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GoldenKaos Captain of the Dead City from Cirith Ungol Since: Mar, 2014 Relationship Status: Showing feelings of an almost human nature
Captain of the Dead City
#281576: May 28th 2019 at 7:57:23 AM

See, the way I think they see it is that they (let's call them the American Left) occupy this space to the Left of the Republicans (obviously) and also to the left of mainstream Democrats. So, they're opposed to the "right-wing party" but also not thrilled with the purported "left-wing party" because to them they're just not left enough. I don't see how that's bothsiderism, they see both as being to the right of them (one undeniably more so) and therefore criticise them for that.

Some definitely take this too far. Idiots like Jimmy Dore almost come across as Republican plants considering how much they dedicate to criticising 'corporate democrats' rather than republicans.

"...in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach."
MarqFJA The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer from Deserts of the Middle East (Before Recorded History) Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
#281577: May 28th 2019 at 8:00:57 AM

You know, it's kinda funny how this thread has recently been oscillating between periods of very rapid activity (20+ pages on average per 24 hours) and very low activity (barely 5-10 posts per 24-48 hours), with the changes in activity being very abrupt.

who makes successions to the right
I didn't know the USA had elements of hereditary monarchy.

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
DeathorCake Since: Mar, 2016
#281578: May 28th 2019 at 8:04:20 AM

[up][up]

Was trying to come up with a good way to point that out for a few minutes there, thanks for that.

To be fair there's so many different factions and positions in the far left or even the AOC/Bernie style American soft left you can't really fit us all on one axis. Plenty of socialists, anarchists and communists of various tendencies also think Jimmy Dore's a conspiracy-peddling idiot, even if he does have good guests on occasionally.

This might be a two-party system thing given the soft-left outlook of "Labourism" in the UK that tends to view left Greens and the liberal-to-left members of the nationalist parties as traitors to the cause who should be expected to line up with the broad centre-whatever consensus rather than entitled to demand things in exchange for their vote.

Edited by DeathorCake on May 28th 2019 at 3:14:32 PM

PhysicalStamina i'm tired, my friend (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Coming soon to theaters
i'm tired, my friend
#281579: May 28th 2019 at 8:29:53 AM

So, they're opposed to the "right-wing party" but also not thrilled with the purported "left-wing party" because to them they're just not left enough. I don't see how that's bothsiderism, they see both as being to the right of them (one undeniably more so) and therefore criticise them for that.

The reason I say it's functionally identical is because when the truly far left say Democrats aren't left-wing enough, the implication (and what I think they believe is) they might as might be a diet right-wing party.

I'm gonna post the video, simply called "Civility", and some direct quotes from it.

(the quotes start after 7:58)

...I don't think Nancy Pelosi is dumb. [...] She knows that this appeal to bipartisan ship will cede ground to the right, and she knows that every bit of ground ceded to the right means more people get hurt. But I think she believes that if she does this very politely, and very even-handedly, it's gonna make her look good; it's gonna win her some political capital, and that is the only thing that politicians on either "side" give even the slightest of a shit about.

Emphasis mine.

I dunno, that sounds pretty bothsidesist to me.

He then goes on to say that the center-left doesn't care about us, and that the "liberal establishment [...] wants to reverse progress we've already made in the name of bipartisanship."

Edited by PhysicalStamina on May 28th 2019 at 11:34:48 AM

i'm tired, my friend
Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#281580: May 28th 2019 at 8:42:59 AM

Every person wants to believe that a lot of other people share their views, whether they admit it publicly or not. This is how you get extremists imagining that if they could just get their message out to enough people, they'd get enough support to have their way. That is obviously fallacious, yet it's how we get this idea that "centrist Dems are selling out the liberal left", and so on.

Democrats want to get changes made to benefit all of us. This is demonstrably true. It is also true that Democrats may disagree on the nature of these changes, how much change is needed, and the pace of change.

But if Democrats are unable to control government, none of those changes will happen. Ever. Pelosi must always consider that. If it means playing "safe" more than some on the left would prefer, that's just how things go. If we don't get a Democrat in the White House and control of both houses of Congress in 2020, we aren't fixing shit, and hard left politics aren't going to win more voters at the polls than they lose.

The media will see to that, if nothing else. I work with a lot of people and I don't see this extreme enthusiasm for liberalism that infuses the more radical communities of the left.

Edited by Fighteer on May 28th 2019 at 11:44:18 AM

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#281581: May 28th 2019 at 8:45:13 AM

The problem with "Pelosi must do X and Y" is the fact that it's making a very large number of assumptions about the way the base will respond. Repeatedly and consistently during the last two years, the Democratic base has gone Left and gotten angrier and angrier. Playing it safe has resulted in numerous Democratic politicians being replaced by more radical politicians.

Representative Cortez has her position because the Democratic base revolted and primaried one of Pelosi's long term allies.

And with good reason.

In the French Revolution, Gabriel Riqueti (Mirabeau for AC: Unity fans) was sent to the wolves because his conciliatory style was poorly thought out and not reflective of the times.

