Dillon Levenque

I know this has been discussed at length; if this thread is considered superfluous than it will fade away on its own.

There have been calls for the Left to move away from its antagonistic position re: Donald and the Republican Party. People say, both here and in the media, that the Democrats need to make an effort to understand the people who voted for Trump. I've waffled a little on this, but in the last couple of days I have made up my mind to waffle no more.

I say NO. Not now, not ever. Ted Nugent wants to knock off the hateful speech (he equates advocating assassination with hateful, apparently), fine. I'll not reciprocate. Bad enough that the Republican Party even allowed Donald into their primary. Maybe they believed he wouldn't stand a chance but to even let him appear as one of their candidates was vile. To not make sure he didn't get nominated was total cowardice and as far as I'm concerned, abdication. Own it, bastards.

You elected the person who personifies all that is worst about the worst of Americans, a person mentally unfit to lead a parade, much less a nation.
You made this bed. Lie in it and shut the fuck up.

The rest of us owe you nothing but contempt.

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Aribeth Zelin

The real problem is the DNC needs to understand their own supporters. They need to understand the progressive independents. And they need to actually support progressives instead of ignoring them because the individual isn't establishment. That or we need a new party that is actually progressive enough.

And yeah, I'm not going to let go of my own principles to normalize this mess.

But when people start to wake up and realize they got the offal instead of the prim rib, I'm not going to cast recriminations; I'll just expect them to help fix this mess.

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WolfEyes

And keep your damn mouths shut and your hands to yourselves while you are helping fix the mess YOU made of this country. You gave up the right to bitch, piss and moan when you let that rat bastard into your primary.

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Ramen Jedburgh

Wait wait...

People are calling for Democrats to be more polite? I mean isn't half the reason the Democrats lost last election because they don't do as much shit slinging in ads and whatnot as Republicans?

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detrius

Democrats won the majority of the vote.

The focus shouldn't be on wooing the privileged voters, who agressively attack anyone who doesn't treat them with the respect they feel they deserve, but on finally introducing fair and open elections to America.

Your problem is that the results of your elecions hang on a tiny number of swing states, gerrymandered counties and so on. Bring in things like proportional voting, alternative votes, make every vote count and you'll see vast improvements.

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Ishina

So I made an effort to understand Trump voters and what I learned was that they are all moronic assholes.

Can wrap this mystery up now. No need to thank me.

Beebo Brink

Think about it. Even with a candidate crippled by decades of Right Wing Hate Propaganda and an onslaught of Russian social media bots, Dems STILL won the majority of the vote.

We're on the right track.

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Argent Stonecutter

The majority of Trump voters make more than $50,000 a year.

And the "hateful speech" against Trump is the merest shadow of what Obama had to put up with.

From Trump, himself.

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Sid II

Both.
The Dems need to get a clear more liberal/progressive stance. And the country needs at least a third party, like a Labour party, maybe even a christian one (for the moderate Christians and Catholics) Three or even four bigger parties will mean a need to form coalitions most of the time. Coalitions mean moderate legislation.

Americans should stop believing that it is impossible to get a new nation wide big party on its feet.

Look what the French president Macron and his followers achieved in a few months.
He even got a majority in parliament from practically out of nowhere.

Plus, a major overhaul of the voting procedures and the powers of the president and congress would help a lot as well.

Casey Pelous

So this guy in a fistfight says to his opponent, "Hey, man, stop with all the punching and blocking."

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Argent Stonecutter

Under the US election laws, it pretty much is. The only time there's been a "third party" in the US has been when one of the existing parties was basically changing its name.

About that...

You'd have to get a majority of both parties to vote to basically weaken the powers of the parties.

Ambiguous

A major third party is not impossible, but pretty damn hard. The two party system does a yuge injustice to the disparity and diversity of our country. It's hard to contain it within two, and the two parties have a hard time catering to all. So they only cater to the money most of the time, until the voters get loud enough.

The US is just to geographically large, diverse, and the population too concentrated for a two party system to be effective. Something's gotta change.

Sid II

If independent candidates can run, why shouldn't it be possible for a third and fourth party to participate in elections?
I know that the way to that point will not be paved by neither the Dems or the Reps, but so what?
It can all start in one of the states, where a charismatic person runs for one of the jobs in Washington.
Of course it will take a handful of visionaries, tons of volunteers and a portion of struggle and time to make it into a new party from that point on.

Argent Stonecutter

Agreed, but short of farming the electoral process out to Australia or something, it ain't happening.

Kara Spengler

Yes, it was like when I saw someone wearing a MAGA hat the other weekend walking towards a pride parade. I was not about to hit him or yell at him. Neither was I about to warn him that he was headed towards a pretty dangerous area by wearing that particular piece of apparel though. If the Rs want to do something monumentally stupid that influences other people I have no idea why everyone else should be the ones to pull them back from the brink.

