Political Loyalty and BOHICA

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For those without military experience or exposure to military personnel, the acronym means Bend Over Here It Comes Again, and refers to an incoming screwing over of the person invoking it. In this case, I'm referring to what happens when political parties and politicians know you're going to vote for them largely regardless of what they do, whether out of loyalty, greater fear of the other party, ethnic or class solidarity, etc. It's one of my deepest frustrations as a dedicated political free agent to see otherwise intelligent people essentially disenfranchise themselves by declaring their eternal loyalty to a party or candidate.

The key to being truly politically powerful is being willing to take a short term loss in pursuit of a long term goal, undying loyalty is for suckers in this game.
Take one of my pet organizations, the NRA. They can and will endorse on either side of the aisle, and thought they still largely support GOP candidates simply due to the nature of the parties, the fact that they will throw their money and support behind a rival candidate either within the party or from across the aisle if crossed makes them far more effective.
The Tea Parties have demonstrated this lately as well, though in their case it's the willingness to sacrifice an election to purify the party that's striking rather than any bipartisanship; they're willing to take the hit of losing a GOP seat short term to drive the party as a whole in the direction they want long term. That should be the real takeaway for other would be political groups from the whole Tea Party saga, influence comes from the ability to deliver a credible threat of going elsewhere, not pledges of undying loyalty.

Another interesting contrast is between the evangelicals who've so strongly influenced the GOP in the last few decades, and the black voters who overwhelmingly support the Democrats while mostly being given mere lip service. Why are the religious voters paid attention to? Because it's well known that they will sit out of a race if they don't like any of the candidates or actively work against those they don't like. I can virtually guarantee it that if the black vote wasn't seen as de facto automatic Democrat, that not only would the Democratic party put more than words into wooing those voters, the GOP would respond to them as well. As it stands, they're considered so off the table by the Republicans that doing anything to sway them is seen as a waste of political capitol, while the Democrats act largely the same but for the simple reason that they don't think they have anywhere else to go. Ditto for gays, though Obama has actually started to deliver on that one a bit, perhaps he was getting a bit nervous looking at his numbers lately.

So, for those who are into the whole brevity thing, my stance could be distilled down to "make them earn your vote", otherwise you're being taken for granted. Loyalty is supposed to be a two way street, not the fear mongering that seems to pass for it these days.

Obama may not be perfect, and he isn't, but the Repugnicans are just too scary.

Dilligaff?

Then why post at all? I mean I'll take the topic bump, but it's sort of contradictory to take the effort to say you don't care when a truly indifferent person wouldn't have even bothered in the first place. I mean if you disagree with my analysis or central thesis than go ahead and explain why, I'd be happy to elaborate or defend my thought process here. Or am I reading this all wrong, and you're just trying to one-up my acronym?

I'm so totally glad to be European...
No matter how stupid the Austrian and German Politicians seem to be, they are by far not as crazy and mindfucked as the North American, Latin American, East Asian (except from Japan) and African politicians are. I mean, even if it's 5 big parties as it is in Austria it's not a real Democracy since you can surely "decide" but you always have to decide for a package of "opinions" even if you only share one of those opinions. If you think that the taxes for rich persons should be raised you have to vote for the Social Democratical Party but then you also automatically vote for... whatever, for example a comprehensive school. And if you think that immigrants should be able to master the language of this country if they want to become citzens you have to vote for the Liberal Party but then you also automatically vote for more unemployment benefit. A real democracy would offer the possibility of voting for each question independently.
But in the U.S. it's only two parties. Two parties, one extremestical party they call Democrats and one insane party they call Republicans. And in fact it's not even the people who decide for one party, it's the media caressing the concerns. It's nothing but a plutocracy full of unworldly insane conservative fascists.
I'm not even that sure if I would prefer the U.S. to the Chinese, since the Chinese may be inhuman but are at least not insane.
No, in fact they are all insane... GENOCIDE!! !! XDDDD

Last edited by awes on 24 Dec 2011, 4:59 pm, edited 1 time in total.

My my deepest frustration is figuring out if I should use my freedom and leave, or stay and attempt to keep it.

Back to politics. if you don't believe that voting them all out is the solution, then you're part of the problem.

Yes