Three things are certain: death, taxes and the rehabilitation of Republican presidents by liberals who used to hate them. Bear that in mind while you consider current attitudes toward Donald Trump.
Just You Wait, History Proves That Someday Liberals Will Love Donald Trump
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The liberals of today would be known as the conservatives of past decades.
The Democrats have repeatedly run to the right in election after election, while representing themselves as the only viable party of the “left”, all in order to force Republicans toward the extreme right, which Democrats expected would make Republicans unelectable, so that the Democrats could eat the Republican’s lunch.
Hillary wanted Trump to be selected as the Republican “pied piper candidate”, one who could win the Republican primaries, but not the general election.
Who could have guessed that the extreme right would come out and vote in sufficient numbers to win in the Electoral College if only they had an extreme right candidate to vote for?
Certainly not the Democrats.
Academic Jason Stanley did an experiment before different audiences composed of self-declared left and right persons.
He quoted Noam Chomsky before these audiences.
When Chomsky was named as the source of the quote, the “leftists” cheered and the “rightists” booed and hissed.
When he quoted Chomsky without identifying him as the person being quoted, the “rightist” audience members cheered and the “leftist” members booed and hissed.
Americans are a confused people suffering from a chronic identity crisis.
Thanks at least in part to the bait and switch campaigns of the Democratic Party, who makes scrambled eggs of the brains of those who try to convince themselves that there is a meaningful consistency among the party’s stated and practiced positions.
[true] liberals have the ability to see all sides, and shades of grey where conservatives see only black and white. Having lived through all these presidencies, I can see them for what they were.
Nixon did give us the EPA and helped relations with China, them’s the facts. He used Vietnam as a political football, announcing the withdrawal – what? A couple days before the election? How many of our troops died between the day he decided to pull out, and the day he felt was most politically expedient? He wanted to nuke NVN, and of course there’s Watergate & the drug war. Overall “asshole” even though he did accomplish some good things.
Reagan looked and sounded presidential, sure. He talked nice, too – so much so I stopped listening lest I be pulled in. He started the ‘fake news’ trend with his “liberal media” nonsense, which has resulted in today’s right-wing refusal to accept reality. He fanned racism, and cut deals with terrorists to help him win the presidency. He gave us Reaganomics, and trickle-down which never happened instead making the rich richer. He was a complete and total hypocrite on unions, being president of the Screen Actors’ Guild then busting the balls of the air traffic controllers. While he’s credited with ending the cold war (hardly) he actually engaged in a game of Russian Roulette with the Russians. “I bet I can bankrupt my country before you bankrupt yours” Perhaps he did have some poisitive accomplishments, but I sure can’t think of any. Asshole, and even worse, an in competent asshole who was merely a figurehead for those who wielded the true power.
Bush? Seriously? Although he looks sane, competent, and worldly wise in comparison to our current one, most liberals still see him as insane, incompetent, and just plain stupid on an absolute scale. I’m not even going to bother listing all his transgressions as they should still be fresh in most people’s memories.
“[true] liberals have the ability to see all sides, and shades of grey”
Then how do you explain the love fest of liberals with Hillary, given Kissinger, who is one of Hillary Clinton’s “besties”?
Maybe all those millions of Hillary voters are not “true” liberals.
I guess the fact that liberals happily vote for conservatives just points out the paucity of true liberals in play in the USA.
> Maybe all those millions of Hillary voters are not “true” liberals.
yeppers. datz why I added the [true] qualifier. 😉
There is a creeping and ever strengthening conservative tendency running through the liberal orientation, as demonstrated in Ted’s cartoon.
Conservatives are those who celebrate the capitalist system as the best of all possible systems in the world, and liberals are those who complain about how the best system in the world is being ruined by conservatives.
“[true] liberals have the ability to see all sides, and shades of grey where conservatives see only black and white.” *
No, Liberals are not able to “see all sides” because of their biased (and shared with conservatives) judgment of the capitalist system as the best of all possible systems in the world.
And those who analyze systemic flaws in the system are excluded from public discourse in the (fake) news as radicals beyond the pale, being radical in the sense of those who sees problems stemming from, and rooted in a seriously flawed system.
*The quoted above Liberal versus Conservative contrast of character statement is a black-and-white statement in itself, and is also a self-referential black-and-white statement.
That was the exact point I was making in reply to your earlier post (on the other thread today.) We tend to confuse party politics with what the words actually mean:
liberal
/ˈlib(ə)rəl/
adjective
1. open to new behavior or opinions and willing to discard traditional values.
conservative
/kənˈsərvədiv/
adjective
1. holding to traditional attitudes and values and cautious about change or innovation, typically in relation to politics or religion.
That, Ted, is on the alas unwarranted assumption that there will be any «liberals» – or anybody else – around to do the loving….
Henri
Tardigrade 2020
Let’s elect our successor species.
Reagan was an actor playing at being president who started covert wars.
Proper president Clinton actually implemented the neoliberal policies with Republican votes and continued militarism.
Bush 2 really played a stupid president saved by Jesus who you could have a beer with and started overt wars and torture.
Proper president Obama legitimized and continued the wars and switched to kill by drone.
