Doesn't Matter 'who' they are, or 'what' they represent...just WIN!

[FCD]

So, according to the political wind-bag James Carville, the democratic left in America needs to stop with the "identity politics" and just focus on "winning".

Doesn't matter who the person is, or what they represent; according to Carville, the most important thing of all is a "D" after their name, and a "W" in the win/lose column.

I think this just screams volumes about just how desperate and shattered the democratic party is right now.  This mouthpiece for the left came right out and said it...democrats don't have a unified message other than "Not Trump", they have no policy position they can agree on...all that matters anymore is "winning".  If Pol Pot, wrapped in a Nazi flag dress, pumps and cherry red lipstick, with a chainsaw in one hand, a syringe in the other arm and sporting a hockey mask is what the people want, well, run him as a candidate!  Whatever it takes...just "WIN".

How desperate is this?  It's so transparent it's almost laughable.  What's important is getting "INTO" office so they can get the gravy train back rolling again, the corruption...it doesn't matter.  Win at any cost!  They are so worthless their very survival depends on getting back to suckling on the government money teet!  My Gawd!

The sheer desperation of just off the charts!

Carville urges dems to win at all costs

[TokenLiberal]

It's a very interesting time politically. I think both parties are in trouble, in their own ways. With the end of neoliberal dominance, populists and idealists on both sides have gained a lot of ground, which is problematic long-term. But while populists have decisively taken over the republican party (Trumpism), far left ideologues are still a minority in the democratic party. Yet they're vocal and relatively well-funded, so the party is in a bit of a pickle. This article from 2021 describes this problem very well. If you really care about understanding the democratic party and its woes, which I assume you do having posted this thread, you should read it. Since you probably won't, a quote:

During the 2020 primary campaign, progressive commentators were writing columns on a near-daily basis insisting that none of this could hurt the party. Swing voters barely existed, left-wing policies were all popular, mobilizing the base mattered far more than appealing to moderates, and electability was just an empty buzzword used by a failed Establishment to fend off popular changes. For a while, these arguments carried the day as the leading Democratic candidates kept racing one another to endorse ideas that polled catastrophically: decriminalizing illegal border crossings (27 percent approval versus 66 percent disapproval), abolishing private health insurance (37 versus 58), and providing government health insurance for people who immigrated illegally (38 versus 59).

The assumption that the left had gained control of the party became so self-evident that the very idea that a retrograde figure like Biden could win its nomination seemed like a sad joke. A whole genre of columns literally begged Biden not to run for president, to spare himself the embarrassment of the inevitable rejection by a party that had moved on. Even the insider-y publication Politico deemed Biden “a deeply flawed candidate who’s out of step with the mood of his party.”

Biden, of course, won the nomination, then the general election. But the years that preceded his victory left internal schisms and damage the party has not managed to heal.

In a democracy, winning at politics is about building a large coalition of voters. The ideal democratic coalition is, at the end of the day, still relatively moderate. Sanders' message resonates with many Americans on the far left, but were the party to adopt it, it would lose touch with the much larger, more moderate voter base. It's this voter base that won Clinton the 2016 primary and Biden the 2020 election. What Carville means here is that democrats should stop trying to take the moral high ground if that's not what the American people want from them. It should stop alienating voters that are important in its coalition in favor of a far-left minority. In other words, it should adopt messaging that Americans actually like, thereby winning elections. This is what he means when he says they should focus on winning. Winning ultimately just means saying things Americans like to hear, and doing things Americans want done. If you do that, they will vote for you.

And the underlying point is that identity politics are unimportant. It's just not a big issue to most voters in the democratic coalition. On top of that, it puts an easy target on the back of democrat politicians. They look like (and often are) a bunch of rich idealist uni kids arguing about irrelevant issues while Americans are struggling to get by. Insisting on this moral high ground is an easy way to lose elections. Carville is absolutely right about this. In my opinion "wokeism" has gone too far not in that its ideals are wrong, but in that it's overemphasized. Democrats need to go back to basics. "It's the economy, stupid" rings true here. That's also a Carville quote, by the way.

I think the best example of the disconnect between democrat activists and the larger, moderate wing of the party, is the "defund the police" movement. It's a particularly striking example of activists losing touch with the population group that they are advocating for. "Defund the police" was supposed to be an anti-racist movement advocating for black people, yet black democratic voters are themselves against it, and actually disproportionally favor an increase in police funding. From the article:

After Floyd’s murder, progressive activists quickly coalesced around defunding the police as a slogan and policy objective. (The slogan was itself a compromise between activists who favored reduction of police budgets and those who favored outright abolition.) Defunding the police never commanded strong support among the public, which has rejected it by margins of more than two to one, and is unpopular among Democrats. Black and Hispanic Democratic voters are more likely than their white counterparts to support higher spending on police, and no more than one-quarter of any Democratic constituency, Black or white, supports reduced funding. Black voters have consistently registered support both for reforming police to crack down on racism and abuse and increasing the level of protection for residents of high-crime areas.

