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clutz -> have you read the court findings in the colorado baker case thoroughly? I'm just checking because some people complain about it without having actually looked closely at it.
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On April 12 2016 13:46 cLutZ wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2016 07:59 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 06:10 Plansix wrote:On April 12 2016 06:01 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 05:58 Plansix wrote:On April 12 2016 05:53 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 05:03 Plansix wrote:On April 12 2016 04:57 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 04:54 Acrofales wrote:On April 12 2016 04:47 Naracs_Duc wrote:
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And you're saying there isn't a large population block in america with xenophobic tendencies paired with a strong interest in removing limits to gun control while limiting the size of government in all things except for police and military spending who are interested in creating a uniform state where their values are more important than the values of others.
Are you saying there isn't a group like that in the US? Are you actually trying to argue that if the US tendency were to adopt more socialist patterns they are more likely to be like Venezuela than like Sweden? I'm saying that we shouldn't automatically assume things will be fine just because an idea sounds good. I'm saying being vigilant, questioning, and cautious is safer than assuming things will automatically end one way and not another. The US is not Venezuela--but the US is not Sweden either. And we shouldn't assume we will end up as one or the other--since we will most likely end up with something different altogether. I don’t think anyone in the thread is going to disagree with on that subject. But constantly dwelling on the slippery slope fallacy is not a productive way to talk about the subject of socialism. All systems can be abused and lead to repression. Not trying to dwell, I just don't like it when experiences are considered invalid just because they go against what the preconceived conclusions are supposed to be. No one is declaring your experience invalid, but simply pointing out that their experience provides with a different perspective on the subject. For reference, you are claiming that our experience with the US and its culture are invalid due to your own preconceived conclusions. What example would you have to use for the US testing a socialist system on the greater economy because I don't see it--for the most part a US experience would be exploration of increased and decreased governmental control on various aspects of finance and banking practices in combination with variations in specialized tax reforms. But please, talk about the time the US attempted a whole scale socialist system. The great depression and the creation of social security? The creation of HUD and section 8 housing? The creation of the ACA? All of the socialist countries you know in the EU did not become that way in one massive, socialist movement. It was a slow process of creating and refining systems. None of those are economic reforms. Unless of course you believe in simply the act of creating a welfare state to be the core of socialism. Even the ACA is merely the formalization and regulation of a still very privatized industry. Its a first step, sure, but not something you would call a move towards socialism as much as it is a move towards a more strictly regulated capitalist system. And yes, I do recall the great depression's effects on america. Mass migration and an increased emphasis on corporate power over worker's rights as we became very protective of the factories and businesses that were available. For the most part, a lot of recent american history is a good argument against the socialist system if we were to look at it purely from a national output metric as opposed to to personal feelings metric. But no, when land reforms were made in my country, when my father's lands were seized in the name of the people, when you were as likely to be blackmailed by police as you would be by rebels. We found out really quickly what equality means. And when time passed and the people who were simply given resources by our government turned out to not have the training, experience, or knowledge of how to actually use the lands and the earth turned fallow and production dropped--things only got worse from there such that marshal had to be put in place just to keep the peace. Much like all countries that aspired to the socialist idea, we too thought it was a good plan. The people were excited, the lower class were excited--and people thought it would mean equality at last. It turned out to not be the case, it turned out were more excited about the idea than we were about wanting to hash out the details and consequences of those ideas. When my family moved here, it was with the idea in mind that we will not be taking those claims lightly ever again. The act of creating a welfare state IS the core of socialism, particularly as modernly practiced. If it had a second main objective it would be heavy regulation of industries where the government can easily restrict competition (such as healthcare). This is a political calculation by socialists who understand its better to take over a sector slowly by regulation and taxation (like the proverbial boiled frog). P.S. If you think US healthcare is "very privatized" I wonder what sectors you think are regulated...? Show nested quote +On April 12 2016 13:28 iPlaY.NettleS wrote:On April 12 2016 09:36 oneofthem wrote:there's actually a lot of substance to that daily news interview with hillary. she's talking about some pretty important things with the lack of long term investment with our big public companies, and the dividend hunger that drives part of this dynamic. it's pretty important to look at these inside baseball issues to figure out a way forward. Daily News: That I think is the fundamental theory of your economic plan.
Clinton: Right, but I also want to change...I didn't get to the long-term part, but let me just finish on fairness quickly. I support the increase in minimum wage. I supported the Fight for 15. I think the way New York has done it makes a lot of sense, because, you know, applying it more quickly in New York City, having a more phased-in application upstate, keeping an eye out for unintended consequences. California's doing something similar.
So I think raising the bottom historically has meant you also bump up those above the bottom. We also have to guarantee equal pay for women. And you know, people look at me when I say this like, "Well, that's a luxury." It's a necessity. It goes into the wage base. It goes into the pocket book, and we have a continuing big problem about unequal pay for women. And the women's soccer team is just the latest example. There's a lot of issues around this because we have a lack of transparency.
So this is a big deal to me. I point out all the time, because when I'm speaking to big crowds, I say we have to guarantee equal pay for women. The women all applaud wildly, and a lot of the men are just sort of looking at me. And then I quickly say this is not just a women's issue. It's a family issue. If you have a mother, a wife, a sister, a daughter who is not being paid fairly, she does not get a gender discount when she's checking out at the supermarket. You're a white woman, therefore you only have to pay 78 cents on the dollar, or you're an African-American woman, you only have to pay 68 cents, or you're a Latino, you only have to pay 58 cents. That doesn't happen, so it is a family issue and it's a broader issue of economic fairness and I would argue growth.
