Nathan vs Vosem

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

The ultimate battle. Far-right (Nathan) versus far-left (Восемь). The stakes have never been higher. What will America face? Continuity and stagnation as a provincial agrarian backwater, or bloody upheaval as midwife to a Great Leap Forward into the capitalist future? You, the voter, will decide that.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

I vote for Nathan and he wins in a landslide. Frankly, no other issue matters here - no candidate who utters the phrase "privatize social security" is going to ever step foot in the White House.

...George W. Bush already did! (Here's a source showing Republicans campaigning on the issue in the 2002 midterms: https://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/01/us/bush-renews-push-to-partly-privatize-social-security.html). The third rail is cuts to net benefits, but it's easy to show privatization wouldn't cause this (and even easier to just confidently assert it).

And the country's gotten significantly more fiscally conservative since then.

(But also I would try to center my campaign around criminal-justice issues, because I think that's where Nathan is most out-of-step with ordinary people).

I didn't know that Nathan had CJ views that were in any way stand out, all the moreso compared to what you've implied (not said) about your own views.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

I vote for Nathan and he wins in a landslide. Frankly, no other issue matters here - no candidate who utters the phrase "privatize social security" is going to ever step foot in the White House.

...George W. Bush already did! (Here's a source showing Republicans campaigning on the issue in the 2002 midterms: https://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/01/us/bush-renews-push-to-partly-privatize-social-security.html). The third rail is cuts to net benefits, but it's easy to show privatization wouldn't cause this (and even easier to just confidently assert it).

And the country's gotten significantly more fiscally conservative since then.

(But also I would try to center my campaign around criminal-justice issues, because I think that's where Nathan is most out-of-step with ordinary people).

I didn't know that Nathan had CJ views that were in any way stand out, all the moreso compared to what you've implied (not said) about your own views.

More just where my views most decisively 'beat' the views of a generic Democrat; even quite blue states like California have voted in favor of the death penalty, and by trying to raise the salience of lurid and exciting crimes and make the top question 'how can we best fight criminals' I can try to control the media narrative and prevent cracks which might harm my campaign (sort of similarly to the GHWB campaign of 1988). I expect us to have a successful Republican campaign over the next two decades or so to take this tack, actually.

Oh, okay. I had thought based on previous statements you were implying a heavily libertarian/anti-police view of criminal justice issues, and I was curious how you would differentiate or market that. This makes a lot more sense.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

The ultimate battle. Far-right (Nathan) versus far-left (Восемь). The stakes have never been higher. What will America face? Continuity and stagnation as a provincial agrarian backwater, or bloody upheaval as midwife to a Great Leap Forward into the capitalist future? You, the voter, will decide that.

Thank you for your service as the spiritual Supreme Arbiter of the battle between Nathan and Vosem. On a related note, the real question which only you can answer is: who would win Georgia? That Georgia.

Given that Vosem's real-life counterpart is actually rotting in prison(?) right now, I think that answers our question. Georgia has been in a protracted Thermidorian phase since 2012. This is despite Tbilisi itself being a hotbed of progressive leftism.