I enjoyed the video John posted of Nigel Farage cutting into the European Parliament. Interestingly, Farage is the head of the UK Independence Party – probably the closest thing the Brits have to a Tea Party. UKIP’s are essentially disaffected Tories with a strong libertarian and UK-first streak, and the party platform revolves around liberty, lower taxes, free trade, independence from the democracy-destroying EU, and a return to national sovereignty. I think their beer policies are great. The shuttering of pubs across England is symbolic of the many problems that country faces.
Perhaps more interesting, to me at least, is that John saw common cause with what Farage was saying, without knowing who he was or what he stood for beyond the short Youtube clip. I think there is a great deal of common cause to be found between whatever groups – Tea Partiers, progressives, civil libertarians, etc. etc.…we all disagree vehemently on the means by which we should achieve many of these goals, but the goals themselves are often not so different (well, not the goals exactly, but the purpose of those goals – to improve society and the human condition – remain fairly common). We pillory our political opponents, cast them in as dark and dubious a light as possible, and that’s fine and good. That’s politics. But there is common ground, too, beyond the lazy and often destructive bipartisanship we see enacted by our political leaders. Therein lies the rub, of course. Common ground is good, but in practice bipartisanship often leads to the worst of all possible worlds. The word ‘centrist’ in Washington may as well be ‘careerist’. I’m not sure if our system was really designed with bipartisanship in mind.
J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford
Uh, I like you ED Kain, but if you think the “Tea Party” is anything more than re-branded right-wing Republicans, you’re fucked in the head.
Citizen_X
Oh yeah? Well, here’s a pretty accurate depiction of contemporary “bipartisanship,” courtesy of Tom Tomorrow.
General Stuck
LOL, if you mean like nutroot progressives, Tea Partiers, and Greenwald grade absolutist civil libertarians/Randoids, then you may have a point. The rest of us in the mainstream liberal dem camp, not so much.
taylormattd
“liberty, lower taxes, free trade, independence from the democracy-destroying EU, and a return to national sovereignty”.
Ugh.
jeffreyw
When the sanitation crews sweep up after a Teaparty convocation they often collect enough shed bark for several canoes.
arguingwithsignposts
Should I raise the High Broderism alert flag today, Kain?
And, fwiw, bipartisanship doesn’t extend to the likes of Grover F’ing Norquist in my book. No way, no how, no day.
And really, the *means* are the crucial part, aren’t they?
geg6
@J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford:
This.
And I’m one of those people who consider politics to be war by other means. Yeah, Mussolini made the trains run on time and I guess that was a good thing. I think marijuana should be legalized, but I don’t give a shit if libertarians think that, too. We have no common causes. I wouldn’t work with a libertarian or anyone currently in the Tea Party (which is basically just the GOP) on anything any more than I would with Mussolini simply because our goals are too different and opposed. I realize that BJ is not big on this sentiment. But that just the way I roll.
mightygodking
You forgot “and kicking out the non-white people.”
cleek
the system wasn’t even designed with partisanship in mind.
“There is nothing I dread so much as a division of the Republic into two great parties, each arranged under its leader and converting measures in opposition to each other. This, in my humble apprehension, is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our Constitution.”
John Adams, 1780
Odie Hugh Manatee
@General Stuck:
Yup, the crazies can all join in common cause and then turn on each other afterward.
Leave me out of it.
jrg
E.D., I think you need to produce a video of Nigel Farage claiming that David Cameron is a secret Kenyan usurper before you convince me that he heads the British analogue to the Tea Party.
Farage holding Photoshopped pics of Kate Middleton with a bone through her nose will also work.
Fuck! A Duck
Kain, given that Cole spent most of his life as a rock-stupid wingnut, I wouldn’t place too much faith in his unconsidered opinion about a populist rant that he found on the internet. Cole’s great and all, but he tends to lead with emotion and leave intellect to sweep up after the horses.
OTOH, you still seem to be a pie-in-the-sky Libertarian desperate to make common cause with anyone who will legitimize your naive political philosophy.
Alien-Radio
Nigel Farage is a collosal dickhead scumbag, I hope he and his party drown in the torrents of a million burst colostomy bags.
