“Leftists”: I don’t even see any difference between these candidates, “Dems” are fascists
“Leftists”: Union buster worst president ever I can’t possibly vote for this guy
“Leftists”: How dare Biden personally cause Covid inflation and grocery price gouging, all of which is definitely his fault and which I keep bringing up
“Leftists”: Biden didn’t stop his enemies from voting down weed legalization, killing immigrants, and making abortion illegal, and several other things that other people did, and so that fact that they did those things is completely on him
“Leftists”: I’ve been betrayed by Biden so so many times after I definitely voted for him previously, I’m very emotional about it and you should be very angry at him, the Democrats haven’t earned my vote and that’s definitely a good logical framework for an election that also includes literal Hitler
“Leftists”: Hey I have a poll which indicates Biden is behind among left handed Costa Ricans (actually he’s ahead but his support has dropped a lot), I posted a couple others today but maybe you missed the ones before. I’m just trying to get out the vote and help Biden
Also “Leftists”: Hey it hurts me a lot when you disagree with my constructive criticism, please don’t do that anymore, pls and thx
Right on! Fuck everyone who dare imagine a better world than a literal dinosaur making extinction worthy policy since the alternative is straight-up going to murder us all themselves.
You can imagine a better world than Biden. That sounds like a great idea to me. How can I help?
(I mean, aside from in the meantime not electing the guy who wants to kill the protestors working for a better world among many other things that would make him being president a very bad problem.)
Participate in collective action: protests, unions, strikes, socialist political parties and so on. Tell your friends they are uncool if they like fascism and very dope if they like increasing their bargaining power with solidaric unity.
Also recognize that violence is inherent to any system of government and that disobedience is a tool, like any other, to fight back at what is unjust. It is also important to recognize that the disenfranchised are bearing the weight of the inadequacies of the staus quo and that being in position to be patient is a privilege.
All of these sound like great ideas. Wanting all of them to be able to happen is actually exactly why I’m in favor of making sure Trump doesn’t get elected in November.
protests
This will be easier if Trump does not have a loyal police force that will fire with lethal ammunition on protests
unions, strikes
This will be easier if the people that run the NLRB are pro-labor, instead of the guy who broke the ATC strike back in the Reagan days (which was who Trump installed to run it, who Biden fired on day 1)
socialist political parties
This will be easier if Trump’s military has not seized the voting machines, and we still have elections, and congresspeople who disobey Trump don’t get killed by a mob
Sure, but harm reduction does not need to infringe on critique of the current executive branch. If criticizing Biden is enough to make Trump win, then he has already won. Biden does not need to be more than a union buster for me to detest him, and still he is more crappy than that. I am not saying he is the worst, but I do not hate myself or my comrades enough to aim that low for the role of the most powerful man in the world.
harm reduction does not need to infringe on critique of the current executive branch.
Yeah. I’ve been criticizing Biden for abetting a genocide quite a bit; I think you can find some comment where I compared the Biden State Department to the Nazis.
That said, total bullshit criticism like “union buster” I tend to be against. You can find other links in this comment section where I talk about it and link to some explanation of his historic support for labor and specifically how it related to his breaking the rail strike and the events after, but here’s an article which talks about it more broadly.
If someone shows up and says “HITLER HAD THREE EYES” I’m like, no, he didn’t, he had two. If someone shows up and says Biden hates labor, I say, no he doesn’t, and then I give some explanation why. If they then say “HOW CAN YOU SUPPORT HITLER/BIDEN WHEN HE DID A GENOCIDE,” I can point them to some comments where I also said that genocide is bad, but at the end of the day Hitler still had two eyes.
This system where any “support” for Biden by talking about good facts about Biden, when he’s also yes assisted the US’s longstanding policy of helping the Israelis kill brown people, is a Republican-like thing. If someone says a good thing about a Democrat they say “HOW CAN YOU SUPPORT THEM WHEN THEY’RE A MARXIST / CHILD MOLESTER / WHATEVER.” I don’t operate that way. Telling the truth is not a forbidden act, even if it crosses up the lines you’ve chosen for who the allies and enemies are.
c’mon man don’t disrespect stegosauruses. stegosauri. stegosaurs. stegosauren. like that, c’mon. they have cool plates and shit, biden has no armor plating
Woah, woah, woah, wait a minute, don’t you know that if there’s no candidate I agree with, that means DEMOCRACY IS DEAD and the only solution is to usher in fascism to kill as many minorities as possible? I Am Very Smart.
