Evolution of U.S. Politics

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That was basically what I was getting at.

It doesn't matter who gets elected, it's all a sham anyway.

The United States is a corporatocracy, the candidates are mere puppets for corporate interests and lobbyists doing their bidding. There is little difference between a Republican or a Democrat. The Republican makes it way too obvious they're in bed with money. The Democrat at least hides the act better.

Aside from a few people like Bernie Sanders, Dennis Kucinich, etc... there is nothing worthy in major government offices to pay attention to.

Sanders and Kucinich want to share wealth they did not produce. That is the problem with socialism. It is based on the zero sum game concept and redistribution of scarcity. It does not deal with growing the wealth to be shared.

ruveyn

Actually, it's an attempt to point out the conservatives (stoics) and liberals (epicureans) have existed in politics at both time periods in each Republic.

Ok, now prove that the Stoics were conservatives and the epicureans were liberal.

I mean, the stoics took some very liberal positions for their time, such as on the equality of ALL human beings, a very radical position for that time.

Epicurean has less political implications given that the major idea expressed was more about individuals promoting their own good. As such, it could be applied to most positions. I suppose they oppose natural law, but the Epicureans were known for not engaging in much politics at all, from what I read.

Okay, the Stoics were conservative in this way: the Stoics considered virtue to have value in and of itself whereas the Epicureans valued virtue to the extent that it could bring pleasure. For the Stoics, virtue was the highest good. For the Epicureans, pleasure was the highest good.



I support the equality of all human beings on the basis that they are all made in the image of God. It is not a liberal stance in and of itself to consider all humans equal, it is just one that modern day liberal have. But consider the likes of William Wilberforce.



The Epicureans followed a philosophy following pleasure and valuing it as the highest good, whereas the Stoics valued virtue as the highest good. Although these were not political parties to be voted for, the notions continue into the present and I consider it somewhat analogous to call the morally conservative as "stoics" and the morally liberal as "epicurean".

That doesn't say anything though. To some liberals, it could be argued that they hold justice as the highest good. For instance, theorist John Rawls developed a theory of justice that is big in liberal circles and that emphasizes equality, but Rawls's conception of justice is put as this:
"Justice is the first virtue of social institutions, as truth is of systems of thought. A theory however elegant and economical must be rejected or revised if it is untrue; likewise laws and institutions no matter how efficient and well-arranged must be reformed or abolished if they are unjust. ... Being first virtues of human activities, truth and justice are uncompromising."

That somehow doesn't sound very epicurean.

As for conservatives, umm.... what about pro-business conservatives? I don't see a reason why they are necessarily all about virtue, and frankly, I can see how they can be seen as about pleasure. Heck, conservative judge Richard Posner is a utilitarian, which is a lot more "epicurean".


It was a VERY liberal stance at the time, and one could argue that this stance is really part of what drives modern liberalism, as they promote equality because all people are inherently equal. Conservatism, however, if we just take the word abstractly, often is about promoting the interests of the current elites.

Is this to say that you are every bit wrong? No, but major details like that really bring a lot of question to your schema.


I don't see the analogy, and I don't think referencing a questionable analogy promotes our understanding.

Pro-megacorp conservatives having morally conservative values in addition to whatever lust for cabbage they have does not change my desire to vote for people who are morally conservative with social concerns. I'm not going to go through all you said right now, why bother anyway.

Well, ok, but you can't reduce the conservative movement to the Christian right and pretend the rest of us see the same way.

I suppose you see no reason, after all, when I write, I am right. When you write, you are wrong. (then again, it is very possible you actually do feel so stigmatized, and while I can understand to some extent given the positions you take, and the implicit drives people find in those positions, I can't see what I should say on the matter)

I'm not claiming "all conservatives are Christian" firstly, as there are atheists and agnostics who are also more conservatives. Unfortunately there are Muslims who would associate conservatism with Sharia law in which case I'd rather be considered morally liberal by them.

Seeing no reason? I see that you seem to bring up examples of people with multiple stances on issues including the general stance/title of conservative and then by association with such people you attach the stances they hold with conservatism and then say that is what conservatism is. Perhaps I should read more in detail, but I'm tired and I'm just replying as I take breaks from moving boxes from my wife and my room into the living room, attempting to get the place in a bit more order. I am so darn hungry and thirsty too, but almost out of food and I rather stay thirsty than drink the tap water here.

I said "reduce conservatism to the Christian right", which is not the same as " claiming all conservatives are Christian", but rather it means "ignoring non-Christian right varieties of conservatism", which is a problem in a number of nations, given that conservatism tends to be a hodge-podge of ideologies that promote nationalism, a more nationalistic and perhaps military oriented foreign policy, free markets, big business, religious morality, maintaining the status quo, etc.


I am joking about seeing no reason.

I don't know what you are talking about by saying "I bring up examples of people with multiple stances and a general ideological title, and by association attach the stances held with a particular ideology, and say that it is what the ideology is".

The most I've done is invoked John Rawls, and John Rawls is one of the biggest ethicists on the left in a very long time. A counter-example like him does bring up a lot of issues with a classification system, given that a lot of people are going to try to emulate his ideas explicitly or implicitly. That being said, I could also invoke research in which liberals are really different than conservatives because liberals tend to emphasize different aspects of morality, such as helping vs harming, and equality, and such distinctions where as conservatives also care more broadly about in-group/out-group distinctions, purity, and authority. The issue is that there is nothing really that Stoic about the last 3(and even something against their beliefs about 2 of them) and Epicureans are not particularly liberal or conservative by such a listing and nothing really engages them about the list either.

Hm... conservatives who operate based on greed and a desire to avoid contributing anything of theirs to society are stoic, while liberals, who are in favor of promoting social equality, are epicurean?

Parakeet, what is the weather like on your planet?

I am not sure I am going to perfectly agree with your characterization, Orwell, but I do think you really get at my point without any questions or equivocations.

Careful. Communists desire absolute equality of outcome. Liberals prefer equality before the law and equal opportunity. Liberals also value, as the label suggests, liberty. I think what liberals really abhor is a concentration of power because it is destructive to liberty and democracy. Excessive market dominance can produce highly illiberal outcomes, and the sizable concentration of wealth in the largest corporations and their ability to use that money to influence elections and elected officials makes them a political power in themselves. Government is most effective as a check on this power and when it cleans up after some of the grosser inequalities that a market can produce (e.g., with welfare for unemployment and disability).

People and organizations with a sufficient advantage in wealth and influence can and do use that leverage to maintain their position, and although they talk quite a lot about their liberty, the liberty of, say, 5% of the population can obstruct the liberty of the rest.

Well, right, it is a caricature, but the general point stands. In this universe, Republicans are not Stoics and Democrats are not Epicureans.

Oh, I haven't even engaged in anything wrong. I said "inherently equal" a position that most liberals accept. Liberals value equality, and sometimes even equality beyond "equal before law" and "equal opportunity", just look at Rawlsian ethical philosophy. Rawls utterly dispenses with the idea of merit and instead promotes the idea of equality behind a veil of ignorance to promote the idea of a more equal distribution of welfare. I mean "liberal" is usually used in a more conventional political idea anyway. (one could argue that Rawls's position is moving more in the direction of "communitarianism" which is not a political position so much as a position in political philosophy, given that the notion of society as a community regarding fairness as essential tends to be less like an agreement of self-interested parties as represented by a more conventional social contract)


Right, or at least any comparison made is too weak to even be useful.