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[GlyphGryph]

Nuts? At least we don't support marijuana while trying to outlaw tobacco.
Most Republicans are more or less willing to compromise, but they want an actual compromise.

Have their actually been any Democrat lead efforts to ban tobacco? o_O I know they've been pushing for bans in places like restaurants, but my understanding is all of those smoking rules apply to pot as well, which seems like a fairly coherent position. Certainly not "nutty". And also, yeah, in case you haven't noticed the national Democrats (and we're talking national parties here, my local Republican officials are generally pretty decent) are pretty stridently anti-pot. So I fail to see how that's an argument for anything.

On the "nut" front, the only difference between the two parties right now seems to be that the Republican's have a good deal more of them in positions of greater power - it's no great revelation that the Democrats keep most of their "wingnuts" at arm's length, (even if, in some cases, the "wingnut" position is a perfectly reasonable one).

Both republicans and democrats are guilty of being completely unwilling to compromise unless it means they get the better deal, and it's definitely not because they aren't getting a fair deal.

Hey - republicans are evil, democrats are good, alright?  Don't you dare challenge my view of American politics

Both parties are evil, or at least very, very amoral - they are funded by corporations and run by politicians. Republican's are simply evil in a way that directly harms significantly more people, in general. This doesn't mean every stance the party holds is wrong, but that, practically speaking, most people should rationally prefer the Democrats.

[mainiac]

 Most Republicans are more or less willing to compromise, but they want an actual compromise.

No they really don't.  When the democratic party adopts Republican ideas, they immediately become the subject of downright insane attacks.  The reason why people are so pissed at the republicans right now is that they have abandoned every principle they had simply to reject compromise:

Libya: Intervening to protect civilians is totally unacceptable when a democrat does it.  Never mind that we are still engaged in multiple wars that republicans started for that exact purpose.  But hey, no surprise, we saw the same damn thing in Yugoslavia.
Obamacare: Mandating people buy insurance is completely unconstitutional when democrats propose it!  Never mind that it was an idea first proposed by 19 republican senators and the republican presidential candidate at the time (Bob Dole).
Stimulus: Never, ever, ever works and is just a big handout to special interests.  That must be why Bush included stimulus in both his 2001 and 2003 budgets and why our republican appointed president of the Fed is begging us to pass more stimulus.

One can not stress enough that republicans in congress are completely devoid of any principle that they will not happily discard in a moment if it helps them achieve their only actual goal which is to make democrats look bad enough for them to return to power.  Absolutely nothing else matters to them in the least.

That being said, the compromise that Obama is offering them is generous.  They are being given some of the spending cuts they want and in return they don't sabotage the economy.  Most people think they should agree to do that for nothing.  Democrats have never threatened to sabotage the economy if they don't get what they want.

On the "nut" front, the only difference between the two parties right now seems to be that the Republican's have a good deal more of them in positions of greater power - it's no great revelation that the Democrats keep most of their "wingnuts" at arm's length, (even if, in some cases, the "wingnut" position is a perfectly reasonable one).

Quite true.  It's a tragic irony of American politics that voting against our disastrous invasion of Iraq ruined many a bright politicians career but not one single war supporter has been held to blame.

[GreatJustice]

Libya: Intervening to protect civilians is totally unacceptable when a democrat does it.  Never mind that we are still engaged in multiple wars that republicans started for that exact purpose.  But hey, no surprise, we saw the same damn thing in Yugoslavia.
Obamacare: Mandating people buy insurance is completely unconstitutional when democrats propose it!  Never mind that it was an idea first proposed by 19 republican senators and the republican presidential candidate at the time (Bob Dole).
Stimulus: Never, ever, ever works and is just a big handout to special interests.  That must be why Bush included stimulus in both his 2001 and 2003 budgets and why our republican appointed president of the Fed is begging us to pass more stimulus.

Even a stopped clock is right twice three times a day

Also, it's not like the Democrats totally flipped on civil liberties, the PATRIOT act, etc the instant Obama took office or anything.

[mainiac]

Also, it's not like the Democrats totally flipped on civil liberties, the PATRIOT act, etc the instant Obama took office or anything.

Progressives are actually angry about that and are the main source of bitching on that front.  How many republicans are bitching for more stimulus or supporting our troops or singing the praises of the mandate?

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Not to mention that the Republicans are still in love with the PATRIOT Act, while there are plenty of Democrats who would get rid of it even if Obama is a treacherous bastard.

[GreatJustice]

Also, it's not like the Democrats totally flipped on civil liberties, the PATRIOT act, etc the instant Obama took office or anything.

Progressives are actually angry about that and are the main source of bitching on that front.  How many republicans are bitching for more stimulus or supporting our troops or singing the praises of the mandate?