UKIP is a fascist party for those who think the BNP (British Nationaist Party, Formerly the explicitly Fascist/Nationalist National Front) is too full of commoners, socialists, and collectivists and could do with better PR.
UKIP Has had openly RACIST leaders, and represents nothing less than ultra hardcore anti democratic authoritarians.
Mark
oh, horseshit. yes, I agree in principle with the isolationist stances that Pat Buchanan and Ron Paul take, but 99% of the goals of the right are completely different from mine. And people who hold up signs that read “Keep your government hands off my Medicare” are not signed on to improving society and the human condition.
It’s too bad there isn’t a Pulitzer Prize specifically for false equivalence, because I’d nominate you for it.
t jasper parnell
Yep just like the Tea Party; whackadoodles.
On a German Socialist in the EU Parliament:
On their policies toward the EU Parliament more generally:
Glenn Beck’s pal, from the earlier link,
And, of course, Global Warming is a hoax.
Reasonable Libertarians all.
Vishnu Schist
Erik – there in lies your fundamental mistake. Most “conservatives” in fact have little or no interest in improving the human condition in general. You know as well as anyone the basis of a significant amount of traditional conservatism is the belief that humans are fundamentally bad, they ate the apple goes the fairy tale. As such people in general are free to build themselves individually, get away from their inherent sin, or they can go wallow in hell, e.g. starve in the streets. To the winner goes the spoils.
Liberal philosophy on the other hand generally believes in the inherent goodness of man. That we are in this together and should build societal structures the allow the most good for the most people since we are all “good”.
The goals aren’t the same at all.
Judas Escargot
I haven’t really seen any evidence that the Tea Partiers have any sincere interest in ‘improving society and the human condition’.
Hell, some of them would probably reach for their gun if they heard you utter the phrase “improving society and the human condition” in their presence. It does sound kinda soshalist.
Linda Featheringill
@taylormattd:
The usual rant.
However, some of that might actually be good for Ireland.
eemom
I’ll give you credit for one thing, E.D. — you sure know how to press the right buttons in this crowd.
(has anyone considered the possibility that E.D. is, in reality, DougJ’s Magnum Spoof Opus??)
Cat
I suggest a little revolt.
We should consider E.D. posts open threads since A) He never responds in thread and B) His posts are idiotic.
Yes we all have common goals, well maybe not top line common goals, but we all want to improve the human condition, well maybe not everyone’s condition, but we all want to continue breathing so we all should just work together!
WTF.
Comrade Javamanphil
We all agree that we want ponies. Some of us think if we enact sensible regulation, tax policy and generally allow people to freely decide for themselves who they are with no fear of discrimination, there is reason to believe many of us will get ponies. Others believe the government is withholding all the ponies so if we just let the rich have all the ponies, we’ll get some pony poop eventually. The Tea Party suggests we kill all the ponies and blame the Other guy. It’s a compromise!
Fuck! A Duck
eemom: Considered and rejected. DougJ has a more subtle touch.
Mike Kay (Democrat of the Century)
yeah, but’s his position on garbage collection?
Blue Neponset
I am sure we all disapprove of cannibalism too, but that doesn’t mean liberals can find common ground with people who think tax cuts pay for themselves.
E.D. should reads John’s post about bipartisanship from a couple of years ago:
Andrew
It’s fine to have the same goals, but the policy matters, too. Sometimes it’s not just a disagreement. Sometimes the policy tea partiers epouse is just flat out wrong – harmful to their supposed goals, even actively thwarting them.
I mean, what can you say to a tea partier who’s supposedly deeply concerned about the deficit, but still believes that both letting the Bush tax cuts expire is wrong and that extending unemployment benefits is irresponsible?
Their policy positions not only work to extend and deepen the deficit; they’re also advocating less-stimulative policy over more-stimulative policy in an environment of high unemployment (which is what’s leading to the deficit in the first place). So what if they have the same “goals” as I do? Everything they want to do about it is wrong.
