To address your greater point- I agree and Harris was a very unique candidate in that Bidens choices basically foisted her on the party but that also partially illustrates my point which is that the Democratic Party ended up with Harris because of a series of choices Biden made- the party didn't choose her in a conventional sense (they simply had no better options at the time) and I don't think it's been established that Harris' 2020 views were representative of the party. Heck, Harris- as part of taking on the nomination mantle- basically memory holed all those left wing positions. Is that not a black and white illustration that the Democratic Party and the vast majority of the left of center population it represents, does not subscribe to the left wing nut views that get ascribed to it?
But this is bigger than Harris. As I said to Jay this predates Harris.
Yes, Yes, but this stuff predates Harris. People were pushing this stuff under Biden, and Obama before him. The Dems are responsible for every fringe nut on the internet and have an obligation to denounce them whereas the GOP aren't responsible for even the fringe nuts they nominate, and I just don't see that you have answered as to why that is.
Sure, but the GOP is literally a mass of angry populists and a fading mass of crusading social conservatives providing votes with a grinning crust of naked plutocrats grifting them for all they're worth. It's not like the right's base is monolithic.
In utilitarian terms we'll probably have to see how things go in two-four years when we can run with candidates who haven't been closely welded to the left-wing nuts but the asymmetry is baffling.
But, Jay, you're literally illustrating my point. None of those points were embraced by the Democratic Party widely.
SSM? Sure, eventually, reluctantly by the Dems but only after VP Biden kind of frog marched them into it. TERF and Hogwarts legacy?!? That's entirely transposed in your mind straight from twitter to the Democratic Party and, as far as I can see, it's made up. Not even Harris got up and threw shade at JK Rowlings or British TERFS. So why?
And I'm not asking this in vulgar utilitarian terms or moral terms- I'm asking you as one of those unaligned centrist view from nowhere voters why.
As to "boy who cried wolf" (and this applies to your comment too John Puccio), the right has been calling Dems communists, fascists and worse my entire adult life. Liberal Fascism was published in 2008 for fish's sake. There are entire genres of music dedicated to sneering at liberal communities and population centers. So why is none of that "Boy who cried wolf"?
Yes really. The reason we keep talking about Sista Soulja is because it was an unusual thing for Clinton to do and because Clinton managed to pull it off. I already agreed that Harris was too associated with further left wing views to be able to silently ignore them the way your standard Dem politician does but Kamala was a unique candidate in a variety of negative ways that aren't typical for her party. That doesn't change my wider point which is that even though none of these left wing fringe positions are formally embraced by the Dems as a matter of course they are expected to be renouncing and policing them whereas the GOP are not.
And you're recapping my main point- why does the GOP not need to? It's not like the right wing fringe ideologies are popular- they're toxic and despised. My own theory is that it may be an artifact of Trump; a kind of reverse Obama field where every possible supporter says of Republicans more toxic positions and associations "well those are who Trump is going to con."
And yes, I know there're more than two groups of voters, and I'm asking you, since you give the vibe of being one of the view from nowhere unaligned voters, why the Dems have this obligation while the GOP doesn't. This isn't just Harris- Biden faced it when he won narrowly in 2020 for instance.
Left wing fringers are generally not Dems. They consider Dems picayune sellouts, despise them and go with the Greens; Dem Socialists or other similar left wing failure parties. This doesn't strike me as controversial to observe.
Why do these fringers reflect on the Dems when right wing fringers, it seems, don't reflect on the GOP? Why do we generally not hear our various unaligned centrists calling on the GOP to denounce their fringers?
Harris didn't denounce left wing fringers. I agree. She generally just ignored them or distanced herself from them. And it can't be denied that her 2020 positions, which were not wildly left wing fringe but were assuredly in viewing distance of wild left wing views, didn't help.
Still, Harris aside, the general political rule is there's very little hay to be made making war on your own fringe- it annoys and turns off your base, signal boosts said fringe and your opponents will always claim you're disingenuous or insufficiently vehement. I'm just curious about this double standard (I certainly don't deny it exists I just am puzzled as to why). Why must Dems make war on or answer for their fringers while the GOP has no similar obligation vis a vis their own? Heck, if the Dems embraced and nominated their nuts the way the GOP does their own the media's collective heads would >pop< explode.
