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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
Just because you were Fair for Its Day in the past doesn't mean you are less of a steaming pile of crap today.
Non Indicative UsernameThe Democrats, meanwhile, have for a long time been the Party of the People: which tries to improve the lot of the common man even if it means forcing the wealthy to give up a bit of privilege. Of course, it's also got its powerful interests that can capture its ideology, and in the 1860s, it was dominated by plantation owners and other Southern/rural elites, who had significant backing from the poor white population.
The Northern industrialists wanted to modernize the nation's economy and saw the slave economy of the South as standing in the way, so the politics of the Republicans tipped in favor of abolition, while the Democrats, representing the "common white man", didn't hold with that high-falutin' nonsense and wanted to keep their agrarian slaveowning culture.
Of course, once that was over, the Republican Party's backers had no interest in anything resembling egalitarianism; they wanted a steady supply of low-wage labor for their factories. Meanwhile, the Democrats' populist base started to get really pissed off at the labor abuses and other privations inflicted by the industrial economy. This led, in short order, to the New Deal, where the Democratic Party came into its own and stood up for welfare and labor reforms.
The fact that the parties are now flipped in terms of populism is an outgrowth of the mid-20th century, when Democrats were riding high on the prosperity of the post-war period, while Republicans were scheming about how to undo all those progressive reforms and get back to the "natural" order of Big Business running the show. To that end, they cultivated the Democrats' working class white voter base who were increasingly chafing at the march towards civil rights reform. Using religion and racism as wedges, the GOP started to pry them loose, and this came to a head in the 70s when movement conservatism got underway as a direct reactionary response to desegregation.
Along the way, however, the Republican Party's intellectual elite started to get mired into a trap of epistemic closure by the need to develop a governing ideology that would keep the restless fundies and racists in line while still performing what they saw as their proper role: dismantling regulation and the welfare state. It took until this very year for that house of cards to finally come toppling down as their voters rejected the double-think and nominated a candidate who espoused their true values.
The idea that there is some kind of de facto ban on Republican ideology in this topic is nonsense, just as much as the idea that the two major parties are static entities that go back to the beginning of time, and if you support what the Democrats are now, that means you also supported the 1860s version of the party. Let's please not engage in egregious strawman arguments like that.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"It's less a case of "We call Repubs wrong because they disagree with us".
It's frequently "We disagree with Republicans because they're wrong."
wrong about racial issues, wrong about marriage equality, wrong about lgbt rights, wrong about women's rights... The list is long. And historic.
Say to the others who did not follow through You're still our brothers, and we will fight for youAs far as Hillary being a one-term President goes...well, realistically speaking, the Democrats can't hold the White House forever (and to be honest, they probably shouldn't, lest they grow complacent).
In any case, when was the last time that a party held the White House for 16 years straight? Has that ever happened?
Oh God! Natural light!And considering FDR was the only president to get elected four times, I think we can safely say that was something of an anomaly. It just doesn't seem like something that really happens.
Still, there's a first time for everything.
Oh God! Natural light!@Karkat: the issue is, the GOP being what it is today, that could be absolutely disastrous. The climate change position alone makes them one of the most dangerous organizations in human history, and I don't see that going away as pin as energy companies are a core part of their backer coalition.
Even if they drop the outright denial eventually, it'll be in favor of "the magic of the free market will fix it", which is barely an improvement.
edited 25th Aug '16 12:34:54 PM by CaptainCapsase
The Republicans have an unstated (but generally understood by almost everyone) rule that Democrats have no right to govern and it's very much an "us vs them" mentality, and considering how diverse the Democratic party is, and how much the Southern Strategy shaped the Republican party, you can generally tie it back to racism as the root cause.
New Survey coming this weekend!Republicans also have a Muslim party chairman in one of Harris County, Texas's districts.
There was some debate, specifically with a Christian pastor saying "his beliefs are the total opposite of ours".
Yeah, remember a few years back when the Republicans literally tried to crash the government entirely? Since Obama was elected, the Republican talking points haven't been "we disagree with this person and we don't agree with his policies", but more "Obama is an illegitimate president and we mist stop literally everything he tries to do regardless of what our constituents actually want."
That's the thing. The average person on the street wants healthcare and they want reasonable gun control. The Republican leadership have gotten so tied up in their insane ideological purity obsession that they're flat out ignoring what Americans actually want.
@Ace Of Spades...
You have to be joking. PLEASE tell me you're joking.
New Survey coming this weekend!Well, the opposition party's nominal role is to advocate a dissenting viewpoint. But ideally, they should be the loyal opposition, objecting in principle while keeping the wheels of government turning. Lately, what we've got is sheer contrariness and obstructionism, to a childish and ridiculous degree. In fact, if Obama said breathing was a good thing, the Republicans would hold their breath until they turned all sorts of funky colors.
This Space Intentionally Left Blank.In other words they're supposed to be Commander Contrarian, not The Starscream?
edited 25th Aug '16 2:11:24 PM by sgamer82
Precisely. The past eight years the Republican party has taken things way too far, putting party ideology before their duty to the country. Our political system is supposed to be about compromise, not total domination of a particular party one way or the other. I'm pretty sure one of the Federalist Papers discussed that concern, but I can't remember which one.
edited 25th Aug '16 2:16:52 PM by randomdude4
"Can't make an omelette without breaking some children." -Bur

Part of Trump's (and before him, the Tea Party's) success is that he stopped beating around the bush, dropped the dog whistles, and just started saying out-and-out racist things. The racist fringe of the party was pissed at the Republican establishment for not really doing anything for them in the last 30 years or so (and a black man being elected president offended them on a deep, deep level), so they latched onto him as America's Great White Hope.
Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.