Dec '16 3:42:03 PM by JulianLapostat
I'm not quite sure how my last post was off-topic, given that the one it responded to apparently wasn't, and that I brought it back to Trump at the end, but okay.
In any case, I'll keep this first bit short and then move into the larger point I was trying to make—looking for historical parallels to explain or compare with Trump is inherently risky. I took issue with Julian comparing Trump with Crassus for a lot of reasons (most notably that it relies on what's now considered a pretty outdated take on who Crassus was), but the reality is that none of us are doing ourselves any favours by making these sorts of comparisons, as they, simply by virtue of being comparing people from radically different time periods and cultures, tend to be shallow. I could write a fair bit on how Trump reminds me of some of the Latin American strongmen that Nixon and Reagan both installed, and I could make it sound convincing, but in doing so I'd be missing some crucial differences (notably the fact that you elected your wannabe Pinochet here, and that pretty much totally alters the equation).
I'm as guilty of this as the next person (how many times have I made Mussolini jokes here?) but the reality is that it's a thing I think we need to avoid doing, at least as part of a serious discussion. Certainly we need to comprehend how we got here, and the existence of prior American populists like Andrew Jackson and George Wallace can certainly be a part of that explanation, but I think we need to beware relying too much even on those comparisons, let alone on ones from another nations and time periods. In doing so we both distort our understanding of historical figures, frequently twisting them to fit the comparison with the modern figure (as I would allege that Julian was unintentionally doing with Crassus), and wind up trying to predict the actions of the modern figure based on the old. The reality is that none of us have a clue what Trump is going to do. We know it's going to be bad, certainly, but whether he'll be Jackson or Pinochet (or insert-figure-here) we can't actually say (not that either of those would be good).
White supremacy and the attitudes that accompany it is a long-running American problem, but Trump is the first American president in the modern era to successfully run on a campaign of that and little else. With that in mind, I don't know how much we can rely on any historical example when trying to work out how this happened. Jackson was a long, long time ago, and while the culture apparently hasn't changed as much as we hoped it had, it's changed enough that we have to ask ourselves how has he successfully exploited this, when even the likes of Nixon and Reagan had to play their cards more subtlety. In the end, I think Trump is more interesting in how he differs from past political figures, than in what he shares with them.
None of which is to say we should stop making Cheetoh Benito jokes or the like. Keep those a-coming.
edited 3rd Dec '16 3:52:33 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar
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I don't think we disagree as much as you think.
The collapse of the Soviet Union alone did not discredit the left. In fact the left in the US was already seemingly discredited following "morning in america" (the end of the early 80s recession and Reagan's reelection). However because Thatcherism/Reaganism was still such a dominant force in politics when the wall feel and Union broke up it allowed the right to claim a triumph and allow for the almost literally canonize Reagan and his policies (the Washington Consensus was one aspect of this).
In the face of this, it's not really that surprising that Clinton and his contemporaries felt the need to move more to the right, as cynical as it may have been.
Reagan is the main reason the country moved as hard right as it did, and the American left has been trying to cope with this ever since. I can't blame Bill Clinton for having had to do that—after twelve years of Reagan and HW Bush, he needed to do whatever he could to get into power and at least undo some of the damage that they had done.
I honestly don't know what it could mean for Trump to be Jackson again. The America Jackson rose against was obsolete, Jackson's solutions were obsolete and the America he left afterwards is obsolete. He is fundamentally irrelevant as a politician. Jackson came to power promising every white man the vote and created land expansion by throwing Native Americans out of their homes. How will Trump be Jackson again...The Frontier is closed, what will he do...expand into Mexico or Canada? That America is gone forever. Jackson wasn't an isolationist and Little Ameriker like Trump is, he was an imperialist and expansionist. And Trump is an America-Firster. Jackson was also a military tough guy while Trump is a rich sissy.
That's why I don't see Jackson in Trump, however much it feeds Stephen Bannon's pretentions. I do see Trump as part of the long anti-intellectual tradition of which Jackson is on a continuum with Mccarthy and Reagan but that's based on unifying aspects of their campaigns and advocacies.
edited 3rd Dec '16 4:34:44 PM by JulianLapostat
...Did you notice the part where I said that you had done something that all of us, myself included, are guilty of? This isn't about you. We've all gone looking for historical parallels for Trump, and in doing so, we're all, I think, doing ourselves a disservice.
And stop double-posting man.
edited 3rd Dec '16 4:03:12 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar
We have to assume and prepare for the worst. Trump is no genius, he's just an incredibly lucky conman who won on a fluke. He is endowed with the essential American virtues of being rich/white/male and embodies the neo-feudal entitlements that goes with that. He comes celebrity and mass media culture, from the world of consumerism. All that is true and I have said that in many other posts which explores the issues at the heart of his candidacy and his campaign.