And then long-term, we've got to look at capital gains as well as corporate tax. I want to reward patient capital. I think the more we can try to nudge our business leadership into looking at what will grow their companies and grow their employment base.
And the final thing I'll say about this, because I could talk on for a long time. When I was giving one of my economic speeches and I was looking through a lot of the reporting, there was a survey that had been done with leaders of major American corporations, people in the top 100, right? And they were asked a question, to paraphrase, that went like this, "If you could make an investment today in plant and equipment, in research, in training and education for your workforce and you could be guaranteed it would pay off in five to 10 years in your bottom line, but it would knock a penny off your share price, would you do it?" To a person, they said no. And I guessed that one of the people saying no is somebody I know who heads one of these big corporations. So I called that person up. I said, "Were you part of this?" "Yes," the answer was. I said, "You really said no?" and the response was, "You have no idea. The activist shareholders, the market would destroy me. I can't make those kinds of long-term investments."
So we're looking at the incredible cost that quarterly capitalism is imposing on our economy. And if we aren't smart enough to figure out how to look at that and deal with it, shame on us. Because I remember when I went to law school, shareholders were not the only constituency of a corporation that had to be given priority, and we have slowly moved away from that for all kinds of legal and economic reasons and pressures. So we've got to take a look at how we are funding ourselves and the kind of pressures we are putting on corporations, which are driving American growth but not feeling like they can make the investments that will actually pay off.
the takeaway is that hillary spends a lot of time thinking about policy issues, because she cares. Whats she suggesting, that female soccer players should be paid the same as the men despite the fact far fewer people watch womens sport? Who pays the difference? Pretty scary to think that she is the frontrunner in this race, she is all over the place. The women are paid less for 2 reasons, and 2 alone: 1) They signed their deal several years ago as opposed to more recently for the men. Live rights have increased significantly in recent years. 2) The men need to be compensated more for playing because of opportunity cost. Many of them can make hundreds of thousands to millions a year playing in the US or abroad respectively. There is a chance of injury in international play jeopardizing such a salary. I'm not aware of any US womens' soccer player who makes significantly more than a well paid trucker.
1st) Not all non-EU countries practiced socialism through bolshevik revolution. Stop making the assumption that the only failed socialist models are only those that specifically mirrored Lenin's coup.
2nd) Welfare systems are not unique to socialism. Fascist states have welfare systems, totalitarian states have welfare systems, and even the most backwards countries have welfare systems. If you think welfare = socialist then does that mean that churches actively running food banks is a socialist system? Does that mean that a country run by the church is a socialist system? Or do you simply say that welfare = socialist because of the specific welfare programs you like seeing in socialists states? How people get their healthcare does not define whether the country is socialist or not for much the same reason how people get their roads does not define countries as socialist or not.
3rd) I love the ACA, I think the ACA is exactly what america needs to slowly convince its population to be supportive of actual socialized healthcare--but the ACA is NOT socialized healthcare. Its a great, and passable, foundation for the beginnings of socialized healthcare, but its primarily a punishment tax for people who don't get health insurance. The main leaps forward of the ACA is regulation preventing denial of healthcare coverage, but does not specifically help people *get* healthcare coverage. In other words, thinking the ACA is socialized healthcare is like thinking Geico is socialized healthcare just because you're dinged for not having car insurance.
4th) The women's soccer team pulls in more money, has more fame, and has more trophies than the men's soccer team. The reason they get more money and that they're contracts are negotiated more is because America is a misogynist country.
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On April 13 2016 02:16 zlefin wrote:
clutz -> have you read the court findings in the colorado baker case thoroughly? I'm just checking because some people complain about it without having actually looked closely at it.
I typically do not look through factfinding in lower court cases as it is incredibly messy. In this case I simply took the accusations of the ACLU at face value: http://aclu-co.org/court-cases/masterpiece-cakeshop/ where they don't allege that there was no alternative accommodation available.
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On April 12 2016 17:14 Nebuchad wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2016 08:42 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 08:32 Nebuchad wrote:On April 12 2016 08:22 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 08:09 Nebuchad wrote:On April 12 2016 04:45 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 04:09 Jormundr wrote:On April 12 2016 03:58 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 03:36 Jormundr wrote:On April 12 2016 03:24 Naracs_Duc wrote:
[quote]
This is because a lot of regimes starts with promises of socialism and end with assault rifles knocking on your front door asking if you're part of the revolution or not. It might be easy for people in the west to think this is an academic argument, but for those of us whose parents had to bribe both rebels and police to stay out of the fighting before moving to the west--it comes as a slap in the face for people to think it doesn't happen. Again, emotional argument that's completely useless in the context of the US. Secret police in the US? That's a fucking joke. Our government isn't stupid enough to be that open and heavy handed with its laundry. They already have so much power that instituting what you fear would essentially be tantamount to relinquishing control, not gaining it. Being selective of some countries over other countries as your anecdote does not make you less emotional. It simple shows your racial bias. Please do inform me of my racial bias and its effects on my argument. You're using the fact that socialist movements worked in white countries (like Sweden) allow you to pretend that socialist movements in other countries don't count (China, Philippines, South America, etc...) So telling people of color that your white examples are more relevant than their non-white