Sometimes it’s not even a matter of policy. Sometimes it’s just flat out lying. Right-wing commentators love to point out California’s budget problem as an example of runaway government excess. Well, California wouldn’t have a budget problem if it weren’t constantly bailing out the rest of the country to the tune of tens of billions of dollars each and every year. Meanwhile, Texas runs an equally large state government with an equally large budget deficit and they’re somehow the very embodiment of limited government, freedom and fiscal common sense.
So, no, just because tea partiers say believe in freedom and sensible fiscal policy and the rest of it doesn’t mean they actually do. Saying the right words doesn’t automatically put your policies in alignment.
Stillwater
I know BJ has an ombudsman, but we really need an editor to catch contentless jibberish like this prior to posting.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
I believe this is the same sentiment that the South Had in the 1850s. I love how electing to join a group is anti-Democratic.
Edited to add the real rant: No, I am not the same as the teabaggers: I am not an idiot, I consider the consequences of my actions, especially as they relate to others, and I don’t consider myself the arbiter of all knowledge and wisdom. They want exactly nothing of what is good for anyone but themselves.
SRW1
So in your eyes the argument that a broken clock is right TWICE EVERY day does indeed have merit and establishes the utility of the clock.
Let me adapt my verdict on Nigel Farage from the previous thread: If you think that somebody is worthy of becoming your friend just because he is being an asshole to somebody else you yourself consider an asshole, you’re inviting trouble.
JGabriel
E.D. Kain:
If the Tea Partiers want it, I’m agin it. I’m changing the purposes of my political goals to include destroying society and degrading the human condition.
Oh, shit. That makes me a banker, doesn’t it?
.
daveNYC
So as libertarians and free marketers, the first bullet point of their pub policy involves changing the tax code to benefit the promotion (and thereby the sale) of ‘traditional’ beers?
Fuck! A Duck
SRW1: Being a British Clock, it can only be right once a day.
Joey Maloney
@Top:
It wasn’t. It was specifically designed to function in a nonpartisan environment. Jefferson and Adams thought that parties (“faction” as it was called in their day) were a pernicious and corrupting influence and should be avoided at all costs. Then they promptly founded opposing factions.
Shinobi
So what you are saying is that I write poetry because underneath my mean callous heartless exterior I really just want to be loved ?????
Somebody throw E.D. out the airlock.
polyorchnid octopunch
You guys are all missing the central salience of that rant. The problem here is one where the elites seem to think they can beat on the plebes with abandon. That works, up until it doesn’t, and then things go pear shaped really fast. He’s absolutely right about that. His other point about the insistence of the European Parliament and the ECB that the Irish git’r’done before the inevitable election are also very much on point.
The guy looks like a tool in a lot of ways, but he nailed it on this issue. It’s not just the NA governments that have decided they work for the rich; it’s governments all over the west.
Marc
I usually am sympathetic, but the UK Independence Party really are a loathsome collection of racists. Is that truly a set of allies worth having? Would you go for, say, the Klan if they had a sensible position on zoning along with the hoods and all? They’re not quite the BNP, but bloody close.
El Cid
Putting aside for one moment the particular context, it’s not so odd for libertarians and even populists conservatives to find brief momentary agreement with liberals and the like. [Or even with harder rightists.]
It’s typically, though, when it goes beyond a few intro points and gets further in, that such agreement doesn’t hold.
I call it the Yeah-Yeah-What? phenomenon.
Throughout the 1990s I noticed that you could be listening to someone like Pat Buchannan or even various odd voices on the shortwave right.
And they’d start to sound like they really made a lot of sense because they were saying the same sort of dissent against power that we liberals and leftists were. Yeah!
And they’d make two or three such points that you’d be surprised to agree with. Yeah!
And then, on that third or fourth point, it would turn into some weird direction you didn’t expect (though maybe should have), some right wing historical shibboleth or unconscionable policy. What?
themann1086
Oh, the UKIP? Yeah, they’re the usual “libertarian” bullshit artists: flat taxes, lower corporate taxes, no inheritance taxes, etc. They also have some lovely views such as: withdraw from the EU; replacing the May Day bank holiday with a St. George’s Day bank holiday (this is dog whistle anti-socialist, pro-religious politicking at its finest); a return to the imperial measurement system; less regulation on home schooling and private schools (more religious dog whistles); opposition to wind power; denialism of the existence of man-made global warming; opposition to GM crops (I know this is a hot button issue for liberals as well, but that’s mostly due to the conflation between the problems of large corporate control and regulatory capture than any inherent problem with genetic modification itself); and more!
