Looking at the infrastructure compromise bill

 So, a compromise bill has been announced that has progressives up in arms. This one is only $1.75 trillion, or $175 billion a year, half of what was originally proposed. Now, the original proposal was lame enough, so this is even lamer. A lot of progressives are now talking about killing the bill entirely. Before making that judgment, I would like to investigate what's in it. 

Provide universal and free preschool for all 3- and 4-year-olds, the largest expansion of universal and free education since states and communities across the country established public high school 100 years ago. Preschool in the United States costs about $8,600 per year. The Build Back Better framework will enable states to expand access to free preschool for more than 6 million children per year and increase the quality of preschool for many more children already enrolled.  Importantly, parents will be able to send children to high-quality preschool in the setting of their choice – from public schools to child care providers to Head Start. The program will lead to lifelong educational and economic benefits for children and parents, and is a transformational investment in America’s future economic competitiveness. In fact, research shows that every $1 invested in high-quality early childhood care and education can yield $3 to $7 over the long-run, as they do better in school, are more likely to graduate high-school and college, and earn more as adults.

  I'm gonna be honest, universal preK and childcare have never been super high priorities for me. At the same time, I do welcome these changes. The universal preK thing actually is pretty good, although I have given criticisms on why they're focusing on this. It's to get parents working again. And I really ain't huge on that approach. It also forces children to go to school earlier, which I don't see as a good thing for children. Forcing kids into the system where it's all they know is just more indoctrination. Honestly, I'd rather see free college than free preK. Still, I can't say that in some ways it is a bad thing. I largely support this.

  Make the largest investment in child care in the nation’s history, saving most working American families more than half of their spending on child care. For decades, child care prices in the United States have risen faster than family incomes, yet the United States still invests 28 times less than its competitors on helping families afford high-quality care for toddlers. The Build Back Better framework will ensure that the vast majority of working American families of four earning less than $300,000 per year will pay no more than 7 percent of their income on child care for children under 6. Parents who are working, looking for work, participating in an education or training program, and who are making under 2.5 times their states median income will receive support to cover the cost of quality care based on a sliding scale, capped at 7% of their income. The framework will help states expand access to high-quality, affordable child care to about 20 million children per year – covering 9 out of 10 families across the country with young children. For two parents with one toddler earning $100,000 per year, the framework will produce more than $5,000 in child care savings per year. Better access to high-quality child care can increase the likelihood that parents, especially mothers, are employed or enrolled in education and training beyond high school, while also providing lifetime benefits for children, especially those who are economically disadvantaged.

 As I said not the highest priority but I do welcome this. Still, this is standard democratic BS of "affordable" care where you still gotta pay like 7% of your income or something like that. That's ridiculous. Just make it free. 

Deliver affordable, high-quality care for older Americans and people with disabilities in their homes, while supporting the workers who provide this care. Right now, there are hundreds of thousands of older Americans and Americans with disabilities on waiting lists for home care services or struggling to afford the care they need, including more than 800,000 who are on state Medicaid waiting lists. A family paying for home care costs out of pocket currently pays around $5,800 per year for just four hours of home care per week. The Build Back Better framework will permanently improve Medicaid coverage for home care services for seniors and people with disabilities, making the most transformative investment in access to home care in 40 years, when these services were first authorized for Medicaid. The framework will improve the quality of caregiving jobs, which will, in turn, help to improve the quality of care provided to beneficiaries.

 I mean this is a good thing. I don't really have opinions other than that. Although it would be nice if we had medicare for all and made these services free as part of that. So this is piecemeal, but it's not terrible.

Provide more than 35 million households up to $3,600 (or $300 per month) in tax cuts per child by extending the American Rescue Plan’s expanded Child Tax Credit. The Build Back Better framework will provide monthly payments to the parents of nearly 90 percent of American children for 2022 – $300 per month per child under six and $250 per month per child ages 6 to 17. This historic tax cut will help cover the cost of food, housing, health care, and transportation and will continue the largest one-year reduction in child poverty in history. And critically, the framework includes permanent refundability for the Child Tax Credit, meaning that the neediest families will continue to receive the full Child Tax Credit over the long-run.

  This is the best thing about this plan. This is arguably the first step toward a basic income, and while, I find it to be piecemeal and don't like it limited to kids, I'm glad this is the one thing that made it into the bill unscathed. Seriously, if there's anything positive I have to say about the Biden presidency, it's this. Still, we should have a full UBI for all, not just a tax credit for people with kids, which is completely unfair to those without kids.

Deliver substantial consumer rebates and ensure middle class families save money as they shift to clean energy and electrification. The consumer rebates and credits included in the Build Back Better framework will save the average American family hundreds of dollars per year in energy costs.  These measures include enhancement and expansion of existing home energy and efficiency tax credits, as well as the creation of a new, electrification-focused rebate program.  The framework will cut the cost of installing rooftop solar for a home by around 30 percent, shortening the payback period by around 5 years; and the framework’s electric vehicle tax credit will lower the cost of an electric vehicle that is made in America with American materials and union labor by $12,500 for a middle-class family. In addition, the framework will help rural communities tap into the clean energy opportunity through targeted grants and loans through the Department of Agriculture.

 This is nice, but again, piecemeal. 

Ensure clean energy technology – from wind turbine blades to solar panels to electric cars – will be built in the United States with American made steel and other materials, creating hundreds of thousands of good jobs here at home. The Build Back Better legislation will target incentives to grow domestic supply chains in solar, wind, and other critical industries in communities on the frontlines of the energy transition.  In addition, the framework will boost the competitiveness of existing industries, like steel, cement, and aluminum, through grants, loans, tax credits, and procurement to drive capital investment in the decarbonization and revitalization of American manufacturing.

 This also seems piecemeal.

Advance environmental justice through a new Clean Energy and Sustainability Accelerator that will invest in projects around the country, while delivering 40% of the benefits of investment to disadvantaged communities, as part of the President’s Justice40 initiative. The framework will also fund port electrification; facilitate the deployment of cleaner transit, buses, and trucks; and support critical community capacity building, including grants to environmental justice communities.  In addition, the framework will create a new Civilian Climate Corps – with over 300,000 members that look like America. This diverse new workforce will conserve our public lands, bolster community resilience, and address the changing climate, all while putting good-paying union jobs within reach for more Americans.

 300k jobs is like, a month of job growth. Still, it's a nice step, but it's kind of small. And I find the diversity circlejerk to be kind of unnecessary here.

Bolster resilience and natural solutions to climate change through a historic investment in coastal restoration, forest management, and soil conservation. The framework will provide resources to farmers, ranchers, and forestland owners, supporting their efforts to reduce emissions. At its peak, the increased investments in climate smart agriculture alone could reach roughly 130 million cropland acres per year, representing as many as 240,000 farms. Farmers, ranchers, and forestland owners have long demonstrated leadership in environmental stewardship with strategies that provide benefits for the farm, the environment, and the public. These investments will help meet the demand from the farming community for conservation support and enable producers to realize the full potential of climate benefits from agriculture.

 This seems unnecessary. 

Strengthen the Affordable Care Act and reduce premiums for 9 million Americans. The framework will reduce premiums for more than 9 million Americans who buy insurance through the Affordable Care Act Marketplace by an average of $600 per person per year. For example, a family of four earning $80,000 per year would save nearly $3,000 per year (or $246 per month) on health insurance premiums. Experts predict that more than 3 million people who would otherwise be uninsured will gain health insurance.

 $600? You do realize people who had insurance have like $5000 deductibles right? This is just more working around the edges.

Close the Medicaid coverage gap, leading 4 million uninsured people to gain coverage. The Build Back Better framework will deliver health care coverage through Affordable Care Act premium tax credits to up to 4 million uninsured people in states that have locked them out of Medicaid. A 40-year old in the coverage gap would have to pay $450 per month for benchmark coverage – more than half of their income in many cases. The framework provides individuals $0 premiums, finally making health care affordable and accessible.

Fixing a gap left by previous democratic efforts to provide healthcare. Gaps still exist though, so this helps, but not much.

 Expand Medicare to cover hearing benefits. Only 30% of seniors over the age of 70 who could benefit from hearing aids have ever used them. The Build Back Better framework will expand Medicare to cover hearing services, so that older Americans can access the affordable care they need.

Makes you wonder why we didnt have this in the first place.

 Make the single largest and most comprehensive investment in affordable housing in history. The framework will enable the construction, rehabilitation, and improvement of more than 1 million affordable homes, boosting housing supply and reducing price pressures for renters and homeowners. It will address the capital needs of the public housing stock in big cities and rural communities all across America and ensure it is not only safe and habitable but healthier and more energy efficient as well. It will make a historic investment in rental assistance, expanding vouchers to hundreds of thousands of additional families. And, it includes one of the largest investments in down payment assistance in history, enabling hundreds of thousands of first-generation homebuyers to purchase their first home and build wealth. This legislation will create more equitable communities, through investing in community-led redevelopments projects in historically under-resourced neighborhoods and removing lead paint from hundreds of thousands of homes, as well as by incentivizing state and local zoning reforms that enable more families to reside in higher opportunity neighborhoods.

 To be fair, this is pretty good. And this is a relatively high priority of mine, so I welcome this.

Extend the expanded Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) for around 17 million low-wage workers. Before this year, the federal tax code taxed low-wage childless workers into poverty or deeper into poverty — the only group of workers it treated this way. The Build Back Better framework will extend the American Rescue Plan’s tripling of the credit for childless workers, benefiting 17 million low-wage workers, many of whom are essential workers, including cashiers, cooks, delivery drivers, food preparation workers, and childcare providers. For example, a childless worker who works 30 hours per week at $9 per hour earns income that, after taxes, leaves them below the federal poverty line. By increasing her EITC to more than $1,100, this expansion helps pull such workers out of poverty.

 As someone who is childfree, I like this a lot. I always felt it was unfair childfree people are always given the short end of the stick. yall got any of that UBI though for us?

