Discussing the republican debate and my overall reaction to it

 So tonight we had the first republican debate....without Trump. And...it was...shall I say, almost glorious. Without our illustrious frontrunner, who is facing even MORE charges tomorrow and will be arrested again (still hoping for that mug shot, they did Guiliani today), the debate was, shall we say, mostly SANE. The feeling in the room (other than that one nutcase, who I will discuss later) seemed to be one of a party that was over Trump, and who wanted to go back to debating substantive issues. This does not mean I agree with ANY of these candidates. I am liberal through and through these days, and I largely felt like they were full of crap in bashing Biden on the economy, but they seemed less sane and rabid than the republican standard bearers of today. It reminded me more of the conservatism when I was young during the Bush era, instead of the rabid batcrap insanity that we're dealing with today. If most of these guys got elected, I would actually feel like they wouldn't be a treat to democracy, and I would happily return to voting third party in an effort to shift the democrats left. Without the threat of Trump, it's like there would be nothing tying me to the current democratic party and its movement. Heck, if some of these guys got elected, I've even tempted to say the two parties aren't that different from one another. With that said, let's discuss the debate as a whole.

Winners: Chris Christie and Mike Pence

The winners of the debate in my opinion were Chris Christie and Mike Pence. 

Chris Christie got into several spats with the big loser, Vivek Ramaswamy, and I loved how he started going on about he's like a chatGPT bot personified and how he was completely and utterly unqualified for office. Chris Christie in general offered a strong performance, in which he ripped trump to shreds, and his stand in, Ramaswamy, not doing much better. 

Still, despite offering a strong debate performance, I'm not sure that he is what the modern republican party wants. He's basically the kind of conservative I am as a liberal. Someone who is moderate and would work with democrats and compromise. He was the republican governor of a blue state after all. And honestly? there isn't much functionally different between him and a centrist democrat. maybe hes a little more conservative, sure, but there is that weird middle ground where neoliberal democrats and liberal conservatives start meeting in the middle and if it came down to Christie vs Biden, I wouldn't really see a ton of difference and would probably vote green. 

But...let's face it. The republican party has gone in the direction of extremism. Trump is dominating the current voter base by a massive margin. Ramalamadingdong (Ramaswamy) and DeSantis are vying for #2, and everyone else is irrelevant. The party very obviously is leaning toward the extremes and I'm not even sure that it can be saved. Still, based on the merits, I have to say Christie offered a valid alternative to the modern republican standard bearers.

But if someone has more conservative values, well, I would say Mike Pence did pretty good. he was the second guy who I would say won. As a liberal I'm more cheering on Christie, but if I were still conservative, Pence would be my guy. He has that old school conservatism that feels more and more like a thing of the past. He's a fundie christian, but he's also PRINCIPLED. he actually stood up to Trump on January 6th, and he also has an impressive record, which he stood on. Given the lack of ideological diversity on issues on the right, I mean, I think Pence is the strongest vision of that that isn't COMPLETELY insane. It's sad I'm actually praising a fundie christian and the vice president of the traitorous one, but here we are. Trump has broken the overton window so bad I'm actually praising the fundie christian of being "sane." 

Oh, and Pence also made vivek look like an idiot too. It is was quite clear he didn't know what he was talking about and pence showed him just how inexperienced he was.So yeah.

As a liberal, if I had to vote in this primary, I'd go christie. As an ex conservative, if I put my conservative thinking cap back on, I'd vote for Pence. Let me just say that was how I read the room after this debate. 

Hung in there: Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis

With the winners out of the way, let's discuss the ones who kinda sorta hung in there. I think Nikki Haley had a pretty strong showing, with strong answers (for republicans) on abortion and foreign policy, and she also joined in on the dogpile of making Ramaswampy (yeah I'm being cheeky with the nicknames tonight, F that guy) look like an inexperienced idiot. Given she barely has any support, I think that simply holding your own elevates you. I don't think she's anyone's first choice, but a second or third? Yeah. If I were still a republican I'd probably consider her my second behind mike pence at this rate. 

The other "hung in there" candidate for me was DeSantis. Now, given Haley's relative position in the race, this was a good thing. But for DeSantis? He's like vying for 2nd with Ramaswamy. And while he had some standout answers, like no more lock downs or whatever, the only things that differentiated him from the pack were trying to be a hardliner and as David Pakman pointed out as I was watching him, that he seemed to yell all the time, eh....not the best debate performance. I mean he kept himself relevant, but he just didn't stand out at all. If he wasn't already second, he would be in the third batch of candidates I'm going to talk about. So this is a de facto loss for him. He's in a position where he doesn't need to break out, he needs to WIN, GAIN GROUND, STAND OUT FROM THE PACK. And he just...hung in there...with the pack. So, I don't think that he had a particularly strong performance.

Who were they again?: Tim Scott, Doug Borgum, Asa Hutchinson

These guys are de facto losers. None of them have support, and none of them stood out at all. In a crowded pack, you need to stand out on the stage. None of these guys particularly did. I mean, I guess Tim Scott KINDA did, I remember him telling his story about growing up in poverty and him circlejerking american dream nonsense. But virtually everything he said was just bog standard republican talking points that blended into the background. The only thing I recall about Doug Borgum is that he ran very strongly in a liberal anti trump direction, the same as christie, but given christie was there, he just didn't stand out either. I can't even remember anything Asa Hutchinson said, that's how boring that guy was. Of course that also could've been david pakman talking through his sections to some extent too. 

Ya know? These guys were like the lincoln chafees and jim webbs of 2016, or in 2020, the likes of howard schultz, or mike bloomburg or some random governor or mayor you never heard of. They just didn't stand out AT ALL. And given its a crowded field, either you make a case for yourself that differentiates yourself, or I have to ask 'why are you even here?" And that's how I felt about this batch of guys. 

Big loser: Vivek Ramaswamy

Vivek Ramaswamy did stand out to me, but not in a good way. This guy is inexperienced, and he's a psycho. He always had the most extreme and hardline positions, the dude talked about wanting to pardon trump if convicted, and his lack of depth on issues like foreign policy was astounding. And he got BODIED by several much more experienced and polished candidates. The general vibe from him is he was that inexperienced kid who had no clue what he was saying, and the more experienced people were telling him to shut up and sit down and go back to the kiddie table. 

Yet...I look on the internet, and people think he WON? WHAT?! I admit, I'm out of touch with the GOP these days. I mean, even when I TRY to put my GOP thinking cap back on, I mean, look at who I like, Chris Christie? Mike Pence? Nikki haley? Yeah, losers who are barely registering in the polls at all. But my own conservative mindset was one of dinosaurs, back when conservatives wanted to conserve the status quo, and wanted to govern effectively, and things like political experience mattered. That stuff DOESN'T matter in a modern political environment, and the fact that most conservatives want to vote for candidates who have zero political experience and who say batcrap insane things shows how far that party has fallen from grace.

I don't even agree with conservatism any more. The second these guys STARTED going that way, it caused me to reevaluate the entire ideology where I ended up leaving it and becoming a liberal. But that doesn't mean that there aren't republicans who I'd respect more than others. And honestly? There are some republicans on that stage who if they won, I could live with the result. Note that none of them are what I'd want, but I could deal with it.
But when I see this guy, I see a nutcase. A young, charismatic nutcase. He has no experience, no qualifications, he has no idea what he's talking about, and his ideas are INSANE. Like at one point he talked about how people born in this country should have to pass citizenship tests to become citizens like immigrants do. I also remember previously people saying he wanted to raise the age to vote to 25. He's an illiberal authoritarian nutcase in my opinion. He always had the most extreme, off the wall positions, and maybe that appeals to modern conservatives, but if so, that tells me that the traditional republicans have definitely lost the party. And that is scary. We're literally watching a realignment into fascism if that's the case, and that's NOT good, that's the result we should be trying to avoid if anything. 

Principled conservatives, ya know, old school ones who actually still CARE about democracy, should be opposing candidates like Trump and Ramaswamy as if they were the strawman they thought obama was. Ya know, that socialist dictator who would take over the country and destroy it. Because these guys would. Even desantis is a threat, but even he comes off looking relatively sane here.

As an ex right winger, to any republicans who still have a spine and some principles and care about democracy and the constitution and "good old american values", I have to say: TAKE YOUR PARTY BACK FROM THESE NUTCASES, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD. I have to admit, this isn't my problem any more, it's not my circus, it's not my monkeys, I left in 2012, I'm not coming back to the right, but FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, TAKE YOUR PARTY BACK FROM TRUMP AND THOSE WHO FOLLOW HIM. He is a demagogue, he is dangerous, and so is Ramaswamy. 

DNF: Donald Trump

Trump is the frontrunner, he didn't so how, and he decided to do a circlejerk softball interview with Tucker Carlson instead. I have not watched it yet, although if I do, and it actually has anything worth talking about, I'll discuss that too, but let's face it, nothing else trump does or says has positive value, so why should I even bother for the most part? I also think trump is a nut, I also think that he's dangerous, and I don't think he has much worth talking about. Trump's general level of intelligence is too low for this blog, which is why i barely mention him and when I do it's with complete and utter disdain as if I'm treating him like a child. Because he's just a giant manchild. A 70 something year old baby. And honestly, the GOP should've thrown him to the curb the way the establishment tried to do with Ramaswamy tonight. 

