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The smug style in American liberalism

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Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#201

Post by LanceH »

cafard wrote: post #161
jessaustin wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Johnson seems to have gotten more votes than Nader; Johnson and Stein together definitely did so. In many of the "battleground" states, Trump's margin is totally swamped by third-party numbers. The observations you've made about Clinton aren't news to anyone. The fact she was nominated anyway , with her only primary opposition coming from outside the party, after the DNC had let it be known to all potential opponents…

I upvoted you. However, I think that Clinton was seen as the safe candidate: she had name recognition, she didn't scare Wall Street. That is not wholly the same as being the candidate of Smug. I trust that the Democratic Party will understand that it has run out of ideas. Will the Republicans know what to do? It strikes me as quite possible that Trump's qualities could be those of a one-term president.

I would say her selection was a political payoff from insiders first. Second it was to put a woman out there for the smug base to go crazy voting for her.

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#202

Post by aaronchall »

bambax wrote: post #151

Wow. This article was published on April 21st, before the end of the primaries. > Trump capturing the nomination will not dispel the smug style; if anything, it will redouble it. Faced with the prospect of an election between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, the smug will reach a fever pitch: six straight months of a sure thing, an opportunity to mock and scoff and ask, How could anybody vote for this guy? until a m…

It's not the first time he's been wrong.

Krugman has lived his life in a liberal urban academic bubble and has no idea what the rest of the USA is like.

We would do well to remember that when we have the misfortune to come across his writings in the future.

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#203

Post by silverbax88 »

clifanatic wrote: post #184
scarmig wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Full disclosure: I'm a Hillary voter, after much internal fretting about voting third party or writing in Obama. Looking at the reactions on my Facebook feed, the large majority of people seem to be taking from this experience the learning that Trump voters are all disgusting misogynistic racist pigs, and America deserves to be damned for its sins against the pro-Clinton media orthodoxy. It's tiring, because in terms…

I remember my Facebook feed from 8 years ago - my liberal friends were celebrating, and my conservative friends were disappointed, but trying to be (somewhat) conciliatory. Now, my conservative friends are celebrating but my liberal friends attitude is "screw America, I hope you choke in your own vomit, you racist bastards".

You have significantly nicer conservative friends than I do. It's been 8 years of racist, xenophobic bile from most of the conservatives on my FB feed, and several of their politicians (Ted Cruz) as well.

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#204

Post by cafard »

jessaustin wrote: post #177
cafard wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I upvoted you. However, I think that Clinton was seen as the safe candidate: she had name recognition, she didn't scare Wall Street. That is not wholly the same as being the candidate of Smug. I trust that the Democratic Party will understand that it has run out of ideas. Will the Republicans know what to do? It strikes me as quite possible that Trump's qualities could be those of a one-term president.

Was that "didn't scare Wall Street" or was it "had accepted tens of millions of dollars from Wall Street"? If Wall Street gets final vet, the Democrat party has changed from the days of FDR. (OT: will they or any of the other Clinton Family Foundation donors ask for refunds?) The inability to see how conflicts of interest look from outside is a Smugness that has afflicted Democrats and Republicans both. Trump could d…

Indeed the Democratic Party has changed since the days of FDR. It is amusing to consider that FDR thought that a realignment of the parties might be beneficial, with the Republicans picking up the conservative (often southern) Democrats and the Democrats picking up the more liberal (often northeastern) Republicans. How'd that work out?

And of course you are completely correct on the inability to perceive conflicts of interest--where they are or where they just might be.

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#205

Post by mikeash »

jessaustin wrote: post #94

On November 6, 2000, during his final pre-election stump speech, Bush explained his history of political triumph thusly: "They misunderesimated me." What an idiot. American liberals made fun of him for that one for years. It is worth considering that he didn't misspeak. He did, however, deliberately cultivate the confusion. He understood the smug style. W's was perhaps a more subtle dominating response to the Smug, b…

I think Democrats just need to nominate better candidates. Al Gore was so boring that his Secret Service nickname was "Al Gore." (A joke, but one he told himself.) Clinton was a terrible candidate who only had a chance because she was running against another terrible candidate.

(And to clarify, I think Clinton was a decent candidate in terms of her policies and her ability to do the job. But she was a terrible candidate in terms of her potential to win. The widespread dislike of her among the electorate may have been unfair, but that doesn't mean it wasn't real.)

Or perhaps nominating bad candidates is just a consequence of the "smug"? Maybe that's what pushes Democrats to think that it's OK if a candidate is boring or unpopular as long as they have good ideas.

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#206

Post by foldr »

Nursie wrote: post #181
foldr wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing is that the only alternative to putting the morons back in their box appears to be letting the morons run the country. Sometimes public opinion really is just wrong , and there is no easy way forward when that happens.

I think that attitude sums up the problem nicely. Anyone that disagrees with my take on this issue is a moron. I disagree fundamentally - if you stop regarding the 'other side' as 'other', as stupid, as meritless, and start to consider their opinions when making policy, well we might make progress.

