Republicans are quite simply un-American

[pecksniff]

Communists. Many have thumped the tub for communist government in Nicaragua, Cuba, Venezuela, Russia and elsewhere. They fully support the full repressive state that is the hallmark of every communist society, particularly freedom of speech.

Nicaragua and Venezuela were never communist, not even in their far-leftiest stages. You need to stop looking at the left end of the spectrum through the wrong end of a telescope. There are important differences between some leftists and others. Anarchists, for instance, are not extreme libertarians -- anarchism is a leftist tradition closely associated with Marxism but distinct from it. In a nutshell, libertarians oppose the state because they see it as a threat to private property, and anarchists oppose the state because they see it as a guardian of private property.

 

[Bud_Spencer]

Nicaragua and Venezuela were never communist, not even in their far-leftiest stages. You need to stop looking at the left end of the spectrum through the wrong end of a telescope. There are important differences between some leftists and others.

There's yer problem, right there.

 

[pecksniff]

There's yer problem, right there.

My only problem there is being right where you are wrong.

 

[Bud_Spencer]

My only problem there is being right where you are wrong.

Both were client states of Cuba and the old Soviet Union (in the case of Nicaragua).

You're a fool.

 

[pecksniff]

Both were client states of Cuba and the old Soviet Union (in the case of Nicaragua).

You're a fool.

Client states, yes; communist systems, no. The USSR no more insisted on that in Third World countries it supported than the U.S. insisted on democracy.

 

[Leather_Lesbian]

One of them has to go: The GOP or America as we know it


Texas is showing us all how the corruption that has overwhelmed the GOP has reached a crisis point, and it's killing people.

That's the Texas Republicans' motto: "Screw the people; we just do what's necessary to help out the fossil fuel billionaires who own us."

Back in 1999, then-Governor George W. Bush, himself of fossil-fuel multimillionaire, separated almost all of the Texas power grid from those of neighboring states to avoid federal oversight. He put the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) in charge of the largely then-privatized grid.

Bush called it, "The nation's most extensive experiment in electrical deregulation."

It turned out to be an extraordinary expensive and deadly experiment, one that burdens Texas to this day.

As The Wall Street Journal noted a few months ago: "Those deregulated Texas residential consumers paid $28 billion more for their power since 2004 than they would have paid at the rates charged to the customers of the state's traditional utilities, according to the Journal's analysis of data from the federal Energy Information Administration."

That money, of course, went mostly into the pockets of wealthy investors, power company CEOs, and filled the campaign coffers of Texas Republican politicians. It certainly didn't do much to reinforce or make the state's power generation systems or distribution grid more robust.

The result was that this past winter when climate change sent a massive cold wave down into Texas, an estimated 800 people died and the state suffered billions in property damage.
https://www.rawstory.com/one-of-the...l&utm_campaign=7327&recip_id=560588&list_id=1

 

[Jesus_Ateo]

Trump told top US general to ‘just shoot’ racism protesters


Trump highlighted footage of confrontations between law enforcement officers and protesters and said: “That’s how you’re supposed to handle these people. Crack their skulls!”

Trump also told law enforcement and military leaders he wanted the military to “beat the fuck out” of protesters and said: “Just shoot them.”

In the face of opposition from General Mark Milley and the then attorney general, William Barr, Trump said: “Well, shoot them in the leg – or maybe the foot. But be hard on them!”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jun/25/donald-trump-general-mark-milley-crack-skulls

 

[allison22]

The Republican Party is the biggest threat to American democracy today. It is a radical, obstructionist faction that has become hostile to the most basic democratic norm: that the other side should get to wield power when it wins elections.

A few years ago, these statements may have sounded like partisan Democratic hyperbole. But in the wake of the January 6 attack on the Capitol and Trump’s acquittal in the Senate on the charge of inciting it, they seem more a plain description of where we’re at as a country.

 

[allison22]

The Global Party Survey is a 2019 poll of nearly 2,000 experts on political parties from around the world. The survey asked respondents to rate political parties on two axes: the extent to which they are committed to basic democratic principles and their commitment to protecting rights for ethnic minorities.

The results of the survey show that the GOP is an extreme outlier compared to mainstream conservative parties in other wealthy democracies, like Canada’s CPC or Germany’s CDU.

The Republican Party's closest peers are almost uniformly radical right and anti-democratic parties. This includes Turkey’s AKP (a regime that is one of the world’s leading jailers of journalists), and Poland’s PiS (which has threatened dissenting judges with criminal punishment).

The verdict of these experts is clear: The Republican Party is one of the most anti-democratic political parties in the developed world.

 

[Bud_Spencer]

The Global Party Survey is a 2019 poll of nearly 2,000 experts on political parties from around the world. The survey asked respondents to rate political parties on two axes: the extent to which they are committed to basic democratic principles and their commitment to protecting rights for ethnic minorities.