Trump is also arrogant. He is so far ahead he thinks he has this wrapped up and doesn't even think he has to debate. First of all because he's an illiberal butthole who doesnt believe in debating his opponents, and two, because he would probably get ganged up on and that would make him look bad. And given he is the frontrunner and he is that arrogant, he took the gamble that he can just take his support base with him and do a softball interview instead and how followers will tune in to that and not the debate.

It's possible this will work given the cultish appeal and the pull that he has, but it could also backfire. I mean, normally Im fighting to get people represented in debates and giving them more air time, and here this guy is in the ultimate position of privilege and he just goes "yeah no not gonna debate"? Yeah, bye felicia! We saw the result of that. I mean, I just saw a potential glimpse at a post trump republican party, and I like what I see. I see sane people who I might disagree with strongly, but who I can at least respect. I see the republican party of my youth, before the tea party and trump ruined it. Not that that's my thing any more, but I feel like if we go back to that and a sense of normalcy, that's a good sign. And that could also put a fire under the democrats to do better too. You think we LIKE Joe Biden? Hillary Clinton? God no. We only vote for those guys at this point because the right has gotten so scary that we feel like we have to JUST TO PRESERVE democracy. Honestly? I struggle to see much of a difference between the centrist faction of the democratic party, and that of the GOP. The differences are minimal and it's like voting between coke and pepsi.

And it's possible this debate might be a shift toward that reality. Perhaps trump is shooting himself in the foot by not debating. maybe once the show is no longer about him, the world will finally move on, and we can finally come back to sanity. One can hope. Honestly, I wish this is what we did in the first place. As I said in 2016, the dude thrived on drama and controversy, and was a giant troll, and the way to make him go away is not to feed the donald. So if donald wants to NOT debate, and the GOP race becomes NOT about him, that's the best outcome.

As long as that fricker Vivek Ramaswamy doesn't take his place. Or DeSantis to a lesser degree.

Conclusion

Honestly, this has been the best GOP debate I've watched in like, over a decade. Since at least 2012. it was mostly civil, and the one guy who was an A-hole got his butt unceremoniously handed to him by a group of experienced politicians who actually kinda sorta knew what they were talking about. It felt like a blast from the past, and seeing these guys in charge of the GOP make me feel much less scared for the future. 

Heck, I feel such a different vibe from the civil and relatively moderate debate that we had that I would almost like to offer a proposition to the right. You dump trump, and dont replace him with someone like ramaswamy or desantis....and you push an old school conservative candidate, and I'm just gonna say it, I'm less inclined to vote for Biden in the general. I can't guarantee I won't, as there are SOME positive aspects to Biden that I like, but let's just say the vast majority of the guy's appeal is "he's not trump", and a lot of us on the left have principles, and would like to vote based on them again, without threatening to implode democracy. 

Currently, if Trump and Biden are the nominees, I'd say 80% chance I vote for Biden. But say it's Biden vs Pence or Haley or Christie....eh....that chance drops to like 20-30%. I mean, I like build back better and I like the child tax credit, and i like student debt forgiveness, but I'm going to be honest, I feel like we should be doing so much better than these half baked band aid programs. And given I like candidates like Williamson and West over Biden, let's just say I might be inclined to vote for them. Just gonna throw that out there. 

Of course, with my luck, it's possible the entire GOP base just tuned out and are gonna support their fuhrer no matter what he does or doesnt do. In which case we're screwed. 

Still, this debate was a nice look at a potential GOP without trump.

Why no one talks about UBI any more

 I came across a thread on r/basicincome asking why people don't talk about UBI like they used to, and I felt like, after some consideration, I should write my honest thoughts on this matter here, as it might be very diagnostic for identifying the problems in the UBI movement, and trying to solve them. As such, I feel a need to discuss the things that in my opinion stop UBI from being more popular, and ultimately stop popular support of the idea and implementation of it from forming.

The obvious elephant in the room

Like with everything else political, we need to go back to when the modern crapshow started, and that is 2016. I honestly feel like 2016 was a realigning year, and one that did not end in a good way. The fact is, the drama associated with the alt right, the SJW left, and the neoliberal center have just made it hard to talk about ANY progressive change. You got the alt right being psychotic and threatening to tear our democracy and rights apart at their seams. You got the neoliberal center focusing on pragmatism and trying to win over moderate conservatives fleeing from the trump movement, and those guys have zero interest in any radical reforms. And then you got the SJW left screaming that everyone needs to check their privilege.

I really feel like 2016 was just a really awful year politically, and it has done things to our politics that we may be stuck dealing with for decades. Now we on the left often feel we're fighting for the soul of our democracy in preventing the alt right proto-fascists from taking over, and the democrats just hold a gun to our heads and tell us that we better vote for them or else, often cheered on by the SJW left who is more focused on identity politics above all else than actually getting things done.

Given these forces, actual policy has become secondary. No one demands ask for big things, and those who do are considered entitled. As such, there's VERY little support for ANY idea that would meaningfully improve the lives of the American people.

UBI was never popular in the first place

The OP who made the thread's frame of reference was 2020-2021, and I'm going to be honest, UBI not being in the limelight is par for the course. The fact is, the last time it was really popular, the idea died off only for the country to get taken over by Reaganism, and it literally took a once in a lifetime recession to revive it and bring it back into the public consciousness.

And that's where I came into it. My own political views are most influenced by the public consciousness around 2012, where many of us were clamoring desperately for a solution to the hellscape that was the economy at the time. And I found my answers. UBI ended up being a darned near perfect solution to our problems, and the more that I researched it, the more convinced of it I became until my politics ended up basically looking like an early version of Andrew Yang's.

And despite that, it literally took until 2020 for Andrew yang for the idea to pick up steam again. And now that moment is past for various reasons I'll get into later, and the idea is dropping into obscurity again given the modern political environment in general.

Keep in mind, it's not just UBI that's in trouble right now. It's the left in general. No one who wants any meaningful positive change can accomplish it given the current political environment. Between trumpism on the right, neoliberalism on the left, and the outsized focus on identity politics, NO ideas can really pass in this current environment. 

The left HATES UBI

I know that the phase that Scott Santens and later Andrew Yang always used was "it's not left or right, but forward", but post Reaganism, the right just isn't gonna be for UBI at all. Don't even consider it right in the current context because the current right is anti government action and anti redistribution. The idea of UBI is opposed to its very principles. 

But I'm starting to realize the left is no better. As I've said before. There are three factions on the left generally speaking. You got the centrists/neoliberals who want centrism and incremental change, and THEY oppose UBI because they dont like big programs that redistribute lots of wealth. They're rather conservative, don't wanna rock the boat, and the best they'll do is the CTC. And I'll get into THAT later on, but suffice to say, that's as progressive as they're going to be on the matter.

SJWs are focused primarily on identity oriented goals, and while they'll scream for reparations for black people, the idea of a UBI is just foreign to them. We give EVERYONE money? including the privileged? Including bill gates? But the money should only go toward the poor, we need to care for the poor, and only the poor. And only the underprivileged. And as such, they create these identity based political battles where white working and middle class people often turn against ideas that would otherwise help them. Because democrats are only interested in helping people that aren't them. You need some level of enlightened self interest to bring those people into the left. And that's why I came over in 2012, after spending most of my life up to that point hating welfare. Because I didn't see it as helping me or people like me. And even then they're not even for ideas that materially help people. SJWs are into moralizing circlejerks that make them look morally superior. It's the same effect that happens among middle class conservatives who do charity. They are on any other day greedy self interested jerks who preach hardcore individualism and the bootstraps mentality, but when they do charity, it makes them oh so good in the ego. And SJWs are the left wing version of that, and given the white suburbanite shift from right to left in recent years/decades, I'd argue the two mindsets are literally the same.

And then you have..."the left." Like the actual left. Well, who came before Yang? We had Bernie. And he was that once in a generation leader on the left who ended up defining young lefties politics for better or for worse, and Bernie wasn't and isn't a UBI guy. He has a lot of good policies, but UBI isn't one of them. The fact is, he's gone harder into the jobs program and green new deal direction, and given the modern young left tends to treat the dude like the right treats Ronald Reagan, as the ultimate standard bearer for progressive politics, people who run afoul of that brand, even in minor ways, are often castigated for it. 

I noticed this when Yang ran in 2020 and suddenly the left started dogpiling on him because he called himself a "human centered capitalist" instead of a "democratic socialist". In practice, the two ethos aren't really...that much different. But the capitalist-socialist rhetoric is huge among young "socialists" and they seem to hate anyone who otherwise thinks similarly but calls themselves a "capitalist."

Which....kinda sabotages the left's larger success since most people arent interested in LITERAL socialism, but yeah, they look at Yang, and his unorthodox brand of politics that's pro UBI, but not necessarily pro green new deal, or focuses on unions or minimum wages, to be a bad thing. They'll even call him things like "libertarian trojan horse" and stuff (as in right libertarian, as in a pejorative). 