Trump really plays a fake reality TV star who does not even pretend to look presidential. Has not yet started actual wars though, just trade wars.
Not raving socialist* proper president Shilly McShill will move any remaining resources to the military and will legitimize and intensify trade wars but with the right amount of gravitas while playing lip service to protecting the contracting biosphere.
Also there is a slight chance that he will be a woman, person of color, LGBTQIA, neurodiverse, or differentially abled (without actually helping any of these groups).
*a raving socialist president in contrast will accomplish almost nothing making him/her the most successful president in recent history.
Parties and people continuously evolve.
Giving a social entity a name does not bring its evolution to an end.
Those who appropriate a name will change the meaning of the name (to some extent by the named factions themselves and others) as the name’s appropriators and those ideologically appropriated under the name, evolve.
Given that things done in the name of (and under) an appropriated name remain largely unknown due to the privacy afforded the state, in the name of state security (with prosecutions of whistle blowers and such), the question might be asked (as in the case of an android in “Blade Runner”), “How can it (they) not know what it is (they are)?” when speaking of liberal and conservative identities.
To paraphrase Heraclitus: You can’t step into the same party twice.
I am a republican, but not a Republican; a libertarian, but not a Libertarian; and a democrat, but not a Democrat.
I hope that clears things up. 🙂 😀 🙂
“I am a republican, but not a Republican; a libertarian, but not a Libertarian; and a democrat, but not a Democrat.
“I hope that clears things up.”
It does.
There is a creeping and ever strengthening conservative tendency running through the liberal orientation, as demonstrated in Ted’s cartoon.
Conservatives are those who celebrate the capitalist system as the best of all possible systems in the world, and liberals are those who complain about how the best system in the world is being ruined by conservatives.
“[true] liberals have the ability to see all sides, and shades of grey where conservatives see only black and white.” *
No, Liberals are not able to “see all sides” because of their biased (and shared with conservatives) judgment of the capitalist system as the best of all possible systems in the world.
And those who analyze systemic flaws in the system are excluded from public discourse in the (fake) news as radicals beyond the pale, being radical in the sense of those who sees problems stemming from, and rooted in a seriously flawed system.
*The quoted above Liberal versus Conservative contrast of character statement is a black-and-white statement in itself, and is also a self-referential black-and-white statement.
Again, a minor quibble with Ted’s observations. I don’t think that one day Trump will be loved by “liberals.” I think they already love him. The much-missed Phil Ochs wrote (and sang) a song called “Love Me, I’m a Liberal.” I’m not going to quote all the lyrics. But here’s a few lines:
“I love Puerto Ricans and Negros/As long as they don’t move next door […]
But if you ask me to bus my children/I hope the cops take down your name […]
Ah, but I’ve grown older and wiser/And that’s why I’m turning you in/So love me, love me/Love me, I’m a liberal.”
What do Trump’s supporters want? They want their preferred scapegoats to stay out of the country. So no dirty Mexicans, no rapist Hondurans, no “bad people” Guatemalans, no drug dealing — you get the idea.
But deep down — as deep down as you can get with the shallow “liberal” variety I’m talking about — the “liberals” want the same basic thing: they don’t want low-income foreigners who either speak no English or who speak English AND their native language (read Gloria Anzaldua for an explanation; I’ve expanded on her premises, but the conclusions I make are easily reached by extrapolation from her model) in this country.
These “liberals”don’t say such hurtful things as beaner or wetback, they just prefer that the diverse populations of those marvelous countries to the South not come here and interact with precious Kayden or dear Molly. It isn’t economic or racial, it’s just that Schyler or Starwind or whatever the hell the kids were named are special and wonderful and deserve the very best of everything. So no “urban” children either, thank you very much.
And what did Trump do? (Or Trump’s underlings. Or his bosses. It’s all the same.) He pleased both sides. The “asylum seekers” (all of whom are lying murdering rapist drug dealers according to a segment of Trump’s base) will be, uh, humanely processed (you know, like cows going into a Temple Grandin-designed slaughterhouse). Sure, the paperwork will take YEARS, but, as the logic will go, the “true” asylum seekers will patiently wait (in Mexico). Only “bad people” will cross the border illegally (and thus can be dealt with by any draconian manner available because, hey, rules is rules). Those asylum seekers who can’t last until the paperwork comes through? Have you ever not show up in court? You lose, automatically. Trump will wave the unfinished paperwork and argue that all those people who didn’t show up were LIARS, like Jim Acosta, who works for lying CNN, which is failing bigly. They went home because Trump made the border secure and they couldn’t sneak in.
His supporters got something better than a physical wall. The system itself has been altered. The “liberals” will love it, love it, love it because they will be able to go back to ignoring the problem and not actually inconvenience themselves in any way whatsoever. (I suspect HRC, who is besties with Henry Kissinger, the war criminal, will announce any day now that she was for a wall before she was against the wall.)
For those unfamiliar with Phil Ochs’ great song….
Henri
arrrgh!
National Lampoon did a great Joan Baez parody on “Radio Dinner” Can’t find in on youtube & I know it used to be there.
:: My best Joan Baez voice :;
Pull the triggers, NIggers,
We’re with you all the way
Just across the bay …