US Politics Mega-thread - Page 5200

On September 05 2025 11:40 Introvert wrote:



That sentence was not directed at you explicitly, although you do go on to match it. You are being far too narrow and ignoring how we got here. In progressive land, we have a sudden reverence for constitutional norms or aversion to executive power that they've been living by. But of course this isn't true. First, recall what I said about the actual machinery of the state. Dems are just fine with a powerful coercive government, because most of the time they either control all of it or at least part of it. Who do you think argued for an expansive view of the civil rights laws this administration is now using to go after places like Harvard?

Or my favorite example: DACA. I remember arguing multiple times over the years about DACA with people here who insisted that it was ok and even good! because it was A) the "right thing to do" and B) that since Republicans wouldn't work with Obama on giving them citizenship, that it was ok for him to implement that program. I don't want to hear a single word about the Constitution or abusing norms from people who gave Obama a pass on DACA, who thought Biden trying to wipe out hundreds of billions of dollars of student loan debt with his pen was ok, or the people who cheered when a local NYC prosecutor went after Trump for paperwork that he claimed would change the election when it was impossible for it to have done so. Or when a president exercises the other great power he has: to not enforce the law. Like Biden did with the border for years. Now, Trump comes in to undo the first lawless action and once again everyone lights their hair in fire.

Just like with the Dobbs decision, what most Democrats mean by "Democracy" and "norms" is "we win" and facism is just when they lose. The different agencies of the federal government should have considered what they were doing when they try to impede Republican presidents from lawfully implementing their agendas. The thing is, slippery slopes are...slippery. Trump wins a nailbiter in 2016 and so many people are spun up into hysterics. How was that for the national temperature? Biden is elected by a similarly slim electoral college win and everyone, including Biden himself, thinks he was elected to re-make the world in his image. How did that work out?

I agree with you, we should all abide by the maxim that we should never take more power than we would give our enemies. Problem is, Democrats don't actually believe their enemies should ever be allowed to have power. And thus we are here. If one side wins by the rules but doesn't get to govern within them, then maybe next time they win they'll just ignore them all together? Sorry, I don't take this argument sincerely when it's only applied to Trump, when the same people yelping now spent the last 15 years arguing that the Constitution was a hopelessly flawed document tainted from the beginning by evil and thus should be given as little reference or reverence as possible.

Again, I have far more disdain for the people who thought that the power was theirs by right of being right. But unfortunately, the rain falls on the just and the unjust alike.

On September 05 2025 11:40 Introvert wrote:



That sentence was not directed at you explicitly, although you do go on to match it. You are being far too narrow and ignoring how we got here. In progressive land, we have a sudden reverence for constitutional norms or aversion to executive power that they've been living by. But of course this isn't true. First, recall what I said about the actual machinery of the state. Dems are just fine with a powerful coercive government, because most of the time they either control all of it or at least part of it. Who do you think argued for an expansive view of the civil rights laws this administration is now using to go after places like Harvard?

Or my favorite example: DACA. I remember arguing multiple times over the years about DACA with people here who insisted that it was ok and even good! because it was A) the "right thing to do" and B) that since Republicans wouldn't work with Obama on giving them citizenship, that it was ok for him to implement that program. I don't want to hear a single word about the Constitution or abusing norms from people who gave Obama a pass on DACA, who thought Biden trying to wipe out hundreds of billions of dollars of student loan debt with his pen was ok, or the people who cheered when a local NYC prosecutor went after Trump for paperwork that he claimed would change the election when it was impossible for it to have done so. Or when a president exercises the other great power he has: to not enforce the law. Like Biden did with the border for years. Now, Trump comes in to undo the first lawless action and once again everyone lights their hair in fire.

Just like with the Dobbs decision, what most Democrats mean by "Democracy" and "norms" is "we win" and facism is just when they lose. The different agencies of the federal government should have considered what they were doing when they try to impede Republican presidents from lawfully implementing their agendas. The thing is, slippery slopes are...slippery. Trump wins a nailbiter in 2016 and so many people are spun up into hysterics. How was that for the national temperature? Biden is elected by a similarly slim electoral college win and everyone, including Biden himself, thinks he was elected to re-make the world in his image. How did that work out?

I agree with you, we should all abide by the maxim that we should never take more power than we would give our enemies. Problem is, Democrats don't actually believe their enemies should ever be allowed to have power. And thus we are here. If one side wins by the rules but doesn't get to govern within them, then maybe next time they win they'll just ignore them all together? Sorry, I don't take this argument sincerely when it's only applied to Trump, when the same people yelping now spent the last 15 years arguing that the Constitution was a hopelessly flawed document tainted from the beginning by evil and thus should be given as little reference or reverence as possible.

Again, I have far more disdain for the people who thought that the power was theirs by right of being right. But unfortunately, the rain falls on the just and the unjust alike.