I mean, as I see UBI, it's reforming a dysfunctional, broken welfare system into something that not only works, but liberates people from economic coercion like most mainstream left policies do not. But for them, they see it as a threat to that welfare system. And they often propose alternative solutions to problems like universal basic services instead, and socialism, and jobs programs, and blah blah blah.

And Bernie himself moved in that direction. In 2016 his attitude toward UBI was ambivalent, and more "if you want it you gotta fight for it", basically encouraging people to rally for it if they wanted it. In 2020, he got stephanie kelton, the anti UBI pro JG economist on his team, and basically went hard in that direction. 

With that said, and with Bernie being the standard bearer for most of the left on the issues, UBI just ended up never getting the attention that it should have. Most people ended up going into more traditional leftist politics instead, leaving virtually no room for a pro UBI movement to grow. 

UBI might attract people from all over the aisle, but there's virtually no coalition for it

UBI IS an idea that appeals to people all over the spectrum, but it also turns away people all over the spectrum too. The modern right hates it, and while some on the right see it as a way to reform our welfare state (hence why the left ends up thinking it's a "trojan horse"), those guys are a tiny minority. 

And then people on the left hate it because it doesnt fit with their politics either. The three major factions on the left are centrists, leftists, and SJWs. The centrists and leftists are at odds with each other, but neither is particularly pro UBI. And of course SJWs hate it too.

So who is going to be for it in practice? There's no coalition. There's no path to viability. This is the problem with Andrew Yang that I pointed out in 2021, and why I started becoming disaffected from the left and shifted toward his forward party.

And of course among UBI oriented people across various political ideologies, there's no coalition there since different ideological factions want a different form of UBI. Right wingers want to abolish all welfare to only have a UBI, or maybe even an NIT, with the potential long term goal of phasing that out too. That said, UBI from the right really IS a trojan horse.

Then you have georgists who often spam subreddits with their crap, but are only interested in UBI on a secondary level. They primarily want a land value tax, which is a terrible approach to UBI, as it isn't very anti poverty oriented, and undermines its ability to be a way to liberate people from work, as per my ideology.

And of course, leftists are like herding cats. Traditional leftists might have little interest in UBI given their other priorities, or want UBI ON TOP of their priorities, the fact is, many of them don't prioritize UBI. Which is a shame because it offers a lot of unique benefits no other policy does.

ANd of course, I've gone in the direction of my ideology being primarily UBI focused, with it being the central politics that I build out my ideal welfare state from there. And this leads to a welfare state much different than most liberals and leftists. I have less emphasis on work, and tend to adopt strains of thought like indepentarianism, real libertarianism, and human centered capitalism into the fray. 

The point is, no one who is for UBI agrees on what UBI should look like or what ideological principles it should serve, so support for it is very lukewarm. 

Andrew Yang stopped advocating for it

UBI's biggest breakthrough moment in the US in recent years was from Andrew Yang's run for president on the idea. He actually did do some of the legwork to try to make a coherent case not only for it, but an entire political platform/ideology centered around it. And honestly? He was right up my alley. I might have minor disagreements with him over the issue, but we generally agree 90% of the time as far as that goes. 

The problem was, Andrew Yang isn't very consistent as an advocate. One day he's for something, the next he's backing away from it, and the next you never hear him talk about it again.

This is a huge reason the left hated him, given their desire for moral purity and consistency in supporting the same positions over the years. 

We saw this behavior early on with medicare for all, and while I admit I have kinda sorta gone in that direction too for pragmatic reasons, I at least try to be as consistent as possible. Yang didn't even have a recognizable healthcare policy by the end of the primary, and no one knew what he was really for. 

By the way, on that subject, the only reason Im lukewarm on M4A these days is because I'm not sure we can fund it AND a UBI at the same time. If we can, that's great, and we should take that approach. But if we can't, well, I have backup public options to complement my UBI with in order to fulfill my original principles as much as realistically possible. Again, if Yang had a similar approach, he didn't explain it.

And then Yang himself distanced himself more and more from UBI. His mayoral run was never a good race to advocate for such a thing, although he seemed to in some form. 

And then forward. Forward originally came off as a return to form, he quietly dropped universal healthcare from his original platform, but otherwise expanded his original cause into political reform like ranked choice voting, open primaries, and independent redistricting. Don't get me wrong these are all positive changes and I strongly endorse all 3 of them (well, at least RCV and independent redistricting, im mixed on open primaries). 

The problem came when Yang decided to merge his movement with the serve america movement and renew america movement, two right wing movements run by neocon types displaced from the modern republican party. And suddenly, UBI is gone. And while Yang remains a supporter, he does not openly advocate for the idea. 

In retrospect, maybe Yang was never the best guy to support the movement. I mean, he was polarizing among the left when he entered the race, and he ended up proving them right as he ended up distancing from it over time. He did a lot to advance it from 2019-2021, giving it some time in the sun, but given the broken political environment, nothing came out of it in the first place. And then he just up and abandoned it, with it losing a lot of mainstream support since then.

COVID, inflation, and "nobody wants to work any more"

A final consideration to think about is how the environment has moved since 2013 or so. Back then, when I first came across UBI, we were in the aftermath of the great recession. Unemployment was very high, jobs were hard to come by, and the economy seemed broken. This feeling extended through 2016, propelling movements like Trump's and Bernie's to the forefront. But given the cursed results of 2016 in general, the left was defeated, the democrats remained centrist, and trumpism became dominant on the right.

I've already talked about how this sucked any air out of the room for a genuine left wing movement in the US, regardless of form. But to speak a bit more, the left and right both generally agreed for various reasons the recession was over, things got back to normal and now the economy is "strong." 

But then we got his with the second once in a lifetime recession in 2020. This was brought about by disease. COVID was so deadly, and so contagious, that world leaders had no choice but to shut down the entire world economy. 

Now, for me, COVID just made me double down on UBI, with me saying "gee, you know what would help in this situation? A FRICKING UBI!" Seriously, from start to finish, this whole thing looked like a UBI would fix it. And we ended up passing stimulus checks and tons of aid packages to help people.It wasn't good enough but it was something. Biden even passed an expanded child tax credit which served as UBI for kids, and cut child poverty in half. For all of his flaws, that was one of the best things Biden has done, and is one of the reasons I cut him a little more slack than I would otherwise. 

But you know what? I would have gone further. COVID, if anything, solidified my views that I was on the right track from the start. And honestly? COVID also proved to me that the economy doesnt need everyone working all of the time. We literally laid off 1/3 of the country. We could make that our new normal and just work less. Not saying I would FORCE people to, but an economy with everyone getting money and people choosing whether to work or not sounds pretty close to what I want.

But...the country revolted against it. You see, the right actually fights for things. The left doesn't, as we'll get to, but the right does. And they saw the threat that COVID posed to their ideology, which is why they went ahead with the homicidal idea to reopen the economy ASAP and force people abck to work. When the right's status quo is threatened, they'll work overtime to sabotage any attempts at change. And the left normally rolls over for them. 

So, the right fought a literal culture war against covid, refusing to wear masks, refusing to get the shot, to acknowledge the virus. basically they wanted to go back to normal. Because the alternative threatened to overturn their values. If the masses realized this could be life from now on, maybe they'd grow accustomed to it and like it. So instead they fought against it. And over time, they won the majority of the country.

And when the vaccine came out, things opened up...all at once. And THIS caused massive shocks throughout the economy. Suddenly, everyone wanted to hire and struggled to find workers. The normally fine tuned economy was out of whack, and inflation started happening. And a "worker's shortage". And everyone blamed "free money". Apparently $1400 is enough to retire on now. 

Now I have pushed back against all of these ideas, but most people are economically illiterate, and as such they'll just blindly believe that the government spending money caused hyperinflation and that lazy people drove workers shortages. Again, the right knows what they're doing. They decided to fight this as a culture war to preserve their way of life, painting everything wrong as "radical democrats and their darned big spending policies". 

Honestly, even if Trump won a second term, and the GOP took congress, nothing would've changed. ANd they'd still blame the left. But the left....tries to distance themselves from things. And Biden quietly revoked as many restrictions on COVID as possible in 2022 and cut aid programs, trying to go back to normal. The right screams to go back to normal and fights for it, and the left...enables them. 

Anyway, in this environment, being the "free money" guy seems unattractive, because half the country believes that Biden's spending policies and $1400 checks and unemployment caused tons of people to stay home, and refuse to work, and they're lazy, and we need to cut this stuff.

SO the child tax credit was disbanded (actually it was manchin and his conservative mentalities, but you get the idea), and people quietly distanced themselves from all of this. And now no one even wants to touch UBI. Yang still seems for it, but given his obligations to his new party, he aint really defending it either. So the idea is once again just dropping out of awareness.