Listen voting is a blood pact, and I’m only complicit if I vote so if I don’t and bad things happen it’s everyone else’s fault. I have the best moral compass.
Just for others who are on the fence, let’s illustrate this via the trolley problem.
There are 4 people who would die without you interacting with the trolley, 2 people die if you switch tracks.
Does choosing to interact with the system at all make you complicit in the death of those 2 individuals? By choosing not to change it are you complicit in the 4 individuals?
I would argue, since you have been given the power to choose even in an unjust system, you must do all you can to minimize harm.
Of course the system should be changed but the trolley will advance with or without your input.
The problem with the trolley problem is that it makes simplifying assumptions that don’t always track to real world situations. For instance, in the trolley problem, what’s happening is purely mechanical, whereas with an election, you’re empowering an actual person who is able to choose whether or not to kill the people in danger. It’s also not a one-off decision, there will be future elections and people will look back at this one to determine what strategies work or don’t work, what is and isn’t a deal breaker. Furthermore, it’s not an individual person making the decision on whether to pull the lever, and many people live in safe states where their vote has no real influence on the outcome. Lastly, the people running are the ones who set up the trolley problem and are ensuring it will keep happening again and again, indefinitely, by opposing any sort of election reform.
So if you want a hypothetical, it’s more like: two mad scientists have, together, put you in a cage. Each one has a laser, each of which is powered by one of two hand cranks placed inside your cage. One of them says they want to kill one person with their laser, the other wants to kill five. They both tell you they need their laser to be more powerful to stop the other (while also frequently cooperating). You can choose to power either laser, or you can sit there and do nothing, or you can desperately try to break the cage.
Philosophical thought experiments tell us very little about the real world because they are so reductive, the real world is messy and not so clear cut.
Well I mean that’s kind of a bad thought experiment too, yeah, because I really like lasers, and me personally I’d want to talk about a laser that’s so powerful and efficient that it can kill someone just with the power from a hand crank. Like, that’s an insane laser, that has to be like, an extremely efficient highly calculated phased optical array, that’s some science fiction level technomagic, there. I’d also wanna know, why the human test subjects, you know? Are they horrible criminals, or, are they clones without brains, or p-zombies, or like what’s up there? I don’t think any ethical self-respecting scientist would wanna test out their shit on some random variable humans like that, and that shit wouldn’t be really like, publishable in a paper, I would imagine. Supplementary questions are maybe like, why am I the one that has to power the laser from inside the cage, rather than them having like an Igor to do it for them, are they just going to kill me afterwards, are they going to kill me if I do nothing, what’s the deal there?
This whole scenario smells pretty fishy to me, I’m gonna go with like, this is probably a milgram experiment style of thing, to me.
Though, through tough, thorough thought, this experiment kind of falls flat as an analogy, because the lasers both power up randomly and will kill people no matter what I do, and neither crank really does fucking anything, so it’s more like you’re just the guy in the ludovico chair, and you have funny little cranks you can turn if you want, as like a distraction from the fact the lasers are going to kill everyone no matter what you do.
Thought experiments are not known for their realism, and I don’t have a problem with picking it apart as long as you would also pick apart the original trolley problem. However:
I don’t think any ethical self-respecting scientist
Oh yeah I guess I missed that. I mean, I dunno, I guess this sort of brings up a question, right, of, can the scientists not be mad but also still be ethical and self-respecting? And, does it require a degree to be a scientist, or can you just sort of be one by nature of engaging in the scientific process? Because somehow I can’t imagine a scientist that would pull this sort of thing off to have been able to actually graduate.
Also yeah I’d definitely critique the trolley problem. It’s a metaphor for like, different ethical philosophies more commonly, but kind of counterintuitively I find that the ethical philosophy modeled as the one in which you don’t pull the lever, is oftentimes the less problematic philosophy. Not as modeled in the problem, but just sort of, as it actually works out. Deontology is based, I guess.
More than that though, like, what is this, the 1920’s? Is there a mustache twirling villain running around tying people to trolley tracks? More than that, we still have trolleys? Why is it a trolley, and not a train? Trains require a much longer amount of time to stop, trolleys go pretty slow, so I imagine they could stop for a person on the tracks quite easily, probably even if the brakes were cut. How have I found myself to be the one pulling the lever in the first place, have I been wheeled in on a gurney by this mustache twirling character, or have I just found myself at the lever at an inopportune moment seconds before the trolley crosses and kills? If it’s the latter, I wouldn’t be able to predict my reaction, most people wouldn’t be able to, it’s a spur of the moment emergency decision, it’s like deciding whether or not you try to push someone out of the way of an oncoming bus or something, it’s not really a reflection of your moral character as much as your reaction time. If it’s the former, I think we could all blame the mustache twirling villain for whatever the outcome may be regardless of whatever decision I make in this stupid saw style trap.
