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Hector
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29 Jan 2009, 4:59 am

gamefreak wrote:
Well the one thing about republicans and democrats is this. The Republicans where to the left from the start of the party up until the 1920's. Then the Republicans went to the right with Harding & the democrats went to the left with FDR.

Lincoin was very liberal and expressed ways to aid the poor. Look at the Civil War, He gave any poor african american cash assistance if they fought on the unions side. He also expressed more even redistribution of wealth and civil-rights.

The only republican since the 20's that were not to the Right where Eisenhower & G.H.W Bush. They were both moderate in political since.

The impression I had was that Nixon's administration was economically more left-wing than that of any president who followed him (with the possible exception of Obama's, now - we'll see). Wasn't aware of G. H. W. Bush being moderate in any sense.



gamefreak
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29 Jan 2009, 9:12 pm

Hector wrote:
gamefreak wrote:
Well the one thing about republicans and democrats is this. The Republicans where to the left from the start of the party up until the 1920's. Then the Republicans went to the right with Harding & the democrats went to the left with FDR.

Lincoin was very liberal and expressed ways to aid the poor. Look at the Civil War, He gave any poor african american cash assistance if they fought on the unions side. He also expressed more even redistribution of wealth and civil-rights.

The only republican since the 20's that were not to the Right where Eisenhower & G.H.W Bush. They were both moderate in political since.

The impression I had was that Nixon's administration was economically more left-wing than that of any president who followed him (with the possible exception of Obama's, now - we'll see). Wasn't aware of G. H. W. Bush being moderate in any sense.



Nixon was very centralist when he was president. Yes he was a left-winger pretending to be a right-winger for the conservative and southern vote.



JoJerome
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30 Jan 2009, 10:37 pm

Ok, let me qualify on John Adams...

As a group, the Founding Fathers were slave owners who felt the only people worthy of voting were property-owning males. None of them were anything close to what we today call 'Liberal.'

But, relative to their times and surroundings, the fact that they designed a government with the express intent of checks and balances, freedom of religion, speech and press, was about as progressive as they could get without being burned at the stake for witchcraft.

- Jo



blackelk
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30 Jan 2009, 10:51 pm

gamefreak wrote:
Hector wrote:
gamefreak wrote:
Well the one thing about republicans and democrats is this. The Republicans where to the left from the start of the party up until the 1920's. Then the Republicans went to the right with Harding & the democrats went to the left with FDR.

Lincoin was very liberal and expressed ways to aid the poor. Look at the Civil War, He gave any poor african american cash assistance if they fought on the unions side. He also expressed more even redistribution of wealth and civil-rights.

The only republican since the 20's that were not to the Right where Eisenhower & G.H.W Bush. They were both moderate in political since.

The impression I had was that Nixon's administration was economically more left-wing than that of any president who followed him (with the possible exception of Obama's, now - we'll see). Wasn't aware of G. H. W. Bush being moderate in any sense.



Nixon was very centralist when he was president. Yes he was a left-winger pretending to be a right-winger for the conservative and southern vote.


Yes. Nixon was very much like Clinton. Very moderate and successful policy wise, but bogged down by "moral" issues.



Hector
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31 Jan 2009, 7:15 am

I'm not sure if the two are exactly comparable. Clinton left office with an approval rating of 65%. Nixon had to resign, and is often regarded as one of the "worst" presidents of the 20th century while if not for being a complete a**hole he'd be regarded as one of the more effective ones.



ruveyn
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31 Jan 2009, 7:17 am

DentArthurDent wrote:
Well personally I see Democrats and Greens as apologists for capitalism and very naive. Problems with poverty, the environment, and all manner of identity politics cannot be solved under capitalism, because capitalism by its very nature causes these problems.


They can't be solved under socialism either. In fact the problems of the poor are ultimately increased under socialism because productivity drops off. The best bet is some kind of mixed economy where producers are relatively unhampered and there a system of doles and hand outs for stupid or maimed or ret*d or chronically lazy people.

ruveyn



blackelk
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31 Jan 2009, 2:58 pm

Hector wrote:
I'm not sure if the two are exactly comparable. Clinton left office with an approval rating of 65%. Nixon had to resign, and is often regarded as one of the "worst" presidents of the 20th century while if not for being a complete a**hole he'd be regarded as one of the more effective ones.


