All of these were fought for with literal blood well before any liberals decided it was in their interest to push legislation. Don't delude yourselves by thinking the libs did these things out of the kindness of their heart.
I don’t disagree, but I think it’s pretty clear Lawrence is using the American colloquial definition of liberal rather than the academic definition.
Even if you use the academic version it makes sense. Liberalism is the default ideology in the USA. The majority of the population at any point will be Liberals.
"the American colloquial definition" is the American colloquial term for propaganda
Not really. Civil rights absolutely, social security, kind of, the activists didn't create the idea but they gave muscle to the labor movement to the point that FDR got elected in the first place and had the momentum so sure, clean air act and clean water act, you must be joking, those were just liberal government things. The things from that end of the spectrum are actually really good examples of why having a functioning government is a good thing even if it means "electoralism," meaning it can't all just be people in the streets fighting. You need both sides of the equation: The vigor and blood to push things forward, and then the paper and system to lock it in. Without either side of that, it doesn't work.
More to the point, stop shitting on people who did good things. If you live in America, you benefit from all of the things on that list. Look for enemies elsewhere. This is the left's favorite thing, to turn its guns exclusively on its own side, and it's super good at it.
I think this type of thinking ends up being quite self defeating.
We should evaluate all politicians as vessels to carry out the will of the people.
When you consider them as such, not as people or entities to assign blame, as your goal is to be pragmatic, you look at their incentives and track records instead.
I think leftists often have this self defeating problem of being unable to stomach the fact that they will not get their ideal politician, and there will be no sudden uprising.
As a result, they often will criticize the politicians closest too them too loudly, ending up supporting "both sides" notions that cause voter apathy and let quite literally fascists win instead.
What I am saying is that we have to be pragmatic.
Particularly for the US, people have to realize that yes, while the DNC sucks, the democrats are the only practical, realistic way for people to actually end up winning.
Its long, slow, and no fun at all, but people have to support them publicly, and acknowledge their faults in ways that don't dissuade voters from voting for them. They then must also vote in increasingly progressive candidates in primaries and local politics.
Anything else is simply grabbing a foot gun, because this imperfect system is very slow, and won't change over night.
Or we could actually work to build up our own communities and set a real workers party up. Otherwise we are at the whims of fascists and fascist lite
Blue conservatives love to pretend they are leftists. That way anyone to the left of them seem like "unreasonable radicals".
lol.
But ignorant chodes in their parent's basement keep telling me Democrats have never done anything of value.
Do your homework, folks.
Liberals do love stealing credit for socialist activism after the fact and pretending they supported it all along, this is true.
By their very nature, liberals and leftists are more in favor of social supports and gender/race equality aĉetis the board. The only people I've ever met with thoughts about inequalities between genders and races have been white conservatives longing for the old days where they could say and do whatever they wanted, as long as it wasn't against another white man.
Fuck all that shit man.
And I want to be clear that, though a lot of the right proclaim to be Christians, a lot of what they support is in direct opposition to Christian ideals.
Love your neighbor. Don't covet, or steal. Take care of the poor and needy. Give to charity.
Instead, capitalists hide behind a thin veil of what they claim is Christianity to try to trick people into agreeing with them so that they can get what they want.... Which is your money.... They don't give a fuck about you.
Tbf, democrats were the ones opposing many in that list... but they also weren't 'liberal' back then either.
2nd time liberals illusory truth effected what Radicalists praxied.
Stop spreading misinformation @cm0002@lemmings.world.
Aside from the conflation of liberals and leftists, this is mostly incorrect about the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts. The Clean Air Act was passed under Johnson, but major Amendments that expanded the regulatory power of the federal government were passed under Nixon and Bush (the first one). The Clean Water Act was signed into law under Nixon, who also pushed for the creation of EPA. Republicans are shit on the environment now, but it used to be a way more bipartisan issue, and Lawrence O'Donnell apparently doesn't know that.
Ironically that works just fine as liberalism under the ideological definitions and reflects the modern reality that American conservatives are no longer liberals and have outright embraced fascism.
I'd be curious to see a similar list for the Reich. Like a legitimate one though, where they actually try to list what they're proud of. At the moment I can only think of a list containing a bunch of "cut taxes for the ultra wealthy."
"fucked the middle east"
"revoked abortion rights"
"let millions of f****ts die of HIV"
"biggest prison population in the world - can I have a 'hell yeah' for modern slavery?"
If memory serves me right just about everyone in Congress supported the Iraq War both times.
It used to be "beat the Nazis," "got the railroads built," and things like that. There is value to having some conservative values in government. The problems with America actually don't have a lot to do with partisan politics; it is that the right wing turned into Nazis, and the "left" wing of the establishment politicians turned into Roman senators too busy getting blowjobs to realize that people are starving in the streets and can't afford their insulin.
I would actually be fine with Republicans of the John McCain / Dwight Eisenhower mold in government. If we could get rid of Mike Johnson and Nancy Pelosi (ideally by just dumping them into the Potomac), and have it be AOC and Adam Kinsinger, I'd be fine with that. The MAGA people are more overtly evil, but it's not even really a party thing.
Republicans did create the EPA but then they destroyed it
Nixon, at this point, would be a progressive Democrat. He was an absolutely legendary piece of human garbage, but he did care about the country and attempt to do big good things for it sometimes, in a way that most of the campaign-contribution-fueled crop of ghouls that are "congress" today do not. Reagan and Clinton really redefined the whole scope of what even being in charge of the country was supposed to mean.
I was genuinely surprised when I read that Nixon intend to "declare war on poverty" and end it by wanting to propose a bill for UBI. He was convinced by several positive studies for UBI presented to him, iirc. But it just so happens that an influential economist breaking grounds at the time, who goes by the name of Milton Friedman (the man who (in-)famously coined the phrase "greed is good") convinced Nixon to abandon the idea. Although I don't remember the exact arguments on how Nixon was convinced to abandon the idea of UBI.
Yeah. He actually kind of meant well. He was hampered by the fact that he was a flinty-hearted vindictive psychopath. But he did a bunch of stuff which there is literally no way to explain other than that he wanted to do something good for the [white] [Republican] [pro-war] people of the country [as long as they were nice to him at all times which is what he deserved].
Let me tell you a thing that is not often mentioned, which I think contributed to the rise of the American right we see today. In the us, unlike in Europe where freedom was economically tied to the rise of lower classes in their struggle against landowners and aristocracy, the notion of freedom implied a freedom from the norms of the majority. This is the old "frontier myth". Then the prairie was settled, but that myth was entrenched. Then the internet came and opened up an unlimited and unregulated space for these cults and alternative views, and since the technological dynamics constantly drives everyone away from pain and towards pleasure, that is confirmation of existing beliefs, the "echo chambers" mushroomed. Because of historical baggage, the US was predisposed towards eccentricity, in a way. On top of this comes the fact that Congress has always had a very very low approval rating. It is epitomized by the representatives who read the phone book out loud, or filibuster, from the podium in order to sabotage the passing of legislation. At salaries paid by the taxpayer!! Then there is the annual shutdown ritual over the raising of the debt ceiling, which could have been avoided by switching from absolute numbers to a percentage of GDP. But it is a ritual, like the knocking on the door of the British parliament. So they keep it. But it adds an impression that they do nothing, that everything is jammed and that no representatives from different parties ever talk to each other over coffee, and that "hate" remains even after the cameras are off.
It’s fucking hilarious how the commits under this is full of far left MAGA proving why any hope of uniting can never happen.
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