The Virginia Society for the Preservation and Appreciation of High-Quality Posts

[TJ in Oregon]

Horrible article.

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I could just as easily argue that much of the modern Left in the United States insists that there should be no "participatory democracy" used to threaten the "personal rights" of whomever the Left sympathizes with. Abortion is a constitutionally protected right (the Supreme Court says so, and if anyone might get appointed to the Supreme Court says otherwise, that person is an extremist who should not be confirmed); marriage is a constitutionally protected right (all hail and bow down before the wonderful Supreme Court decisions that struck down democratically-made laws that: prohibited a man who owed child support from getting married (Zablocki v. Redhail, 1937), banned same-sex marriage (you know the case)).

You see, to the modern Left, there are "personal rights" (not mentioned anywhere in the Constitution) that are protected by the Constitution, but there aren't any "economic rights" of the kind that Buchanan was dedicated to preserving that are also protected by the Constitution. And then there are examples of when the Left abhors Supreme Court decisions that strike down campaign finance laws and Affirmative Action.

So "liberal Democracy," it seems, is the idea that the Left can have whatever laws they can successfully adopt via the democratic process, but the Right can't. Conservative Supreme Court Justices should not strike down liberal laws, but liberal Supreme Court Justices should go right ahead and strike down conservative laws. It's funny how this is called "democracy."

[TJ in Oregon]

lol people who live in a bubble and never struggled for anything coming in and saying society is crumbling. go buy your $5 latte and $10 toast and opine about the fall of America

It takes a lot of $5 lattes to match the monthly payment for a pickup truck that is far more expensive to buy and keep fueled than some compact car that is more practical. The people who have bought those overpriced pickup trucks that are more vehicle than they need (you can rent one when you really need one unless you are in a business that needs one, in which case you can afford buying the truck outright) have typically struggled all their lives, and in view of how they vote (that sounds like a Trump voter) they are in just as big a bubble as those who can afford the $5 latte and $10 toast.

I live in a rural area drowning in meth and opiates -- a part of Michigan that is basically eastern Kentucky without the hills. If you can't imagine what parental drug use does to kids...  I have no children, but you can imagine what I would want them to think about certain things. Children should not grow up thinking that the police are the "Blue Meanies" because they bust their parents' meth lab or arrest parents when they get into a fight. The problem isn't that meth is illegal; the problem is that meth messes people up so badly that it makes police action necessary.

We have a mass culture that denigrates formal learning, and any kid who grows up in it will be handicapped in competition with adults who as kids have taken school seriously. That mass culture does even more harm to kids than Jim Crow racism did to blacks. We reel now as a culture that treated sexual harassment as a perquisite of power until recently unravels on sexual conduct of some people with very high profiles -- including the current President. OK, so we are doing some things about it, which indicates that we are not crumbling as badly as we would be if we simply shrugged it off.

Our educational system does little even at the undergraduate level to shape the potential leaders of our society (that includes the college graduate who gets a job at the auto plant and becomes a shop steward with the UAW, so that is a leader) the capital to make moral choices at some personal sacrifice. Because life for our college graduates often has its focus on sex, material gain and indulgence, bureaucratic power, and entertainment and our society treats those who can give up any one of those for principle as schmucks, such an old standard as

Do not lie, cheat, or steal; do not tolerate lying, cheating, or stealing by others

becomes "Go ahead, but just don't get caught."

People who have the choice between the morally-good life and living large but are smart enough to know the consequences of a vile social order aren't making the choice for moral goodness.
And, yes, our political system is in bad shape. America is badly polarized because identity matters more than quality, and because our legislative branch is under the control of lobbyists. Yes, that was as true with Barack Obama as it is with Donald Trump; Obama resisted the trend, but Trump exults in it. "Constituent service" used to mean the people in one's district; it now means giving spoils to those who hire the lobbyists.

...I'm not going to disparage the $5 latte or the $10 toast; the American consumer society depends upon people making consumer choices and not living in ashes and sack-cloth. The consumer society is what has kept America from facing a proletarian revolution.

[TJ in Oregon]

Yeah, that’s pretty much what I expected out of this situation over which #NeverTrump folks whipped themselves into hysteria and conspiracy theories. Entire media outlets and a large swath of the Democratic Party and electorate were willing to fan the flames of Russophobia and try to launch another Cold War on the basis of rumors that they wanted to be true.

Yes, certain high level figures in Trump’s circle are in serious legal trouble, but if any campaign was as thoroughly investigated as Trump’s, I wouldn’t be surprised to see similar levels of illegal activity. That doesn’t excuse it, but rather should highlight how corrupt the American political system really is.

Now, can CNN and MSNBC try focusing on real journalism again and can the Democratic Party try running on real issues in 2020? I’m glad this nonsense is finally over.