US politics

Why was my post title edited?

A quasi-fascism already revealed itself among most western nations under the guise of public health. Entire populations were stripped of their human rights, subject to state dictate and lost a significant degree of their power, freedoms, and the right to control their own lives during those times. So all this jibber-jabber about “our democracy” and the threat of a future fascism rings hollow in the wake of this period. We’ve already lived it and are still experiencing it.

In contrast to other federal, state, and provincial governments, the US government didn’t quite go down the path of other western nations.

Reply to NOS4A2 Maybe pick up a book and figure out what fascism is. Universal healthcare isn't it.

Reply to Benkei

I said “public health”, not “universal healthcare”. I also never said public health is fascism. Maybe pick up some glasses.

Reply to NOS4A2 Oh, my bad, it's the "lock downs are fascism" bullshit again coming from the guy who will happily roll over to get shafted by oligarchs because he thinks the gubberment is the problem. This should be fun.

Reply to Benkei

Uh oh, those those scary oligarchs. Can you name one and how he’ll hurt me?

Quoting _db

"Vote! Contact your reps! Protest!", yes, we have been doing all this, and it's clearly not enough, otherwise none of this would be happening to begin with. The problem isn't external to the system, the problem is the system itself.

True. But I’d argue it’s happening because the counter forces are stronger and better organized. They have the wealth and resources to create networks of power— mainly through use of propaganda. The Koch network is a prime example — Jane Mayer has done good work here.

But the answer, as always, is organizing. Especially on the local level. We’re often too distracted by the national drama — where we can do little to change — and pay little attention to state and local issues, where we can have a very real effect. That will have to be the way moving forward.

That’s what the right has been doing since Obama was elected— starting with state legislatures and midterm turnout. It worked very well. There’s no reason the left can’t do the same.

True, the Tea Party was largely motivated by the fear of “losing their country” to those very scary immigrants and minorities, but if the left can generate the same level of energy sans the xenophobia and racism, watch out.

The issue is we have the most disorganized Left in the world.

Reply to _db

We live in sad times.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weimar_Republic#Elections_of_July_1932

Fascism wins not just by democracy -- it organizes -- but there's precedent for fascists winning power through some democratic measures: by using the tolerance of republican rule, fascists organize.

Even so -- I still don't believe the answer is be better at hierarchy. That's a compromised position that I'm willing to work with, but for me I still think the answer is to be better at organizing without hierarchy.

But how to do that in our world? well... I already failed a few times at it, so I'm not sure.

Reply to NOS4A2 Koch, Musk, Zuckerberg.

Reply to Benkei

I don’t own a Tesla, use Facebook, and am largely unaware of Koch industries. If they ever strip me or anyone of our human rights I will stand in opposition. Until then, I guess the gubberment is the problem after all.

Reply to NOS4A2 Yes, the world revolves around you. Which is why you are and remain an idiot.

Reply to Benkei

You said these oligarchs will shaft me yet you cannot say how. Odd, that.

Quoting _db

Lots of people are justifiably upset over recent events

I am upset over recent events, BUT, in the context of our history, all this can not be a complete surprise.

We have had several episodes of militant reaction against efforts designed to extend aspects of democracy.

a) Eleven states succeeded from the Union in response to efforts to limit the spread of slaveholding. A civil war followed.

b) Reconstruction (such as it was) resulted in terrorism against blacks via the KKK, Jim Crow laws, and suppression of voting rights (which enabled the 'solid south' to maintain a long-term hold on Congress.

c. Anti-labor violence began in the 1880s--referencing the Hay Market event in Chicago.

d. A 'Red Scare' set off concerted violence against blacks and labor leaders in 1919.

e. Women won suffrage, but only after a long struggle. Suffrage aided the institution of Prohibition, a 13 year disaster.

f. Extreme conservatives have been unhappy about New Deal programs ever since the 1930s.

g. Homosexuals and Communists (odd bedfellows in several respects) were persecuted during WWII and after. Reference Joe McCarthy's (Republican from Wisconsin) drive to dig out communists from government, Hollywood, and the Ladies Aid society.

h. Richard Nixon's subversion of government in the Watergate scandal.

i. Ronald Reagan ignored the AIDS epidemic.

j. The plutocracy kept wages steady during 40 years (some with high inflation) further impoverishing the working class while enriching themselves even more.

