View previous topic :: View next topic |
Author |
Message |
wannago
Joined: 16 Apr 2004
|
Posted: Sat Jun 18, 2005 8:19 am Post subject: |
|
|
Hank Scorpio wrote: |
The head of a political party should not overshadow their candidates. They should work behind the scenes and function as a powerbroker. Dean isn't playing that role because he either:
A) Doesn't know how to shut his big damned mouth.
or
B) Is an attention-starved megalomaniac.
Either quality is not something you want in the head of a party. The smart Democratic politicians are trying to distance themselves from the Dean trainwreck accordingly. |
How about C) All of the above?
I've never understood people's fascination with Dean. You would think that a party as diverse as the Democrats could come up with someone better. |
|
Back to top |
|
 |
sundubuman
Joined: 04 Feb 2003 Location: seoul
|
Posted: Sat Jun 18, 2005 10:34 am Post subject: |
|
|
W.T.Carl wrote: |
The only thing Dean is doing is rallying the left wing of the party. By doing this the middle and right factions (blue dogs) are growing very nervous about next year's election. The "move on" Al Franken types will run that party into the ground. The FDR style party is dead as he is. We shall see what happens in '06. |
Hopefully, Americans will eventually be given a real choice...Libertarian vs. Republican.
The Democrats have been a coalition-building, race/class/gender-baiting, opportunistic bunch for way too long. Ideas are the last thng they worry about. It's all about dissing the WHITE MAN....
which is ironic...
May they rest in peace..... |
|
Back to top |
|
 |
Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
|
Posted: Sun Jun 19, 2005 12:05 am Post subject: |
|
|
sundubuman wrote: |
The Democrats have been a coalition-building, race/class/gender-baiting, opportunistic bunch for way too long. Ideas are the last thng they worry about. It's all about dissing the WHITE MAN.... |
What are you babbling about? The Democrats are too big a party across too wide a spectrum to simply dismiss it as a whole as the PC-clan. |
|
Back to top |
|
 |
Nowhere Man

Joined: 08 Feb 2004
|
Posted: Sun Jun 19, 2005 12:50 am Post subject: ... |
|
|
Quote: |
The Democrats have been a coalition-building, race/class/gender-baiting, opportunistic bunch for way too long. Ideas are the last thng they worry about. It's all about dissing the WHITE MAN.... |
Right, so what's that make the Republicans?
A racist, class-based, chauvanistic bunch who, by virtue of "patriotic" wars, convince their working class supporters that the tiddles they toss off the plate to them, like tax cuts, are the piddle they should drink with satisfaction.
Delish. |
|
Back to top |
|
 |
Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003 Location: Established in 1994
|
Posted: Sun Jun 19, 2005 1:20 am Post subject: |
|
|
Quote: |
Libertarian vs. Republican |
I've always thought of Libertarians as just Republicans on steroids in terms of economic policy and attitude to government. Am I wrong? |
|
Back to top |
|
 |
Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
|
Posted: Sun Jun 19, 2005 6:56 am Post subject: |
|
|
Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
I've always thought of Libertarians as just Republicans on steroids in terms of economic policy and attitude to government. |
Yes, but the Libertarians are actually sincere when they call for less government. They also do not tend to support legislating morality in any form (be it liberal or conservative), and they do not back the entire religious agenda of some of the Right. |
|
Back to top |
|
 |
mithridates

Joined: 03 Mar 2003 Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
|
Posted: Sun Jun 19, 2005 7:20 am Post subject: |
|
|
Sounds like Dogbert. Okay, let's get them into power. |
|
Back to top |
|
 |
thepeel
Joined: 08 Aug 2004
|
Posted: Sun Jun 19, 2005 11:14 pm Post subject: |
|
|
Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
Quote: |
Libertarian vs. Republican |
I've always thought of Libertarians as just Republicans on steroids in terms of economic policy and attitude to government. Am I wrong? |
Generally Libertarians seek to demolish government to a skeleton. Protection of private property and certain amount of Law and order stuff would the her only functions. A standing army is also usually opposed in lieu of a well armed population.
They also endorse an isolationist foreign policy, with NO WAR.
And having fun will be ok too.
There has been much talk recently about a Libertarian Republican divorce. The two sides seem to suffer for irreconcilable differences. |
|
Back to top |
|
 |
Hank Scorpio

