(February 7, 2019 at 8:17 am)Yonadav Wrote:

(February 7, 2019 at 5:18 am)Thoreauvian Wrote: As a reminder, yet again, here is the actual platform of the Democratic party from 2016:

https://democrats.org/about/party-platform/

Where exactly do you think this shows that "new Democrats" in the service of billionaires own the Democratic party?

As far as I am concerned, these are the positions on the issues which Democrats hope to vote for.  Whether we succeed or not has as much to do with Republican opposition as it does with our intentions.

https://newrepublic.com/article/130737/d...e-mcgovern

Nice dodge.  Now perhaps you can actually read the Democratic platform and let us know how it reflects Democrats in the service of billionaires.  

So far, I'm not convinced you have any clear idea what Democrats actually stand for in comparison to Republicans.

(February 7, 2019 at 9:23 am)Thoreauvian Wrote:

(February 7, 2019 at 8:17 am)Yonadav Wrote: https://newrepublic.com/article/130737/d...e-mcgovern

Nice dodge.  Now perhaps you can actually read the Democratic platform and let us know how it reflects Democrats in the service of billionaires.  

So far, I'm not convinced you have any clear idea what Democrats actually stand for in comparison to Republicans.

Really? You're one of those party loyalists who keeps insisting that Democrats are some sort of monolithic entity. You are loyal to the party no matter what direction they turn, and you seem to be oblivious to the fact that there really are factions within the party, what those factions stand for, and are oblivious to which faction is in control. I frequently get the feeling that you think that terms like 'The New Democrats' are informal buzzwords, because you keep conflating criticism of the New Democrats with criticisms of the Democratic Party in general.

You've waived your silly little pamphlet in my face quite a few times. I tried to have a discussion with you about why many of the people who have become disenfranchised with the direction that the Democratic Party has been going in since the rise of The New Democrats don't find that pamphlet to be very sincere. But you got angry and flipped the chessboard over. And then you came back with the pamphlet in hand, as if we never had that discussion.

Now I gave you a very good article to read, and you just came back with 'Nice dodge', despite the fact that The New Democrat's allegiance to tax cuts, trickle down theory, and corporate sponsors is discussed in the article. That's fucking vapid. You don't really have anything to say about anything other than "Republicans bad; Democrats good".  That's just negative partisanship. The problem with negative partisans is that they only care about the other party, and they are completely oblivious to their own.  I'm a Democrat. You're just a silly anti-Republican.

(February 7, 2019 at 10:27 am)Yonadav Wrote:

(February 7, 2019 at 9:23 am)Thoreauvian Wrote: Nice dodge.  Now perhaps you can actually read the Democratic platform and let us know how it reflects Democrats in the service of billionaires.  

So far, I'm not convinced you have any clear idea what Democrats actually stand for in comparison to Republicans.

Really? You're one of those party loyalists who keeps insisting that Democrats are some sort of monolithic entity. You are loyal to the party no matter what direction they turn, and you seem to be oblivious to the fact that there really are factions within the party, what those factions stand for, and are oblivious to which faction is in control. I frequently get the feeling that you think that terms like 'The New Democrats' are informal buzzwords, because you keep conflating criticism of the New Democrats with criticisms of the Democratic Party in general.

You've waived your silly little pamphlet in my face quite a few times. I tried to have a discussion with you about why many of the people who have become disenfranchised with the direction that the Democratic Party has been going in since the rise of The New Democrats don't find that pamphlet to be very sincere. But you got angry and flipped the chessboard over. And then you came back with the pamphlet in hand, as if we never had that discussion.

Now I gave you a very good article to read, and you just came back with 'Nice dodge', despite the fact that The New Democrat's allegiance to tax cuts, trickle down theory, and corporate sponsors is discussed in the article. That's fucking vapid. You don't really have anything to say about anything other than "Republicans bad; Democrats good".  That's just negative partisanship. The problem with negative partisans is that they only care about the other party, and they are completely oblivious to their own.  I'm a Democrat. You're just a silly anti-Republican.

No unlike Trumpsters we most certainly are NOT sheep. 

But AS VOTERS, and this is the part you keep missing in all this. REGARDLESS of party, a politician is only as effective as the pressure that is put on them to do what you want. So again, in terms of long term history, GOP voters have had long term, every day doing, every day planing, and every day saying, whereas the democrats back then GAVE UP, which forced our politicians to play under the GOP narrative and compete and compromise on their terms. 

The "New Democrats" as you so falsely want to use as a slur, are not in it for billionaires, are not in it to turn us into Cuba either.

(February 7, 2019 at 10:36 am)Brian37 Wrote:

(February 7, 2019 at 10:27 am)Yonadav Wrote: Really? You're one of those party loyalists who keeps insisting that Democrats are some sort of monolithic entity. You are loyal to the party no matter what direction they turn, and you seem to be oblivious to the fact that there really are factions within the party, what those factions stand for, and are oblivious to which faction is in control. I frequently get the feeling that you think that terms like 'The New Democrats' are informal buzzwords, because you keep conflating criticism of the New Democrats with criticisms of the Democratic Party in general.