Ah, then your position is that the Democrats must police their left wing fringes even though these are people who aren't Democrats because those fringes deranged fringing reflects poorly on the Dems because... reasons. But the GOP has no need to do the same for their right wing fringe nuts possibly because they elect them as Republican Senators, Congressfolk and President and manage to eke out wins about half the time? And who sets these rules?
I mean, yes, he's won twice (and lost once) but both the first time was incredibly close and the second time was not as historically narrow but not particularly a big win. Then again, considering what he has to work with in terms of the right and the GOP, those wins remain remarkable so maybe you are in grandfather sucking eggs territory.
Frankly I'd find you opining about the first one to be interesting in telling me a bit about your morals. I'd find you opining about the second interesting as to how you think the electorate works. And I'd find both interesting to have an idea as to what you'd be saying if, say, you hadn't been banned from Redstate. So I'd welcome you opining on both.
I think there's a pretty persuasive case to be made that Bibi isn't afraid exactly of Trump but uneasy because he knows a lot of people who don't like him have Trumps' ear. The Saudi/'s, for example. I think it's not so much fear of Trump trying to fish Bibi over so much as fear that Trump will be too unpredictable for Bibi to continue to do the fan dance he's been doing.
It's really really tough. The core root of NIMBY is naked self interest and property is a huge portion of most home owners fiscal worth. I'm very pro-development but when a ten bedroom apartment went up next to my home replacing a little bungalow (core urban neighborhood) I couldn't even pretend to be happy. I am proud that I did nothing to discourage it or encumber it in any of the hearing or planning stages but having the south side of the house cast in perpetual shadow stung like a mother-fisher and that's without even thinking about if it actual impacted the property value.
There's a very real parochial interest in NIMBYism but it's wildly, desperately, important that city management doesn't succumb to it because the downstream impacts of succumbing to is have proven to be utterly catastrophic- particularly to liberalism.
That appears to be economically illiterate. Holding premiums the same in fire prone, or flood prone, areas doesn't produce steady profits- it produces catastrophic losses. Increasing premiums in higher risk areas doesn't produce larger profits- it simply prevents catastrophic losses. We see this on the right, Florida's flood insurance debacle, and on the left, California fire insurance mess.
Well done, yes, basically he was quite capable when compared to his right wing predecessor but seems somewhat wane compared to his, well, Liberal predecessors. Ironically the area Trudeau's weakest in, fiscal sobriety, is the area Cretchen and Martin made their names managing (well also eviscerating separatism but you'll never match wily old Jonny Cretchen in that category since he left not a lot left to stomp on).
If by "do just that" you mean offer a policy that charges a premium that doesn't cover their losses and pass those losses on to other customers in safer locales by way of higher premiums (and eventually get out competed by insurance companies that don't and go out of business) or go out of business through rank insolvency. I... uh... kind of see why the insurance companies are electing to not "do just that". They don't have "subsidize people to live in flooding and forest fire prone locations" in their mandate nor do I think they should do so. Nor do I think should we do so.
Yeah, Justin has had a long run which is hard on governments to start with and he didn't learn many of the lessons his liberal predecessors absorbed which has resulted in even harder problems for his administration. Maybe his resigning will contain the damage but looking at how the past elections have gone I wouldn't bet it. There's gonna be a federal shellacking of the grits. *sigh* Back to the wilderness for them for a cycle.
On “Trump’s Ace in the Hole”
To address your greater point- I agree and Harris was a very unique candidate in that Bidens choices basically foisted her on the party but that also partially illustrates my point which is that the Democratic Party ended up with Harris because of a series of choices Biden made- the party didn't choose her in a conventional sense (they simply had no better options at the time) and I don't think it's been established that Harris' 2020 views were representative of the party. Heck, Harris- as part of taking on the nomination mantle- basically memory holed all those left wing positions. Is that not a black and white illustration that the Democratic Party and the vast majority of the left of center population it represents, does not subscribe to the left wing nut views that get ascribed to it?
But this is bigger than Harris. As I said to Jay this predates Harris.
"
Hmmm you may have a point there.
