Political Roundtable Part XXXI

[dobrojim]

Popper, try reading The Sum of Us (McGhee) or Dying of Whiteness (Metzl).
Or if you have Netflix watch This is who we are (Larry ROBINSON, not Wright)
and then try to claim that complaints about CRT and the like
are made in good faith.

[Zonkerbl]

Why do you care about abortion?

Popper what are you talking about? Could you get to the point? Or are you genuinely just asking for input on what is the best way to decide policy questions?

We are trying to persuade *you* that *you* are wrong (well, I'm not, but let's assume we are). What sorts of arguments might we make to persuade you? Can you give an example from your personal life where someone changed your mind about something and what kind of arguments they made? Or are you asking for what sorts of arguments would change my mind?

On abortion, there's just no way to convince me that women's lives are worthless. Women are persons with intrinsic value. So it's impossible to convince me that abortion should be banned at conception with no exceptions for rape or incest or medical necessity.

I do think it's possible that somewhere between conception and birth a zygote makes the magical transition from a clump of cells indistinguishable from a bacteria to a potential person with rights. But I'm not persuaded by *any* religious argument or appeal to authority about what this transition period is. The only fact based dividing line is viability. Saying "oh well it should be a few weeks before that just in case" is a slippery slope. How many weeks is a "few"? Are you trying to slide in your religious beliefs into the threshold?

I don't take the side of imaginary children. My focus is definitely on the rights of actual, real world women. Any attempt to appeal to me that imaginary children are somehow more valuable than women, or that aborting imaginary children is murder, has no weight with me at all. The only fetus that I know has the potential to become a human being with rights is one that has reached viability. Everything else is just magical wishing.

I have thought about this issue a *lot*. I have been on the internet for decades and I have seen every forced birth argument under the sun. I don't find any of them to be fact or logic based, and so I don't find any of them persuasive.

I hope this helps you understand my perspective and the kinds of arguments necessary to persuade me otherwise (however unlikely that may be).

Sure. I learn all kinds of interesting stuff on this thread. I once believed that sending able bodied people a monthly stipend based on income and # of kids (and who struggle financially) would be bad public policy. I saw a documentary last year where a dozen single mothers were interviewed. They described how they used the money and what a difference it made in their and their kids lives. I now support that policy if it's responsibly paid for. It's a D passed law that expires soon i think. Can't remember the name of it off hand.

I usually avoid discussions about race and abortion but I'll make an exception here. Years ago someone on this thread introduced the idea that there is only one race. I did a little research and it's changed the way I think about k-12 education. Regarding abortion, in the early stage I'm very sympathetic about the women's right to choose. Later on, not so much. But I'd abstain from voting on the issue for a personal reason.

To your main question, every time I'm involved in important discussions or in a substantial business transaction I want to know everything I can about the person(s) I'm engaged with. It helps me come at an issue from their perspective. I'm not sure why that's caused such controversy.

Interesting, the negotiation training I've had is kind of the mirror image of that - interest based negotiation, where I try to be as clear to my interlocutor what it is that I want, otherwise we're going to waste a lot of time arguing over things that don't matter.

[popper]

Popper, try reading The Sum of Us (McGhee) or Dying of Whiteness (Metzl).
Or if you have Netflix watch This is who we are (Larry Wright)
and then try to claim that complaints about CRT and the like
are made in good faith.

Okay. I'll make a point of it. Thanks

[Kanyewest]

I will say that I appreciate popper and nate showing up in the thread and giving thoughtful responses to difficult questions. I hate the direction our country where each side declares jihad on the other's mindset. I may agree with a progressive holy war to retake civil liberty and protect the rights and lives of the vulnerable. But I deplore the mindset that has made this necessary. If we could have argued it out we might not be in this situation. Instead we allowed billionaires to promote a troll for the highest office of the land and have wrecked reasonable debate, as trolls do. Only there are no thoughtful moderators who can boot a President for ruining public discourse. Unless of course he is rightfully indicted and convicted. And even then it would take a stacked court to ensure the verdict sticks. We need more and better moderators on the Supreme Court.

