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Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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phasmid posted:

I think a good thing would be to make sure that each party didn't represent the same agenda, because that makes voting in national elections utterly meaningless.

Southpark is a dangerous chemical that harms brain growth in children.

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Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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phasmid posted:

The rebuttal of someone who doesn't have many worries. Hope you don't get ever caught in a riot.

There is plenty of hot takes you can still be making if you really must, but it feels hard to believe anyone in 2018 is still trying to beat the "both parties are the same" drum.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Mister Fister posted:

Nothing he said was controversial.

Right now is one of the most politically polarized times in all of US history, The number of votes that go on anything but pure party lines is lower than it's ever been. Of all the lazy opinions possible "both parties are the same" is the dumbest and laziest possible one in 2018.

Like, you can say you don't like the agenda of either, and want something else, but they are demonstrably as polarized and in conflict as has ever been to the point it's tearing the country apart with wild policy swings between administrations.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Instant Sunrise posted:

The problem with voting for the lesser of two evils is that the lesser evil is still evil.

Just declaring both parties "evil" and then smugly feeling above it all seems like the same sort of thing as those guys that just go "I'm not a democrat or a republican, I'm an INDEPENDENT" then basically always have exactly pure conservative beliefs.

I am sure everyone on earth disagrees substantially with every political party that contains any members other than themselves. But one party or the other almost certainly better reflects your policy positions in very major ways.

Like if you are a single issue voter and your single issue is "full communism now" neither party is going to be fully what you want, but it's pretty obvious one is far more what you don't want.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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viral spiral posted:

This. The current Democratic Party is nothing more than a neoliberal technocrat Party. Voting for them is like voting for Jeff Bezos or Mark Zuckerberg for President;

You know the word "technocrat" has nothing to do with web apps or technology people, right?

Grr those democrats! Always hiring climate scientists to make decisions on climate policy and economists to make economic decisions! what scoundrels!

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Instant Sunrise posted:

Exactly. But in something like a general election between a milquetoast center-right candidate and a straight up actual fascist, the battle is already lost and the only thing to do there is to stem the bleeding, but even a lesser evil is still evil

It's stupid to just call everything that doesn't agree with you "evil" then pack up your brain and stop thinking. Some policies are evil, some are wrong. Just declaring it a war of good and evil and that everyone is evil is just a short cut to not thinking.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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General Dog posted:

I'd generally prefer less evil to more evil, though my ideas of what's evil might not square with everyone.

I would prefer Democrats win and Republicans lose elections

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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tsa posted:

Lmao you are so dumb.

I am very smart, I can’t distinguish Democrats and Republicans because I am so woke.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Flowers For Algeria posted:

Basically I think we’ll all agree that a system that forces you to choose between two evils is evil in itself and ought to be entirely destroyed, to be replaced with a system that has safeguards against evil ever being a choice. Fascist, racist and other demonstrably noxious parties should be barred from ever running in elections. They should also be disbanded and their members put in prison.

Once the rivals of our political party are safely in jail, only then will we be free from facism.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Uroboros posted:

Vote for the lesser of two evils...if for nothing else than to buy yourself more time to devote to whatever organization you feel helps spread the ideals you truly agree with.

Excuse me, that would require thinking and work and I would rather just declare everyone evil and myself enlightened and above it all and declare that as long as there is no communist party I'm not voting (but also don't make me work to get a communist party or anything, just let me call hillary shillary and trump dump and let me think I am doing my part)

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Cerebral Bore posted:

Yeah, don't you know that you need to be grown up and realistic and doggedly insist that obvious garbage isn't garbage, then get real mad when people aren't convinced?


Voting against a anti-abortion or gay rights candidate for a pro-choice and pro rights candidate? Heh, no thanks! haven't you heard? They are both sinners in my eyes.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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WampaLord posted:

You really need to get over your 5 year old view of the world. You think because the Republicans are Bad Guys that the Democrats must be Good Guys.

On many issues they are the good guys and you should vote for them with no hesitation until whatever full communism now party you support actually succeeds at being a realistic contender in any race anywhere.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Majorian posted:

You do realize that people who criticize the Democrats from the left still tend to turn out for the Dems, right?:psyduck:

Yeah right, they mostly turn out for smugly telling you they didn't vote and for rushing into every conversation they can find to parrot every republican fox news talking point they can manage to sand down enough to pretend they are saying it because they are actually so woke and leftist

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Flowers For Algeria posted:

I defy you to actually provide any significant example of a leftist parroting a republican fox news talking point

Provide me with any significant proof that people that take up the "leftist" label as an excuse to spam the same few slogans to every thread on every website are actually meaningfully particularly "leftist" or any more actually progressive than people that don't do that.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Cerebral Bore posted:

If the dem fanboys were half as interested in turning the party into something that people actually want to vote for than they are in making excuses for the incompetence and corruption of the dem establishment, we wouldn't be in this mess in the first place.

