I am a liberal democrat that embraces socialist ideals but not socialism per se. I am not politically active in that I do not attend rallies, fund raisers and other functions. I do, however, vote in all relevant local and national elections.

 

But enough about me, let's here about you.

Same.

1. I'm a gun owner who seeks gun control (let's start by renewing the ban on automatic weapons and requiring registration for weapon purchases at gun shows and private sales).

2. I'm pro-choice and pro-death penalty.

3. I believe in reducing the national debt and having government being fiscally responsible, but doing so with higher taxes and ending corporate subsidies. Let's end the trickle down lie that's been perpetuated since Reagan. When 1% owns the vast majority of wealth and land, there is no real freedom for the rest.

4. Welfare should not be a perpetual benefit for the able-bodied. Switch it to job training, and if you don't go, you don't eat.

5. In relation to #4, give government scholarships to students willing to get STEM degrees.

 

I believe that those with the crappiest jobs should make the most money, on the grounds that university professors have a pretty good life and sanitation workers should be compensated well for the unpleasant task of making sure we don't drown in our own garbage.

 

I think politicians should make minimum wage so we only get people who really believe in helping others in the job.

 

I believe that none of this will ever happen, but I believe we would all be better off if it did.

 

I believe it is possible to support the police but still call them out when they kill people without provocation. 

 

 

Aren't we all?

Depends on what you're 'appalled and disgusted' with. 

 

When I was in college (back in the 1970s), historical materialism was called economic determinism because historical materialism was too closely identified with Marx and people were trying to avoid the communist "taint."

 

I have heard very little about it in graduate school because now history is all about post-modernism and post-structuralism. I think because history has so many subsets these days (gender, race, post-colonialism, etc.) there is less interest in a more over-arching theory that attempts to explain history as a whole.

 

I personally always thought there was a lot in the historical materialistic theory, but perhaps that comes from having read Religion and the Rise of Capitalism at an impressionable age.

 

A professor scathingly referred to me as a military historian (p.s. I'm not) a few months ago in an attempt to disparage my critique of a fellow student's work (she is a cultural historian). Apparently it is now bad form to expect historians to support their theories with actual evidence. So I guess my support for HM could just be that I'm old-fashioned.

This is why partisan polarised politics doesn't work.

The political boundaries vary from country to country so comparisons are not easy. For example British Conservatives are more left than American Republicans and are closer to Democrats while the majority of the (socialist) Labour Party fit would comfortably within the left-end of the Democrat spectrum and the true lefties in the Labour Party would put most Americans into a flat communism-bashing apoplectic spin. However, the most socialist party in the UK are the Greens and UK UKIP is the closest we get to American Republicans. All major American and British parties are Authoritarian-Capitalist.

However... I reject the whole left/right, conservative/liberal, capitalist/socialist, authoritarian/libertarian shebang. The entire concept that one ideology can solve all problems is stupid, the idea that one single philosophy holds all the answers is idiotic and the belief that one political party can cure all ills is just plain nutty. 

More than that they are all a comical conceit typified by the current USA Presidential election where the American public is now being asked to choose "the lesser of two (or three or four) evils" where the choice is not who do you like most, but who do you dislike least (ignoring the partisan numpties who blindly toe the party line even if they nominate a tub of lard as their candidate) - divisions and factions within all the world's major political parties/ideologies (this is not just an American or a British phenomenon) are showing that a single party can never, and has never, represent a single ideology and that partisanship is a fallacy. Selecting a president and/or government who is least abhorrent to your personal ideology/philosophy still results in a leadership that you don't actually want and who cannot and will not govern the country in the way you would like. The situation now is the USA is facing an election that any clear-minded Republican or Democrat shouldn't actually want their party to win because the long-term consequences of their candidates failing to please and appease the voting public over the next four years is pretty dire: A Trump win could be the beginning of the end of the Republican party and a Clinton win could trigger an unprecedented anti-Democrat backlash. The optimistic belief that all will come good after the election is a one-way ticket to cloud cuckoo land, it's a delusion that has no historical precedent and carries no guarantees - the idea that Trump can be contained or that Clinton can carry on courting a happy compromise between Wall Street, disaffected Republicans and 'Bernie' socialists is fanciful at best.

There are no simple answers and magic bullets don't exist. Even creating a homogeneous "middle-ground" between the eight polarised extremes of left, right, conservative, liberal, capitalist, socialist, authoritarian and libertarian doesn't result in a universal panacea for all the issues that governing a country faces; the problem with 'compromise' is it has both positive and negative connotations, often simultaneously. Governance has to be adaptive and dynamic because nothing is ever static.