examples shows a lot about your bias. For the sake of someone having said it, the difference between those two sets isn't that one is white and the other isn't. The difference is that one case refers to a social democracy movement and the other refers to a socialist movement under the american (or historical) definition. Your examples aren't dismissed because they aren't white enough. They are because we're not talking about the same thing. You mean you guys didn't make reform laws through the democratic process and had the side effects happen only after passing it through legal means? Or are you mainly imagining China and Cuba's rise to communist power when you imagine social reforms. Sometimes trying to fix the economy by giving more power to the workers does not work. Sometimes it leads to bloodshed, and other times it doesn't. Don't pretend that somehow the US is safe from these issues just because you imagine it is more similar to the EU than to the non-white social reform states. So when people share their stories about what has gone wrong, listen to them. And makes sure to develop safeguards against it. Remember that the power you give to the good leaders will be the same ones used by the bad ones who came later. Do not think of things as being innately good or innately bad--but as mere options that you have to take in context with the resources available, the people available, and the types of leaders you can envision following after you. I don't mean that and I'm not pretending any of this. I usually mean what I write. You are putting in the same sentence political tendancies that are different and you've said that the only reason we're not putting them in the same sentence is because we don't care about non-white people experience. You are incorrect. We're not putting them in the same sentence because they don't belong in the same sentence. That is the entirety of what I'm saying. You have made zero argument as to why they are not the same things other than because you say so. It's literally the first thing I did. I said that one was social democratic (i.e. center left) and the other was socialist in the classical definition (i.e. left to far left and possibly leading to communism). You act as if there was no far left parties in Europe, as if social democracy was the expression of all leftist ideals in Europe. It's not true. Tsipras is from a far left party. There is a far left party developping in Spain. As far as I know every european country has a minoritary far left party that is distinct from the social democratic one. One of the things you've said is that you're scared of fundamentalists. In politics, that transcribes to being scared of extremes. A social democrat cannot be extreme. When he is, he stops being center left, and so by definition he stops being a social democrat and enters another definition that is further left. In order for your argument to make sense, you have to demonstrate that Bernie is further left than social democracy, which is a very different argument. Under the guise of being scared of fundamentalism, which is a noble concern that I also share, you're actually arguing against restoring a moderate balance to the US. Internationally, the center is defined to be somewhere between Bernie and Hillary. Right now, in the US, the center is between Hillary and a republican. That is factually out of balance. You don't have to think that this imbalance is a problem as a general individual, but as someone who's claimed to be worried by extremism, you should think it is. You should be far more worried that a republican has a decent chance of getting elected every four years than you are by Bernie's rise or popularity. If that's not the case, by definition you aren't scared by extremes, you're just scared by the left.
Three things.
a.) Not all countries brown countries practiced iron curtain socialism. Some were just countries attempting to pass more socialist leaning bills that lead to bloodshed. Don't assume that only totalitarian regimes create failed socialist policies.
b.) How Spain or Denmark or Sweden or even fucking China defines left wing and right wing, or liberal and conservative has absolutely ZERO bearing on how the US defines it. Bringing up how international averages (amongst white countries only) understands left wing and right wing has very little relevance in the american political system for much the same reason a total average of all countries (the US is very extreme left wing if you include places like current Syria, Iran, and China into the international mix for example) has no relevance in the american political system.
So trying to make an argument that social democrat is centrist in some random country in the EU is irrelevant to the discussion.
c.) I do not think Bernie will recreate the iron curtain. I do believe that, much like Lenin, he will put into place a lot of policies that feel like a good a idea at the time until someone like Lenin takes over and takes advantage of the new powers Bernie gives the government.
Specifically:
-I think that he will be a lame duck president unable to pass things because the only things he wants will be too left for the GOP/Tea Party side who currently holds the majority.
-I think his attacks on wall street funding will result in him being unable to pass laws that prevent it while increase wall street donations to the RNC preventing the DNC from winning any more races in the next few midterms.
-This will eventually lead to a supermajority in the congress and the house allowing them to eventually circumvent Bernie all the while putting in little resistance to Bernie's healthcare plan and education plan but preventing the tax reform plans he wants to use to pay for it.
-The US will go into debt unable to pay for Bernie's policies and public support for his stances will shift as people will blame the state of the economy on Bernie's idealism.
-Conservative support will skyrocket and all the efforts made in the past 8-20 years will be rolled back to extremist versions of Reagan's policies.
So yes, I do think that Bernie is dangerous for democrats. Not because I disagree with what he wants, simply put I think his lack of a plan, lack of ability to lead, and inability to play the game the way its meant to be played will destroy the Democratic party and everything they've been trying to build.
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On April 13 2016 02:30 cLutZ wrote:Show nested quote +On April 13 2016 02:16 zlefin wrote:
clutz -> have you read the court findings in the colorado baker case thoroughly? I'm just checking because some people complain about it without having actually looked closely at it. I typically do not look through factfinding in lower court cases as it is incredibly messy. In this case I simply took the accusations of the ACLU at face value: http://aclu-co.org/court-cases/masterpiece-cakeshop/ where they don't allege that there was no alternative accommodation available.
So what is the nature of your objection(s) to the way that case was handled?
