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What do you mean by centrist? America doesn’t really have a left-wing political group, certainly not in any mainstream way. Obama referred to himself as a Reaga

by mlthoughts2018 6y ago

What do you mean by centrist? America doesn’t really have a left-wing political group, certainly not in any mainstream way. Obama referred to himself as a Reagan Republican and Biden is even more right-leaning. Even figures like AOC and Bernie Sanders are extremely anodyne, not at all “left wing” just barely more liberal than American centrists. The “centrist” view in America is extremely far to the right, which then allows factions like Trump’s to be far right to deeply fascist, racist extremes (this is not hyperbole, Trump is dangerously fascist) and yet still act like he’s just “on the right” because “centrist” positions in the US are themselves so deeply far right already. The US really urgently needs more mainstream far left politicians, instead of nearly-Republican examples like Harris, Warren, Biden, Buttigieg, etc. AOC & Sanders are the closest, but by no means do they represent views that are anywhere near being a healthy “far left” ideology to help draw a compromise from the far right and towards a healthier centrist position. “Centrist” in the US would at least be on the fence of letting individual own assault rifles, withdrawing federal funds for abortion, reducing the EPA and decommitting from international agreements on climate change, granting large tax breaks to corporations, eliminating social welfare programs for oppressed classes of people (in ways that overtly hurt the poor, minorities and women), and creating a legal chasm blocking any road to universal medical care, all while buying into jingoistic ideas about America being the best and dehumanizing other groups like immigrants and foreigners. That’s the centrist position in the US. When anything further left is even suggested, the socialism boogeyman is drummed up and huge populations of people will vote against it for no other reason than “socialism bad.” Any sense of acting like there’s a benign Republican core of ideas around states’ rights or lower taxes to be discussed in good faith is just gobsmackingly wrong about the US. That is just simply a falsehood. What passes for middle of the road, “good faith” centrist discussion is deeply far right already, and “both-sides-ism” where “liberals claiming all Trump voters are racist” is disingenuously used to act like it’s “the same as” the behavior of the American far right is both completely wrong and contributing to the problem.

manigandham 6y ago
Using what "left" and "center" mean in other countries to compare to American politics is pointless. There are clear left and right viewpoints in the US with centrist usually being a fiscally conservative and socially liberal mix of policies.
- mlthoughts2018 6y ago
  There is no longer a core of fiscally conservative but socially liberal citizens, that just does not exist. I also reject the premise of your first point. It doesn’t matter what the current within-country standard for left and right are, that’s useless semantics. All that matters is outcomes in peoples’ lives. A personal right to own assault rifles or limit federal funds for abortion (even if only for fiscal or states’ rights reasons) is emphatically far right in the sense of overall outcomes for lives, it does not matter what within-country label someone might want to call it by.
  - manigandham 6y ago
    If the labels are now useless semantics than what was the point of your original comment? > "far right in the sense of overall outcomes for lives" What's this even mean? You're now redefining the term into something entirely different.
    - mlthoughts2018 6y ago
      I did not say labels are meaningless. I said taking labels that have meanings, like far right vs far left, and trying to redefine them (semantic games) to be relative to some arbitrary standard within a single country (like saying “fiscal conservative but social liberal is “centrist” in the US” when in fact it all hinges on the fine points of those positions) is not helpful or useful. Political labels (not within-country labels at a point in time) can be useful. Far right and far left have long-developed meanings in terms of broad policies they endorse and those policies have meanings in terms of the actual measurable impact on lives and human flourishing. I feel your comment is not in good faith at all. Saying something like “what does this even mean” as a rhetorical deflection tactic when my comment was perfectly clear is very uncharitable and additionally it’s not contributing any new arguments or information, you’re just acting like the premise is unclear, but for no acceptable reason.
      - manigandham 6y ago
        The labels referring to political parties within a specific country will have meanings within that same context. > "to be relative to some arbitrary standard" That's what you were doing by saying the left isn't actually the left. Why? The left has a clear definition in the USA. You are redefining it for some reason. > "Far right and far left have ... meanings in terms of the actual measurable impact on lives and human flourishing." Yes, both extremes are generally terrible for lives. Was that the point? Otherwise no, I don't know what you mean. Perhaps you can answer instead of deflecting.
chasd00 6y ago
US individuals cant own assault rifles without special federal permits.
- mlthoughts2018 6y ago
  But belief they should be allowed to own them is quite widespread among Republicans / Libertarians. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/10/22/facts-about-guns-in-united-states/ https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/10/22/facts-about... > “ Other proposals bring out stark partisan rifts. Democrats, for example, are much more likely than Republicans to favor banning assault-style weapons (88% vs. 50%) and high-capacity magazines (87% vs. 54%).” You can also see in the charts in that link that even though a modest majority of all Americans believes there should be stricter gun laws, it is driven drastically by how dominant that view is among Democrats (86%) vs Republicans (where 69% say current gun laws are OK or are already too strict). I only chose this topic because it refutes the falsehood that there’s some core of reasonable centrists in America - there’s totally not. Many issues are like this example of gun laws where it is extremely partisan and where one version of the extreme partisan divide is usually considered “centrist” (for example, belief that gun laws are mostly OK as-is, which is a really right wing belief but is seen as “centrist”) but it actually belies America being heavily shifted to the far right by default, so it’s not really center.