The results of the survey show that the GOP is an extreme outlier compared to mainstream conservative parties in other wealthy democracies, like Canada’s CPC or Germany’s CDU.

The Republican Party's closest peers are almost uniformly radical right and anti-democratic parties. This includes Turkey’s AKP (a regime that is one of the world’s leading jailers of journalists), and Poland’s PiS (which has threatened dissenting judges with criminal punishment).

The verdict of these experts is clear: The Republican Party is one of the most anti-democratic political parties in the developed world.

The GOP has barely shifted at all in the past couple of decades in terms of how conservaive it is. The Dems, OTOH, have moved far, far left. We haven't gone nuts, you all have.

 

[vastiesmith100]

lies this tread is full of leftist

bull shit.

 

[Rightguide]

The thread starter is quite simply unbalanced and un-American.

 

[SecretSapphic]

Democrats want people to get vaccinated and save American lives.

Republicans want to halt vaccinations, get people to stop wearing masks and put millions of American lives at risk.

The Republicans are a bigger threat to America than ISIS and the Taliban combined.

 

[innocntplay]

Democrats want people to get vaccinated and save American lives.

Republicans want to halt vaccinations, get people to stop wearing masks and put millions of American lives at risk.

The Republicans are a bigger threat to America than ISIS and the Taliban combined.

We live in times where smart people are silenced so that stupid people won't be offended.

 

[spankednaked]

Retired Lt. Colonel Alexander Vindman believes Republicans who questioned him during the first impeachment of former President Donald Trump behaved more like his defense attorneys than legislators.

Vindman, who won a Purple Heart for wounds he received in Iraq in 2004, writes that he fully believed that at least some Republicans in Congress would see the president's behavior the way I did—as an obvious and unacceptable abuse of presidential power.

He goes on to describe his experience at the impeachment hearings and offers a generalized criticism of the Republican approach.

"As an active duty army officer, I'd hoped I would receive fairly evenhanded treatment from elected officials," Vindman writes.

"Early on, however, I realized that the Republican members were unified in one goal: to defend the president at all costs. Truth was their enemy, so my conveying the truth made me their enemy, too. They weren't there, I realized, to hear and weigh testimony."

"They didn't see themselves as legislators performing the duties incumbent upon them under the Constitution. Instead, it was a purely adversarial procedure," Vindman goes on.

"The Republican members seemed to have rationalized taking a role as defense attorneys, going to bat for the president, fulfilling an attorney's duty to provide a client with the best possible defense, regardless of his guilt.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/poli...-their-enemy/ar-AAMVXHi?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531

 

[Sean Renaud]

The GOP has barely shifted at all in the past couple of decades in terms of how conservaive it is. The Dems, OTOH, have moved far, far left. We haven't gone nuts, you all have.

Absolute bullshit. Ronald Reagan was to the left of Obama and Hillary. And we aren't even THAT far left anymore. We've made the unfortunate choice of assuming the right are capable of dealing in good faith.

 

[pecksniff]

The GOP has barely shifted at all in the past couple of decades in terms of how conservaive it is. The Dems, OTOH, have moved far, far left. We haven't gone nuts, you all have.

It's just the other way. The GOP has evolved into a true ideological party, while the Dems remain a coalition of interest groups.

 

[YDB95]

Absolute bullshit. Ronald Reagan was to the left of Obama and Hillary. And we aren't even THAT far left anymore. We've made the unfortunate choice of assuming the right are capable of dealing in good faith.

What Bud might be seeing - and I'm being VERY generous here - is that a few elected Dems are staking out genuinely left-of-center positions that used to be perfectly normal, like the idea that maybe shoveling ever more money to the rich at everyone else's expense isn't good for the country, or that a strong and well-maintained infrastructure is good for us all. After 30+ years of establishment Dems trying to win with the My Fair Lady Strategy ("Why can't a Democrat be more like a Republican?"), a real Democrat sounds like a wild-eyed radical to them.

 

[pecksniff]

We live in times where smart people are silenced so that stupid people won't be offended.

Other way around, actually.

 

[pecksniff]

The thread starter is quite simply unbalanced and un-American.

You are in no position to judge, traitor.

 

[ShyBiGuy954]

 

[pecksniff]

In those metaphorical terms, it is much, much more often the RW that calls apples bananas. For decades now the movement has been based on the assumption that facts are negotiable.

 

[YDB95]

In those metaphorical terms, it is much, much more often the RW that calls apples bananas. For decades now the movement has been based on the assumption that facts are negotiable.

They're also big on projecting. We see it here every day, including in that link you're replying to.

 

[innocntplay]

Republicans like Democrats are elected. In this new era there is some valid debate on the validity of elections.
Elected representation is what it is supposed to be.
Now non-elected are making decisions.

 

[pecksniff]

Republicans like Democrats are elected. In this new era there is some valid debate on the validity of elections.
Elected representation is what it is supposed to be.
Now non-elected are making decisions.

It was always so. No republic can function without career civil servants who remain in place from one election to the next.