Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

That sinking feeling

antipope.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

161–170 of 178 posts

Re: That sinking feeling

#161

Post by AnimalMuppet »

dragonwriter wrote: post #156
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And it's true. For every option, there are people who, when they voted Leave, weren't voting for that. So you have a slight majority who voted Leave. But they were (in their own minds) voting for different flavors of Leave. You don't have a majority behind any particular kind of Leave. Therefore there is no possible way to do this that will satisfy the majority of people. That's going to be problematic.

But because the terms of an exit, under the laws of the EU, are not up to the departing nation, voting Leave meant accepting a hard Brexit —which could result no matter what the British government negotiating position was—was, even if not th best result, both acceptable and preferable to the status quo ante. There's no other reasonable interpretation of a vote for Leave.

> There's no other reasonable interpretation of a vote for Leave.

I wonder how many of the people who voted Leave thought that was true.

Now, you can say that it doesn't matter, because they had opportunity to inform themselves before the vote. It's not like the rules around Article 50 have changed since the vote. But still, I wonder how many of the Leave votes really meant "Leave, even if it's a hard Brexit". (I can't prove any of this, of course...)

Re: That sinking feeling

#162

Post by dragonwriter »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #160
wilsonnb2 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If liberals want to do anything about it they need to start actually giving a damn about America's poor and rapidly shrinking middle class in spite of the fact that they hold "backward and primitive" religious beliefs and are behind the times on social issues. Hillary focused so much on the shrinking middle class and the poor during the 2016 election - I can't believe that anyone who has actually read her policy su…

I have an extremely different impression of her campaign. If you look, not at the words on the platform, but at her campaign, it seemed very clear to me that she didn't care about working class people in flyover country. And I thought that was very strange, because that used to be the Democratic Party's core constituency. I can't at the moment point you to documentation to back up my impression, but I'm pretty sure I…

> And I thought that was very strange, because that used to be the Democratic Party's core constituency.

Abandoning the working class and going all-in for neoliberal economics while retaining center-left social policies was the defining feature of Bill Clinton’s campaign and Presidency; that faction of the party was dominant from then on, though there have been signs of that dominance weakening over the last several years; it would be poetic if it's dominance (in Presidential terms) within the party began and ended with a Clinton.

Re: That sinking feeling

#163

Post by sgt101 »

smacktoward wrote: post #72
kevingadd wrote: post #3

Political aspects of Brexit aside, I had no idea Britain's food and fuel situation was so dire in the event of a Hard Brexit. I would have assumed they were more self-sufficient - the near-doomsday predictions coming from civil service is really sobering. It sucks that the US is contributing to this problem right now (in many ways, really). Can they disentangle themselves from this even if they manage to get the gove…

Britain has been dependent on food imports for a long time, ever since the late 19th century. That’s why the U-boat threat in both World Wars was so dangerous — Germany came within an inch or two of sinking enough ships containing food and other vital import goods to starve the country out.

This is typical of high density population centres - remember that Germany was starved out by the Royal Navy's blockade in 1918.

Re: That sinking feeling

#164

Post by specialist »

mcphage wrote: post #118
api wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think some of them know that. Would it really be any better if they'd not rioted in the voting booth? If anything the trends that are destroying the American working and middle class are accelerating. They have nothing to lose that wouldn't be lost anyway. You're totally right that the result will just make them angrier and the cycle will repeat. This is how civilizations fall. If liberals want to do anything about…

> If liberals want to do anything about it they need to start actually giving a damn about America's poor and rapidly shrinking middle class in spite of the fact that they hold "backward and primitive" religious beliefs and are behind the times on social issues. I'm not sure why you think they don't. Personal bankruptcies dropped by half since the ACA passed, and health care costs were one of the leading causes of pe…

Punishing people who try to help. What is this phenomenon called? Anti-Good Samaritan? No good deed goes unpunished? Resentment?

As an election integrity activist, I've had multiple people scream in my face very threateningly about stolen elections. "That's why I'm here buddy. Why y'all yelling at me?"

Re: That sinking feeling

#165

Post by EliRivers »

coldtea wrote: post #145
EliRivers wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

UK is supposedly a democracy (and thus such matters are to be decided by popular vote) I disagree; that's not true at all. The UK generally does not have such matters decided by popular vote. An actual referendum is a very unusual thing in the UK.

Well, there was the Scottish independence referendum. (Had it gone for independence, we'd still be hearing how the Scots where deluded, how the independent Scotland side had "electoral spending irregularities" and such, how they are racist and backwards, etc. Now that we hear about it again in the face of Brexit -- where Scottish independence would be interpreted as "Scotland in the EU" -- the same people would say t…

Sure does. Such matters are meant to be decided by those democratically elected representatives; not by popular vote. Referenda, especially with only two opposing options, make bad democracy, exposing one of its most dangerous failure modes; a tyranny of the majority.

