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Post by yeshuapantera on Jan 14, 2021 4:35:14 GMT
Any good thoughts or ideas?
We're pretty divided right now as a nation....
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Post by Midnight Rider on Jan 14, 2021 5:28:14 GMT
Maybe start diminishing the importance of party affiliation. Look at one another and realize that most people want similar things in life. Realize that Dems and Reps live and work together every day and neither side is Satan's spawn.
Maybe if we used "American" instead of 'Democrat' or 'Republican' , things may improve. I would be willing to put an 'American' bumper sticker on my car. Not putting Biden's sticker on my car...I'm not promoting a personal hero. Not putting a party affiliation sticker on my car either.
...
I think I need a day off from this forum...haha.
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Post by yeshuapantera on Jan 14, 2021 13:12:24 GMT
All good points, but the bigger issue here is that we're stuck with a situation where the divide between parties has been increasing for the last two decades. It won't be easy to undo, I'm afraid. Especially when leaders are keeping it going. Unfortunately, Biden probably has a slim to none chance of any national healing. But I still think it's best that he keep saying it for the sake of at least trying to promote that mantra from the oval office.
Any advice for the US from Canada or New Zealand?
How has the left versus right divide played out in those nations??
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Post by Midnight Rider on Jan 14, 2021 17:39:09 GMT
Well, trying to reprogram 350 million people is a difficult task. Congress people kind of depend on division to be reelected, I think and then we have ultra one-sided news outlets like CNN , Fox , etc who depend on one particular party to generate income. Actually I can't rate Fox because I dont watch it that much. CNN though, is a drama llama. Americans dont like being told what to do , either. Which is another challenge. And then there is this fear and loathing of someone who calls theirself a this or a that. I was a registered Republican for 10 years. Then one day I checked the other box and became a Democrat. Much like my Christian baptism, nothing special happened. Hopefully, somehow, we can keep radicals on both sides to a minimum.
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Wertbag
New Member
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Current Belief System: Atheist
Gender: Male
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Post by Wertbag on Jan 14, 2021 19:12:37 GMT
Here in NZ the political divide is quite small. They describe our two main parties as centre-left and centre-right, there are no extremes. So when either party takes control, things will already be going well and hence no one wants to change too much. They will tweak some taxes, move some money around and just keep it ticking. No one gets really worried because we know very little is going to change. Pretty much a "if it ain't broke don't fix it" situation. I'm sure there must be extreme left and right wing people in the country, but you don't see them and they get no air time. This seems different to the US where the loudest, angriest and craziest people make the best news. If thats all you ever see then you start thinking that is all there is out there.
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Post by yeshuapantera on Jan 14, 2021 20:18:27 GMT
Well, trying to reprogram 350 million people is a difficult task. Congress people kind of depend on division to be reelected, I think and then we have ultra one-sided news outlets like CNN , Fox , etc who depend on one particular party to generate income. Actually I can't rate Fox because I dont watch it that much. CNN though, is a drama llama. Americans dont like being told what to do , either. Which is another challenge. And then there is this fear and loathing of someone who calls theirself a this or a that. I was a registered Republican for 10 years. Then one day I checked the other box and became a Democrat. Much like my Christian baptism, nothing special happened. Hopefully, somehow, we can keep radicals on both sides to a minimum. Good post! I like your moderate views, MR. I relate to it. Even if I tend more right on some of the issues. I'm very socially liberal so it balances out somewhat into a moderate zone. Remember a while back when there was at least an attempt to claim, "fair and balanced" on some of these media outlets? And bipartisan attempts were made. I'm thinking back to the Hannity and Colmes days. We're sort of attempting that here with a center left and center right admin and diverse staff of moderators. Ex-christian freeforums: Fair and Balanced But that ship has long sailed where the mainstream media is concerned....
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Post by Midnight Rider on Jan 14, 2021 20:19:05 GMT
I think most people in America are center left or center right, but like you said, the extremists get air time so people start thinking that the other party is all extremist wackos... even though as you go about your day to day life interacting with regular people of all political persuasions there is some sort of fantasy that America is headed into some post-apocalyptic Mad Max movie.
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Post by yeshuapantera on Jan 14, 2021 20:33:46 GMT
Here in NZ the political divide is quite small. They describe our two main parties as centre-left and centre-right, there are no extremes. So when either party takes control, things will already be going well and hence no one wants to change too much. They will tweak some taxes, move some money around and just keep it ticking. No one gets really worried because we know very little is going to change. Pretty much a "if it ain't broke don't fix it" situation. I'm sure there must be extreme left and right wing people in the country, but you don't see them and they get no air time. This seems different to the US where the loudest, angriest and craziest people make the best news. If thats all you ever see then you start thinking that is all there is out there. Wertbag, thank you for accepting my invitation to join in discussion here. Welcome aboard!!! I've always enjoyed your posts. What you're saying does make sense. We're spread a little differently here. The two main parties are more along the lines of center-right and the left side of center-left. And this will change more so if Biden dies or is removed and Harris takes control. Apparently she's been farther left than Bernie Sanders in the senate. Our political divide is an interesting one. And lopsided. Not smoothly balance left to right. I noticed that after the 2016 election there was shout down movement towards moderate democrats and center left personalities. They were being called, "the right," by more radical minded leftist's. And a lot of them then sided with the right because they didn't want to put up with the hate speech directed at them. Even though none of them really identify as republican. In any case, pulling everyone towards the middle seems like the apparently, and glaringly obvious solution to our current political divide. And does pose a problem. Even if Biden tries this as part of a reset, and healing, he'll likely drum up enemies really quickly within the DNC. In fact, my thoughts on this are that Biden would have to go on a purge of radicals within the DNC to try and force them out of the party. To be honest, many of them like AOC probably belong in a third party, not the DNC. Just my opinion. He'd have to have iron balls to do this, too. To "fight" that sort of "battle." Qualifier: I did not condone physical violence in the above paragraph, just in case anyone is tempted to twist the context of my words.
