Real or imagined threats

[TheMeInTeam]

So while I completely agree with your assessment that global corporations' influence on politics is one of the biggest problems we as humanity have to face, it's not called "corporatism".

And yet the state also influences corporations heavily, especially competitors. It's a two way street, and that does blur the difference.

 

[rah]

which is when we definitely hit cynical territory,

How could any student of politics not be cynical? Or anybody that has witnessed it for 60 years.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

Get the money/power/respect first but whatever means necessary (within reason) and then you can do good w it.

this is oxymoronic: I get money and power by causing suffering in the world just so that I can use the same money to alleviate suffering? I don't see much purpose in that. many good things have been done entirely without money, others with nothing but volunteer work. me & my love raised a non profit from the ground that's now working independently of us, without any money or fame. quite a few revolutionaries and politicians didn't come from old money or high society. it's comforting to tell yourself that "if you don't play you lose by default", but that's just not true. as @aimeeandbeatles constantly proves, both in video games and in real life there's always ways to bend and defy the rules, to play a different game, to do something new.

I think you have kind of a weird image of the environmentalist. Most of the Green party voters here in Germany are 40 something suits with high disposable income. A dear friend has his own electric car startup. That's environmentalism, too, without "playing into the system" too much and without being a trailer hippie. It's not wrong to participate, but you don't have to go all out and sell your soul to the devil.

I mean, you are right when you say that living self-sufficiently on your own won't change the status quo, but then again barely anything a single person does matters in that regard, unless you're the 0.1% Where we disagree, I think, is that the secret is not to "play the game" until you're one of those 0.1% and can do good things (because that will never happen), but rather to find entirely new ways of playing. The single biggest problem with capitalism is that we can't imagine any alternative anymore. Without utopian ideas you can have all the money and power in the world and you're still limited in what you can do. I would argue you can't change the system, neither from within, as you said, nor from outside (terrorism, opposition). For the same reason foreign aid, while often helpful, especially in crises, never really works to change the structural problems. It's still operating in a faulty framework. And the beautiful thing about utopian ideas is that they often carry on. The 0.1% are also human, they also pick up on ideas. That's why we have universal human laws. They're not perfect, but they're something. Here's to hoping we can find something better.

Many use investment gurus. Mine is essentially a blind trust. I make none of the decisions. Sorry if I don't share your opinion that I am evil.
And these days, it's not always obvious to what a company actually does. Of if you're in an investment fund sometimes you don't know all the companies involved. I will concede that some are obvious, but there are many commercial that provide components to weapons companies. Are they evil too? How much research must you do before you're not evil?

call me old fashioned, but I it really doesn't seem smart to invest in something you don't personally know. sounds a lot like gambling if you ask me. I can do fine without giving my money to a guru, as crazy as that sounds.

 

[JPetroski]

Republicans here practically worship the military. I feel it goes way beyond patriotism, it's not even about American values but instead simply about glorifying military just because it's military, if I'm making sense?

We would do well to slay this sacred cow but the implications of trying to do so would be the ickiest of icky conversations to have with grieving parents. I'm not sure it's glorifying military so much as people experiencing loss and needing it to mean something/be for something. In other words, I don't think the military is glorified because people like big parades, etc. (we really don't have those here which is why Trump's thought of having a huge parade a few years ago was so weird and off-putting to so many). I think it is glorified because people need to think of a soldier's death as a sacrifice for a greater good... That's why people say things like, "they died for our freedom" even though our freedom was never really in jeopardy in most conflicts. It doesn't usually make literal sense, but some need to say it to make sense of it for themselves.

 

[The_J]

As someone who once nearly got beaten up on open street by a bunch of actual nazis, I find it highly entertaining that in a threat about imagined threats there's a discussion if the average Trump voter is a nazi. (Obviously there is real threat in there, but the imagined one is definitely bigger than the real one)
Not sure if this comes in level of irony before or after the fact that someone working for a bank is calling someone out on perceived unethical investment .

I think the real imagined threat is probably the loose usage of these terms.
If the average idaho grandpa is a nazi, this devalues the actual issue, and makes the real issue invisible.

 

[Gorbles]

How could any student of politics not be cynical? Or anybody that has witnessed it for 60 years.

I guess more nihilist is what I was aiming at, though that's an extreme term anyhow, which is why I didn't use it. There's a difference between cynical about claims made, and being cynical about everyone and everything to the point where you label improvements to working class quality of life as a "bribe".