Thanks Steve.

I think we need to move past the perception that liberal, socialist and conservative are anathemas to each other and are somehow incompatible - as Greg's "schizophrenic" post shows it is perfectly reasonable to have a [set of] views that cross these ideological demarcation boundaries without forming coalitions that are simultaneously compromising and compromised. As you rightly say, collaborations on specific ideas, projects, crises, etc., that retain individual viewpoints but discard stubborn blind obedience to partisan standpoints so are truly co-operation rather than forced compromise is a viable solution. This is the crux of all my post-Brexit diatribes - the only way leaving the EU can work, or at least be made to work, is with the cooperation of the 48% who voted to remain (and that requires allowing time for a healing process that the point-scoring bickering we are currently witnessing is preventing).

                   If I had to put some kind of label on myself, I would say "Social Democrat". I believe in the democratic process, though in practice, I realise it is far from perfect. To give things a "Human face", I believe in lots of social programs for the disadvantaged out there.

                        I am not really all that "radical" but do realise that a little left or right of centre, politically, isn't what I would deem a "viable alternative" to the powers that be. That sucks, but extremists are not the answer, either, so I remain kind of disolusioned with it all. 

THIS!    

One reads history and the very few truly quality politicians can be counted on one hand! Most are liars, cheats, power hungry megalomaniacs (Hello Donny!) and mostly , incompetents sycophants.  

So, you and I agree on a majority of issues, and for the few disagreements we could perhaps reach an accord given some enlightened, non-hyperbolic dialogue. But as Dean pointed out earlier, our beliefs and concerns are incongruous to the fast-food, prepackaged political parties that we are force-fed. How many more think the same way? A majority, perhaps? Or a majority at least that would prefer to see some sort of compromise solutions rather than black-and-white polar opposites with both sides unwilling to pass common sense legislation without tacking on absurd bill amendments that assure the doom of the bills.

None. That's the point. Why keep repeating the same mistake expecting a different outcome. 

That kind of attitude gets us nowhere. It's a bit sad really. Resting the entire future of the world (and I do mean the world) on the shoulders of one man is not only unrealistic and hopelessly optimistic, it's also somewhat unfair.

The current democratic political system is styled on greco-roman blueprints that were in reality far from democratic. It was created when, like those democracies of ancient Greece and Rome, countries were governed by the elites of society where only a fraction of the population were eligible to vote or hold office and the remainder of the population were either slaves, plebeians, serfs, indentured servants or otherwise regarded ineligible by social status ... or women. Universal suffrage is http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_suffrage#Dates_by_country" rel="nofollow - a modern (predominately 20th century) concept that the now archaic political system is so ill-equipped to work with it is not even remotely capable of working effectively. It is geared to preserve and benefit the pre-20th century social strata while giving the outward appearance of being for the people by the people (clue - it never was).

Partisan politics requires an entire group of people to think and act en mass - this is achieved in a practical sense by having a single stated ideology that everyone conforms to, then a select few are granted the power to enact the agreed policies. Over time this becomes corrupted into a select few who manoeuvre themselves into a position of power and then enforce policies that everyone obediently follows as long as they point in the general direction of the previously agreed ideology. As we have seen in the current US presidential election that manoeuvring can involve little more than an obscene amount of money and a provocative slogan or two. Those funding that then expect privileges and concessions in return for their monetary support and government policy is then dictated by wallet and cheque and so the ideology that the party was built upon becomes corrupted. The more power a party has the more corrupted its ideology becomes and the more seats the party wins the more power it can wield. This power is inversely proportional to the number of electable seat-winning parties that are extant in a democratic political party system. One-party system = all powerful; two-party system = extreme power; multi-party system = shared (coalition) power; no-party system = equal power.

In the UK and the US (plus Australia, Malta and Jamaica) the first step would be to open up the electoral system to break the two-party strangle-hold as this is only slightly better than the communist one-party virtual dictatorships. [Gary Johnson and the Librarians are making noises that a third party can win an election, but they are woefully wrong - third parties only become one of the two major parties in the two-party system when one of the two major parties is so depleted in numbers that they cannot garner enough support to stay in contention]. This would lead to a multi-party system that stands slightly more chance of benefiting a broader section of the population but since practically every other democracy in the world is a multi-party system and they don't work any better then that still isn't quite good enough. The next logical step is the no-party  http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=107423&PID=5354816#5354816" rel="nofollow - individual/group collaborations that Steve (laz) mentioned on the previous page.

