(07-26-2020 09:19 AM)450bench Wrote: (07-26-2020 09:13 AM)Fo Shizzle Wrote: (07-26-2020 08:52 AM)450bench Wrote: (07-25-2020 08:36 PM)Fo Shizzle Wrote: The problem is the same on BOTH sides. The radicals get the most attention. Most on the Left and Right are closer to the center than either would like to admit. Its the fcking moonbats that seem to control the agendas. Ill fully admit the Left has more radical moonbats..but..Like my late mother... most liberals are more pragmatic than is being portrayed. My mom did not have a mental illness. She died from a 12 year battle with cancer.
No it’s not on both sides. You ever see a conservative riot, want to remove police, frame the president of the United States, beat the shiiiit out of liberals for just being liberals, attempt to completely take over cities etc. etc.
So tired of people saying it’s on both sides, the mess we are in. That’s complete bs.
I haven’t seen a liberal capable of having a normal conversation about politics in, oh, 4 years. They are collectively condescending, judgmental, political sickos, who see everything in the prism of “their way is the only way” and if you disagree you’re a racist person with no intelligence.
Save the “it’s on both sides” nonsense for another subject.
Ok..I'll agree to drop that slant if you will agree to not post hyperbole like "Liberalism is a mental illness." Fair enough?
Negative. Not gonna do it. Why? Because that’s what it’s become. Look, we need both parties to thrive. That’s what makes this country so magical. It’s a check and balance with reasonable people on both sides. THAT’S where your argument applies because coming to reasonable agreements, while possible, is so difficult, even under normal means of measure.
Right now, since Trump won, liberals have truly lost their minds and total control of their own sanity.
Here's the way I see it. The left has an agenda. It's not a good one, IMO, but it is a clear one, and they are devoted to it. Republicans don't. The last time republicans made it about ideas was Newt's contract in 1994, and that was their biggest electoral victory ever. But by 1996 they had lost the plot. I want republicans to have some ideas--and walls and tariffs aren't the ones I want to see.
The problem I see is that the intellectual center of the republican party has become dominated by neocons--who used to be national security democrats but left over the drug and counterculture and anti-war movements of the 1960s. Their idea of conservative social policy is do what democrats want, only don't spend as much on it. And their idea of foreign and military policy is that any war is worth fighting, but not winning.
The democrat welfare plantation has stifled Black advancement out of poverty for 50 years, and has replaced what used to be the amazingly strong Black family (if you had Black friends in the 1950s and 1960s, you know what I'm talking about) with 75% of Black children growing up in fatherless homes. It's not hard to come up with a better alternative, so why haven't republicans done so? How about a simple universal basic income instead of the current hodgepodge of means-tested welfare programs with their bloated administrative costs, school choice to give inner-city Black children the chance of a better education, improved vocational education to give them a better chance to earn a decent living, enterprise zones to encourage capital investment in poor and minority neighborhoods, and universal health care on the Bismarck model?
Universal health care is a good idea. Single-payer isn't. Bismarck is. And it's pretty easy to explain why. It's also pretty easy to explain why for the others. Reprise Ross Perot's PowerPoint approach. That's a pretty good way to explain ideas simply.
Conservatism means a balanced budget. The only way to get there from here is a consumption tax. Do what Europe does to afford its welfare state--a consumption tax plus lower, flatter, and broader (by eliminating exclusions and deductions) income taxes. Bowles-Simpson recommended that income tax approach, and Domenici-Rivlin recommended that income tax approach and also a consumption tax. Europe manages to provide both a more comprehensive safety net and a more tax-efficient climate for investment and growth than we do. We do okay on the investment and growth side because we win in so many other areas, but why not win tax too and slam-dunk the decision process?
Military and foreign policy? Treat your friends better than you treat your enemies, and never fight a war that you don't intend to win. We are in Cold War II, and China is our enemy. So act like it. Quit getting people killed and maimed in Mideast wars between people who have been fighting each other for thousands of years, and will continue doing so for thousands of years after we leave. Focus on China. We beat the Soviets in Cold War I, and kept it cold, because Truman bribed up an alliance to contain them, and then Reagan turned up the heat on their economy and broke them. We can reprise the same strategy against China. Bribe up an alliance around the first island chain--Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Philippines, and Taiwan. Throw in India, Thailand, Vietnam, Australia, Japan, and South Korea. If we or our allies control the first island chain, we can destroy the Chinese economic model any time we want to. As far as friends, move closer to the British Commonwealth. Offer UK membership in NAFTA/USMCA the day after Brexit becomes effective. Extend that to the Commonwealth. Let the Commonwealth countries take on some of our world policeman duties in return.
Those are some policy ideas I would like to see some party adopt. They are anathema to democrats, but republicans could adopt them
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Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s powerful speech against misogyny in Congress was overdue
