Is the GOP's extremist wing now too big to fail?

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The lunatics are running the asylum over at the GOP.

They're not about to de-radicalize because of the politicians telling them to--that would get them primaried out of office and replaced with even crazier crazies.
They're not about to de-radicalize because of conservative media telling them to--that would cost them ratings.
They're not about to de-radicalize because of moderate media telling them to--they would just see it as more sign that the marxists have taken control of everything.
They're not about to de-radicalize because of Trump telling them to--he revels in it.
They're not about to de-radicalize because of the capitalist class telling them to--they already consider them traitors to America for not using their economic power to promote solely conservative capitalism.

Something has to give. Hopefully a few humiliating electoral defeats this decade will force them to get their act together. I fear though that something dark and violent will come from the right wing once they realize that democracy and demographics and facts are not on their side.

This conservative angle of stylizing themselves as the only truly patriotic Americans is tiring and does not help you. Conservatives acting like they are the only true-believer super special Americans who are super special because only they really care about the Constitution (blessings and peace be upon it!) is insulting.
"Are you against conservatism? Then you hate America!"
It's inane. It stops discourse dead. I see a conservative talk like this and I know that they're living in a fantasy world built to help them feel like special snowflakes for their very specific interpretation of what America is and should be.
Are some people unfairly called extremists? Yes. Is right-wing extremism a deadly serious problem? Hell yes.
What was acceptable in the past is not necessarily acceptable now. Society changes. Interpretations of history change. Perceptions of historical figures change. Yesterday's radicals are today's moderates. Yesterday's moderates are today's radicals. This is how it has always been.

"Our" ABC has a similar requirement:

Excerpt taken from: https://about.abc.net.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/CODE-final-15-01-2019.pdf

Yet even with this there are still complaints of imbalance in reporting by the corporation...As well as complaints about private media (which as noted is "free to be partial to private interests") not being impartial, so doubtless media organisations would find ways around the suggested "fairness doctorine".

You also have the potential for the same "it's a private company, so can carry what material it wants, and prevent whatever material it wishes" claims as were made recently about social media organisations...

Fnord & goldfish tried the trick of putting words in my mouth and I called them out on that.
Now it is your turn.

Cut and paste where I have ever said both sides are equally bad.
You won't because you can't.
This type of straw man argument is typical of some people.

What I have always said is there are a***holes on both sides of the political divide.
However, the left won't admit it.
This denial is axiomatic nonsense.

Consider:
"The right are fascists" with my statement "there are dirtbags on either side of the political divide.


When you say things like that you completely destroy your credibility.
Where have I ever said, "only The Left is Bad"?
Please stop your straw man misinformation campaign.



You keep on saying rubbish like that.
Cut and paste where I have said this.
Your "broken record" stunt only works on people supporting you.

Are you using Hitlers tactic of "If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it"?
It looks that way.



"No credibility" is a phrase that comes to mind.

Perhaps the people you are referring to want to preserve the older traditions and are unhappy with the progressive's increasing socialism of America.

[quote=Feyokian]I wonder if there's a place in the modern world for the return of something like the fairness doctrine or if it would be viewed by a sizeable chunk of people as just another unpatriotic plot to impose political correctness and censor free speech.[/quote]
IMHO that was the single inflection point in amuuurican discourse in general, that was the point where we went from getting along to wanting to exterminate the other.

No, I have done nothing of the sort.

Weird that centre-right people like myself and ASPartofMe who frequently express our opposition to leftists are now “leftists” according to you. What does that say about you?

The simple fact is that the centre-right is sick and tired of the far right. Unfortunately centre-right politicians are increasingly afraid to stand up to the far-right. It has got to the point that lifelong Republican voters are having to desert the Republican Party for the most leftist Democratic Party in history because for all the Democrats’ failings, they’re nearly always the only option with basic respect for the democratic process and constitutional rights.