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On April 13 2016 02:35 Naracs_Duc wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2016 17:14 Nebuchad wrote:On April 12 2016 08:42 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 08:32 Nebuchad wrote:On April 12 2016 08:22 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 08:09 Nebuchad wrote:On April 12 2016 04:45 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 04:09 Jormundr wrote:On April 12 2016 03:58 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 03:36 Jormundr wrote:
[quote]
Again, emotional argument that's completely useless in the context of the US. Secret police in the US? That's a fucking joke. Our government isn't stupid enough to be that open and heavy handed with its laundry. They already have so much power that instituting what you fear would essentially be tantamount to relinquishing control, not gaining it. Being selective of some countries over other countries as your anecdote does not make you less emotional. It simple shows your racial bias. Please do inform me of my racial bias and its effects on my argument. You're using the fact that socialist movements worked in white countries (like Sweden) allow you to pretend that socialist movements in other countries don't count (China, Philippines, South America, etc...) So telling people of color that your white examples are more relevant than their non-white examples shows a lot about your bias. For the sake of someone having said it, the difference between those two sets isn't that one is white and the other isn't. The difference is that one case refers to a social democracy movement and the other refers to a socialist movement under the american (or historical) definition. Your examples aren't dismissed because they aren't white enough. They are because we're not talking about the same thing. You mean you guys didn't make reform laws through the democratic process and had the side effects happen only after passing it through legal means? Or are you mainly imagining China and Cuba's rise to communist power when you imagine social reforms. Sometimes trying to fix the economy by giving more power to the workers does not work. Sometimes it leads to bloodshed, and other times it doesn't. Don't pretend that somehow the US is safe from these issues just because you imagine it is more similar to the EU than to the non-white social reform states. So when people share their stories about what has gone wrong, listen to them. And makes sure to develop safeguards against it. Remember that the power you give to the good leaders will be the same ones used by the bad ones who came later. Do not think of things as being innately good or innately bad--but as mere options that you have to take in context with the resources available, the people available, and the types of leaders you can envision following after you. I don't mean that and I'm not pretending any of this. I usually mean what I write. You are putting in the same sentence political tendancies that are different and you've said that the only reason we're not putting them in the same sentence is because we don't care about non-white people experience. You are incorrect. We're not putting them in the same sentence because they don't belong in the same sentence. That is the entirety of what I'm saying. You have made zero argument as to why they are not the same things other than because you say so. It's literally the first thing I did. I said that one was social democratic (i.e. center left) and the other was socialist in the classical definition (i.e. left to far left and possibly leading to communism). You act as if there was no far left parties in Europe, as if social democracy was the expression of all leftist ideals in Europe. It's not true. Tsipras is from a far left party. There is a far left party developping in Spain. As far as I know every european country has a minoritary far left party that is distinct from the social democratic one. One of the things you've said is that you're scared of fundamentalists. In politics, that transcribes to being scared of extremes. A social democrat cannot be extreme. When he is, he stops being center left, and so by definition he stops being a social democrat and enters another definition that is further left. In order for your argument to make sense, you have to demonstrate that Bernie is further left than social democracy, which is a very different argument. Under the guise of being scared of fundamentalism, which is a noble concern that I also share, you're actually arguing against restoring a moderate balance to the US. Internationally, the center is defined to be somewhere between Bernie and Hillary. Right now, in the US, the center is between Hillary and a republican. That is factually out of balance. You don't have to think that this imbalance is a problem as a general individual, but as someone who's claimed to be worried by extremism, you should think it is. You should be far more worried that a republican has a decent chance of getting elected every four years than you are by Bernie's rise or popularity. If that's not the case, by definition you aren't scared by extremes, you're just scared by the left. So trying to make an argument that social democrat is centrist in some random country in the EU is irrelevant to the discussion.
If you don't agree with the international definition of what is moderate and what isn't, how can you then with a straight face say that you're against extremism? A moderate is someone who stands for moderate principles on a predetermined scale, not on a scale that he made up himself based on what he believes. If you want to argue that you're scared of the left, based on the experience that you had with it, that is a legitimate position and a legitimate concern. But do not present it as a moderate stance. When you think that a situation where you get to choose between center right and far right every four years is better than a situation where you choose between center left and center right because there's too much risk that we could run into far left situations in the latter, then you don't have an anti-extremist stance. And you should be able to realize that.
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So basically the discussion for twenty pages has been about "socialism", with the only argument being welfare state = socialism = lenin = bad.
Socialism from, say the French Parti Socialiste, and socialism from Soviet Socialist Republic have strictly nothing in common.
Socialism covers system going from USSR (that called itself socialist) to mild social democracy such as France or Germany that have much more in common with the States under Bush than with USSR at any point of its history.
Socialism as used by European today means social democrat, which is a totally, perfectly capitalist society with a welfare state. That is NOT what Mao or Lenin meant by socialism which was a non-capitalist system with a state owning the means of production. Under Lenin, you couldn't own a factory. That what socialist meant for him. If you think that Sanders wants to nationalize all businesses you need to read the newspapers a bit more carefully.
Stop using "socialism", which is an empty word used by the right as a strawman, and use communism and social democracy. Those have nothing to do with each other. If your point in that discussion is to mix them up for propaganda purpose, you are not helping.
As a general rule, using Leninism or communist China to discuss modern Europe is fucking grotesque.
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On April 13 2016 02:07 LegalLord wrote:
Anyone have a good explanation for why a fair number of businesses have taken a pro-LBGT stance recently? Seems to have become a lot more common since that last SCOTUS case.
I don't see it as "pro-LGTB", but "anti-discrimination". Big difference.
Apart from the obvious question: why not?