Hillary clinton got the majority of the votes in the election. By several million people.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Cerebral Bore posted:

Cool that she's president, then.

This is incidentally why your lot is useless at winning anything - you literally end up ignoring objective reality in favour of poo poo that doesn't loving matter but you wish it did.

You literally just said democrats need to turn into something people vote for. People voted for them, more people voted for them than republicans, millions of more people voted hillary clinton than trump. More people have voted for democrats than republicans in all but like one election in the last 25 years. Getting raw numbers of people to vote for them is the exact thing democrats are actually good at.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Neurolimal posted:

More people voted for them because they focused on population centers rather than winning states.

Cool, weird that that wasn't the issue that got brought up and instead the original go to attack was some incorrect lie about them not having a platform people want to vote form even though they have gotten the most votes in nearly every election in decades. Almost like people bringing it up are disingenuous or something!

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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VitalSigns posted:

:):):) Congratulations 08 Dems! We won! Now you can save tens of millions of lives and there's nothing Republicans can do to stop you!
:obama: Nah, we're gonna let a third of you die anyway that'd be rad. Maybe half, but at least a third.
:confused::confused::confused: Buh--wha--but why?
:obama: Uh cuz we like money? And rich people who profit from your deaths will give us lots of it to let them keep killing?
:aaa::aaa::aaa: That's monstrous, what an evil thing to do!
:byodood: How DARE you?! We're saving millions and millions of lives, that's evil now? You should be on your knees thanking us for not being greedy enough to kill you all like Republicans would, don't we deserve to wet our beaks a little
etc etc etc * and on and on forever as Americans keep dying needlessly*

And in the exact same time the candidate that actually aligns with your values better failed to win elections or get votes or maybe even failed to exist on this corporeal plane. And generally put a worse showing on fixing any issue than even the worst democrat.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Majorian posted:

I'd still like to see evidence of them parroting Fox News talking points, besides Jimmy Dore, who is not really left wing - he's just a loving moron.

https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/878946025662296064

https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/782264189574377472

https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/727791165341356032

etc

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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VitalSigns posted:

But now I guess we're getting into "a Republican said the sky is blue so I must believe the opposite" territory.

Nah, as I said "the republicans say a lot of true stuff and I agree with them a lot" is always a huge element of whiney faux leftist internet culture.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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twodot posted:

Huh? Are we supposed to think this is a real argument? The exchange goes:
A: Democrats are bad for reasons
B: You're just parroting Republican talking points
A: I mean maybe, but only because they are correct about these specific reasons
B: See! I knew all along you would argue the things you are saying are, in fact, true. You arguing the things you say are true just proves me more right.

How is that an objection?

It's the way the targets are never different and it's so clear the republican narrative takes the lead. If it was so called "true leftists" that were attacking one group of democrats and then republicans attacking another and the democrats the republicans hated were the ones the "leftists" loved or something that would be one thing, but it's the super obvious way that if a republican hates a democrat that by the end of the week the official newsletter has gone out that they are also target #1 centerist.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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VitalSigns posted:

The fact that Republicans will make bad faith arguments does not magically mean that other people making those arguments must be incorrect just because a Republican agrees.

If you find yourself agreeing with republicans now and then then sure, that is no big deal, if you find yourself agreeing with republicans often enough you might just be a republican as their party best represents your values.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Rigged Death Trap posted:

Because if you seriously believe that leftists cost dems the election then I have no words to help you

I seriously believe that a group of people have declared themselves "leftist" while holding no significantly or particularly leftist ideas and doing nothing but amplifying a bunch of right wing narritives by believing everything they half heard from their conservative dad.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Inescapable Duck posted:

You're so close to busting out Virtue Signalling and fishhook theory can be complete.

The thing is, there is no virtue signalling happening, it seems like people you'd never even guess they had any leftward tendency at all if they didn't inform you that they totally do, somewhere, way in the back, that they will totally advocate for once they finish attacking the true enemy.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Majorian posted:

The people you're talking about make up a fraction of a percentage of Bernie supporters and left-wing critics of the Dems.

Sure, and a huge vocal part of a bunch of internet communities that have nonstop extremely loud temper tantrums to make sure to derail or stop conversations larger groups of people might have had that might have been.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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I am sure that a conversation where the starting point is that everyone in every election is always "evil" was going to be a totally great conversation and not a total circlejerk

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Brony Car posted:

unlike in the Bible, Goliath usually wins.

Well, in the bible goliath won twice a day for 40 days before being beat. So he usually won too.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Ytlaya posted:

Why is it that the left bothers you so much? What are you worried about? And I want specifics - what is the bad scenario you are imagining that will occur due to the radical left? "Letting Republicans win because they don't vote enough" isn't a reasonable answer, because there's zero evidence the left votes less than any other sub-group (like centrists/moderates). Why is it that the left bothers you so much while, say, the center doesn't?

