Why left/right thinking is outdated

[Youch]

"Left/Right" is for simpletons. Republican/Democrat is for the partisan "Go Teamers." Neither properly define the issues.

The issue is and always has been about political philosophy. Modern liberalism vs. Conservatism. THAT is the issue, the debate and the Rosetta Stone against which we should measure all candidates. Everything else is a distraction and merely doodling in the margins.

I agree with you - but shouldn't Liberalism and Conservatism each be split into two or three smaller 'subsets'?

To me there is a huge distance between the outer right wing of the Tea Party and the centrist thinking of many consrvatives - which is why it amazes me that on this board we see so much of the GOP = Good, Dem = Evil (and its opposite).

Finally, someone engaging in actual dialog. Thank you.

First of all, the GOP is the Republican Party establishment. Not a representation of a political philosophy. Party, not philosophy. If the GOP was conservative, they would have de-funded Obamacare, for example. Not Boehner, not a single prominent Republican is even talking about defunding or repealing Obamacare......that massively irresponsible expansion of government benefits them as it grows the federal government in both size and scope, and thus grows their power base. Obama's $860 BILLION dollar stimulus was sold to the American drones as funding "shovel ready jobs" yet virtually not a whiff of federally funded infrastructure has been funded or built, while the lion's share of that money, OUR MONEY, was spent on vote-buying schemes such as food stamps, and kickbacks to unions, etc...., and not a single GOPer is saying crap about it. Get my point? The GOP is almost as bad as the libs. THUS, a distinction MUST be made between self-serving political parties and vastly opposing political philosophies.

I don't agree that two opposing political philosophies can be split into subsets. I understand there are differing social and economic positions, and that there are some blurry lines especially when talking about libertarians. Conservatism is NOT religious, as the low-information lefties throw out as fear-mongering. Conservatism is basically Constitutionalism. And not even in a radical way. Liberals are ALWAYS pushing away from and against it.

I could go on for hours. Let me summarize with this point. Have you noticed, perhaps not, that progressivism always goes in one direction, and any step to slow it down is smeared as radical. In other words, that political structure that worked so well for us until 1913 is somehow archaic, yet since then the size and scope and power of government, OVER US, has grown exponentially and become more and more dysfunctional, yet any attempt to fix it (i.e., the Tea Party) is smeared as radical, racist, homophobic and all sorts of inarticulate nonsense. Recall, if you please, that citizens created the states, and state legislatures created the federal government largely to address foreign affairs and interstate commerce, yet know we are beholden to that federal government for EVERY GOD DAMN THING IN OUR LIVES, from light bulbs to toilets to school lunches, and yet they WANT MORE of our property to fund their growth?

And you want to doodle at the margin by talking about subsets??

As you can tell, I'm not a big fan of the fence-sitters who call for being centrist, as pandering to the middle always leads to capitulation, which always leads to the expansion of our federal government. Expansion of the federal government ALWAYS is done at the cost of individual freedom. Do you see the difference between conservative and liberal?

 

[Picaro]

It no longer matters. Corruption is choking the U.S. to death, and it will end up like every other corrupt regime around the planet, with a very small, clan-centric group of the very wealthy sitting on a very large group of poor people. Neither Party is interested in ending this trend, and in fact are enthusiastic in speeding it up. It's about identity politics, not ideology and philosophy. Most Americans want more corruption, not less; if they didn't there wouldn't be nearly as much and they wouldn't be voting for more of it Governments are a reflection of those cultures it governs, democratic, republican, parliamentary, communist, fascist, dictatorship, all reflect their people. It can't be any other way.

 

[Youch]

It no longer matters. Corruption is choking the U.S. to death, and it will end up like every other corrupt regime around the planet, with a very small, clan-centric group of the very wealthy sitting on a very large group of poor people. Neither Party is interested in ending this trend, and in fact are enthusiastic in speeding it up. It's about identity politics, not ideology and philosophy. Most Americans want more corruption, not less; if they didn't there wouldn't be nearly as much and they wouldn't be voting for more of it Governments are a reflection of those cultures it governs, democratic, republican, parliamentary, communist, fascist, dictatorship, all reflect their people. It can't be any other way.

I agree with much of that. But it can be "any other way." It's called apathy, dumbing-down and dependency. More people are concerned about their iPhone apps and games, or the Kardashians, and/or have been maleducated in history and civics, perhaps intentionally. People don't WANT corruption, they simply are too lazy or ignorant to want to deal with it, which only benefits the politicians who prey on that by way of more Government Cheese, i.e., vote-buying schemes. And it is only going to get worse when King Obama, himself, changes the racial and cultural demographics by, against the will of the majority of Americans, giving amnesty to millions of future dependents.