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If you can ask "so what?" when it comes to Bush and Obama, why can't you do it regarding Trump?
Anyway, forget the talk about hypocrisy, and let's just focus on the outcomes. Yes, if Trump keeps ruling by decree, the next Dem administration can just undo everything by decree. What you're leaving out is that if Trump doesn't do that, the Dems can still just rule by decree (and have the advantage of not having their institutions disrupted). Show me a path to sustainably reducing abuses of power in the future, and you'll have a compelling argument, but right now you're asking for unilateral disarmament.
That's what I'm doing - I don't really care much about the hypocrisy on either side. I expect both sides to be hypocritical. "We are upset when their side does it, but when our side does it it's good" is practically a default in politics.
I don't know that there is one, but it would require people to actually value bipartisanship again, because you'd have to have people in both parties actually negotiating with each other, instead of treating a political victory as the opportunity to sack and pillage until the party's over.
Look, I understand (and expected) your "You're just asking for unilateral disarmament" argument. I can tell you with lots of Dems (and very liberal ones) on my Facebook feed, that they absolutely feel the same way every time they were asked not to get carried away under Biden, or when they were gloating about all the things Harris was going to do to own the conservatives, and now, when they are being asked to reflect on where it brought them. You are, after all, evil, and norms and rule and law don't really apply when you're trying to fight Nazis. Wow, you say, how terrible and unreasonable! This just proves we should crush them harder. Yup, and so we get exactly the same argument from the right - Democrats are so evil, so unreasonable, so unhinged, that norms and rules of law don't really apply.
So it goes. I'm not quite a doomer yet, but there's no way out unless at least some people want a way out that isn't "unilateral disarmament."
Well then, it's going to be hard for your charges of hypocrisy to mean something. You detail the thought process behind it yourself, and how it's so tragic that both sides see each other as evil and refuse to talk to each other, but if I offer to out my monkey-brain urge to get even on hold, let bygones be bygones, an all I want in return is some plan to ensure this won't happen again, and you've got nothing... then I'm sorry, fighting with gloves off is not hypocrisy. You need to offer a clear and actionable alternative if you want to criticize others.
There's many ways to address this, from "who started it" to disputing whether or not what is happening now is even approaching what they did in the past, but in the end you can always say "they see you in the same way", so I'll give you an argument where I think this does not hold true.
Again, let's forget about the past, and focus on the future. Ultimately, I wish your liberal friends all the best. I want that they are able to live their lives according to their values, free from the interference of evil chuds like me. When I'm in a good mood, I even wish that it brings them all the happiness they expect, rather than what I think are the likely consequences of their ideas. Even though by now they came up with things that warrant a holy crusade, and a declaration that the child sacrifices will stop (and this is more literal than some might expect), I'm willing to accept a cease fire where they their thing in peace, as long as I'm allowed the same. Would you say your liberal friends would find those terms acceptable? If not, than I'm sorry, but we are not the same, and any implication that we are equivalent is false.
I think some of them would, and some of them would not. Just as you personally might be willing to live and let live, but many (most) of your fellow rightists would not. So yes, I think you are equivalent, and the way out is either war or the "moderates" among us persuading the majority to curb the extremists. I do what little I can (I have had relationships suffer as a result); do you ever tell your side "Hey, maybe dial it down a bit"?
Well, I'd love to hear from some of them, whenever I asked this, it was made clear to me that the terms are unacceptable. Trace literally pointed to this as one of the irreconcilable differences.
Ok, now you're just making stuff up.
Depends what you mean. When people are attacking someone on the other side, who doesn't deserve it, yes I intervene. If you mean dial the extremist rhetoric, I'm sorry I am an extremist, and I'm in no mood to come back to le moderat centrism.
I'm making up the fact that there are a lot of rightists who do not believe in compromise or coexistence with leftists? Really?
"Most" is my opinion, but I don't see how you deny "many."
Okay, so you just said "We are not the same" (about my liberal friends who you think are uncompromising extremists).
If by your own admission you are an uncompromising extremist, well, you are the same. Which places neither of you on higher moral ground.
Reread my commment. I didn't say "compromise and coexistence", I said "I leave you alone, and you leave me alone, and we both get to have spheres that are in accordance with our values". You completely changed the conditions I offered.
With that in mind, yeah I'm pretty sure most right wingers would not be uncomfortable with those terms, whereas most leftwingers would, and that it does mean we are not the same and I have the moral high ground.
I don't think I did ("compromise and coexist" to me is pretty much the same as "leave you alone, and you leave them alone, and you both get to have spheres that are in accordance with your values", unless you think you're all going to be living on different continents or something). But using your specific wording, I will state the same thing: I think some liberals would agree to that and some would not, and some rightists would agree to that, and some (most, IMO) would not.
I'd say compromise necessarily involves adjusting your life so that you don't live in full accordance with your values (and in return your opponent does the same). I fundamentally different solution to what I put forward. It doesn't involve living on different continents, America's federal system is more than enough to handle it, if the states were allowed more autonomy, in the worst case it would involve secession.
I guess we'd have to agree to disagree on the respective ratios of people who would comfortable with that solution on each side. I'm yet to run out of fingers for the liberals that would see the solution as acceptable. I'm not going to say there aren't right-wingers with a similar totalizing mindset, but the majority can respect a neighbor's fence.
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