Comment by zackmorris
2 years ago
Yes but the "both sides" argument is a fallacy.
I live in a red state whose natural environment has been devastated by Republican policies for over a century. What people see here today is a remnant of primordial old-growth wilderness. But they think it's natural and how it's always been. Similarly to the way that austerity drives struggle and suffering for working class families, but they continue voting conservative against their own self-interest. The worse it gets, the more they vote Republican. Like Lucy pulling the football away from Charlie Brown right as he is about to kick it.
Democrats have been pushing for sustainability and a national rollout of renewable energy since at least the 1960s, definitely before the Earth First! movement of the 1980s, and probably all the way back to the strengthening of national parks by Teddy Roosevelt during the Progressive Era around 1900. It's odd to imagine a Republican as an environmentalist today, but there used to be many. That helps us to understand how the parties flipped due to stuff like Nixon's Southern Strategy.
We can blame Democrats for urban sprawl, high state sales tax, red tape/overregulation, basic hypocrisy in not living sustainably at an individual level and subscribing to neoliberalism like Republicans. But the economic and environmental problems we face today are mostly a result of decades of anti-sustainability legislation and subsidies for fossil fuel companies by Republicans. To say otherwise is revisionist history and not the academic view IMHO.
With the 100 year storms hitting the south every 2-10 years now, the environmental bill is coming due. It's all but certain that some number of southern states will flip blue. It will be interesting to see if that improves their infrastructure, or if it's too late.
But I do agree with you about the dysfunction. When the Boomers pass, I wonder if the parties will flip again and introduce a whole new set of wedge issues to argue about incessantly as the world burns.
That's exactly my point though. It's only a fallacy because of your particular view on certain topics. For some people it's guns and abortion, for you it's the environment.
Imagine the world from the point of view of some one that truly believes that abortion is the murder of little children. I really mean it, just for 30 seconds.
We all have these core issues that we hold most dear and assume others must as well. Many people care far more about social issues than the environment or taxation or whatever their 'it' is.
Having only 2 parties forces us to choose the party that best represents our 'it' but to also vote for the myriad of other policies we may disagree with. We very much dislike the other party though because they have the opposite stance on our 'it'.
"It's all but certain that some number of southern states will flip blue" Florida is redder than ever. I encourage you to pause and reflect on the why of that. It's very much not because the voters are stupid, they have other 'its' that are important to them.
I'm afraid that this is something we'll have to agree to disagree on.
It's not really possible to write about this without sounding political, but the article covers a problem of political origin. So I'll do my best here to stay objective.
The left is fairly aligned today along a number of ideological lines. Basically all democrats want renewable energy, recycling, regulated natural monopolies instead of privatization, minimal social safety nets in the form of unemployment insurance and food stamps, universal healthcare, higher taxes on the wealthy, etc. It feels that scaremongering over taxation is a distraction from the fact that corporations and the wealthy have received multi-trillion dollar tax cuts since the Reagan Revolution and trickle-down economics, which created the national debt, many argue by design.
The right however is divided between libertarian ideals and religious fundamentalism. Jesus would be sad that children are caged at the border, while Christian nationalists call for tougher border enforcement. Rivers are being poisoned while rightwing think tanks like The Heritage Foundation call for more deregulation. People are struggling to make rent, much less pay their taxes, while roads and bridges crumble due to siphoning of the general fund to pay for continuous war in the Middle East and the bloating of the military industrial complex via IOUs to social security. Just on and on and on. There is so much cognitive dissonance within the Republican party that its voters must hold their noses while continuing to vote for it, simply to avoid the pain of voting for the other guys. There is no unified Republican vision to speak of today like there was under a statesman like Eisenhower. So the party turns to strongmen like the former president and Ron DeSantis in desperation, while the left and the rest of the world watch in confusion.
I feel that the projection of the right's frustrations onto the left is not based in fact or reason. Florida is redder than ever, as you said. But Florida is becoming uninsurable. My friend just moved there and narrowly escaped having his home destroyed because hurricane Idalia turned east at the last moment. Homosexuals didn't cause that, centuries of CO2 emissions from the industrial revolution and complete denial of that fact by the right did. But the news makes both of those stances sound fair and balanced.
One of the major things that Republicans struggle with is materiality (relevance and prioritization).
Without a natural environment, humanity can't survive. Bitcoin may use a lot of energy (that's dwarfed by manufacturing and transportation) yet look how much it's popped up in the comments as a factor in the blackouts. Corporate welfare and defense spending dwarf food stamp costs like SNAP for children, yet Republicans consistency target that for spending cuts. Wind and solar costs fell below coal and natural gas a decade ago, yet rightwing think tanks continue to spread propaganda that renewables are more expensive, that photovoltaic panels and fiberglass windmill blades are worse for the environment than burning radioactive coal.
Even wedge issues like abortion aren't what they seem. The left argues that personal choice and responsibility should not be overridden by government overreach. But that's a Republican sentiment. Democrats would normally argue for the protection of embryos, since they are a vulnerable segment of the population and have no advocate. Yet the parties are flipped on this, using it as a tool to rally their bases. So indirectly, I agree with you here.