We tried to moderate him: PMs, warnings, strikes, cool off suspensions. His behavior just got worse, and eventually he violated every RealGM TOS, even countervailing violations, like it was his intent to identify and violate every rule. When we voted on his fate, his supporters stormed RealGm, and seemed confused to find it was not a physical place. After he got his lifetime ban and we all started getting hate mail, threats, and relentless attempts to initiate litigation with all of us, he started a new platform called RealDT, which was quickly changed to RealDonaldTrump because the former name was repeatedly confused with popular gay S&M site RealDBT. And now he and his supporters call us FakeGM. Even his insults are plagiarized from other people.

It would be funny if Hands was Trump.

[doclinkin]

I will say that I appreciate popper and nate showing up in the thread and giving thoughtful responses to difficult questions. I hate the direction our country where each side declares jihad on the other's mindset. I may agree with a progressive holy war to retake civil liberty and protect the rights and lives of the vulnerable. But I deplore the mindset that has made this necessary. If we could have argued it out we might not be in this situation. Instead we allowed billionaires to promote a troll for the highest office of the land and have wrecked reasonable debate, as trolls do. Only there are no thoughtful moderators who can boot a President for ruining public discourse. Unless of course he is rightfully indicted and convicted. And even then it would take a stacked court to ensure the verdict sticks. We need more and better moderators on the Supreme Court.

We tried to moderate him: PMs, warnings, strikes, cool off suspensions. His behavior just got worse, and eventually he violated every RealGM TOS, even countervailing violations, like it was his intent to identify and violate every rule. When we voted on his fate, his supporters stormed RealGm, and seemed confused to find it was not a physical place. After he got his lifetime ban and we all started getting hate mail, threats, and relentless attempts to initiate litigation with all of us, he started a new platform called RealDT, which was quickly changed to RealDonaldTrump because the former name was repeatedly confused with popular gay S&M site RealDBT. And now he and his supporters call us FakeGM. Even his insults are plagiarized from other people.

It would be funny if Hands was Trump.

Or SD20.

[verbal8]

The ends justifies the means! Might makes right! Hail Satan!

It is probably Heil Satan.

[Pointgod]

We tried to moderate him: PMs, warnings, strikes, cool off suspensions. His behavior just got worse, and eventually he violated every RealGM TOS, even countervailing violations, like it was his intent to identify and violate every rule. When we voted on his fate, his supporters stormed RealGm, and seemed confused to find it was not a physical place. After he got his lifetime ban and we all started getting hate mail, threats, and relentless attempts to initiate litigation with all of us, he started a new platform called RealDT, which was quickly changed to RealDonaldTrump because the former name was repeatedly confused with popular gay S&M site RealDBT. And now he and his supporters call us FakeGM. Even his insults are plagiarized from other people.

It would be funny if Hands was Trump.

Or SD20.

Well STD always bragged about how rich he is, he was a real estate mogul, claimed to be a college athlete and always mentioned about all the sex he had with Playboy models, barely literate….. wait a minute

[dobrojim]

more examples of bad faith arguments

The Tea in tea party supposedly stood for Taxed Enough Already. So after BHO *cut* taxes during
the first half of his first term, the TEA party's message was he had raised taxes. It wasn't true
for the vast majority of citizens but it was widely believed anyway. Those dang socialist democrats.

The GOP reacted to BHO's winning the 2008 election by saying their only goal was to make
sure he was a 1 term president. Although they failed at that, their obstructionism for the
sake of obstructionism damaged the country and slowed the recovery from the 2008-2009
economic disaster. They opposed many things that previously they would have supported
but had to posture as if BHO was a communist, an old trope used against civil rights advocates
such as MLK.