They didn’t leave the Tories for libertarian reasons, of course; they left because the Tories were too supportive of the EU for their liking.
Hawes
That might be true if we lived in a Madisonian world of “faction”, with alliances coming and going based on specific issues.
But we live in a Van Burenesque world of “party” and we can’t move beyond that.
Barney
@jrg: Will this do?
“All of you will be aware of the UK Independence Party (UKIP). It campaigns mostly against immigration and Europe. But less attention is paid to their other views and activities.
Later today at 2:30pm a press conference / meeting is being held in Brussels to launch a book titled: ‘Bilderberg Group – Towards Creation Of One World Company Ltd‘.
The event is being hosted by two UKIP MEPs: Nigel Farage (former leader) and Godfrey Bloom. Also attending: Mario Borghezio (Italian MEP) and the book’s author Daniel Estulin.
Godfrey Bloom is the MEP from Yorkshire & North Lincolnshire who we exposed in February as having made a video praising the 1985 French terrorist attack on Greenpeace Rainbow Warrior that killed a photographer. He apologised for that video once we published it.
Bloom is a well known climate-change denier.
The author Daniel Estulin is a big believer in the view that the Bilderberg Group are the “masters of the world” and hold secret meetings to influence events across the world. Apparently their next meeting starts 3rd June.”
Liberal Conspiracy
grendelkhan
Nice applause lights. The proper test of a theory isn’t what it permits, but what it forbids. Your political theory appears to only exclude mustache-twirling supervillains, and declare everyone else to be potential allies. It’s a terrible theory.
But hey, why don’t we all just hug and turn into Tang? We all want to be loved, right?
Carnacki
@Vishnu Schist: Yep. The idea of working together for the betterment of all is so against libertarian principles Kain should be excommunicated from the Church of Rand for his heresy.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@cleek:
What cleek said.
“I’m not sure if our system was really designed with bipartisanship in mind.” comes across as historically ignorant.
I can see how one might seek an analogy between our current political system and our adversarial system of justice in the sense that the latter attempts to uncover truth via a dialectical process, while the latter has over time incorporated the idea of open and frank opposition between the two major political parties into its informal structure. But the fit is loose and I’m don’t think it works well as a tool for analyzing the quality of policy produced by our system as partisan polarization has waxed and waned over time.
I think our longstanding and serious political problems are cultural rather than being merely structural – or if they are structural, the structure in question is deeply embedded in our culture rather being part of the political superstructure which has been constructed on top of it.
Taylormattd
@Mike Kay (Democrat of the Century): Gasp! The ombudsman simple does not care for your comment.
themann1086
@grendelkhan: You get an internet for the End of Evangelion reference.
Hypnos
Anti-EU people forget how Ireland’s prodigious growth was kickstarted by 17 billion euros of investments in infrastructure and education courtesy of the EU Structural Funds program. That’s almost 10% of current GDP.
When that program started in 1989 Ireland was the Haiti of Europe.
Now I fully agree with the fact that its just ridicolous that common people, rather than bankers, are taking the pain of this debt crisis, but keep in mind that European leaders are the only ones who have said investors should also be taking an haircut. The markets didn’t take kindly to that.
The European Commission is at the moment the most progressive legislative body in the world under pretty much any standard – social, environmental, economic. If it weren’t for the EU setting extremely high standards the quality of life in Europe wouldn’t be so high.
For example it would be much harder for single European nations to stand up to China or the US and negotiate things such as the ban on hormone-riddled US beef – and the nations more controlled by their corporations, like the UK, would probably gladly subject their population to such crap. Hell, UK environmental standards would be abysmal if it weren’t for EU directives. Not to mention the committment to Global Warming mitigation.
The EU is the only thing keeping Europe afloat. Don’t trust people who say otherwise.