As longtime Minneapolis police-reform activist Nekima Levy Armstrong lamented, most Black Minneapolis residents wanted serious police reform: “Instead, what we got was progressive posturing of a kind seen throughout the country and a missed opportunity to bring about real change and racial justice.” There are at least some models of police reform that combine greater accountability with more robust protection. Camden, New Jersey, for example, reconstituted its corrupt, abusive police force with one that was both more responsive and larger. Those kinds of reforms are not easy, but they at least have a chance of success since they can command significant public approval (which is not a sufficient condition to enact a high-profile reform, but it is a necessary one). There was never a world in which a concept supported by less than 20 percent of the public was going to emerge victorious.

Yet activist groups of all stripes rushed to join the defund movement, including Planned Parenthood, the ACLU, and dozens of climate groups. Those endorsements have continued to blow back in the faces of Democrats. Virginia Republicans in this year’s election learned they could attack any Democrats receiving endorsements from these groups as gaining support from “pro-defund” organizations, and one Democrat declined an endorsement from NARAL, an abortion-rights group, in order to avoid being linked to police defunding.

I think Pete Buttigieg is the most promising democrat politician of our time. He clearly understands this problem and is finding creative ways to bring back values arguments that the democratic party has long abandoned, for example around the concept of freedom. An example of why I think he's the future of the party is a recent panel of democratic politicians discussing where the party is headed, where diversity (a big part of identity politics) came up. As usual, Buttigieg talked about the issue in a way that shows his talents. He said (I'm paraphrasing here, don't remember his exact words) that diversity is not, or should not be, about silly HR diversity training people are forced to sit through, it's about accepting non-conformity. He mentioned that if there is one thing he always respected about conservatives, it's their visceral dislike of anything that threatens to push them into conformity (I happen to agree with him on that), and that when ideals around diversity ultimately lead us to push people into conformity, we've lost our way. I think conservatives intuitively understand this contradiction, and progressives have trouble understanding it, or underestimate its impact on politics.

Anyway, point is, idealist, far-left "intellectual" democrats need to shut up for a second and let the grown ups figure out the direction of the party. Alas, to its detriment, they probably won't shut up.

[FCD]

TL, I will have you know that I did read your reply, and once I figured out where the link was to the 2021 article you referred to was (they're hard to spot here on MPP sometimes), I have since read that article as well.

I would also agree that Carville is indeed right. He may be right for all the wrong reasons, but at least he's calling a spade a spade and not hiding behind some ideological lies and double-speak. At least he has the guts to stand up and say to his party...'Look, we all know we're a bunch of crooks, so let's just accept this and move on to what's really important here...getting elected back into office by any means necessary, including outright lies if need be, so that we can open the floodgates, refill the "Swamp", and get the gravy train back flowing again. Then, between us and the crooked republican swamp dwellers, we can finally have some "bi-partisanship".. I applaud him for at least telling the truth.

Lastly, thank you for further illustrating my points in the OP.

[TokenLiberal]

TL, I will have you know that I did read your reply, and once I figured out where the link was to the 2021 article you referred to was (they're hard to spot here on MPP sometimes), I have since read that article as well.

Pleasantly surprising. Yet, it seems some of my and the article's points didn't quite get across.

I would also agree that Carville is indeed right.  He may be right for all the wrong reasons, but at least he's calling a spade a spade and not hiding behind some ideological lies and double-speak.  At least he has the guts to stand up and say to his party...'Look, we all know we're a bunch of crooks, so let's just accept this and move on to what's really important here...getting elected back into office by any means necessary, including outright lies if need be, so that we can open the floodgates, refill the "Swamp", and get the gravy train back flowing again.  Then, between us and the crooked republican swamp dwellers, we can finally have some "bi-partisanship"..  I applaud him for at least telling the truth.

But.. that's not what he said at all? I argued this in my post. He's saying democrats should stop focusing on issues Americans don't really care about (e.g. identity politics) and start focusing on things they do. The fact that this would be a more successful strategy politically means the system is working as intended. In a democracy, if politicians want to win, they must do things that the population wants them to do. The democratic party needs to start doing things that its coalition of voters actually wants it to do. That's all Carville is saying. Your addition about them being crooks and just wanting to get back into power to "restart the gravy train" is imagined. You really want to believe democrats are evil, so you conveniently read into things in a way that confirms this existing belief (you even somehow think my post validates you in this belief).