It's all a matter of perspective. The far right of today hold pretty conventional views by historical standards, in a similar fashion the "centre-right" of today are cartoonishly left wing by the standards of only a few generations ago. If you insist on sitting inside the Overton window presented to you, you are indeed centre-right. From a broader viewpoint, you are barely to the right of Antonio Gramsci and a living testament to the success of the cultural revolution.

You’re quite right that it is a matter of perspective. Certainly someone who was opposed to same-sex marriage and who generally believed that women should be primary caregivers rather than men would have been considered an ordinary conservative fifteen years ago, if indeed they were considered a conservative at all. Nowadays that would be seen as a very conservative viewpoint.

Ironically I think you start to sound somewhat like Gramsci in the second half of your post. I would consider myself considerably to Gramsci’s right on economic issues. I am an enthusiastic supporter of free markets and free trade, and extraordinarily relaxed about people getting filthy rich. My approach towards capitalism is basically uncritical. I wish to shrink the state, albeit not dramatically. I am extremely relaxed about privatisation and sceptical of nationalisation. I reject the notion that capitalist classes are controlling our discourse via subtle means - if anything I tend to believe the exact opposite (that people seek out views that they agree with and the media simply caters to the I suspect Gramsci would find my complacency pretty revolting.

There are issues where I might be considered to the left of Gramsci. For example, most social issues that are not related to class, and immigration. I do think the immigration system is a relatively recent invention, and our attitudes towards immigration are much further to the “right” by historical standards than people assume.

I think we all share a natural cognitive bias towards assuming our corner of the political spectrum is larger than it is- that is to say, we are better at differentiating ourselves from our allies than we are at differentiating people with very different views to us from their allies. I am trying to think of a plainly ridiculous example and struggling. So perhaps a variation upon an old joke:

- A leftist is someone who cannot tell the difference between Blair and Hitler.

- A rightist is someone who cannot tell the difference between Stalin and Bush.

- A centrist is someone who cannot tell the difference between Stalin and Hitler.

Maybe we should elect AOC (who I don’t even agree with that much) just to “own the cons”, so to speak.

Oh bless your heart you're adorable. Hey everyone! Now it's MY turn! This should be entertaining...
Calls himself The Oracle of Truth but doesn't like being called the ministry of facts - figure that one out...
And anyways, half the time all you're doing is quoting other people - so if you're going to rely on using other people's words to represent you, then others don't have much choice than to put other peoples words in your mouth...



So here, you're saying you NEVER say "both sides are equally bad" - this is implicit, cos if you had ever said it, even once, I'd be able to quote you on it - ergo you can't have ever said it if you believe this claim. And yet, right below, I have your own words trying to play the hummina hummina shuffle "uh buh duh, I never said that they were EQUALLY bad, I just said that there's bad on both sides!" Splitting hairs at best



You claim you acknowledge there are a***holes on both sides, yet you only obsess over one side. "Because they won't admit it" - yet while you passively mention the possibility of a***holes on both sides, there never seem to be any on the right that garner your attention. Funny that. Or, do you leave them alone cos they DO "admit it"? IF they DO admit it, please provide examples of right wing a***holes, and what they do that makes them a***holes. I have you, right there, saying they exist. Show me some. Tell me who these right wing a***holes are, and what they've done that makes them bad. Or are you just saying stuff?



But you think "fascism" is an overused term, dontcha? Not sure where you're going with this. Never have you actually said "the right are fascists", so how is it connected with your supposed "neutrality" in hiding behind the claim that you supposedly believe there are a***holes on "both sides". If you were TRULY unbiased, you'd whine about both sides, since they do have a***holes on both sides. To single one side out (even for such childish noble reasons as "but they wont admit it!") is to engage in bias, isn't it? You've literally selected a differentiating reason to single one side out over the other.



Well, you only ever say "the left is bad", so...
Show me where you have ever called out the right other than in the vaguest of theoretical terms framed inclusively as a "both sides" schtick.
Please stop projecting your wacky delusions onto other people.



