this post was submitted on 06 Dec 2023
996 points (97.9% liked)
Memes
45719 readers
1057 users here now
Rules:
- Be civil and nice.
- Try not to excessively repost, as a rule of thumb, wait at least 2 months to do it if you have to.
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
I don't know how to feel about this election as an ameribro.
I'm left-libertarian (upper case left, lower case libertarian) on the political compass, which is practically not represented in US politics, so I'll take whatever I can get. Biden is, realistically, the best I can hope for this election cycle. He's not great, there's a lot of big policy issues I diverge with him on pretty sharply (both on left and libertarian), but the other candidates for the DNC are a hot fucking mess. As for the libertarian party, it's actually insane. Gary Johnson got booed for saying he'd want people to have driver's licenses to drive. That's a no go for me. And as far as the conservatives go, they run the gamut from not an instant disaster (I guess) to the loud, proud, and complete end of the republic.
Biden has at least done some things that I kinda like, and doesn't seem keen on destroying the republic. I'd love to get a reformer in and sweep Reaganism out on its wrinkled, swampy ass forevermore, but I don't think that's realistic at this point. Where I start getting worried is that the Biden campaign seems dead set on repeating some frankly terrible HRC '16 strats, which, well, we saw how well that worked for her, but the pro-Biden response is "Trust me bro, Trump is actually unelectable this time". I'm also concerned because, let's face it, Biden's old enough that he could get struck down with a stroke or what have you at any minute.* Every day, the cosmic dice are getting more and more weighted against him. The democrats have done very little to make a case for a possible candidate/president Harris, where the republicans have laid a LOT of groundwork against her. If Biden bites it or gets incapacitated, Harris is going to have a huge uphill climb in front of her.
I guess where I get uneasy is that it feels like the democrats are making a lot of avoidable and predictable mistakes, and they're just banking that it won't blow up in their face this time because, uh, what, that was that time, this is this time? They could do better, but they're just going to choose not to, and be shocked if shit goes sideways.
*I mean, so could Trump, but I'm not hoping that he wins.
Not OP but gonna explain a bit about it nonetheless:
Other than the US use (generally meaning anarcho-capitalist, selfishly ignorant or both), libertarian is just the opposite pole of the "how much do we let people control us" axis from authoritarian.
So basically a left-libertarian (which is a big spectrum of different political philosophies) is broadly speaking someone who doesn't believe in inherent authority but DOES believe in rules and various degrees of enforcement to defend the powerless from the powerful.
Isn't that left liberal? Libertarian is liberal right on that compass.
Right goes to laissez Faire markets and liberal is the opposite dimension of authoritarian.
One shame less in your life: you are not reading Ayn Rand.
No. Liberalism is a center-right to right wing ideology that's inherently capitalistic and permissive towards business. If Rupert Murdoch was still in Australia, he'd be supporting the Liberal Party.
Only the ahistorical and deliberately misleading US definition.
Rupert Murdoch (through his media companies) still very much does support the Liberal party.
Good point. I meant he'd be supporting ONLY the Liberal Party but might as well be accurate 😁
I'm not in the US, no, but am intimately familiar with most of the terms, themes and national level events as I've been following and debating thoroughly for half my so far 40 years lol, so you don't have to worry about me not getting it 🙂
Ah ok, sorry about that. I get a lot of people assuming that, so I was the one making an ass out of you and me this time 😁
As for the rest, I think I'm just going to leave it be since I've described the broad strokes pretty accurately already and it's semi-late here so I'm gonna go catch some Zs if I can. Sleep tight yourself when you get that far!
You're very welcome and I'm very happy if you do!
Unless you understand better that you love Ayn Rand now, of course 😛😆
That town would be built and maintained by literal slaves.. Slaves that they would probably feed to said bears if they complained.
They aren't confusing the terms. It's just that "libertarians" in the US are largely viewed as right-wing anti-authority, whereas on the global stage, they're kindof like normal anarchist-lite. If you say, "well that's not very specific", then yes that's correct.
They still aren't confusing the terms. They made it very clear where they were coming from and now it's been clarified further.
Do not demand that the discussion be as ignorant as you were at the start of it. That's pathetic.
No that's incorrect. The are right wing as in market liberal but also anti-authorian.
I get the impression that people write different things on their compass but mean the same thing.