You’re analogy missed the part where they can operate without you and Infact the madder scientist wishes you to do nothing. It’s why Republicans work so hard in red States to add roadblocks to voters.
You can act on the cage while minimizing harm. Not voting doesn’t work, never has, never will.
You can choose non-participation and you can fool yourself that it washes your hands but it does not stop the status quo, in fact it encourages it.
Even with those conditions, I would still do nothing. The “less mad” scientist is still responsible for creating the situation just as much as the “more mad” one. I’m not playing their little game. Strengthening a psychotic killer is not “minimizing harm.” Neither has even promised to let me out of the cage (not that I have any reason to trust anything they say), and both worked together to put me there. Your strategy is just to play along with their game and do what they want you to until the end of time.
The biggest problem with your worldview is that you’re allowing politicians to be treated as mechanical and immutable. The relation between voters and politicians is a negotiation, and offering unconditional agreement during a negotiation is about the worst thing you can do. The fact is that my moral convictions are the thing that are fixed and immutable, and it’s the responsibility of politicians to act in such a way that’s congruent with them if they want my vote.
If enough people think like me, then it would be Biden who would be forced into the trolley problem: either cave to our demands and you don’t get to genocide anyone but you do get to be president again, or don’t cave to our demands and lose. If you think I’m being unreasonably obstinate, well, good. I am a machine that doesn’t vote for people who do genocide, I cannot be reasoned with on that point and will continue that function regardless of circumstances or of my own best interests. That’s what I’m going to be doing no matter what so make your plans around that.
I have seen you before. You have a biased perspective that wants the US to destabilize so China can expand easier. Everyone can see you are disingenuous.
If I posted a giant block of resources debunking the ridiculous “Uyghur genocide” claim, would you actually read them? I wanna know if I should go through the effort of grabbing and linking them, or if I should just shit post at you until you go away.
Dems are not Fascists, they’re pro-Oligarchy or broken down for ease of understanding: they want to reduce the power of the State - which is the one Power that is controlled by voters through elected representatives - over Money by having the State refraining from “intervening in the Markets” and “Regulate” but still enforce things like Land Ownership, so that Money is the dominant Power and the State serves only as the wielder of Force that protects Money’s exclusive rights to what would otherwise be the Commons and from pushback from the rest of Society.
(Consider the possibility that the level of abuse of police violence you see in the US is not by chance)
Republicans are the ones with Fascist leanings.
They’re two different kinds of far-right and they both want to weaken the power that common citizens have via the vote in Democracy, but they have different ideas about who should really be in control (Republicans is “us”, Democrats is “those who can pay us the best”) and very different takes on the Morality sphere (Democrats are fine with freedom and equality as long as it’s not on Money and things controlled by Money - so LGBT rights are fine, but a Judicial System were the rich don’t have massive advantages over the poor is not fine - whilst Republicans want to impose their own twisted version of a Judeo-Christian Morality - minus the good parts like turn the other cheek or Greed as a Deadly Sin - on everybody else)
In summary: there is no Left Party in the US, there’s not Center Party in the US, there doesn’t even seem to be a pro-Democracy Party in the US. At best there are a handful of token lefties in the “lets weaken Democracy but keep the Theatre of it” Party.
Nailed it to a tee man. That’s pretty much them down the line. Always aggressors when they have the platform and always victims when their shit is called out.
They’re like if Ben Shapiro decided to separate into a hive-collective and systematically shit on everything touched by the concept of nuance.
“Leftists”: I don’t even see any difference between these candidates, “Dems” are fascists
“Leftists”: Union buster worst president ever I can’t possibly vote for this guy
“Leftists”: How dare Biden personally cause Covid inflation and grocery price gouging, all of which is definitely his fault and which I keep bringing up
“Leftists”: Biden didn’t stop his enemies from voting down weed legalization, killing immigrants, and making abortion illegal, and several other things that other people did, and so that fact that they did those things is completely on him
“Leftists”: I’ve been betrayed by Biden so so many times after I definitely voted for him previously, I’m very emotional about it and you should be very angry at him, the Democrats haven’t earned my vote and that’s definitely a good logical framework for an election that also includes literal Hitler
“Leftists”: Hey I have a poll which indicates Biden is behind among left handed Costa Ricans (actually he’s ahead but his support has dropped a lot), I posted a couple others today but maybe you missed the ones before. I’m just trying to get out the vote and help Biden
Also “Leftists”: Hey it hurts me a lot when you disagree with my constructive criticism, please don’t do that anymore, pls and thx
Right on! Fuck everyone who dare imagine a better world than a literal dinosaur making extinction worthy policy since the alternative is straight-up going to murder us all themselves.
