The Democrats are getting schooled....

[Kshartle]

Conservative:

Social issues; statist
Economic issues; usually statist in the sense that they don't want to abolish gov't, but wanting to move certain things "in the direction of freedom" or something like that.
Foreign policy: Seem to be interventionist when a Repub is in office and isolationist when a Dem is (unless they don't take action, then they're interventionist again .

Ahahah, truth in jest.

I agree except for the term isolationist. Definately agree on the (unless they don't take action). Example - Obama's choices in Crimea were wimp or warmonger.

[moda0306]

Conservative:

Social issues; statist
Economic issues; usually statist in the sense that they don't want to abolish gov't, but wanting to move certain things "in the direction of freedom" or something like that.
Foreign policy: Seem to be interventionist when a Repub is in office and isolationist when a Dem is (unless they don't take action, then they're interventionist again .

Ahahah, truth in jest.

I agree except for the term isolationist. Definately agree on the (unless they don't take action). Example - Obama's choices in Crimea were wimp or warmonger.

Libs are the same way.  Libs wouldn't have been nearly as anti-war towards Iraq (well, eventually they became anti-Iraq) had they not smelled political blood in the water with a Texan Repub running things.

They would have a lot of bad things to say about Obamacare as well, and would be saying "we should do single-payer or public option" in much more vehemence.

But conservatives are just ultra bad this time around, because we haven't had a democrat (read: socialist) that wasn't a sh!t-kicker from the South since 1960 or so.  Now we have this black dude who's academic and has a name that sounds like a terrorist and it just drives a certain portion of the conservative crowd nuts.  Not all of them, mind you, but the "guns & religion" crowd wouldn't be "Tea Partying" nearly as much if Obama was caucasian Gubnor Skeeter Shuckscorn from rural Georgia, who had a said every single word Obama has said, and done everything he has done, but with more of a James Carvill twang to him.

[Benko]

  Now we have this black dude who's academic and has a name that sounds like a terrorist and it just drives a certain portion of the conservative crowd nuts.

I had really thought you the most reasonable of the "leffties" on the board.  But you must be kidding.

The obamacare roll out alone re-inforces the conservative thought i.e. leffties can't even run a 7-11.  Clearly Obama care is a zillion times more complex than a 7-11, but that fact that the roll out was that staggeringly bad reflects on Obama as staggerinly incompetent.  His name on it.  He is president.  Given this (not to mention many other examples) why does one need to invoke racism to disllike someone who bows to foreign leaders, had reduced our standing/power/prestigue in the world, has produced consistently high unemployment (people not working)?

[Kshartle]

  Now we have this black dude who's academic and has a name that sounds like a terrorist and it just drives a certain portion of the conservative crowd nuts.

I had really thought you the most reasonable of the "leffties" on the board.  But you must be kidding.

The obamacare roll out alone re-inforces the conservative thought i.e. leffties can't even run a 7-11.  Clearly Obama care is a zillion times more complex than a 7-11, but that fact that the roll out was that staggeringly bad reflects on Obama as staggerinly incompetent.  His name on it.  He is president.  Given this (not to mention many other examples) why does one need to invoke racism to disllike someone who bows to foreign leaders, had reduced our standing/power/prestigue in the world, has produced consistently high unemployment (people not working)?

I've said the best strategy for the republicans would be to have a half-black half hispanic lesbian run. It would be a complete rout as all the claims of racism and discrimination, sexism etc. would be neutralized.

[moda0306]

Benko,

I'm not even really a lefty... more of a dedicated devil's advocate.

I'm a firm believer that most people don't fully understand their opinions/emotions/motivations.  So you'll never get people to admit this, but a very solid portion of conservatives are obviously hugely affected not by logic (much), but much more by race, culture and religion.  I live in Minnesota, where the conservatives aren't even that conservative, and I see it quite often.

I am not saying there aren't reasons not to dislike Obama, but since when is our "standing/prestige in the world" so important?  When you have a fumbling idiot "Good-ol'-boy" in the office, everything was "with us or against us," and now everything is just a bunch of hyperbole from the right, that you can't even tell when a valid crap on Obama comes through, because you're so busy fact-checking the bullsh*t.

Understanding motivations is huge, Benko... I understand racism is only one ill personality trait, but let's not pretend it doesn't exist... look at every major political battle between "centralized federal government power" and the Southern states or citizens:

(I focus on the South because, as a region, they tend to symbolize the ultimate of lack of self-awareness and honesty about their intentions, now and in the past.)

1828: Election of Andrew Jackson, a democrat, but believed in centralized federal power (shot-down SC secession), but still held solid victory in the South, and 1832 had similar election results.