And so on.

The arc of the future may bend towards greater justice and greater freedom, but it regularly snaps back to fostering less justice and less freedom.

Reply to NOS4A2 Don't worry about how. Where there is a will, there is a way.

Reply to NOS4A2 That's because you're apparently living under a rock. Zuckerberg - privacy, Koch - environment, Musk - labour rules.

The first two directly affect you, the last one if you'd work at Tesla. I forgot Bezos but I'm sure you never order via Amazon to avoid the continued exploitation of its personnel.

It's not that I can't point it out, it's that I expect someone to be moderately informed about the world to realise all this for yourself which makes any conversation with you tedious, so I'm gonna leave you to it and read the short stories instead. There will be more wisdom in those stories than in your posts.

As a Brit I may show some ignorance here, if so please forgive me!

1) How can the system work when the president cannot get his policies through Congress because his party has no majority? Surely the two arms of govt need to be elected on the same ballots, and so be working together. This partial paralysis seems to me to have worked against presidents of both parties. Who gains from it?

2) How can elected senators be allowed to be paid by the pro-gun lobby to advocate their views? In the UK any financial payment by outside interests to MPs is banned. This too perpetuates a paralysis and reduces politicians' power.

3) And now the Supreme Court seems - without being asked - to be deciding on legally relevant but political issues. How is this fair to voters? Another undermining of democracy?

Quoting Tim3003

1) How can the system work when the president cannot get his policies through Congress because his party has no majority?

Complicated. But the filibuster allows a minority in Senate to prevent discussion. There are ways around it but the Democrats have allowed the GOP to dominate.

Quoting Tim3003

2) How can elected senators be allowed to be paid by the pro-gun lobby to advocate their views?

This type of corruption is decried by US citizens in both parties. Sadly, the US Supreme Court call this kind of bribery, "free speech."

Quoting Tim3003

3) And now the Supreme Court seems - without being asked - to be deciding on legally relevant but political issues.

Biden talked about adding member to Supreme Court (perfectly constitutional) but dropped the issue. It is worth considering if nine people are enough to set legal principles for the entire nation.

Reply to Benkei

You can do no more than to try to belittle me, whether to pad your weak theories or to make yourself feel better, but the fact remains that your oligarchs have not nor cannot shaft me. They do not have the power over me that you claim they do. I respect that you want to advocate for their employees and feel you know better how they should run their businesses, but the power I speak of is real and affects millions residing in particular jurisdictions.

So yes, maybe stick to fiction.

Reply to Jackson

Here we agree.

So far the court's ruling on Citizens United v. FEC has turned what was once hyperbole into fact: we now live in an oligarchy, since propaganda is efficacious and money buys propaganda.

Reply to Moliere

Yes, the US is basically an oligarchy. Biden, sadly, too scared to prosecute Trump.

Reply to Tim3003

The Supreme Court could allow states to re-implement abortion bans because it was a court decision that originally made it illegal to have bans of abortion.

If Congress had ever passed a bill making abortion illegal they couldn't do this. Basically, it was a right ensured by a court decision.

Now the Court could also have said a law ensuring the right to an abortion is unconstitutional, but that would face a much higher bar, and no such law existed.

As to the question of deadlock, its in large part due to two factors:

1. Representation in the Senate isn't based around population but around the arbitrary borders of US states. This means that some citizens have outsized representation relative to others and so widely unpopular actions can still have a majority of legislator's support.

2. In general we do elections as "whoever gets the most voters wins." Some states have runoffs, most don't. Very few states do ranked choice voting or instant run off voting. The way party candidates are selected for races is in party elections called "primaries." These are often closed elections where only party members can vote. They also have low turn out. Generally, older and more radical people are more likely to vote in the primaries.