In the run up to the disastrous Iraq war, an oft used slogan was 'we have to fight them over there,
or else we will be fighting them here'. There was never any realistic possibility that the US
would be invaded by Iraq, or anyone else. Disingenuous, but effective scare tactic. The lie
succeeded and we paid a dreadful price and are still paying a price for that.

All the references to BHO being a foreigner. Rather than debate the merits of his policy proposals
he was cast as the other. Reasonably well informed people knew it wasn't true (as far as his nationality goes)
but it was widely believed by low information voters and reinforced their belief that this n****r couldn't be
trusted. No one needed to explain to a certain slice of the population that he was black. He would
be reflexively opposed by those people.

McConnell refusing to even hold hearings on Merrick Garland. now 2/9 justices on SCOTUS have made
explicit statements that they are out for revenge. The country is paying the price. Actual arguments
to the court about the merits of cases are now superfluous. The GOP is still angry about Bork
who literally talked himself out of being confirmed. But the lesson became don't talk about
yourself in any meaningful way, unless you're going to say I'm going to get the mofos who opposed
me and exposed the skeletons in my closet and my unfitness for a lifetime appt on the highest court.

Arguments that supply side economic policies manifesting as tax cuts for the rich would 'lift all boats'.
This goes back to the 80s. Didn't work then and still doesn't work, at least not when it comes to lifting
all boats.

[Zonkerbl]

yeah personally I think the SCOTUS has been illegitimate ever since McConnell refused to hold hearings on Merrick Garland. And then when he ignored the "well there's an election coming up" excuse for RBG's replacement. Both of those appointments are illegitimate, imho. You can't say the SCOTUS is an impartial arbiter of balls and strikes after that. Which eliminates the whole point of the SCOTUS. We already have a Congress for elected officials to exercise political power. If the SCOTUS is just an extension of Congress what is it even for?

And I follow a bunch of lawyers on twitter and the decisions they are handing down now are all hyperpartisan and not logically consistent. Appealing to the fact that abortion was illegal in 1868, when women were still considered men's property, is completely cuckoopants. If Roe v Wade was a natural response of the law to women getting treated more like citizens and less like property (it was a gradual process - even up until 1970 women couldn't hold bank accounts independent of their husbands), then any historical precedent before the 19th amendment is completely irrelevant. Argh! I'm still mad at how stupid and arbitrary and obviously partisan that decision was. Yeah, no one is going to abide by that, there's going to be a lot of "just try and enforce this" chicanery going on.

I would love for the SCOTUS to be stuffed and a new abortion decision passed down that fixes everything that was wrong with Roe by appealing to women's rights as people, and any rights you claim the unborn fetus has has to be balanced against her rights, and not this weird, vague privacy thing, and not this neanderthal "we want to return all our social policy to 1868" garbage. All this constant whining from the right about activist judges, and then when they get the chance they replace the activist ones with even more activist ones. "The ends justifies the means!"

[Pointgod]

more examples of bad faith arguments

The Tea in tea party supposedly stood for Taxed Enough Already. So after BHO *cut* taxes during
the first half of his first term, the TEA party's message was he had raised taxes. It wasn't true
for the vast majority of citizens but it was widely believed anyway. Those dang socialist democrats.

The GOP reacted to BHO's winning the 2008 election by saying their only goal was to make
sure he was a 1 term president. Although they failed at that, their obstructionism for the
sake of obstructionism damaged the country and slowed the recovery from the 2008-2009
economic disaster. They opposed many things that previously they would have supported
but had to posture as if BHO was a communist, an old trope used against civil rights advocates
such as MLK.

In the run up to the disastrous Iraq war, an oft used slogan was 'we have to fight them over there,
or else we will be fighting them here'. There was never any realistic possibility that the US
would be invaded by Iraq, or anyone else. Disingenuous, but effective scare tactic. The lie
succeeded and we paid a dreadful price and are still paying a price for that.

