4 ms·

Must is liberal himself. He's just not far left.

by mc32 4y ago

camdat 4y ago
Define "far-left"
- mc32 4y ago
- throwaway0a5e 4y ago
  People who ignore the parts of Europe between the Oder and the Urals when contrasting US and European politics. Disclaimer: Trying to use this definition prior to the year 2000 is unsupported and will result in some really weird shit.
  - guerrilla 4y ago
    This comment is psuedointellectual brain-death. The only country it includes that isn't literally at war with the rest of Europe is 80% of Poland... who have health insurance.
    - mc32 4y ago
      There is a whole lot more to ex-iron curtain Europe than Poland, Ukraine and Russia. Baltics, Belarus, Hungary, Romania, Czechia, etc.
      - guerrilla 4y ago
        Nope. The Oder starts (barely) in the Czech Republic and the other 99.999% flows through Poland, ending in the Baltic Sea. The Baltic states are north of it (and also not the fascist paradises OP wishes they were) while the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Romania are south of it. Geography fail.
        mc32 4y ago
        I think you’re being geographically pedantic when the poster used metonymy. Figure of speech fail!
        guerrilla 4y ago
        They mentioned a country with more welfare than the US and then you mentioned a handful of countries you must not know anything about in order to list them together with the others... shrug As racist as Polish and Hungarian politicians are, they still do more from their people than any Americans do and would be called "socialists" by FOX news if they knew anything about them. And the Baltics, I mean, come on, what are you even talking about.
        scollet 4y ago
        throwaway0a5e 4y ago
        There are two points I was getting at with my heuristic. I primarily wanted to highlight that the people quipping about "there's no far left in the US" or "the far left in the US is the mainstream left in Europe" are far left hence why they don't see much to the left of them in the US. Left-right, tall-short, skinny-fat, if you find yourself on a spectrum and one side of you is sparsely populated you are the extreme by definition. Second, these people are generally ignorant of how far right some of the "other half" of Europe leans on social issues. Sure, they have lots of government services and safety nets, healthcare included. But they don't lean as far left on many social subjects as the US does. Identity politics, sexual orientation and abortions are three good examples of topics on which the left half of the bell curve of opinions on these subjects has more of it's meat to the right than the US equivalent. (Arguably a lot of this is a function of the US's history of reactionary politics but that's outside of the scope of this discussion, the positions today are what they are.) So even in a context that includes "nations who literally tried communism and kept the stuff they liked when they were done" the opinions of the "far" left in the US is decently out there.
        4y ago
warning26 4y ago
What a bizzare take. You’re suggesting that the person who announced his support for rightwing lunatic DeSantis is clearly actually a liberal? What definitely of liberal could possibly support such a position?
- mc32 4y ago
  It's not bizarre. He’s saying the left went so far left that his only reasonable choice is a guy on the right. Imagine that. A guy who has voted Democrat is now moved to vote for a right wing candidate because the left's policies have deviated so much. The far left have to come to terms that moderate liberals do not identify with people on the far left with their attitudes toward crime, identity politics, economics and other mainstream political issues that the moderate left of Bill Clinton and Gore of yore would not have supported. If Bill or Al Gore or Kerry of 2004 were running, Musk would vote for them. So would the many who will vote out some democrats in congress come 2024. In large part people voted for Biden because he promised to return to the mean --but instead has embraced the left wing of the party rather than the center of the Dem. party. You forget he's voted Democrat or independent in the US before now. He's leaving because he believes the left has left him (moving too far left for him).
  - warning26 4y ago
    Can you name even one Biden policy that is “far left”? I’d argue every republican candidate has moved much father right than Biden has moved left.
  - scollet 4y ago
    - dang 4y ago
      We've banned this account for massively breaking the site guidelines. I lost count at 150 comments in the last several hours. That's arson, regardless of how right you are or feel you are, and regardless of which side of whatever argument you happen to be on. Seriously not cool. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
scollet 4y ago
[flagged]