You are a victim of your own confirmation bias. It's one of humanity's worst enemies in the social media era, and we should all be very careful not to let it control us.

[FCD]

Pleasantly surprising. Yet, it seems some of my and the article's points didn't quite get across.


But.. that's not what he said at all? I argued this in my post. He's saying democrats should stop focusing on issues Americans don't really care about (e.g. identity politics) and start focusing on things they do. The fact that this would be a more successful strategy politically means the system is working as intended. In a democracy, if politicians want to win, they must do things that the population wants them to do. The democratic party needs to start doing things that its coalition of voters actually wants it to do. That's all Carville is saying. Your addition about them being crooks and just wanting to get back into power to "restart the gravy train" is imagined. You really want to believe democrats are evil, so you conveniently read into things in a way that confirms this existing belief (you even somehow think my post validates you in this belief).

You are a victim of your own confirmation bias. It's one of humanity's worst enemies in the social media era, and we should all be very careful not to let it control us.

You know, even though we may be on opposite ends of the ideological spectrum, I kinda' like you.  I can't explain why exactly.  Even though I violently disagree with much of your blinded zeal, I always appreciate discourse with someone who is somewhat educated.  But I suppose I could be mistaken, it is the interwebz after all.

I deliberated on how to reply to your statements, and chose the following response:  I don't think all democrats are "evil" at all.  I think many of them are misguided, and only some of them are truly evil.  There's a difference.  Sadly, some others in the party are just unfortunate victims of the first two types.  You take exception to my 'gravy train' statement, but my rejoinder would be...why then are so many democrats all up in arms and screaming about the colossal waste being found by the DOGE efforts...if not for the 'gravy train'?  Facts is, democrats love corruption and waste; they wallow in it.  You may wish to deny it, but any truly objective person would never actively endorse waste and corruption.  Well, that is unless they too are corrupt and benefit personally from waste and diversion.

As for conformation bias, I guess my retort would be this:  What you perceive as confirmation bias, I perceive as confirmation.  So, in a way you are absolutely correct; I do have confirmation bias...about the truth.  Oh, and trust me, I do know what "confirmation bias" means, down to the statistical and mathematical levels, so no need to explain it to me.

A while back you opined about people not responding to you here and, in essence, your not fitting in.  I don't have an explanation for that other than two things; I have replied to you, so it's not everyone, and keep trying.  In the same breath, I do hope you read other's complete replies and deliberate on them for merit rather than just dismissing them out of hand.  But, I won't belabor this point.  However, on a serious note, there is another website which I think would welcome your views and possibly engage you with more discussion if you are interested.  The website is called 'Deny Ignorance'.  They're not much for political debate unless it is biased left, but they do have another sister website / sub-website called 'Deny Politics'.  You may be happy to learn I've been banned there (DI, not DP), so rest assured my recommendation is not a trap or some kind of sarcasm; it's not.  I just thought I'd pass this along because you do seem civil enough, and they appreciate that kind of behavior above all.  I, on the other hand, am not perceived as such a civil and distinguished guest I guess, thus my banishment (personally, I think it's all a big misunderstanding, but hey, what do I know?), but I think you might find it a good fit.    There's some good people there.  

Maybe give it a look-see and see what you think.

[TokenLiberal]

You know, even though we may be on opposite ends of the ideological spectrum, I kinda' like you.  I can't explain why exactly.  Even though I violently disagree with much of your blinded zeal, I always appreciate discourse with someone who is somewhat educated.  But I suppose I could be mistaken, it is the interwebz after all.

Thanks, it's good to know I'm not wasting my time.

You take exception to my 'gravy train' statement, but my rejoinder would be...why then are so many democrats all up in arms and screaming about the colossal waste being found by the DOGE efforts...if not for the 'gravy train'?  Facts is, democrats love corruption and waste; they wallow in it.  You may wish to deny it, but any truly objective person would never actively endorse waste and corruption.  Well, that is unless they too are corrupt and benefit personally from waste and diversion.

As for conformation bias, I guess my retort would be this:  What you perceive as confirmation bias, I perceive as confirmation.  So, in a way you are absolutely correct; I do have confirmation bias...about the truth.  Oh, and trust me, I do know what "confirmation bias" means, down to the statistical and mathematical levels, so no need to explain it to me.

To be clear, what I mostly take issue with is your interpretation of Carville's words. You are attributing to him opinions that you yourself hold, and then feeling validated by him. You apparently also thought my post was an illustration of your points, which it wasn't. This is what led me to make the point about confirmation bias. You interpret my and Carville's words such that they confirm your existing beliefs, when they are in fact saying something else entirely.