Conclusion

As such, the environment is currently hostile to UBI, and the seeds of the movement are sprouting in hostile soil that will eventually kill them off. I still believe in the idea. If anything, the older I get, the more pro UBI I get. From 2020 to 2023, I've gone in the opposite direction of being EVEN MORE pro UBI, to the point that I've pushed back against the bernie leftists on the subject and retooled my ideological priorities around it, which is one of the reasons i aint really keen on Williamson or West this time around (neither are pro UBI). And I do think that it is THE answer.

But it seems obvious that the movement has challenges. It lacks a unifying coalition or ideology behind the movement. And the political environment is such where in this 'strong economy" with low unemployment and high inflation, no one has the stomach for the idea.

Honestly, this is another reason why I'm fine with just going Biden in 2024 for the time being. This environment won't last forever, and honestly, an economy this "good" is rare, and even with it the core problems that drive me to the idea remain. Jobs are still oppressive. People still cant afford to live. Mainstream ideologies will never solve our problems. But maybe one day UBI might.

But we might have to wait a few years for the environment to settle down where we can realistically talk about the idea again. 2024 isn't our year. 2028 might be. 

Anyway, as a UBI advocate, indepentarian/real libertarian/human centered capitalist, etc, I think that we need to do a better job making a more comprehensive case for UBI. This is what I've been trying to do over the past year as i toyed with writing a book on the subject, but then not really getting anywhere. I'm still thinking this stuff through. I'm still trying to put the finer points on what arguments need to be made and where to go from here. But I don't think it's good enough to just advocate for UBI in a vacuum. We need to advocate for an actual ideology that supports UBI as its centerpiece and then argue for that. Many writings I've made on here have tried to accomplish that. That's why im always critical of everyone else ideologically. All of the old ideologies have problems, because they all lack the proper exegesis on the economy to get to the core of its problems and how to solve them. And we need to make our own that makes a case FOR UBI and complementary policies if we want to succeed. And yeah. I'll keep working on doing this I guess.

How conservatism has influenced my post conservative life

 So, as you guys know, I'm actually an ex conservative. I became more liberal in 2012, and shifted my ideological foundations radically, going from conservative christianity to secular humanism and liberalism. But in retrospect, I have noticed that I never fully integrated myself into liberalism, and that this is why my own political ideology has gone in a different direction than full on left wingers. While I am generally liberal and consider modern conservatism to be bankrupt, I have to admit that conservatism has had impacts on my philosophy that have caused me to diverge both from traditional liberals and leftists. And I figured that it might be useful and productive to discuss how this is the case, as it helps provide further ideological clarity to my worldview. That said, let's get into it.

Social policy

A very american perspective on rights and freedoms

I notice this most distinctly when discussing the Rammstein thing, but despite ripping on the constitution worshipping right wingers, I am still a bit of a constitution worshipper. I love our freedoms. Freedom of speech. Right to bear arms. Rights for criminals in various amendments. presumption of innocence, rule of law, equal rights for all, etc. I am very influenced by the liberal tradition of our constitution and its rights. I admit that our own legal system isnt the end all be all of everything. I'm not a strict constitutionalist like the right is. I admit there are flaws, and i tend to embrace a more liberal perspective of the spirit of the law rather than its letter (ie, living constitution vs strict constitutionalist). But...seeing other countries and how they're doing things? I have to be like, wtf Europe sometimes. Like they just dont have the free speech rights we do. They dont have the rights to bear arms. And I tend to be really going against the left over a lot of their cancel culture mob justice nonsense, in how they seem to want to hang till lindemann by his entrails simply because a woman accused him of bad things. Even though said woman didnt actually accuse him of anything apparently, and just got off for that. And I ended up having to defend that decision today. because that's how much i respect the rule of law and rights and freedoms and stuff.

For me, it's a very structural functionalist thing. I see these rules and laws having been formed in the legacy of past wrongdoings to prevent future wrongdoings, and I see their erosion to be harmful to society as a whole. These legal protections exist for a reason, and if we try to repeal them, we're screwing around, and will find out. To preserve a free society, I largely support them. Even if I am sometimes critical of exact legal structures for whatever reason and propose reforms. 

Go woke, go broke

Ya know, I always had a disdain for SJWs, even as a conservative. They werent called that back then, they were called things like "feminazis" and blah blah blah. But as I get older, i can't help but feel like that the criticism against them is more than valid than I gave it credit for. let's face it, 2012 was an election cycle where these politics werent prominent. And it made it easier to come over.My own politics were influenced by atheism/secular humanism, and by libertarianism. 

I never embraced all of this hyper insectionality BS, and privilege, and blah blah blah, and while there was always some aspect to it, i kinda tolerated it rather than openly embracing it. And the second it went against my priorities, I started attacking them. And I haven't been friendly with them since. And am now to the point of flat out opposing their ideology, and realizing it is illiberal and against everything I believe in. I admit they sometimes have valid points, but here's the thing, I DONT CARE. Which brings me to my next point.

Self interest is GOOD

Look, it's not bad to have empathy, it's not bad to care about others, but as I see it, all humans are self interested. Note that I didn't say evil, I dont believe, like christians, that humanity is EVIL. But we are selfish, and I dont see any reason to expect people to be otherwise. But liberals care. They love to virtue signal how much they care. And they love to portray themselves as selfless and moral. While conservatives have church, the social justice cult and democratic party often is the left's church. 

And a lot of times, discipline is enforced within the left by use of stuff like telling people to check your privilege and care for others. And for me, if this goes against my own "enlightened self interest", this appeal is crap. I am a believer of the so called sociological imagination. That the personal, is the sociological. That one can connect one's personal issues to larger societal trends. And that people can recognize that by solving social issues, they help themselves. But the left just seems to expect people to be perfect little angels, be selfish, not advocate for things in their self interest, and shames them for doing so. Then they wonder why many people won't vote for them. Well THOSE people must be selfish and racist and blah blah blah. Which brings me to the next two points.

Individualism is good

One of the worst aspects of the left, from a conservative or libertarian perspective, is the focus on collectivism. One cannot deny the individual and their liberty. My ideal reality has everyone pursuing their own interests and living their lives as they want. And while I sometimes believe that a little collectivism is needed for that (see my economic policies and enlightened self interest), and that extreme individualism is bad. I cannot deny being an individualist at heart. I'm just one who sometimes realizes that "apes together strong."

Racism is a heart issue

The left is OBSESSED with racism, and as I said above, I don't really care. Racism is NOT a priority for me. And I don't even think it's realistic to solve it without extreme authoritarianism. Because racism is a heart issue. I dont support racism, I dont embrace racism, I think racism is bad. Okay? Can we get that out of the way? Bad things are bad. But how do we solve that? Eliminate peoples' free speech rights because they say bad things? Not in favor of that. Also, the left seems to demand some level of moral purity on the issue that is ridiculous. It's like fundamentalist christianity, trying to force people to believe certain things and act in ways that go against their nature when it doesn't work. Trying to use authoritarian means to correct for peoples beliefs. Trying to implement poor policies that don't solve the problem and just inflame tensions further like affirmative action.I'll come back to the pragmatism issue later on in economics, but as far as I'm concerned, if one is racist, that is a heart issue, and regulating your way out of it just leads to reduced freedoms otherwise. My belief in the rule of law trumps gains on this one issue. 

Guns good

Unpopular opinion, but I believe in our second amendment. While gun violence is a problem in society, I don't support more than moderate gun control, and believe in the right to bear arms.

Immigration

To be blunt, I'm somewhat nationalist for economic reasons, and given my support for universal safety nets, I'm not for open borders and the like. i like controlled immigration, and while we shouldnt be overtly inhumane to illegal immigrants, I don't really think we should give them the full rights of citizenship either. I admit a compromise is necessary for those who are here, and my views are a lot more left on this issue than right in practice, but I still retain some elements of my right wing perspective here like immigrants shouldnt get social services, should learn english, and i'm not a fan of the birthright citizenship loophole. 

As many right wingers will point out of lefties, sometimes their obsession with empathy gets the better of them here. How can you be for universal safety nets with no obligations or work requirements attached to them, while also being pro open borders or illegal immigration? That does not work. There's an obvious budgeting problem with that. You need to be more explicitly neoliberal or third way for that to work, and that doesn't influence my politics. 

Oh, and btw, not long ago, this wasn't controversial, in 2016, Bernie called open borders a "koch proposal." It is.

Principles > "Pragmatism"

So this is a section I added in later on that I forgot to mention in my original release of this article, but a big thing I bring from conservatism to liberalism is my emphasis on principles over pragmatism.

Now, I admit I'm a pragmatist on economics later in this article, but this is much different than left wing "pragmatism". When I am a pragmatist, I mean it in the sense that I ask if an idea is actually possible in reality. Like, can it work, if implemented? That's the good kind of pragmatism. but often liberals (particularly DNC supporting ones) talk about so called "political pragmatism." Ie, whether we can pass something into law and whether we have the votes. I dont care. I push for what I push for, and I dont temper my expectations much to cater to "moderates" or blah blah blah.

I mean, when I was a right winger, we HATED so called "RINOs" (republicans in name only). We would do the political equivalent of tarring and feathering them and ran most of them out of elected office between the 1990s and the 2010s. "What's the matter with kansas" talks about this.

