Move the Overton Window
Move the Overton Window
240 comments
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I tell people that Bernie is a centrist and his policies are the bare minimum of acceptable compromises that should accept, but what we really should do is abolish billionaires and turn every company into a worker's co-op
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least socialist post on lemmy
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Sorry to bring the news but…the rest of the world have been calling US Democrats right-wing and Republicans far-right for decades.
My dad used to joke that the US is the country of freedom, where you can choose between the right and the right.
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The right does this and it seems to work for them.
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"I'm not a Republican, I'm a centralist." (Proceeds to list pro-republican things, bash Democrats, then talk about how weed is okay.)
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Thinking gay people have human rights cancels out thinking black people don't!
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I'm not just a centrist, I'm a conservative! I agree with Adam Smith, the father of Capitalism.
For instance, I agree with him that monopolies must be regulated or they will corrupt the government:
It is to sell the one as dear, and to buy the other as cheap as possible, and consequently to exclude, as much as possible, all rivals from the particular market where they keep their shop. The genius of the administration, therefore, so far as concerns the trade of the company, is the same as that of the direc- tion. It tends to make government subservient to the interest of monopoly, and consequently to stunt the natural growth of some parts, at least, of the surplus produce of the country, to what is barely sufficient for answering the demand of the company
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They will employ the whole authority of government, and pervert the administration of Justice, in order to harass and ruin those who interfere with them in any branch of commerce, which by means of agents, either concealed, or at least not pub- licly avowed, they may choose to carry on.
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I also agree with him that landlords are parasites and need to be heavily taxed:
As soon as the land of any country has all become private property, the landlords, like all other men, love to reap where they never sowed and demand a rent even for its natural produce.
A tax upon ground-rents would not raise the rents of houses. It would fall altogether upon the owner of the ground-rent, who acts always as a monopolist, and exacts the greatest rent which can be got for the use of his ground.
If you call yourself a captalist but don't even believe in what Adam Smith said, are you really even a capitalist?
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Nooooo, you're supposed to quote something about "the invisible hand of the market" without context!
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That didn't stop the Christians
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Sure, but people are a lot more fervent in their support of capitalism than christianity.
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If you call yourself a captalist but don’t even believe in what Adam Smith said, are you really even a capitalist?
i'm a capitalist, but only to the extent that capitalism is the most effective mechanism of meeting the needs of a market. I think it's fundamentally impossible to run an economic system in any way that is more optimized to the needs of it's consumers than you can under capitalism, and that's what i like about it.
It's also true that there are some self regulating effects on the market. But that's more complicated.
Though, just because i believe the market handles itself in most cases, doesn't mean i believe it requires no regulation. That would be preposterous. I don't want pure unregulated capitalism, but i don't want socialism/communism either, i want both. Both is good.
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So a mixed economy?
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That's what I'm doing for a long time now, but I just learned about the Overton Window haha.
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Top tier username btw
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As a moderate conservative, I would like to see the end of private land ownership in a stateless, moneyless society.
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As a moderate conservative, I believe in ownership and democracy. Therefore the people who work at a company should own it and have an equal vote in how it is run.
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We may not agree on everything, but I support you. Let us seize the means of production together first. Afterward, we can sort out the details of our views on moderate conservatism.
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As a moderate conservative, I believe in conserving natural, finite resources like oil and gas. I believe in making large investments into clean and renewable energy for all, so we can conserve the natural beauty of our land, just like God intended.
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I'm a far right fringe militia extremist who was there on J6 (but I did not go inside) and I'd do it all again to shift the tax burden to those most able to pay it.
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Lol these are the kinda conservatives we need.
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"I dream of society where I will be guillotined for being a conservative."
~ Pierre-Joseph Proudhon
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As a moderate conservative I believe an economic system that benefits few at the expense of the many is inherently unstable and radical.
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Nice
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As a hard line right winger I believe we should aim for a world where all forms of work can provide a dignified living
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this is basically what everybody believes, and what everybody should unite on, the problem is that the right is currently enraptured by what can only be described as the "most elaborate con in history" as opposed to actual politics. The left is a complete clusterfuck of bullshit and idiots, but that's another story for another day.
This is what would be considered a "traditionally right view of politics" and if that's where your politics align, great for you. Take advantage of that as much as possible, however, avoid the modern american right as much as you physically can. They are a bastardized version of that flavor of right wing politics. They offer nothing, and don't even espouse traditional right wing views.
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That's a great start! I'm curious how you reconcile that with other right wing views like free-market capitalism, smaller government, and deregulation? Also curious about those who either temporarily or permanently can't work.