All the references to BHO being a foreigner. Rather than debate the merits of his policy proposals
he was cast as the other. Reasonably well informed people knew it wasn't true (as far as his nationality goes)
but it was widely believed by low information voters and reinforced their belief that this n****r couldn't be
trusted. No one needed to explain to a certain slice of the population that he was black. He would
be reflexively opposed by those people.

McConnell refusing to even hold hearings on Merrick Garland. now 2/9 justices on SCOTUS have made
explicit statements that they are out for revenge. The country is paying the price. Actual arguments
to the court about the merits of cases are now superfluous. The GOP is still angry about Bork
who literally talked himself out of being confirmed. But the lesson became don't talk about
yourself in any meaningful way, unless you're going to say I'm going to get the mofos who opposed
me and exposed the skeletons in my closet and my unfitness for a lifetime appt on the highest court.

Arguments that supply side economic policies manifesting as tax cuts for the rich would 'lift all boats'.
This goes back to the 80s. Didn't work then and still doesn't work, at least not when it comes to lifting
all boats.

It was all a lie, it’s always been a lie and Republicans are nothing if not hypocrites.

Read on Twitter

Read on Twitter

The question is what are the people going to do about it? Hillary Clinton literally warned everyone in 2016 that the Supreme Court was on the ballot and what Republicans would do. “Americans were like, naw I’m good”. The warning sign is still flashing bright red, none of this has changed.

[Zonkerbl]

well, that's the problem with Democracy. Once enough people decide they don't want it anymore, they'd rather change the rules to use the terrifying power of the government's monopoly on violence to force their opinions on everybody else, that's it. Democracy depends on the good faith of everyone involved and McConnell set the Republicans' good faith on fire and laughed while it burned. I honestly don't see a path back to Democracy from here. We're Putin's Russia now.

And maybe it's been like that for awhile and we're just now seeing the truth come out from the shadows. Maybe we were never really a Democracy.

[Kanyewest]

more examples of bad faith arguments

The Tea in tea party supposedly stood for Taxed Enough Already. So after BHO *cut* taxes during
the first half of his first term, the TEA party's message was he had raised taxes. It wasn't true
for the vast majority of citizens but it was widely believed anyway. Those dang socialist democrats.

The GOP reacted to BHO's winning the 2008 election by saying their only goal was to make
sure he was a 1 term president. Although they failed at that, their obstructionism for the
sake of obstructionism damaged the country and slowed the recovery from the 2008-2009
economic disaster. They opposed many things that previously they would have supported
but had to posture as if BHO was a communist, an old trope used against civil rights advocates
such as MLK.

In the run up to the disastrous Iraq war, an oft used slogan was 'we have to fight them over there,
or else we will be fighting them here'. There was never any realistic possibility that the US
would be invaded by Iraq, or anyone else. Disingenuous, but effective scare tactic. The lie
succeeded and we paid a dreadful price and are still paying a price for that.

All the references to BHO being a foreigner. Rather than debate the merits of his policy proposals
he was cast as the other. Reasonably well informed people knew it wasn't true (as far as his nationality goes)
but it was widely believed by low information voters and reinforced their belief that this n****r couldn't be
trusted. No one needed to explain to a certain slice of the population that he was black. He would
be reflexively opposed by those people.

McConnell refusing to even hold hearings on Merrick Garland. now 2/9 justices on SCOTUS have made
explicit statements that they are out for revenge. The country is paying the price. Actual arguments
to the court about the merits of cases are now superfluous. The GOP is still angry about Bork
who literally talked himself out of being confirmed. But the lesson became don't talk about
yourself in any meaningful way, unless you're going to say I'm going to get the mofos who opposed
me and exposed the skeletons in my closet and my unfitness for a lifetime appt on the highest court.

Arguments that supply side economic policies manifesting as tax cuts for the rich would 'lift all boats'.
This goes back to the 80s. Didn't work then and still doesn't work, at least not when it comes to lifting
all boats.