Joined: 18 Jan 2003 Location: Ann Arbor, MI
|
Posted: Mon Jun 20, 2005 12:38 am Post subject: |
|
|
BJWD wrote: |
There has been much talk recently about a Libertarian Republican divorce. The two sides seem to suffer for irreconcilable differences. |
I don't see how this would really be feasible. I'd probably say I'm a more libertarian than a social conservative, but personally I'd never say I'm a Libertarian, because like most political movements (socialism, etc) when you take it to it's logical endpoint it ceases to work.
There's also the fact that when you've got a party saying that we shouldn't have gone into AFGHANISTAN, which to my mind is the very definition of a justified war, you're not going to win over many Americans. They just take the ideology and Ayn Randism way too damned far.
Nope, people like me, although we may dislike social conservatism don't have much of an alternative. Vote for the hate America left? I don't think so, cousin. I'll swallow the somewhat bitter medicine before I'll ever vote for Moveon.org's man of the hour. |
|
Back to top |
|
 |
Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003 Location: Established in 1994
|
Posted: Mon Jun 20, 2005 3:28 am Post subject: |
|
|
Quote: |
Yes, but the Libertarians are actually sincere when they call for less government. |
Are you saying Republicans are not sincere when they say 'small government' and 'Government is not the solution. Government is the problem'? I'm shocked, Kuros. Shocked, I say.
Quote: |
Generally Libertarians seek to demolish government to a skeleton. |
But then they've never had a government to control. What they would do once in office might not be any different than what Republicans claim they want to do until they get in office.
So far, no one has disagreed with my original definition of Libertarians.
IMO, the key reality that the Libertarians miss is that Americans only want a small government when it comes to dealing with the other guy's problem. I'm reminded of how Koreans want open markets in other countries but don't want to open their own markets. Same thinking pattern. (People are people, after all.) |
|
Back to top |
|
 |
thepeel
Joined: 08 Aug 2004
|
Posted: Mon Jun 20, 2005 7:30 am Post subject: |
|
|
Hank Scorpio wrote: |
BJWD wrote: |
There has been much talk recently about a Libertarian Republican divorce. The two sides seem to suffer for irreconcilable differences. |
I don't see how this would really be feasible. I'd probably say I'm a more libertarian than a social conservative, but personally I'd never say I'm a Libertarian, because like most political movements (socialism, etc) when you take it to it's logical endpoint it ceases to work.
There's also the fact that when you've got a party saying that we shouldn't have gone into AFGHANISTAN, which to my mind is the very definition of a justified war, you're not going to win over many Americans. They just take the ideology and Ayn Randism way too damned far.
Nope, people like me, although we may dislike social conservatism don't have much of an alternative. Vote for the hate America left? I don't think so, cousin. I'll swallow the somewhat bitter medicine before I'll ever vote for Moveon.org's man of the hour. |
A couple things... The ones who worship Rand are called Randoids, not Libertarians. Also, if Afghanistan was worth the war, then finish the job. If it was in the name of national defence, wipe them off the map. Self defense doesn't mean nation building, it means killing every threat and perceived threat when necessary. Afganistan should be a giant mirror if it was actually worth the fight.
Also, if Americans want limited or no government in such and such situation it is only because those are the ideas and values that have been sold to them. We are educated by state employees for 12 years and surprise!, we end up accepting the state as a necessary institution.
I would consider myself a fairly aggressive libertarian and would like nothing more than to see the Canadian (my 'home') government burn and when I talk with my libertarian friends we don't ever disagree on this. |
|
Back to top |
|
 |
mithridates

Joined: 03 Mar 2003 Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
|
Posted: Mon Jun 20, 2005 7:43 am Post subject: |
|
|
Ah, didn't like Martin's 4.5 billion here for NDP votes, a few hundred million here and there to impress the provinces before the big vote in parliament? I could scarcely believe how much money he was throwing around to stay in power.
It worked though.  |
|
Back to top |
|
 |
thepeel
Joined: 08 Aug 2004
|
Posted: Mon Jun 20, 2005 8:26 am Post subject: |
|
|
mithridates wrote: |
Ah, didn't like Martin's 4.5 billion here for NDP votes, a few hundred million here and there to impress the provinces before the big vote in parliament? I could scarcely believe how much money he was throwing around to stay in power.
It worked though.  |
We should expect nothing else. He will buy off the special interest groups while having his bum gently massaged by the CBC/TSTAR/GnM. But really, Harper would have done the same.
I vote NDP. Crazy, I know. But when they finally come to power and begin to destroy the economy, Alberta (my real home) will separate and we can bid farewell to the unworkable Canadian project. |
|
Back to top |
|
 |
mithridates

Joined: 03 Mar 2003 Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
|
Posted: Mon Jun 20, 2005 9:00 am Post subject: |
|
|
Well, another Albertan. I'm from Calgary, Dalhousie to be specific. If I were in Canada right now I would vote Green, then Conservative, then who knows what.
I did like Chretien for his sheer invincibility though. He was the teflon man. |
|
Back to top |
|
 |
mithridates

Joined: 03 Mar 2003 Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
|
|
Back to top |
|
 |
|