Cat
@polyorchnid octopunch:
Welcome to Earth, first time here?
Shalimar
E.D., I refer you back to a rant Glenn Beck went on during the Sotomayor confirmation, where he managed to equate empathy with Hitler’s reasoning for exterminating millions of people. How the fuck am I supposed to make common cause with morons who think having empathy for other people is evil?
azlib
E. D. does have a point about bipartisanship being a mirage and code for careerists. To bad the country does not believe it. The polling on bipartisanship is very positive. Of course I think when people are asked the question, it comes down to wanting everyone to essentially agree with my position and I will give away a few crumbs. It always amuses me that something is called bipartisan because a few Dems or Reps voted for it, even when the vast majority of each respective caucus voted “no”.
As for shared lofty goals I am not sure sure there is agreement. Brad DeLong had a good essay recently on the politics of resentment. http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2010/11/battered-but-not-beaten.html which I think gets to the real heart of what the Tea Party is all about which is definitely not solving or even debating issues with any sense of reason.
I am afraid when reason gets thrown out the window as a basis for decision making, we are truly in serious trouble.
TheMightyTrowel
@Fuck! A Duck:
[begin UKIP style rant]
ACTUALLY that would be a facist EU clock that’s only right once a day. Back before this heavy handed continental governance we had good old 12-hour imperial clocks whose white faces shown out in the darkness and, when stopped, were right twice a day.
[end UKIP style rant]
Corner Stone
@Cat: Regarding your comment at #20, I always find it interesting that in a thread that may get to 200 comments there is always one person who pipes up and tells us all how we’re not seeing the brilliance of what EDK is arguing. We’ve all closed our minds to the insight EDK is dropping for our betterment.
Then that person goes on to make a banal comment on the level of “insight” that EDK has already provided us.
Here’s a pro-tip for those people: EDK is not insightful, nor blessed with visionary interpretation.
He is a twit.
Tim Connor
Keep up the good work. You can become another David Brooks and sell your drivel to the highest bidder.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@azlib:
There are different flavors of “bipartisanship”. There is the everybody-has-been-bought kind (c.f. the military industrial complex) and there is the kind where an ideological issue cuts across the lines that currently define the two parties (c.f. civil rights legislation in the 1950s and 60s).
As a gross generalization, I’d say the former is bad and the latter is good. In that sense bipartisanship is the political equivalent of cholesterol.
El Cid
@Hypnos: I also remember how much Spain was massively assisted by EU funds, resulting in a different, non-bubble related construction boom, including not only new projects like expanded high speed rail, but renewing the infrastructure on standard speed medium to long-distance rail; roadways; even the strengthening of older urban buildings which simply were not safe or holding together properly any more.
El Tiburon
Teatards are know for their willingness to listen to other points of views and to compromise. Fo Sho.
Fact is Teatards and/or civil libertarians claim to want a smaller government, but we know that is total bullshit. What they want is to cut off the middle/lower class from any assistance. They don’t mind the military budget or anything that helps them.
El Tiburon
@General Stuck:
Oh brother. Now Greenwald is an “absolutist civil libertarian” and a breath away from being a ‘randoid’?
That is not only a LOL, but a ROFLMAO.
General Stuck
@El Tiburon:
Well, he is an absolutist civil libertarian, but I admit I shouldn’t have used a hyphen between them, because they are not equal in every respect. I give Greenwald credit for at least having a social conscience via his left leanings on social safety net issues, and at least non malevolent intent in general as the right leaning Randoid wingnuts. But the belligerent hatred for all things concerning authority is comparable, as is the faulty logic and downright dishonesty in tactics and strategy for promoting their causes and political alignments.
edit – though in general, I hope you are not going to tell me Greenwald is a “progressive” as in liberal ideologues of the netroots. He is hard core libertarian with some left leanings.
Sly
A right-wing European (who, I suspect, less than 5% of the people around here have even heard of) said something on one occasion that conforms with reality, and those that agree with him on this one occasion now have right-wing sympathies. All based on a three minute clip.
