(02-06-2017, 04:09 PM)Galen Wrote:(02-06-2017, 03:58 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Some people here have suggested that the Democrats and progressives must "pick their battles." I say no. The Democrats are going to need to block virtually everything, every day. They can't "pick their battles."
If Reid hadn't of eliminated the filibuster for most presidential appointments then the (Democrats -- insulting smear redacted) wouldn't be in this situation. McConnell would leave the filibuster intact but knowing that his opponents will eliminate the filibuster when an nominee they favor comes up provide him with the incentive to go nuclear at this point. The only reason they haven't now is because they are waiting to see if the Dims are going to be even remotely sane.
"Remotely sane" in your expression means that Democrats accept that their role in American political life is to acquiesce in whatever our would-be dictator Trump wants. America has never worked that way; I would prefer that the United States of America splinter into its fifty states even if some become fascist dictatorships than that the United States become one unitary Evil Empire as repressive as the Soviet Union at least in the Brezhnev era on non-economic matters. If you wonder what a society as repressive as the USSR under Brezhnev but with the freedom of economic indulgence for economic elites and near-serfdom for the poor looks like, then think of Chile under Pinochet.
Commie-style 'democratic centralism', which is anything but democratic, is fine with you so long as it serves your plutocratic dream. C'est vrai, n'est-ce pas?
(I really must practice my French in case I must move to Canada).
I've met people from Pinochet's Chile during the dictatorship. They made very clear to me that I didn't want to visit such a political nightmare even if it has spectacular scenery, a rich culture, and (in its most populous areas) climates analogous to those off coastal California. Should I have to flee America for my political beliefs, Chile would be near the top of my list of countries in which I would want refuge -- because I would rather be where people appreciate political freedom enough to stay clear of demagogues.
Quote:I don't think the (Democrats -- insulting smear again redacted) are even remotely in a position to block everything.
We Democrats are operating with 48% representation in a political system in which the 52% now operate on the principle "We won and you are done -- forever!" which is utterly novel, and contrary to 220+ years of Constitutional government. But it is compatible with dictatorship, as in China, where the nominal opposition gets to have an ineffective presence with but 30% representation. To be sure, the political culture has changed, at least with the Right becoming more rapacious and intolerant, something that this Crisis Era either corrects with a revival of freedom or endorses with the descent into tyranny.
Face it, Galen: you are no libertarian. You believe in a pure dominion of economic elites in political and economic life with the rest of Humanity obliged to suffer to the extent necessary for the maximal indulgence of those elites.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.