Why are there so many partisan bootlickers in these forums?

It is my understanding this forum was originally intended as a hippie forum? The hippies were willing to criticize both LBJ, and Nixon. But now here it seems criticize on one side and making excuses for the other. "Oh Republican wars are bad but Democratic wars are good" even though they are often a continuation of one to the other. Can we say that Bush was a warmonger, Obama was a warmonger (continuing and in many cases expand on the wars Bush started), Trump was a warmonger, and Biden supports proxy war at least. Every president since Clinton should have been impeached for something. (Aside from the wars, there is the Patriot act that every President since Bush has renewed). No president has even done anything to pardon Snowden or any of the other whistle-blowers.

 

I totally agree. But I don't have much to say about it because I don't talk about politics unless I have to.

 

So true, I don't trust either party. I try to pick the best person to vote for, but they all lie. So sad we don't have any better choice, at election time.

 

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Well criticizism is one thing but simple hatred is another. Mere critcizism isn't enough to get me typing this.

 

This is not the time to be neutral about what is taking place in the political realm of our country. Money rules in politics as well as most of the rest of life and most politicians are bought and sold, as it were, by powerful interests on all sides of the political spectrum. I think my opinions about the current state of political affairs are known around here well enough, so no need to restate any except to say that many improvements to the government of this country could / should be made to help the average citizen. As far as precluding wars in which we taxpayers find ourselves paying---there have always been wars--there will always be wars ---due to certain characteristics inherent in the human race. What's new under the sun? Not much.

 

I can think of 74 million boot lickers that aren't in the forums.

 

Yes I mentioned some of them. Warmongering, the Patriot act, and government covering for their own corruption by labeling Snowden Manning etc. as criminals.

 

Opposing both major parties is not the same thing as being Neutral. I often quote George Washington who warned about political parties in his farewell address. As for there always being wars, sure, but not all countries have been as war hungry.

 

George was naive. Political parties appeared during his administration, and partisanship became pretty intense. The nature of our representative democracy and human nature makes parties inevitable. As for war hunger, not all countries have been superpowers in competition with ideologically opposed totalitarian rivals. Opposing both major parties is equivalent to supporting the one which is opposed to the party closest to whatever third party you might support, if any (e.g., like supporting Ralph Nader in 2000, which was equivalent to supporting G.W. Bush). Or if you just don't vote, letting others decide the contest.

 

It won't do you or anyone else any good to oppose both major political parties. They are what exists and they are what we get. IMO one has to observe both parties, and listen to the actions / ideas of each party over the arc of history in the US and of course what they stand for RIGHT NOW and make a choice to vote for the party that you think is the best one to lead this country. There are those that believe that this economic system has been somewhat rigged from the beginning to favor those with the most capitol and I am among them. Also IMO---if you can't tell which of the two parties is showing that it is much the worse for the US and particularly working people-----and black and brown citizens,health care for women, the dismantling of the education system,the complete cheapening of the social intercourse of the country and who most favors the rich in all matters----------you are not paying attention.

 

Since the administration of George Washington, we've had a predominatly two party system. They haven't been the same two parties, and during various periods, one has been dominant over the other. And of course there have been lots of minor parties, and sometimes a third party that looks like it's getting some traction: the Know Nothing Party, the Populist Party, the Progressive Party, the Socialist Party, George Wallace's American Independent Party,Ross Perot's Reform Party, etc. But the pattern has remained pretty stable. The Republican Party is the only example of a Third Party that became one of the two parties in the 1850s. Since then, it's been Democrats vs. Republicans--although Ross Perot's Reform Party was able to gain ballot access in all fifty states and to win over 8% of the popular vote. Yet he did not secure a single vote in the electoral college! There are three main reasons for the persistence of the two party system: (1) ballot access restrictions, which are controlled by the state governments that are controlled by one or another of the two major parties; (2) "winner take all" elections for the Electoral College and state legislatures; and (3) a tendency of one or another (or both) of the two major parties to adopt any winning idea a third party can come up with. These factors are so formidable that the principal role of Third Parties today is to act as "spoilers" for one of the two major parties. This was the charge against the Green Party in the 2000 election, when it ran Ralph Nader and drew votes away from Al Gore (D) in his contest with George W. Bush (R).
Nader to Crash Dems' Party?
https://web.archive.org/web/20050212030717/http://wc.wustl.edu:80/workingpapers/Burden.pdf
Herron & Lewis (April 24, 2006). "Did Ralph Nader spoil Al Gore's Presidential bid? A ballot-level study of Green and Reform Party voters in the 2000 Presidential election". Quarterly Journal of Political Science.
Biden fans are concerned that the so-called "No Labels" party, a "moderate" third party, with Joe Manchin (yuck) as a possible candidate for President. A moderate party would probably pull votes from Biden, and in the light of history, probably stands a snowball's chance in hell of winning.
Letters to the Editor: Third party? 'No Labels' gives Trump his clearest path back to the White House
No Labels' third-party fantasy may elect Trump
Bill kristol no labels party not responsible centrism - Yahoo Video Search Results