There's no disservice to anyone to try and find some sense of where to place Trump in light of what happened. It's a valid way of trying to make sense of something that is seemingly senseless.
I am sure if Clinton didn't do it someone else would have and not as well as he...as evidenced by Tony Blair who tried to be the Clinton of England. The fact is decisions have consequences. LBJ's decision to act on principles rather than the Southern constituency had consequences, and Clinton's actions had consequences.
edited 3rd Dec '16 4:35:21 PM by JulianLapostat
Here's their info. They're actually progressives:
DO YOU PROMOTE EVIL? The Satanic Temple holds to the basic premise that undue suffering is bad, and that which reduces suffering is good. We do not believe in symbolic “evil.” We embrace blasphemy as a legitimate expression of personal independence from counter-productive traditional norms.
IF YOU DO NOT BELIEVE IN THE SUPERNATURAL, HOW IS TST A RELIGION? The idea that religion belongs to supernaturalists is ignorant, backward, and offensive. The metaphorical Satanic construct is no more arbitrary to us than are the deeply held beliefs that we actively advocate for.
WHAT DO YOU BELIEVE? We believe in the pursuit of knowledge and freedom of Will. We believe in our Seven Tenets:
One should strive to act with compassion and empathy towards all creatures in accordance with reason.
The struggle for justice is an ongoing and necessary pursuit that should prevail over laws and institutions.
The freedoms of others should be respected, including the freedom to offend. To willfully and unjustly encroach upon the freedoms of another is to forego your own.
Beliefs should conform to our best scientific understanding of the world. We should take care never to distort scientific facts to fit our beliefs.
People are fallible. If we make a mistake, we should do our best to rectify it and resolve any harm that may have been caused.
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Kind of interesting to know that Satanists sound more reasonable then the fringe elements of the Religion they are commonly pitted against
edited 3rd Dec '16 5:37:09 PM by Ecrivan
Formerly known as Bleddyn And I am feeling like a ghost Resident Perky GothGreen Party drops Recount Attempts in Pennsylvania
, making the whole Recount process pointless as if Trump just keeps Pennsylvania, he would win regardless.
Way to go, Satanists.
Now, we just need to round up the herd of Discordian cats...
Actually, that's a point...
Claim anything Trump does against your Tropian-Discordian beliefs. He's such a cliched stereotype that the pattern cannot, and should not, last! Just doing my bit at ripping the Dead Horse Trope up so a better reconstruction can find traction, man. It's my religion.
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I mean, the idea of the recount actually changing the outcome was always a longshot. I see the recounts as more of an optics thing- the presence of a electoral College popular vote split prompted serious grumbling about whether or not the result would accepted every other time, and the margins were smaller than. So a certain amount of fighting back here is only proper, in some ways, even if the fighting back is, in practice, only symbolic.
Just to let you guys know,but the Satanic Church is different from Satanism.
The Satanic Church is a protest religion meant to show the hypocrisy of leaders who profess religious freedom beliefs when in actuality they just want the US to be a theocracy with one Christian religion.
Here's a pretty good clip of them taking down Megyn Kelly:
Basically they got the Ten Commandment structure taken down by trying to put a Baphomet statue and since both were in accordance with religious freedoms laws, they couldn't let one stay while allowing the other so they had to get them both down.
Religious Freedom cuts all ways and if Scientology qualifies then what we can all do is create our own religion and claim exception under First Amendment laws.
John Oliver pointed out in his parody church show
.
So let's all get creative and invent our own religion. It has a precedent after all. Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine and Maximilien Robespierre all believed that civic virtue ought to be tied to Deism. Robespierre cited Voltaire's maxim as his first and only commandment, "If God does not exist, it is necessary to invent him".
So let's invent our own gods and endow the Creator with inalienable powers of Immortality, Anarchy and the Pursuit of Utopia.
In all fairness this kind of subversion is a brilliant protest movement. The Republicans have given us ropes so let's make them hang themselves with it. It has precedent after all...Gandhi's famous salt march exploited an absurd salt tax that was poorly enforced but by making that an issue, he got the world to take notice and made the British enforce the absurd law, and made themselves absurd.
edited 3rd Dec '16 6:07:55 PM by JulianLapostat
...
No, I think I'm gonna have to not jump on the 'Satanists are a protest and basically just there to troll republicans' train.
Because that's how the other side is gonna justify being okay with the KKK and neo-nazis. 'We may have racists, but they have satan worshippers.' It's the kind of thing that gonna be a deal-breaker with anyone remotely religious.
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Then how do we fight them? Lately it seems like everything we try to do, they have an automatic counter for.
edited 3rd Dec '16 6:18:45 PM by TrashJack
"Cynic, n. — A blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be." - The Devil's Dictionary

Ok, because I understood that he was talking about Bill, but the replies seemed to be about Hillary.
1 2 We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be. -KV