Kylaer wrote:
Lucis Spei wrote:
Bleh, it's stuff like this that makes me question whether I'm really a liberal.
Lucis, trust me. You're a liberal, not in the traditional sense but in the modern, synonymous-with-leftist sense. If you want to switch, that's great, but you'll need to do some serious rethinking on some of your previously-stated positions.
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Uhh, so, is anyone, like, going to actually address some of the points in it? If it's so crazy, it should be easy to pick apart.
Sure.
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In past single-party eras, the majority party earned its preeminence with broad popular support. Today the electorate remains closely divided
The presidential election was very tight. The mid-term congressional elections, on the other hand, were solidly Republican, with the GOP managing an unprecendented mid-term gain of seats. That's a strong mandate there.
http://www.fec.gov/pubrec/fe2002/hseparty.htmTotal 2002 Democratic Votes: 33,865,154
Total 2002 Republican Votes: 37,289,707
The GOP obviously has the clear edge hear, but it's not exactly what I'd call "
broad popular support". Maybe you would, I guess that "broad is a pretty fuzzy, subjective kind of idea.
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and actually prefers more Democratic policy positions than Republican ones.
And I'd like to see where he pulled this statement. Unless, of course, he pulled it from his ass, which I have no desire to see.
http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?PageID=753Quote:
Yet while Americans feel empowered and applaud individual enterprise, they increasingly see the need for a government safety net for the needy. Two-thirds (66%) say it is the responsibility of the government to take care of people who can't care for themselves. That represents a modest increase from recent values surveys and a more significant change from 1994, when anti-government sentiments were the most pervasive over the past 16 years.
A comparable percentage (65%) believes that the government should guarantee every citizen enough to eat and a place to sleep. That is in line with levels in previous surveys, with the exception of 1991 when 73% said they agreed with that idea.
What may be more surprising is that, in spite of the rising budget deficit, a 54% majority thinks the government should help more needy people even if it means going deeper into debt. In 1994, as hostility toward the government reached a high point, just 41% backed more aid for the poor, even if it increased the deficit.
http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?PageID=758Quote:
There is broad agreement among the public with regard to the value of environmental protection. More than eight-in-ten (86%) agree that there needs to be stricter laws and regulations to protect the environment, and about two-thirds (65%) agree that people should be willing to pay higher prices in order to protect the environment.
http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?PageID=757Quote:
Most Americans (57%) say they oppose changing the laws to make it more difficult for a woman to get an abortion, while 36% are in favor, and there have been only slight changes in public opinion on this question over the past sixteen years. While abortion is a significantly more divisive issue today than was the case in 1987, most of the partisan and religious divisions were firmly in place a decade ago, and have changed little since.
And so on. I don't have time to sort through the whole Pew Report right now, since I'm totally supposed to be drawing the Midlands right now.
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As the Florida debacle of 2000 showed, the Republicans are also able to hold down the number of opposition votes, with complicity from Republican courts.
...much later...
In the aftermath of the Republican theft of Florida's electoral votes and the 2000 presidential election
OMFG TEH BUSH STOLE TEH ELECTION!!111 *sigh* This charge has been dealt with time and again. As for "complicity from Republican courts," it was
Gore who first took the issue to the courts, not Bush.
The SCOTUS still voted along party lines, IIRC.