US Politics Mega-Blog - Page 151

On January 24 2019 11:50 xDaunt wrote:
Oh, and as a relevant aside, Venezuela is a perfect example of why the Second Amendment matters. An armed populace would be able to more easily get rid of Maduro.

On January 24 2019 14:22 IgnE wrote:


Oh come on. Poor taste and worse logic.

On January 24 2019 17:42 GreenHorizons wrote:
I just hope people notice the US is doing everything that Russia was accused of and worse right now in Venezuela and virtually none of the people who think Russia is a big deal think the US doing worse is a problem let alone worse.

On January 24 2019 17:51 Jockmcplop wrote:


Its the politics of principle - with exceptions.
Interfering in foreign elections is bad, unless the other country is socialist/communist - then you are simply 'saving' the population.

Never look at the principles to determine what someone's politics are, its always the exceptions that tell you what someone really thinks. Freedom is good - unless its Palestinians, or black Americans. Election interference is bad - unless they're commies.

On January 24 2019 11:31 GreenHorizons wrote:


I can't keep straight whether the Venezuelan people elected Maduro like you just said to cushion the inhumanity you're supporting or he's not an elected leader like your presidents administration just said to justify the coup to take back US corporate interests in Venezuela?

Bolsonaro openly said he would imprison and/or banish his political opposition, as well as a whole ton of draconian bullshit. SA is still fucking decapitating people for non-violent crimes as well as plenty of other horrific shit that typically is used to justify fucking up other Muslim countries. That you describe that as not "outright fucking over their people" at least jives with your previously articulated morally bankrupt and deplorable position on foreign policy.

I certainly still see it plainly as such.

On January 24 2019 11:44 xDaunt wrote:


Even if we presume that Venezuela had a fair election (huge presumption) in which they chose Maduro, that is not a good enough reason for the Venezuelan people to continue to suffer under his rule. So yes, they absolutely should overthrow his ass.



Wake me up when Brazil and Saudi Arabia are enduring massive famines and economic collapse. Then we can talk about how horrible they are in relation to Maduro-era Venezuela. The fact that you refuse to admit and accept is that Venezuela is in a completely different league of "horrible" than either Saudi Arabia or Brazil.

On January 24 2019 18:15 iamthedave wrote:


I believe I've done this dance around the pole quite enough but I'll chip in to say Maduro was largely elected because Chavez hand-picked him. He did win the election, but realistically anyone Chavez picked was going to because of his popularity with the public (waning in his dying years, but still overwhelmingly popular).

On January 24 2019 18:33 Jockmcplop wrote:
The simple fact is that Venezuelans elected the guy that was running their country. The entire world has stepped in and said that no, they don't like it, so they've changed it. This is a dictatorship now, run by the EU, the US and Canada against the wishes of the people of Venezuela.

It could well turn out to be better for the people of Venezuela. I doubt it, but it could. It'll certainly be better for any of the people that we are likely to hear from. It ain't democracy though, this is just foreign powers acquiring a vassal state.

On January 24 2019 18:41 Jockmcplop wrote:
Well I agree with that, the problem here isn't the right wingers who never had a problem with Russia interfering in US elections. The problem is the people who were actively against such things on principle, but whose principles seem to have gone missing in the last day or so.
I would suggest that this is mostly a centrist or neolib thing.

On January 24 2019 14:16 IgnE wrote:


The economy wouldn't collapse but capital is more fluid, across a global level, than it was in the postwar decades. I don't oppose a 70% marginal tax rate, but I don't think it will be very effective. It will simply change incentives, change where the money is, how it is, but not whose it is.

On January 24 2019 20:07 iamthedave wrote:
Here's a possibly interesting question for you, GH: Do people's politics need to be consistent?

What I mean by that, do you feel politics needs to be a series of exact, unbendable principles, or is it reasonable that people might have a lot of conditional factors involved?

I have the feeling most people believe their politics to be consistent because they don't examine them deep enough, and in actuality most are built on a series of conditionals.

On January 24 2019 20:07 iamthedave wrote:
Here's a possibly interesting question for you, GH: Do people's politics need to be consistent?

What I mean by that, do you feel politics needs to be a series of exact, unbendable principles, or is it reasonable that people might have a lot of conditional factors involved?

I have the feeling most people believe their politics to be consistent because they don't examine them deep enough, and in actuality most are built on a series of conditionals.

On January 24 2019 20:42 Nebuchad wrote:


I think liberalism is an incoherent political belief, but I'm not exactly bashing liberals for having it. Liberalism is what we have right now, so it's very easy, in the first world, to just assume it works well. I do believe most liberals are just misinformed and don't realize the inconsistency in their beliefs.

In the case of fascists and other theories that are to the right of economic liberalism (but let's face it it's mostly fascism in our case), I think they have a coherent political belief, it's just that it's based on principles that are unpopular in the general population, and they've learned to pretend that they don't hold those principles, which causes them to appear incoherent if you trust everything they say. "I'm not a racist, but [racist idea]", and so on. As long as you ignore the rhetoric, there is a coherency in the world view.

In a sense liberalism is a better enemy than fascism because you can easily show the flaws in the logic of liberals. To fight fascism in the battle of ideas you have to get people to redefine their core world view, often while they pretend that their world view is something else. That's a lot harder.

On January 24 2019 20:42 Nebuchad wrote:


I think liberalism is an incoherent political belief, but I'm not exactly bashing liberals for having it. Liberalism is what we have right now, so it's very easy, in the first world, to just assume it works well. I do believe most liberals are just misinformed and don't realize the inconsistency in their beliefs.

In the case of fascists and other theories that are to the right of economic liberalism (but let's face it it's mostly fascism in our case), I think they have a coherent political belief, it's just that it's based on principles that are unpopular in the general population, and they've learned to pretend that they don't hold those principles, which causes them to appear incoherent if you trust everything they say. "I'm not a racist, but [racist idea]", and so on. As long as you ignore the rhetoric, there is a coherency in the world view.

In a sense liberalism is a better enemy than fascism because you can easily show the flaws in the logic of liberals. To fight fascism in the battle of ideas you have to get people to redefine their core world view, often while they pretend that their world view is something else. That's a lot harder.

On January 24 2019 21:48 iamthedave wrote:


I've not found that. I see very little true coherence of belief in any established viewpoint. The most fundamental issue with fascism is that it isn't actually meant to result in the deaths of thousands of people. The idea behind fascism is to put the best guy in charge, as defined by characteristics that are entirely arbitrary (a fundamental incoherence since it becomes Might Makes Right, which by definition means that any force that defeats Facism is inherently superior to it), and that the best guy will justly rule their nation in the perfect way, leading to the perfect economy, order and strength. It's the idea of benevolent dictatorship.

I can think of very few fascists who frame it in anything but the most ideal of ways (as in 'we'll kill everyone I personally don't like and nobody else' and it'll be fantastic) or engage honestly with the lessons that should logically be learned from failed fascist states of the past (such as how planned, centrally controlled economies tend to fall apart and actually aren't as reactive to shifts in the market as fascists believe, because unless The Leader believes a threat is a threat, the market will be prevented from responding to it).

It's coherent on paper, but not in the mouths and minds of actual fascists. Conservatism and Liberalism are both coherent on paper but less so in practice.