But since I also disagree with your assessment that the democratic party just wants to be in power "to restart the gravy train", I'll respond to that part too. First of all, yes, there is a lot of corruption in US politics but this is, unfortunately, a systemic issue not limited to one party. The poor state of campaign finance law enables it, and the existence of primaries means that politicians need to do a lot of individual fundraising to win elections. You mentioned in the other thread that you would want to make it illegal for the health care lobby to donate money to politicians. I very much agree (so would most Americans, I think it would actually be very popular). This would be major reform in campaign finance law, and would require the reversal of Citizens United among others. What it wouldn't solve is that politicians simply need a lot of money to win primaries, but getting rid of them is unrealistic.

Citizens United was a 5-4 decision. All democratic appointees dissented, but the majority of republican appointees carried the day. Why did that happen if the democratic party is the party of corruption? And why is it that reversing Citizens United only seems to be a talking point on the democratic side, and republicans are quiet about it? Republicans are also strangely silent about the fact that Trump just gave a billionaire a position in his government after he donated $300m to his campaign. I would have an easy time arguing that actually the republican party is the party of corruption.

This lecture by Ian Shapiro about money in politics is an excellent introduction on why the US has a corruption problem (the whole series is amazing, I highly recommend it). He brings a refreshing argument shedding light on the demand side of the supply and demand of money in politics. You can skip the first 20 minutes unless you care about SCOTUS history.

Regardless, the fact that the US has a corruption problem doesn't necessarily mean politicians go into politics (and want to win) because they want to make money. I think this view is overly cynical. Politicians, by and large, go into politics not out of opportunism but out of an ideological drive to steer public policy. Politics, as far as career choices go, is not that lucrative. There is usually much more money to be made in the private sector.

why then are so many democrats all up in arms and screaming about the colossal waste being found by the DOGE efforts...if not for the 'gravy train'?  Facts is, democrats love corruption and waste; they wallow in it.  You may wish to deny it, but any truly objective person would never actively endorse waste and corruption.  Well, that is unless they too are corrupt and benefit personally from waste and diversion.

There are a few valid reasons one might criticize DOGE.

1) Inspectors general are normally the watchdogs that investigate waste, fraud and abuse. They are appointed to serve multiple administrations to minimize partiality. A president needs good reason to fire them, and has to notify congress 30 days before doing so (source). Trump fired 17 of them without this notice on january 24th, which is illegal, and apparently replaced them with DOGE, which is supposedly meant to find waste and abuse but is not held to the same standards as inspectors general are. These standards are important.

Can you think of a reason why it would be problematic for each president to essentially assign their own inspectors general? A reason why it's important for them to be maximally independent?

2) What you, Trump, and DOGE call waste and abuse, democrats may not find wasteful. For example, you might think the entire department of education is a waste, along with USAID. Democrats don't agree that investing in education on the federal level is a waste, or that investing in other countries to further American interests is a waste. You apparently do, that's fine, but that is an ideological difference. It doesn't mean democrats are corruptly in favor of wasting taxpayer dollars. Do you see the difference?

By the way, whether or not these departments are a waste is not up to the executive branch. It's up to congress. The fact that DOGE is being used to essentially remove or reduce funding appropriated by congress is executive overreach. It's called impoundment, and it's illegal.

3) There are clear conflicts of interest for Musk.

My point is that criticizing DOGE doesn't mean one likes waste and corruption. Democrats don't like DOGE mainly for the three reasons I just laid out. I personally think it's very fair to criticize it for these reasons, and I think it's actually much more likely that DOGE is itself a result of corruption, and that it is itself a waste, than that it is finding significant, actual waste in federal departments that inspectors general wouldn't have found. 

Can you understand, at least, that there are other reasons someone might criticize DOGE than because they like waste and corruption?

A while back you opined about people not responding to you here and, in essence, your not fitting in.  I don't have an explanation for that other than two things; I have replied to you, so it's not everyone, and keep trying.

Well, replying is one thing, actually engaging with my points and answering questions is another. But I'm still here, and trying, and learning what makes people want to engage and what makes them not want to.

In the same breath, I do hope you read other's complete replies and deliberate on them for merit rather than just dismissing them out of hand.

I always do. Dismissing people's opinions out of hand is not my style. If a position seems ridiculous to me, I am much more likely to start asking a lot of questions, so I can understand why people feel the way they do.