"
Yes, Yes, but this stuff predates Harris. People were pushing this stuff under Biden, and Obama before him. The Dems are responsible for every fringe nut on the internet and have an obligation to denounce them whereas the GOP aren't responsible for even the fringe nuts they nominate, and I just don't see that you have answered as to why that is.
"
I'm, alas, too cheap to subscribe to substacks in general as much as I'd love to read MY's stuff and comment on it.
"
Sure, but the GOP is literally a mass of angry populists and a fading mass of crusading social conservatives providing votes with a grinning crust of naked plutocrats grifting them for all they're worth. It's not like the right's base is monolithic.
In utilitarian terms we'll probably have to see how things go in two-four years when we can run with candidates who haven't been closely welded to the left-wing nuts but the asymmetry is baffling.
"
But, Jay, you're literally illustrating my point. None of those points were embraced by the Democratic Party widely.
SSM? Sure, eventually, reluctantly by the Dems but only after VP Biden kind of frog marched them into it. TERF and Hogwarts legacy?!? That's entirely transposed in your mind straight from twitter to the Democratic Party and, as far as I can see, it's made up. Not even Harris got up and threw shade at JK Rowlings or British TERFS. So why?
And I'm not asking this in vulgar utilitarian terms or moral terms- I'm asking you as one of those unaligned centrist view from nowhere voters why.
As to "boy who cried wolf" (and this applies to your comment too John Puccio), the right has been calling Dems communists, fascists and worse my entire adult life. Liberal Fascism was published in 2008 for fish's sake. There are entire genres of music dedicated to sneering at liberal communities and population centers. So why is none of that "Boy who cried wolf"?
"
Yes really. The reason we keep talking about Sista Soulja is because it was an unusual thing for Clinton to do and because Clinton managed to pull it off. I already agreed that Harris was too associated with further left wing views to be able to silently ignore them the way your standard Dem politician does but Kamala was a unique candidate in a variety of negative ways that aren't typical for her party. That doesn't change my wider point which is that even though none of these left wing fringe positions are formally embraced by the Dems as a matter of course they are expected to be renouncing and policing them whereas the GOP are not.
And you're recapping my main point- why does the GOP not need to? It's not like the right wing fringe ideologies are popular- they're toxic and despised. My own theory is that it may be an artifact of Trump; a kind of reverse Obama field where every possible supporter says of Republicans more toxic positions and associations "well those are who Trump is going to con."
And yes, I know there're more than two groups of voters, and I'm asking you, since you give the vibe of being one of the view from nowhere unaligned voters, why the Dems have this obligation while the GOP doesn't. This isn't just Harris- Biden faced it when he won narrowly in 2020 for instance.
"
Left wing fringers are generally not Dems. They consider Dems picayune sellouts, despise them and go with the Greens; Dem Socialists or other similar left wing failure parties. This doesn't strike me as controversial to observe.
Why do these fringers reflect on the Dems when right wing fringers, it seems, don't reflect on the GOP? Why do we generally not hear our various unaligned centrists calling on the GOP to denounce their fringers?
Harris didn't denounce left wing fringers. I agree. She generally just ignored them or distanced herself from them. And it can't be denied that her 2020 positions, which were not wildly left wing fringe but were assuredly in viewing distance of wild left wing views, didn't help.
Still, Harris aside, the general political rule is there's very little hay to be made making war on your own fringe- it annoys and turns off your base, signal boosts said fringe and your opponents will always claim you're disingenuous or insufficiently vehement. I'm just curious about this double standard (I certainly don't deny it exists I just am puzzled as to why). Why must Dems make war on or answer for their fringers while the GOP has no similar obligation vis a vis their own? Heck, if the Dems embraced and nominated their nuts the way the GOP does their own the media's collective heads would >pop< explode.
"
Ah, then your position is that the Democrats must police their left wing fringes even though these are people who aren't Democrats because those fringes deranged fringing reflects poorly on the Dems because... reasons. But the GOP has no need to do the same for their right wing fringe nuts possibly because they elect them as Republican Senators, Congressfolk and President and manage to eke out wins about half the time? And who sets these rules?
