Like it or not, she exposes faults in the system in a fun way. Congress has been stuffy old white men for time immemorial. Out of curiosity, do you think Bernie is a moron? Even if you disagree with his opinions on economic policy...I think she's an extension of Bernie politics, just younger.
LOL I know you think that and it makes me laugh. Imagine how much you'd freak out if the president attempted to tell Putin in secret that he'd have more flexibility to work with him after re-election and then the president allowed Putin to push him around in Syria and then allowed Putin to conquer a neighboring country.....oh wait that happened, and you didn't care because tribalism. I get that you are still upset that your girl Hillary was rejected by the American people, but you are just going to have to get over it one of these days.
LOL does she? I absolutely think Bernie is a moron....he's someone who doesn't even know he's not actually a socialist. How could you take him seriously intellectually? He's a Social Democrat that thinks he's a Democratic Socialist and doesn't know the difference between the two. At his age, with his profession, there's no excuse in that. AOC on the other hand is actually a socialist, because she's not intelligent enough to not be a socialist....so Bernie has her on that one even if he's too much of an idiot to know it. There is simply no such thing as an intelligent socialist, just as there is no such thing as an intelligent Nazi. Supporting failed and murderous ideologies such as that inherently makes you a fool.
eh we'll have to agree to disagree I guess. I think you're conflating lack of intelligence with naivety or her simply having a different perspective than you. She seems bright and poised to me.
I could see that perhaps if we were talking about something less extreme. Given the history of things like socialism and nazism, it goes beyond naivety if you are convinced those things are good. You have to be an outright unintelligent person to attempt to push those ideologies. Those are basically flat-earth type political ideologies.....only considerably more horrific and murderous. Specifically when talking about AOC, when listening to her, there's never even been a second where I heard anything that could pass as an intelligent thought. She merely parrots far left and socialist talking points without fully understanding any of it....which is why she always crumbles if she faces even the slightest bit of push back on anything. Even interviews that are designed to be as friendly as possible have ended up exposing her as a moron on accident. I had to edit this because I can't talk about "flat-earther" types of political ideologies without also including Anarchists. I didn't want anyone to think that I was intentionally excluding them since I'm a libertarian and Anarchists are essentially libertarian ideology taken to a laughable extreme. So it's not just collectivist ideologies that are inherently unintelligent and I didn't want anyone to think that was what I was saying.
I would have been inclined to agree with you a few months ago, but the degree to which she's not only been able deflect the hamfisted attacks and instead turn them into weapons that advance a definable policy agenda imto the national conversation is incredibly impressive. People are actually debating a 70% top marginal rate. Think to how much different that is from a year ago. In part because some incels thought that a video of her dancing was a big deal ... Simply put, she is just better at this than they are.
Yeah but you've unintentionally proven my point. While those on the fringe left may love talk about jacking up taxes, it's not a winning discussion to be had for Democrats in all but the bluest parts of the country. Running against massive tax hikes is a really easy way to get Republicans to take back the house and for Trump to win re-election.
People don't seem to get that her generation...Millennials...are a lot more progressive and thus they actually agree with AOC more than others. They come into a world where they have gone to college and got little to nothing out of it and are entering their 30s with little to no financial security...and a generation worried about the future of the planet. They are 59% democratic. 79% of Millennials think Immigration strengthens the country 46 for the Silent generation and you can go down the list for any issue and see this split between the youngest generation and the oldest. AOC is representative of her generation, like it or not, it's not a surprise then that she's been dominating social media. Like it or not and I think this, more than anything, is what has conservatives scared of her. Before I hear the brain dead "Only young people are liberal!" nonsense, not backed up by ANY credible data, in fact, the opposite has been shown to be true...that generations have their political preferences and that people, more or less, are locked into their political preferences. The truth is. The conservatives are going to be battling this wave of progressivism for a while now and if you are a conservative you may be better to try and understand their world view instead of demean and mock them. They don't see this economic prosperity and after years of trickle down economics promises...they don't see the trickle. Bernie and AOC and other progressives speak to them and the only way you are going to change their mind is by actually arguing their point. AOC is going to continue to rise. All I've heard as counters to her ideas are personal insults about her being stupid and silly and VENEZUELA!!!! this ish ain't working. I've seen people try to counter her points and they are doing a very very VERY poor job of it. She continues to get more popular and in Congress, where you are one vote out of hundreds, popularity is power.