However, on a serious note, there is another website which I think would welcome your views and possibly engage you with more discussion if you are interested.  The website is called 'Deny Ignorance'.  They're not much for political debate unless it is biased left, but they do have another sister website / sub-website called 'Deny Politics'.  You may be happy to learn I've been banned there (DI, not DP), so rest assured my recommendation is not a trap or some kind of sarcasm; it's not.  I just thought I'd pass this along because you do seem civil enough, and they appreciate that kind of behavior above all.  I, on the other hand, am not perceived as such a civil and distinguished guest I guess, thus my banishment (personally, I think it's all a big misunderstanding, but hey, what do I know?), but I think you might find it a good fit.    There's some good people there.  

Maybe give it a look-see and see what you think.

Thanks for the recommendation. Currently I'm quite satisfied with the amount of forums I'm on, but if I'm ever not, I'll have a look.

[FCD]

To be clear, what I mostly take issue with is your interpretation of Carville's words. You are attributing to him opinions that you yourself hold, and then feeling validated by him.  ...

Yes and no.  I do sometime inject some intentional sarcasm to over-emphasize my point.  Understand, I am a physicist by education and background, and I realized a long time ago that sometimes it helps to assist people's understanding of a concept by exaggerating one or more of the variables in a particular equation or formula to the extreme.  This can work both ways.  It can illustrate the relative importance of that variable in comparison to other variables, and/or it can also illustrate the relative insignificance of a variable in comparison to others.  When it comes to political topics, these are on the opposite end of the spectrum (IQ wise) from complex astrophysics problems, so I don't really expect to truly enlighten someone as much as get a rise out of them.

As for 'validation', I don't get any particular 'warm & fuzzy' feeling out of it.  I am more illustrating how some issues are perceived by one group in comparison to another group.  Which brings up another point...

There are a few valid reasons one might criticize DOGE.  ...

Valid or invalid points aside, the underpinning issue is two things.  One is, opinion of 'good' vs. 'bad' for the country (and maybe 'bad' is the wrong word; maybe 'not productive' might be better, like no 'little bang for the buck').  The second is outright fraud, corruption and abuse.  I'm sure I don't need to tell you, those two things are wholly different.  But before tackling those two concepts, I want to say something else which fits best here (albeit out of sequence with your response).  I think you'll see why in a moment, but it is a response to this statement:

...  First of all, yes, there is a lot of corruption in US politics but this is, unfortunately, a systemic issue not limited to one party.  ...

I would be totally lying to you and everyone else if I were ever to suggest, even for one second, that the corruption and waste we see with the federal government was limited to only one party.  It is most assuredly not!  Both the republican party, the democratic party and, candidly, every other party are guilty of this and more than happy to participate in corruption and waste after they realize it can:

• Benefit them personally, and...
  
• Has no/little legal or political repercussions (blowback / jail)
  

I also want to add something else here (and this may surprise you).  Despite my appearance to the contrary, I am actually not a hardcore "republican".  I would definitely put myself in the corner of being pretty hardcore 'conservative', but there are numerous things I violently disagree with on the republican platform.  The republican stance on abortion is high among these objections.  This is not because I support abortion (I don't particularly; I'm more agnostic about it), but rather because I see this as speaking with 'forked tongue'.  On the one hand, the party says "freedom!", but then on the other hand, the party says "when you do it exactly the way WE believe you should and how WE want you to".  That's not 'freedom'.  There are a number of other examples where I deviate from the party-line.  If the republicans would drop the abortion issue completely, I think they'd be about impossible to beat (but they just can't seem to do this).  But I digress.  Suffice to say there are other examples I could cite as well.

Back to my original point above about DOGE versus subjective opinion, versus fraud.  I am sure we can find points where I disagree on a subjective level about the merit of a program, but that is not the same thing as wanton waste and corruption.  This distinction is critical.  And then there will be shades of grey here as well, but again, that is vastly different from graft and theft for personal gain.  I want to be very clear about this.  I'll cite one of these 'grey area' issues for clarity.  In my opinion, appropriating money to further trans people's acceptance in African countries is highly objectionable (to me), to the point of being laughable.  BUT...that doesn't necessarily mean it is fraud. (I don't want to focus on debating any of these examples here; I use them simply as examples).  I look at programs like this and compare them to the success or failure of this nation as a whole.  This is an example of a subjective objection.  On the other hand, when we have examples of hundreds of thousands of dead people, or people who haven't even been born yet, collecting benefits such as social security, unemployment or other benefits, this is an example of outright theft and crime.  The people cashing these checks should go directly to jail (for a very long time).  They are intentionally bilking the 'system', and any process which allows this to happen should be overhauled to prevent it absolutely.  Those two examples are starkly different, and there's not a whole lot of tolerance (on my part) for allowing the first to justify the second.  And, this is what I see going on with the left (not just democrats, mind you).  There are also republicans who are "in" on these grafts as well.  A person who willingly participates in crime, regardless of who they are or what party they belong to, should be treated the exact same...go straight to jail.  No 'if's, 'and's' or 'buts'. 