Expand access to affordable, high-quality education beyond high school. Education beyond high school is increasingly important for economic growth and competitiveness in the 21st century, even as it has become unaffordable for too many families. The Build Back Better framework will make education beyond high school – including training for high-paying jobs available now – more affordable. Specifically, the framework will increase the maximum Pell Grant by $550 for more the more than 5 million students enrolled in public and private, non-profit colleges and expand access to DREAMers. It will also make historic investments in Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCUs), and minority-serving institutions (MSIs) to build capacity, modernize research infrastructure, and provide financial aid to low-income students. And, it will invest in practices that help more students complete their degree or credential. The framework will help more people access quality training that leads to good, union, and middle-class jobs. It will enable community colleges to train hundreds of thousands of students, create sector-based training opportunity with in-demand training for at least hundreds of thousands of workers, and invest in proven approaches like Registered Apprenticeships and programs to support underserved communities. The framework will increase the Labor Department’s annual spending on workforce development by 50% for each of the next 5 years.

 I'm sorry, but this is freaking pathetic. Pell grants are useless. I remember getting one one year when I was in college. I think it gave me like $1k a year? That isn't much. Also, the obsession with idpol here, focusing on dreamers and black colleges particularly feels like it's unnecessarily divisive. And out of this, we don't even get the 2 year community college. This proposal is a joke. 

Promote nutrition security to support children’s health. The Build Back Better framework will help children reach their full potential by investing in nutrition security year-round. The legislation will expand free school meals to 8.9 million children during the school year and provide a $65 per child per month benefit to the families of 30 million children to purchase food during the summer. 

Wanna know what would be monumentally better than this? UBI.

Strengthen the middle class through a historic investment in equity, safety, and fairness. The legislation makes a transformative investment in Rural America through a new Rural Partnership Program that will empower rural regions, including Tribal Nations and territories, by providing flexible funding for locally-led projects. The Build Back Better framework will also make an historic investment in maternal health and establish a new and innovative community violence intervention initiative, in addition to investing in small businesses and preparing the nation for future pandemics and supply chain disruptions.

I mean I don't really feel anything either way on this one. I do like having more pandemic/supply chain related preparedness though.

 The Build Back Better framework includes a $100 billion investment that will improve our immigration system by providing long awaited relief to millions through reconciliation, and making enhancements to reduce backlogs, expand legal representation, and make the asylum system and border processing more efficient and humane.

 Cool I guess.

Now onto taxes:

Stop large, profitable corporations from paying zero in tax and tax corporations that buyback stock rather than invest in the company. In 2019, the largest corporations in the United States paid just 8 percent in taxes, and many paid nothing at all. President Biden believes this is fundamentally unfair. The Build Back Better framework will impose a 15% minimum tax on the corporate profits that large corporations—those with over $1 billion in profits—report to shareholders.  This means that if a large corporation says it is earning a billion dollars, then it can’t avoid paying taxes. The framework also includes a 1% surcharge on corporate stock buybacks, which corporate executives too often use to enrich themselves rather than investing workers and growing their businesses.

 Good move, but the tax rate was 40% in some cases under Obama...

Stop rewarding corporations for shipping jobs and profits overseas. President Biden has led the world to stop the race to the bottom in corporate taxes, while also calling for an end to incentives that encourage corporations to ship jobs and profits overseas. That’s why the President won an agreement among 136 countries on a 15% global minimum tax. This framework will help finish the job. Consistent with that agreement, it’d adopt a 15% country-by-country minimum tax on foreign profits of U.S. corporations, so that they no longer receive massive tax benefits from shifting profits and jobs abroad.  And, these reforms would ensure that other countries abide by the agreement by imposing a penalty rate on any foreign corporations based in countries that do not.  Other countries will not be able to take advantage by pursuing a race to the bottom.

 We were at 40%. 15% is an insult.

Ask the highest income Americans to pay their fair share. The Build Back Better framework includes a new surtax on the income of multi-millionaires and billionaires – the wealthiest 0.02 percent of Americans. It would apply a 5 percent rate above income of $10 million, and an additional 3 percent surtax on income above $25 million. The Build Back Better framework will also close the loopholes that allows some wealthy taxpayers to avoid paying the 3.8 Medicare tax on their earnings.

 Not bad, but seriously, we should be taxing the rich at like 70% anyway.

Invest in overhauling tax administration, so the wealthy finally pay what they owe. Regular workers pay the taxes they owe on their wages and salaries—with a 99 percent compliance rate—while too many wealthy taxpayers hide their income from the IRS so they don’t have to pay. Yet, the IRS does not have the resources it needs to pursue wealthy tax cheats. As a result of budget cuts, audit rates on those making over $1 million per year fell by over 60 percent over the last decade, and the IRS audits only 7,5000 of the 4.2 million partnership returns filed each year. The result of a gutted IRS is a two-tiered tax system, where wage earners pay all the taxes they owe, but the top 1 percent evades over $160 billion per year in taxes. The framework will create a fairer tax system through transformation investments in the IRS: hiring enforcement agents who are trained to pursue wealthy evaders, modernizing outdated IRS technology, and investing in taxpayer service, so regular Americans can get their questions answered and access to the credits and benefits they are entitled to. Additional enforcement resources will be focused on pursuing those with the highest incomes; not Americans with income less than $400,000.

 Yeah, we lose an insane amount of money from poor enforcement. So I support this.

Overall impressions

Overall, this bill has a few good things in it, but those things are WAAAY more moderate than i would like. Way too much stuff focusing on children, which leaves childless Americans in the cold. Sure we get a slightly higher EITC, but ya know what? I'd rather have a UBI. Despite that complaint, the child tax credit is the best part of the bill, and it making it in without means testing is good, so that's my big thing here. This is a move in the direction of UBI, even if it's only for kids, so I welcome it.

The childcare thing I kind of like, as I recognize that it's a problem America faces, but out of all of the problems we face, it isn't what I would focus on. Of course, Biden is a neolib who just wants to 'go back to normal" and sees this as an obstacle to doing so, so that's why they're focusing on that. It's about increasing the labor force, flooding the market with workers to drive wages down, blah blah blah. Still, childcare has been a long standing issue, so I support this. 

The healthcare stuff is nice but WAY too moderate and piecemeal, even coming out of the Biden administration. 

The climate stuff also seems horribly piecemeal mostly.

The higher education proposals are a joke.

Like, outside of a few proposals, this whole bill is next to worthless. I can't say I hate everything about it, but even when it has decent proposals, they're still far more moderate and inadequate than they should be. Given the climate was supposed to be the big thing, this barely has any climate stuff at all. Numerically it comes up to 1/3 of the budget, but looking at the proposals I don't see this doing much. It seems inadequate at dealing with the problem. 

Honestly, the only thing about this that excites me is the child tax credit remaining un-means tested. That's a good first step toward a UBI. And if anything saves this bill in my eyes, it's that freaking proposal.

All in all, a lot of progressives are so insulted by this they're talking about voting against this to tank it to offset the moderates who want to water stuff down in the first place. Do I agree with them? Eh, no, if only for that darned tax credit. Seriously, if not for that, i would totally be on board with the "kill the bill" mentality. But hey, UBI for kids? UBI is my big #1 cause, and this is, again, the first step toward it. If Manchin got his way and means tested it, i would've said, yeah, torpedo away. But if I were in congress, I'd support it just to make that first small step toward a UBI.

Still, let this joke of a bill be a testament to the failure that is the democratic party. It literally played itself. We voted in a moderate president, and then what amounts to closet republicans with a D after their name tanked those proposals down worse. Biden is a joke of a president. He really is. To think this is the best we could do. Well, that's why I'm not really a democrat any more, except on my voter registration. I'm totally a forwardist. And looking at this proposal through Yang's 6 tenets, well, it makes a small step on the UBI thing. But looking at this proposal, is this modern and effective governance? Not in the least. Most of it is the same watered down, bureaucratic BS the dems always do, that leads to broken programs no one really likes, that the public later turns on and votes for republicans over. 

Again, I must emphasize, the only reason I don't come out against this totally where I'm on team "kill this joke of a bill to spite the moderates and the Biden administration" is because of the child tax credit, aka UBI for kids. Other than that I would be happy to tank this to push for better proposals in the future, because most of these are kind of insulting.

Actually criticizing Biden

 So, Breaking Points did a segment on Obama campaigning for Biden, saying how we can't afford to be tired and stay home and we need to vote for Biden even if we aren't happy with him and didn't accomplish all that they set out to do. Now, I would, normally, in principle, agree to some extent. I am willing to give people some credit, understanding that they're not kings or dictators and can't just solve all problems with a magic wand. Obviously there's not just a president, but 535 members of congress too. HOWEVER, let's be honest about the Biden administration and the democratic party. They suck. They could be doing much more, but they can't, they won't, and it's the democrats' fault.

In 2020, and going back in 2016 too, a large proportion of the democratic party didn't want Biden. They wanted Bernie. An even smaller contingent wanting Yang, but let's focus mainly on Bernie because 35% > 2%. So, what did Bernie stand for? Well, he stood for a lot of nice things, many of which i supported. A $15 minimum wage, medicare for all, free college, green new deal, etc. All of these great ideas, that, while not exactly what I would go for if I had my own way, are acceptable proposals that would move America in the right direction. I supported Bernie in 2016 and 2020 for a reason. Because he was the best candidate. And despite me nitpicking and saying I'd rather want a UBI, and blah blah blah, nah, I just went with the platform that seemed acceptable to vote for. Obviously I can compromise that much.

But Biden, he didn't want any of that. Centrist democrats told us it was too pie in the sky. So Biden ran on being a moderate where nothing would fundamentally change. He played footsie with the likes of John kasich and Colin Powell in courting suburbanite right wingers alienated by Trump being a lunatic, and he explicitly chose moderate, centrist proposals. Free college and student debt forgiveness became 2 year community college and maybe some debt forgiveness. Medicare for all became a public option. The green new deal became an infrastructure plan. UBI became a child tax credit, etc. Biden clearly tried to offer mild, moderate proposals to what the progressives in the party wanted, and I found them quite frankly kind of insulting. To me, part platforms are the goal posts. They're the moral document that the party stands for, and what it advocates for. I don't necessarily blame candidates and parties for failing to achieve all of the goals they set out to, but they should set out to do such things. The problem is, the Biden administration set off on these things "half cocked" as the British would say. They weren't fully committed to the ideas. They just threw progressives some bones to make it look like they were trying while grossly underselling the ideas. This essentially forced the discussion to the middle.