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Yes exactly right! I love oil and I think we really need to make sure that everyone gets enough food and medicine so that they can learn about why it's so great. If we get more money into schools and research we will be the best drillers on the planet. Right makes right!
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I'm curious how you reconcile that with other right wing views like free-market capitalism, smaller government, and deregulation?
Read the OP again..
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Well obviously smaller government needs to get its ass out of people's private health decisions and bedrooms, and stop helping other countries invade their neighbors or abuse their populace. Big waste of money! Then it should pull back funds from enforcing ridiculous outdated regulations like zoning and trespassing that restrict the American freedom to live where you want. Also, churches should participate in free-market capitalism like every other business, openly showing their books and chipping in exactly the same percentage of taxes, as should businesses of all sizes, with a clear and simple tax code. Loopholes are sneaky communist bullshit! And we need to get the tax brackets back to Reagan levels!
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All those things are important yes of course, but as someone on the far right, I believe we need to focus on making sure the fundamental freedom and dignity of all people is guaranteed, before we fix those other things.
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Under the "free market" a kid can make thousands of dollars unboxing or reviewing toys, sounds like someone slaving away at a minimum wage job should also be able to support themselves
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I'm a centrist. I think we should have a maximum wealth cap set at 1000x the median household income. I am willing to do this via tax policy instead of the guillotine.
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I was curious what the number would be. That's $80,000,000 (fixed) in wealth. Seems pretty reasonable tbh.
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The median household income is about $80k in the US. 1000x is $80 million.
I like this ratio because it both indexes things to inflation but also ties the allowable wealth of the wealthiest to the well being of the average family. Also, it's still a very high amount. $80 million is still a ton of money.
Consider the highest paid salary workers, not CEOs, but actual workers. Think the most well paid doctors, lawyers, and other professional classes. Even if the best paid doctor in the country kept living like a college student their whole career. They make $1 million a year but live like a monk, saving and investing everything they can. And they do this from the time they graduate until they die of old age.
They would still struggle to hit a $80 million net worth by the time they die.
It is impossible to make that level of wealth by your own work alone. The only way you accrue a fortune greater than this is if you're in the business of labor arbitrage - you are hiring people and siphoning off a large portion of the wealth they generate for yourself. A "doctor" who works a practice with 30 doctors underneath them isn't really a doctor, they're a business owner just like any other.
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There really should be a wealth cap. If you have more then 1000x the median income to your personal net worth then you don’t need it. Sorry not sorry.
They would likely find loops holes like they already do though….. le sigh…
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They would likely find loops holes like they already do though…… le sigh…
there's two big problems, either you find loopholes, or you just leave the country.
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None the less, we need to do something about wealth hoarding if we want to have even a semblance of a democracy.
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Gonna build banks and, since corpos are people, they'll have a net worth. When they reach the cap build another.
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2 propositions. 1, making lawmakers job a minimum wage job so they have an incentive to raise it and feel the effect their policies have on the population. 2, capping a
PDGCEO salary to ~20x the lowest salary of his company.-
1 makes lawmakers more susceptible to corruption.
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1 means only the wealthy can become politicians.
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congressional appointment should be handled like jury duty. "Dammit, I pulled congressional duty again." the certainty of having to return to your old life would encourage you to make it better for non-politicians as well.
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How would you go about enforcing it? What happens to the ceo whose wealth ticks about your 1000x threshold due to a good day on the stock market?
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Those are policy details. A common fatal flaw among the left is obsessing over details and trying to pick apart any good idea. The wealth cap is philosophy statement. Obviously any policy needs rules to implement it. But that's for legislators, not people discussing the idea itself. You shouldn't attack a broad policy by getting lost in the minutia.
This happened in the 2020 Democratic Primary. All the candidates had these pointlessly elaborate policy documents and white papers that were immediately forgotten after the election.
Politics is not about obsessing over minutia. It's unproductive to engage in such nit picking of something that is simply a broad policy vision.
I'm sure if you wanted to, you could answer your own question. How would YOU implement this wealth cap while addressing asset swings?
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Sounds reasonable to me.
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"I don't care what everyone else says, there's no need to execute the wealthy en masse. Workers just need to seize the means of production."
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there is no means of production in services based economy, so unless you're willing to go through total economic collapse, and rebuilding through all of that, to some extent globally, that'll be quite the journey. And you'll find it to be the answer to the question of "why hasn't anything happened yet"
It's because people like being able to buy things lmao. Maybe if this admin causes a depression of sorts, but i'm not confident on that being the case, it's certainly a realistic possibility, but it doesn't seem to be imminent right now.