You can be an advocate and supporter of democratic socialism in theory (i.e. a socialist), while acting as a social democrat in practice as a representative of the people — as compromise, or with the goal of affecting a gradual transition to a more socialist system. If you want to call him a moron because he thinks some form of socialism can be a good way of organizing a society, I suggest you just say that.
The two are fundamentally opposed to one another. Now you can be a socialist who is posing as a Social Democrat in order to sucker people into thinking there's no difference between the two so you can keep taking steps towards eventually wiping out capitalism and replacing it with starvation....I mean socialism....but you can't legitimately be both at the same time. Social Democrats are captialists, Democratic Socialists are socialists. Now when it comes to Bernie, does he simply not understand the difference or is he much more cynical? He's either simpleton or monster and I see him as more of a well intentioned simpleton.
We are already a democratic socialist country. Here are SOCIALIST constructs The Military The Police The fire department Public education Hospitals Libraries Government And on and on we can go, the only thing we are missing is a national healtcare program and we are well on our way to that and 66% of the populace wants it. Only grumpy old white folks don't .....well those and the dumbasses who support them......the war is not with the people - it is with the uber rich that have robbed stupid people blind. DD
It's funny how with the "socialism" label, some people want to say its all or nothing. But you can call yourself a "capitalist" while not being a Randian-style capitalist, and you can call yourself a "democrat" while not desiring unfettered democracy. I'm guessing Bernie used to be a more "pure" socialist back in his younger days, and he didn't feel the urge to distance himself from that label even as his views may have moderated somewhat with age. A lot of people on the Right like to refer to big government programs geared towards curtailing the effects of capitalism (e.g. welfware) as "socialism". Well, in that case, if that's the sort of things he supports, it seems perfectly fair to me that he refer to himself as a socialist. Anyway, more on this "Is Bernie *really* a socialist?" conundrum (it mostly argues your point that he shouldn't be calling himself that, though I'm not really convinced): https://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/20/upshot/bernie-sanders-democratic-socialist-capitalist.html
You can't be a socialist and a capitalist at the same time. You either support some form of capitalism, or you are a socialist, not both. Socialists seek to replace capitalism with socialism. So sure, you have some people who wrongly call themselves socialists that are not socialists....and I call them out for it, but you don't have socialists that support ANY form of capitalism. Perhaps Bernie was an actual socialist at one point, but given the complete and total failure of every country to ever adopt it, I'd bet he realized how foolish it is and altered his beliefs to be more in tune with the capitalist views he has now.....even if he still wrongly calls himself a socialist. You can support a welfare state and still be a capitalist, it's called being a Social Democrat, those people aren't socialists....even if some of them aren't smart enough to know it.
It's pointless. Some people just are too rigid and see things as black and white. There are different forms of socialism, some are more socialist and some are less so, and this is basically true with every political ideology or idea...but it really is pointless trying to teach (right-wingers) people this fact. It also doesn't matter what Bernie or AOC calls themselves because conservatives will still call them socialist. We had people calling Obama a socialist after all...
Ah yes, the "many different forms of socialism" argument. Love it. It's like getting a group together telling them they are about to play hockey and then you take them to a baseball diamond and hand out gloves, balls, and bats. If people tell you that baseball isn't hockey, you just tell them that baseball is just a different form of hockey.... Next we might get the "Real hockey has never been tried, so you can't use examples of hockey in the past to say what hockey is"
Baseball is a team sport though and there are many different team sports. Believe what you want to believe, I'll instead rely on political science, its terms, and its study, over random internet extreme right winger that yells out 'SOCIALIST' as much as possible. Fact is, there are different forms of socialism. I go by facts, not feelings.
You're wrong on this one. I agree that you're looking at this far too rigidly. One can support certain ideological policies for one set of circumstances yet adopt a different approach regarding another. I'm "liberal" when it comes to the environment, as I find fossil fuels antiquated and a national embarrassment. However I'm "conservative" when it comes to the death penalty because I support it. I think economic policy is more nuanced than social issues...few if any people are strictly capitalist or socialist