>Anyone that disagrees with my take on this issue is a moron.

It's wrong to think that everyone who disagrees with you on anything is a moron. It's also wrong to deny the existence of morons who occasionally do moronic things.

I mean, we are talking about a group of people who held a referendum, knowing that the vote would be close, and then didn't even have a plan for what to do afterwards. The country is in chaos and the leaders of the Brexit brigade have all sodded off, having absolutely no idea what to do next.

We did consider the opinions of Brexit supporters. Their concerns were taken seriously. The Conservative government went overboard in its attempts to reduce migration and negotiate a more favorable deal with Europe. They really couldn't have done any more without doing something outright ridiculous. But that wasn't enough. So the public insisted that they do something ridiculous.

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#207

Post by maratd »

usmeteora wrote: post #135
yummyfajitas wrote: post #35

This is definitely the preference falsification election. Those who know me on HN know that I'm an outspoken proponent of unorthodox ideas. I'm regularly shouted down, called racist/evil/etc, downmodded and flagged on HN. I also get a steady stream of private emails: "I wouldn't say this publicly cause of the bullies, but that .gov link with all the data does seem to support you. I think you might be right, I need to…

I actually agree with you in some cases here. I'm not a huge fan of Hillary. However, as a young women working in technology and male dominated environments, it's really hard for me to believe the pathological sexism isnt a fundamentally limiting component in making everything better. I don't believe women should get free rides and everything should be equal overnight. I'm not a man hater. I know many educated male p…

> products made in technology would be better if there were an equal gender ratio in the workforce.

There is no justifiable reason for a 50/50 split in any industry. Some industries are dominated by women and some by men. That's OK. It just reflects the differences between men and women, and yes, they do exist.

The same applies to the workforce at large. If a larger percentage of women than men choose not to participate in a traditional manner, that's OK. Just because we don't put a dollar figure on rearing kids or community engagement, doesn't mean those activities don't bring substantial value to the table.

> As a woman who has been spoken to in previous workplaces the way Trump has spoken poorly of women

There is a fundamental difference between guys "shooting the shit" and actually behaving that way. He's far too much of a pussy to be grabbing anyone by the pussy. That said, there are certainly scumbags out there who would behave that way and neither you (nor anyone present) should tolerate that kind of behavior, regardless of repercussions.

Well, the last part is easy to say and hard to do. One of the reasons I'm not in a traditional employment setting is that I have a very low tolerance for shitty behavior.

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#208

Post by silverbax88 »

rorykoehler wrote: post #54
scarmig wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Full disclosure: I'm a Hillary voter, after much internal fretting about voting third party or writing in Obama. Looking at the reactions on my Facebook feed, the large majority of people seem to be taking from this experience the learning that Trump voters are all disgusting misogynistic racist pigs, and America deserves to be damned for its sins against the pro-Clinton media orthodoxy. It's tiring, because in terms…

Obama is a huge part of why this happened. He promised change and delivered empire.

Wait, what? He ran on fixing the economy (done), ending the war in Iraq (done), restoring our relationship with the rest of the world (done), universal health care (done) and improving the acceptance of minority groups (somewhat done - at least the LGBT community).

Illegal immigration is down, unemployment is down, crime is down.

There are definitely things Obama hasn't done, but he absolutely delivered change, and he did it while facing a completely obstructionist Congress and Senate for most of his tenure. People just get complacent, even when things are going great. No matter how much any president does, or how good things are, people will get antsy just because our human nature forces us to constantly avoid what we perceive as stagnation.

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#209

Post by douche »

germinalphrase wrote: post #124
gozur88 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's what I was thinking. As long as I don't get more than six MRIs a year I come out ahead.

I burned my foot without insurance. Out of pocket this twenty minutes in the doctor's office, two pain pills, and a nurse assuring me that it wasn't quite a third-degree burn cost me $2000+. It's not six MRI's the uninsured need to worry about, it's incidental injuries and illnesses that potentially cost several month's wages. God forbid you have a multi-day stay in the ICU.

Under many of ACA policies, you would still end up paying that amount, because they have ridiculously high deductibles. So if you are a relatively healthy person that does not regularly go to the doctors to get that chewed up earlier, you are still going to be left holding the bag for non-catastrophic, but expensive services.

I have been burned by this in the past.

Re: The smug style in American liberalism

#210

Post by greedo »

tnmrnis wrote: post #113
gadders wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A similar thing happened with Brexit, and the last UK General Election. Right-leaning voters just can't be bothered to identify themselves and get involved in debates about it. They just vote.

The similar thing is happening all over europe right know. Right-leaning voters don't want to identify themselves because the negative social implications can be quite significant. Also the west seem to have lost its debate culture. These days most debates of conservatives and progressives in shouting 'commie' and 'racist' at each other. In a good debate you wanna help your opponent to give the best possible argument…

At least in the US, it's been gone since the Nixon era. I was too young to vote in Carter v. Reagan, but the hyperbole around his candidacy was amazing. I remember my parents being freaked out when McGovern lost in 1972; it was the end of the world...
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