Oh no, you should always fight for a better world! Just don’t staple it to accelerationism in the mean time.
Which to be clear I’m not accusing you of but is often the underlying thread on Lemmy in particular.
I am not. Not voting is statistically the same as voting for the candidate you like the least. However, I don’t both eat shit and lick arse.
You can imagine a better world than Biden. That sounds like a great idea to me. How can I help?
(I mean, aside from in the meantime not electing the guy who wants to kill the protestors working for a better world among many other things that would make him being president a very bad problem.)
Participate in collective action: protests, unions, strikes, socialist political parties and so on. Tell your friends they are uncool if they like fascism and very dope if they like increasing their bargaining power with solidaric unity.
Also recognize that violence is inherent to any system of government and that disobedience is a tool, like any other, to fight back at what is unjust. It is also important to recognize that the disenfranchised are bearing the weight of the inadequacies of the staus quo and that being in position to be patient is a privilege.
All of these sound like great ideas. Wanting all of them to be able to happen is actually exactly why I’m in favor of making sure Trump doesn’t get elected in November.
This will be easier if Trump does not have a loyal police force that will fire with lethal ammunition on protests
This will be easier if the people that run the NLRB are pro-labor, instead of the guy who broke the ATC strike back in the Reagan days (which was who Trump installed to run it, who Biden fired on day 1)
This will be easier if Trump’s military has not seized the voting machines, and we still have elections, and congresspeople who disobey Trump don’t get killed by a mob
Sure, but harm reduction does not need to infringe on critique of the current executive branch. If criticizing Biden is enough to make Trump win, then he has already won. Biden does not need to be more than a union buster for me to detest him, and still he is more crappy than that. I am not saying he is the worst, but I do not hate myself or my comrades enough to aim that low for the role of the most powerful man in the world.
Yeah. I’ve been criticizing Biden for abetting a genocide quite a bit; I think you can find some comment where I compared the Biden State Department to the Nazis.
That said, total bullshit criticism like “union buster” I tend to be against. You can find other links in this comment section where I talk about it and link to some explanation of his historic support for labor and specifically how it related to his breaking the rail strike and the events after, but here’s an article which talks about it more broadly.
Removed by mod
I’m just interested in reality, is all.
If someone shows up and says “HITLER HAD THREE EYES” I’m like, no, he didn’t, he had two. If someone shows up and says Biden hates labor, I say, no he doesn’t, and then I give some explanation why. If they then say “HOW CAN YOU SUPPORT HITLER/BIDEN WHEN HE DID A GENOCIDE,” I can point them to some comments where I also said that genocide is bad, but at the end of the day Hitler still had two eyes.
This system where any “support” for Biden by talking about good facts about Biden, when he’s also yes assisted the US’s longstanding policy of helping the Israelis kill brown people, is a Republican-like thing. If someone says a good thing about a Democrat they say “HOW CAN YOU SUPPORT THEM WHEN THEY’RE A MARXIST / CHILD MOLESTER / WHATEVER.” I don’t operate that way. Telling the truth is not a forbidden act, even if it crosses up the lines you’ve chosen for who the allies and enemies are.
If that means I am “singing praises” then sure.
Removed by mod
Stegosaurus to be exact.
c’mon man don’t disrespect stegosauruses. stegosauri. stegosaurs. stegosauren. like that, c’mon. they have cool plates and shit, biden has no armor plating
Yeah, I did actually feel bad for the Stegosaurus in the comparison and chose to mention them only because they are so cool! :(
Woah, woah, woah, wait a minute, don’t you know that if there’s no candidate I agree with, that means DEMOCRACY IS DEAD and the only solution is to usher in fascism to kill as many minorities as possible? I Am Very Smart.
Listen voting is a blood pact, and I’m only complicit if I vote so if I don’t and bad things happen it’s everyone else’s fault. I have the best moral compass.
This but unironically.
You have every right to your opinion.