It was all a lie, it’s always been a lie and Republicans are nothing if not hypocrites.

Read on Twitter

Read on Twitter

The question is what are the people going to do about it? Hillary Clinton literally warned everyone in 2016 that the Supreme Court was on the ballot and what Republicans would do. “Americans were like, naw I’m good”. The warning sign is still flashing bright red, none of this has changed.

I remember coming across some people prior to 2016 that there was no difference between Clinton/Trump. I also think there was a sense of complacency/overconfidence at the time that Clinton would easily win and people wanting to exercise their right to ideals by voting 3rd party.

I do think that people were more urgent to vote in 2020 for Biden and even then the margin in some states were much closer than people thought. Still, not sure if complacency will happen again although perhaps people will be motivated to vote against Trump in 2024. We'll find out how strong pro-abortion sentiment is in the 2022 midterm election.

[pancakes3]

in 2016, it wasn't so much voter complacency but frustration. capital D dems were skating back then. the reason there was "complacency" in 2016 is that dems were disillusioned by the Dems (see, TGW). And for good cause. And we're bearing the consequences of Dem complacency now in seeing how Republicans have jumped Democrats on so many different levels: State-level gerrymandering, co-opting SCOTUS, abusing filibuster, etc.

Dems are caught with their pants down, and the only card they have to play is "never-trump"

The actual policies that Dems should pass: GND, student loan reform, police reform, climate reform, banking/wealth equality reform are all at a standstill, and Republicans are starting new fires (election reform, dismantling of administrative state, abortion, court reform) that will similarly be talking points for stump speeches but won't be able to be enacted.

yeah, Obamacare was cool, but (1) it's been gutted; (2) it's really the only progressive piece of legislation passed in FOREVER; and (3) we're coming up on 15 years and nothing since.

[Wizardspride]

I think how one approaches the issues discussed in this thread is important in understanding the arguments presented. For example, I'm not a materialist (and I don't think Nate is either). Judging by the arguments presented here I suspect most of you are. If that is accurate then lets debate on those materialistic terms. If that is not accurate please advise on what other terms the debates should be conducted. Please have the courage to disclose your foundational beliefs so we can ascertain the most effective means of debate.

I just noticed your post and it really bothered me.

You're implying someone must be a "materialist" if they disagree with your line of thinking.

Plenty of "spiritual" people vote Democratic.

[Pointgod]

well, that's the problem with Democracy. Once enough people decide they don't want it anymore, they'd rather change the rules to use the terrifying power of the government's monopoly on violence to force their opinions on everybody else, that's it. Democracy depends on the good faith of everyone involved and McConnell set the Republicans' good faith on fire and laughed while it burned. I honestly don't see a path back to Democracy from here. We're Putin's Russia now.

And maybe it's been like that for awhile and we're just now seeing the truth come out from the shadows. Maybe we were never really a Democracy.

But this was all preventable, you can’t just throw your hands up and blame a minority when it was the majority of people that let that happen. If voters hadn’t let Republicans take control of the House in 2010 this wouldn’t have happened, if the voters hadn’t let the Democrats lose the Senate this wouldn’t be happening, if 100,000 voters in 3 states had decided to show up, didn’t stupidly vote third party or didn’t vote for Trump this wouldn’t be happening. If the Democratic Party had paid more attention to state legislatures this wouldn’t be happening.

And the reason I bring these examples up isn’t to relitigate the past or blame people, but rather clearly paint the path that led to this moment because if things get worse there is a clear path that can be traced from 2020 election to the 2022 midterms to the 2024 election. Or else a decade and half from now we’ll be having the same conversation of either how you prevented the end of Democracy or how Americans fell into complacency and both sidesism despite the attacks on women, people of color, gay rights, poor people, children, the environment from Republicans

[dckingsfan]

I think how one approaches the issues discussed in this thread is important in understanding the arguments presented. For example, I'm not a materialist (and I don't think Nate is either). Judging by the arguments presented here I suspect most of you are. If that is accurate then lets debate on those materialistic terms. If that is not accurate please advise on what other terms the debates should be conducted. Please have the courage to disclose your foundational beliefs so we can ascertain the most effective means of debate.