1860: Upon hearing of Lincoln's victory, and viewing him and the Republican party as essentially a bunch of abolitionists, Southern states start seceding, one by one sending letter-after-letter to the Fed's, laced with account after account for their reasons, 95% of which claim the federal government's hostility to the institution of slavery. 

Postwar: VP of confederacy writes a book trying to rewrite history that the South seceded over tarriff's and "states rights."  This revisionist history (to be fair, along with a lot about the intentions of the Union and Lincoln, by a different group), exists to this day.  "Slavery was dying."  "It wasn't about slavery, but tarriff's and state's rights."  "The Union could have bought the slaves."  It's mostly BS.

1865-1877: Southern Reconstruction controlled by federal troops/employees... two black U.S. Mississippi senators elected (voter fraud!?)

1877: Reconstruction ends, and the Southern white class takes over the political machinery again... no Southern black senator elected again until 2013... tells a story in-and-of-itself. 

1912: Woodrow Wilson elected, with popular support from the South

1913: WW expands federal government perhaps more than any president before him... creating income tax and federal reserve bank.

1916: WW wins reelection w/ popular support from South after said federal government expansions.

1917: WW engages in WWI.

1920: Small-government libertarian Harding runs, and wins, with no support from the South.

1924: Small-government libertarian Calvin Coolidge wins presidency, with no support from the South.

1928: After almost a decade of blistering prosperity under small-government Republicans, Hoover wins the presidency, with little Southern support, against a "Progressive" Al Smith, who took most of the deep South. 

1932: FDR Elected with huge support from the South.

1933/34: FDR Expands federal government in massive new ways.  Taxes high.  Spending high.  New laws/regulations galore.

1936 and 1940 and 1944: FDR Elected with pretty huge support, overall, but especially, crazily, solid support in the deep South.

1948: After winning a world war, Civil Rights legislation proposer Harry Truman runs as a dem, South puts up "Dixiecrat" Strom Thurmond to run against him.... Strom Thurmond remained a U.S. senator until 2002, when he resigned.  He switched from a dem to a repub in 1964 because of Civil Rights legislation.    It appears that "States Rights," and the abuses of the federal government's central power, are once again big issues to Southern voters (the ones that can afford the poll tax, anyway).

1952: General f*cking Eisenhower, after winning us a war, wins an election (duh), but loses in the South to a segregationist democrat from Illionois.

1960: Similar to Truman, the South saw their options as too supportive of Civil Rights legislation.  They run Harry Byrd in opposition.  He wins a couple Southern states.

1964: Texas native Lyndon Johnson (who passed Civil Rights legislation) loses in the South to free-market Republican Barry Goldwater, but wins overall election.

1968: South runs George Wallace in most successful 3rd party bid ever, but loses to Richard Nixon.

1972: Massive support for Nixon against anti-war candidate, McGovern... including the South.  Polarizing the electorate on race was a huge point in this election.

1976: Deep South democrat wins with deep South support... The guy put solar panels on the white house.

1980's: The South actually supports a Repub again... even after raising FICA taxes, granting illegals amnesty, and proposing a ban on military-style assault weapons.

1992: WWII vet, former vice president, and Presidential War victor, Texan George Bush loses to a draft-dodging, debaucherous, slick talker from Arkansas.

1996: A few years after "Hillary Care" fails and Clinton raises taxes, Bill Clinton is reelected, with pretty solid support in the South, against a WWII vet from Kansas.

2008 & 2012: A black guy from Illinois/Hawaii/(Kenya?) gets elected, wants to take taxes back to 1996 rates (far-lower than most of 20th century), expand healthcare like Hillarycare (like in 1993), and is concerned about the distribution of wealth since its spread from what it was at throughout most of the 20th century, and all of a sudden everyone in the South is a wannabe libertarian, secession is in talks again, revolution against gun forfeiture, etc.

More and more the motivations are "states-rights," and "original intent" of our founding fathers.  It's a fraud.  One big fraud.  Only when any type of social equality of "inferior" races have been suggested, has the South given a flying flag about "States Rights."  Not only do they claim it as preferable today (which is ok), but that States Rights, and opposition to centralized power, have been the true motivator for the stars & bars all along.  I realize I'm generalizing by region/culture.  And I realize I'm not speaking about everyone down there... but I'm not trying to make a point about individuals one way or another, but a universal element of human nature that the South just seems to keep proving to us on steroids (I don't blame them... in that heat).

If you, yourself, are not racist... that's great!  But don't blame people for questioning the overall motivations of people.