Are you skeptical of the existence of politics? 

 

This the best that this type of capitalistic democratic system will ever be. It reflects both the best and worst thinking, motivations and actions of it's citizens, government officials, job producers, lobbyists and politicians, as mores and values evolve over time. The idea that this type of government can ever be broken down and replaced, I'm sorry to say, is just wishful thinking or dreaming. And that makes me sad, frankly. America is never going to replace it's constitution and I doubt that the UK will ever restructure it's democratic government.

 

Remember, you yourself have no plan on how to do this and neither does anyone else. And how could it be accomplished even if you did?

 

It's been going in the US and UK for a sight longer than a century and is a product of itself. Polarisation is self-perpetuating and vacillating from one polarity to the other achieves nothing but harm. It's an archaic system that does not adapt itself to the modern make-up of society - we are not naturally polarised in our outlook so are force to fit-in with one of the two seemingly opposing ideologies.

There are plenty of models and examples of how this non-partisan non-polarised approach works on the small-scale in both the political and the business worlds. I called it "no-party" before but in places like Iceland and The Channel Islands it is a multi-party system that has almost as many individual parties as there are available seats in the governmental body so coalitions are replaced by collaborations. The problem is determining whether this is scalable to encompass larger organisations of country and population. I suspect it isn't but that isn't but the principle is sound enough for workable solution to be found if enough people put their minds to it. I don't have all the answers and it would make little difference if I did as it will take a collaborative effort of people far more knowledgeable than I to formulate and achieve anything of lasting value; there are an increasing number of people who believe that the untried and untested Libertarian approach is the solution - I believe they are wrong as that's just replacing one ideology with another, but it shows that there are people who want change. Redirecting those who would shore-up a poorly adapted system towards creating a viable alternative is not beyond the wit of man. Either that or we continue along the path of scepticism, apathy and complacency that disenfranchises and disaffects more and more people.

 

That reminds me of something J Krishnamurti (an Indian mystic..) said many years ago in the late 60's I think......and I'm paraphrasing here...: 'Nothing will change for the better on earth regarding our systems until there is a fundamental change in the very nature of human consciousness.'

 I think he was right on the money.....our problems with our political systems  reflect our inner turmoil and who we are as people on this planet. As long as we are 'sh*ts' our systems will reflect that. 

Sorry to hear that Steve, my condolences.
 

 

 

The point of my post is emphasize that we imperfect beings demand perfection from others as imperfect as ourselves. Contrary to Dean's view, this is not pessimism but simply pragmatism. 

 

But I feel that polarization in democracy is symptomatic of a problem that can be fixed. As an example, Americans may  vote for a Democratic president in order to stop the US from invading other counties, while voting for a Republican

Senator or Congressman, and Republican state officials, because they feel that high crime rates in their cities would be better served, as if the modern military styled police are simply going to vanish overnight.

I hold the American Democratic party responsible for not addressing this issue. The failure of politically informing Democrats of this results in consequences like Republican gerrymandering and other such problems.

 

A Democrat has to toe the party line. Not be pro-gun and pro-death penalty but both anti-gun and anti-death penalty. And definitely not pro-choice and pro-death penalty.  We American's cannot have both ways. The result of the former is the democratic polarization of our government that we Americans always suffer. And with effort it can be fixed or greatly reduced, which I find to be a better option than replacing our government with something else.

 

One should only replace what can't be fixed, and I'm far from conceding to that the American government cannot be fixed or that our system of government is inherently broken.

Then why the hell do you bang on about a one-party system like it's the only alternative to a two-party system? 

 

And the fact that I find polarization normal in democratic systems, albeit way too unbalanced, as I stated in a previous post, with America not securing either an all Democratic or Republican President and Congress. Not the stalemating opposing system that we have at present.

While "Lilliputian" implies a very small thing, the Lilliput narrative in Gulliver's Travels was a satire on the sectarian Big-Endian/Little-Endian two-party system. 