I just noticed your post and it really bothered me.

You're implying someone must be a "materialist" if they disagree with your line of thinking.

Plenty of "spiritual" people vote Democratic.

More and more folks are finding that being spiritual means not belonging to a church as the churches become more and more weaponized.

[popper]

I think how one approaches the issues discussed in this thread is important in understanding the arguments presented. For example, I'm not a materialist (and I don't think Nate is either). Judging by the arguments presented here I suspect most of you are. If that is accurate then lets debate on those materialistic terms. If that is not accurate please advise on what other terms the debates should be conducted. Please have the courage to disclose your foundational beliefs so we can ascertain the most effective means of debate.

I just noticed your post and it really bothered me.

You're implying someone must be a "materialist" if they disagree with your line of thinking.

Plenty of "spiritual" people vote Democratic.

You are correct of course that plenty of D's are spiritual. Didn't mean to imply that at all. I've personally met many in my lifetime.

[Zonkerbl]

well, that's the problem with Democracy. Once enough people decide they don't want it anymore, they'd rather change the rules to use the terrifying power of the government's monopoly on violence to force their opinions on everybody else, that's it. Democracy depends on the good faith of everyone involved and McConnell set the Republicans' good faith on fire and laughed while it burned. I honestly don't see a path back to Democracy from here. We're Putin's Russia now.

And maybe it's been like that for awhile and we're just now seeing the truth come out from the shadows. Maybe we were never really a Democracy.

But this was all preventable, you can’t just throw your hands up and blame a minority when it was the majority of people that let that happen. If voters hadn’t let Republicans take control of the House in 2010 this wouldn’t have happened, if the voters hadn’t let the Democrats lose the Senate this wouldn’t be happening, if 100,000 voters in 3 states had decided to show up, didn’t stupidly vote third party or didn’t vote for Trump this wouldn’t be happening. If the Democratic Party had paid more attention to state legislatures this wouldn’t be happening.

And the reason I bring these examples up isn’t to relitigate the past or blame people, but rather clearly paint the path that led to this moment because if things get worse there is a clear path that can be traced from 2020 election to the 2022 midterms to the 2024 election. Or else a decade and half from now we’ll be having the same conversation of either how you prevented the end of Democracy or how Americans fell into complacency and both sidesism despite the attacks on women, people of color, gay rights, poor people, children, the environment from Republicans

I'm not blaming the minority, I'm just saying - it's really easy for a minority to destroy Democracy. And it's not a minority - Trump legit won in 2016. The majority no longer wants Democracy, is what I'm saying. The problem is, to destroy democracy, you only need to win once, while defending democracy is something you have to do every year. Eventually you're going to fail and we did.

We're on a path to lose Democracy for good in 2022. Maybe the SCOTUS terrorists executing the Roe V Wade hostage in public will delay things, maybe we'll hang on by a thread in 2022, and maybe that'll give us a chance to recover enough to hold Trump off in 2024, or maybe he'll die from cholesterol poisoning from all the burgers he eats. I mean it's not 100% over. But I give the probability of democracy surviving past 2022 maybe 10%.

[Pointgod]

And there it is. This is why the idea of just letting every state do whatever it wants is a terrible **** idea and actually goes against the idea of all people have the same rights.

Read on Twitter

Republicans are full mask off and telling you exactly who they are and what they’ll do if they get power.

Read on Twitter

Read on Twitter

I don’t care if Democrats don’t fulfill your wish list, remaining complacent is insane.

[Zonkerbl]

I mean, if the Dem party would get off their septegenarian butt and actually do something, like go on a whirlwind nationwide tour focusing like a laser on abortion, maybe I'd be less pessimistic. I'm not holding my breath.