Sorry, E.D. What Farage actually suggests for Ireland, Greece, Portugal, and Spain (unilaterally withdrawing from the Euro) does not, in any way, come from any other higher moral purpose than his own tired and narrow euroscepticism. He would kill those countries to save them, if he could, and I seriously doubt he has any interest in saving them.
On a similar note, the Tea Party thinks that the recession was caused by Jimmy Carter giving two trillion dollars worth of houses to shiftless black people. There is no common ground with crazy.
Citizen Alan
@Cat:
Seconded.
Mike Kay (Democrat of the Century)
@El Tiburon: he is.
he supported the Citizens United decision on the grounds of absolutism.
He’s done work for Ron Paul. Why would that shock you? you can see how a libertarian would be attracted to Ron Paul, as he calls for elimination of drug laws, the patriot act, the FBI and CIA, and cutting the defense budget in half, he bashes wall street and the fed, he was a opponent of the iraq war and neo-cons and supports gay rights. On the down side, Paul wants to end social security, medicare, public schools, farm subsidies, the EPA, women’s choice, and probably the civil rights act.
Hypnos
@El Cid: it should be worth mentioning that right after their economy collapsed, the Icelanders applied to join the EU. Apparently it’s better than being left out in the cold.
Countme In
I found Farange’s rant to be rather bracing, considering the austerity measures being forced on the poor and unemployed in Ireland and elsewhere.
I didn’t know who he was.
Then I looked up the UKIP and Farange’s fellow travelers and realized that I’m so fucking pissed off at the moment that had I rounded a corner in a Germany city in 1923 while in a raw mood and encountered a certain moustachioed demagogue ranting about austerity measures being forced on the Fatherland, that I might have thought HIS “beer policies” were great too.
I think there could be violence on a massive scale in Ireland and other countries, from pure fucking frustration and desperation, but I hope someone has the foresight to put a bullet in the UKIP’s head before the wrong trains start running on time.
Tata
I think there is a great deal of common cause to be found between whatever groups – Tea Partiers, progressives, civil libertarians, etc. etc.…we all disagree vehemently on the means by which we should achieve many of these goals, but the goals themselves are often not so different (well, not the goals exactly, but the purpose of those goals – to improve society and the human condition – remain fairly common).
Hey, wacky Libertarians. You’re for freedom! Bravo! Say, how do you feel about the Right to Choose? You’re against it? You’re against women having the freedom to choose their own destinies?
Come to think of it, you look just like those people I used to defend clinics against. Yeah.
Countme In
My two cents: I think E.D. Kain is a reasonable individual, even though I don’t agree much with his political and economic philosophy.
I say keep him here (I mostly lurk) where we can keep an eye on him and protect him as the fascist, sadistic Republican Party continues to kill its own, as part of its quest to destroy the rest of us.
JohnR
You know, ED, I’m glad you’re posting here. Other than that it stirs up a lot of excitement and jumping-up-and-down arm-waving (which is generally a good thing; opens the sinuses and tones up the CV system, etc.), it’s always very nice to see the thoughts of a naive, innocent, young idealist such as yourself.
Looking at that quote above, it strikes me that perhaps you haven’t thought it through too well – you do realize that something on the order of 80-90% of all human conflict (conservatively estimated based on statistics I just pulled out of my, um, hat) can be traced to disagreements about the means by which different groups intend to go about achieving similar goals (or at least goals designed to achieve the common purpose of ‘improving the human condition’). You forget that words and labels are tricksy things – what counts are the definitions.
Keep up the good work!
Catsy
@Alien-Radio:
Okay, so maybe they are a lot like the teabaggers after all.
Midnight Marauder
@Countme In:
I really enjoy these kinds of comments, because they highlight so much of what is farcical about E.D.’s tenure here thus far. There are always people who proclaim how “reasonable” he is, even in the face of him writing completely unreasonable tripe like the following:
Tell me what endgame goals the modern Republican Party has (you know, the one that wants to repeal the 14th Amendment) with any legitimate progressive movement. Tell me where someone who believes the Earth is 6000 years old, evolution is a liberal myth, and trickle-down economics actually works is supposed to find common ground with someone whose endgame is the very antithesis of each of those things.