So, it worked. Biden won. Narrowly. He won by what amounts to 1% of the vote in the electoral college, which is by the skin of his teeth. I want to emphasize, by my model, Biden ALMOST lost. And it should've never been close, he had like 4-5 points on breathing room in my projections and that got pushed down to 1. The senate, dems underperformed there and barely managed to pick up 50 senators. They only won because they were campaigning on stimulus checks and the like. 

So, The dems won and they took over congress and the presidency. They dont have the ability to pass everything because they dont have the 60 member senate needed to break a filabuster, but they can do 3 reconciliation bills a year. They did the first to push for a stimulus program. It gave people the $1400 checks promised, the bare minimum, and mainly just extended unemployment, which was controversial. Whereas stimulus went to almost everyone, unemployment didn't, creating tension between those who worked and those who didn't, which is one of the reasons the right exploited the idea to push their "no one wants to work any more" rhetoric. It wasn't the case, but it was bad optics and i honestly wish that rather than go through means tested conditional programs, it would've been a universal grant. COVID would have been the best testing ground for UBI, although perhaps in retrospect given conservative bashing of what Biden DID do, it was best it was off the table (ironically it might've given into the worst fears of the right on inflation and work incentives from a correlation is causation in the minds of the ignorant perspective). Still, it was a questionable plan, and the money spent was inadequate to a lot of people, and it's well spent, and gone, and we have little to show for it but the sky not falling for a few months. 

Now we have this $350 billion a year bill. And people are screaming OMG $3.5 trillion despite that being a 10 year number and the military budget being over twice that. And it had the watered down infrastructure bill (not oppposed to that as I'd rather have UBI), it had free community college, it made the child tax credit semi permanent, and it had free childcare. I mean not terrible proposals, but given what people like yang and bernie proposed, again, half measures. But then, we can't even have that. Because of two people. Joe Manchin, and Kyrsten Sinema. They shot down the minimum wage when we pushed for that a few months ago. They're chewing down the proposals Biden has here, trying to means test the child tax credit, and axe the free community college, and blah blah blah. And keep in mind, this isn't republicans doing this, this is the DEMOCRATS, during reconciliation. The same people Obama is telling us to vote for.

And let's not forget Biden just abandoned forgiving student loan debt despite being able to do it via executive order, he axed any semblance of a progressive healthcare plan, and yeah, he just abandoned tons of proposals. 

So, Biden starts off chewing us down in the 2020 election. And then other democrats fight to stop the party at large from doing anything to help people. you got manchin fighting to keep the filibuster in place, and to undermine the child tax credit, and infrastructure proposals. And this is the democrats. I know the republicans suck. I could understand the argument to keep voting for democrats, if democrats fought for decent ideas, but they don't, and that's the problem. The democrats keep watering it down and watering it down and making things worse and watering it down. And then they say we have to vote for them. Screw you Obama, no I don't. And I won;t. Maybe you're feeling the same energy you did in 2010 after your base abandoned you after you preached hope and change at them. You feel that the right is angry, they're gonna strike back, and the dems will be annhilated in 2022 and 2024. And you know what? They very well might be. I fully believe if a rematch election were held today, Trump would win by a landslide. Not because Biden is as bad as the GOP says he is, or that Trump is good, but because trump's base is more fired up and the democrats have no enthusiasm. That's the problem democrats have with every election, and why i support running more left wing candidates. You need to keep voters enthused, to keep them voting for you, to keep you in office. You need to do things. And not pull this BS of "no we can't". Stop watering crap down, stop then compromising on said watered down crap, and stop voter shaming when the voters hate your guts as a result.

Democrats dig their own holes here. They could have it all if they freaking got their acts together. but instead they focus on culture war issues (yeah, the GOP meme I posted in the last article about Dave Chappelle had a point), they severely underdeliver on actual progressive legislation, and then they just expect people to support them when they don't do anything of note for them, and act like the most minor watered down scraps or another.

Honestly, this is why I'm no longer a democrat in my heart, but a member of the forward party. This is why before the forward party formed, I voted green. I mean, okay, I can understand, you cant pass every proposal you want in the most extreme forms you want. Fair. But are you gonna at least try to do ANYTHING of note? No, and that's the problem. Democrats don't earn votes. I'm gonna be honest, i rip the democrats so hard for a reason here. I wish I could still be a democrat. I wish the democrats actually represented me and my politics. But they don't. And this isn't because of the big bad republicans. No, the democrats themselves choose political strategies that explicitly alienate voters like me, and then lecture me and talk down to me and tell me I have to support them and blah blah blah. No, I don't. And if the candidate doesn't pass muster, I won't. And if you try to force me, like they did in 2020 when they got Hawkins removed from the ballot, I'll not only write in the candidates I want, I'll also go down the line voting for every single third party candidate I see just to refuse to give the dems satisfaction of forcing me to support them.

Really, I wish that democrats supported real solutions in good faith, and werent constantly sabotaging themselves. Because thats the problem. Biden and other centrists water stuff down, and then the most moderate swing dems then sabotage it further to the point we get nothing. And the dems then voter shame us for not voting for them more despite their own candidates doing this. 

We lost faith in you guys because you don't do anything. With that said, enjoy losing to the GOP again. I would've hoped you would've learned you lesson from the Obama administration, but apparently not. I guess we gotta do this again. Oh well, it is a shame, but hey, you chose this. I've been pushing the dems left since 2014 or so trying to get them to understand that they can't keep going like this and expect to win. They just don't listen. Oh well, they can live with the consequences I guess.

I don't get the republican hate of Joe Biden

 So, every time I look in "right wing land" these days and look at their attitudes toward the left, I always have to cringe. The sheer ignorance I see in most opinions is astounding. And these guys really seem to have it out for Joe Biden. "Let's go Brandon" (F Joe Biden) is a hilarious catch phrase of theirs now, and while I have nothing against people hating on Biden (let's face it, I hate on him too), watching right wingers do it is just...no. 

Here is a meme that tried to put conservative concerns to paper, and I would like to address these points, to express how stupid conservatism is these days. 

1) The point about bank accounts is...idk, somewhat valid? I mean I see what Biden is trying to do, given how much in taxes is lost to poor enforcement of the tax code, but I'm not sure being flagged of each individual transaction is really necessary. Still, if I recall it's only transactions above $600, which is the threshold to make certain kinds of income taxable, so that seems to be what they're doing there.

2) All presidents "bomb children" if we wanna be honest about it, and if anything this is a leftist talking point. Why the right gets so high and mighty about bombing kids when most of the wars that lead to that are initiated by conservatives is kind of hypocritical. Also, Biden got us out of Afghanistan. Just reminding everyone of that.

3) Got Americans and Afghans tortured and killed. Again, who initiated that war? I seem to recall it being a conservative named George W. Bush. 

4) Giving terrorists a military...I'm assuming this is pulling out of Afghanistan...but wait, didn't you just bash Biden for bombing people there? So which is it? This is why I hate partisan hackery arguments. Republicans do something, it's good, democrats do the same thing, it's bad. Dems are darned if they do and darned if they don't, because these criticisms aren't based on sincerely held ideology, but on partisanship. Democrats could literally end poverty and cure cancer and these guys would still complain about it. I guarantee it.

5) Fauci never "lied". Fauci changed his mind as the scientific consensus changed. I know right wingers tend to struggle with the idea of knowledge changing in the face of new evidence as they like things to remain the same and get confused at the idea of anything changing, but please try to keep up.

6) Yes, and Cuomo faced a ton of hate for it. And he even resigned for it. No one freaking defends Cuomo any more. And I never liked the guy when he was the hero last year. Because I know the dude was a neoliberal hack who the dems were pumping up to be greater than he was. While democrats deserve some blame for that, yeah, they dropped him. 

7) Proven hoax? I don't even know what they're on about. Are they so in denial they don't think that Trump did anything? They think he won? They think just because republicans exonerated him that the whole proceeding was a hoax? What?

8) Supply chain crisis. Yeah, that was due to COVID. COVID happened under Trump btw. Not that I really fully blame him for this aspect of things. Just his handling of the virus and how he killed 500k people, most of which unnecessarily, because he refused to take the proper action to shut things down, and then attacked democrats for daring to do so. And yes, shutting things down created a supply chain crisis, but hey, that was to save lives. Republicans are sociopaths on the economy. 

9) Border crisis...yeah he dealt with that. if anything he was too brutal and trumpesque about it. Also didn't trump have to deal with "caravans" coming over during his presidency? 

10) Mandates bad. Even though it's to save lives. Something these people don't give a crap about.

11) Due to supply chain issues and other issues related to opening the economy. Imagine having to shut your computer off and turn it back on again only for you to have to deal with annoying issues on the reboot. That's where we are now. Also, inflation, in moderation, is a good thing, and while I think its a little on the high side, I think that the effect its having on the work place is well worth the change. If 5% inflation leads to a 50-100% increase in living standards for working class Americans, I'll freaking take it. 

12) Biden is weak on having a lot of plans. My big criticism of him. Still, what do these jokers wanna do instead? They never govern worth a crap anyway.

13) Yeah yeah yeah, culture war stuff. Look, I get it, bourgeois libs be bourgeois libs. Obsessed with culture over substance. The real question is what are you guys, the right, going to do instead? NOTHING. YOU DO NOTHING. YOU HAVE NOTHING.

I don't like Biden. But let's face it, the majority of these talking points are hypocritical partisan hackery with no substance, which I see myself as above, which is why i spend so little time arguing with the right. Every time I do so I feel like I lose brain cells. Because I feel like the amount of time I need to spend going over basic concepts about governance again and again is annoying. Here's a few talking points of my own i think are helpful to understand here.

1) Problems that exist are complex and often have developed over the course of several administrations. Like Afghanistan. Bush did that. We've had 3 presidents since then, including Biden. Biden finally ended it. You can talk about him poorly doing so, but hey at least he did it. Trump wanted to do it too and was partially responsible for how we got out too. 