Just for others who are on the fence, let’s illustrate this via the trolley problem.
There are 4 people who would die without you interacting with the trolley, 2 people die if you switch tracks.
Does choosing to interact with the system at all make you complicit in the death of those 2 individuals? By choosing not to change it are you complicit in the 4 individuals?
I would argue, since you have been given the power to choose even in an unjust system, you must do all you can to minimize harm.
Of course the system should be changed but the trolley will advance with or without your input.
Addendum: https://academic.oup.com/book/1401/chapter-abstract/140735282?redirectedFrom=fulltext
I found this interesting book on this very subject and I think I will be purchasing it in order to explore their arguments.
The problem with the trolley problem is that it makes simplifying assumptions that don’t always track to real world situations. For instance, in the trolley problem, what’s happening is purely mechanical, whereas with an election, you’re empowering an actual person who is able to choose whether or not to kill the people in danger. It’s also not a one-off decision, there will be future elections and people will look back at this one to determine what strategies work or don’t work, what is and isn’t a deal breaker. Furthermore, it’s not an individual person making the decision on whether to pull the lever, and many people live in safe states where their vote has no real influence on the outcome. Lastly, the people running are the ones who set up the trolley problem and are ensuring it will keep happening again and again, indefinitely, by opposing any sort of election reform.
So if you want a hypothetical, it’s more like: two mad scientists have, together, put you in a cage. Each one has a laser, each of which is powered by one of two hand cranks placed inside your cage. One of them says they want to kill one person with their laser, the other wants to kill five. They both tell you they need their laser to be more powerful to stop the other (while also frequently cooperating). You can choose to power either laser, or you can sit there and do nothing, or you can desperately try to break the cage.
Philosophical thought experiments tell us very little about the real world because they are so reductive, the real world is messy and not so clear cut.
Well I mean that’s kind of a bad thought experiment too, yeah, because I really like lasers, and me personally I’d want to talk about a laser that’s so powerful and efficient that it can kill someone just with the power from a hand crank. Like, that’s an insane laser, that has to be like, an extremely efficient highly calculated phased optical array, that’s some science fiction level technomagic, there. I’d also wanna know, why the human test subjects, you know? Are they horrible criminals, or, are they clones without brains, or p-zombies, or like what’s up there? I don’t think any ethical self-respecting scientist would wanna test out their shit on some random variable humans like that, and that shit wouldn’t be really like, publishable in a paper, I would imagine. Supplementary questions are maybe like, why am I the one that has to power the laser from inside the cage, rather than them having like an Igor to do it for them, are they just going to kill me afterwards, are they going to kill me if I do nothing, what’s the deal there?
This whole scenario smells pretty fishy to me, I’m gonna go with like, this is probably a milgram experiment style of thing, to me.
Though, through tough, thorough thought, this experiment kind of falls flat as an analogy, because the lasers both power up randomly and will kill people no matter what I do, and neither crank really does fucking anything, so it’s more like you’re just the guy in the ludovico chair, and you have funny little cranks you can turn if you want, as like a distraction from the fact the lasers are going to kill everyone no matter what you do.
Thought experiments are not known for their realism, and I don’t have a problem with picking it apart as long as you would also pick apart the original trolley problem. However:
I literally specified mad scientists.
Oh yeah I guess I missed that. I mean, I dunno, I guess this sort of brings up a question, right, of, can the scientists not be mad but also still be ethical and self-respecting? And, does it require a degree to be a scientist, or can you just sort of be one by nature of engaging in the scientific process? Because somehow I can’t imagine a scientist that would pull this sort of thing off to have been able to actually graduate.
Also yeah I’d definitely critique the trolley problem. It’s a metaphor for like, different ethical philosophies more commonly, but kind of counterintuitively I find that the ethical philosophy modeled as the one in which you don’t pull the lever, is oftentimes the less problematic philosophy. Not as modeled in the problem, but just sort of, as it actually works out. Deontology is based, I guess.
More than that though, like, what is this, the 1920’s? Is there a mustache twirling villain running around tying people to trolley tracks? More than that, we still have trolleys? Why is it a trolley, and not a train? Trains require a much longer amount of time to stop, trolleys go pretty slow, so I imagine they could stop for a person on the tracks quite easily, probably even if the brakes were cut. How have I found myself to be the one pulling the lever in the first place, have I been wheeled in on a gurney by this mustache twirling character, or have I just found myself at the lever at an inopportune moment seconds before the trolley crosses and kills? If it’s the latter, I wouldn’t be able to predict my reaction, most people wouldn’t be able to, it’s a spur of the moment emergency decision, it’s like deciding whether or not you try to push someone out of the way of an oncoming bus or something, it’s not really a reflection of your moral character as much as your reaction time. If it’s the former, I think we could all blame the mustache twirling villain for whatever the outcome may be regardless of whatever decision I make in this stupid saw style trap.
