Was anyone else pushed to the Left by the Tea Party?

[Mr. Illini]

I've definitely moved left as the tea party has become popular.

I don't know if it has only or at all to do with the Tea Party, but I will say that I know their anti-intellectualism has not made it difficult.

[IceSpear]

I was pushed to the right by the tea party. Its thoughtless attacks on consensus viewpoints and intellectual culture made me more likely to identify with otherwise offensives centrism and moderation. I have this feeling that if the tea party never existed and McCain was elected, I would be a True Leftist.

Wow, this exactly. The tea party (and the extreme right more so I guess) is increasingly turning me into a Matt Yglesias/Josh Barro centrist and it's horrible.

It's called the Overton Window, and the GOP pushes it to the right VERY effectively and seemingly without end.

(And before someone makes a lolololbutuhaveaready4hillarysig, SCOTUS and keeping the right wingers at bay is much more important right now. We can start running leftists once demographics favor us more heavily)

[H. Ross Peron]

Partially yes.

[KingSweden]

Not really. I'm still where I always was, they just moved waaaaaaaaay to my right.

[bullmoose88]

Not really. I'm still where I always was, they just moved waaaaaaaaay to my right.

This basically.

[TJ in Oregon]

I was a pushed toward the left a little bit for a while by the Tea Party's (and the GOP as a whole)'s increasing dogmatism on economics and the lack of willingness to give President Obama a fair shot. There was a period around 2010-2011 where I drifted into DINO/Blue Dog territory for a bit, repulsed by the Tea Party. I think the thing that turned me off more than anything else was what I deemed an unfair hatred for President Obama, when he's an actual person still. I can be a sucker for victimhood sometimes.

However, with the Democrats increasing emphasis on a certain brand of social issues, for me to actually become a swing voter in the usual national context, I'd probably have to renounce pretty much everything I believe in. I'm slowly stopping actually paying attention to issues as there's really no point anyway. I'm journeying toward being a Republican zombie voter.

[Indy Texas 🇺🇦🇵🇸]

I was a pushed toward the left a little bit for a while by the Tea Party's (and the GOP as a whole)'s increasing dogmatism on economics and the lack of willingness to give President Obama a fair shot. There was a period around 2010-2011 where I drifted into DINO/Blue Dog territory for a bit, repulsed by the Tea Party. I think the thing that turned me off more than anything else was what I deemed an unfair hatred for President Obama, when he's an actual person still. I can be a sucker for victimhood sometimes.

However, with the Democrats increasing emphasis on a certain brand of social issues, for me to actually become a swing voter in the usual national context, I'd probably have to renounce pretty much everything I believe in. I'm slowly stopping actually paying attention to issues as there's really no point anyway. I'm journeying toward being a Republican zombie voter.

More abortion restrictions have been passed in the past 3 years than in the entire previous decade. Nothing has made getting an abortion any easier in recent years. So where is this increasing emphasis on "a certain brand of social issues" beyond expressing indignation when a Republican suggests that rape victims should be forced to give birth or that a brain-dead woman in Texas should be kept alive against her widow's wishes to be a human incubator for the severely deformed fetus inside her?

Or having the audacity to suggest that maybe if you want fewer abortions to happen, it would behoove you to prevent unwanted pregnancies from happening to begin with and that might require doing things to make birth control cheaper and easier to access?

The Republican position on "life" is more about punishing women for sexual autonomy and punishing couples who don't want to have children than it is about caring about what they see as people. They certainly don't seem to care about what happens to those children once they are born.

[TJ in Oregon]

I was a pushed toward the left a little bit for a while by the Tea Party's (and the GOP as a whole)'s increasing dogmatism on economics and the lack of willingness to give President Obama a fair shot. There was a period around 2010-2011 where I drifted into DINO/Blue Dog territory for a bit, repulsed by the Tea Party. I think the thing that turned me off more than anything else was what I deemed an unfair hatred for President Obama, when he's an actual person still. I can be a sucker for victimhood sometimes.

However, with the Democrats increasing emphasis on a certain brand of social issues, for me to actually become a swing voter in the usual national context, I'd probably have to renounce pretty much everything I believe in. I'm slowly stopping actually paying attention to issues as there's really no point anyway. I'm journeying toward being a Republican zombie voter.

More abortion restrictions have been passed in the past 3 years than in the entire previous decade. Nothing has made getting an abortion any easier in recent years. So where is this increasing emphasis on "a certain brand of social issues" beyond expressing indignation when a Republican suggests that rape victims should be forced to give birth or that a brain-dead woman in Texas should be kept alive against her widow's wishes to be a human incubator for the severely deformed fetus inside her?

Or having the audacity to suggest that maybe if you want fewer abortions to happen, it would behoove you to prevent unwanted pregnancies from happening to begin with and that might require doing things to make birth control cheaper and easier to access?

The Republican position on "life" is more about punishing women for sexual autonomy and punishing couples who don't want to have children than it is about caring about what they see as people. They certainly don't seem to care about what happens to those children once they are born.

