(April 21, 2017 at 2:59 pm)Minimalist Wrote:(April 21, 2017 at 11:46 am)Brian37 Wrote: Oh so you know him personally?
This is the same crappy argument I hear from the far right about Islam, "Let em take care of their own countries".
No sorry, our map wont expand thinking like that. Do you want more blue states or do you simply want to keep losing? Do you want a more secular middle east?
Yes I agree that the middle of the country is still far to conservative, but no you don't have any clue what you are talking about when it comes to my personal friend. My Mom was a mostly lifetime voting republican and she raised me in pluralistic Northern Va.
How many times have we heard from far right bigots "If you don't like America leave", now here you are telling a fellow liberal "If you don't like your state leave".
I will defend my friend and no, he doesn't have to move, he has as much right to stay where he is at as atheists have the right to live in America.
This is why we keep losing. We allow the GOP to divide the races. We allow the GOP to pit urban poor against republican rural poor and I will not abandon an liberal in any state. He doesn't want us saying "fuck you" to him, he wants our help so he can flip Oklahoma blue. And they did have a DEMOCRAT governor at one point, so it is bullshit to say we shouldn't try.
You are not going to pull that "us vs them" crap trying to pit me against a very kind empathetic person. My suggestion is that you get to know people first and only judge the individual. I am fine going after bigots, but just like Muslims I will not lump all "rednecks" in one lump. Just like some atheists whom are not "rednecks" do support Trump.
Now you talk of percentages. You do understand 30 years ago the polls asking if Americans would consider atheists for public office were nothing, and while we may not be at the top of the list, the polling is far better now.
So you would not vote for John because he likes banjos and country music even if he is for LGBT and is for the economic left? Stupid to me as a tactic if you want our policies to cover more of the nation.
"We will never get those red states" sounds like "we will never have a black president".
Sure, if you've already written liberals in those states off we wont grow long term.
No, I don't know him, other than what you've said which I'll accept at face value. But it doesn't matter. He is clearly outnumbered by the assholes. If he wishes to stay where he is then he will have to deal with state and local governments which deny medicaid expansion, deny LGBT rights, which seek to force women to have ultrasounds before abortions and try to make them impossible to get under any circumstances. They can have pipelines on their front lawns while the state poisons them with lead in their water to save money. They can have governors who trash state budgets while cutting taxes on billionaires and corporations ( which are really the same thing) and then seek to punish children by cutting education budgets but they always have the money for death penalty cases, more prisons (privately run at excessive cost, of course) and to defend the utterly unconstitutional laws they pass all the way to the supreme court! One of the consequences of having an electorate which falls for slogans and flag-waving is that the upper classes dominate while the poor get fucked over more and more but what can you do when it seems that all they want is very simple solutions to complex problems and if they don't work they will close their eyes, click their heels together, say "I want to go home" and convince themselves that things are better anyway.
Be clear about something. I don't give a shit about the 60-million odd morons who voted for the WLB. Given population increases he did no better with his base than McCain and Romney did. They are assholes for a variety of reasons perhaps but assholes nonetheless. You aren't getting them "back." You haven't had them since Nixon with his "moral majority" horseshit. My complaint is with the Democrats and so-called Progressives/Independents who sat on their asses because Clinton was not "perfect." Well, if you intend to wait for "perfect" then you may as well give up now because perfect never runs in our elections. The system mitigates against it.
I'm glad I'm old. I won't have to watch the slow-speed train wreck that America is becoming for very long.
He'd agree that there are far more deeply religious people than their are redneck liberals yes, but how the fuck does that help the coast states who just lost the rust belt and how does that help him in his state. Again, that would be like a white person during the age of segregation when the desegregation to a black person, "I feel for you man, but it's no use".
He is well aware of the bigots but it is unfair to him using that cop out "He's outnumbered" just like it would be unfair to blacks if whites back then said, "Oh well, what are you going to do"?
Now go watch a few of the "Liberal Redneck" comedian videos he also hates the assholes in his bunch too, but we cannot keep allowing the GOP to do that to America. I want more blue states and you should as well, and it is because of people like John and comedians like Trea that can help us. They are how we defeat the right.
The good thing is more and more young people are not buying the bigotry of their parents too. Don't write him off merely because of where he lives.