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I'm not into that hippie dippie bullshit, I've heard great arguments from both sides. But I suppose if forced to pick a flavor of Fully Automated Gay Space Communism, I'd probably pick the "Luxury" variety, like anyone.
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Except, the wealthy will likely resist the recovery of what they stole from workers. SO executing at least the very worst of them should stay an option if necessary.
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I've been doing that for years. I've been claiming to be a conservative and supporting things like universal healthcare. I even give it capitalist flair by saying that ensuring everyone has more money means I can then take that money by selling them shit they don't need. How the hell am I supposed to sell my useless crap if everyone's spending their money on rent?!
Ditto with stuff like housing the unhoused. I don't want filthy drug addicts strewn about the streets taking up my park benches and constantly asking me for 'bus money'! Get them houses so I don't have to see them anymore! Also god I hate kids, especially when they're just hanging around on the street being annoying and intimidating. Build some youth centres so they have somewhere to go and get them away from me!
Altruism through selfishness etc etc etc.
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Conservatives should be the biggest supporters of the LGBTQIA+ community due to their record low use of abortion services.
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Universal healthcare is good, naturally, because it would reduce payroll expenses for businesses, letting them create more jobs, and be more competitive in the global market with lower prices. Universal healthcare is how we bring manufacturing back to the United States.
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Yup, some people can only think in selfish terms so making your argument from that perspective will make it more attractive
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All that lowers crime, too. And a better educated population is a more proficient workforce, who can build more impressive stuff, do better science, and better cure and treat the diseases you or your family might eventually suffer from.
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You are on to something there, my friend.
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"There's no place for the state in the bedrooms of the nation"
When Pierre Trudeau said that in the 1960s, it was a thing that many conservatives believed. Who'd think it was possible that in 2025 we'd be wanting the conservatives to be like the conservatives from the 1960s.
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This is literally what I've done my whole life. I have never identified as a leftist, always as a centrist, it's not my fault other people don't understand where the center is.
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A lot of „leftist“ beliefs are really just basic human decency and that’s already too much for some people
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It's less a sneaky trick and more a condition imposed on us by political circumstance. "I can't really tell you my ideological affiliation because I'm afraid you're allergic to it" isn't a good sign for your chances at persuasion.
Even then, words are wind.
I'm much less concerned with the professed views of this or that terminally online trillionaire gooner internet celebrity than I am with what said gooner is currently ordering his gooner gang to do to the US Treasury system. If he was running around in a Che Guevera T-shirt while he ripped the copper wiring out of the federal government, it wouldn't make me feel any different.
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Or abandon the political labeling system entirely and make it socially outdated by learning to confront someone labeling themselves by responding to them with something along the lines of: "Why would you allow someone else to tell you what it is you believe in? You don't get to decide what being a conservative/liberal means. Someone else decides that. You aren't part of it. So why would you let whoever that is tell you what you should think?"
Change the meaning of what it means to even use the labels and the weapon of using the labels to divide us no longer functions.
It has been dismantled, and they will have to come up with something else.
And just because they will eventually invent a new weapon, does not make it pointless. This is just the never ending metaphorical arms race we are all living in, but it gets easier once you see it for what it is.
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Because the labels are used for a shortcut to understanding. I really don’t want to spend ten minutes laying the ground work to have a discussion only to find out i am talking to a neocon.
Seems like a waste of time.
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You are not that person. You are you and this would be a decision you make, not some other person. The question is, do you feel like a simple label, controlled by someone else, able to shift from under your feet without your input, is capable of succinctly summing you up to another person? Is your life, your thoughts, your experiences, so capable of being put into such a box, to your satisfaction?
Or are you more dynamic, storied, multi-faceted, vibrant, and in charge of your own thoughts, than a single word defined by a perfect stranger, could possibly describe? And I don't mean your external self (visual appearance), I mean the person you are inside your own head.
I don't know you, but I'd prefer to think you're probably the latter...
But that's for you to decide.
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Sorry but this is dumb. I am the one who decides if a label applies to me or not. I won't call myself an anarchist because my beliefs are not described by this word. I will call myself a communist because it describes what I think is true, even if I need to specify ("I'm a communist but...").
There's no one telling me what I believe in, and if a label changes meaning over time or my views change and it no longer applies to my thinking I will just stop using it.
It's the same when you use any other word to describe yourself. "I'm a musician" until I stop playing. "I'm not a painter" until I pick up a brush. "I'm long haired" until I cut my hair.
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It is gonna be very hard unbrainwash everyone. I was even taught that shit in school, so one dimensional
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“Why would you allow someone else to tell you what it is you believe in? You don’t get to decide what being a conservative/liberal means. Someone else decides that. You aren’t part of it. So why would you let whoever that is tell you what you should think?”
the short answer is because the agree with it.