If you actually take the time to think this entire argument out, you find that you are examining an argument that has no empirical basis in reality. We’ve witnessed the Republican Party double, triple, and quadruple down on everything from outright bigotry to torture over the last 40 years, and somehow, when it’s all said and done, I am supposed to share mutual long-term goals with these people? It what world is this a real thing? At some point, people need to acknowledge that there is no coming back for some individuals, that they are entirely off the deep end, and there is no constructive way for you to engage them. It just cannot happen. And the people who feed the delusion that it can magically happen somehow are, in my view, equally as loathsome and moronic in their naiveté.
You are talking about a group of people that would have had people like me hung 50 years ago for not just having a white girlfriend, but for even just for looking at one.
Why don’t you read up on Emmett Till and then tell me how we have the same goals as Tea Party Republicans.
morzer
The UKIP are hardly the British version of the Teabaggers. Basically, they are a single issue party of particularly Europhobic and embittered Tories, and do nothing other than strip a few votes away from Cameron’s slightly less fanatical (and rather more obviously split on Europe) right-wingers disguised as centrists. They may seem reasonable if you pick the right scrap of Youtube, but in practice they are regarded as Little Englander cranks and serial losers by the overwhelming majority of the British electorate. I really wish commentators who clearly know bugger all about British politics would stop making pronouncements on what British political parties stand for and how they compare to US political parties (the short answer being that even with excessive beer policies, they don’t).
As for the “democracy-destroying” EU, it might be pointed out that so far they haven’t destroyed any democracies, despite all the strident rhetoric on the subject. If any democracy is in danger in Europe, it would be Italy’s version – because of a corrupt right-wing sexual pervert who happens to control a rather large chunk of the Italian media. Sound vaguely familiar?
Pongo
I kind of wondered about the lefty hype of this clip, too. You don’t have to listen too hard to get that he’s an unabashed free marketeer. The common cause on the left is the irritation we all feel over corporate welfare. The Tea Party movement has hardly put a stop to that and, in fact, only helped to ensure that it will continue unabated by putting the party most responsible (not solely, of course) for abetting corporate malfeasance back in power. Still kills me that we spent $3 billion this cycle to essentially end up right back where we were at 2 years ago and will probably repeat the same foolish exercise 2 years from now. What a bunch of rubes we are.
This guy, like all libertarians, has a rather narrow world view when it comes to the proper role of government that smacks of magical thinking–much like ED’s contention that TSA would run more efficiently if left to the free market.
Redshift
This:
Reminds me of nothing so much as this:
duck-billed placelot
Privilege Denying Dude thinks Tea Partiers working for common good.
MBunge
I’m not sure if our system was really designed with bipartisanship in mind.
Someone was really not paying attention in civics class as a child.
Mike
sparky
ooh, an EDK thread not yet at +200 comments. wheeeeee!
see, the problem here is that there is so much upward abstraction that one might as well say everyone agrees we should not blow up planet Earth; in other words, it’s an empty sentence whose beginning is a hopeful thought that really cannot be supported at all by the end of the same sentence. i know it’s a blog and all, but i encourage you to reflect a moment before hitting that “post” button.
there is one other sentence that is worthwhile in that post, and perhaps if you had focussed on that it would be a more betterer [sic] arrangement of letters.
i mean this one:
but that is really only a starting place, as the phrase “member of the Republican party” or “member of the Democratic party” means essentially the same thing: service to those with the most money. period.
LikeableInMyOwnWay
Really? Maybe a few years of reading up on the history will part the curtains for you?
Let’s just say, I doubt that the Framers intended a government that would become completely non-functional in the face of both domestic and international affairs, lose the respect and trust of most of its citizens, and degrade into a constant war of words and inaction between intractable parties.
Unfortunately they made a few mistakes in their design that resulted in that very thing happening. The tendency of the Senate to wind itself into a bolus of shit that couldn’t govern a book club, much less a country, might be one example.
Cat
@sparky: ooh, an EDK thread not yet at +200 comments. wheeeeee!
brantl
@Mark: “It’s too bad there isn’t a Pulitzer Prize specifically for false equivalence, because I’d nominate you for it.
”
Seconded.