[note: I've said before that this only applies to elections to a governing body, it does not necessarily apply to Presidential elections where there can only be one winner regardless of the voting system or party system used - in that regard whoever wins in a multi-party race will always be a minority winner]

Polarisation is only common in a democratic system that relies on simple majority voting (or variants thereof) - in that respect it is a self-perpetuating system. A third party (or pole) cannot make in-roads into this system because there are no prizes for coming second - the two main parties can continue to win their safe-seats/states and come third in the seats they cannot win, which places the third party in second place in every contested seat/state without changing the outcome. For example, consider this extreme exaggeration of a three-horse race in a two-party system:

...so B wins even though C wins the popular vote. C also loses out to A as the elected opposition in parliament/congress/senate/where-ever because they didn't win a single seat. So the net result of this is one of the two main parties can be opposed by over two-thirds of the voting population and still win. While that is situation normal for the second main party it is SNAFU for any third (fourth, fifth, etc.) party. More than that, just under half the population now has zero representation and the country is governed by representatives of under a third of the population... what a terrifically bad democracy that is.

I am also a Post-Keynesian, meaning I reject austerity, the necessity of balanced government budgets, dominance of monetary policy over fiscal and the notion that markets are these magical things that work beautifully, and if simply left to their own will create the best possible outcome for the most people. 

I agree, this matter concerns most Western democracies. I only speak for France, because that's the only political system I can pretend to genuinely know.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Stagnation" rel="nofollow - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Stagnation

According to him, Western countries have their economic growth years behind them and must learn to live without it. Developing countries are just catching up by applying the recipes that worked after WWII.

BTW, taking about renewal, the simple fact that "young" politicians, like Justin Trudeau, can be at the head of the country is science-fiction for Frenchs. In France, they're all the same arthritic oldsters preserved in formalin for decades...

Frankly that's not my problem it's yours because even with those "missing" voters the two-party system would still not represent the true composition of the voters. However are these poor southern Democrats really missing or is it that they are just going against type and voting Republican?

As to overlooking your concerns fro jumping backing and forth between party lines from Republicans and Democrats in America - not so much overlooked as completely missed it .... because you've barely typed a hundred words in this thread and didn't mention it once. People switch between the parties because neither one is a good fit for them so when the one in power doesn't do it for them they'll vote for the other bugger next time. If there was more choice then the chances of finding one that is a better fit is greatly improved, people do not fit neatly into Republican or Democrat pigeonholes. 

That's only because you narrowed down a World-problem to a wholly American one. (or should that read holy American one ).

Unfortunately America's status as a World power and its foreign policy (irrespective of who's in power on any given Saturday) takes all American politics onto a far wider platform than just what affects Americans. Essentially telling me to butt out of things because I don't understand them is narrowminded and parochial. History is something to be learnt from, it is not something to be blindly repeated because we've always done it that way. The issues that affect Britain and British politics are the same as those that affect the USA and how you approach them is basically the same: you have the same basic democratic system as us, (minor differences necessary between a monarchy and republic aside) and you use the same polarised, two-party, simple majority election system we do (most other countries do not). You also are fairly unique in using the same common-law judicial system that we do (most other countries do not) so how political bills are translated into statute law is also more or less the same. The current mess Britain is facing is a direct consequence of the polarised system and is a portent of what is in store for the USA. 

 

How about we do the rest of the world a favor and both but-out for once? At least until we can show that we can actually clean up at home first.

 

If you and Dean can see no future in the present  British system, then I respect your right to try to fix or replace it.

 

I, however, have not lost all hope in America's system. The American demographic is changing faster than we can blink. This Trump lunacy is the last ditch effort of 50's right wingers to "restore America to old conservative values" before they drop dead and finally die out. Bernie was just too independent for his own good, but his example has put an extreme alternative candidate, that has ever been thought possible, to run for America's top rung. However, when the new mixed American demographic soon outnumbers the old, watch out world.

 

America's system is broken? You bet. But a fix that can't be stopped  is on the way, and many intelligent people simply fail to see it.

 

 

Edit: The demographic I referred to is racial.

Frankly the only two sh*ts I couldn't give is whether anyone is offended that as a foreigner I have the temerity to have an opinion on American politics (or on the grammatical logic of common American idioms come to that - but hey-ho, thankfully it's not my job to teach Americans how to speak their adopted non-native language).

To understand British politics all you need to do is look at the parallels in your own. (Brexit is just our Mexican Wall, the only difference is ours is a moat and was supplied ready-made - all the Brexit vote did was to decide to raise the metaphorical draw-bridge... and then fill it full of sharks - and like Trumpington's fabled Wall, neither of which we can actually do.) What you see happening within the Republican party we are watching happen within the Labour party (albeit for different reasons - Corbyn is our Sanders equivalent) - and that particular internal struggle has been waging for 40 years or more.

Why not, though?  I don't mean a full blooded revolution with a violent overthrowing of government itself.  But I do believe a fundamental change in the politics of a country itself does not come without change.