The better question is asking them whether they want to agree with something someone else said once, or whether or not they want to have their own belief foundation, their own principle system, and their own way to derive an answer to a problem.
The problem with modern day politics is that nobody, almost nobody is willing to engage critically with the problems at hand, to determine a real, functional solution to the problem, or at least, the best possible solution they can come up with. Everybody is perfectly fine and content with saying whatever the funny man on the screen tells them, and that's the end of the story.
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I've noticed women on bumble do this. Put moderate as their political affiliation, and list black lives matter and LGBTQ+ and such as their causes. Before this post I would think "elected moderates aren't doing anything for your causes at best," but my perspective as I swipe left on them anyway is a little different now
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My friend in her 30s avoids dating apps because on those apps, either the guy calls himself a centralist and then wants a trad wife and a woman to know her place, or he calls himself not politically active and only listens to Joe Rogan for the discussions nobody else talks about.
Where my single male friends who are good dudes are afraid every woman is just a OF influencer.
I feel sorry for the dating scene.
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that's a left leaning moderate position. A far left position would be some shit like straight communism/socialism
The moderate left is more liberal in essence.
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I like the method of pushing the left further left through extreme demands.
Legalize abortions until age 5!
Mandatory puberty suppressors for all teens!
Reparations for anyone except white straight abled males!
Make Israel a world culture site whose government is run by the UN!
Behead all billionaires!
100% inheritance tax!
No religious education for those under 18!
Socialized medicine for all people and their pets!
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the government will finally give me a state mandated fursona (p.s. i am a tea party republican)
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Make Israel a world culture site whose government is run by the UN!
Are you Tom Clancy?
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The last three are just plain sensible, though! Okay, maybe not socialize veterinary medicine, although we could probably afford it if we beheaded the billionaires…
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Arm the homeless
Legalize meth
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I think you're too extreme. We need to be reasonable if we're to be taken seriously. 17 for religious educated is better suited.
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Oh goody. Someone who finally gets it.
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The Window keeps moving for one simple reason.
The GOPs vote in every election. They may hate the candidate but if they've gotten the Party's endorsement they'll vote.
The Left keeps waiting for the perfect candidate to come along...
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"Perfect"
The left is waiting for an actual left candidate and the Democrats keep running moderate right-wingers who wouldn't have been out of place on the Republican ticket 25 years ago.
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“””””moderate right-wingers”””””, only in this shithole could we call a fascist-lite candidate that. Gods I hate this dump
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Yeah, Kamala is the worst. As a Marxist-Leninist, I'm happier with Trump, and that's why I didn't vote.
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That bullshit is why we have Trump.
Abortion? LGBT rights? Legalized Marijuana?
Look at any issue and Harris was farther left than any 1995 Democrat. But she wasn't perfect enough.
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The problem is the Democrats aren't a real leftist party. I'm done waiting for the Democrats to finally disobey their oligarch masters and cater to their voters.
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More than that they're hodgepodge party. They're combination of liberals and leftist. This was okay for the most part when the little liberals, the petite bourgeoisie, was in control of the party. Because their interest usually align mostly with the left, if not totally. But starting in the late seventies and the eighties the neoliberals took over, the big liberals, the the grand bourgeoisie. So now the party is run by people whose economic and social interests are directly and violently opposed to leftists. So the party's inherently self-destructive.
Until we jettison those neoliberals, we have no chance. That's why so many people say it's time for a new party. Leave them to their old decrepit party and move in Mass to something new.
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Sounds like your plan is to sit and wait while Trump runs amok. What am I missing?
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The GOPs vote in every election.
Republican voters (especially the radicals) throw a fit and stay home or vote third party whenever they don't get their way. Because they've done this, the Republican party has learned to fall in line behind what they want, and so they vote for it. Even so, the Libertarian party regularly gets triple the votes of the Greens and the last major third party candidate drew votes primarily from the right. The right is constantly whining about "RINOs," and if you go into most right-wing circles and try the shit liberals do with the left, "Sure you might not agree with their stance on abortion, sure they're going to regulate your guns, but if you don't fall in line, you're not a 'real' right-winger," you would be bullied and laughed at.
Liberals think it's the opposite because they're obsessed with making sure every single person falls in line without a single condition. Absolutely no respect for anyone's moral convictions (in contrast to the right). So anyone who ever tries to hold the democrats to a standard is the most important thing ever, whereas on the right it's just normalized and accepted because it's so common.