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Post by Midnight Rider on Jan 14, 2021 20:34:38 GMT
Well, trying to reprogram 350 million people is a difficult task. Congress people kind of depend on division to be reelected, I think and then we have ultra one-sided news outlets like CNN , Fox , etc who depend on one particular party to generate income. Actually I can't rate Fox because I dont watch it that much. CNN though, is a drama llama. Americans dont like being told what to do , either. Which is another challenge. And then there is this fear and loathing of someone who calls theirself a this or a that. I was a registered Republican for 10 years. Then one day I checked the other box and became a Democrat. Much like my Christian baptism, nothing special happened. Hopefully, somehow, we can keep radicals on both sides to a minimum. Good post! I like your moderate views, MR. I relate to it. Even if I tend more right on some of the issues. I'm very socially liberal so it balances out somewhat into a moderate zone. Remember a while back when there was at least an attempt to claim, "fair and balanced" on some of these media outlets? And bipartisan attempts were made. I'm thinking back to the Hannity and Colmes days. We're sort of attempting that here with a center left and center right admin and diverse staff of moderators. Ex-christian freeforums: Fair and Balanced I think we can do fair and balanced. Try to see the good in your non-preferred party, and have a little critical thinking/skepticism about your own party or party leaders. I was impressed with Taba's substantial post. His ability to take a balanced view of what's going on is refreshing. I really hope to adopt a more balanced view of the upcoming President(s) and not just look at the R or D next to their name and make an emotional decision about them as I have in the past. Have you seen this study: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3092984/I cant help being a liberal...our brain structures are different. haha.
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Wertbag
New Member
Posts: 14
Current Belief System: Atheist
Gender: Male
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Post by Wertbag on Jan 14, 2021 21:08:58 GMT
I always thought that democracy everywhere is very resistant to change. If we see a problem and if the majority agree, it is still almost impossible to change a political structure. America could really do with a multi-party system, so the extremes are separated, but I can't see that ever happening. Really if we came up with a better system, there would still be no way to ever get it implemented anywhere in the western world. You see that a bit with some Americans and their fanatical belief that the constitution is the greatest thing ever created and it should never be changed. Surely it has been changed in the past?" you can ask, but then it usually comes down to the person liking a specific clause (usually the 2nd). Politics is too much a fame game rather than finding the best person for the job. I'd love to see a system where performance, education and being the best candidate is the reason you are voting. Too often its a case of "I hate both candidates, but I'll try to pick the best of the worse".
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Post by Midnight Rider on Jan 14, 2021 21:36:33 GMT
I always thought that democracy everywhere is very resistant to change. If we see a problem and if the majority agree, it is still almost impossible to change a political structure. America could really do with a multi-party system, so the extremes are separated, but I can't see that ever happening. Really if we came up with a better system, there would still be no way to ever get it implemented anywhere in the western world. You see that a bit with some Americans and their fanatical belief that the constitution is the greatest thing ever created and it should never be changed. Surely it has been changed in the past?" you can ask, but then it usually comes down to the person liking a specific clause (usually the 2nd). Politics is too much a fame game rather than finding the best person for the job. I'd love to see a system where performance, education and being the best candidate is the reason you are voting. Too often its a case of "I hate both candidates, but I'll try to pick the best of the worse". The best of the worse. That's usually my voting decision. lol I do wish we had like 4 or 5 parties so we had more than just this binary choice. And there should be more requirements besides age 35 and a natural born citizen. How about a Master's degree in something? A certain minimum number of years work experience in some particular field, like law. A battery of tests and interviews like they do when you join the military, or become a doctor or perform some other work that involves public trust and public safety. Yes, the US Constitution is tossed around like God's word. Some parts of it may be timeless points of wisdom, but other parts are showing their age and are generally outdated.
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Post by yeshuapantera on Jan 15, 2021 2:37:55 GMT
It would be nice to have at least three dominant parties. The libertarian trails behind. No telling if it will be possible to ever do any better. It would require masses of people to cross over and support it.
But yes, I would like to see more competition for the white house. Keeping the parties on their toes and having to work hard at gaining public notoriety. We literally had a guy camp out in his basement, barely campaign, and win the election. Basically by default because enough people with enough power hated the other guy. If there were three or more parties it wouldn't have gone down like that.
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mwc
New Member
Posts: 21
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Post by mwc on Jan 18, 2021 14:31:34 GMT
I'm registered "NP" (for No Party). Some people register "I" thinking it's the same thing but often that's American Independent which is a party (similar to Republican though a tad more crazy I think). This is after having been "R" for my entire life.
Anyhow, I'm no longer given the option to vote for a president/vice-president in the primaries. They are partisan. They're blank on my ballot. California has open primaries, but the GOP sued to close theirs, so I can trade my ballot in on election day for another party (pretty much Democrat) and vote for their candidate if I like otherwise I get no choice until November.
The rest of my ballot is the same though. Just that partisan section is blank.
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