Nixon has many more legislative accomplishments than Clinton. He was also pretty popular and won re-election easily.

Quote:
Under Nixon, direct payments from the federal government to individual American citizens rose from 6.3% GNP to 8.9% in government benefits including Social Security and Medicare. Food aid and public assistance also rose, beginning at $6.6 billion and escalating to $9.1 billion. Defense spending decreased from 9.1% to 5.8% GNP. The revenue sharing program pioneered by Nixon delivered $80 billion to individual states and municipalities.


Quote:
One of Nixon's economic advisers, Herbert Stein, wrote: "Probably more new regulation was imposed on the economy during the Nixon administration than in any other presidency since the New Deal.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Nixon



Hector
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31 Jan 2009, 3:10 pm

Of course, I have no objection to any of that, except Watergate ruined Nixon's entire record. Whereas I don't think most people ultimately took Clinton's own "moral" transgressions all that seriously (given his enduring popularity).



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31 Jan 2009, 3:47 pm

Hector wrote:
Of course, I have no objection to any of that, except Watergate ruined Nixon's entire record. Whereas I don't think most people ultimately took Clinton's own "moral" transgressions all that seriously (given his enduring popularity).


True. Though I think both were hugely overblown. Watergate is one of the most overblown scandals I can think of.



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31 Jan 2009, 10:37 pm

well, it allowed us to 'kick Dick Nixon' around some more..;)

Gad, I lived through that. I was so sick of day after day of it. You know something? One of the legal aides on the Democrats' side was (wait for it), Hillary Rodham

Lincoln suspended habeus corpus, jailed dissidents (they called them Copperheads back then..;).

Nobodies' slate is entirely clean.

I'm a very much rarity; a moderate. I have to listen to both sides, then actually make up my mind. It's so much easier to go with the flow, listen and watch things that agree with your position.

Capitalism and Socialism both have serious flaws; it's good that there's more than one system, to keep each other honest...;)



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31 Jan 2009, 11:06 pm

ruveyn wrote:
DentArthurDent wrote:
Well personally I see Democrats and Greens as apologists for capitalism and very naive. Problems with poverty, the environment, and all manner of identity politics cannot be solved under capitalism, because capitalism by its very nature causes these problems.


They can't be solved under socialism either. In fact the problems of the poor are ultimately increased under socialism because productivity drops off. The best bet is some kind of mixed economy where producers are relatively unhampered and there a system of doles and hand outs for stupid or maimed or ret*d or chronically lazy people.

ruveyn


don't forget the crazies. or would they fall in the ret*d category by your standards?



ToadOfSteel
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31 Jan 2009, 11:31 pm

I'm a crazy pinko left-wing communist nutjob...

Why, you ask?

Well, there is the little thing of me not being afraid to call Bush an idiot, because he, well, is an idiot...

Sure, presidents come and presidents go. All have something deplorable to their name, all have something wonderful... Some had more deplorable acts than others, but no single president was free of corruption, just as no president was completely 100% corrupted (otherwise they would have exerted military force to remain in office past their terms)...

But Dubya brought in one element that had never been seen in the US presidency before: the element of COMPLETE f*****g INCOMPETENCE... All the other 42 presidents before Bush had some idea of how to manage a country, even if I didn't agree with their policies (I'm not a fan of Reaganomics, but that doesn't mean Reagan was an incompetent president)... January 20, 2009 was the greatest day in US history, and would have been regardless of who won the election (even if Ron Paul won), just for the virtue of kicking that dumbass out of the White House...



Hector
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01 Feb 2009, 7:33 am

Admittedly whenever an American describes themselves to me as a "moderate", my first instinct is to think "conservative". I mean, moderates largely went out and voted for Reagan in 1984.



pakled
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01 Feb 2009, 4:17 pm

actually, I was raised conservative, but it didn't take..;)

The media is so polarized nowadays, that there's actually not much out there for us. After all, who wants a talk radio show where people try to solve problems and be reasonable? It wouldn't last 5 minutes, it'd be so boring.

The whole point of political discourse nowadays is to make your side look good, and the other side look bad. Everything's zero-sum. A win-win scenario is the last thing they want.

I guess being a moderate doesn't mean you lay awake at nights knowing someone, somewhere, is having a good time...;)