Sorry for going through all this, but it paints such a ridiculously clear picture to me about how a pretty solid chunk of the U.S. electorate thinks.  I see it a ton in MN as well.  People are just generally a lot more supportive of a robust social safety net if the people getting help look like their Grandma, disabled friend, or themselves. So if we're examining the topic of racism, I think it's clear that it plays a pretty huge role in motivations.  Not just with whites, of course, but whites have the economic/political power, so it's easier to track their racism statistically easier than other races .

Not that there isn't some incompetence... but that's a constant.  Benghazi wasn't anything compared to Iraq.  The IRS scandal wasn't Watergate.

I've said the best strategy for the republicans would be to have a half-black half hispanic lesbian run. It would be a complete rout as all the claims of racism and discrimination, sexism etc. would be neutralized.

Remember, they have to win a primary first. 

The key to U.S. politics isn't how to become the perfect moderate to diffuse the opposing party, it's how to straddle the dual roles of having to rile up the base of party "hard-liners" that vote in primaries without sounding like a raging extremist by the time you have to gain independents in the general election.

[Benko]

I'm not even really a lefty... more of a dedicated devil's advocate."
Why is it that conservatives, anarchists, libertarians never deny their beliefs, but no one is ever a leftist (least on this board?).  If your biases match the DNC/standard liberal talking points, you might be one.

The discussion on racism is what is happening now.  There certainly was rampant racism (and rampant sexism) but they are far far less than they were, and largely irrelevant to discussions of the man in the white house.  He was given the benefit of the doubt for a long long time and it only fell to present low 40s levels after he earned it over and over and over again.

"Sorry for going through all this, but it paints such a ridiculously clear picture to me about how a pretty solid chunk of the U.S. electorate thinks.  "
This is what the left wishes were true i.e. it would be nice for the left if they could blame his unpopularity on racism instead of the results of his being in office 5 years.

"Not that there isn't some incompetence... but that's a constant"
Sorry, I disagree.  No one since Carter has been this incompetent.  And Carter was a farmer.  If you can't manage your farm plants die.  Obama (best I know) never had a real job.  But I don't think you'll ever see things this way.  It is like the Obama and Romney are same crowd on here (anyone still think that?)

No one died in Watergate.  We have no idea what Obama did or not evening of bengazi.  People died but no one was responsible. 

[moda0306]

Benko,

I was just saying how the usual "home team" in foreign policy political support is on steroids now with the addition of the racial element.

That is all I was getting at.  It was a discussion of the definition of the word "conservative"... an aside Kshartle and I had.  You then said I was playing the race card, even though what I was pointing out was pretty obvious if you look at even the very recent past.

I find that the claims of Obama's incompetence ring no more or less true than any hyperbole from partisan bots every cycle, but the fact that you think he's more incompetent than Bush is pretty amazing to me.  Bush's debacle in Iraq cost thousands of American lives, a ton of that international respect you seem to care about, and tens of thousands of Iraqi lives, not to mention all the wounded/disabled for life.



For the record, if the victims in Benghazi had been black Americans, the embassy was in some Eastern European conflict country, and president Obama was president Bush, I am willing to bet there would have been much more of an uproar in the African American community.

Is that fair?  Does that make you see where I'm coming at on this?  I'm not trying to make this a white only thing, but when you've got the majority of the population and VAST majority of the wealth, it's easier to notice your biases over time.  (I mean "your" generically... not "you, Benko")

[Libertarian666]

Regarding clacy's point though....I thought that was a conservative goal... move insurance to the individual market!

As long as we have community ratings, I think that's a great idea.  Get employers out of it.  But, again, conservatives try to play both sides of this so they can trash it no matter the outcome. 

No, conservatives want the government to stay out of it.  The free market had decided that employer sponsored health coverage was something that employees preferred.  For those that didn't like that option, there has always existed an individual market.

So far, there have been roughly 1-2 million people covered that previously didn't have insurance.  You could have easily put in place a government option that was intended for people that had pre-existing conditions and expanded medicade for those that thought the individual market was priced too high for low or middle income people.

Instead, it looks like we're all going to have to go towards a government insurance when this blows up the entire insurance industry.

This is wrong. The reason we have employer provided health care is that the government imposed wage-price controls during WWII, and this was a loophole.

In other words, the pre-existing system was also a result of government action, not the free market.

[donnyg1941]

When you included SS as a wealth distribution scheme, you revealed your underlying Randian mind-set. Wasn't it Alan Greenspan who rigged the SS program back in 1982, at the behest of a president whose initials are RR? The outcome of that effort was to provide Reagan with extra $ to hide his huge military deficits and tax cuts for the very wealth deficits.