2) Presidents have little impact on the economy. People love to bash the president because economy is doing bad things. No jobs, inflation too high, supply issues, etc. This is actually one of the reasons reagan became so popular. Because there was a lot of inflation and supply issues in the 1970s and the republicans hammered away on that until they got reagan in and then flipped the narrative and hailed in a hero. Didn't help those issues went away during that administration. To Reagan's credit, working with Volcker to crash the economy did end stagflation, but it was carter's idea. Likewise, the issues now did not originate with Biden, but with Trump. And I don't blame Trump. He didn't do much to cause the crises we have now economically. neither did Biden. And Carter didnt cause stagflation. At the same time people get credit for economies more than they deserve. Reagan did some good things but mostly he was hailed as a hero for the wrong reasons. Again, it was the 1982 recession, which was orchestrated by the fed, that was the solution, not tax cuts, not union busting, etc. But conservatives made a tall tale about how Daddy Reagan saved the day. Centrist libs love to go on about how the economy did better under Obama and Clinton but recessions happened under Bush, Bush, and Trump. It was just the way the cycles worked. Economies bottom out every 7-10 years or so, and the president has nothing to do with that.

What I expect from presidents is to respond to economic crises with a progressive agenda. Which the dems fail to do and the GOP doesnt believe in doing. But I dont actually chalk up the health of the economy to presidents mostly.

3) Stuff that's acceptable under GOP presidents becomes bad under liberal ones. it works the other way around too, which is why i hate partisan democrats. They badmouth republicans for torture and economic mishandling of stuff then quietly do the same thing, and then attack the left for criticizing them. We all know it.

4) Republicans hate taking their medicine. Literally at this point. They're literally dying on the hill of being forced to take their medicine. Republicans dont like to be told what to do for any reason even if its for their own good. They're like immature brats in that sense. 

But yeah, this is why I hate engaging with the right. Again, I dislike Biden for my own reasons, but I'll never give Biden crap for stuff he isnt responsible for. And I like to see myself as above standard partisan bickering. And yes, I crap on the democrats too. I do it more than the GOP since I at least have a shred of respect for them on a purely intellectual level.

Ripping the band aid off: why immigrants should learn English

 So, as you guys know, I've been distancing myself a bit from the democratic party and wokeism as of late. I've never been one for wokeness. I'm an ex conservative who developed mostly left views since 2011-2012ish, but I still occasionally retain conservative views on such subjects. I don't see it as that big of a deal for the most part as I'm what, left of center 80-90% of the time, but there are some issues where I still have relatively conservative views. Immigration being one of them. I've discussed my main immigration stance lately, and I generally consider myself center, for left wing economic reasons. Sometimes I side with the right, sometimes with the left. However, one axe I have to grind on the subject is language, and this is a point where I'm actually pretty conservative.

Here's the thing. I was born here, in this country. It's a predominantly English speaking country. But, around 41 million people do speak Spanish, and smaller numbers of people speak other languages. Now, there's nothing inherently wrong with this, except for the fact that when you have multiple languages, people need to either learn one language, or multiple, to be able to speak to each other. And this is complicated and confusing. Being an English speaker in a predominantly English speaking country, I believe people should learn English. It's easier for everyone. And it kind of fits my own approach toward immigration. If you're going to move to another country, you should conform to the extent that you do not burden those who were born there

But of course, to much of the left, that's "racist". You can't expect immigrants to learn English. No, but you wanna know what we can do? Make everyone in the country who is native there be bilingual. And this is kind of what pisses me off about the wokies on this specific subject. I was born here, I didn't ask people to come live here. Why should I have to learn Spanish in order to communicate with immigrants? Why should my job prospects suffer because I have to interact with a spanish speaking customer base? Why can't those people learn English?

That's one of the many double standards within SJW logic, but it's one that pisses me off. These guys would rather burden like 280 million English speakers to learn a second language, rather than just forcing the minority to learn English. And we have had these situations before. With the Irish, the Italians, the Chinese, etc. The first generation struggles to conform, often forming their own communities as a result (see Chinatown or Little Italy), before the second generation being raised here learns English and becomes more full fledged American. And that's fine, I have nothing against that. I'm not trying to be an actually racist jerk here, I know how it works. BUT, that's the thing, previous generations never gave these guys any slack. We always expected immigrants to learn English, and if the first generation didn't do so the second generation did. We didn't accommodate immigrants in a way that burdens those who are here. That's literally my biggest rule when it comes to immigration. Don't burden those who are here. Essentially, immigrants should get more limited forms of social services or none at all, and they should learn English. Otherwise, I largely don't care. Trumpers will wanna mass deport people, which I think is xenophobic and inhumane, while I just want to address the logistical elephants in the room. 

 My opinion is, if you want to come here, you should conform well enough that you don't burden or inconvenience the natives. Really, I don't think "you should learn the primary language to a country you decide to live in" is really an unreasonable expectation. Wokies will make a big deal about it given their ideology, but that's kind of why I don't like their ideology. In an academic context, we could discuss how not knowing the primary language is a barrier to success and blah blah blah, but when the rubber meets the road, is it really reasonable to just demand everyone else shoulders the burden to make up for that? SJWs would say yes. And that's precisely why I cannot stand them. Because that's what their entire ideology is. Expecting privileged people to suffer because others have it worse. Whereas my ideology is generally...what it is toward immigrants and with everyone else, i'm like, if these ideas help the majority of people then that's a good thing. It's like the whole cookie analogy again. Sure, the dude hoarding the cookies will tell the dude with one cookie an immigrant is taking his cookie, but the problem is the SJWs will scream at the dude with one cookie that he should just give it up. It doesn't make the world better or address the real issues, it just causes a ton of pointless infighting.

Alec Baldwin and the importance of unions

 So, I don't generally talk about unions a ton given my UBI emphasis on this blog, but I do support unions to some extent, I just don't believe they're an end all solution. And the Alec Baldwin incident is a good reason why. For those who don't know, Alec Baldwin apparently accidentally killed someone on set while filming a new movie by shooting her with a gun that was supposed to have blanks in it. It's unclear why the shot killed her, but there were a lot of reported incidents regarding a lack of safety while filming this movie. 

While many film crews are unionized, there have been some issues with unions, and as a result, many normal workers have walked off of the set in response to this general lack of safety and were replaced by strike breakers. The person who was in charge of the firearms on this movie was not unionized.

It's been suggested that perhaps if they were unionized and those in charge of filming the movie took the lack of safety seriously, that perhaps this incident wouldn't have happened. Such is life under unrestrained capitalism. Corporations cut corners and safety is always a concern. There's a reason early factory workers regularly lost limbs. Obviously, we need workplace regulations, and unions to help even the playing field and allow workers to present their grievances to their employers. 

Now, I've been mildly antagonistic toward unions on here before, and I want to clarify. Again, I'm not anti union, I just don't see them as an end all. The reason I am as I am is because I'm an indepentarian. I believe that freedom doesn't truly exist in capitalism unless people have a right to say no, not just to any job, but to all jobs. Unions, they might help improving working conditions, but they still tie people to work. It might makes work better, but it doesn't free people from it. 

At the same time, UBI might not work here. UBI might allow anyone to walk off the set of a movie production, or any other job, but in and of itself, it doesn't necessarily improve working conditions. Ideally it gives people more bargaining power to get better working conditions, but these gains probably won't be fully realized without unions. That said, UBI and unions should probably work together. UBI gives people the freedom to say no, and unions give people the bargaining power to present grievances and improve working conditions. You need both. Not just one. 

It really is a shame the safety issues on the set of this movie have come to this. They never should have come to this. We've been making movies for a century, surely we've figured out how to use guns on a set of a movie without killing anyone. Something was wrong here, and given there were rampantly bad working conditions here, it seems clear there were systemic issues at work that led to this workplace accident. Maybe if they actually listened to the union this incident wouldn't have happened.

That said, I stand in solidarity of unions. I do believe in the right to organize, just as I believe in the right to say no. I don't believe unions are an ideal end all solution like the traditional left seems to act at times, but they are a useful tool for righting wrongs.

Quick note on Yang's "moderate" direction

 So, Yang had a podcast today in which he addressed his "moderate" framing of the party. Since this was a constant criticism of  mine about him, I felt it was appropriate to address. And it seems Yang and I are on the same page. He mentioned his platform is aggressive as fudge. UBI? Healthcare? Ranked choice voting? These are radical progressive changes. Yang is actually progressive as fudge. BUT, he adopts moderate framing because he wants to get out of the tribalism we're in. Which I can get behind. The fact is, people ARE too tribalistic. Everyone is partisan. And while I can get fairly entrenched in my own ideological views, i dont feel loyalty to any group. Not to the democrats, not to the Bernie Bros, and not even to the Yang Gang. Tribalism is cancer, and I hate supporting a side for the sake of supporting a side. This is not to say that I am directionless. I have very strong ideological convictions. And I will support those who see things my way. But I hate how everything in politics is about tribalism. I wish politics was more about ideas and less about supporting a team. And I hate how everything is about identity over policy. Even Yang, in addressing the subject, seemed uncomfortable with a braindead "enlightened centrist" position on things, where we adopt moderate positions for moderation's sake. I feel like that's what the centrist wing of the democratic party does. And it sucks. 

That said I'm with Yang here. Let's be progressive as fudge on our ideas, without being entrenched in the tribalistic "my team is better than your team" thing. I see where Yang is coming from and that's why my thought process over the past year has made me so in favor of his party. I'm just sick of the rest of the spectrum, and their purity tests, and their focus on identity, and supporting the tribe over ideas. So yeah, let's get UBI, M4A, and change the political system to not be controlled by entrenched interests.

Burn the witch? Not so fast, discussing the Dave Chapelle special

 So...the Dave Chappelle special is the source of a lot of controversy, and I was gonna flat out ignore it, in part because 1) I dont care about SJW drama and 2) I don't have netflix, but then after an SJW friend was screeching about it and talked about reading the transcripts to see what it said without patronizing it, I decided to read the transcript. And the transcript got me thinking about discussing some deeper subjects I want to touch on regarding freedom of expression, so I decided to do it.

So let's get it out of the way. Yes, it's offensive. And yes, it "punches down", in the sense that it criticizes and makes fun of underprivileged groups. I mean, with the link above, yeah, viewer discretion is advised, because MAN there's a lot of slurs and offensive stuff there.

However, the people screaming about it simply because it's offensive seem to be missing some of the major points it was trying to make, which was really just picking fun at SJW and outrage culture in general. Sure, it was offensive, but it's art and self expression, and even more, the whole thing makes valid political points about our time. That said, I will be quoting a few things I think people are missing with this thing.

