A Model of a Basically Competent Republican President

[BeBMan]

In 2048 poly will have threads like "Inspector Gadget will declare that SHIELD and MiB broke the law to hide Stormy Daniels' child with Trump from the US public"

[ricketyclik]

I'm not American, so my perspective is different from the one you're asking the question from.

America has a distorted "what's good for the individual is good for the whole" indoctrination message throughout its history. America is prototype neoliberalism. You guys are brainwashed by that throughout your lives.

Try to imagine a perspective that says "what's good for the whole is good for the individual". By the whole, I mean everyone. Try to break free of that "anyone can make it if they work hard enough" crap, and see your system for what it is, indoctrination to benefit the very few while convincing the majority that they too can one day be that minority.

Even your "left" is far to the right of most of the rest of the world.

[Lorizael]

Not sure what the relevance to this thread is, but I think you have a very simplistic view of America. America is big enough to have hyper-individualistic folk, commies like Che, socialists like Bernie, and insane transhumanists like me.

[-Jrabbit]

Yeah, but via a macro view, his theory has some relevance.

[Proteus_MST]

This view about large scale individualism (being more important than the collective) surely seems to be the view that is politically dominant in the USA (even Obama didn't dare to go as far left as proposing a single payer health insurance, for example, although he took a lot of steps forwards towards getting a larger percentage of americans insured)

[Lorizael]

That's fine, but I genuinely don't understand what relevance it has to the thread topic. Also don't terribly appreciate the condescending "try to imagine" bit. Hey man, try to imagine that the self is an illusion and that we're all connected. HAVE I BLOWN YOUR MIND YET.

[Proteus_MST]

That's fine, but I genuinely don't understand what relevance it has to the thread topic.

True ... after all the thread is about a model for a republican president, who per definitionem already is right from the democrats and therefore even more right than most right-wing parties in europe

[Elok]

Moving back to the topic, it might depend how narrowly you define competence. Certain mainstream GOP viewpoints would probably have disastrous effects, most notably the dogged insistence on cutting taxes and scaling back social services. From a certain POV, if poverty suddenly became substantially worse, that would not be terribly objectionable. If competence is meeting your goals, a GOP president could be very competent--no reason he couldn't, unless the goals were literally impossible. On the other hand, Trump has shown that brand loyalty increasingly matters more than policy. I could see a Republican doing some very un-Republican things, provided he said the right things and insulted the right people en route.

[ZEE]

On-Topic posts.

[ricketyclik]

Not sure what the relevance to this thread is, but I think you have a very simplistic view of America. America is big enough to have hyper-individualistic folk, commies like Che, socialists like Bernie, and insane transhumanists like me.

Yes, I understand that, but statistically enough of the people of the US have been brainwashed by the privately-owned media and the education system to allow domination by corporations, all the while thinking it's good for them and the only reason they aren't hyper-wealthy is that they haven't worked hard enough.

When you systematically dumb down your population, why are you surprised that laughable figure heads get elected?

[Kidlicious]

Yes, I understand that, but statistically enough of the people of the US have been brainwashed by the privately-owned media and the education system to allow domination by corporations, all the while thinking it's good for them and the only reason they aren't hyper-wealthy is that they haven't worked hard enough.

When you systematically dumb down your population, why are you surprised that laughable figure heads get elected?

Has it ever occurred to you that most of us are not trying to get wealthy?

[Lorizael]

Far-right demagoguery appears to be on the rise throughout the world. The US has Trump, but Britain has Brexit and actual Nazis are gaining power in Europe. Italy had a Trumpian leader long before Trump in Berlusconi. So I don't see a good reason to come up with a causal explanation for Trump that is distinctly American rather than part of a broader global trend.

[Aeson]

"Please God ... anything but more wealth! I'm working 2 jobs just to pay the bills and that's exactly how I like it. Don't you dare give me a raise evil capitalist overlords!" - said everyone in Kidland

[ricketyclik]

Far-right demagoguery appears to be on the rise throughout the world. The US has Trump, but Britain has Brexit and actual Nazis are gaining power in Europe. Italy had a Trumpian leader long before Trump in Berlusconi. So I don't see a good reason to come up with a causal explanation for Trump that is distinctly American rather than part of a broader global trend.

True.

OK, you win this debate.

[Lorizael]

Moving back to the topic, it might depend how narrowly you define competence. Certain mainstream GOP viewpoints would probably have disastrous effects, most notably the dogged insistence on cutting taxes and scaling back social services. From a certain POV, if poverty suddenly became substantially worse, that would not be terribly objectionable. If competence is meeting your goals, a GOP president could be very competent--no reason he couldn't, unless the goals were literally impossible. On the other hand, Trump has shown that brand loyalty increasingly matters more than policy. I could see a Republican doing some very un-Republican things, provided he said the right things and insulted the right people en route.

I'm open to the idea of a disastrously competent president. What I'm more thinking about is that the two most recent Republican presidents don't seem to have any business being in government at all. Trump is painfully ignorant of what his job even entails. Bush was almost assassinated by a pretzel.