But you literally keep saying the same rubbish over and over. Rubbish in, rubbish out...
Interestingly, you use an awful lot of words just to not-say things. Oracle running out of Truth to share? Or is that all the Truth there is? I expected more...



So now YOU'RE comparing people to Hitler? Good job! Oh, wait, you didn't SAY I WAS Hitler, you just drew a weak and flimsy comparison to imply I was Hitler-ISH. Here, hold this Godwin for me, I think you need it more than I do.
Also, in order for this to be true, I would have to be lying. Are you saying I'm lying? No, probably not - you don't actually SAY much of anything, lest it come back to haunt you later.



"No credibility", yes - that's another one I'd agree with, mr random internet person

Hehehe.



This is probably THE misconception of our generation. Almost everyone puts such views on the right hand side of politics, associated as it is with Thatcher and Reagan and so-called modern "conservative" formations. It's better described as "economic liberalism" and more correctly identified with what the Americans would call political liberalism.

Aren't the republicans and the democrats both neoliberal, and the two parties are basically competing over cultural tendencies, while there is no option for different economics?
It looks to me like the neoliberal era has brought significant decrease in wages at the lower end (just as Hayek had planned) and the two parties, unwilling to even debate economic changes, are just blaming the others for their culture of X that supposedly led to the wage decrease.

Is mocking allowed here now?
[Pepe rubs his paws together]

Sweetie, 'The Ministry of Truth' is said *ironically*.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ministrie ... y_of_Truth



It may be 'implicit' to you, but fantasy is just that.

BTW, You do know how 'context' works, right?
Regardless, find *one* example, in this context, where I have said "both sides are equally bad", and we will take it from there.
Well, you can't and you have admitted that.
But now you are into 'mindreading'.
'Interesting'.

You do realise that suppositions are not facts, right?

What sort of a 'Seinfeld bizarro world' do you live in?
What part of 'Both sides have a$$holes' is the same as saying they are both equal in a$$holedness?

I actually did explain this in another thread, where the ultimate conclusion was that *both sides* are acting abominably.

I used this example:


BTW, Fnord is happy that the far left of politics has replaced a 'heart' with a 'fist'.
Do you agree with him?

Certainly pre-2016 it was easier to say that the two parties were two cheeks of the same neo-liberal arse. And there really wasn't a huge difference between them over cultural matters. It was more of a delay. Like the Tories in the UK, The Reps. played the role of the slow kid in the class and the ever-noble loser. Putting up minimal resistance to whatever change the culturally-focussed left wanted, then ignoring it, accepting it as settled, never attempting to change things back when they were in power and sometimes later pretending it was a conservative idea/virtue all along.
It's an older pattern than you might think. “The Conservatives, mark my word, never yet took up a cause without betraying it in the end.”

Under Trump there was a definite slide towards (actually right wing) nationalist/protectionist economics and some very token efforts on immigration and cultural matters. Where the parties are now is less clear and even less clear is their future direction.

I call myself “socially and economically liberal” for exactly this reason. But it seems clear to me that there’s, at the very least, clear daylight between economic liberals and people who are very much not economic liberals, the socialists and such.

You can’t pull out a political weighing scale and say that such-and-such a person is definitely a 4.36/10 politically and therefore centre-left. If “almost everyone” thinks that Adam Smith and Margaret Thatcher were centre-right by modern standards then they are centre-right.

You get people on the far-left who say that being left-wing inherently means supporting the abolition of the state along with the concept of private property, and therefore Jeremy Corbyn is not left-wing.

If our political spectrum is to have any meaning at all, it has to be rooted in mainstream, day-to-day discourse, not ivory-tower theorising which lumps together the entire political system. That’s not to say that lumping together all the outsiders as “extreme right”, “extreme left”, or rarely a few other “extremes” doesn’t miss out a lot of subtlety, but the most relevant subtlety is the subtlety that dictates our day to day politics, the divisions between our parties and within our parties.