But on the left, everything is "well we dont have the votes" and "what about joe manchin?" And "we need incremental change" and blah blah blah. And as an ex conservative, it's sickening.

A lot of liberals have this weird "nice guy" type attitude of acting like republican voters line up to vote for whoever the republican nominee is and that the left needs the same discipline, except...my experience on the right is anything but this. hell, in my later conservative days, I developed a libertarian streak and supported freaking Ron Paul. I considered voting libertarian in 2008. And no one gave me crap for that. What they gave me crap for was moderating in 2011 or so and becoming more liberal. If you're a principled hardliner, the right loves that and respects that. What they hate are moderates who have no principles in their eyes.

On the left, it's the opposite. There's this weird cultish mentality that we have to fall in line and vote blue no matter who even if the candidate is a piece of crap, even if we dont like them, even if they offer nothing. The left is largely AFRAID to vote their consciences, and it actually is quite disgusting.

To be fair, I'm to a point where I am recognizing that the principled "left" is just as insane as the far right at times just about, but still, the centrists arent much better with their overemphasis on pragmatism and incrementalism. And I do support the whole "hold your politicians accountable and vote them out of office if they dont represent your values" mindset. I've just recognized, as far as leftists go, that I don't share their values. Hell, I don't share anyone's actually. I'm basically politically homeless these days. Still, I do tend to lean toward the side of supporting my actual values rather than voting for a crap candidate that I hate over one I actually like.

Economic policy

Actual Pragmatism

The big thing the right likes to pull is to act as if left wing ideas dont work. it does so by pointing out the failures of communism. "Communism is a nice theory on paper, but it doesnt work." And it's true, for as high minded as some leftists were, their ideas were failures in practice and shouldnt be repeated. And no, dont give me that "real communism has never been tried" crap. Real communism CANNOT WORK. It's a theory on paper.

The same logic is also erroneously applied to liberalism. While there are issues with liberal thinking that I'll get to in other points, liberal ideas do work, and can work. And I generally speaking run every proposal I advocate for through a "can it work" viewpoint. I literally try to plan out the policy, what it will look like, and what the consequences are before I go for it. I like to look before I leap. And this is a huge reason I've come to embrace more liberal thinking with its focus on more responsible, reformist approaches to change, rather than radical chance.

"Government doesn't do anything right"

Ronald Reagan once said the most scary words in the English language are "I'm from the government and I'm here to help". Seriously, i bashed leftism enough, but let's focus on liberalism (although leftists solutions often have similar problems). Take obamacare. We had this policy that was 1200 pages long, barely did anything, and while it made some positive progress, it also was very flawed in its nature. 

Like everything the left does is like this. Instead of taking the simple approach, they go for this complicated piecemeal approach. Often out of so called "pragmatism". By while my pragmatism is about "will this work", theirs is about "well can this pass congress given the current political environment?" Combined with their focus on empathy and feels, but only for selective groups of people, liberals are infamous for promoting these piecemeal policies that are overly complicated and full of bureaucracy and barely do anything. 

Honestly, much like andrew yang, i believe in "modern and effective government" and that we should do things the simplest ways possible. UBI, ideally with taxes that are deducted from your paycheck as you go, so you never have to file taxes, and you get free money every month. 

Btw, a lot of conservatives used to like UBI and its sister policy the NIT (its more bureaucratic and means tested cousin) because it avoided a lot of the economic pitfalls that welfare often has with work incentives and poverty traps and blah blah blah.

Real freedom for all

Ultimately, I like the idea of economic liberty. I just realize that economic liberty in a conservative paradigm is that you're free to work or starve to death. While conservatives believe in all of this theoretical liberty, they don't seem to realize that such liberty is actually unattainable, and that unfettered rights to property lead to a world in which we're all enslaved to property owners.

by implementing simple policies like UBI and healthcare, I help capitalism live up to its full potential. Unlike what leftists think, I dont hate capitalism. I dont always love it either, but i tend to have the same attitude toward it conservatives often do of democracy, it being the least bad system. Much like phillipe van parjs and his concept of real freedom for all, I believe that my policies actually INCREASE economic liberty. And provide a free market solution to capitalism's greatest ills. 

I mean think of it this way, if a worker doesnt like his job, what is a better solution? Dont fix the core power imbalance but then impose band aids like minimum wages and regulations and unions and blah blah blah. Or...we can just give people money and if they decide it isnt worth working any more, they can quit? Ya know? I dont think a lot of people would tolerate crap jobs if they werent economically coerced to work bad jobs. Again, I kind of believe, you give people the money, that they'll make the proper decisions for it.

I know modern conservatives hate this. Both modern conservatives, and liberals, and even leftists, are often very paternalistic about how people should act and what they should do with their time. I believe in the individual, and I believe people should make rational decisions about that. 

And before people wonder if no one would work at all if we gave people that much freedom, relax, there are economic curves for work incentives, and while as UBI and taxes increase, work incentive goes down, there is likely a point of optimal balance between one's economic freedom and economic growth. 

Enlightened self interest

Unlike a lot of libs, I dont expect people to be caring for the poor and the underprivileged, etc., I just ask you to do a basic calculus and tell me if my ideas would help you. No one likes taxes, but taxes are, admittedly, the lesser evil, when the alternative is, IMO, wage slavery. Is it better to pay based on your ability to do so, or it better to be forced to work just to survive? Again, I dont expect people to be selfless, I just expect them to ask if my ideas would help them. And 8/10 times, they probably would. 

Like, Im not trying to get everyone to work in a collective, I'm not trying to make people take time out of their day to do things or expend effort on issues, I just ask...would you rather work and earn whatever money you do? or would you rather pay 20% more of your check to get back $15000? If you earn under $75000, as most do, it sounds attractive. And keep in mind that scales higher in households.

Foreign policy

Enlightened self interest at work again

I'm of the opinion that most americans dont wanna focus more on foreign policy than they have to. And I dont think we should get involved in a lot of stuff we do. We shouldnt get involved in foreign wars that dont concern us or further our national interest.

At the same time though, a lot of stuff DOES impact our national interest. Do we want Russia rampaging through Europe like its the 1940s again? Do we want China to take over taiwan? Do people not realize that these things are not in our national interest, and we kinda do sorta have to do things sometimes to ensure that freedom remains free? Because we do.

Afghanistan and Iraq were a waste. But combatting russia and china, our greatest geopolitical foes, are not a waste. And to go more into that...

America is the lesser evil on the world stage

When i say enlightened interest, I dont mean "screw people over" by invading other countries because capitalism. We've done a lot of wrong in the past, and sometimes in the world today. BUT...never forget that Russia and China are worse. Those countries are powerful (but at this time not as powerful as us), they're illiberal and they're authoritarian. And if they had more sway on the world stage, that would be BAD for us. It might be a long term threat to our economic freedom, self determination, and national security. So, we have to contain them, and build relationships with other countries and maintain alliances. We need to support NATO. We need to support our allies in Asia and the pacific. We need to contain our rivals and enemies.

The anti war left is stupid

Ya know, my dad was a vietnam vet. He would come home from the war, only to get spit on in the port authority in NYC, because weirdo leftists called him a "baby killer". I despise the SJW left, but the anti war left reeks of the same obnoxious self righteousness and shoving their vlaues down others' throats as they do.

I dont care what your values are. But we should at least respect the troops. I dont think we need to go all "thank you for your service" every 5 seconds where the right engages in literal hero worship and stuff over that stuff. But yes, respect the troops. A lot of them believe they're doing the right wing. And in the case of vietnam, A LOT OF THEM DIDNT WANNA BE THERE. There was a draft in that war, ya know? And just because my dad enlisted, he did so because he recognized if he did not go in on his own terms, he would've been drafted. 

The same goes with the anti war left of today that screams america bad while unapologetically spewing pro putin talking points. America isnt perfect, but were the lesser evil. And you are allowed to say the stupid BS things you do because of our freedoms. If you said this crap in russia or china against your home country there, you would be arrested. So have some respect. At least a little, huh?

Heck, let's just say that the SJW mentality of being obnoxious, self righteous, virtue signalling, and intolerant of other opinions is the most obnoxious and alienating aspect of the left, and that all it does is drive everyone right.

Conclusion

Not everything I spoke of is explicitly a conservative value. A lot of these ideas are liberal. But, they arent quite the same as modern liberalism, and are rooted in holdovers from my past conservative philosophy. As such, when I came over to the left, I quickly identified the kinds of left wing politics i DIDNT find useful or were a liability, and i corrected for them. As such, I created a new form of left politics that should be appealing to some conservatives. But...sadly...conservatives have just radicalized into illiberal fascists themselves over the past decade,a nd are so far gone fricking mike pence and mitt romney look like moderates, and constitutional conservatism is no longer a thing.And the left often picks fights with me (and i with them) over obvious philosophical differences with them.

I dont believe i am conservative. Maybe more so than a lot of liberals and leftists on certain topics, but generally, all being conservative is, is preserving the status quo and wanting change. Almost all lefties, progressives, liberals etc will, upon reaching a certain level of change, become conservative. And I would argue the reason i come off more conservative in 2023 than I did in 2013, despite not really changing my core convictions much, is because what those things mean has changed with the times, and views that were once radical now come off as weirdly conservative to some leftists and even some liberals.

