|
|
|
|
|
Thomas Jefferson said that the biggest danger to our government would be when one group got too much power. I believe we have reached that time.Originally Posted by nadB
As recently as 4 years ago Republicans controlled the White House, Senate, and the House.
The right hasn't exactly been shut out of power forever and ever. Or even now.
With apologies to Mr. Jefferson, I think a bigger danger is that we've moved past political differences as disagreements about policy or differing points of view (or heck, even differing motivations) and settled on an "all or nothing, they're not just wrong, they're evil and want to destroy everything I love and my way of life" mentality. On both sides. And you can't get anything done like that, which just proves the point and drives the wedge deeper.
The left does this. The right does this. Democrats do this. Republicans do this.
It hurts us all.
What hurt you personally or from a business standpoint over the past 4 years?
The list is already long from what has happened over the past 4 days.
Me personally?
https://www.npr.org/2020/12/02/91266...leges-plummets
The worst of that is COVID, but alsoBut that isn't really my point at all. I think fewer international students coming over is a problem. You might think it's a good thing. Someone else might not care one way or the other. Or want to dig into why. And reasonable people can have reasonable disagreements about the why, and about whether it's good or bad, and about what might or might not be done about it. And while it's possible that some of those people would be motivated by some great objectively evil world domination plan (on either side I guess) but it's also true that people sometimes just disagree.experts point out that international student enrollment has been declining since 2016
And instead of the left jumping to racism (which may or may not be part of the program) and the right insisting that any pro-immigrant policies at all are simply a step towards open borders and some kind of George Soros run world communist order (which I suppose may or may not be the case at times?), I think we'd accomplish more if we'd assume good, patriotic intentions from those we disagree with and actually debate policy as policy instead of along pre-set teams assuming the worst with no quarter given.
Maybe this hasn't been your experience? I hope not. If people in your circles give the benefit of the doubt and argue political policies in good faith I think that's a great step in the right direction. I fear it's becoming a lost art in our society at large.
I don't know any on the right or many democrats who think Trump or conservatism actually caused the China virus crisis. Those on the left won't even admit to where it came from and what led up to the world wide mess.
I'd agree with you about international students. We need them. We need their money. We need to be indoctrinating them with our capitalists and especially Christian values.
Racism has become a tool to incite. For 40 years of my life we grew out of the hate. In 2009 the flames were fanned and have been since.
Forced change and loss of freedom causes people to hate politics and all it stands for.
I don't blame the COVID pandemic on the right at all. And it's the main cause of International Student numbers dropping in 2020/2021. But the drop before that was largely (although not entirely) policy based. This is what I do, I can go as inside baseball as anyone would care to (nobody would, it's very wonky) on that topic.
But my main point is that everyone who voted for Biden isn't an evil communist who hates everything America stands for. And everyone who voted for Trump isn't evil either. Of course not. But our political discourse nationally has gotten to that point. The why is debatable, but that fact that this is where we are is unfortunate.
My main 2 points above in my reply to Don where just that
1. I'm not sure we can really decide that one group has too much power when the other group had more or less similar power very recently (and is hardly powerless now).
2. I think a bigger problem than "too much power for one group" is demonizing our "enemies" to the point that we can't talk to them. A problem on both left and right.
I agree.
Certainly those whose votes were harvested were probably not all "an evil communist who hates everything America stands for".
Also, I doubt that many of the dead people who "voted" were "an evil communist who hates everything America stands for".
See now, even as someone who doesn't think that has been remotely shown to have happened, I can admit this is a witty reply.
Common ground. Kumbaya.
The left has jumped to racism, but the right has never insisted that pro-immigrant policy was what you stated. This is the problem with political discussions. You are arguing with a strawman, not real opinions and issues.
First of all, illegal immigration is NOT immigration any more than shoplifting is shopping. As a matter of fact, if you looked at it in a manner that was in the least unbiased (doubtful that will happen since you already equated illegal and legal immigration as a part of your argument), allowing illegal immigrants to flood our borders screws the least educated and skilled Americans because they are willing to work for peanuts and live in multi-family homes to save whatever they earn to send home to relatives that have hot yet made the journey here. It is also dangerous for the ones coming here, as the women are raped on the way and whatever they had is stolen by coyotes or bandits (or perhaps the end up suffocating in the back of a semi trailer in the Texas heat).
When Roberts decided to support an executive order made by someone that is not even president anymore, he pretty much decided that this is the way things were going to be forever. I am, of course, talking about DACA. No person on the "right" that I am aware of wants to deport the people that were brought here illegally without their consent as children. Taking care of them could have been the basis for creating some sort of new realistic immigration laws, but the Supreme Court put the turd in the punch bowl by deciding THEY would create immigration law based on an outdated executive order, thereby removing the one issue that both democrats and republicans could totally agree on. He is truly the biggest idiot on the court (the others that voted for that could be expected to do so because they are pretty much morons all the time). They were too f&^$#ing stupid to see the unintended consequences of their actions.
The process needs to be streamlined, and in the absence of that you will continue to get thousands of illegals attempting to stream across the border and overwhelming our system. It shouldn't take 7-10 years to get an answer about whether you have been accepted or not, and NOBODY should be able to circumvent the system and delay the processing of those that are attempting to follow our laws....which are really the folks we want here. This is and has been up to Congress to solve, but they don't want to solve it (unless they believe they can profit from it in terms of money or power).
There are dozens of countries with strict immigration laws that we should take a lesson from. Also, why aren’t lefties screaming about these countries, Canada for example, and demanding that they stop this heinous racist act of demanding people do things the right way?
Immigration wasn't really my point. The point was that demonizing our political opponents isn't helpful.
But there are those on the right who oppose legal immigration. Stephen Miller was a big part of the Trump administration's immigration strategy. He's pretty much on record as opposed to many aspects of legal immigration.
I suppose it's true that he wouldn't have stated that any pro-immigration policy was a Soros backed effort towards open boarders, but you can't tell me there isn't ever hysteria on the right about the topic. Just look at our long threads on the topic here.
And therefore, legal immigration suffered in many ways over the last 4 years. And again, if that's someone's goal then that person and I probably disagree. But that doesn't make me an open boarders proponent nor does it make them racist (although either of those things may be true in some cases).
If you aren't seeing this all or nothing mentality in your circles, then great. Maybe it's not the problem it seems to be.
I absolutely believe the DACA issue should be settled legislatively. And I think most on right and left want to help that group.
But when Congress won't act, that leaves it to the executive, which leads to lawsuits, which leads to the judicial more or less making the laws.
I wholeheartedly agree that this isn't the way it's supposed to happen.
But there are just too many vested interests in Congress. Your political future is just better off when you don't legislate. Appeal to the base and get elected again.
But I don't have a great solution for that. I think I saw that ranked voting has been proposed like 14 times. But why would anyone already in the system agree to weakening the system?
Ditto
Thomas Jefferson also said it is not only the right of the people to change their government, it is their responsibility.
Of course, we have two factions with totally different POVs on what any "new government" should look like. For me, and about 75 million others, I think that new government should remain a Constitutional Republic, with reduced bureaucracy and term limits for ALL political offices...i.e. drain The Swamp!
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
