Discussion for article #232675
I am sad to say that a woman being republican is a deal breaker for me. I had a female acquaintance who left her husband to shack up with some guy…a republican. Ran into her a few years later and she was crying into her beer to me about what an a_hole he turned out to be. I was like, “Well, what did you expect? He isn’t an ass because he is republican…he is a republican because he is an ass”
I pretty much consider it sort of a warning sign these days.
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I have a friend who’s a republican. It’s becoming extremely difficult to be friends with her. It has nothing to do with beliefs. Sincerely held beliefs are fine, differences in opinion are fine. What this ridiculous piece in The Daily Show completely misses is that to be a Republican today means to just accept and spout outright lies. Republicans don’t believe in climate change, don’t believe in evolution, and have general contempt for education and knowledge. In order to get along there have to be certain agreed upon facts. With republicans you have to argue that two plus two is four and not five. It’s exhausting!
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Well, the NY Times poll out today says that 48% of Republicans not only accept climate change, but want something done about it. In fact, on a whole range of issues, elected Republicans are not only out of step with the public, they are out of step with half or more of their voters. So why do they keep getting elected? Why does a Republican not run to represent that broad swath of the party? A candidate who could capture 45-50% of the Republican vote, while the remainder was split between the multiple clown car occupants should have an easy road to the nomination, not to mention, a much better shot in the general. Yet, it never seems to happen.
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Dating trolls. What a masochistic waste of time.
I know lots of Republicans who believe in climate change, think evolution is fact, want weed legal, think gay marriage is fine, want less war, etc. I think what you are referring to is the extremist idiots. Granted, there are LOTS of them, but to lump all Republicans into one “belief system” is part of the problem. We have issues we agree with many Republicans on. As a liberal I know a lot of extremist liberals who I don’t agree with on some issues. But with extremist conservatives I don’t agree with them on ANY issues.
To me we need to engage the other side when we agree on things. That’s how things get done.
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…there are easier ways to be a masochist.
And ironically enough, if a republican does have those type of fetishes, they almost always want to be the bottom, not the Top.
My problem is that when someone gets angry about Obamacare, I tend to translate their arguments into aggressive attempts to deny people healthcare. So they come across to me as really mean spirited and selfish.
Or if people rail about how the peace process in Iran is dangerous, and force is the only thing they’ll understand, I tend to translate that into a pro war statement – an argument that says, “Let’s drop bombs on innocent people and incinerate them.”
When I do those translations I don’t think I’m being entirely fair. I mean, I think that’s where it ends up, logically. But I don’t think the people saying those things are coming at the issues with that intent.
Anyway, it’s hard for me to be friends with someone who wants to incinerate other people, or who wants to deny other people healthcare, etc.
Having said that, I have relatives who disagree with me on politics, and so there are times when I have to get past this sort of thing. It’s possible, but it does take effort.
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The problem is that the extremists are in charge.
The way to change that is to engage the sane ones. Eventually they will vote Democrat if the nuts continue to be in charge. But they won’t do that if you alienate them and call all of them nuts. That makes them want to stay Republican.
The “swing” vote is vital and wins elections. Moderate Republicans are key to that. You get them to come around by engagement, not by trashing them and calling them names. It’s no different than Iran. You can start a war with them, or you can engage them. I opt for the latter.
That’s why it’s important to engage the sane Republicans you reference. Eventually they will vote Democrat if the nuts remain in power and if we out good left leaners (not left nuts) on the ballot. The Republicans will still have nuts in power, but they won’t have any control over Congress, the Presidency, or SCOTUS. Plus a lot of the extremist nuts are older and dying off. So eventually the nuts will lose more support.
It’s a process that takes time, but part of that process is to engage the 48% of Republican voters you reference. Even if only 5% of them decide to vote Democrat, that is a HUGE deal in elections.
This brings up a good point. There are actually quite a lot of people out there who vote entirely out of either a team sports mentality or because of cultural/family influence or even fear. And not so much on all of the issues. I came out of high school and my early college years a registered Republican. Hey, less in taxes means more beer money, right? But then something happened…I met actual Republicans. I disassociated myself pretty quickly when I learned that opposing a useless war and advocating gay rights meant that I was, in fact, a practicing Communist that killed babies and aided terrorism to some people. There are plenty of sane Republicans out there, but when poked and prodded enough I’d argue many really would be better off a registered Democrat or are at least willing to admit their party has been increasingly held hostage by whackos. Party affiliation really isn’t the deal breaker. It really comes down to how absolutely bat shit goddamned crazy they are. It’s one thing to hear someone say, “I typically vote Republican”, versus “BENGHZIE KenYOAAN MARxist MOOOSLIM Dictator???” Like others have pointed out, unfortunately the GOP seems to be filled with the latter nowadays.
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Most people don’t make a detailed analysis of the issues, they vote out a general sense that “He seems like a good guy” of “He cares about people like me” or “She seems like a strong leader” or simply “I don’t like how things are, let’s give the other guys a chance.” That isn’t unique to the US, by the way.
It’s not even necessary for sane Republicans to vote Democratic; it’s more important that they bring their own party back to sanity.
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I dated a republican once, during the Clinton years. She considered herself fiscally conservative, but socially liberal. I disagreed with her, but she was smart and mainly remained a Republican, because she thought Democrats were irresponsible about spending money. I had no issues dating a Republican and could even tease each other about it at the time. I ran into her 10 years later and she had become a Democrat and loathes the current Republicans. I think this isn’t an isolated story. The Republicans have chased out most of the rational, bright, compassionate people from the party–I don’t think there is anyone datable there left. I can’t believe that 67% of Democrats could really date a Republican. I’m married now with children–if they started dating a Republican, I’d really have a hard time with it.
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And they get zero pushback from the, (more or less), non-extremists who are completely cowed by the noisy, overbearing extremists.
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This! It’s not so much about their political views, but their general worldview. A willingness to vote for people who are routinely racist, almost always homophobic, who have nothing but contempt for the poor, and those who deny basic math and science is unacceptable. I can understand someone who was a Republican in the 80’s and even 90’s, but anyone who still aligns with the GOP is either a moron, a horrible person, or completely checked out of current events, and all of those options are unacceptable in man I’d consider relationship material.
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When Colbert left, did he also take key Daily Show writers with him?
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There is nothing wrong with having a different viewpoint on a set of facts. There is everything wrong with creating your own set of facts to fit your narrowed viewpoint.
PS TPM, I really like this auto-preview feature of my comment. Very helpful.
So they may claim. And so what? How many of those “lots of Republicans” would vote FOR a candidate who openly believes in climate change, evolution, etc?
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At dinner last night where I am attending a conference, we got on the subject of NASA’s New Horizons expedition to Pluto. This woman speaks up with, "Adam & Eve, God created all, blah…blah….then….“Now they’re trying to tell us that there is something outside of our Solar System!”
Took me 20 minutes to recover from that mental whip lash. In less than an hour I learned that she hates: Obama, Clinton, black people, immigrants, Democrats, Jews, and a host of other things. Later we got on the subject of Native Americans and I tossed this gem out just to see what would happen, “Yes, sadly, Native Americans had way too liberal of an immigration policy.” This woman laughed and laughed because all her little brain heard was “liberal” and she had the knee jerk reaction to that word assuming it was a joke about liberals. Holy crap, we share a country with these people.
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