We could drill into specific issues here, but those are really for a different discussion, which I am happy to do, but here's my fundamental point.   The left has taken the position that "everything" DOGE is doing is bad..."everything".  This is wrong.  And, any person with a lick of common sense on the left should be slapping that mantra down every single time it comes up.  If actual benefits are being cut for basic needs from the people who truly need these benefits, then yes, we should evaluate these items very carefully to ensure this is NOT happening.  If, on the other hand, processes are simply being made more efficient so more of those dollars can go to those who need them, then I fail to see why anyone (again, with a lick of common sense) would disagree with such 'cleanup'.

Moving on...

The poor state of campaign finance law enables it, and the existence of primaries means that politicians need to do a lot of individual fundraising to win elections.

Now, on this particular point, I think I am going to have to take pretty strong exception.  At the foundational level, getting elected shouldn't require gigantic funding at all.  As it stands right now, there is already WAY too much money in politics!  The fact that it requires billions of dollars to elect a president in this country flies in direct opposition to everything the United States Constitution stands for.  Period.  So, maybe we agree here, but when you say "campaign finance reform", to me this means...prohibit almost all of it by law.  It does not, in any way, mean there should be 'more' of the same, regardless of how it is done.  We should be electing leaders based on merit, not the size of their bank account.  Now, people will say things like...'well, this one candidate uses advertising, which forces this other candidate to also use advertising, and advertising costs big bucks'...and this is true, but there's a hidden boogeyman man in this line of thought.  And that boogeyman is contained in the fact that it is an accepted assumption that society has permission to be intolerably "LAZY" today.  American Citizens are NOT "entitled" to have their political parties served up to them on a platter right next to their TV dinner with their fat ass not having to move off the couch.  Citizens have a responsibility to participate in their destiny.  It's not a luxury they are 'entitled' to; it's a "responsibility".  When you drive that message solidly home, it puts things like campaign finance (advertising, brand marketing, mind-fucking, and all the rest of it) in a pretty dim light.  So, if one were to ask me, I would suggest less is more in this regard.  However, I do recognize this is perhaps an ideological difference between "conservative" and "liberal" ideologies.  It is also an area which is turbulent to discuss, but not unsolvable. 

Lastly, I know you would really like to get me to engage on the Citizens United decision.  You have brought it up several times.  I'll tell you straight-up; I'm not going to do it (i.e. engage you).  As a general rule, I don't believe in PACs.  I think most of them are full of lies, and layers of very carefully constructed illusions, even conservative ones.  Their very existence depends on creating high-stakes legal disputes, big media drama and wide publicity, which intentionally polarizes society, and forces people, by design, into picking a side and becoming single-issue voters.  They are very carefully curated subject areas designed to create a narrative which then drives support for an agenda. It's their mission in life. They are great examples of solutions in search of a problem. They start with an agenda, and then carefully construct a problem around the agenda item, and then create a narrative which solves the problem and thereby achieves the agenda. Almost without exception, this is how PACs roll.  It's their fundamental underpinning, all of them.  So, I'm not going to engage you on Citizens United, just like I won't start blathering on about the NRA, or some other conservative PAC.  (not saying you were 'blathering', just that I'm not going to do it).

I think that's about it for now.

[TokenLiberal]

Yes and no.  I do sometime inject some intentional sarcasm to over-emphasize my point.  Understand, I am a physicist by education and background, and I realized a long time ago that sometimes it helps to assist people's understanding of a concept by exaggerating one or more of the variables in a particular equation or formula to the extreme.  This can work both ways.  It can illustrate the relative importance of that variable in comparison to other variables, and/or it can also illustrate the relative insignificance of a variable in comparison to others.  When it comes to political topics, these are on the opposite end of the spectrum (IQ wise) from complex astrophysics problems, so I don't really expect to truly enlighten someone as much as get a rise out of them.

As for 'validation', I don't get any particular 'warm & fuzzy' feeling out of it.  I am more illustrating how some issues are perceived by one group in comparison to another group. 

Just so I understand you: You're illustrating how this issue would be perceived by someone on your end of the political spectrum, but you don't necessarily perceive it this way yourself? If this is the case, I'd just say that we would both get a lot more out of our discussion if you put forward your own position, and to be up front about it when you don't. You won't get a rise out of me regardless, and I don't want to find myself spending time arguing against positions that you don't hold. That would be a waste of time.

