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Republicans love the free market unless it doesn’t suit them. And Republicans secretly want big government, again big and small where it suits their and their d

• akira2501 4y ago
  Politicians love the people until they get their first lobbying check. This phenomenon isn't isolated to any particular ideology.
  • jakelazaroff 4y ago
    Only one particular ideology tries to pretend these are their values, though.
    • colechristensen 4y ago
      You seem to be insinuating that the only political party that isn't full of shit is the one you align with, when that particular disease is and has always been everywhere.
      • taylodl 4y ago
        There's a reason I don't align with the political party that's full of shit - because they're full of shit! It didn't used to be this way - I used to be a Republican (I'm no spring chicken, I've been around the block a few times). The Republican Party has earned my repudiation! And hey, the Democratic Party may earn my repudiation also but due to Duverger's Law (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger's_law) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger's_law) I'm pretty much stuck with being a Democrat until they become the worse option than the Republicans. At this point I don't see that happening for quite some time.
      • suture 4y ago
        That is not what is being insinuated. The charge is that Republicans advertise themselves as being the party of small government and the free market. That charge is true or false independent of the hypocrisy of other parties. Those hypocrisies can be brought up another time. Do you believe the Republican Party in North Carolina is being hypocritical in this instance?
        • colechristensen 4y ago
          I think four state representatives wrote a bill. State houses are full of idiots and really stupid bills are put forward all the time. Unless we're all residents of North Carolina AND there is a sense that this bill has traction, it is not worth any attention nor should it be thought of as representing a party's position.
          • suture 4y ago
            • colechristensen 4y ago
              Your snarkiness is inappropriate here and your politics a symbol of unhelpful political discourse everywhere in this country. I don't care what a few politicians wrote in a bill, it doesn't rise to what "North Carolina wants" or what their local party wants. You shouldn't take idiots so seriously or focus on this "ha! gotcha!" kind of political nonsense. The bill is stupid, the people sponsoring it are stupid, let's not inflate that to saying that everybody in their party is a hypocrite because of a bill they introduced. You want to go on a crusade against these individuals, go ahead, but it's generally uninteresting and unhelpful to anyone. If we focus on making broad generalizations based on stupid statehouse bills around the country, we will certainly never get anything done besides a lively bit of insulting each other.
              • suture 4y ago
                Don’t need to make a broad generalization to say that the proposal in question is hypocritical. One can say, “The people who made this proposal are being hypocritical and they are wrong for doing so.” It is always appropriate to admit that someone’s actions are hypocritical regardless of what “side” one is on. I believe the failure of people to point out individual acts of hypocrisy is what leads, overtime, to people making stereotypes. Importantly one should note that the leadership of the Republican Party fails to admonish those who came up with this dumb proposal. (Yes, Democratic leadership rarely calls out Democratic lawmakers making really bad proposals but right now we are talking about the Republican Party.). For instance, the leadership isn’t saying, “This is contrary to our principle of small government.” So it is OK to use a bit of a broad brush in this case.
      • netsharc 4y ago
        When the asshole is in the "other team": "What a scumbag that whole team is!" When the asshole is in "your team": "They're all equally crooked anyway!" There are individual politicians who try their darndest to be clean, but heck, if a little bending of principles gets your constituents that funding, it's probably easier to do so rather than fight hard for that funding "the right way" and get nothing at the end. Are lobbyists that evil that they offer money for politicians' noble causes? There's already the "we'll open an office in your constituency" that actually helps people with jobs...
      • CuriouslyC 4y ago
        You're not wrong, but the amount of blatant hypocrisy on the right is just on another level, particularly among the hardcore Christians. At least the democrats typically have the decency to be sex positive or openly gay before having a scandalous affair.
  • mywittyname 4y ago
    Donate money to the politicians you like. Politicians with a large number of small donors don't need to take money from lobbies. Campaigning isn't cheap and if you don't pay them, the lobbyist will (or will get them replaced). Complaining about money in politics is like complaining about the rain being wet. So might as well buy an umbrella like every other dry person did.
    • rgrieselhuber 4y ago
      Or just ban lobbying.
      • mitchdoogle 4y ago
        How is that supposed to work? Are we going to ban public comment? Are we going to leave politicians to make decisions entirely on their own without any expert advisors?
        • orwin 4y ago
          You can ban or limit financing. Make an upper 10 or 20k limit per campaign per person. Lobbyist can still participate in public comment, offer dinner at three star restaurants, write the law proposition/amendment for the politician, but the checks will be limited.