Must is liberal himself. He's just not far left.

by mc32 4y ago

Must is liberal himself. He's just not far left.

camdat 4y ago

Define "far-left"

mc32 4y ago
throwaway0a5e 4y ago
People who ignore the parts of Europe between the Oder and the Urals when contrasting US and European politics. Disclaimer: Trying to use this definition prior to the year 2000 is unsupported and will result in some really weird shit.
- guerrilla 4y ago
  This comment is psuedointellectual brain-death. The only country it includes that isn't literally at war with the rest of Europe is 80% of Poland... who have health insurance.
  - mc32 4y ago
    There is a whole lot more to ex-iron curtain Europe than Poland, Ukraine and Russia. Baltics, Belarus, Hungary, Romania, Czechia, etc.
    - guerrilla 4y ago
      Nope. The Oder starts (barely) in the Czech Republic and the other 99.999% flows through Poland, ending in the Baltic Sea. The Baltic states are north of it (and also not the fascist paradises OP wishes they were) while the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Romania are south of it. Geography fail.
      - mc32 4y ago
        I think you’re being geographically pedantic when the poster used metonymy. Figure of speech fail!
        guerrilla 4y ago
        They mentioned a country with more welfare than the US and then you mentioned a handful of countries you must not know anything about in order to list them together with the others... shrug As racist as Polish and Hungarian politicians are, they still do more from their people than any Americans do and would be called "socialists" by FOX news if they knew anything about them. And the Baltics, I mean, come on, what are you even talking about.
        scollet 4y ago
      - throwaway0a5e 4y ago
        There are two points I was getting at with my heuristic. I primarily wanted to highlight that the people quipping about "there's no far left in the US" or "the far left in the US is the mainstream left in Europe" are far left hence why they don't see much to the left of them in the US. Left-right, tall-short, skinny-fat, if you find yourself on a spectrum and one side of you is sparsely populated you are the extreme by definition. Second, these people are generally ignorant of how far right some of the "other half" of Europe leans on social issues. Sure, they have lots of government services and safety nets, healthcare included. But they don't lean as far left on many social subjects as the US does. Identity politics, sexual orientation and abortions are three good examples of topics on which the left half of the bell curve of opinions on these subjects has more of it's meat to the right than the US equivalent. (Arguably a lot of this is a function of the US's history of reactionary politics but that's outside of the scope of this discussion, the positions today are what they are.) So even in a context that includes "nations who literally tried communism and kept the stuff they liked when they were done" the opinions of the "far" left in the US is decently out there.
        4y ago

warning26 4y ago

What a bizzare take. You’re suggesting that the person who announced his support for rightwing lunatic DeSantis is clearly actually a liberal? What definitely of liberal could possibly support such a position?

mc32 4y ago
It's not bizarre. He’s saying the left went so far left that his only reasonable choice is a guy on the right. Imagine that. A guy who has voted Democrat is now moved to vote for a right wing candidate because the left's policies have deviated so much. The far left have to come to terms that moderate liberals do not identify with people on the far left with their attitudes toward crime, identity politics, economics and other mainstream political issues that the moderate left of Bill Clinton and Gore of yore would not have supported. If Bill or Al Gore or Kerry of 2004 were running, Musk would vote for them. So would the many who will vote out some democrats in congress come 2024. In large part people voted for Biden because he promised to return to the mean --but instead has embraced the left wing of the party rather than the center of the Dem. party. You forget he's voted Democrat or independent in the US before now. He's leaving because he believes the left has left him (moving too far left for him).
- warning26 4y ago
  Can you name even one Biden policy that is “far left”? I’d argue every republican candidate has moved much father right than Biden has moved left.
- scollet 4y ago
  - dang 4y ago
    We've banned this account for massively breaking the site guidelines. I lost count at 150 comments in the last several hours. That's arson, regardless of how right you are or feel you are, and regardless of which side of whatever argument you happen to be on. Seriously not cool. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

scollet 4y ago

[flagged]