The result is that third parties are generally not competitive and that the candidates from the two major parties tend to be far more radical than the median voter. So most voters being unhappy is sort of baked into the process as the winner of elections is often going to be the person who has the most support from their party's more radical elements. This isn't always the case, but it often is.


Any attempts to fix these problems is resisted by the people with the power to change how elections are held because they are less likely to stay in power if elections are changed to make the preferences of the median voter more likely to be reflected.

Reply to Benkei

Government has never hurt me.

I guess government isn’t the problem after all.

Top notch logic.

—

What a stupid political ideology.

Reply to Jackson
All your replies seem to echo my observation that the system doesn't quite work...

Reply to NOS4A2

I agree with you that government is worse than the rich. However, don't you accept that there are tens if not hundreds of thousands of people dying from poverty? Don't you think a small increase in taxes for the likes of Zuckerberg, Koch, and Musk, would fix this? Don't you think this is the right thing to do?

Reply to Down The Rabbit Hole

Yes, I accept the former, but not the latter. I don’t think taking people’s money or property is the right thing to do. I don’t think advocating to take other people’s money and property is the right thing to do either. The right thing to do would be to help those in need.

Reply to NOS4A2

I like the idea of no force threatened against peaceful people, but it doesn't feel right in this context.

Tens if not hundreds of thousands of deaths v making the rich pay a little bit more.

Obviously those in poverty aren't being helped by other means. Do you have any suggestions?

Quoting Tim3003

And now the Supreme Court seems - without being asked - to be deciding on legally relevant but political issues. How is this fair to voters?

The Supreme Court was asked. How? In some court room, a few years ago, a judge made a decision and it was appealed to at the next higher court. Either the plaintiffs or the defense asked the court to reconsider. This process was repeated until the Supreme Court was asked to decide. It doesn't have to say yes -- it can say, "No -- there is no reason for us to review the case." Then the last higher court decision stands. It can also decide to settle the issue more broadly -- like it did a few years ago when it announced that gay marriage was a right in all states.

How you feel about the court depends on whose ox was just gored. The court upheld the constitutionality of Obama Care and the conservatives twisted in pain. The court decided that abortion was unconstitutional, and pro-choice people howled (and will for some time).

I'm at least a progressive and I loathe the conservative majority on the court, but I can remember when the progressives held a strong majority (like the Warren Court under CJ Earl Warren) was loathed by the right wing. There were billboards demanding that Earl Warren be impeached.

The Founding Organizers of the US government and political system kept their thumb on the scale in favor of an elite -- even an elected elite. Some of the FOs were frankly suspicious of "the people".

Reply to Jackson The first use of a filibuster (whatever they called it) was observed on September 22, 1789, when Pennsylvania Senator William Maclay wrote in his diary that the “design of the Virginians . . . was to talk away the time, so that we could not get the bill passed.”

Reply to _db
I strongly disagree with making abortion illegal but isn't the US system sending the question of abortion legality to the state level? If a red state with a majority of people who are against abortion, isn't that democratic? The US democracy is garbage and I'd prefer if abortion was legal throughout the US for many reasons but idk if this is the best example of complaining about the US being undemocratic. There is that issue of many people in the US thinking abortion is immoral.

Reply to Banno
What a shame your partner-in-crime is not here, tragic. Perhaps you two could find a new forum to post in and move there together?

Quoting Banno

something is missing. Some form of illumination.

Like, a light unto the gentiles, so to speak?

How we got to where we have been for a long time is available in some (not all) history books. What one needs to do is follow the money, literally and figuratively. Any country's history is a mixed bag of progress and regress--not necessarily in balanced sequence. Look for historical accounts that do not gloss over the grave regressions.

You may well ask, "How will I know whether they are glossing over regressions?"