          • sgjohnson 4y ago
            Would require overturning a supreme court precedent or amending the constitution. Because the current settled law is that throwing money at politicians and them then spending it is speech that’s protected under the 1st amendment.
            • kgwxd 4y ago
              Then why can't I throw money at a cop to persuade them to not give me a ticket?
  • bpye 4y ago
    It is possible to have a system where politicians cannot receive donations from corporations. This is the case in BC for example.
• sacrosancty 4y ago
  It's because it's not a fundamental part of their identity. The same is true for all sorts of good-sounding political ideals - free speech, free trade, human rights, world peace, save the environment, anti-racism, etc. The two main parties swap "ownership" of these ideals back and forth through history because they don't actually care and are just using them to appeal to the meandering whims of voters, who also don't actually care and just use them to feel smug about their team. If you want someone who's consistent on liking the free market, find someone who make that ideal a part of their identity. Perhaps someone who calls themself a libertarian?
• phkahler 4y ago
  >> And Republicans secretly want big government, again big and small where it suits their and their donors’ interests The Democrats want to increase spending (services) and the Republicans want to increase control. Rather than "left" and "right" I once drew a 2D graph and placed a bunch of political parties (ideologies) on it. I don't recall what the axis were unfortunately. All I remember is that anarchy was in the lower left and totalitarian state was the upper right. It turns out the parties don't pull us back and forth left-right, one pulls us UP and the other to (on my graph) the right. Since what they want is not actually opposite, this seems to be pulling us ever more toward the totalitarian state in the far upper right.
  • colechristensen 4y ago
    >The Democrats want to increase spending (services) and the Republicans want to increase control. I don't think this really captures it at all. At this point the median Democratic and Republican seems to want low grade autocracy to enforce their vision of what is right on everybody. (I chose the word median carefully, not everyone believes this way, but it also isn't an extremest view, something like what somebody right in the middle of the party acts like)
  • anigbrowl 4y ago
    Did you draw it, or just fill it out? https://www.politicalcompass.org/ https://www.politicalcompass.org/ The political compass is a bit of a meme, albeit a useful one.
  • stjohnswarts 4y ago
    Democrats and Republicans all want to spend money, just on different things. Republicans do not want to pay for it and indeed lower government revenues to profit the 1%. Dems want to spend it on pork and social programs. This is the undeniable truth of American politics. Also republicans are becoming more fascistic and attempting to put agents in places (state government mostly) to overthrow the next Presidential election via throwing out Electors if they need to and the American public knows this but doesn't care.
• stjohnswarts 4y ago
  How is installing free EV charging at government owned facilities "the free market" ? There is nothing in there about stopping a shopping mall or private company from putting in free chargers.
  • qeternity 4y ago
    > First off, the bill wants businesses (restaurants etc.) with free charging stations to print at the bottom of every receipt how much of the customer’s bill goes towards subsidizing charging — whether the customers make use of the service or not. This is a gross overstep of government power, ignoring everything else in the bill.
    • stjohnswarts 4y ago
      Nitpicking, the overall arch of the bill is to stop government from providing free EV charging stations.
• Vladimof 4y ago
  > And Republicans secretly want big government secretly, both parties want the same thing... it's secretly the one-party state.
  • bradlys 4y ago
    Secretly it is also a one party state. A neoliberal one.
• johndevor 4y ago
  > Edit: To everyone mentioning Democrats, note that I did not. Systems thinking demands that you do.
  • bmitc 4y ago
    That’s a bit of a non-statement. I’m a big proponent of systems thinking. But in the case of the Republicans, they always like to bring up the “other side” to justify their extremist positions. As if the political spectrum could be placed on a 1D axis, the Republicans like to bring up Democrats as just the opposing opinion. It’s like saying, “look we’re just right of the Democrats and they’re left of us”, without acknowledging that the Republican Party is damn near right of everything and everyone else on this axis. They’re an extremist group who like to soften the perspective of their positions and policies by pointing to the other side. They literally threw their former presidential candidate and state governor under the bus because he was the only one who acknowledged Trump’s instruction as an assault on America. So, in fact, systems thinking would indeed say to pay strong attention to extremists. It’s the thinking that we keep treating the Republican Party as just another party, the way that they like it while they get away with whatever, is how we have got here.
    • johndevor 4y ago
      > systems thinking would indeed say to pay strong attention to extremists. Incorrect. Systems thinking demands that you look at the system (government, dems, repubs) in their entirety. "System" not "part of system". Anyway, g'day I'll let you have the last word if you'd like.