Same with gun control. Democrats aren't demanding that the government take away our guns. That's Republican propaganda. But the left is arguing for banning or at the very least licensing assault weapons, just like how a truck driver should probably have a class A driver's license to operate a vehicle with such destructive potential. The key here is that this is all beside the point, since both sides are trying to protect children in schools. But the right is still in denial that their own children aren't at risk as long as guns aren't regulated.
I don't really know what to say about all of this. And thankfully nobody cares what I think. And also I'm always wrong, luckily. But I believe in my heart that the pandemic opened our eyes to reality. The chickens have come home to roost. Formerly academic problems are now at our doorstep. I can see that Biden has survived nearly unsurvivable trauma, so now he's woke. He is no hero to the left, but its hero Bernie Sanders couldn't be allowed by the establishment. Where is an empathetic leader on the right? Where is the conservative leader that will rise above generational trauma to lead us into prosperity? There isn't one. Because the right isn't doing the work to move through a healing and growth process. There's only projection, finger pointing, half-truths and ridiculous eventualities like a whole state's power grid going down so that a few guys at the top can dip their sticky fingers into the public's electric bill.
Thank you for the thoughtful response. For the most part you are correct. I do want to stress though that while I agree with you on many of the issues on a whole, I look at them from a slightly different perspective.
I'll use myself as an example. I live in Florida so I can identify with your friend and insurance. My political leanings have shifted as I have gotten older and had kids. I voted Dem religiously my entire life until the last midterm. I voted for Desantis even though on many issues I disagree with him. My 'it' to continue my theme from my prior post became social issues and more importantly how they affect my kids. I am very much against schools keeping secrets from parents and the sort of gender & race ideology that is encouraged in states like California [I expect to be massively down voted over this]. I have no issue with adults making whatever choices they want in life as consenting adults. Thus Desantis got my vote this round even though I disagree with him on many things, especially his use of government power to target political enemies like Disney (which has blown up in his face). I don't think Desantis is a good candidate for federal power and will vote for Biden again. I will probably vote Desantis again on the state level for the same reason, local control of schools and social issues that in my mind could affect my kids.
You could argue that my concerns are unfounded or pale in comparison to the dangers of climate change. Right now though they are my main concern and I will hold my nose and vote on them. I agree climate change is an issue, I just don't see it as being immediately solvable. Third world countries are going to continue to burn coal and more of it as they seek to expand their economy. I don't see how we can ask them not to while we sit here in the first world and enjoy the benefits of decades of doing just that.
As far as assault rifles, the right sees them as insurance against government coming into homes and dictating to them how they should live their lives. Whether we agree or not, that is their world view or at least some of them. This was compounded when we watched police in other countries assault people in the pandemic over mask wearing. A family member of mine who is highly intelligent and manages billions of $ has what can essentially be called an arsenal for this reason.
Abortion for many is not so much an issue of personal choice but of the wholesale murder of kids. I think you would agree that it should not be a parents choice to kill a 4 year old, just extrapolate to a fetus and that's how they feel. Again, this is their belief and it understandably colors their world view. I don't share this belief but I get it.
Many white republicans see the changes in other countries like race being taken into account in prison sentencing and school admission and see how this affects their kids long term. The mayor of new york city, a democrat just said that all of the immigrants being sent to NYC could be the end of it. Republicans in TX and border states have dealt with this for many years so you can understand how it colors their opinion.
I'm pretty much with you on the military industrial complex part except I view it as a jobs program. We provide work to people who otherwise may not find meaningful employment as well as providing hundreds of thousands of middle class jobs to the engineers that build our weapon systems and the supporting software. If we cut our military spend by half tomorrow, where would all of those jobs go?
Democrats frame violent crime often as a gun issue but so many of the weapons used in shootings in cities like Chicago are illegal weapons. Republicans see these cities and their crime rates as proof that being lax on enforcement and punishment leads to violence. SF is a great example of this as people leave and businesses close up due to rampant theft and safety concerns.
I generally try and put myself in other peoples shoes to understand where they are coming from. I'll vote Biden because I think he is doing a good job on the federal level I don't see any decent candidates of the caliber of McCain or Romney on the Republican side. I'll also try and vote for mixed government in congress as preventing 1 party from having full power prevents the most extreme of either parties ideas being pushed through. Real change requires compromise from both. I'll vote for Republicans on the state level as right now my 'it' requires it.
I am willing to change though as my 'it' changes and as my kids get older, my voting will probably continue to evolve. Everyone has a reason why they vote how they do though, their core issue is just different from yours or mine. I think I may be a little different in that my core issue actually changes. I think for most they just vote how they have always voted and their core issues remain the same.
One thing I very much don't like is how vindictive politics has become in the last decade or so. People hate the other side to the point of violence [left and right]. I cannot condone that. I also see what happened on Jan. 6 as an abomination which is another reason that I will not vote R at the federal level unless the candidate utterly condemns it and the person in power when it happened.
1 reply →