You've waived your silly little pamphlet in my face quite a few times. I tried to have a discussion with you about why many of the people who have become disenfranchised with the direction that the Democratic Party has been going in since the rise of The New Democrats don't find that pamphlet to be very sincere. But you got angry and flipped the chessboard over. And then you came back with the pamphlet in hand, as if we never had that discussion.

Now I gave you a very good article to read, and you just came back with 'Nice dodge', despite the fact that The New Democrat's allegiance to tax cuts, trickle down theory, and corporate sponsors is discussed in the article. That's fucking vapid. You don't really have anything to say about anything other than "Republicans bad; Democrats good".  That's just negative partisanship. The problem with negative partisans is that they only care about the other party, and they are completely oblivious to their own.  I'm a Democrat. You're just a silly anti-Republican.

No unlike Trumpsters we most certainly are NOT sheep. 

But AS VOTERS, and this is the part you keep missing in all this. REGARDLESS of party, a politician is only as effective as the pressure that is put on them to do what you want. So again, in terms of long term history, GOP voters have had long term, every day doing, every day planing, and every day saying, whereas the democrats back then GAVE UP, which forced our politicians to play under the GOP narrative and compete and compromise on their terms. 

The "New Democrats" as you so falsely want to use as a slur, are not in it for billionaires, are not in it to turn us into Cuba either.

Negative partisans absolutely are too sheep. You obviously haven't read the article that I gave you. I gave you that article for your benefit, not mine. I wanted for you to be a little less ignorant.

(February 7, 2019 at 10:47 am)Yonadav Wrote:

(February 7, 2019 at 10:36 am)Brian37 Wrote: No unlike Trumpsters we most certainly are NOT sheep. 

But AS VOTERS, and this is the part you keep missing in all this. REGARDLESS of party, a politician is only as effective as the pressure that is put on them to do what you want. So again, in terms of long term history, GOP voters have had long term, every day doing, every day planing, and every day saying, whereas the democrats back then GAVE UP, which forced our politicians to play under the GOP narrative and compete and compromise on their terms. 

The "New Democrats" as you so falsely want to use as a slur, are not in it for billionaires, are not in it to turn us into Cuba either.

Negative partisans absolutely are too sheep. You obviously haven't read the article that I gave you. I gave you that article for your benefit, not mine. I wanted for you to be a little less ignorant.

Your patronizing is underwhelming.

(February 7, 2019 at 10:27 am)Yonadav Wrote: You're one of those party loyalists who keeps insisting that Democrats are some sort of monolithic entity. You are loyal to the party no matter what direction they turn, and you seem to be oblivious to the fact that there really are factions within the party, what those factions stand for, and are oblivious to which faction is in control. I frequently get the feeling that you think that terms like 'The New Democrats' are informal buzzwords, because you keep conflating criticism of the New Democrats with criticisms of the Democratic Party in general.

It would be truly astonishing if I was unaware of the factions within the Democratic or Republican parties. What I am loyal to is the party platform, and until you demonstrate that it favors billionaires, I will assume your claim that "New Democrats" control the party is just a far-left talking point.

(February 7, 2019 at 10:27 am)Yonadav Wrote: You've waived your silly little pamphlet in my face quite a few times. I tried to have a discussion with you about why many of the people who have become disenfranchised with the direction that the Democratic Party has been going in since the rise of The New Democrats don't find that pamphlet to be very sincere. But you got angry and flipped the chessboard over. And then you came back with the pamphlet in hand, as if we never had that discussion.

I think Democrats do a pretty good job of being inclusive. The question is where the sweet spot of the center of our demographics actually lies.

(February 7, 2019 at 10:27 am)Yonadav Wrote: Now I gave you a very good article to read, and you just came back with 'Nice dodge', despite the fact that The New Democrat's allegiance to tax cuts, trickle down theory, and corporate sponsors is discussed in the article. That's fucking vapid. You don't really have anything to say about anything other than "Republicans bad; Democrats good".  That's just negative partisanship. The problem with negative partisans is that they only care about the other party, and they are completely oblivious to their own.  I'm a Democrat. You're just a silly anti-Republican.

Your article is an opinion piece with which I do not agree. Whatever you are, IMO you believe you should be able to tell everyone else what to think without explaining yourself adequately. It is entirely possible we will never convince each other of anything, regardless of how often we exchange our perspectives.

(February 7, 2019 at 1:10 pm)Thoreauvian Wrote:

(February 7, 2019 at 10:27 am)Yonadav Wrote: You're one of those party loyalists who keeps insisting that Democrats are some sort of monolithic entity. You are loyal to the party no matter what direction they turn, and you seem to be oblivious to the fact that there really are factions within the party, what those factions stand for, and are oblivious to which faction is in control. I frequently get the feeling that you think that terms like 'The New Democrats' are informal buzzwords, because you keep conflating criticism of the New Democrats with criticisms of the Democratic Party in general.

It would be truly astonishing if I was unaware of the factions within the Democratic or Republican parties.  What I am loyal to is the party platform, and until you demonstrate that it favors billionaires, I will assume your claim that "New Democrats" control the party is just a far-left talking point.