If the republicans would drop the abortion issue completely, I think they'd be about impossible to beat (but they just can't seem to do this).

The reason is that the religious right is a very important demographic to them, and the religious right feels very strongly about this issue. It's an easy way to keep that demographic firmly in the republican camp, and people who feel strongly about it on the other end are unlikely to swing republican even if they did drop it. So it's a no brainer for them, really.

Back to my original point above about DOGE versus subjective opinion, versus fraud.  I am sure we can find points where I disagree on a subjective level about the merit of a program, but that is not the same thing as wanton waste and corruption.  This distinction is critical.  And then there will be shades of grey here as well, but again, that is vastly different from graft and theft for personal gain.  I want to be very clear about this.  I'll cite one of these 'grey area' issues for clarity.  In my opinion, appropriating money to further trans people's acceptance in African countries is highly objectionable (to me), to the point of being laughable.  BUT...that doesn't necessarily mean it is fraud.  (I don't want to focus on debating any of these examples here; I use them simply as examples).  I look at programs like this and compare them to the success or failure of this nation as a whole.  This is an example of a subjective objection. 

This is essentially the same point as the one I mentioned under (2) in my last post. So we agree here.

On the other hand, when we have examples of hundreds of thousands of dead people, or people who haven't even been born yet, collecting benefits such as social security, unemployment or other benefits, this is an example of outright theft and crime.  The people cashing these checks should go directly to jail (for a very long time).  They are intentionally bilking the 'system', and any process which allows this to happen should be overhauled to prevent it absolutely.  Those two examples are starkly different, and there's not a whole lot of tolerance (on my part) for allowing the first to justify the second.  And, this is what I see going on with the left (not just democrats, mind you).  There are also republicans who are "in" on these grafts as well.  A person who willingly participates in crime, regardless of who they are or what party they belong to, should be treated the exact same...go straight to jail.  No 'if's, 'and's' or 'buts'. 

So here you're talking about individuals (citizens) who use social programs for their benefit in an immoral way. Do you think democrats like that this happens? If so, why? Also, how big of an issue is it? How many billions are wasted each year on dead people? Because we have to be realistic here. We might say that even one case is one too many, and that's easy to say but we have to consider what we would need to do to prevent them. We would need to invest in more employees and better systems to prevent cases of abuse, and that means spending money. If this is causing $100 million to be wasted but costs $500 million to prevent, is it worth it?

The reality of social programs is that there are always going to be people abusing them. If you want to be entirely rid of that problem, the only way is to abolish the programs. But when we consider doing that, we shouldn't forget that these programs have real benefits too. Without them there would be more poverty, more crime, and your streets would be less safe.

It's not very generous of you to assume that democrats, since they are generally in favor of expanding social programs, like the fact that they are sometimes abused (if that is indeed your assumption). You like the free market, no? What you're doing here is akin to me saying "so I guess you like monopolistic behavior and you like it when companies pollute a river that people are drinking from". It's not that you like these things, it's that you support a free market economy despite them, because the benefits outweigh the downsides (and I'd agree with you, for the record, adding that it's worth the effort to add anti-trust and anti-pollution laws to prevent these downsides). The same is true for democrats (and me personally) with regards to social programs. Again, it's more of an ideological disagreement.

We could drill into specific issues here, but those are really for a different discussion, which I am happy to do, but here's my fundamental point.   The left has taken the position that "everything" DOGE is doing is bad..."everything".  This is wrong.  And, any person with a lick of common sense on the left should be slapping that mantra down every single time it comes up.  If actual benefits are being cut for basic needs from the people who truly need these benefits, then yes, we should evaluate these items very carefully to ensure this is NOT happening.  If, on the other hand, processes are simply being made more efficient so more of those dollars can go to those who need them, then I fail to see why anyone (again, with a lick of common sense) would disagree with such 'cleanup'.

I don't think everything DOGE is doing is wrong. I do think the job they are apparently hired to do is better done by inspectors general, which is an office specifically designed to detect waste and abuse in government agencies. I explained why previously. Mainly I think the standards inspectors general are held to (impartiality for one) are very important here. DOGE is not held to those standards, and is basically free to do whatever it wants. Given who is leading it, and that his interests don't necessarily align with those of the American people, it's not exactly a recipe for success (unless you're Musk).

Now, on this particular point, I think I am going to have to take pretty strong exception.  At the foundational level, getting elected shouldn't require gigantic funding at all.  As it stands right now, there is already WAY too much money in politics!  The fact that it requires billions of dollars to elect a president in this country flies in direct opposition to everything the United States Constitution stands for.  Period.  So, maybe we agree here, but when you say "campaign finance reform", to me this means...prohibit almost all of it by law. 