Do you see where I am going with this? In our country, you can shoot and kill a (n word) but you better not hurt a gay person’s feelings. [laughter] And this is precisely the disparity I wish to discuss. I have a question for the audience and this is a real question, I am not joking around. Is it possible, that a gay person can be racist? [audience] Yes! Yeah!

 This seems to be the crux of the entire show and the main point Chappelle is trying to make about this whole show. He especially levels a fairly below the belt attack on gay people shortly before this, making light of the AIDS crisis, and then he basically turns around and says this. Chappelle isn't being offensive for the purpose of attacking gay people. He's trying to point out about how there's all of this systemic violence against black people, but then gay people get offended when you simply MAKE FUN of them. Clearly one kind of behavior is worse than the other, and that's the point Chappelle is trying to point out, that instead of hand wringing over how offended you are over stuff, such as his comedy, you should be more offended by all of the violence against black people.

Now, in a lot of ways, Chappelle does this through the whole show. He's black, and he kind of does his black thing, and everything he says is from an obviously black perspective, and to some extent, as a white dude, I kind of find another level of parody here, which boils down to self parody. You see, all these people aren't on the same side. You got the black community going at it with the gay community and white feminism, and white feminism going at it with trans people and black people, and all of these groups all devolve into their little tribalistic cliques all claiming to be the most oppressed, and getting into suffering olympics with each other. 

And as a white dude who is educated on critical theory, here's my perspective, you're all right, but you're all wrong. Like, critical theory is valid. And black people, women, the LGBT+ community all face problems that come from not being part of the most privileged group. But at the same time, these guys all display victimhood complexes that end up coming off as insufferably self righteous to anyone outside of their group. And eventually, these groups clash and start eating each other. I don't think this was an intentional lesson of Chappelle's show, but it was kind of satisfying to watch. Black people having it worse doesn't mean treating gay people poorly is justified, and likewise, Chappelle still has a point about how being made fun of isn't as bad as dying. Either way it just comes off to me as tribalism that basically points to the absurdity of SJWism in general, and this is a huge reason why as a white dude, I try to avoid getting into these spats. I don't think arguing over who has it worse really gets us anywhere. I'd rather argue about how we can all improve our lives. But that's the downfall of SJWism, SJWs DO NOT DO THAT.

To be fair, he might have intended to do this. Because he poked fun at all of these other groups, like feminism, and the LGBT+ community, while at the same time not being opposed to their goals. He just hated how people got in his face all the time with their crap, and he ends up throwing down with them as a result. 

Now, to be fair, this wasn't the biggest thing that Chappelle was criticized for, what he was really ripped on was his views on transgenderism, since he's not really accommodating to that stance. 

I’m team TERF. I agree. I agree, man. Gender is a fact. You have to look at it from a woman’s perspective. Look at it like this, Caitlyn Jenner whom I have met, wonderful person. Caitlyn Jenner… was voted, woman of the year. Her first year as a woman. Ain’t that something? Beat every (b word) in Detroit. She’s better than all of you. [laughter] Never even had a period, ain’t that something? [laughter] I’d be mad as shit if I was a woman. I’d be mad if I was me. If I was in the BET awards, sitting there and they’re like “And the winner for (n word) of the year… Eminem.” My man. [audience laughs] Gender is a fact, this is a fact. Every human being in this room, every human being on Earth had to pass through the legs of a woman to be on Earth. That is a fact. [laughter] Now… I am not saying that to say, that trans women aren’t women. I’m just sayin, that those pussies that they got… You know what I mean?

 I’m not saying it is not pussy, but that’s like Beyond Pussy or Impossible Pussy. You know what I mean? It tastes like pussy but that’s not quite what it is, is it? It’s not blood, that is beet juice. [laughter] Oh buddy, I’m in trouble now.

 And all things considered this is probably the worst thing he said.

The real question is...is he even wrong? I'm going to be honest, I actually understand his point and agree with it.

Here's how I look at the transgender issue. We are born male or female. However, sometimes as we grow older wires cross or something where some people see themselves as not the sex they were born as, but the other one. Now, a lot of people, especially on the right, are going to see this as "wrong". But, having evolved to be accepting of people of alternative sexualities and the like, I see nothing wrong with transgenderism. I mean, does transgenderism hurt anyone? No. So, I do believe that if you aren't comfortable with your gender and experience gender dysphoria, you can change it. And it's none of my business what you do. It's your life, make your own decisions.

However, let's keep in mind what it is, transgender, not transsex. Sex is whether you're physically male or female. Gender is more related to identity, masculine or feminine. I do believe that you can be born male, and you can transition to being female and identifying as a woman. But...let's be honest, you're still you, and your body is still one born male. It still has Y chromosomes, it can't necessarily have kids. But, you got some surgeries that turned your outie into an innie, and we really have to say, are you REALLY a woman now? Well, yes and no. You're no longer really male in my opinion, but you're not really the same as a born female. I think Chappelle's "Beyond Pussy" is an appropriate comparison. It's an imitation, but it's not the real thing. You can change your gender, but you can never fully change your sex IMO.

The real question is, does it matter? Most of the time no. I mean, when we say trans women are real women, it's a bit of a white lie so to speak. You see, gender dysphoria is a legitimate mental disorder, and one of the treatments can be changing your gender. And often times it is very comforting to trans people to affirm their identities, and to play along for social interaction's sake to not offend them and make them feel good about themselves. They might wanna be called "she" instead of "he", and you should, generally speaking abide by that if asked. However, let's be honest, this is more a white lie for their own benefit, that sometimes the SJWs take way too far. Because their perspective isn't reality. It's about their own little circlejerk. In their desire for "acceptance", they deny reality and go all in with the "white lie" and start attacking anyone who states the obvious.

Now, how often does stating the obvious have to come up? Not often. And I think the right wingers who get in trans peoples' faces and INSIST that they're their birth gender are kind of jerks. You don't do that. It's not really socially acceptable and you seem like a crass jerk if you do. But at the same time, those people aren't wrong, they're just jerks. it's like running into a church and screaming god isn't real. You don't do that. It doesn't matter whether you're correct or not, sometimes social tact is more important.

But at the same time, the SJWs take the "social' aspects too far. Again, a big axe to grind I have on this subject is being told I'm bad for not wanting to sleep with a trans person. After all, all trans women are real women, right? Well, that's the thing. Are they? Like, push comes to shove, are they REALLY? I'd argue no.

But, obviously the cases in which that subject actually comes up are going to be very rare. Most of the time, liberal social performative circlejerking is probably better. Because honestly, systematically denying a trans person's desire identity can cause severe mental issues and cause them to want to off themselves. And that's bad too. 

That said, where do I really stand here? Well, for the most part, my ideas aren't much different than a typical liberal's on this subject. I'm generally speaking "pro trans rights", in the sense that as a libertarian I believe they have a right to pursue their own happiness. But factually? Nah, I kind of do have slightly more conservative beliefs here. I don't generally consider stating such facts to be socially appropriate in most situations, but that's what I believe. In practice, my views are going to functionally be on the left most of the time though.

But to go back to Dave Chappelle here. Chappelle is basically being ripped for this. For stating the obvious. I don't think he was wrong. And I don't think it's necessarily wrong to express this in a standup environment. Even more so, Chappelle seemed to not be all that dissimilar from me. He basically seemed to be trying to protect peoples' identities, not attack them, not make a scene, not out them, in the real world. he told stories about how people went after him for expressing anti trans views, but at the end of the day, he seemed to be more in the whole "whatever dude, your life aint up to me." 

You see, the real right aren't the people like me, or Chappelle, who are comparing trans genitalia to "I can't believe it's not butter". The real enemy on the right are the fundie christians and the fascists who want to control peoples' behavior. When I was a kid, gay people my age would be sent to reeducation camps. And I'm sure trans people face the same difficulties. And that's wrong. people shouldnt be afraid to express their preferred gender and live as they want. That doesn't mean everyone is going to affirm it and go along with the "white lie" as I like to call it, but as long as people aren't trying to deny you your rights, in my eyes they're not bad people. because that's what the right tries to do. To be on the right, in terms of transgenderism, it goes a lot further than denying the gospel that "trans women are real women", it goes to the point of saying that trans women shouldn't be allowed to use their preferred bathroom, that they shouldnt be allowed to change their gender, and that they deserve your scorn and hatred. Again, most of the time, you probably should be going along with the white lie. And for me, an autistic person, to have to lecture people about avoiding being blunt to avoid hurting someone's feelings, is just...wow. I mean, if I can do it, at least somewhat, so can you. 

And I think Dave Chappelle would agree. A few more quotes worth posting:

And the hardest thing for a person to do is go against their tribe if they disagree with their tribe, but Daphne did that for me. She wrote a tweet that was very beautiful and what she said was and it is almost exactly what she said. She said, “Punching down on someone, requires you to think less of them and I know him, and he doesn’t. He doesn’t punch up, he doesn’t punch down he punches lines, and he is a master at his craft.” That’s what she said.

 This was in response to a trans person he was friends with. Yeah, Dave Chappelle has trans friends. And I know having X friends doesn't go far in the SJW world as they're more centered around dogma, but he was basically pointing to the fact that he humanizes and befriends anyone, including the trans.

Empathy is not gay. Empathy is not Black. Empathy is bi-sexual. It must go both ways. It must go both ways.

 Yep, this seems to be the point of his entire show.

And this one was a clear jab against cancelling people.

Remember, taking a man’s livelihood is akin to killing him. I’m begging you, please do not abort DaBaby.

 Yep. 

But yeah. Here's how I feel about this dude's whole show. This dude was ripping the left hard. And while much of his show was offensive, it was so intentionally. It was an example of subversive art. It's a lot like when I was an atheist and I liked those memes on r/atheism that talked about zombie Jesus and drawings of Muhammad and the like. The point of such humor is to break social norms. Not all social norms are good. Many are bad. SJW social norms are a mixed bag. I believe they mean well, but sometimes they go WAY too far with the moral policing. And Chapelle's show seemed to be aimed at opposing that. Of course his show was offensive. That's the point. He wasn't doing it to be mean spirited, he was doing it to take the sanctity out of the SJWs' moral system. By breaking every rule in the book, he disrespects that moral system, and that's what his show was about, disrespecting that system. The dude seems tolerant toward everyone. But he's not necessarily respectful in the face of people who demand undue respect and try to censor him and punish him for not conforming to their rules. SJWs love to exert power over people, to punish them for breaking their rules. And sometimes you need people like Chapelle to stand up to them.