There are plenty of Republicans that opposed all of those things when they were "Republican Ideas", probably about as many as there are progressives presently opposing Obama's support of the PATRIOT Act. The number of those who actually stand for their ideals rather than for the colour of their ties is pretty small in both parties, though

[Helgoland]

And that's why what really matters is the tie - all that 'holier-than-thou' crap is gonna get us nowhere.
That being said, I find it very funny that the republicans are red and the democrats blue

[mainiac]

Could you name me any republicans in positions of authority who opposed the individual mandate before 2005 or so when democrats started embracing it?

Personally I'd say the number the stand for ideology first is rather high.  You just need to understand that the parties reflect what their true ideologies are.  Democrats desperately want to make government work and will compromise for as much as they think they can get.  Sure single payer would have been the most efficient but they didn't think they could get it so they settled for Obamacare which was the most efficient they could get.  Republicans want to reward the virtuous and punish the undeserving.  Those are their true ideologies and once you look at it that way everything they do makes a lot of sense.  Why would republicans oppose single payer when it allows other countries to have healthcare as a smaller percentage of GDP then just our government funded portion?  Well it punishes the virtuous capitalist who owns an insurance company and rewards the undeserving poor people who never made anything with their lives.

And that's why what really matters is the tie - all that 'holier-than-thou' crap is gonna get us nowhere.

This is true that you start with the assumption that both sides are equally at fault and equally virtuous.  If you just think about this proposition in the abstract for a moment then you will see that it's extraordinarily unlikely for both sides to be equally to blame.  Think back through history, how often does it seem that both sides are equally to blame for problems are equally responsible for good events?  It happens but usually when there is broad consensus, which doesn't exactly describe our current politics.

Once you understand that it's reasonable to be concerned with which side is more deserving then the whole point of democracy becomes clear, letting citizens support the deserving.

[Helgoland]

Once you understand that it's reasonable to be concerned with which side is more deserving then the whole point of democracy becomes clear, letting citizens support the deserving.

That's what I meant - you can't trust individual politicians, and you can't make big jumps with the parties, soo you'll have to find out which of the existing parties (I'm looking at you, libertarians!) is better.

[mainiac]

I somehow got the opposite meaning of what you wrote.

[misko27]

http://www.politico.com/blogs/burns-haberman/2012/12/rnc-launches-official-autopsy-on-election-151552.html?hp=t3_3
 
Looks like soon there will be a official response. This could make or break the repubs for a while.

[GreatJustice]

Could you name me any republicans in positions of authority who opposed the individual mandate before 2005 or so when democrats started embracing it?

Personally I'd say the number the stand for ideology first is rather high.  You just need to understand that the parties reflect what their true ideologies are.  Democrats desperately want to make government work and will compromise for as much as they think they can get.  Sure single payer would have been the most efficient but they didn't think they could get it so they settled for Obamacare which was the most efficient they could get.  Republicans want to reward the virtuous and punish the undeserving.  Those are their true ideologies and once you look at it that way everything they do makes a lot of sense.  Why would republicans oppose single payer when it allows other countries to have healthcare as a smaller percentage of GDP then just our government funded portion?  Well it punishes the virtuous capitalist who owns an insurance company and rewards the undeserving poor people who never made anything with their lives.

Depends on what you consider positions of authority to be. Pat Buchanan and Jim DeMint both come to mind immediately, though.

Can you name me any Democrats in positions of authority that presently oppose foreign interventionism and/or the PATRIOT Act?

[MetalSlimeHunt]

http://www.politico.com/blogs/burns-haberman/2012/12/rnc-launches-official-autopsy-on-election-151552.html?hp=t3_3
 
Looks like soon there will be a official response. This could make or break the repubs for a while.

Fingers crossed that their conclusion is something stupid and messes them up even further.

[GlyphGryph]

Can you name me any Democrats in positions of authority that presently oppose foreign interventionism and/or the PATRIOT Act?

Why are we talking about that stuff at all? what relevance does this have to the whole "we were for it before we were against it" thing that the conversation was actually about? The point was that the Republican's oppose things simply because the Dems support them, from what I understand, rather than because they believe they are doing the best whatever, as far as I can understand it.

Sometimes I honestly have trouble following your train of thought.

[mainiac]

Can you name me any Democrats in positions of authority that presently oppose foreign interventionism and/or the PATRIOT Act?

Nancy Pelosi?

She opposes the Patriot act and she is house minority leader.  She would be house speaker right now if Republicans hadn't gerrymandered like it was going out of style.  I don't know any who are isolationist though.  The Democratic party has been for humanitarian intervention since Woodrow Wilson.