So, I dunno, trolley problem, kinda sucks.
You’re analogy missed the part where they can operate without you and Infact the madder scientist wishes you to do nothing. It’s why Republicans work so hard in red States to add roadblocks to voters.
You can act on the cage while minimizing harm. Not voting doesn’t work, never has, never will.
You can choose non-participation and you can fool yourself that it washes your hands but it does not stop the status quo, in fact it encourages it.
Even with those conditions, I would still do nothing. The “less mad” scientist is still responsible for creating the situation just as much as the “more mad” one. I’m not playing their little game. Strengthening a psychotic killer is not “minimizing harm.” Neither has even promised to let me out of the cage (not that I have any reason to trust anything they say), and both worked together to put me there. Your strategy is just to play along with their game and do what they want you to until the end of time.
The biggest problem with your worldview is that you’re allowing politicians to be treated as mechanical and immutable. The relation between voters and politicians is a negotiation, and offering unconditional agreement during a negotiation is about the worst thing you can do. The fact is that my moral convictions are the thing that are fixed and immutable, and it’s the responsibility of politicians to act in such a way that’s congruent with them if they want my vote.
If enough people think like me, then it would be Biden who would be forced into the trolley problem: either cave to our demands and you don’t get to genocide anyone but you do get to be president again, or don’t cave to our demands and lose. If you think I’m being unreasonably obstinate, well, good. I am a machine that doesn’t vote for people who do genocide, I cannot be reasoned with on that point and will continue that function regardless of circumstances or of my own best interests. That’s what I’m going to be doing no matter what so make your plans around that.
That’s just incorrect and I point to 2016 as the perfect case study for how low voter turn out not motivating policy change.
I empathize that what is happening in Palestine is unforgivable however you’re cutting off your nose to spite your face.
If Trump acts as he promises to and accelerates climate change even further, there won’t be a hill left to die on.
I have seen you before. You have a biased perspective that wants the US to destabilize so China can expand easier. Everyone can see you are disingenuous.
Removed by mod
Yes, we get it. You love capitalism if they call it “Chinese characteristics,” and you love genocide as long as it happens to Uyghurs.
If I posted a giant block of resources debunking the ridiculous “Uyghur genocide” claim, would you actually read them? I wanna know if I should go through the effort of grabbing and linking them, or if I should just shit post at you until you go away.
(i know the answer already btw)
You can make whatever accusations you like, but it’s meaningless if you don’t have
evidenceDamn, you got me
Dems are not Fascists, they’re pro-Oligarchy or broken down for ease of understanding: they want to reduce the power of the State - which is the one Power that is controlled by voters through elected representatives - over Money by having the State refraining from “intervening in the Markets” and “Regulate” but still enforce things like Land Ownership, so that Money is the dominant Power and the State serves only as the wielder of Force that protects Money’s exclusive rights to what would otherwise be the Commons and from pushback from the rest of Society.
(Consider the possibility that the level of abuse of police violence you see in the US is not by chance)
Republicans are the ones with Fascist leanings.
They’re two different kinds of far-right and they both want to weaken the power that common citizens have via the vote in Democracy, but they have different ideas about who should really be in control (Republicans is “us”, Democrats is “those who can pay us the best”) and very different takes on the Morality sphere (Democrats are fine with freedom and equality as long as it’s not on Money and things controlled by Money - so LGBT rights are fine, but a Judicial System were the rich don’t have massive advantages over the poor is not fine - whilst Republicans want to impose their own twisted version of a Judeo-Christian Morality - minus the good parts like turn the other cheek or Greed as a Deadly Sin - on everybody else)
In summary: there is no Left Party in the US, there’s not Center Party in the US, there doesn’t even seem to be a pro-Democracy Party in the US. At best there are a handful of token lefties in the “lets weaken Democracy but keep the Theatre of it” Party.
Nailed it to a tee man. That’s pretty much them down the line. Always aggressors when they have the platform and always victims when their shit is called out.
They’re like if Ben Shapiro decided to separate into a hive-collective and systematically shit on everything touched by the concept of nuance.