Look for deviant historical accounts. Some titles (These and similar books may not be your cup of tea at all -- I don't like some of them -- but they do cover American History from an angle quite different than the typical narrative):

White Trash: The 400-Year Untold History of Class in America, Nancy Isenberg youtube talk by the author

A People's History of the United States by Howard Zinn (what Zinn thought about the other side of history from the more traditional "fundamental nationalist glorification of country)

A True History of the United States: Indigenous Genocide, Racialized Slavery, Hyper-Capitalism, Militarist Imperialism and Other Overlooked Aspects of American Exceptionalism by Daniel A. Sjursen

Lies My Teacher Told Me, James W. Loewen

From the Folks Who Brought You the Weekend: An Illustrated History of Labor in the United States, Priscilla Murolo

Noam Chomsky has all sorts of things to say about American history, most of it unflattering,

Reply to Down The Rabbit Hole

I like the idea of no force threatened against peaceful people, but it doesn't feel right in this context.

Tens if not hundreds of thousands of deaths v making the rich pay a little bit more.

Obviously those in poverty aren't being helped by other means. Do you have any suggestions?

Taxes are quite an old concept and they haven’t helped much yet. I’m not sure a little more will do. And they might even have a worse effect, which is indifference. If the state takes a man’s quarter and promises it will help the poor with it, the man no longer has the quarter to give and less responsibility towards the poor. He has already done his part.

It is also an unjust mechanism for helping the poor. It is unable to distinguish between the deserving and undeserving, those who want and do no want help, and it operates through the theft and extortion of other people’s money.

My suggestion is we need more concerned people such as yourself to cooperate and help.

Reply to Bitter Crank The question is, is there sufficient resilience in your democratic institutions, that they might be restored? Given the failure of the supremes, and of the GOP, things are not looking good.

The “checks and balances” are not working. Will time bring a rebound? Perhaps.

The failure of the left in the US is an international tragedy.

Quoting Tim3003

All your replies seem to echo my observation that the system doesn't quite work..

Yes.

Reply to Judaka
Yes, sending the matter to the states permits different laws in different places. But the legality of laws is a big part of what the Supreme Court has to figure out. Now that all of the precedents built from Roe vs Wade have been struck down, we don't know how far the Court will go. Or to be precise, they don't know far they can go.

Quoting Paine

Yes, sending the matter to the states permits different laws in different places. But the legality of laws is a big part of what the Supreme Court has to figure out. Now that all of the precedents built from Roe vs Wade have been struck down, we don't know how far the Court will go. Or to be precise, they don't know far they can go.

Thomas is the Trump of the Supreme Court.

I'm currently reading Rawls' Political Liberalism, which goes to great lengths to describe how the notion of justice as fairness emerges as a result of the healthy pluralism that is the result of a well-functioning society and a reasonable interchange between competing reasonable doctrines. What I see in the US aligns with none of that.

I no longer have any respect for the United States as any kind of reasonable constitutional democracy. It is horrific; I am horrified.

Quoting Banno

Will time bring a rebound? Perhaps.

Probably, rather than perhaps, but it matters how long it takes. A lot of damage can be done while we wait for balance to return.

It has mattered, still does matter, what happens on the state level. Some states have a slovenly political culture than tends toward corruption. Others have a much firmer political culture which avoids corruption to a large degree. Unfortunately what has happened at the federal level can happen at the state level.

I am not altogether sanguine about this country's future--and not just because of some idiot bastard sons and daughter on the Supreme Court. Congress has been a captive of the plutocracy for a long time -- nothing new there. The plutocrats don't seemed to care what happens to the world, above and beyond their immediate self-interest. Time has run out, or will soon, for environmental common sense to take effect (here, there, everywhere).

We could, of course, revolt. "We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish A NEW Constitution for the United States, and hereby consign to the dustbin of history the pre-existent government and its parasitic class of rich people. May it rot in the depths of hell."

A revolution in the US is about as likely as the Second Coming, but it could come like a thief in the night and surprise us all. (Don't hold your breath,)

Quoting Pantagruel

I no longer have any respect for the United States as any kind of reasonable constitutional democracy. It is horrific; I am horrified.

I am confused as to why Biden allows Trump to subvert our democracy.