Because I have no actual belief that many of the people actually hold any particularly left wing beliefs and instead just discovered that if they call hillary a "neoliberal" every place their dad said "liberal" they can just regurgitate his worldview without being ostracized by their liberal friends, to the point they might not even realize when they are making legitimate concerns and when they are buying into republican narratives.

The negative effect of that is reading yet another ten page essay on the evils of shillary clinton that largely calls for her to support policies she already supports and denounce things she already denounced mixed all in with real criticism in a way that makes it harder to address real criticism than if they had not helped in the first place.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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Ytlaya posted:

It seems like you genuinely can't comprehend the idea of people disliking the Democratic Party from any perspective other than a right-wing/conservative one.

If you have opinions like "oh you know, hillary's plan for a public option and expanded medicare isn't going as far as I want, and her support of gay rights is mostly correct now but was late coming and felt bare minimum and her views on abortion generally seem correct but she seems to be giving some amount of concessions that I prefer she not" or something then fine, go for it, you are with me.

If you have opinions that get anywhere close to seeing the two parties as the same or trying to pretend that you can't distinguish the two I absolutely think you are either a fake posting concern troll stuff or a dupe that got your brain soaked in conservative narratives until you can't tell whats what.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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VitalSigns posted:

To someone who is going to die or whose family member is going to die because they can't afford medicine under the ACA and/or will still die under Hillary's plan the parties may as well be the same. Either one is going to let them die for money.

So your standard of a politician you'd support is only one where literally no one dies? Because boy, I would really like all those people to have gotten expanded medicare instead of waiting.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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VitalSigns posted:


You can make all the game theory arguments you want, real human beings don't follow game-theory 'rationality' and there's a limit to how much poo poo they will take. You're just the guy playing the Ultimatum Game yelling "arrghh stop rejecting the dollar just because I'm taking the rest of the pot, now we're both broke and it's all your fault!"

I'm sorry that you consider more people getting medicare to be "poo poo".

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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VitalSigns posted:

I don't, obviously.

The democratic candidate was offering that thing you apparently think isn’t poo poo.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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VitalSigns posted:

It's kind of depressing that I can't actually count on liberals understanding that killing people for money is wrong to do, and in order to even have a chance at making them understand that it's bad I have to couch dying people in terms of threatened electoral votes.

It’s depressing that anyone would be fine killing people because they are fussy a candidate that didn’t run that they made up in their head would have been better

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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A Typical Goon posted:

Anything less than universal healthcare regardless of income is poo poo

Actually expanding medicare is good and reducing medicare is bad and you are a bad person if you think otherwise just because other potential things are even more good

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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A Typical Goon posted:

Ok. So why should we support the option that leaves poor people to die when we can support the one that doesn’t kill people and you admit is better?

You know who has presented medicare for all plans universal healthcare? Literally politicians who are democrats.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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VitalSigns posted:

Maybe it would be smart to run one of them for president instead of someone who opposes that next time?

Maybe it would be smart know or care or learn anything about democrats beyond hillary clinton before trying to mouth off on what "democrats" collectively do or think or say.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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VitalSigns posted:

Are you taking "hey Democrats should help more people not less" as some kind of personal insult to a sports team rather than as a recommendation for what Democratic politicians ought to do if they want to win elections?

Universal healthcare is already literally part of the democratic party platform. You can claim that you think it's a trick and they just put that in to fool everyone and your giant brain saw through the ruse or whatever and that any work they do towards it that isn't writing "universal health care exists now" and having a party is just their evil plot to murder. Expanding medicare, public options, that is literally how you get universal healthcare. It's not the actual literal best version, but subsidized public option insurance is literally how a bunch of countries do universal healthcare and it's infinity better than what the US has.

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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VitalSigns posted:

But honestly just the fact that you have to say "OK the Democratic Party doesn't support the literal best health care system for Americans, in defiance of all reason, logic, and human empathy, because they're too beholden to donors to ever do it" should be a clue that as long as they hold sway the donors are not going to let a public option happen because that's almost as deadly to private industry profits as the NHS.

Who told you any of this? They literally have universal healthcare as a central plank of their national political list of positions. Its only your imagination they tells you they have some sneaky second plan they aren’t showing that says “step one: not have universal healthcare”

Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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WampaLord posted:

Sorry, what public option?

The one that she devil, mother of all sins hellery Democrat Clinton ran on providing.

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Owlofcreamcheese
May 22, 2005
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VitalSigns posted:

Uh you told me, when you offhand mentioned that the Democratic Party doesn't support the literal best version of universal health care for Americans, an illogical, evil, and insane position for them to have?

No country that exists has implemented Truely flawless universal healthcare that could not be improved in any way. If we get mandatory insurance with a strong public option like Luxembourg instead of some actually perfect fantasy version I don’t think anyone would be that sad.

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