(February 7, 2019 at 10:27 am)Yonadav Wrote: You've waived your silly little pamphlet in my face quite a few times. I tried to have a discussion with you about why many of the people who have become disenfranchised with the direction that the Democratic Party has been going in since the rise of The New Democrats don't find that pamphlet to be very sincere. But you got angry and flipped the chessboard over. And then you came back with the pamphlet in hand, as if we never had that discussion.

I think Democrats do a pretty good job of being inclusive.  The question is where the sweet spot of the center of our demographics actually lies.

(February 7, 2019 at 10:27 am)Yonadav Wrote: Now I gave you a very good article to read, and you just came back with 'Nice dodge', despite the fact that The New Democrat's allegiance to tax cuts, trickle down theory, and corporate sponsors is discussed in the article. That's fucking vapid. You don't really have anything to say about anything other than "Republicans bad; Democrats good".  That's just negative partisanship. The problem with negative partisans is that they only care about the other party, and they are completely oblivious to their own.  I'm a Democrat. You're just a silly anti-Republican.

Your article is an opinion piece with which I do not agree.  Whatever you are, IMO you believe you should be able to tell everyone else what to think without explaining yourself adequately.  It is entirely possible we will never convince each other of anything, regardless of how long we exchange our perspectives.

And this is typical of my experience with you. I give you a very well reasoned article that is solidly rooted in facts, and you disparage it as 'just an opinion piece'. Uh, OK. What was the opinion? Oh, yeah. The opinion was that the Republicans handled the defeat of Goldwater correctly, while the Democrats handled the defeat of McGovern very badly. OK. I didn't necessarily intend for you to agree with that opinion. That wasn't the point of giving you that article. I gave you that article so that you could look over the many facts that the opinion was based upon. And among those facts were facts about the Democratic neoliberals pushing policies that favored the wealthy. But you reason that since the facts are presented as a part of an opinion piece, then the facts are opinions. That's a pretty silly thing to do, isn't it?  

Let me ask you something, Jay. Don't you think that it is a little weird that we live in a society that gives us tax incentives for rent seeking, while taxing real productive income more heavily?  I mean sure, the lower income producers who have children get the Earned Income Tax Credit, but those who don't have children or are higher earning producers pay more tax than non-producing rent seeking billionaires. You don't see an aristocracy forming? The Second Estate? You know, a culture where the producers pay the taxes and the second estate lives handsomely on their cut of those taxes. I know that you are a big fan of Robert Reich, so I am certain that you have seen him explain how the working class pays taxes to the rich. You do realize that is exactly how the British aristocracy and the French second estate earned their incomes with no tax burden, right?

Hell, he prattled on about everything from slavery to the Holocaust.
None of which had anything to do with the current state of the union.

I think that was the point.  Rather than try to sell the american turd he'd created, he'd prefer to fling a few boilerplate lies and then paper that over by peddling nostalgia from "better times".

I particularly loved the part where president baby cages talked about the poor little bay-bees no ones executing.

(February 7, 2019 at 1:44 pm)Yonadav Wrote: And this is typical of my experience with you. I give you a very well reasoned article that is solidly rooted in facts, and you disparage it as 'just an opinion piece'. Uh, OK. What was the opinion? Oh, yeah. The opinion was that the Republicans handled the defeat of Goldwater correctly, while the Democrats handled the defeat of McGovern very badly. OK. I didn't necessarily intend for you to agree with that opinion. That wasn't the point of giving you that article. I gave you that article so that you could look over the many facts that the opinion was based upon. And among those facts were facts about the Democratic neoliberals pushing policies that favored the wealthy. But you reason that since the facts are presented as a part of an opinion piece, then the facts are opinions. That's a pretty silly thing to do, isn't it?  

Look at Kennedy and Johnson. I don't think McGovern was in the mainstream of Democratic thinking. I think Goldwater was an outlier as well, and only became more acceptable when the Republicans moved further right. I think Democrats need to move further left and that Republicans need to move back toward the center. The first will be ineffective without the second, and given the Trump disaster it might happen.

I'm a gradualist, as I mentioned elsewhere.

(February 7, 2019 at 1:44 pm)Yonadav Wrote: Let me ask you something, Jay. Don't you think that it is a little weird that we live in a society that gives us tax incentives for rent seeking, while taxing real productive income more heavily?  I mean sure, the lower income producers who have children get the Earned Income Tax Credit, but those who don't have children or are higher earning producers pay more tax than non-producing rent seeking billionaires. You don't see an aristocracy forming? The Second Estate? You know, a culture where the producers pay the taxes and the second estate lives handsomely on their cut of those taxes. I know that you are a big fan of Robert Reich, so I am certain that you have seen him explain how the working class pays taxes to the rich. You do realize that is exactly how the British aristocracy and the French second estate earned their incomes with no tax burden, right?

I never said we don't have big problems with money in the U.S. I just don't understand why current Democratic policies, as listed in the party platform, couldn't effectively deal with them if in fact they were enacted over Republican opposition. Please let me know what you would change in the platform, that you think favors billionaires.