Quoting _db

The problem isn't external to the system, the problem is the system itself. It's not like some foreign agent invaded the US and bypassed all its laws - most of these developments went through the perfectly legal process so nobly enshrined by the Constitution.

Yes. The pendulum swings back and forth between conservative and liberal. Both outlooks are valuable and they both have dark sides.

Give it time. It will swing back the other way eventually, although the SCOTUS is a long term procession. It will take decades to recover from the present conservative domination of the court.

I’d chime in to say the US isn’t a direct democracy and wasn’t designed to be either. The founding fathers were wary of the common man’s ability to vote and wanted to protect citizens from the “tyranny of the majority.”obviously if people don’t have trust in the voting system then the whole thing falls apart. But I personally don’t see a lot of reason to worry-at the end of the day I think most people will reason their way through and we will see Hagel’s dielectric at work.

Reply to Tate
Yeah, that’s how I see it too

Reply to Jackson
Thomas is an odd factor. To some degree, he is anti-federalist about many of these issues. He wants a constitutional restriction upon what can be granted as rights.by states. He seems to be working on having rights for women to be bracketed the way the Hatch decision for gun rights superseded local control.

Quoting Paulm12

But I personally don’t see a lot of reason to worry

Trump organized a violent coup. AG Garland refuses to indict Trump. Hell yes I am worried.

Quoting Paulm12

I’d chime in to say the US isn’t a direct democracy and wasn’t designed to be either. The founding fathers were wary of the common man’s ability to vote and wanted to protect citizens from the “tyranny of the majority.”obviously if people don’t have trust in the voting system then the whole thing falls apart. But I personally don’t see a lot of reason to worry-at the end of the day I think most people will reason their way through and we will see Hagel’s dielectric at work.

I agree.

Quoting Jackson

I am confused as to why Biden allows Trump to subvert our democracy.

I think the democracy is already subverted. It is a losing battle at this point.

Quoting Pantagruel

I think the democracy is already subverted. It is a losing battle at this point.

So, Biden wants Trump to destroy it? I hope that is not his strategy.

Quoting Jackson

I am confused as to why Biden allows Trump to subvert our democracy.

.

A) Trump was busy subverting democracy before Biden was elected.

B) Trump is not an isolated player; he has a substantial following with considerable political clout.

C) Some countries have traditions of liquidating inconvenient and overly annoying persons. We tend to put up with and ignore such types, unless they break laws that can be conveniently prosecuted.

Quoting Jackson

So, Biden wants Trump to destroy it? I hope that is not his strategy.

The people - the democratic system - have put the institutions in place already. Whatever damage has been done has been done to the fabric of the culture. It is the picture of the corruption of the human spirit. The American Dream has become the American Nightmare.

Quoting Pantagruel

The people - the democratic system - have put the institutions in place already. Whatever damage has been done has been done to the fabric of the culture. It is the picture of the corruption of the human spirit.

Count me in as not going down without a fight.

Quoting Paulm12

we will see Hagel’s dielectric at work.

You mean Chuck Hagel?

Sorry, flippant remark, I'm sure you meant Hegel.

Anyway - my view is that while there is a great deal of systematic rot in the entire American and for that matter Western political system, that the so-called 'right' - in the form of the rabid right, of the Tea Party and Trump Cult type, are the principle villians in the piece. Some of the ideological extremism of the left is also infuriating but overall, if I was American, which I'm not, although with American relatives, I would have to support the Democratic Party.

Let’s all help those in need. Just don’t do anything too big to help those in need.

Leave it all up to individuals, not their government. Because the government is always bad.

So you want to help those millions in need? Give a homeless person a few bucks. That’ll solve the issue.

Taking property away is unacceptable — never mind the fact that it’s precisely the owning of property and resources, especially hoarded by .001% of earthlings, that causes the millions of those in need in the first place.

So goes the tenets of [s]antisocial personality disorder[/s] libertarianism.