Again, I dont believe my views have largely changed. I always believed this stuff, these are lessons i learned from my old conservatism and that influence my post conservative politics. I just feel more of a need to write about this stuff now, because of how far left some of the left has gotten, and how I feel the need to correct for that by laying down some basic philosophical principles that keep me grounded, so i dont make the same dumb mistakes I see other liberals and leftists making. Because these people dont seem to learn and it makes me cringe how basic these guys fallacies often are.

And that's another way to read this. Rather than how conservatism influenced my politics, one can read it as what i see as the biggest fallacies of the left. Because the whole point of these principles, was to help me avoid making the same mistakes they often did, and still do.

The Maui thing is why we need basic income

 So, as we know, Maui had a natural disaster, fires burned down peoples' homes, and Biden wants to give those people a whopping $700 for their trouble. I swear this man is just one step up from hurling paper towels into the crowd. It's pathetic.

Anyway, Scott Santens is pushing for $700 a month for the next year per individual. And that's better. He's a UBI advocate as we all know. He's using this to push for UBI, and that"s far more effective. 

But, I'm once again going to plug for full on UBI. $1250 a month per adult, $450 per child. Every citizen in the country. If you lose your job, you're taken care of. If you lose your house, you're taking care of. Cat 5 hurricane demolishes your entire community? Everyone is taken care of. Just pack up and move, live on the UBI, and get your crap together. If a disease comes and shuts down the entire country like COVID did, boom, automatically taken care of. 

Like...so many of these issues would be solved if we just had a UBI. We wouldnt have to hee and haw about aid, and how much, and who gets it, and how its administered and blah blah blah. Nah, UBI is the aid, here's your money, go go go. Get your life back together. And if you screw up somehow, well, there's always next month. 

UBI is the ultimate financial security. It's basically social security, but for everyone. And then people pick themselves up by their bootstraps from there. Find a new place to live, find a new job (if you want/need one), etc etc etc.No need for bureaucracy, or middlemen. Just get the job done. Again, we could solve so many problems if we just gave people a UBI from the get go.

And let's face it, UBI is generous enough that it makes Biden's tiny aid package look as insulting as it is. Again, one step up from the toilet paper guy. Just my opinion.

Discussing free speech, European speech laws, and the Shelby Lynn thing (Rammstein)

 So, in a rare legal win (given the vast majority of cases are going Till/Rammstein's way), Shelby Lynn won a case against Till Lindemann, in which Lindemann sought an injunction against her for accusing him of drugging her and stuff, and the courts sided with Shelby.

I have very mixed thoughts on this. Let it be known that I am NO fan of Shelby Lynn. To be blunt, I think she's a lying piece of crap who is at this point knowingly lying and exploiting her status as an alleged victim (even though by her own admission nothing had happened to her), for personal gain in the context of fame (or infamy, as far as us Rammstein fans go). 

 On the other hand, as an American, i DO NOT like a lot of Germany's approaches to speech. The idea that Till Lindemann, as much as I otherwise agree with his side of the story, can lawyer up and go around just suing the everloving crap out of anyone who accuses him of something or in some cases reports on it is very unsettling to me. In America, we have the first amendment, we have freedom of speech and freedom of press, and while yellow journalism is a thing (and a scourge, let's be honest), and I would definitely say the media is irresponsible at times, I struggle to come up with meaningful solutions to this that do not compromise freedom of speech. 

Imagine if i wrote something on this blog badmouthing someone and then I get sued or something. It's ridiculous. While defamation is a thing, our laws are as such where you have to prove malice before silencing someone. And while I would argue Lynn has gone so far off the deep end I would argue that at this point, she is potentially acting with malice, the court seemingly disagrees. This is a rare loss for Lindemann. Outside of a couple other minor injunctions he's lost, Till has won the vast majority of cases against him, with many news outlets being forced to issue retractions for their quite frankly irresponsible reporting. 

 With that said, I did want to go into this issue a bit.

Hamburg Regional Court does not see Shelby Lynn's statements as an expression of suspicion, but a mere expression of opinion that does not violate Till Lindemann's personal rights.

After Shelby Lynn recently publicly stated that she personally had nothing to accuse our client Till Lindemann of, the Hamburg Regional Court has now also decided in a decision of August 15, 2023 (Az. 324 O 256/23) that her statements are not expressions of suspicion, but mere reviews.

Eh, given she started out calling Till a "pedophile piece of ####" and claimed to be spiked by Rammstein, eh....she was definitely throwing bombs in the early days.

HOWEVER, I have to admit, it seems like after a week she got some cease and desist she shared a little bit off on her twitter without explaining what was in it, and she suddenly changed her words to "spiked AT Rammstein". 

I feel like this might be the important thing. She basically did seem to distance herself from her original allegations, explicitly mentioning that Till did not touch her, and changing the language to avoid directly incriminating Till (despite clearly insinuating he drugged her), and it seems like this was just enough to avoid the legal censors. 

Still, the legal bar for "suspicion" vs "review" is unclear here, and I'm not a german legal expert. But if I had to guess, what's why she managed to avoid it. 

On the one hand, Im frustrated by this. Because I've been following this one since day 1. Remember, I was actually IN r/rammstein the first night she made her original allegations. I even told her to go to the police if she was serious. 

And she....delayed. 

And since then, her story fell apart. First she had bruises, and she claimed to be drugged and put under the stage for the purpose of having sex against her will. But then it turned out the bruises were nothing and likely from leaning up against a bar next to the stage. And there's no evidence she was drugged, she was likely just drunk, and till didn't touch her.

I admit, I can KINDA sympathize with lynn in theory that first night. Imagine you you drunk out of your mind, possibly going through medicine withdrawals (she was allegedly on lexapro which interacts badly with alcohol and potentially skipped doses), and you come down from whatever happened, you remember blacking out, and you're like OMG I MUST'VE BEEN SPIKED. And then given the row zero thing apparently happened (maybe, we do have one video but it could have been staged by lindemann himself rather than be a legit thing that happens every concert that every day fans participate in), it would imply that if she was spiked, the purpose was to get her to have sex. 

But when no evidence of spiking arose, and till respected her no, she came off looking like an idiot. And then she seemingly admitted till didnt touch her and changed her bios to "spiked AT rammstein" rather than "by rammstein" and the issue shifted to these weird feminist grievance politics about how till shouldnt be having sex with fans, and that there's systems of coercion and imbalances of power and the patriarchy and blah blah blah. 

And me, being the rammstein superfan that I was, already KNEW of row zero because it has been controversial in the community for years, and was like "yeah? so what? so till likes to boink fans, if it's all consenting and no one was drugged what's the problem?"

As such, once Lynn's original accusations fell apart, I stopped caring, started defending till being the libertarian that I am, and disliked this whole dog and pony show against him. 

As far as this goes, I know this is unpopular with many of my fellow rammstein fans, but I kind of have to say that if she distanced herself from her original accusations, and she started just criticizing row zero as a concept rather than accusing till of any specific crime, well...that's protected speech. Feminist idiots have every right to their own opinion and their ability to express it, and if they think what till is doing is immoral, that's their prerogative. They even have a right to protest against him. Not that i agree with the protests, but they have a right to do it. 

As such, I can kind of see, in theory, how she could have avoided getting her pants sued off here.I don't like the language here between "review" and "suspicion", as it seems kinda thin, but as someone who is not a legal expert, well, I'm going to have to defer to the court there on that subject.

background:

After attending a Rammstein concert in Vilnius on May 22, 2023, Shelby Lynn explained via the social networks Twitter and Instagram and in an interview with the BBC that drugs had been mixed in her drink. This statement was used on social networks and in the media to raise serious allegations against our client. For example, SPIEGEL raised the suspicion (now prohibited by the court) that our client drugged women at Rammstein concerts with knockout drops, drugs or alcohol in order to be able to perform sexual acts on the women.

 Notice how legalistic this is. The courts probably examined all of her statements and concluded that lynn probably didn't raise accusations against till specifically, but it was other parties that did so based on the info lynn provided. So, other parties are liable for accusations, but not the original accuser themselves, because they were vague enough to avoid penalty. And Lynn herself did, again, clarify after being C&Ded herself that till did not touch her, and that she didn't know who administered the drops (although it was heavily implied to be lindemann himself, or someone who works for him). 

We had applied for Till Lindemann to prohibit Shelby Lynn from claiming that drugs were mixed into her drink at the Rammstein concert in Vilnius. In the proceedings, she defended herself with the argument that she had not personally accused our client with her statements distributed via Twitter and Instagram. She was partially misquoted by the BBC. The fact that third parties would conclude that Lindemann was involved was not her fault, especially since she had expressly stated that she did not know when and how drugs were administered to her.

Again, notice how PRECISE and LEGAL this wording is.