That said, I have to say, I like his show, and agree with it. I kind of believe that this stuff is a bit absurd these days, and yeah sometimes we need a stand up comedian to just rip everyone regardless of how offensive it is. maybe the moral policers  and the hand wringers won't like it, but eh, screw them.

More issues with the Forward Party's "moderate" framing

 So, today I got in a discussion with someone who argued that open primaries would drive Americans to "the center" as cross party voting would be a thing, and that the 20% "most extreme" voters end up voting in individual parties.

Here's the thing though. I don't necessarily believe this (or more precisely believe extremism within the parties is asymmetrical), and I support Yang's agenda so that often times more "extreme" ideologies are allowed to succeed in electoral politics.

To me the problem is the two party duopoly. We have two choices, and they're like Coke vs Pepsi. Or more recently, like flat Diet Coke (not even Coke Zero) vs battery acid. The two parties are fundamentally captured by big money and special interests, and closed primaries just ensure that they remain the same. Most who bother registering with the parties are more partisan and identify with the party as it exists. This is not the same as being extreme, ideologically. Being "liberal" or "progressive" or "socialist" doesn't mean you agree with democrats inherently, nor does being "conservative" mean you have to agree with republicans. You might be an supporter of an ideology, but NOT agree with the party. 

And to discuss the asymmetry I mentioned. On the republican side, yeah, the most extreme elements of the party wins. But on the democrats, it's the moderates who have power. It's not Bernie Sanders and progressives who wield power in the democrats, it's people like Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton. And people who DO have more left wing views aren't represented. Progressives get coopted into the party and watered down. And people like Yang have no chance. The fact is, with the closed primary system, self identified "democrats" end up voting for democrats in primaries, and they like the Clinton and Biden wing of the party. People like Yang, or even Sanders, are actually "independents" with no real home in the party. The party is hostile to their interests, and are often bullied and browbeaten to NOT support third parties, because they're told if they don't, the republicans will win. 

This is the environment that has driven me to the Forward Party, and while I am a supporter of it, I'm a nominal supporter who has my own mind and will be critical of it when needed. And the moderation schtick is one of those things that don't sit well with me.

I'm not here to make things more moderate mostly. I'm here because I understand the only way my ideas can take root in this system, the duopoly needs too be broken up. The duopoly robs all independents of their ideologies. People with new and unique ideas that bring the country foeward are not allowed to have their ideas heard. Because either you're a republican, and subscribe to that set of ideas, or a democrat. And democrats are hostile to anyone who is to the left of them on economics. Third parties, open primaries, and ranked choice voting are the way out.

Maybe my ideas won't win in that system either. They are unique and relatively esoteric compared to the general public. But, they would have a better chance than they do now, and what would stop them would be a much fairer system than exists now. And I would be able to vote my conscience, and have my views heard better than they are now. The duopoly is problem number one as far as the political system goes. It literally stifles peoples' views, and my goal is to expand the overton window so we can have many ideas competing with each other on even ground rather than being forced to adopt two options. It is better for representatives to come from 4-6 parties and represent that range of opinions than be locked into dealing with 2. 

And if we are forced to deal with two, it's better those two are more representative of the larger public and not largely dictated by  relative few who then impose themselves on the rest of the public under the banner of lesser evilism. 

I want politicians that actually represent me. Under the current system, they do not. And I feel like the system is hostile too my actual beliefs, and unrepresentative of what I actually want. I don't always agree with the forward party, but given its goals in making the system more representative, and its support for basic income, I fully support it as a vehicle for my ideas at this current point in time. 

Discussing foreign policy for a bit, in light of Colin Powell's death

 So, this isn't going to be as much about Colin Powell, as much as it is the reaction to his death. My feed is being spammed with tons of people screaming he's a war criminal, and how he's evil and blah blah blah. Now, I'm going to be honest, I'm a bit more nuanced than either side on this mess. Like, I don't really agree with the far left on stuff, but I'm not a neocon either.

This is one of those areas where I don't have a strong opinion, and my opinion is fairly moderate. Like, to me, foreign policy is something I don't want to waste my time on. I tend to be isolationist in the sense that I don't want to get involved in everyone's BS, but at the same time, I kind of recognize we have to. So I'm isolationist in ideology, but a bit more interventionist in reality. This leads to me having opinions that don't fit in anywhere, except, ironically, the democratic party. Mainstream centrist democrats actually get it closest for me, where they generally don't get involved with foreign issues directly as much but at the same time, we need to defend our national interests involved, and maintain strategic relationships with other powers to offset those who threaten us and our power. I'm kind of a reluctant supporter of the American empire. I have a bit of a distaste for it, but at the same time I recognize if we don't act, we may end up losing ground to rival powers like Russia or China, and that would be worse for us, and potentially for everyone else involved. So, I tend to be more interventionist and supportive of our foreign policy than the left is, but I'm not as zealous as republicans and democrats. 

That said where do I fit in? Well, here's the thing. My foreign policy was largely shaped by 9/11 and its aftereffects. I was at one point totally on Bush's side of believing that by invading countries we were bringing them freedom and democracy and they loved us with open arms, but after watching Iraq and Afghanistan and learning out history of interventionism in those regions, I can't say i'm anywhere near as supportive of that as I used to be. We kind of make our own problems, and invading countries seems to waste a lot of money, but not getting a lot done. And when we pull out later, everything goes to hell anyway. I don't in any way criticize Biden for the pullout, I totally agree with it, and I agreed with Obama pulling out of Iraq, and I do have a consequences be darned mentality to it. Why? because these are not conflicts we can win. Our military is good at going in and breaking stuff, but then we just occupy countries that dont want us there, and aren't willing to fight for themselves, and then they get taken over by natives who are fairly hostile to us anyway. So, why bother?

But at the same time, I'm not gonna scream that our actions were OMG WAR CRIMES AND THESE PEOPLE ARE SO TERRIBLE AND SHOULD BE BROUGHT UP IN FRONT OF THE HAGUE! I mean, are our actions crappy? Sure. Did these leaders make mistakes? Sure. In the case of the Bush administration, did they know they were making a mistake? probably. The thing about Bush is you never really know. Bush is a bit of a religious zealot who isn't super attached to reality, but I do believe his cabinet might have been more interested in natural resources. Bush also might have held a grudge against Hussein because Hussein spited his dad at every turn. That said the Iraq invasion did not seem very justifiable in retrospect, and Powell does share some blame.

Still, Powell seemed to be the most principled guy of the bunch, and was the one left holding the bag. So I do feel like he gets a bad rap. This doesnt exonerate his role in it but I believe he may have been a more honest actor than the rest of the Bush administration.

Anyway, these mistakes have made me largely anti interventionism, and largely anti war. Not in a hippie sort of way but in a "how does this really help us" sort of way. I see war like conservatives see liberal government, us doing a bunch of stuff with no clear result to people and I'd rather either want my tax dollars back, or spent on something else. 

But at the same time, here's the thing. I understand the world isn't a nice place. That if we weren't in the rest of the world, Russia and China would, and that other countries would be exploiting the situation for themselves. America has always been an aggressive imperialist power for better or for worse. In some ways it's what made us great. From a 21st century leftist's perspective, Polk's land gains were actions of imperialism, but at the same time, owning the land we do made us the power we are today. We have the most temperate land from sea to shining sea and that makes us the undisputed big kid on the block in this part of the world. Given the relatively inferior land of Canada, Mexico, and South America, no one can compete in this hemisphere, and we've always been aggressive in shooing foreign powers out of this sphere of influence, lest we be challenged. Does this behavior sometimes have a negative effect on others? Sure. I dont make excuses for our exploitation in cuba, or supporting pinochet, etc., but I do understand that if we don't take strong stances toward foreign involvement here, it could weaken our geopolitical standing and threaten us and our way of life. So while my ideals lean a bit left, on a realism level, well, I believe in doing what we have to do. Same with our strategic relationships overseas. We need to support NATO to contain russia. We need to support South Korea, Japan, etc. to contain china and north korea. If we don't, these guys will take over these regions, people will suffer as much if not more than they do today, and we will be weaker for it. Foreign policy isn't really nice, and honestly, we can't always play nice like the left wants. I don't take any pleasure in this reality, I just understand it as it is. America needs to defend itself and its interests first, and while we should be as humane as possible in doing it, I'm not exactly going to argue against doing so. If we don't, Russia or China will, and we don't want them controlling the world. In a lot of ways, we've kind of built up the world economy and we police it so that it leads to positive effects for everyone. People can criticize capitalism, and you know what, justly, so, but at the same time, is whatever system Russia or China going to impose on people any better? I don't think so. 

So, we're kind of caught in a bind, and that said, what does my actual foreign policy look like? Well, the Obama administration really. I was never dissatisfied with obama's foreign policy. He did some things I didn't like and got a bit too involved in some countries like Syria and Libya, but he got us out of Iraq, he didn't put American boots on the ground anywhere, and he got us out of more stuff than he got us into. People will complain about his drone strike policies, and stuff like that, but hey, beats Bush era invading people.

Why do I feel I need to say this? because this is an area in which i feel my ideals are poorly shared by anyone. Neocons have this shoot first and ask questions mentality, and also, screw everyone else. Bush for example was extremely anti UN and constantly snubbed them. Nah, we need multilateralism. And Trump just was like an immature child on foreign policy. He had no idea what he was doing, was largely handled by advisors, and ended up driving most of them away over time who just couldn't handle dealing with such a petty moron. At the same time, the left, if it had its way, would pull out of everything, which might sound good, until russia or china move in, and stuff destabilizes or turns against us due to the lack of our presence. We have enough supply chain issues as is, do we really want more? That could happen if America doesnt keep the global economy running smoothly. We could run into shortages of oil or other resources real quick if we don't control how things work overseas. People often hate us talking about how X country is sitting on top of a reserve of some in demand material, but honestly, if we don't have it, our way of life suffers. And if you want to stand on principle and argue for greatly reduced living standards as a result of a breakdown of global trade and access to materials, go right ahead, but I'd prefer not to do that. And idk, again, mainstream liberalism is a okay to me. It keeps things flowing and keeps a steady hand on things, but is more reserved and less interventionist than republicans. I would say Im maybe a bit left of obama as I do have some mild brands of left wing ideas in my thought process and I do believe we should strive to be as moral as humanly possible here. But at the same time, I'm not really a leftist, who seems way too obsessed with considering anyone who isn't morally pure a war criminal. Like, foreign policy is crappy. You're really getting in the dirt with that one. No one is clean in it and I really don't believe we can afford to be clean. It's natural selection, survival of the fittest out there, and we should maintain our advantage, lest we become victim of another country's foreign policy. That's literally how I see it, it's them or us, and I'd rather it not be us. Maybe in the distant future we could work toward resolving this but for now I have no answers other than trying to minimize our footprint and simply focus on maintaining rather than aggressively expanding. This means keep the relationships we have, try to strengthen them, but dont get involved in every regime change war we think MIGHT benefit us, but 30 years later probably won't. Again, I think the Obama administration is a good footprint here.