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On April 13 2016 02:48 Nebuchad wrote:Show nested quote +On April 13 2016 02:35 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 17:14 Nebuchad wrote:On April 12 2016 08:42 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 08:32 Nebuchad wrote:On April 12 2016 08:22 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 08:09 Nebuchad wrote:On April 12 2016 04:45 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 04:09 Jormundr wrote:On April 12 2016 03:58 Naracs_Duc wrote:
[quote]
Being selective of some countries over other countries as your anecdote does not make you less emotional. It simple shows your racial bias. Please do inform me of my racial bias and its effects on my argument. You're using the fact that socialist movements worked in white countries (like Sweden) allow you to pretend that socialist movements in other countries don't count (China, Philippines, South America, etc...) So telling people of color that your white examples are more relevant than their non-white examples shows a lot about your bias. For the sake of someone having said it, the difference between those two sets isn't that one is white and the other isn't. The difference is that one case refers to a social democracy movement and the other refers to a socialist movement under the american (or historical) definition. Your examples aren't dismissed because they aren't white enough. They are because we're not talking about the same thing. You mean you guys didn't make reform laws through the democratic process and had the side effects happen only after passing it through legal means? Or are you mainly imagining China and Cuba's rise to communist power when you imagine social reforms. Sometimes trying to fix the economy by giving more power to the workers does not work. Sometimes it leads to bloodshed, and other times it doesn't. Don't pretend that somehow the US is safe from these issues just because you imagine it is more similar to the EU than to the non-white social reform states. So when people share their stories about what has gone wrong, listen to them. And makes sure to develop safeguards against it. Remember that the power you give to the good leaders will be the same ones used by the bad ones who came later. Do not think of things as being innately good or innately bad--but as mere options that you have to take in context with the resources available, the people available, and the types of leaders you can envision following after you. I don't mean that and I'm not pretending any of this. I usually mean what I write. You are putting in the same sentence political tendancies that are different and you've said that the only reason we're not putting them in the same sentence is because we don't care about non-white people experience. You are incorrect. We're not putting them in the same sentence because they don't belong in the same sentence. That is the entirety of what I'm saying. You have made zero argument as to why they are not the same things other than because you say so. It's literally the first thing I did. I said that one was social democratic (i.e. center left) and the other was socialist in the classical definition (i.e. left to far left and possibly leading to communism). You act as if there was no far left parties in Europe, as if social democracy was the expression of all leftist ideals in Europe. It's not true. Tsipras is from a far left party. There is a far left party developping in Spain. As far as I know every european country has a minoritary far left party that is distinct from the social democratic one. One of the things you've said is that you're scared of fundamentalists. In politics, that transcribes to being scared of extremes. A social democrat cannot be extreme. When he is, he stops being center left, and so by definition he stops being a social democrat and enters another definition that is further left. In order for your argument to make sense, you have to demonstrate that Bernie is further left than social democracy, which is a very different argument. Under the guise of being scared of fundamentalism, which is a noble concern that I also share, you're actually arguing against restoring a moderate balance to the US. Internationally, the center is defined to be somewhere between Bernie and Hillary. Right now, in the US, the center is between Hillary and a republican. That is factually out of balance. You don't have to think that this imbalance is a problem as a general individual, but as someone who's claimed to be worried by extremism, you should think it is. You should be far more worried that a republican has a decent chance of getting elected every four years than you are by Bernie's rise or popularity. If that's not the case, by definition you aren't scared by extremes, you're just scared by the left. So trying to make an argument that social democrat is centrist in some random country in the EU is irrelevant to the discussion. If you don't agree with the international definition of what is moderate and what isn't, how can you then with a straight face say that you're against extremism? A moderate is someone who stands for moderate principles on a predetermined scale, not on a scale that he made up himself based on what he believes. If you want to argue that you're scared of the left, based on the experience that you had with it, that is a legitimate position and a legitimate concern. But do not present it as a moderate stance. When you think that a situation where you get to choose between center right and far right every four years is better than a situation where you choose between center left and center right because there's too much risk that we could run into far left situations in the latter, then you don't have an anti-extremist stance. And you should be able to realize that.
The politics of Spain is not the politics of America. Relative terms like "Moderate" "Leftist" or "Conservative" are in relation to the political group and environment that they are in. Saying that some guy in Spain is super leftist and so that means Hilary is right leaning is as stupid sounding as saying that there's some guy in Syria who is super conservative so that should mean Hilary is left leaning. Its an absurd standard to use irrelevant examples to define something that already has examples within the context and framework that politician works in.
The US has definitions of what counts as left, right, and center. Just because it is different from the EU or Japan or Ethiopia does not make it an invalid metric. For example, would it be an okay argument for the right wingers in Sweden to say that they are actually the liberal party because compared to Mike Huckabee they are essentially communists? Should that mean that the current left wing of the Swedish party should be marginalized as extremists just because they are nowhere close to what the dominant world power is when it comes to what counts as centrist?
Its a very naive, stupid, and childish way of seeing the world to use non-related examples as proof. You're better than that, TL is better than that.
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On April 13 2016 03:02 Biff The Understudy wrote:
So basically the discussion for twenty pages has been about "socialism", with the only argument being welfare state = socialism = lenin = bad.
Socialism from, say the French Parti Socialiste, and socialism from Soviet Socialist Republic have strictly nothing in common.
Socialism covers system going from USSR (that called itself socialist) to mild social democracy such as France or Germany that have much more in common with the States under Bush than with USSR at any point of its history.
Socialism as used by European today means social democrat, which is a totally, perfectly capitalist society with a welfare state. That is NOT what Mao or Lenin meant by socialism which was a non-capitalist system with a state owning the means of production. Under Lenin, you couldn't own a factory. That what socialist meant for him. If you think that Sanders wants to nationalize all businesses you need to read the newspapers a bit more carefully.
Stop using "socialism", which is an empty word used by the right as a strawman, and use communism and social democracy. Those have nothing to do with each other. If your point in that discussion is to mix them up for propaganda purpose, you are not helping.
As a general rule, using Leninism or communist China to discuss modern Europe is fucking grotesque.
Personally, I want them to take this amazing debate about socialism to PM or to its own thread. The straw-man punching got old 10 pages ago.