Watch the faithful statist reserve a special code of ethics for his government that he refuses to hold to any other group of men and women. Wealth should taken away from those who earn it but we shall let it forever coalesce, without work or effort, in the politician’s coffers. Hundreds of millions of people cannot work together, but the faction we put in power can do it all. The private man should never earn and save too much wealth, god forbid, but our officials should take it and hoard it for their own uses. They, and only they, know how to spend it. This we know because we voted for them.

The paternal politics of the servile.

Quoting Benkei

Which is why you are and remain an idiot.

:ok:

Sociopathic statist libertarians talking to themselves is sometimes fun to watch.

Quoting Paulm12

The founding fathers were wary of the common man’s ability to vote and wanted to protect citizens from the “tyranny of the majority.”

Here in Colorado the citizens voted to give up our individual votes for president (electors) to whomever wins the nation-wide majority. There are conditions, of course. If a number of other states follow suite this will come into play. Hence an effort to revert to this "tyranny". This result surprised me.

Reply to NOS4A2

Eh. This looks like a perspective which thinks these tickets (what else is a dollar?) are worth something.

If you follow back the reality of our world, however, I think you'll see -- tickets are worth things because people work.

We live in a world where that's not acknowledged. So I understand the confusion.

But it's a world only upheld by The State.

Reply to Moliere

Tickets are worth things because people work—I’m not so sure what that means. As far as I know currency is usually valued according to what, if any, commodity backs it, or on the faith in the issuer of it, in many cases governments and their central banks.

What has been created by this half century of massive corporate propaganda is what's called "anti-politics". So that anything that goes wrong, you blame the government. Well okay, there's plenty to blame the government about, but the government is the one institution that people can change... the one institution that you can affect without institutional change. That's exactly why all the anger and fear has been directed at the government. The government has a defect - it's potentially democratic. Corporations have no defect - they're pure tyrannies. So therefore you want to keep corporations invisible, and focus all anger on the government. So if you don't like something — you know, your wages are going down, etc. — you blame the government. Not blame the guys in the Fortune 500, because you don't read the Fortune 500. You just read what they tell you in the newspapers... so you don't read about the dazzling profits and the stupendous glitz, and the wages going down and so on, all you know is that the bad government is doing something, so let's get mad at the government.

(Chomsky)

—

Always worth repeating. In case anyone is taken in by the complete bullshit spouted by statist libertarians.

One wonders why, since corporations control the United States, one doesn’t just start one. It’s relatively easy and inexpensive to do. Once done he could let it loose on the battlefield and immediately possess the power and influence he claims they have.

But all that would involve effort. Much better to fall back on the hope that he may one day control social activity, capital, and most importantly the lives of other people with the monopoly on violence, so long as he can elect a body of benevolent angles with the swing of his vote.

Speaking of bullshit.

Don’t like oligarchy? Just become an oligarch. Bam.

Impressive logic as always. Just get in the fortune 500.

I guess the same applies for those who pretend to be anti-statist: just become the state. Run for something, get elected. Easy as that.

:yawn: Simplistic Nickelodeon political dogma. Always funny, always boring.

As usual, misrepresentations, made up logic, and other absurdities. The statist knows he can start a corporation and compete with the very corporations he despises, but won’t, because risk is best left to other people and other people’s money.

Fantastic, now we're also pretending capitalism would reward virtue. :rofl:

Is the method of pretending others say things they didn’t say a bad habit or a tried and true method of deceiving fellow travellers?

The statist-pretending-to-be-anti-statist can start a campaign for office, but he’d rather blame his ills on big government like the snowflake he is. Ignoring, as always, plutocracy. So be it.

—

Don’t like plutocracy? Become a plutocrat.

Don’t like the Fortune 500? Get into the Fortune 500.

Don’t like the government? … Well, that’s always the problem, because daddy Reagan said so. Just try to eliminate it as much as possible.

In other words: Leave the [s]gun[/s] democracy, take the [s]cannoli[/s] plutocracy. Like a good corporate slave.

Quoting Benkei

Fantastic, now we're also pretending capitalism would reward virtue.