 

[Cloud_Strife]

As someone who once nearly got beaten up on open street by a bunch of actual nazis, I find it highly entertaining that in a threat about imagined threats there's a discussion if the average Trump voter is a nazi. (Obviously there is real threat in there, but the imagined one is definitely bigger than the real one)
Not sure if this comes in level of irony before or after the fact that someone working for a bank is calling someone out on perceived unethical investment .

I think the real imagined threat is probably the loose usage of these terms.
If the average idaho grandpa is a nazi, this devalues the actual issue, and makes the real issue invisible.

The average "Idaho Grandpa" also has guns and more than likely has friends with guns who share his views on non-white people.

 

[Zardnaar]

I guess more nihilist is what I was aiming at, though that's an extreme term anyhow, which is why I didn't use it. There's a difference between cynical about claims made, and being cynical about everyone and everything to the point where you label improvements to working class quality of life as a "bribe".

Your taking money off someone and redistributing it to some one else. Either via taxes, or trickle down.

Pick your poison. Policies are essentially bribes, candy maybe more big picture cheap social cause type stuff.

They don't call it bribes but it's essentially the same thing right or left. UBI is a prime example.

 

[Cloud_Strife]

You cannot make money or become rich in a capitalist system without exploitation, policies aiming to redress this are not "bribes" they're band aids to keep the system going on.

If you want to see bribes in the form of policy look no further than the Gops record on big business and corporations

 

[Gorbles]

Your taking money off someone and redistributing it to some one else. Either via taxes, or trickle down.

Pick your poison. Policies are essentially bribes, candy maybe more big picture cheap social cause type stuff.

They don't call it bribes but it's essentially the same thing right or left. UBI is a prime example.

So in your opinion, raising living conditions for the most impoverished counts as a "bribe", or "candy". Okay.

 

[Zardnaar]

So in your opinion, raising living conditions for the most impoverished counts as a "bribe", or "candy". Okay.

If you offer someone money in return for something that's not employment then yes.

It's not stated but say free healthcare is essentially a bribe. So is a tax cut.

In return they want your vote. If you vote for policies you don't personally benefit from financially that's not a bribe.

Polititians make a promise to get your vote. You expect them to either honor that promise or at least try to.

Boiled down democracy is a popularity contest.

Google bribe definition.

To dishonestly persuade (polititians lol) to act in favor by gift of money or other inducement.

Bribing the middle class isn't the worst way to win an election.

 

[Gorbles]

I wasn't talking about the middle class, Zardnaar. I've been consistently talking about the working class, and otherwise most impoverished. Also, a policy that's out in the open is pretty hard to be dishonest about. You might end up disagreeing with how they implement it, but that's a theoretical at a future point in time.

I was just trying to clarify what you considered a bribe - I already know the definition. It's alright, at this point I don't think I need any more clarification

 

[rah]

I don't know. If there's really no realistic way to implement your promise, isn't that kind of dishonest?
I personally support a medicare for all who want it option, but realize it may be a long way off. Promising free health care to all is dishonest in my book, and just a simple bribe. Same thing for eliminating existing education loan debt.
I also remember our favorite Crook's promise to deliver the bestest cheapest health care plan. Still waiting. Oh yeah, now he's saying it will be after the next election. No bribe offer there.

 

[Cloud_Strife]

It's only a long way off because the people who are against it hold all the power, not just in the GOP but also in corporatist democrats like Pelosi, it's not an issue of resources, it's an issue of political will

 

[rah]

Which neither party has, which is dishonest. Which is my point.

 

[Cloud_Strife]

Which neither party has, which is dishonest. Which is my point.

Except there are those progressives in the Democrat party that are pushing for it, the same however can not be said for the GOP, that is where you are wrong.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Promising free health care to all is dishonest in my book

When did we stop being the nation that got **** done and became the nation of limp noodles that decides preemptively we can't do anything except bomb other countries, throw kids in cages and cut taxes?

Republican leadership over the decades has destroyed our ability to think big to solve our problems.

I am sure medicare, medicaid, social security and the GI Bill were all seen as empty dishonest bribes at one point or another too.

 

[rah]

Do you really think those progressives are enough to actually get them passed? If so, you're more gullible than I thought.
I will agree that at least they make the noise. The republicans sure don't.

When did we stop being the nation that got **** done and became the nation of limp noodles that decides preemptively we can't do anything except bomb other countries, throw kids in cages and cut taxes?

Probably around the turn of the century. Before then, government seemed a tad more compassionate.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

The republicans sure don't.

Yes they do. It sounds like

WE ARE WEAK WE CAN'T DO THAT GIMME TAX CUTS LET THE POORS EAT CAKE

 

[rah]

Wait for those tax cuts to expire on individuals. I predict that will piss off some of those people that were talking them up when it started.