"
I mean, yes, he's won twice (and lost once) but both the first time was incredibly close and the second time was not as historically narrow but not particularly a big win. Then again, considering what he has to work with in terms of the right and the GOP, those wins remain remarkable so maybe you are in grandfather sucking eggs territory.
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Err.. you're using a left wing academic example for the right? Could you unpack that more?
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Frankly I'd find you opining about the first one to be interesting in telling me a bit about your morals. I'd find you opining about the second interesting as to how you think the electorate works. And I'd find both interesting to have an idea as to what you'd be saying if, say, you hadn't been banned from Redstate. So I'd welcome you opining on both.
On “Reports: Isreal and Hamas Agree To Cease-fire Deal”
I think there's a pretty persuasive case to be made that Bibi isn't afraid exactly of Trump but uneasy because he knows a lot of people who don't like him have Trumps' ear. The Saudi/'s, for example. I think it's not so much fear of Trump trying to fish Bibi over so much as fear that Trump will be too unpredictable for Bibi to continue to do the fan dance he's been doing.
On “Trump’s Ace in the Hole”
I'm curious. Are there any subjects where the Republicans should, or should be expected to, be policing the right?
On “Open Mic for the week of 1/13/2025”
Really makes some of his stories, Calliope in Sandman especially, land very differently.
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It's really really tough. The core root of NIMBY is naked self interest and property is a huge portion of most home owners fiscal worth. I'm very pro-development but when a ten bedroom apartment went up next to my home replacing a little bungalow (core urban neighborhood) I couldn't even pretend to be happy. I am proud that I did nothing to discourage it or encumber it in any of the hearing or planning stages but having the south side of the house cast in perpetual shadow stung like a mother-fisher and that's without even thinking about if it actual impacted the property value.
There's a very real parochial interest in NIMBYism but it's wildly, desperately, important that city management doesn't succumb to it because the downstream impacts of succumbing to is have proven to be utterly catastrophic- particularly to liberalism.
On “Multiple Wildfires Rip Through Los Angeles Amid Historic Winds”
That appears to be economically illiterate. Holding premiums the same in fire prone, or flood prone, areas doesn't produce steady profits- it produces catastrophic losses. Increasing premiums in higher risk areas doesn't produce larger profits- it simply prevents catastrophic losses. We see this on the right, Florida's flood insurance debacle, and on the left, California fire insurance mess.
On “Justin Trudeau Resigns As Liberal Leader and Prime Minster of Canada”
Heh, I can say with confidence that the Board wouldn't even dignify such an offer with a response.
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Well done, yes, basically he was quite capable when compared to his right wing predecessor but seems somewhat wane compared to his, well, Liberal predecessors. Ironically the area Trudeau's weakest in, fiscal sobriety, is the area Cretchen and Martin made their names managing (well also eviscerating separatism but you'll never match wily old Jonny Cretchen in that category since he left not a lot left to stomp on).
On “Multiple Wildfires Rip Through Los Angeles Amid Historic Winds”
If by "do just that" you mean offer a policy that charges a premium that doesn't cover their losses and pass those losses on to other customers in safer locales by way of higher premiums (and eventually get out competed by insurance companies that don't and go out of business) or go out of business through rank insolvency. I... uh... kind of see why the insurance companies are electing to not "do just that". They don't have "subsidize people to live in flooding and forest fire prone locations" in their mandate nor do I think they should do so. Nor do I think should we do so.
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If you can't offer a policy at a price that people will buy and cover the losses, you don't offer a policy. As in Florida, so in California.
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Fruits of global warming and Cali's decades of NIMBY housing policy. It's gonna suck.
On “Open Mic for the week of 1/6/2025”
Well done.
On “Justin Trudeau Resigns As Liberal Leader and Prime Minster of Canada”
Yeah, Justin has had a long run which is hard on governments to start with and he didn't learn many of the lessons his liberal predecessors absorbed which has resulted in even harder problems for his administration. Maybe his resigning will contain the damage but looking at how the past elections have gone I wouldn't bet it. There's gonna be a federal shellacking of the grits. *sigh* Back to the wilderness for them for a cycle.
On “Open Mic for the week of 12/30/2024”
Yeah I like his work.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.