darksabre

My definition of a Libertarian (based on my experience with them) is someone who thinks the best way to solve bad government is to destroy it rather than participate in and fix it. It's the "Rage quit" of politics and completely fails to account for how inevitable/essential government is, especially in a capitalist economy. A Libertarian thinks that unregulated capitalism will somehow work for them and not against. Every Libertarian small business owner thinks they did everything themselves with no outside help even though that is NEVER true. Libertarians think everything they do and achieve happens in a vacuum. Unless we're completely dismantling capitalism there's no point in "being" Libertarian. Bring some Libertarian ideas to government. I like that. I would probably get on board with a number of Libertarian-ish reforms. In-re my comment about Soviet Communism, what did the leaders do versus what they said they were going to do? They promised a workers revolution and then used it to make themselves rich by controlling industry. Libertarian politicians (they are inevitable just like government) would promise that you as the labor would have more money to do whatever you liked with it, but the truth is they would be making themselves rich at your expense. You would be free to be poor and stupid. Liberty!

You're not a Libertarian bud. You're just a liberal who wants a better ROI for his tax dollars.

No, but when you take all of the coercive social structure out of the mix, it becomes hugely problematic because people will ultimately resort to just worrying about themselves over anyone else. Greed is a trait everyone has, Libertarianism just enables it most effectively. Every liberertarian I've ever met is just mad that they have to pay taxes. So they say "if I didn't have to pay all these taxes, I could be more involved in my community! I would donate more to charity! The Gospel!" But they're full of shite. They really just want to build a 12 foot wall around their property and stuff their money under the mattress. I should add that I am sure I have Libertarian views. But I would never identify as Libertarian. Anyone who comes before me and says "I'm a Libertarian!" immediately tells me that they're only worried about themselves. They may talk a lot of talk otherwise, but I don't believe them.

Word. The problem is that no challenger can outspend either party or overcome the creature-of-habit voting practices of most reliable party voters. I could walk away from the Democratic party but there's no point, because people sure as hell aren't walking away from the GOP. It's easier to try to influence the Democratic party from within, just like the Tea Party did to the GOP...

I'm stunned that Pruitt resigned. I figured this administration was condoning his behavior. Maybe Trump is mad that Pruitt is better at stealing than he is?

Not that our government is even doing the best job of that right now, but your point remains valid. Libertarianism is to me the modern equivalent of Soviet Communism. A whole bunch of people like to say and maybe even believe they are left-libertarian, but they're actually all right-libertertarian, because the "I want what is mine" part of being a Libertarian always wins out.

lol Islanders

Really feeling some jalapeno chips tonight

I'll be frank: I don't like these things. I can be a different thing on a different day and a different set of questions.

Sh*t dude. I'm sorry to hear that.

I think instead ofnothing every curse word should be replaced with "Smehlik"

This is it in a nutshell. I have a friend right now who is exploring the whole thing. He's made the switch to identifying as a woman. He's never really been a happy guy and he certainly seems happier as they/she. I don't know if his plan is reassignment surgery but I could see it happening. I'm not about to tell him he's wrong, ya know?

This is what happens when you live in a blue state. You don't see the wave coming. I didn't think Hillary was going to lose until I went with Josie to Ohio that fall and saw the chaos. Then I got worried. Her losing felt inevitable to me by the time we got to election night. I was feeling very "because Buffalo" about it all. Why did Hillary lose? "Because Democrats".

Gender dysphoria, sure. Gender norms are typically social constructs. Think of transgender as being straight up biologically put together wrong. A whole bunch of things happened to make you come out with the parts you have. But you never feel comfortable with those parts. It has basically nothing to do with gender norms and social learning. You're just straight up born wrong. I'm not sure we have the scientific research available to really completely explain the phenomenon. This is how I understand it. Transgender people feel in a way about their physical shells that is almost inexplicable to someone like you or me.

I think they thought this. They didn't want to have to replace RBG with someone more moderate at the time. But... What they should have done was have RBG retire in 2013 right after Obama was elected, and then let the GOP stonewall the nomination and turn the 2014 midterm into referendum. That would have been forward thinking politics from the Democrats. Of course the caveat would have been that the Dems would have had to turn out in 2014 like they're going to have to now in 2018. Obama was probably the guy to make it happen and the party completely failed to use him.

Well, I think we're kinda confusing two issues. Gender fluidity is a separate thing from your sex. There's a huge movement right now around recognizing the wide spectrum of gender types. Most of us are probably a little gender fluid but are comfortable with our biological sex bits. But a lot of transgender people are the opposite: not gender fluid, but completely out of sorts with their physical body. You can be a girl who likes boys who feels like she absolutely needs to be a boy physically. Aye?

@josie's understanding of this is way better than mine, so I'll tag her and see if she wants to join in. But I will tell you one thing: transgender people are some of the most confident people I have ever met. I know several now who have gone through reassignment surgery and there is not a more certain person on this planet. It really has nothing to do with who you are attracted to. It's just about how you feel about who you are. I think it's something that is very hard for people like you and me to understand. I cannot fathom being so confident that I would be willing to have massive surgery. But trans people are. They get to a point where simply being a boyish girl is not enough. They feel straight up trapped in their own bodies. I can't even begin to imagine what that feels like. I am not them.

It's open bahd. Let's talk about how Transgender people aren't punchlines.

wrt to RvW, yeah, probably. That probably deserves its own thread... The Democrats really missed the boat in 2016 with messaging about the Supreme Court. It was legit the only topic I was voting on. Half my friends had no idea it was even a concern. It should have been the one singular issue of the entire election season for Democrats. Naturally, they failed at basic politics.

I want to keep the same stuff for this season, but I think the moment the Sabres clinch a playoff spot they should switch back to Song #2 for the goal song...

Would it have been better if the rule were unable to be changed? The Obama admin wouldn't have gotten its lower court appointments, but the GOP wouldn't be getting several SCOTUS justices. How few justices could the SCOTUS have? We would be down to 7 right now if the 60 vote rule were still in place.

Good stuff LTS. I don't think we'll need to over-moderate anything here. Having separate Topics/Threads is going to be really helpful. Anyone trying to troll/derail thread topics should be easy to call out. The old Politics Megathread seemed to engender itself to trolling and sh*tposting.

So let's talk about that 60 vote threshold. Why was it so easy to eliminate it? Should the Democrats have done so? Would the GOP have just done it anyway once the cat was out of the bag that it was an option? It looks to me like the Democrats sacrificed a number of SCOTUS noms just to fill some lower courts. That seems...short sighted.

I think this is right. I know the Dems were catching a lot of blame for basically coming up with the tactic that the GOP turned around and used on us. I think that happens a lot...

We're currently living in a pretty weird timeline. Barring anything unusual happening, the SCOTUS is about to become the most conservative it has ever been. Trump will get his nominee with a simple majority. Before we get into where the Supreme Court is headed, I'd like to try to parse together how exactly it is that we got here in the first place. I think Democrat voters are mostly to blame for not showing up in 2016 when a Supreme Court seat was on the line, but there is also a lot of procedural stuff that I don't quite know the full story on. Hoping people can fill in the blanks for me, but my understanding is that there was essentially a gentlemen's agreement in place in Congress regarding the number of votes needed to confirm, but no hard and fast rule about it? The GOP delayed and delayed on the Garland nomination and when Democrats tried to stop it the GOP changed the "rules". Was this avoidable? Could there have been actual laws in place to prevent the delay of the Garland confirmation? Were there precedents that the Democrats set in the past that set this whole mess up?