I agree with Scratcho that our two parties, for all their faults and foibles, "are what exists and they are what we get." Anything that increases the risk that Trump will regain the Oval Office, like a Third Party effort at this time, is a menace to U.S. democracy!

 

Most countries with a similar system have more than 2 parties that are competitive. How on Earth is voting for Nader like supporting Bush? I have heard that claim but the logic just doesn't add up. Votes should be earned, no candidate is entitled to them. Say that your two option were Fascism or communism, would you still vote for the lesser of 2 evils?

 

Wars: The US is still actively involved in Syria. And lets talk about the elephant in the room, the Russian -Syria war. Why should we restart the Cold War over it? And there are indications of actual troop mobilization rather than simply monetary support. We shouldn't be fighting wars for other countries, it has ended badly every time.
The Patriot Act had bipartisan support, maybe more Democrats opposed it, but enough supported it for it to pass with a good margin ,and a Democratic president renewed it, if he really wanted to make a statement against it, he could have vetoed it, even if he knew the veto would be overturned.
Patriot Act: Much of the surveillance apparatus that were instituted by it are still in effect. PATRIOT Act.
Snowden Manning etc.: I have not been impressed with Snowedn in recent years by how he has been cozying up to the Russians, but the information he revealed to the American people (that many suspected but were called crazy for claiming before he released the info). Domestic surveillance for one. Manning release evidence of war crimes. Assange creating a repository for such information. Now people will say :they should have gone through the proper channels" but in many cases those channels were controlled by the very people being exposed. But also, information such as that given to Gleen Greenwald were released through the proper channels as it has been established that media publications are proper channels to release sensitive information (think the Pentagon Papers or Watergate).

 

No country I know of has a system similar to our electoral college, and few have a federalist system where the states have so much control over national elections. I'm a great admirer of our Constitution, but some features are unfortunate from the standpoint of democracy.

How on Earth is voting for Nader like supporting Bush? Let's go back to the 2000 election. You may remember or have read about the one with the hanging chads in Florida. The popular vote for President was close to a tie, with Al Gore and George W. Bush each winning about 48%. And the Electoral College vote gave Bush the majority by a single vote. The recount dispute was essentially decided by a 5-4 decision of the Supreme Court, which effectively awarded Florida’s 25 votes in the Electoral College to Bush, ensuring his victory. Nader won enough votes in Florida and New Hampshire to keep either of them out of Gore's column. Because Nader was a progressive candidate, as Gore also tended to be, he drew votes that probably would otherwise have gone to Gore. If Nader's votes in Florida had gone to Gore, there would have been no recount. And even without Florida, Nader's 4% of the New Hampshire vote would have given Nader 270 votes in the Electoral College to Bush's 267. Exit polls reported that 25% of Nader's voters would have gone to Bush if Nader hadn't run, 38% would have voted for Gore and the rest would not have voted at all, giving Gore a 13% net advantage over Bush. Nader himself didn't come close to winning. He got 27.4% of the popular vote and no electoral votes, which is typical of third parties.

Which would be the lesser of the two evils? Hard to say. They're both pretty d----ed evil! If we go by body count, I'd say Nazism. But that's based mainly on the Soviet and Chinese examples. Vietnam doesn't seem as bad, and 6 million Jews is nothing to sneeze at. I'd always vote for the lesser of two evils if I were reasonably sure which of the evils was lesser.

Do you see the Nazis vs. Commies example as relevant to U.S. elections. In the present contest of Biden vs. Trump, there is no comparison. Biden has his faults, but Trump stands out as one of the most evil candidates in U.S. history--a thoroughly corrupt crime boss who tried to overturn an election last time and poses a genuine threat to democracy!