Re: That sinking feeling

#166

Post by mcphage »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #160
wilsonnb2 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If liberals want to do anything about it they need to start actually giving a damn about America's poor and rapidly shrinking middle class in spite of the fact that they hold "backward and primitive" religious beliefs and are behind the times on social issues. Hillary focused so much on the shrinking middle class and the poor during the 2016 election - I can't believe that anyone who has actually read her policy su…

I have an extremely different impression of her campaign. If you look, not at the words on the platform, but at her campaign, it seemed very clear to me that she didn't care about working class people in flyover country. And I thought that was very strange, because that used to be the Democratic Party's core constituency. I can't at the moment point you to documentation to back up my impression, but I'm pretty sure I…

> If you look, not at the words on the platform, but at her campaign, it seemed very clear to me that she didn't care about working class people in flyover country

Interesting. What about her campaign gave you that impression?

Re: That sinking feeling

#167

Post by KSteffensen »

wilsonnb2 wrote: post #101
adamrezich wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why "should" the Brexit referendum get the special privilege of a "do-over?" I have no idea how the law works over there but surely that would set some sort of terrible precedent? I have zero skin in that game but the idea that people can espouse the virtues of democracy one minute only to make endless excuses as to why the result of a wholly democratic vote is wrong, invalid, or otherwise "deserves" a do-over the ne…

Nobody should trust the will of the people. That's why we have representative democracies and not direct democracies. The Brexit referendum shouldn't get a special "do-over". Instead, the result should be ignored because leaving the EU is a bad idea regardless of the people's will. I'm sure a majority of the people have many other terrible ideas that they agree with, especially when you only need 51% of those who car…

> Nobody should trust the will of the people.

How then, should the people rule themselves?

Re: That sinking feeling

#168

Post by KSteffensen »

api wrote: post #55
btrautsc wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

an upvote was not enough recognition for this comment. "I hope Trump does as much damage as possible." - I have heard almost this exact quote. Its difficult to empathize with the sentiment, but it is potent and its real.

Prediction: if Trump doesn't help, actively harms the situation, or gets chased out in scandal (all very likely) then the next Trump will make this Trump look like a moderate. Whether it's a far-right demagogue or a far-left demagogue probably depends on which side is able to find and bring to the field the most compelling populist firebrand. I really think the left/right divide is overstated here. A lot of these peo…

Who is this "ruling class"?

My experience is that people in democracies get the politicians they deserve.

That's what I've seen in Spain, Argentina, Turkey, Italy, my own country Denmark, Hungary and it's also what I see in the USA.

Living in a democracy is a responsibility. It's hard work. If you stand on the sidelines and complain without ever running yourself, you get to live with a ruling class.

Re: That sinking feeling

#169

Post by AnimalMuppet »

mcphage wrote: post #166
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have an extremely different impression of her campaign. If you look, not at the words on the platform, but at her campaign, it seemed very clear to me that she didn't care about working class people in flyover country. And I thought that was very strange, because that used to be the Democratic Party's core constituency. I can't at the moment point you to documentation to back up my impression, but I'm pretty sure I…

> If you look, not at the words on the platform, but at her campaign, it seemed very clear to me that she didn't care about working class people in flyover country Interesting. What about her campaign gave you that impression?

It may be the media's fault, but it seems like every time I heard her say something, it was about abortion, or LGBTQ issues, or race. It wasn't about the economy or jobs or even unions. So I concluded that the social issues were what she cared about, and the economy and workers were not.

Re: That sinking feeling

#170

Post by belorn »

mcphage wrote: post #118
api wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think some of them know that. Would it really be any better if they'd not rioted in the voting booth? If anything the trends that are destroying the American working and middle class are accelerating. They have nothing to lose that wouldn't be lost anyway. You're totally right that the result will just make them angrier and the cycle will repeat. This is how civilizations fall. If liberals want to do anything about…

> If liberals want to do anything about it they need to start actually giving a damn about America's poor and rapidly shrinking middle class in spite of the fact that they hold "backward and primitive" religious beliefs and are behind the times on social issues. I'm not sure why you think they don't. Personal bankruptcies dropped by half since the ACA passed, and health care costs were one of the leading causes of pe…

Look at the extreme polarization in politics. How has the Democrats described the poor & working class males which is a large voting group for Trump?

Polarization in politics is exceptional harmful because it reduces the impact of good laws. So long the general perception is that the Democrats view poor & working class males as "the other" and "evil" the lower the chance is that any law will impact voting patterns.

Post reply on HN