We had applied for Till Lindemann to prohibit Shelby Lynn from claiming that drugs were mixed into her drink at the Rammstein concert in Vilnius

 Because she didn't accuse till directly, it appears to be a "review" rather than a suspicion. And third parties like media outlets ran with it.

Keep in mind these law firms spend hours just combing through this stuff. They probably have ALL of the stuff that was said, and they probably concluded, legally, that yeah her statements were not precise enough to be an accusation. Even though to any person speaking vernacular english (because shelby is irish and does speak english so her original statements were in english, not german), it was clear she was insinuating stuff. But the law doesnt care about that. They care about precision. Stuff that might leave speculation for others often gets passed the letter of the law here. Because again, law is very overly precise here. And it has to be. Dont get me wrong.

The Hamburg Regional Court took up this argument and rejected the application for an injunction on the grounds that Shelby Lynn had not expressed any suspicion against our client, but had merely drawn an evaluative conclusion on the basis of a connecting fact she alleged (unusual signs of failure with moderate alcohol consumption), which our client did not infringe his personal rights.

 As far as her actual statements, this may be correct. Especially given the obvious legal limbo she was doing online going on about how till didnt touch her and "I was spiked AT rammstein, not BY rammstein." 

Even if our client's application for injunction was rejected, the reasons for the resolution speak in our client's favour. To the extent that it states that Shelby Lynn did not raise the suspicion that our client had put drugs in her drink, it is clear that all the subsequent reporting, which raised precisely this suspicion, is unfounded. The Hamburg Regional Court's decision is also likely to have an impact on the preliminary investigations currently pending at the Berlin public prosecutor's office, which were initiated by uninvolved third parties with reference to Shelby Lynn's allegations.

 And it seems like they're willing to take the legal L here if it makes their case stronger on other fronts. Rather than go after Lynn herself (as much as some of us would have liked to have seen that), they admit that the fact that Lynn didn't make any direct accusations puts the blame on the media outlets who used her statements and did.

Now....again, I know a lot of Rammstein fans are kinda pissed on this one. And I even argued with some today. Some managed to agree with me after i explained my logic, while others did not. 

I look at it like this. 

I've been saying for months now to let the courts handle it. And apparently they did. And while till largely seems innocent of any actual wrongdoing, if we're going to accuse shelby of defamation or whatever, she is entitled to the same presumption of innocence if we want to introduce legal consequences against her. This is perfectly fair. If we did not do things this way, we would be accusing anyone who makes any accusations against others at all of potentially defaming them if they cant prove their case.That would be ridiculous. 

While defamation exists, there are safeguards against it to protect free speech. I know in America for example, you would have to prove that they knowingly made false statements. And I dont think you could prove that here insofar as her original accusations went. One can make a case that lynn truly believed she was spiked, and that given the difficulty of the situation at the time, didn't quite know better. Whether you buy that is up to you (I know there's been lots of questions of lynn's motives), but regardless, as long as there remains reasonable doubt, I aint comfortable with shutting her up or suing her either.

Because if Lindemann can just go around shutting down anyone who makes accusations against him just because they can't 100% prove them, well, that is kind of scary from a free speech front. And I personally don't like germany's sue happy legal culture here. I see them going after lynn and all of these outlets, and i kind of see that as a flagrant violation of free speech.

And personally, if the court is going to err and be wrong, I'd rather it do so on the side of freedom. I would take a case in which someone who probably deserves to be sued into oblivion gets off than one where someone who doesn't is successfully sued. Just as the legal system works to protect lindemann's presumption of innocence, well, I think people like lynn are afforded the same privileges. 

If anything it would seem hypocritical and against my values if I said otherwise. 

So as much as I would've liked to have seen lynn sued into oblivion for this, I have to accept the court ruling here.

And I know I've been accused of being a little "ivory tower" over this, but hey, law IS an ivory tower sometimes. Just look at the american debate we have where half the judges are these "strict constitutionalists" where they believe in the letter and only the letter of the law, and that things should be interpreted as they would be in 1789 regardless of the consequences to larger society. I mean, that's a valid legal school of thought here in the US. And while a lot of us who are more left leaning think that's stupid and idiotic, well, legally, again, ivory tower rulings are legit sometimes. 

As I see it, based on the facts presented, Lynn's statements didn't violate the letter of the law. That does not mean that I agree with them, that I don't think that she was full of crap, or that she was insinuating guilt here. I'm NOT a fan of lynn. And I use my free speech rights regularly to criticize her online. If anything, I dislike how forums censor us when we wanna make fun of her idiotic "it doesn't foam" video. 

The fact is, I like freedom, I like speech. And while I personally would have liked to have seen the courts look at the obvious weight of her "evaluations" in terms of what they insinuate about certain people, well, given the precision of law, she got off. And I can see why she did, and respect the logic behind the decision, even if I don't agree with it. If anything, I'm glad Germany seems to have SOME respect for free speech here.And yeah, that's my opinion.

Applying enlightened self interest to social policy

 So, I wrote an article about this tonight, but it didn't come out as good as I wanted it to, so I'm doing a rewrite. 

The core aspect of applying enlightened self interest to social policy is to ask people why they care so much about social issues. I really feel like these issues have gotten outsized attention in recent years, and I really think we need to downplaying them. As such, I want to explain my general stance on stuff.

I believe in liberty to do whatever one wants to do unless they harm others. I believe when people are left to their own devices, it is up to them what they do with their life, and if they're not happy, they should try to change it. I only believe government should step in to protect people from negative actions by others, and for me, unjustified authoritarian impulses are part of that.

To anyone who wants to push their own morality on people, I have to ask, why do you care? Why do right wingers care if men wanna have sex with other men, or men wanna become women, or women want to abort a fetus that doesn't even have the brain development to know it exists yet? No party is actually being hurt by these issues, so why do you care? When one boils down right wing arguments on these topics, we basically get stuff like "well we always did it that way", which is a bad argument for anything, or "god said so", which shouldn't apply to a sane secular society with separation of church and state, or "society will collapse if we change things" (unless you can demonstrate it, then this is invalid), or some moral panic about leftists wanting to force their radical crap on people (which is an argument for SJWs to stfu with their own moralizing), or some sort of moral panic involving children (which comes from ignorance, and should be debunked with facts, like I attempted to do in explaining the trans thing to people). Once these arguments are soundly debunked, we can basically then point out that these social issues harm no one, there is no legitimate reason to care about what others do, and advocate for a libertarian theory of leaving people alone. 

Which just leaves the left. Now, the left is different. The left is the side of "caring". I call the social justice types the "cult of caring", because they always gotta virtue signal how much they care about stuff that doesn't affect them and how it makes them a good person. People who don't care are bad people to them. Remember what I said about SJWs, it's not enough for them to care about these issues, they're so self righteous that you have to care too. They employ a lot of shaming and bullying behavior a lot to manipulate people into prioritizing their issues and as I like to say, you can't force people to care. I like to tell these people that screw their morality and self righteousness on the matter. And once you show these people that you don't care, they have no power over you.

Now, they HATE it when you do this, because for them, when they virtue signal, you have to do it back. They recognize members of their cult by doing this stuff with one another. It's like those call signs they used in WWII where one person says "flash" and you say "thunder." But stand firm. You don't have to care, and honestly, there's no shame in not caring. People only have so much bandwidth to dedicate to topics, and often times one topic comes at the opportunity cost of another. And I feel like a lot of leftists use this stuff primarily to burn out peoples' bandwidth on other issues so they only care about this. Which stifles all progress.

So what about the idea of being privileged, and being like MLK's white moderates if you don't care? I say tough crap. These guys don't care about my top issues, so why should I care about them. Now, ideally, most of my social positions lean far more left than right, but ultimately, I only can dedicate so much empathy to them and beyond that point I'm not playing their stupid games. So if they try to weaponize empathy like they often do, it's gonna backfire on them. Now, note, this is their fault, not yours. if they want to secure your vote, they have to meet you where you're at. There should be give and take. Coalition building ensures bringing diverse people together and making them happy enough to remain in the coalition. Why should we have to take one for the team on issues we care about to cater to them and their concerns? You shouldn't, that's the answer. So don't feel guilty, as guilt is the intended emotion they want to make you feel, and stand strong in your own power.

As such, enlightened self interest ultimately leads to a kind of sane center on social policy. It neutralizes the worst elements of the alt right and fundamentalist christianity, as it really boils down issues to why should you care? Why should you care if people do stuff that doesn't affect you? TLDR, you shouldn't. But likewise, this makes you a more passive rather than active ally to the left, and the left these days wants converts, not passive supporters who kinda sorta care, but who full throatedly endorse their agenda. So the lack of caring turns people away from the alt right, but also from the far left. And that's fine. Both sides are authoritarian and both wanna stick their nose where it doesn't belong. People shouldn't care either way. And the only reason you should particularly care is if one side or the other is trying to thrust their morality on people. If the right tries to take away rights, they're gonna have a bad time, because people don't like that, but if the left tries to get self righteous and push their crap down one's throat, they're gonna have a bad time too. Which is why, despite originally trying to stay away from this culture war crap, I've found myself having to get more and more involved, often times attacking the left. Because the left doesn't allow people like me to be neutral. They end up having to force their morals on me and I have to keep firmly showing them the door. 