Manchin has made his demands known; screw this guy

 So, Joe Manchin has finally told us exactly what he finds so objectionable with Biden's infrastructure plan. And, while I wouldn't beat this dead horse, given my ideological distaste for him and his demands, I feel like I have to cover it. 

Basically, he wants work requirements on the child tax credits, and means testing where households over $60k can't get it. And he wants to means test a bunch of other stuff Biden supports.

As I said, screw this guy, he should join the republicans already. 

Like, this is why we can't have nice things. We can't have nice universal solutions. No, people like Manchin have to means test everything. Never mind that Biden's solutions are already milquetoast and mediocre. He has to take the few nice things about them and squeeze the life out of them.

My big issue with the child tax credit is essentially that I'd rather have a full UBI, rather than something for kids only. And I am afraid of the tax credit approach BECAUSE I fear frickers like Manchin doing exactly what he's doing and sabotaging the programs. If you give a UBI, and frame it as a fundamental right, it becomes like social security reform, something that's impossible to do and political suicide for anyone who tries it. But a tax credit just lends itself to arbitrary requirements like this. And Manchin is going there.

This much be what he meant by "entitlement society", ya know what, Joe, screw off to the GOP already. I know I don't consider myself a democrat any more because they're too conservative for me in some ways (and because they do crap like this), but this guy might as well be a flat out republican. If I were Biden I'd try to do everything possible to make this guy's life miserable. I'd want to Arlen Specter him. Unfortunately, the democrats celebrate their moderates instead of run them out of the party. Instead they run people like me out of the party who actually want comprehensive progressive solutions without compromises. 

Again, Biden's proposal was mild and moderate enough and now this guy has to completely ruin what good there was in it. We can't have nice things, because democrats don't fight for them, and on occasion they go full blown republican and then sabotage them while screaming about "entitlements". And then they wonder why they lose elections. This is why. You guys can't even given Biden, a dude who is already as moderate and compromised as crap, a break on his milquetoast policy that most Americans want and many Americans see as moderate. 

And let's discuss his $60,000 limit on this tax credit. That's not individually, that's per HOUSEHOLD. And as we know from my UBI studies, the median household is around $70k. My UBI plan would benefit people making up to like $66-70k individually, and households, generally speaking in the $100-200k range depending on family size. This plan is a joke. It was already mild, and Manchin's just making it suck. Most Americans will likely turn against it, and Biden now. But I assume that's the point. Make the programs so bad they lack majority support so they can be cut back later and used as bargaining chips to remain in office (vote for me or the big bad republicans will repeal this). 

I hate politics in the US, man. I feel like we can never have nice things. As I said, it's bad the democrats are as moderate and ineffective as they are and then you got "moderates" acting like republicans and basically making these ideas suck in general. There's a reason people just wanna bring down both parties and push for third parties. This is why. Because we can't ever have good things from the two parties. it sickens me.

I don't get tankies

 So, as we know, socialism is a contentious topic for me. It's a lot like identity politics. Highly overrated among the populace, people think it would revolutionize everything, but at the end, it changes little. Most differences from capitalism are abstractions in my eyes, and I really just don't see socialism as solving the biggest issues I have with capitalism. I have flirted with very mild forms of socialism in the past, as the idea of democratic control of workplaces is appealing to me on a purely ideological level. But yeah, generally speaking, overrated. 

What I really don't get though, are tankies. Tankies are essentially a form of communist that defends authoritarian communist states. Like, unlike libertarian, democratic, and market socialists who fill the ranks of "the far left" in the US, these guys are actual defenders of countries like the USSR, or China, or North Korea, or Cuba. And I'm going to be honest, do those countries sometimes get too bad of a rap? Sure. I mean, not everything about them is as bad as capitalist propaganda would indicate, those states, while not having the highest GDP, or lacking a lot of personal freedoms, they have done some good things. I hear cuba has a decent healthcare system. I hear the USSR solved homelessness and former states have a high home ownership rate to this day. They gave people guaranteed jobs and incomes. And while I kind of find that to be a bit dystopian (and everything else about them, really), they actually can claim some victories here and there.

But, for people to defend them seems weird. I mean, most of these countries have a horrid track record at human rights. China is locking up the Uighurs, most such states have highly censored media, they shut down political protests, and they exert control over the lives of their citizens to insane degrees we westerners would find unacceptable. Most of them can claim massive purges in their early days, as anyone who didn't fit was executed (and this amounted to millions of people). There were massive famines. I mean, they're not really all good. Maybe not as bad as we like to portray them, but still not a desirable model.

I just find it odd a class of people exists who defend these guys with a zealous passion. I mean, I look at the problems with the US, and I'm like, okay, if we were that system instead, life would improve in some ways but probably greatly decline in others. I might gain materially, but then be forced to work jobs I dont want to work, and live in places I dont want to live, and be told what to do all the time. I find American society authoritarian enough in a lot of ways. I don't believe communism would be a straight upgrade for me. I'm an indepentarian for a reason. I want all the benefits of more left wing ideologies, without sacrificing the freedom. I believe that social democracy is a worthwhile third way to have. I might not like the excesses of American capitalism but I don't believe all capitalism is bad. And I think a form of human centered capitalism would be good.

Even the forms of mainstream lib-left socialists seem to want to have their cake and eat it too. They want the benefits of socialism, without the costs of the authoritarian states. So why die on a hill of defending authoritarian countries with questionable ideas regarding human rights? I don't get it. There are just so many better compromise models if you hate capitalism so much. Some more capitalist, some more socialist. Being a tankie is as irrational as being a right libertarian who defends the gilded age.

Joe Manchin is a piece of crap

 So, I've never been a fan of Joe Manchin, but he's extremely obnoxious. He's basically a democrat, who isn't really a democrat, but a republican with a D after his name. And I know I use that term often when describing democrats since democrats are inherently conservative to some extent, but no, I'm taking it a step further this time. This dude should just change his registration to republican already.

He's one of the two senators (along with Kyrsten Sinema who is also a piece of crap), who is blocking Biden's anemic infrastructure bill. Like, you would think $3.5 trillion over 10 years, or $350 billion a year, is peanuts compared to what I advocate for on my blog, but hes negotiating it down further. And the dude is so self righteous about it. He has this idea about how democrats want to turn us into an "entitlement society" (I wish) and that that's bad. Uh, first of all, Biden's bill is very minimalistic. He ran as a centrist, is pushing an incredibly mediocre bill, and then Manchin turns around and starts using republican talking points against it. It's kinda cringey. Like, republicans are the party that goes on against entitlements and rugged individualism, and now he's out righting Biden and pushing this stuff? Bro, just stop and gtfo of the party already.

And I know a lot of centrist democrats will defend him claiming he's better than a republican, but that's the problem. They're so steeped in tribalism that that little label after their name means anything. Anyone with an R is evil and anyone with a D is good. These guys don't even care about values. On values, Joe Manchin is a republican as far as I'm concerned. He talks like I did when I grew up listening to Rush Limbaugh. Just cut ties with him already. Jesus.

And then there's his whole "outsiders won't tell west virginians what to do" thing. Uh, yeah, your state is poor, your economy is addicted to coal, and your population is on meth. I'll be the "northern agitator" every day of the week if it means improving lives. I hate to talk about job creation, but isn't replacing all of those coal jobs with new clean energy jobs a good thing? And that's not even getting into my ideas. UBI would basically be a godsend to your state economically. An entitlement, would save your state.

That's the problem I have with republicans. Not only do they actively make the country worse, but then they claim to LIKE it that way. And I hate this gatekeeping thing various tribes in American politics do. Like "dont tell me what to do unless you're one of us". The idpol people use it constantly and it's a huge reason I hate them. It's annoying. I'll have whatever opinion I want and I don't care what other people think. And yes I will tell you what's good for you. You might disagree, but have an honest disagreement with me over stuff. Don't just dismiss my opinion without a debate with this crap. I just find that enraging. 

But yeah. I'll be the outsider telling them what's good for them. Biden's infrastructure plan would be mildly good for them. My ideas would be better. I mean, low income rural states with bad/no jobs. Duh. UBI would be great for you guys. Don't tell me I can't tell you that. You're getting my opinion whether you like it or not. Manchin is bad for standing in the way. He's holding his state back. I will look down with disdain on anyone who literally defends living poorly with vapid virtue signalling. I don't care if I look bad or tyrannical for doing it. The society they support is, in my opinion, also tyrannical. 

And that goes for actual republicans too. But for democrats to do it, with republican talking points, it's just like, seriously? Yeah no screw these guys.

Am I moving to the right, or was I ever that far left?

 So, it's quite clear there's some significant shifts in tone in my views as of late. When i started this blog, I was a fiery Bernie Sanders progressive, but as of late, I find myself more at odds with the progressive movement. I started off being conciliatory toward the SJWs, but then became more hostile to them over time. I'm clearly burning a lot of bridges with the left as of late, and I want to address this.

I came over to the left, from the right, in 2012. I was raised a very staunch Reagan and Bush conservative, who was a fundamentalist christian in my teenage years. I listened to Rush Limbaugh, I held consistently right views on most topics (minus death penalty). But then, over time, I shifted. When I went to college I realized the religious fundamentalism was harmful and I slowly drifted toward libertarian positions on social issues. On economics, I started drifting to the center, but then the tea party temporarily drove me overwhelmingly right. However, I quickly realized my mistake, and realized that the problems with conservatism were ideological, as in, i had issues with their entire perspective of the world. I became an atheist around this time, which shifted me hard left socially. And the recession shifted me hard left on economic policy. I ultimately joined the democrats, and sided with them in 2012. In 2013-2014 I expanded upon my ideology, shifting toward the human centered capitalism I have today. It was like a little bit of Bernie Sanders, and a little bit of Andrew Yang. More Yang than Bernie, but Yang wasn't a political force yet, so I identified as a Bernie supporter in 2016.