manigandham 6y ago

Using what "left" and "center" mean in other countries to compare to American politics is pointless. There are clear left and right viewpoints in the US with centrist usually being a fiscally conservative and socially liberal mix of policies.

mlthoughts2018 6y ago
There is no longer a core of fiscally conservative but socially liberal citizens, that just does not exist. I also reject the premise of your first point. It doesn’t matter what the current within-country standard for left and right are, that’s useless semantics. All that matters is outcomes in peoples’ lives. A personal right to own assault rifles or limit federal funds for abortion (even if only for fiscal or states’ rights reasons) is emphatically far right in the sense of overall outcomes for lives, it does not matter what within-country label someone might want to call it by.
- manigandham 6y ago
  If the labels are now useless semantics than what was the point of your original comment? > "far right in the sense of overall outcomes for lives" What's this even mean? You're now redefining the term into something entirely different.
  - mlthoughts2018 6y ago
    I did not say labels are meaningless. I said taking labels that have meanings, like far right vs far left, and trying to redefine them (semantic games) to be relative to some arbitrary standard within a single country (like saying “fiscal conservative but social liberal is “centrist” in the US” when in fact it all hinges on the fine points of those positions) is not helpful or useful. Political labels (not within-country labels at a point in time) can be useful. Far right and far left have long-developed meanings in terms of broad policies they endorse and those policies have meanings in terms of the actual measurable impact on lives and human flourishing. I feel your comment is not in good faith at all. Saying something like “what does this even mean” as a rhetorical deflection tactic when my comment was perfectly clear is very uncharitable and additionally it’s not contributing any new arguments or information, you’re just acting like the premise is unclear, but for no acceptable reason.
    - manigandham 6y ago
      The labels referring to political parties within a specific country will have meanings within that same context. > "to be relative to some arbitrary standard" That's what you were doing by saying the left isn't actually the left. Why? The left has a clear definition in the USA. You are redefining it for some reason. > "Far right and far left have ... meanings in terms of the actual measurable impact on lives and human flourishing." Yes, both extremes are generally terrible for lives. Was that the point? Otherwise no, I don't know what you mean. Perhaps you can answer instead of deflecting.

chasd00 6y ago

US individuals cant own assault rifles without special federal permits.

mlthoughts2018 6y ago
But belief they should be allowed to own them is quite widespread among Republicans / Libertarians. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/10/22/facts-about-guns-in-united-states/ https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/10/22/facts-about... > “ Other proposals bring out stark partisan rifts. Democrats, for example, are much more likely than Republicans to favor banning assault-style weapons (88% vs. 50%) and high-capacity magazines (87% vs. 54%).” You can also see in the charts in that link that even though a modest majority of all Americans believes there should be stricter gun laws, it is driven drastically by how dominant that view is among Democrats (86%) vs Republicans (where 69% say current gun laws are OK or are already too strict). I only chose this topic because it refutes the falsehood that there’s some core of reasonable centrists in America - there’s totally not. Many issues are like this example of gun laws where it is extremely partisan and where one version of the extreme partisan divide is usually considered “centrist” (for example, belief that gun laws are mostly OK as-is, which is a really right wing belief but is seen as “centrist”) but it actually belies America being heavily shifted to the far right by default, so it’s not really center.