There is no data whatsoever that supports your narrative, and it also doesn't make any sense. There are so many more "my way or the highway" types on the right, this is the culture that produces soverign citizens who are the ultimate expression of "refusing to compromise your beliefs even when it's completely unreasonable and out of line with reality," and libertarians and such are just a lighter version of that.
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"the Republicans vote in every election" said the foaming Democrat as the Gestapo took them away to the camps.
your country is literally going through a coup and all you can think about is this fetishistic image of saving your country through electoral reform. I'd be laughing if I wasn't so disturbed.
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I was at a local protest yesterday. There were probably a few thousand of us in total. As we were marched around, led by police officers who monitored and managed our progress the whole time, I just kept thinking "This many people working together could probably actually do something that gets national attention." We have a Trump Tower in my city that the protest went by, and everyone just ineffectually flipped it off or yelled some dumb shit like "Fuck Donald Trump." I bet if we'd all charged the lobby at once, it'd have broken through to national news, but instead we kept an orderly and maintained peace as we shouted "No Justice, No Peace." It won't surprise you to learn corporate news didn't bother to report on it, since nothing really happened.
I'm getting out of this place, Americans have no goddamn chance. They don't know how to protest, they don't know how to scare their oligarchs anymore. It's no wonder the oligarchs are laughing at us, I'm laughing too.
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I'm always open to learning.
Why don't you explain in detail how you personally mustered a large swath of the population to follow you.
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Ratchet theory: the GOP keeps pushing us to the right; the Democrats prevent movement to the left.
The left being so obedient to the Democratic Party is part of the problem. If more of them voted Green, some change could actually happen.
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If more of them voted Green, some change could actually happen.
Jill Stein doesn't think Putin is so bad.
https://www.newsweek.com/jill-stein-vladimir-putin-war-criminal-1954965
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The GOP base knows exactly how to move the Overton window: vote in every election and win.
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more like acting like its not an issue, or someone else will come and fix, checks and balances, basically fall in the same trap as republicans,
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Yeah there's a term for this: liberalism.
Many liberals want the similar things as leftists, they just know waving red flags and repeating the same inane slogans doesn't accomplish anything.
Leftists are so obnoxious that the working class prefers fascism over leftism. Leftists, being obnoxious, just goes on thinking the working class is stupid for not appreciating their greatness. Completely incapable of considering they're abject failures at communicating with the working class they claim to care about.
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So what liberals have given the working class the demands the leftists want?
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TRUE, AND BASED.
Thank you.
Liberalism is literally the solution to the problem, but leftists have so much political brainrot they would only be happy if marx came back from the dead to personally govern the country. And righties would only be happy after the complete dissolution of everything they ever know and love, because they're stupid.
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Ew, there's a bunch of libshit everywhere. God, they got it on the ceiling too! It's like they exploded in a rancid series of projections!
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Yeah who can forget all the liberals who agree with leftists and give their demands like:
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there are enough idiots in this world for this to actually work
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I mean that is literally how it shifted so hard to the right lol
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This is kind of how I try to describe cooperatives to some people. It works if you think of freedom and autonomy as conservative ideas which cooperatives bring without central planning socialism, while still being socialist. Also been pleading my leftist circles for years to try to appeal to a wider audience in a similar way. If only we recognize that we've all been lied to and propagandized to believe in capitalism, speaking in a way the "right" can get on board with would only help them start listening to reasonable solutions.
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I've been taking this angle for years and it works like magic. Same with credit unions - most people hate big banks too and literally just need help getting started. "Vote with your wallet!"
The best part about direct action is that it helps the person employing it. Voting benefits the individual voter so little that they don't think very concretely about what will actually happen, and instead side with whichever tribe gives them more useful local allies.
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I'm a libertarian. Universal basic income would eliminate the need for less efficient welfare programs, cut overhead spending, and feed money back into the economy.
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Cut Federal regulation - repeal the Taft-Hartley Act!
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I was thinking of using a crowbar.
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Good idea
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Why do we need to prove our place on the political spectrum? Ragebait post, everyone above me fell for it. Trash.
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The post is about the fact that a lot of ring wing people claim to be centrist and by doing so, help pushing the Overton window towards social acceptance of far right talking points. To counter that the post suggests that you do the same but as a left wing person.
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I can't understand your comment. Like, I know all those words, but the order they're in makes no sense.
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Come on in. I define myself as a centrist liberal. I think Israel is a criminal apartheid government. I think healthcare is a human right. I also think a market economy is the most efficient way to enrich the proletariat so Marx can stuff it.
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And you can be wrong about that last sentence.
You ignore the unequal exchange and imperialism of developing nations the US dominates. Those people are workers too.
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