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On April 13 2016 03:04 Naracs_Duc wrote:Show nested quote +On April 13 2016 02:48 Nebuchad wrote:On April 13 2016 02:35 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 17:14 Nebuchad wrote:On April 12 2016 08:42 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 08:32 Nebuchad wrote:On April 12 2016 08:22 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 08:09 Nebuchad wrote:On April 12 2016 04:45 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 04:09 Jormundr wrote:
[quote]
Please do inform me of my racial bias and its effects on my argument. You're using the fact that socialist movements worked in white countries (like Sweden) allow you to pretend that socialist movements in other countries don't count (China, Philippines, South America, etc...) So telling people of color that your white examples are more relevant than their non-white examples shows a lot about your bias. For the sake of someone having said it, the difference between those two sets isn't that one is white and the other isn't. The difference is that one case refers to a social democracy movement and the other refers to a socialist movement under the american (or historical) definition. Your examples aren't dismissed because they aren't white enough. They are because we're not talking about the same thing. You mean you guys didn't make reform laws through the democratic process and had the side effects happen only after passing it through legal means? Or are you mainly imagining China and Cuba's rise to communist power when you imagine social reforms. Sometimes trying to fix the economy by giving more power to the workers does not work. Sometimes it leads to bloodshed, and other times it doesn't. Don't pretend that somehow the US is safe from these issues just because you imagine it is more similar to the EU than to the non-white social reform states. So when people share their stories about what has gone wrong, listen to them. And makes sure to develop safeguards against it. Remember that the power you give to the good leaders will be the same ones used by the bad ones who came later. Do not think of things as being innately good or innately bad--but as mere options that you have to take in context with the resources available, the people available, and the types of leaders you can envision following after you. I don't mean that and I'm not pretending any of this. I usually mean what I write. You are putting in the same sentence political tendancies that are different and you've said that the only reason we're not putting them in the same sentence is because we don't care about non-white people experience. You are incorrect. We're not putting them in the same sentence because they don't belong in the same sentence. That is the entirety of what I'm saying. You have made zero argument as to why they are not the same things other than because you say so. It's literally the first thing I did. I said that one was social democratic (i.e. center left) and the other was socialist in the classical definition (i.e. left to far left and possibly leading to communism). You act as if there was no far left parties in Europe, as if social democracy was the expression of all leftist ideals in Europe. It's not true. Tsipras is from a far left party. There is a far left party developping in Spain. As far as I know every european country has a minoritary far left party that is distinct from the social democratic one. One of the things you've said is that you're scared of fundamentalists. In politics, that transcribes to being scared of extremes. A social democrat cannot be extreme. When he is, he stops being center left, and so by definition he stops being a social democrat and enters another definition that is further left. In order for your argument to make sense, you have to demonstrate that Bernie is further left than social democracy, which is a very different argument. Under the guise of being scared of fundamentalism, which is a noble concern that I also share, you're actually arguing against restoring a moderate balance to the US. Internationally, the center is defined to be somewhere between Bernie and Hillary. Right now, in the US, the center is between Hillary and a republican. That is factually out of balance. You don't have to think that this imbalance is a problem as a general individual, but as someone who's claimed to be worried by extremism, you should think it is. You should be far more worried that a republican has a decent chance of getting elected every four years than you are by Bernie's rise or popularity. If that's not the case, by definition you aren't scared by extremes, you're just scared by the left. So trying to make an argument that social democrat is centrist in some random country in the EU is irrelevant to the discussion. If you don't agree with the international definition of what is moderate and what isn't, how can you then with a straight face say that you're against extremism? A moderate is someone who stands for moderate principles on a predetermined scale, not on a scale that he made up himself based on what he believes. If you want to argue that you're scared of the left, based on the experience that you had with it, that is a legitimate position and a legitimate concern. But do not present it as a moderate stance. When you think that a situation where you get to choose between center right and far right every four years is better than a situation where you choose between center left and center right because there's too much risk that we could run into far left situations in the latter, then you don't have an anti-extremist stance. And you should be able to realize that. The US has definitions of what counts as left, right, and center. Just because it is different from the EU or Japan or Ethiopia does not make it an invalid metric.
You are correct. What makes it an invalid metric isn't that it's different from the EU. It's that its positions are [right wing](republicans) - [left wing](democrat), [far left] (social democracy), [very far left?] (doesn't exist, a socialist position), [very very very far left?] (doesn't exist, communism). You can tell it's invalid because extreme positions are situated just one degree right of center on one side, while the extreme positions of the other side are situated a million degrees left of center.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On April 13 2016 03:03 m4ini wrote:Show nested quote +On April 13 2016 02:07 LegalLord wrote:
Anyone have a good explanation for why a fair number of businesses have taken a pro-LBGT stance recently? Seems to have become a lot more common since that last SCOTUS case. I don't see it as "pro-LGTB", but "anti-discrimination". Big difference. Apart from the obvious question: why not?
Because businesses aren't known to care for social issues unless there's some benefit to them for doing so.
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On April 13 2016 02:07 LegalLord wrote:
Anyone have a good explanation for why a fair number of businesses have taken a pro-LBGT stance recently? Seems to have become a lot more common since that last SCOTUS case.
My only guess is that they realized the masses were for that, and wanted to both earn popularity points/get free publicity by going along with it, and didn't want to earn the ire of the masses by going against them. I doubt most of their CEO's or HR departments really care, but I'm sure their marketing and PR departments realize that it's a good move to do this. It's a good thing though, if the southern states refuse to join us in the 21st century, perhaps they don't deserve to have the benefits of it while still living in the 19th.