I wasn't talking about abortion specifically there, although this year in my home state of Ohio (a place where I have voted for local Democrats a number of times before) the Democrats have decided to make it the year of the pro-abortion crusaders or something given their slate of candidates for statewide office (Neuhardt, Turner, and Pillich). What I was referring to is their increasing desire to use the government to enforce moral consent of folks like me to providing artificial contraception to women when we don't believe in it, and then painting it all as some kind of a 'war on women'. They then take Sandra Fluke and give her a speaking slot at the Democratic Convention for what is essentially a thinly veiled tirade against the Catholic Church. If you're looking for me to come out with some statement about how we should encourage birth control, I can't in any kind of good conscience make one, or support using the government to make one. If you're going to have an abortion otherwise, then yes, please use birth control, but that's about as far as I can go there. If it's actually the government giving out the birth control, I can't really support it persay, but it's not something I'd ever vote based on. But when the government is used to force private citizens to provide birth control, that, of course, will tick me off. Especially when they chose the vocal and antagonistic route of doing so that they chose. Gay marriage is similar in many respects, I can't in any kind of good conscience support it, but as long as the government isn't acting in a way as to force people who believe homosexuality is wrong to partake or to use itself as a propaganda machine I'm not going to pitch a fit. However, that does not seem to be the intent of most who support it and few things are as telling as the reception Jo Jordan received after voting against it in Hawaii. Just read the comments section and wow If you want another sample, look no further than the Atlas Forum for a series of posts by one of our very own lovely liberals (donning a blue avatar for some reason) about how horrific it would be for a private business owned by an Evangelical Christian not wanting to sell Jewish trinkets (which turned out not to be entirely true as they sell Jewish trinkets in other locations where there is a larger Jewish market). With these sorts of disputes it looks incredibly obvious that almost every social policy position the Democrats are taking at this point is a reaction against Christianity, or a culturally sycophantic version that still is still a reaction against Christianity, often by claiming how they're not those Christians or something of the sort. At least in my mind, that's what the Democratic Party is at this point. Heck, that's what a decent fraction of the Republicans are at this point. The rest have a whole lot of incompetent morons, but I have to vote for the coalition I've got not the coalition I want sometimes.

There are some issues I still favor the Democrats on, and if the Republicans take a libertarian turn there may be a whole lot more in the near future (legalization of drugs in particular, although the Democrats may still support that more than the Republicans). But I'm halfway checked out politics at this point. I used to have some idea that I should listen to my political opponents more often than my political allies since I'd learn more that way, but I've grown weary of it. It's basically all a subtext about how the Catholic Church and organized religion in general is a tool of oppression and I'm a stupid troglodyte. Perhaps in a couple years we'll have moved on to economics or something and they'll be worth listening to again. Until then, not so much.

[Indy Texas 🇺🇦🇵🇸]

I was a pushed toward the left a little bit for a while by the Tea Party's (and the GOP as a whole)'s increasing dogmatism on economics and the lack of willingness to give President Obama a fair shot. There was a period around 2010-2011 where I drifted into DINO/Blue Dog territory for a bit, repulsed by the Tea Party. I think the thing that turned me off more than anything else was what I deemed an unfair hatred for President Obama, when he's an actual person still. I can be a sucker for victimhood sometimes.

However, with the Democrats increasing emphasis on a certain brand of social issues, for me to actually become a swing voter in the usual national context, I'd probably have to renounce pretty much everything I believe in. I'm slowly stopping actually paying attention to issues as there's really no point anyway. I'm journeying toward being a Republican zombie voter.

More abortion restrictions have been passed in the past 3 years than in the entire previous decade. Nothing has made getting an abortion any easier in recent years. So where is this increasing emphasis on "a certain brand of social issues" beyond expressing indignation when a Republican suggests that rape victims should be forced to give birth or that a brain-dead woman in Texas should be kept alive against her widow's wishes to be a human incubator for the severely deformed fetus inside her?

Or having the audacity to suggest that maybe if you want fewer abortions to happen, it would behoove you to prevent unwanted pregnancies from happening to begin with and that might require doing things to make birth control cheaper and easier to access?

The Republican position on "life" is more about punishing women for sexual autonomy and punishing couples who don't want to have children than it is about caring about what they see as people. They certainly don't seem to care about what happens to those children once they are born.