No no no, it’s about freedom. You know, the freedom to work for the plutocrats who run the corporations and the government. Because you’ll definitely be one of them one day — if only you try hard enough you lazy bastard.

Here's my theory.

What is happening to the Republican party is what happened to the NRA.

Now the NRA was formed by Civil War veterans in 1971 and for a long time, for a hundred years, it seemed as an ordinary gun association, that for example favored limitations like a machine gun ban in 1934 etc. What then happened? Robert Spitzer explains in on article:

By the mid-1970s, a dissident group within the NRA believed that the organization was losing the national debate over guns by being too defensive and not political enough. The dispute erupted at the NRA’s 1977 annual convention, where the dissidents deposed the old guard.

From this point forward, the NRA became ever more political and strident in its defense of so-called “gun rights,” which it increasingly defined as nearly absolute under the Second Amendment.

One sign of how much the NRA had changed: The Second Amendment right to bear arms never came up in the 166 pages of congressional testimony regarding the 1934 gun law. Today, the organization treats those words as its mantra, constantly citing them.

And until the mid-1970s, the NRA supported waiting periods for handgun purchases. Since then, however, it has opposed them. It fought vehemently against the ultimately successful enactment of a five-business-day waiting period and background checks for handgun purchases in 1993.

What Spitzer doesn't go further into and what's crucial to understand is just why a dissident group did take the NRA over and why they thought the NRA was a losing battle, why the "old" NRA wasn't political enough.

I believe idea is simple: one doesn't believe that both sides can reach a consensus on gun rights / gun safety. From the NRA's viewpoint, the other side will go for total ban on all firearms, never will stop their salami tactic and will constantly continue this when there is a shooting incident. Hence it's logical, the new NRA presumed, to fight all the way, any concessions however sound these might seem, will be a defeat because the other side will never stop until all firearms are banned from the people. If you tell yourself this over and over, you'll start to believe it, and it will justify even the most outrageous things.

And this tactic from the NRA has been successful. Yet it has come with the cost of polarization of the gun debate. Or basically has meant the death of the debate. This view holds on to the idea that no consensus can be reached. It fails to realize that in a country where guns have such a prominent place historically and prominence that ownership is mentioned in the Constitution, banning all firearms simply will not happen. And if that doesn't happen, then there obviously would be a consensus to be found. But naturally there is absolutely no desire to look for this, once you have the model of "fight after every inch". Hence there simply cannot be a real consensus seeking gun debate.

This is now happening in politics too, which has been long in the making, but by the Trump win in 2016 and his loss in 2020 it came all very clear. You see, Trump never thought that he could get votes from the other side (clearly shown with his comment about shooting people in New York). Trump never did change and tone down his rhetoric when he got to be the Republican nominee in order to seek votes from democrat leaning voters. Likely this wasn't a shrewd thought, because Trump just cannot be anything else but Trump. If his supporters think that torture works, then he is for torture. It's just a sales pitch. He just doubles down as populists do and wants the outrage from his opponents. This causes that there is a racist undertone in Trump's thinking: that Republicans are basically white and blacks and minorities basically vote democrats and when "white America" loses it's majority position, it's all over. What happened to the NRA has now happened to the GOP.

And hence you don't seek those possible votes from the disappointed and frustrated Democrats, but you double down on your base. You remain as extreme as you can be and portray everything Democrats push as socialism, even if the party is only partially leftist and basically centrist. And when you do this, you can accuse of every older Republican of being a RINOs, Republicans in name only. And it works!

But this puts you on the road where democracy is really in peril. If a consensus cannot be found in a democracy, then that democracy doesn't work. And if you think that your destined to lose in democratic elections, then hell with the democratic part!

Quoting NOS4A2

Tickets are worth things because people work—I’m not so sure what that means. As far as I know currency is usually valued according to what, if any, commodity backs it, or on the faith in the issuer of it, in many cases governments and their central banks.

I agree with this. Currency has worth because governments establish social worlds where said currency counts -- you either pay the man for the bread, or it's theft, and the state has a thing to say about theft.