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On April 13 2016 03:11 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On April 13 2016 03:03 m4ini wrote:On April 13 2016 02:07 LegalLord wrote:
Anyone have a good explanation for why a fair number of businesses have taken a pro-LBGT stance recently? Seems to have become a lot more common since that last SCOTUS case. I don't see it as "pro-LGTB", but "anti-discrimination". Big difference. Apart from the obvious question: why not? Because businesses aren't known to care for social issues unless there's some benefit to them for doing so.
Easy publicity and scoring favor points with the general public, the cost in lost business expansion is negligible.
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On April 13 2016 03:11 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On April 13 2016 03:03 m4ini wrote:On April 13 2016 02:07 LegalLord wrote:
Anyone have a good explanation for why a fair number of businesses have taken a pro-LBGT stance recently? Seems to have become a lot more common since that last SCOTUS case. I don't see it as "pro-LGTB", but "anti-discrimination". Big difference. Apart from the obvious question: why not? Because businesses aren't known to care for social issues unless there's some benefit to them for doing so.
They employ a LGTB people and based in areas where the the newly passed restrictions do not exist. Its good press and they don't see the tiny ass population states passing these laws as a huge part of their market. The power dynamic between these states and a company like Deutsche bank is strongly in favor of Deutsche bank. North Carolina needs these companies a lot more than they need North Carolina.
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On April 13 2016 02:46 zlefin wrote:Show nested quote +On April 13 2016 02:30 cLutZ wrote:On April 13 2016 02:16 zlefin wrote:
clutz -> have you read the court findings in the colorado baker case thoroughly? I'm just checking because some people complain about it without having actually looked closely at it. I typically do not look through factfinding in lower court cases as it is incredibly messy. In this case I simply took the accusations of the ACLU at face value: http://aclu-co.org/court-cases/masterpiece-cakeshop/ where they don't allege that there was no alternative accommodation available. So what is the nature of your objection(s) to the way that case was handled?
I object to bringing the case in the first place, as it appears to have been brought punitively (in other words, the intent all along appears to have been to find a baker who would refuse on religious grounds) instead of because this couple went to several bakeries and kept getting refused service, threw their hands up in the air and went to the state for some relief.
I object to the general principle of public accommodation laws without the showing of a need as they are a substantial burden on liberty (religious or otherwise, I don't think a Democrat should have to make a Republican's poster).
I do not object to the panel and court's decision to apply the law in this case as the defendant's defense that he was discriminating on the content of the message of the cake, not the couple's inherent characteristics is weak. See footnote 8 for more.
However, I do object to the courts rejection of the as-applied strict scrutiny challenge based on the 1st and 14th Amendments. This is a failure because they treated it as only a religious liberty case, while it is also a freedom of speech (compelled speech) and freedom of association (compelled association) case.
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I see, thank you for the clear explanation; looking over the docs, it looks to be a different case than the one I was thinking of as well.
I'll keep your points in mind as I ponder the issue some. I may or may not have any further posts on it.
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On April 13 2016 03:10 Nebuchad wrote:Show nested quote +On April 13 2016 03:04 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 13 2016 02:48 Nebuchad wrote:On April 13 2016 02:35 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 17:14 Nebuchad wrote:On April 12 2016 08:42 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 08:32 Nebuchad wrote:On April 12 2016 08:22 Naracs_Duc wrote:On April 12 2016 08:09 Nebuchad wrote:On April 12 2016 04:45 Naracs_Duc wrote:
[quote]
You're using the fact that socialist movements worked in white countries (like Sweden) allow you to pretend that socialist movements in other countries don't count (China, Philippines, South America, etc...)
So telling people of color that your white examples are more relevant than their non-white examples shows a lot about your bias. For the sake of someone having said it, the difference between those two sets isn't that one is white and the other isn't. The difference is that one case refers to a social democracy movement and the other refers to a socialist movement under the american (or historical) definition. Your examples aren't dismissed because they aren't white enough. They are because we're not talking about the same thing. You mean you guys didn't make reform laws through the democratic process and had the side effects happen only after passing it through legal means? Or are you mainly imagining China and Cuba's rise to communist power when you imagine social reforms. Sometimes trying to fix the economy by giving more power to the workers does not work. Sometimes it leads to bloodshed, and other times it doesn't. Don't pretend that somehow the US is safe from these issues just because you imagine it is more similar to the EU than to the non-white social reform states. So when people share their stories about what has gone wrong, listen to them. And makes sure to develop safeguards against it. Remember that the power you give to the good leaders will be the same ones used by the bad ones who came later. Do not think of things as being innately good or innately bad--but as mere options that you have to take in context with the resources available, the people available, and the types of leaders you can envision following after you. I don't mean that and I'm not pretending any of this. I usually mean what I write. You are putting in the same sentence political tendancies that are different and you've said that the only reason we're not putting them in the same sentence is because we don't care about non-white people experience. You are incorrect. We're not putting them in the same sentence because they don't belong in the same sentence. That is the entirety of what I'm saying. You have made zero argument as to why they are not the same things other than because you say so. It's literally the first thing I did. I said that one was social democratic (i.e. center left) and the other was socialist in the classical definition (i.e. left to far left and possibly leading to communism). You act as if there was no far left parties in Europe, as if social democracy was the expression of all leftist ideals in Europe. It's not true. Tsipras is from a far left party. There is a far left party developping in Spain. As far as I know every european country has a minoritary far left party that is distinct from the social democratic one. One of the things you've said is that you're scared of fundamentalists. In politics, that transcribes to being scared of extremes. A social democrat cannot be extreme. When he is, he stops being center left, and so by definition he stops being a social democrat and enters another definition that is