I wasn't talking about abortion specifically there, although this year in my home state of Ohio (a place where I have voted for local Democrats a number of times before) the Democrats have decided to make it the year of the pro-abortion crusaders or something given their slate of candidates for statewide office (Neuhardt, Turner, and Pillich). What I was referring to is their increasing desire to use the government to enforce moral consent of folks like me to providing artificial contraception to women when we don't believe in it, and then painting it all as some kind of a 'war on women'. They then take Sandra Fluke and give her a speaking slot at the Democratic Convention for what is essentially a thinly veiled tirade against the Catholic Church. If you're looking for me to come out with some statement about how we should encourage birth control, I can't in any kind of good conscience make one, or support using the government to make one. If you're going to have an abortion otherwise, then yes, please use birth control, but that's about as far as I can go there. If it's actually the government giving out the birth control, I can't really support it persay, but it's not something I'd ever vote based on. But when the government is used to force private citizens to provide birth control, that, of course, will tick me off. Especially when they chose the vocal and antagonistic route of doing so that they chose. Gay marriage is similar in many respects, I can't in any kind of good conscience support it, but as long as the government isn't acting in a way as to force people who believe homosexuality is wrong to partake or to use itself as a propaganda machine I'm not going to pitch a fit. However, that does not seem to be the intent of most who support it and few things are as telling as the reception Jo Jordan received after voting against it in Hawaii. Just read the comments section and wow If you want another sample, look no further than the Atlas Forum for a series of posts by one of our very own lovely liberals (donning a blue avatar for some reason) about how horrific it would be for a private business owned by an Evangelical Christian not wanting to sell Jewish trinkets (which turned out not to be entirely true as they sell Jewish trinkets in other locations where there is a larger Jewish market). With these sorts of disputes it looks incredibly obvious that almost every social policy position the Democrats are taking at this point is a reaction against Christianity, or a culturally sycophantic version that still is still a reaction against Christianity, often by claiming how they're not those Christians or something of the sort. At least in my mind, that's what the Democratic Party is at this point. Heck, that's what a decent fraction of the Republicans are at this point. The rest have a whole lot of incompetent morons, but I have to vote for the coalition I've got not the coalition I want sometimes.

There are some issues I still favor the Democrats on, and if the Republicans take a libertarian turn there may be a whole lot more in the near future (legalization of drugs in particular, although the Democrats may still support that more than the Republicans). But I'm halfway checked out politics at this point. I used to have some idea that I should listen to my political opponents more often than my political allies since I'd learn more that way, but I've grown weary of it. It's basically all a subtext about how the Catholic Church and organized religion in general is a tool of oppression and I'm a stupid troglodyte. Perhaps in a couple years we'll have moved on to economics or something and they'll be worth listening to again. Until then, not so much.

If you don't like abortion, then you need to try to reduce it by reducing the number of unintended pregnancies. Simply telling people not to have sex doesn't work and is a bit ridiculous when applied to married/cohabitating couples who don't want or can't support a child. Encouraging the use of birth control is the only realistic way to achieve this.

If you try to reduce abortion by banning it and forcing people to have children, you are violating other people's sovereignty over their own bodies.

If you're telling me you oppose the use of birth control, I'm going to tell you I think you're an idiot. That makes about as much sense as the Jehovah's Witnesses who oppose blood transfusions or the Christian Scientists who won't even take Advil for a headache. There is nothing in The Bible that says birth control is wrong. I don't care what some Catholic priest wrote about it a hundred years ago. This is not a Catholic country and it's unreasonable for you to expect the government and society to comply with Catholic dogma. It is unreasonable for you to expect Catholics and other groups to receive special exemptions from following the law as it relates to provision of health insurance. This is a democracy and that law was passed via democratic means. Until enough Americans share your views to vote enough people and a president into office to overturn it, that's the law of the land. If you don't like it, then move to Mexico or Chile.

[TJ in Oregon]

If you're telling me you oppose the use of birth control, I'm going to tell you I think you're an idiot. That makes about as much sense as the Jehovah's Witnesses who oppose blood transfusions or the Christian Scientists who won't even take Advil for a headache. There is nothing in The Bible that says birth control is wrong. I don't care what some Catholic priest wrote about it a hundred years ago. This is not a Catholic country and it's unreasonable for you to expect the government and society to comply with Catholic dogma. It is unreasonable for you to expect Catholics and other groups to receive special exemptions from following the law as it relates to provision of health insurance. This is a democracy and that law was passed via democratic means. Until enough Americans share your views to vote enough people and a president into office to overturn it, that's the law of the land. If you don't like it, then move to Mexico or Chile.

Did you actually bother to read a word I posted or are you into attacking straw men tonight? No where did I say I expect the entire country to conform to Catholic dogma. I do expect the government not to be hell bent on decimating it and requiring me or anyone else to provide a good or service that goes against the beliefs of their religion absent an imminent danger posed to someone else. We still have a First Amendment that does include a right to the free exercise of religion, which includes refusing to do something going against those beliefs if it is to mean anything at all. This will end up before the Supreme Court in some fashion, and who knows what will happen. You might win and if you do, congratulations. You'll get to control my idiot self. You asked why I despise the Democratic Party, well this is why. Not that you bothered to give it a moment's thought or bothered to respect my views anyway.

[Ebowed]

I don't think I've changed my views much since 2007, although even as a more conservative teenager I've always identified as a Democrat.

The Tea Party did, it seems, help me find some political solidarity with those who are offended by its attacks on assistance to the poor, science, and secularism.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

IndyTX, What does it matter whether or not the Bible says anything about contraception?  You are saying that because they don't hold to a version of Protestant Sola Scriptura, their views should not be respected?  If freedom of religion means anything, it means you don't get to choose which religious views are true or correct or even rational enough for other people to be allowed to follow. 

Also I really don't get this view that because the Healthcare law was passed democratically, that people aren't allowed to criticize some aspect of it (not that the birth control mandate was specified in the law that Congress voted for in any case).