Which is where my tensions with the democrats began. In retrospect, I really only had a temporary honeymoon period in which I was super pro democratic party. My relationship became strained with them just 3 years later over the Hillary/Bernie divide. I never really got into traditional democratic party politics. My ideology isn't shaped by the historical forces that influenced their party, but my own personal journey, and Hillary's entire stance toward the democratic brand...alienated me. On economics, I got to the point where I was to the left of Hillary and more in line with Bernie. I decided early on our economic system was fundamentally broken and we needed a new new deal. While the democratic platform was...okay, it failed to address a lot of major issues. I believed we needed stronger solutions like UBI, M4A, and free college. And that was what my idea of a new new deal was. And Bernie prominently supported 2/3. He didn't support UBI, but UBI seemed to be a pipe dream at this point and not even in the conversation, so I let that one go for future election cycles. Ultimately, the most important thing was moving the overton window left first. We cant have any nice things if we don't.

But, we got Hillary. ANd she rejected all 3 of my priorities, and promoted social issues. And that's where I started becoming more at odds with democrats on them. Everything with the democrats was obnoxiously sectarian. Everything was about race, gender, and sexuality. And if you weren't equally as concerned about those issues, you were racist, sexist, etc. I never had a good relationship with the SJWs. I kind of learned about critical theory in college so I can at least speak their language and understand where they come from, but I just don't identify with it as a cishet white male, and I just never really felt strongly about these issues. You could influence me to move a bit to the left on them when tied to my own priorities, but otherwise, I don't care all that much. And I remember watching the whole gamergate thing play out in 2013 and I just decided to avoid that dumpster fire. it seemed like pointless drama between overbearing SJWs looking to push an agenda and gamers who literally did hold sexist attitudes at times. it was just one of those situations where no one wins. And I remember SJWs tried to push into the atheist movement with atheism+, and that being a failure as no one really cared or was interested in a brand of atheism specifically around those issues. But then in 2016 Hillary started sicking those guys on the bernie people, and it just ended up alienating me big time. I dont see myself as sexist or racist. Hell as I said if these guys weren't so hostile they could likely get me on their side. But because they instead decided to pick a fight with me due to insufficient zeal for their causes, they ended up driving me the other way.

And then trump happened. And the left went into insane damage control mode. And this is where I ended up just tuning out for 2 years. The SJWs were screaming "not my president" and bashing in storefronts, and i ended up explicitly ending friendships with people who were quite frankly radical nutjobs who were okay with literally assaulting people and commiting property destruction to fight their political opponents. I mean, I'm normally pretty tolerant toward other opinions as long as we're not actively fighting constantly, but advocacy for any type of violence is a line I just won't accept as far as friendships go a lot of the time. And then between the democrats being obnoxiously centrist and the SJWs being overtly leftist, I just got alienated. The progressives were my big island of sanity at this time, as at least they cared about medicare for all, and free college, and had some significant anti democratic party sentiment, but eventually cracks started forming too.

When Yang entered the political mainstream in 2019 with the joe rogan interview, I was instantly won over. This dude was literally studying the same issues that fundamentally influenced my views, and came to the same conclusions as me. It was uncanny. I had to support him. But this started costing me support. UBI suddenly went from far left wing idea to a right wing one. Progressives turned on it, hard. Suddenly Yang was trying to destroy welfare, and I was like "yeah, so?", I mean, isnt that the point? Welfare sucks and is the legacy of moderate democratic gains over time leading to a broken system, followed by further compromises and cuts compromising it further. It's terrible. No one should defend it, but suddenly progressives did and it was weird. I continued to try to be conciliatory, recognizing yang wasnt perfect on healthcare or free college, but they just kept being hostile to it. I did temporarily go back to bernie for various pragmatic reasons, but after 2020, I just kind of was done. 

It became obvious that the progressives had morphed into being borderline socialist and pushing tons of ideas i wasnt huge on. And while I liked some like M4A and free college, I disliked other like the green new deal, and let's be honest, none of them are for a realistic UBI. And over the past year, I've kind of cut ties with the three major factions in the democratic party. I've gotten to the point where I'm just BEYOND tired of the centrists. Like really, I just despise them as holding back progress and being more similar to republicans than I am now. At the same time, I also have cut ties with the SJWs and racial advocates. I'm a little more sympathetic toward them than the centrists, but not a ton. And I've had enough with progressives who hate on UBI and it seems more and more like my ideology is diverging from theirs.

The real question is, how much of this is really a shift in me, and how much is a shift in the environment around me? Ultimately, it's more of the latter.

On social issues, I was explicitly won over by the democrats NOT being the crazies I was raised to believe they are. I was never for open border on immigration. SJWs seemed ridiculous and a target of scorn from more mainstream lefties. I was primarily influenced by the atheist movement at the time, and this caused me to shift significantly left on issues like abortion, gay marrage, and set the groundwork for me to be pro trans, but I never really got into the circlejerk. Friends who I had around 2013-2015 started becoming insufferable post 2016, as I had friends shunning me for not being as far left as them on social issues. And I got screamed at by an ex friend for using the wrong pronoun by mistake when they were trans. And yeah, i just got alienated. The environment, due to the clinton/trump dichotomy, led to increased polarization on social issues that didn't previously exist. The right moved further right, to being explicitly racist on race issues, while the left moved to be more insufferable. The 2016 election cycle became politics, and both sides just radicalized. And I was just unaffected by this, because much like gamer gate a few years prior, I didn't care. I never cared much for social issue fights. They're not my cup of tea. And when I left conservatism I never shifted to far left positions now considered purity tests today. I mean, the idea of screaming at someone for not explicitly supporting palestine wasnt a thing in 2012. Hell I felt I was a far leftie in 2012 on the palestine issue simply for having a "both sides" perspective afforded to me by atheism. Now that's considered unremarkably centrist, with me being called an anti semite by the pro israel side and an imperialist by "the left." On immigration I always held onto some elements of being not super pro immigration. I believed closed borders were necessary for liberalism to work. Now I'm lambasted as a right winger for not being for abolish ice and crap. And it just goes on. I've seen lefties bashing atheist thought leaders who in the early 2010s I respected like Christopher Hitchens , Sam Harris, and Bill Maher. Now, I don't really agree with these guys all that much either, and I consider Bill maher to be obnoxiously pro centrism, but still. It really just goes to show how much has changed. Society has changed in the past decade, specifically in the past 5 years. The left is now way further left than it used to be socially, and I just don't fit. I went from being far right, to comfortably left in 2012, and now despite being like, center left, I'm hated for not being on the cutting edge of the far left.

What of economics? Well, let's face it, I'm left of the democratic party. The democrats' centrist wing is pathetically center right. They made their shifts in the 90s and while they've slowly drifted left, they aren't amazingly so today. Biden might be the most progressive president since LBJ, but that isn't really saying much at all, given how far right the overton window has been since then. And even then, LBJ literally sparked the UBI discussions of the 60s and 70s with his great society being such a broken and flawed program. At the time it was championed by the right, as a more efficient and libertarian alternative to welfare (and this later did influence my views on the topic), but it was then championed by the left in the form of george mcgovern who was rejected by the democrats, and then the parties shifted far right since. So I come across UBI in 2013-2014 and I'm basically like, this is what conservative me would see as utopian leftism. And while it has roots in right wing ideology, that branding of the right is long dead and its effectively a far left idea today. Medicare for all, and free college also seemed ridiculously far left at the time. Bernie made M4A and free college a bit more mainstream, and purity tests of the progressive wing, but they never got on board with UBI. They went with UBI's biggest competitor, the job's guarantee, and as an ex conservative, what i saw as an inefficient and authoritarian alternative to UBI. You see, I guess there was a little conservatism left in me as I always found democratic approaches to solving problems horridly inefficient, but that drove me to support what i considered ideas to be further left. But as the sanders movement set the bleuprint for modern progressivism, I just didn't fit in this new paradigm. As society crystalized around me, my views didn't change, but society changed around me. 

That said, now yang is considered to be this centrist or something for supporting UBI and wanting government to run...efficiently. It's weird. it's not really me that's changed much, it's society has changed around me. I just keep picking the side that represents me best as I go along. And then when I end up reaching disagreements with those factions, I cut ties. 

The fact is, when I really look at it, I don't think my views have changed much in the past 7-9 years. I mean, maybe I did go a little left as the country did in 2016-2020 or so, but then I basically snapped back, as tensions grew with the factions I supported. That's what I described recently on the race issues like BLM. Like, I can sympathize with george floyd, but then the movement turns into basically arguing against a police shooting of every brown person ever. Oh, he had a knife and charged at the cop? Why didn't he disarm him? Why shoot him? Uh, because the cop's life is in danger? Duh.

For the most part, society just shifted around me. The overton window on a lot of issues, particularly social issues is radically far left, and I just cant keep up. On economics, the democrats maintained their centrist branding which alienates me, but at the same time,  the progressive wing is just too crazy left for me, and I consider myself, and the yang gang, for that matter, to be a new form of left wing that isnt as radical as the socialists and progressives, but isnt as moderate as the centrists. It's just different. People struggle to place it on a spectrum, because it just doesn't fit. As I keep saying, it's simultaneously radical and moderate. It would radically change society, without undermining our fundamental institutions as they exist. And people just can't wrap their heads around that. Well, as yang and Scott Santens would say, its not left or right, its forward. But to me, forward tends to imply some level of progressivism. it's simply "alt left." 

That said, overall, between now and 2012, I'd say roughly 80-90% of my apparent political shifts are just the environment around me changing what the left right spectrum looks like, and 10-20% is me actually having a change of heart. I don't think I'm becoming more conservative as I age all that much. I'm just discovering I was just never that radically left in the first place, and I just sound a bit more conservative as a result. 

I really don't think lefties today know what conservatives look like today if they think I'm conservative. I WAS conservative. Trust me. I'm not that any more.