41–50 of 140 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Conservatism has never been about any of the things its supposed to be about. See: federal debt.
One can argue that those representatives who claim to be fiscally conservative but vote for unfunded liabilities are not, in fact, fiscally conservative.
> with intent or reason to believe that it is to be used to the injury of the United States There are two versions of the United States. 1. The People of. The ones that benefit from whistleblowers. They are not injured when classified information is distributed - they get valuable insight they don't normally get into the doings of their employees (government officials that take their salary from taxes). The ones upon…
Not saying either is right or wrong, but I def align personally with the “more freedom from pls” camp.
The governments policing authority should be pointed at itself alone, and let the results of that trickle down.
But we prefer to conflate stable society needs with a goal of paramount importance (currently “free market trade”) that will implode indeed our mental model of reality if the literal world should have to change.
But it won’t implode humanity itself unless we do it to ourselves.
We need to have a sober debate about enabling more people to escape this daily grind. We’re actively instigating anxiety, mindless resource exhaustion (while pretending financial measures of efficiency alone are achieved literally), living some socialized Stockholm syndrome, sympathizing with the aristocratic captors who are plainly indifferent, because they’re subjected to the same struggle too (but not really)!
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Speaking from experience with them, they seem to think the 2nd amendment must necessarily be respected by the very government they think is allowing them the guns to threaten said government with in the first place. That's the cognitive hole I'm pointing to - if they stockpile weapons to eventually potentially overthrow the US government, they must do so knowing that it will be illegal to do so regardless - the 2nd a…
The 2A doesn’t protect the use of arms against the government, and I don’t think I’ve ever heard a 2A advocate suggest that. The point is to prevent the government from disarming the populace before such action might be required.
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There is a dichotomy in the government between elected representatives and unelected bureaucrats. The "deep state" exists but it is not nearly as malicious as popularly portrayed. At worst, those who make their careers as unelected bureaucrats and federal officers may occasionally be self-protecting and rationalize their decisions in terms of the trolley problem as for the greater national good, and are overly confid…
Most unelected bureaucrats only have a job at the whims of elected representatives. Your vote for the bureaucrats, via proxy of your representative. I'm not sure why people have a hard time grasping this concept, when they grasp the concept of representative democracy (Where you vote for new legislature, or for supreme court appointments, or for executive actions, via proxy of voting for a representative of congress,…
This is true for political appointees - ambassadors, Cabinet secretaries, etc. - but much less so for the civil service, where folks like State Department diplomatic staff or FBI agents tend to serve multi-decade careers under many different administrations.
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Most unelected bureaucrats only have a job at the whims of elected representatives. Your vote for the bureaucrats, via proxy of your representative. I'm not sure why people have a hard time grasping this concept, when they grasp the concept of representative democracy (Where you vote for new legislature, or for supreme court appointments, or for executive actions, via proxy of voting for a representative of congress,…
This has been on a trend of less and less true as Congress continues to abdicate its responsibilities to bureaucrats in the Executive office. It doesn't matter which party they vote for as much of the day to day lives of citizens is determined by people who never stood for election, and barely answer to someone who did.
> and barely answer to someone who did.
Their hiring is done by elected officials. Their employment and power, aside from a few positions, which are fixed-term, is contingent on the whims of those elected officials.
Just because Congress has been very busy with abdicating all responsibility for governing the country to the executive (Works great when Obama's in charge, because you can blame him for the milk going sour, works great when Trump's in charge, because he can take all the bad PR), doesn't mean that the bureaucrats don't answer to anyone.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Most unelected bureaucrats only have a job at the whims of elected representatives. Your vote for the bureaucrats, via proxy of your representative. I'm not sure why people have a hard time grasping this concept, when they grasp the concept of representative democracy (Where you vote for new legislature, or for supreme court appointments, or for executive actions, via proxy of voting for a representative of congress,…
> Most unelected bureaucrats only have a job at the whims of elected representatives. Your vote for the bureaucrats, via proxy of your representative. This is true for political appointees - ambassadors, Cabinet secretaries, etc. - but much less so for the civil service, where folks like State Department diplomatic staff or FBI agents tend to serve multi-decade careers under many different administrations.
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Or, you know, Truman. Or Hoover. Generally speaking, people capable of getting themselves elected President have authoritarian tendencies.
As an aside, the fact that the FBI building is still named after Hoover says something about the values of that organization (yes, I know they passed a law giving it that name which would make it tricky to rename).
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> Most unelected bureaucrats only have a job at the whims of elected representatives. Your vote for the bureaucrats, via proxy of your representative. This is true for political appointees - ambassadors, Cabinet secretaries, etc. - but much less so for the civil service, where folks like State Department diplomatic staff or FBI agents tend to serve multi-decade careers under many different administrations.
They only keep their jobs through the administrations when they do as they are told. If the president wants to change a department's policy, and the department pushes back, he can fire as many directors as he needs to.
https://www.vox.com/2018/8/27/17786324/trump-fires-governmen...
> The reason he can’t is simple: Unlike his employees at the Trump Organization, about a third of federal workers belong to unions. And those unions have negotiated certain job protections for workers, which includes a process that gives workers a chance to improve their job performance before they are terminated.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Speaking from experience with them, they seem to think the 2nd amendment must necessarily be respected by the very government they think is allowing them the guns to threaten said government with in the first place. That's the cognitive hole I'm pointing to - if they stockpile weapons to eventually potentially overthrow the US government, they must do so knowing that it will be illegal to do so regardless - the 2nd a…
The 2A doesn’t protect the use of arms against the government, and I don’t think I’ve ever heard a 2A advocate suggest that. The point is to prevent the government from disarming the populace before such action might be required.
Oh, well, I have, and that's the kind of 2A advocate I'm talking about.
I'm sure there are other sorts, but that's the kind I meant.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The most profitable central principle for a party of corporations is deregluation of _industry_. Scaling up of the military and authoritarianism is a profitable choice as well. Those are two main incentives of many conservative parties and groups. The unifying principle of conservatism is: survival of the fittest. The strongest, toughest country, business, and individual has the right to survive. Helping and trying t…
>The unifying principle of conservatism is: survival of the fittest This isn't just a principle of a party but a natural law. This is displayed in liberal politics also. Life is a fight using powers as a utility, hard and soft powers. Liberals tend to bank on using the powers of certain ideologies, many as vague as conservative ideologies, in order for those ideologies to survive. Some use the soft power of love whic…
When my cat cuddles up to me on the bed, this natural 'life is a fight' law falls to pieces. Beings are capable of generosity without a gaining idea, and most of us have encountered this as part of our lives. I have found that lovingkindness and compassion are boundless in every sentient being's heart.
I think self-identified 'liberals' generally don't have any concrete principles about power itself. As long as it is illegal to not treat all people equally, liberals seem to think government power should increase to the extent that it can relieve suffering and foster generosity. Parts of the left, with its civil libertarians and Proudhon anarchists, think about power in a deeper and more heterodox way...