Edited by CharlesPhipps on May 28th 2019 at 8:57:00 AM

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
Fourthspartan56 from Georgia, US Since: Oct, 2016 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
#281582: May 28th 2019 at 8:45:19 AM

I really like Thought Slimes videos but he's an anarchist and that means he's ideologically obligated to have unreasonable views about the people actually in a position to make things better.

It just comes with the territory, people who reject hierarchy aren't going to like people who support hierarchy but aren't fascists.

"Einstein would turn over in his grave. Not only does God play dice, the dice are loaded." -Chairman Sheng-Ji Yang
Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#281583: May 28th 2019 at 8:47:01 AM

[up][up] And as more Democrats come to the polls, more Republicans will rise up to resist them, and more centrists will be turned off by CNN's coverage of the "radical left".

We aren't having a revolution here. Nobody is bringing out the guillotines. We have a system of democracy that we need to follow, and that system means that Democrats can't win Congress and the White House even with a majority of the popular vote. You need an overwhelming majority, and that means you need the center as well as the left.

The system is rigged against us. Are you willing to risk it all on aggressive progressivism?

[down] Soft anarchism is just as utopian as Communism and Libertarianism. It can't work with real people.

Edited by Fighteer on May 28th 2019 at 11:49:45 AM

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#281584: May 28th 2019 at 8:47:37 AM

It just comes with the territory, people who reject hierarchy aren't going to like people who support hierarchy but aren't fascists.

Soft anarchism exists that basically believes you need a little government to kill hierarchies lest someone take advantage of a power vacuum.

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
Protagonist506 from Oregon Since: Dec, 2013 Relationship Status: Chocolate!
#281585: May 28th 2019 at 8:50:00 AM

Extremist bothsiders tend to be of the opinion that both parties are the same; whereas centrist bothsiders are of the opinion that the parties are too polarized. For my part, I tend to fall into the latter opinion, though I don't believe both parties are equally at fault for the polarization of politics.

[up] That's just minarchism, though.

Leviticus 19:34
CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#281586: May 28th 2019 at 8:50:11 AM

And as more Democrats come to the polls, more Republicans will rise up to resist them, and more centrists will be turned off by CNN's coverage of the "radical left".

The Democrats have already lost that war because the Republicans have been painting them as baby-killing Illuminati servants who want to sell white women to the Brown Horde of Taken Villains for decades now.

While the Democrats were trying to find common ground, they were victims of a massive war propaganda effort that means that they're far behind in resistance.

But let me have Aaron Sorkin speak for me instead about just what Democrats are facing.

Edited by CharlesPhipps on May 28th 2019 at 8:53:12 AM

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#281587: May 28th 2019 at 8:52:24 AM

Soft anarchism is just as utopian as Communism and Libertarianism. It can't work with real people.

It works significantly better than authoritarianism and strong state government. Indeed, it is the ideal form of government to restrict the power of authorities as much as you can. It's how the Bill of Rights and constitutions work.

Check and balance that shit.

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#281588: May 28th 2019 at 8:54:05 AM

[up] That's blatantly false. Read up on the Jefferson vs. Hamilton debate. Hamilton was proven right many times over: you need an aggressively regulatory government to drive social and economic progress. If Jefferson had had his way, we'd still be an agrarian, third-world economy with no global influence. That owns slaves.

Or, more likely, we'd have been taken over by a more economically advanced power.

Edited by Fighteer on May 28th 2019 at 12:04:55 PM

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
M84 Oh, bother. from Our little blue planet Since: Jun, 2010 Relationship Status: Chocolate!
Oh, bother.
#281589: May 28th 2019 at 8:55:03 AM

Senator Cortez has her position because the Democratic base revolted and primaried one of Pelosi's long term allies

...AOC is a Representative, not a Senator.

Disgusted, but not surprised
archonspeaks Since: Jun, 2013
#281590: May 28th 2019 at 8:55:57 AM

Almost everything is significantly better than authoritarianism so that’s not saying much. The problem with minarchism or soft anarchism is that it misunderstands how much the government actually needs to do to keep society running.

They should have sent a poet.
Fourthspartan56 from Georgia, US Since: Oct, 2016 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
#281591: May 28th 2019 at 8:56:43 AM

Soft anarchism exists that basically believes you need a little government to kill hierarchies lest someone take advantage of a power vacuum.

Anarchism is a rejection of hierarchy, soft anarchism sounds pseudo-anarchic.

That's just minarchism.

"Einstein would turn over in his grave. Not only does God play dice, the dice are loaded." -Chairman Sheng-Ji Yang
TobiasDrake (•̀⤙•́) (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
(•̀⤙•́)
#281592: May 28th 2019 at 8:57:18 AM

Anarchy is the larval state of feudalism. It exists only until such a time as people start forming their own little fiefdoms in absence of a central authority.

Minarchism, meanwhile, is the larval state of Insert Large Government Here. It's an idea that sounds cool. "Minimal government. You just need government to control THIS, nothing else."

Until they add, "And also this."

"Oh, and this."

"And this, we need government involved with this."

"Oh man, I can't believe we forgot about this. Regulate that shit!"