But yeah, at the same time, I feel like this also allows a level of flexibility that just like with economic action, social action too is largely dictated by people acting in their enlightened self interest. it's good to leave others alone because then they'll ideally leave you alone. It's good to sometimes band together to restrict bad behavior that leads to the detriment of others. Extreme individualist libertarians might see it as their right to blast loud music on their property, but if those sound waves invade yours, it becomes a problem. So noise regulations are good. If a deadly disease is ripping through the population, maybe some restrictions on human activity may be necessary in the short term to minimize the spread of said disease and save lives. hence, covid regulations can be justified too. Just because im libertarian doesnt mean I'm an ideologue, and it's perfectly fine for people to regulate or limit the acts of others if those actions do negatively impact them. 

As such, through the theory of enlightened self interest, my ideas on social issues gain some level of consistency. I will admit there are a handful of issues where we can debate the negative harm of actions to others vs the negative harm from regulating an issue in and of itself, and perhaps people have different tradeoffs. Still, in a democracy, we should come to a point where issues that the majority of people believe should be regulated are, and the issues where most people don't think should be regulated, aren't. This isn't a perfect system, and we won't get the ideal results every time, but we should get some reasonable point of view as long as most people are driven by rational self interest and a policy of live and let live, as opposed to some authoritarian ideology that dictates to people what they should be doing with their time. 

Honestly, i think this theory really starts to contextualize why i think a certain way on a lot of issues, and you can see, for better or for worse why i prioritize what i prioritize. Maybe not everyone will agree, but as I like to say, tough crap. There's private morality and public morality, and what i described is public morality. Privately, you can believe whatever you want, and you can live your life however you want. You just dont get to tell others how to live unless you have some overriding reason to take action against others. I think this is a very good theory to look at issues through, to be perfectly honest. 

It's okay to be a little selfish

 So, recently, I put forward my theory of enlightened self interest, which is basically the idea that individuals can act in mildly collective ways to advocate for reforms that further their individual self interest and liberty. Heck, in general, I would say my political ideology largely relies on this idea. While a lot of the modern left seems to lean harder into collectivism and "caring politics", to the point of using the concept of empathy to shame and bully people into line, my own politics is based on my own rational self interest. And I don't see a problem with that.

A basic income would benefit people like me. Universal healthcare would benefit people like me. Free college and student debt forgiveness would benefit people like me. More accessible and cheaper housing would largely benefit people like me. Solving climate change would benefit people like me. A higher minimum wage would help people like me. 

I feel like the left needs to do a better job pitching this stuff to Americans. Most Americans are self interested. We're a country based on individualism, liberty, and self interest to sociopathic levels, and people often have their self interest misdirected. They'll vote for people like Reagan or Bush (either one) or Trump in order to get a $1k tax cut, they'll oppose welfare because "it doesn't benefit them", but then they'll be against a UBI that functionally gives them say, $5k. It's insane, man. And it's because conservatives tend to do well with people who are individualists, and who have an egoistic outlook on their own financial well being.

Well, my core argument since 2012 has generally speaking been that the right is serving most working class americans a load of hooey. They think that if only you work hard and make your boss more money, that the wealth will "trickle down". maybe it will if you're in the top 20%, but if you're in the bottom 80%? Lol fat chance. Statistics kind of proves otherwise. You're basically on the same old treadmill of life and the only way things will improve for you is through systemic change. Have you ever looked at the economy and felt like you were on a treadmill and no matter how hard you worked or what you did, nothing seemed to change? It's because for most Americans, it doesn't. The economy is rigged, you're a wage slave to some rich person and you should advocate for liberal policies that improve your way of life. This is what I think is the ethos that is missing from the left today, that was present in 2012.

We were so close too. When I advocated for Bernie in 2016, I could see how his ideas would improve my life. And his ideas would improve many peoples' lives. That's the point, and that's why more people should've supported the guy. But, Clinton then used social politics to serve as a distraction, bringing back the same old toxic politics of liberalism from my conservative youth that during the obama era I had come to believe were a strawman. Instead we got this weird cult of caring. How we need to care for the women, and the minorities, and the LBGTQ community, and you shouldn't expect the government to push for policies that helped improve your life, you should sacrifice all of that stuff on the altar of white male liberal guilt, and vote for the team that does nothing to help you. Because it isn't all about you. You're privileged and can survive the next for years, but all of those women and minorities and LGBTQ people won't. 

Honestly, I feel like this is what led to the fracture of that emerging obama coalition that the democrats started developing in 2008 and 2012. When I came over to the left in 2012, it was in part because I understood for the first time in my life that trickle down economics was a scam and that if I actually wanted solutions to improve my life, they would come from the left, not the right. But in 2016, we shifted to an ethos of "how dare you vote for your own rational self interest, don't you know that it's not all about you? You're selfish. You should vote for all of these "underprivileged" groups instead and blah blah blah.

And I know, i've been trying to play softball with these liberals as I believed they meant well, although I recognized some were just manipulative pieces of crap, but at this point I'm more openly hostile to this specific ideology, but here's the thing, I DON'T CARE, I REALLY DON'T CARE. And you can't shame me for not caring. Your privilege games don't work with me. While I support other peoples' rights in principle, if you force me to choose between a platform that helps me and one that doesn't help me, I'm going to vote for the one that helps me. Every fricking time. And I'm not gonna stop unless someone can demonstrate to me how it's not in my interest to do so. Shove your self righteousness and cult of caring BS where the sun doesn't shine. 

Say it with me guys, I DONT CARE! Seriously, demonstrate to them they have no power over you, because that's what they're doing. They're weaponizing empathy, and the way to beat that is to demonstrate to people that you see through their grift and you don't care. So yeah, don't let the democrats pin 2016 on you because you voted for jill stein. After all, it was their problem for not supporting ideas that helped YOU. They might do a lot of handwringing about women and minorities and blah blah blah, but yeah, send them packing. Tell them you don't care. They might think you're an absolute horrible person for that, but you know what? Odds are they're a hypocritical piece of crap anyway. Because you know what? Most of those self righteous moralizers seem to be upper class suburbanite whites anyway. Social justice politics, despite the focus on the underprivileged, seems practiced most fervently by the most privileged whites. They're often upper class, they have healthcare, they have their college loans paid off, they have a steady income with a 401k and a job in middle management (they might even be YOUR boss, or your boss's boss), but you know what? The second you expect to self sacrifice for you by raising their taxes, they'll suddenly become conservative, imagine that. Because at the end of the day, they're hypocrites and pharisees. They love to be self righteous and push around others, but if you show them they can't push you around, then they have no power over you.

Honestly, I think if everyone voted in their actual interests, the world would be a better place. Sure, some people would vote against my ideas. But then again, those guys are generally like 20-30% of the population. In a vacuum, my ideas would help up to 70-80% of the population. And you know what? if they voted that way, then maybe the world would be a better place.

Unfortunately, this self righteous moralizing left likes to look at these people like the unwashed masses because they're not members of their cult and in some cases might have views contradictory to them. Well, unlike them, I don't expect moral purity. Because my pitch to those guys on social issues is this, you shouldn't care. I mean, I feel like a lot of people aren't TRULY bigoted against people, they just feel like the left with their social justice nonsense shoves stuff down your throat. My pitch to them is actually this. Why do you care? If this stuff doesn't affect you, why must you try to dictate what others do with their lives? And from there, if they decide their little right wing culture wars and associated authoritarianism and bigotry is more important than fricking $1250 a month, universal healthcare, and a socially libertarian live and let live platform, then goodbye, have a nice life.

You see, that's the thing. Even if I don't care, and even though I prioritize my interests, i don't actually support, on social issues, throwing anyone under the bus. If anything Im trying to neutralize their hatred of the left by asking them why they care so much. And if they have no good answer, and just wanna cut their nose to spite their face, well, you can't reason with everyone. But if we can build a coalition that talks people down from that ledge of literal alt right grievance politics, than that's good enough for me. Unlike most lefties, I don't demand moral purity for people. I don't treat them like the unwashed masses for not believing the right things. And much like everyone thing else, my ethos is one of "if it isn't bothering you, then maybe you should leave it alone."

So yeah, that's my actual pitch to America here. Practice enlightened self interest. On economics, vote for policies that benefit you. And on social issues, if something doesn't bother you, why should you care? 

I feel like the left loses these days because on social issues they act completely morally self righteous and even when they support the right policies they do it with such an obnoxious self righteous attitude that it undermines them. And on economic policies, the left needs to do more to push for policies that help average americans, and then SELL THEM. I really feel like the modern left hits the wrong notes, and I feel like this general ideological approach is more positive. Instead of expecting people to give up their interests for this weird moral crusade in which they virtue signal all day about how much they care, we should embrace peoples' interests, and sell left wing politics on basis that is in their interests.

This is actually such an obvious part of my own philosophy I'm surprised I havent explicitly talked about it before. Better late than never. Amazing what outright rejecting social politics and mainstream leftism has done to my own ideological clarity at times.