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Kara Spengler

The frustrating thing is anyone who talks about ANY voting system other than the one we have now gets shut down with 'DEY ARE AGUNST THE CON-STEE-TOOTION!!!!' by people who want it to stay as-is (usually the Rs) because they know that a majority of people will listen to that argument.

Kara Spengler

Not impossible but our system is rigged against it. For example, FEC funding does not go to every party who wants to run in an election.

Kara Spengler

Nothing. In fact there are quite a few parties, the greens on the left and the libertarians on the right being the biggest 2. Unfortunately our election laws (the place that enshrines such wonderful ideas as the electoral college) pretty much de facto keeps them from unseating the Ds or the Rs.

Soda Sullivan

As much as I would love to see a third party, ora forth, rise up and become a beneficial factor in our political process, I also live in the real world and understand the fact on the ground. We simply can't pull a Macron and create a third party that sweeps through office, our system does not allow for it. To pull of such a thing would take years of commitment and have to be built from the ground up. Americans in general, are quite lazy, we are great at protesting, but lousy at organising. We can barely get have the eligible voters interested in the elections at all, much less building a third party coalition.Nor is it needed. More people voted for Clinton than Trump. All the Democrats have to do is make sure the right people, in the right places, vote for them. It is that simple.

As for the OP, I agree to an extent. I have no problem calling Trump a narcissistic idiot. I refer to Sen. Mitch McConnell as Emperor Palpatine whenever possible. Ted nugent may be sincere, but I also think he is an ass. And I think everyone should scream loud and clear about how dangerous some of the actions that Congress is taking are going to be. I simply draw a line at blanket statements like "all Trump voters are moronic assholes" or "all Republicans want to destroy the country" or "All liberals are lazy snowflakes who want special treatment and free handouts". Perhaps it is where I have lived and how I have had to live, but I know, for a fact, that such comments are not facts, and thus do more damage than good.
While some of them surely need a mental workup and are very misinformed, I will not insult the Democrats who felt Trump was a better choice for them than Hillary Clinton.

Even in these tenacious, sometimes violent times, as long as I can still set across the table from the conservative farmer in his overalls in his John Deer hat, with me in my piercings and tattoos, and have a civil, often humorous discussion on what we agree on and what we don't, I will always try to avoid casting blanket statements about any one party, not matter how good it makes me feel. And if I slip, I know someone here will be fast to correct me.

WolfEyes

State and religion need to remain separate. Religion has no place in government. That includes political parties.

How long will Macron and his followers remain in power? How long will the party be popular? Such things can and do change literally over night.

WolfEyes

How many of the Clinton votes were votes against assTrumpet or were votes cast as the lesser of two evils? How many that voted for Clinton only voted for her because she was the best of a bad lot? How many of those only cast a vote for Clinton because Bernie didn't win the primary?

Remember when the American Independent Party was established? 1967/8. It was a huge deal back then. Remember George Wallace?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americ...nd_Information

Sid II

Isn't "In God we trust" on the dollar bill?
The president solemnly swears at the inauguration...
So state and religion are not separated completely.

We have that separation as well, but we do have a few parties based on religion.

It doesn't mean they start to build churches and stuff with tax money, it means that their political agenda is based on their faith, like helping the poor, be good for the elderly, anti abortion etc.
The Christian Democrats were the biggest party for decades.
And we were still (one of) the first with legislation about abortion, gay marriage and life ending.

WolfEyes

1) Only since 1957. The US was NOT founded on religion. The founders tried their damnedest to be sure religion would never be part of the US government. As far as I am concerned E pluribus unum is still our national motto.


2) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United...aths_of_office


3) They are separated completely. By the Constitution. It's the religious fanatics who have been trying to force religion into government in the past few decades.

What works for the Netherlands won't necessarily work for the US.

I'm sorry but I will never agree to politics based on religion in the US. That is what got us into this nearly insurmountable mess we are in now.

Aribeth Zelin

Most everyone's already covered this, but Coalitions won't work when the system isn't parlimentary - the US' isn't.

Not entirely, for a little while we did have multiple parties [as in, more than 2]. But truly viable ones haven't existed since before the US Civil War.

So much this. Also, the whole Pledge with 'One nation, under god'? That's from the same period. It was just to show that we weren't 'Godless Commies'. The original pledge, by the way, was written [without God] by a Baptist minister who was also a Socialist. An aside, I loath when people change someone else's art - and a poem is art.

But I won't even agree to my own faith being officially in politics, because with my luck we'd get the Fluffy Bunnies who would insist we all become vegans including our dogs and cats....

Jopsy Pendragon

And by going along with that, we let him use the outrage from 9/11 to justify pre-emptively invading a country that had -nothing-to-do-with-it-.

I agree. Not just no, but GdDmnFckngHll NO.