further left. In order for your argument to make sense, you have to demonstrate that Bernie is further left than social democracy, which is a very different argument. Under the guise of being scared of fundamentalism, which is a noble concern that I also share, you're actually arguing against restoring a moderate balance to the US. Internationally, the center is defined to be somewhere between Bernie and Hillary. Right now, in the US, the center is between Hillary and a republican. That is factually out of balance. You don't have to think that this imbalance is a problem as a general individual, but as someone who's claimed to be worried by extremism, you should think it is. You should be far more worried that a republican has a decent chance of getting elected every four years than you are by Bernie's rise or popularity. If that's not the case, by definition you aren't scared by extremes, you're just scared by the left. So trying to make an argument that social democrat is centrist in some random country in the EU is irrelevant to the discussion. If you don't agree with the international definition of what is moderate and what isn't, how can you then with a straight face say that you're against extremism? A moderate is someone who stands for moderate principles on a predetermined scale, not on a scale that he made up himself based on what he believes. If you want to argue that you're scared of the left, based on the experience that you had with it, that is a legitimate position and a legitimate concern. But do not present it as a moderate stance. When you think that a situation where you get to choose between center right and far right every four years is better than a situation where you choose between center left and center right because there's too much risk that we could run into far left situations in the latter, then you don't have an anti-extremist stance. And you should be able to realize that. The US has definitions of what counts as left, right, and center. Just because it is different from the EU or Japan or Ethiopia does not make it an invalid metric. You are correct. What makes it an invalid metric isn't that it's different from the EU. It's that its positions are [right wing](republicans) - [left wing](democrat), [far left] (social democracy), [very far left?] (doesn't exist, a socialist position), [very very very far left?] (doesn't exist, communism). You can tell it's invalid because extreme positions are situated just one degree right of center on one side, while the extreme positions of the other side are situated a million degrees left of center.
That's not even how the American political positions break down.
On the far far left is perceived as something akin to benevolent totalitarianism--a system where the government provides most if not all the support and resources to its people. On the far far right is something akin to neo-feudalism, an extreme form of anarchism where smaller communities become self run states that does not require federal controls.
In the middle of that are the moderates.
Democrats are to the left of that, republicans are to the right of that--but barely.
Its more accurate to think of it as Moderate, DINO, Moderate Democrat, Fiscal Conservative/Socially Liberal Democrat, Democrat, Left Leaning Democrat, and so on and so forth with communist being far into it, and many other beyond communist past that.
To the right its very similar between neocons, conservatives, GOPs, Tea Party, RINOs, Socially Liberal Republicans, Goldwater Republicans, Reaganites, Christian Right Republicans, Fascists, etc...
America has a very WIDE and very DEEP definition of what counts as liberal and what counts as conservative bred as much by how one perceives the other as much as it is bred by what bills each side passes. When "2nd Amendment Nutjobs" talk about the government taking their guns--its literally because they see the left as being not being very far off from becoming totalitarian regimes. They look at us and think we are the crazy ones.
So its definitely a lot more nuanced than you are pretending it to be with a lot more layers than you are really wanting to accept. And EVEN THEN it still is not relevant to the discussion of taking the experiences of people who come from countries who tested socialist changes more honestly instead of more selectively. To discuss and understand why it goes bad in some places, and why it goes well in others. To not pretend you already know how it will conclude in the US just because you think "It can't happen here in the US." Every country who has been punished by their experiments with social programs thought that "we are different" that the mistakes of others could not possibly happen to them.
It is foolish to only look at the evidence that suites you and not to the evidence available. And trying to shift the discussion to what counts as liberal or conservative is asinine.
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Even porn sites are getting in on boycotting states with discrimination laws.
A popular porn site is blocking some North Carolinians' access to its material due to the state’s law preventing cities from banning discrimination against the LGBT community.
The porn site, xHamster, tweeted on Monday that it was “blacking out access for North Carolina” because of newly passed House Bill 2, which also dictates which public restrooms transgender men and women can use.
When users with a North Carolina IP address visit the website they will be asked if they support the anti-LGBT law, xHamster Chief Marketing Officer, Alexander D. Hawkins, said in an email. If they choose in the affirmative they will be blocked from the site, he said.
“We blacked out the access to our website because we want to draw the attention of millions of people to patterns of human rights violations,” Hawkins said.
While some North Carolina lawmakers have argued that the sweeping law defends religious liberty, opponents say the law turns its back on the LGBT population in the state.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/nation-now/2016/04/12/porno-xhamster-website-blocks-anti-lgbt-law-north-carolina-users/82934350/
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On April 13 2016 04:41 TheTenthDoc wrote:Even porn sites are getting in on boycotting states with discrimination laws. Show nested quote +
A popular porn site is blocking some North Carolinians' access to its material due to the state’s law preventing cities from banning discrimination against the LGBT community.
The porn site, xHamster, tweeted on Monday that it was “blacking out access for North Carolina” because of newly passed House Bill 2, which also dictates which public restrooms transgender men and women can use.
When users with a North Carolina IP address visit the website they will be asked if they support the anti-LGBT law, xHamster Chief Marketing Officer, Alexander D. Hawkins, said in an email. If they choose in the affirmative they will be blocked from the site, he said.
“We blacked out the access to our website because we want to draw the attention of millions of people to patterns of human rights violations,” Hawkins said.
While some North Carolina lawmakers have argued that the sweeping law defends religious liberty, opponents say the law turns its back on the LGBT population in the state.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/nation-now/2016/04/12/porno-xhamster-website-blocks-anti-lgbt-law-north-carolina-users/82934350/
When porn takes the moral highground against you, you done goofed.
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EPT