Before you know it, you have people in your nation whining about how the government's too big and we need a minarchist government, and you're left scratching your head and going, "I thought that's what we had...."

Edited by TobiasDrake on May 28th 2019 at 9:57:53 AM

My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.
CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#281593: May 28th 2019 at 8:57:27 AM

Re: AO

I knew that but was editing a TV tropes page at the same time. You should never multitask while discussing politics.

Edited by CharlesPhipps on May 28th 2019 at 8:58:30 AM

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
PhysicalStamina i'm tired, my friend (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Coming soon to theaters
i'm tired, my friend
#281594: May 28th 2019 at 8:59:48 AM

This isn't really related to anything, but:

Senator Cortez has her position because the Democratic base revolted and primaried one of Pelosi's long term allies.

You mean Rep. Ocasio-Cortez.

i'm tired, my friend
Protagonist506 from Oregon Since: Dec, 2013 Relationship Status: Chocolate!
#281595: May 28th 2019 at 9:01:14 AM

Minarchism basically runs headfirst into a "required secondary powers" issue. They want a society with basically two laws ("don't hurt others" and "don't infringe on property"), but these concepts are extremely vague and require a whole lot of government just to get those two concepts working.

America itself actually is a good example of this. It's pretty universally agreed upon that society should strive toward "freedom", but Concepts Are Cheap is in full effect and US politics are more or less a debate to define freedom.

Leviticus 19:34
Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#281596: May 28th 2019 at 9:06:09 AM

[up] This. It's why I can't take Libertarians seriously. They keep trying to reinvent government every few decades, and every time they get a chance (like with those idiotic "libertarian freesteads"), they rediscover the reasons why we have it in the first place. "But maybe this time it'll work." It's like a broken record.

Edited by Fighteer on May 28th 2019 at 12:06:41 PM

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
DeathorCake Since: Mar, 2016
#281597: May 28th 2019 at 9:25:23 AM

[up][up]

The left-Anarchists are typically not great fans of An Caps or private property either. I haven't personally read much anarchist philosophy nor do I really care much about them, but they're certainly not libertarians or capital-L Liberals in any sense unless in the USA "Anarchist" means "Ancap" in the same way that US leftists can somehow be said to be in favour of "extreme liberalism".

Edited by DeathorCake on May 28th 2019 at 4:26:02 PM

GoldenKaos Captain of the Dead City from Cirith Ungol Since: Mar, 2014 Relationship Status: Showing feelings of an almost human nature
Captain of the Dead City
#281598: May 28th 2019 at 9:27:01 AM

The reason I say it's functionally identical is because when the truly far left say Democrats aren't left-wing enough, the implication (and what I think they believe is) they might as might be a diet right-wing party.

I mean, from an European perspective (where, of course, the Overton Window is further left, and mainline left-wing parties openly have 'socialist' in the name), the DNC are a diet right-wing party. In fact, that's how I've always viewed the Democrats. To paraphrase a panellist from the British current affairs panel show Have I Got News For You: "the USA has a right-wing party and a VERY right-wing party". (Or "one party is pretty right-wing and the other party is mad").

Now, some on the left certainly will engage in bothsiderism. Idiots like the aforementioned Jimmy Dore for example, who Sam Seder took to task for not supporting Hillary in 2016 (Sam would have preferred Bernie, for the record). But in general, the Left are criticising the Democrats and Republicans for the same base reason - they're both to the right of their position. One is more so, and does get more flak for that, but both parties will also have things (stances, policies etc) in common that the Left disagree with, so sometimes they'll be criticised for the same thing because they functionally aren't that dissimilar in that particular example.

"...in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach."
AlleyOop Since: Oct, 2010
#281599: May 28th 2019 at 9:30:42 AM

To be fair, even anarcho-communes sound like a good idea on paper and may work swimmingly well for the first few generations but eventually some charismatic asshole will probably come along and turn that into a fiefdom. Without some form of external authority to come in and enforce in light of direct democracy failing to do the job there's no real good control internal control mechanism to prevent all the myriad anarcho-communes (which are hard to scale up past a certain point) from turning into breakaway microstates with time.

PhysicalStamina i'm tired, my friend (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Coming soon to theaters
i'm tired, my friend
#281600: May 28th 2019 at 9:36:03 AM

I mean, from an European perspective (where, of course, the Overton Window is further left, and mainline left-wing parties openly have 'socialist' in the name), the DNC are a diet right-wing party. In fact, that's how I've always viewed the Democrats. To paraphrase a panellist from the British current affairs panel show Have I Got News For You: "the USA has a right-wing party and a VERY right-wing party". (Or "one party is pretty right-wing and the other party is mad").

I mean, that's cool and all, but neither Thought Slime nor I are European, and on our side of the pond, "left" and "right" have different definitions. Perhaps Dems would be a diet right-wing party if they were in Europe, but they're not. They're in the United States of America. And, therefore, in the United States of America, where I and presumably Slime are from, calling the Democratic Party a diet right-wing party is not correct. To any capacity.

I don't know why this has to be explained multiple times.

Edited by PhysicalStamina on May 28th 2019 at 12:36:49 PM

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