So we are at least operating at the same scope, here -- which is important, because I think that's frequently missed. Normally people begin to talk about supply/demand and firms and such -- things that happen within a market established by states.

Now, why do states back such things? What's going on between states? Which state is richer? And how did it become richer?

Things worth explaining.

And one such explanation puts the genesis of the wealth of nations with an organized work force which exchanges its labor for tickets to exchange for goods or services.

Quoting Moliere

And one such explanation puts the genesis of the wealth of nations with an organized work force which exchanges its labor for tickets to exchange for goods or services.

And on the backs of slaves, genocide, exploitation, colonialism. You know — the free market.

Reply to Xtrix Yeah, I agree -- especially in our world, with our particular history, primitive accumulation explains why capital rose where it did first: capital requires a seed, and feudal/mercantile/colonial organizations provided that seed in our world.

Reply to Moliere

Now, why do states back such things? What's going on between states? Which state is richer? And how did it become richer?

In short, it accrues to its power and benefit. The state has no real mechanism to earn wealth of its own so it must take it from those who are productive.

Reply to NOS4A2 Well...

I mean.

That's the labor theory of value. Badda-bing.

Reply to Moliere

It’s theft on a grand scale.

Reply to NOS4A2 Yup. That's exactly what Marx says -- people aren't given the number of tickets that are actually equal to the amount of value they produced. So the nation -- through capital -- benefits.

Reply to Moliere

The labor theory of value has largely been abandoned and widely criticized. I’m not sure it applies.

Reply to NOS4A2 In that case, you're contradicting your point here:

Quoting NOS4A2

The state has no real mechanism to earn wealth of its own so it must take it from those who are productive.

And you're left with the question -- why is this or that state more wealthy than another?

In spite of the opinions of economists, I don't think it's an accident that the United States inherited the earth and squandered it, and then China has come on the rise because it has an industrial base.

Reply to Moliere

I haven’t contradicted anything. A state might be more or less wealthy for a variety of reasons, like the nationalization of industry, higher taxes, less wasteful spending, debt, and so on.

Reply to NOS4A2 Heh. Well, OK. But now you have many reasons -- not a reason. You're moving from science to history -- a move I'm fully in favor of. But it's not usually what economists like because their assertions no longer apply, given that they mostly only apply ceteris paribus

Reply to Moliere

I’m not an economist, so perhaps it’s for the best.

Reply to NOS4A2 Eh, I'm not either. If I opposed non-expert thinking then I'd always have to remain silent.

In general I think historical thinking is better for-us, insofar that we understand it to be something a little less potent than scientific thinking in terms of its rigor, but it cares very much about truth. Even moreso than scientific thinking, in my opinion -- it cares about the specific truth of the situation more than even the logical rules. Contradiction? Bring it on! We saw what we saw.

But it's also a sort of more humble knowledge that can't be proclaimed.

And there: it seems you and I agree that the state doesn't really do anything. We do. And that's where value comes from.

Quoting Judaka

If a red state with a majority of people who are against abortion, isn't that democratic?

Fundamental human rights should not be up for debate, full stop.

Reply to ssu :100:

It doesn't take a grand conspiracy. It takes narrow interests pursued relentlessly. The "right to life" anti-abortion drive is another good example: They have been consistent and persistent for 50 years. (Longer, really.). Conservatives are better at monomania than progressives. Reactionaries are not fastidious when it comes to respecting their political opposites.

Wealthy elites are also consistent and persistent, which is how the rich stay rich and the poor stay poor.

Reply to _db

If a red state with a majority of people who are against abortion, isn't that democratic?
— Judaka
Fundamental human rights should not be up for debate, full stop

Both sides think they have the moral high ground in this debate, and are protecting human rights. Unfortunately, I don’t think either side will be happy with a statewide vote, which despite maybe being a better compromise of democracy is desired.

Of course, if democracy was desired, I don’t think most people would have wanted Roe v Wade to pass in the first place, as it protected 2nd trimester abortions which less than 40% of the population thought should be legal.