We do indeed agree. I don't understand, then, that you don't want to talk about Citizens United. The government has tried to outlaw specific forms of campaign contributions before, and the supreme court has ruled these laws unconstitutional. So if you and I were president, we might make a good faith effort to restrict campaign finance law (or to prohibit money in politics altogether), but it wouldn't take long for a case to reach SCOTUS and the law would be struck down. This is why I bring up Citizens United. In it, the court ruled that money = speech, and that by restricting corporations from spending money to promote certain candidates we are violating the first amendment. Now, I think this "money = speech" mantra is ridiculous, but while it stands, restricting campaign finance is not possible. This is why reversing CU is so important. Why don't you want to talk about that?

It does not, in any way, mean there should be 'more' of the same, regardless of how it is done.  We should be electing leaders based on merit, not the size of their bank account.  Now, people will say things like...'well, this one candidate uses advertising, which forces this other candidate to also use advertising, and advertising costs big bucks'...and this is true,

Agreed, money should not decide elections. But there are systemic reasons why American politicians need more money than politicians in other Western democracies. Corruption is barely a problem in much of Western Europe. Understanding why that is helps us understand why the US is different, and what kind of systemic change it would take to fix the problem. The lecture I linked earlier goes into it at the end, here is a timestamped link. It's only about 10 minutes from there and very informative. It comes down to the fact that American political parties are weak (as opposed to strong parties in most of Western Europe) (Shapiro goes into why), which ultimately means that individual candidates need a lot of money. It's why I keep mentioning primaries; they are the main reason American parties are so weak. Stronger parties would mean that fundraising for individual candidates becomes less important, and this would lower corruption.

but there's a hidden boogeyman man in this line of thought.  And that boogeyman is contained in the fact that it is an accepted assumption that society has permission to be intolerably "LAZY" today.  American Citizens are NOT "entitled" to have their political parties served up to them on a platter right next to their TV dinner with their fat ass not having to move off the couch.  Citizens have a responsibility to participate in their destiny.  It's not a luxury they are 'entitled' to; it's a "responsibility".  When you drive that message solidly home, it puts things like campaign finance (advertising, brand marketing, mind-fucking, and all the rest of it) in a pretty dim light.  So, if one were to ask me, I would suggest less is more in this regard.

I agree that citizens have this responsibility. But we have to be realistic here. The reality is that politicians need money because people are not, and are never going to, take the time to get informed about politicians they have never heard of. You have to reach them somehow. We can sit here and complain that people are not taking the time to get informed and rely on their biased media to "inform" them, and I'm right there with you, but that's what we're working with at the end of the day. That's not changing.

However, I do recognize this is perhaps an ideological difference between "conservative" and "liberal" ideologies.  It is also an area which is turbulent to discuss, but not unsolvable. 

What do you mean by ideological difference? Where do you think the difference is? I actually think Americans on both sides of the political spectrum are generally in favor of stricter campaign finance law. But only one party (the democratic party) is really talking about reversing Citizens United, which would be the first step.

Lastly, I know you would really like to get me to engage on the Citizens United decision. You have brought it up several times. I'll tell you straight-up; I'm not going to do it (i.e. engage you). As a general rule, I don't believe in PACs. I think most of them are full of lies, and layers of very carefully constructed illusions, even conservative ones. Their very existence depends on creating high-stakes legal disputes, big media drama and wide publicity, which intentionally polarizes society, and forces people, by design, into picking a side and becoming single-issue voters. They are very carefully curated subject areas designed to create a narrative which then drives support for an agenda. It's their mission in life. They are great examples of solutions in search of a problem. They start with an agenda, and then carefully construct a problem around the agenda item, and then create a narrative which solves the problem and thereby achieves the agenda. Almost without exception, this is how PACs roll. It's their fundamental underpinning, all of them. So, I'm not going to engage you on Citizens United, just like I won't start blathering on about the NRA, or some other conservative PAC. (not saying you were 'blathering', just that I'm not going to do it).

I don't believe in PACs either, let alone super PACs. I think they are destructive and bad. And the first thing we would need to do if we want to get rid of them is reverse Citizens United... So I'm still very confused as to why you don't want to talk about that. It's such an important piece of the puzzle when it comes to money in American politics. Besides, we would probably agree!

[TokenLiberal]

Just realized there might be a misunderstanding. You might think that when I say Citizens United, I'm talking about the actual PAC called "Citizens United". That would make sense. I'm actually talking about the landmark SCOTUS decision "Citizens United vs FEC" (link) where the court ruled that money = speech and that restricting corporations from spending money on politics is a violation of the first amendment.