Hmm, "fiery apocalypse" sounds a lot like what the victims of Hillary's bombings will experience.
Also, I have to disagree with the following:
But they also believe a lot of really preposterous and regressive things that would functionally obliterate modern society. The Libertarian Party platform explicitly calls for abolishing or repealing the following things: income taxes, Social Security, public education, the Environmental Protection Agency, Obamacare as well as and I quote, “all federal programs and services not required under the U.S. Constitution.”
This is not an inherently bad thing.
* Income taxes SHOULD be repealed (and ideally replaced with a wealth, property, and environmental taxes).
* Social Security SHOULD be abolished (and replaced with a universal basic income).
* The EPA does more harm than good because their regulations target specific goals rather than general outcomes (cultural example: Ghostbusters 1984). Also, Gary Johnson supports a carbon tax, which is the ONLY effective way to handle the environment: by internalizing the negative externality of pollution.
* Obamacare SHOULD be abolished, since it forces everyone to buy a private product in a market that shouldn't even exist. This forces poor people to pay MORE on premiums while still not being able to afford the deductible.
* We currently have too much government waste, INCLUDING the military, which Gary Johnson would also cut (though perhaps not as much as Jill Stein).
I will, however, grant that the American Libertarian movement is mostly off its rocker with how far right wing many of them are, leading them to really just be in favor of privatized tyranny. However, the president does not have the power to unilaterally enact laws, only to enforce them. I would trust Gary Johnson to veto a lot of bills that should be vetoed. I would not trust Hillary to veto those bills because she'll want to take credit. I would not trust Trump to veto bills because he will want to do it for his ego.
Furthermore, I don't really agree with most of the underlying assumptions here, such as:
* If you're a True Progressive(tm), you should vote for the Democrat / lesser evil because that's better than the alternatives.
* Al Gore totally wouldn't have gotten into Iraq, despite giving a speech in 2002 about how we should get into Iraq.
* If you don't vote for [Democrat running in year 4*n], then you'll let in the opponent who is literally Hitler and will cause the end of the world.
* Gore lost because of those 40,000 Nader voters, and not because of the 300,000 FL Dems who voted for Bush. Or the fact that he lost NH. Or TN, his home state. Gore's shitty campaigning had absolutely no bearing on his electoral failure, and neither did the Supreme Court.
This really isn't about "liberal > conservative" or "left vs right wing" when both parties hold functionally the same policies when it comes to the things that truly matter. At the end of the day, the simple answer is that candidates need to do better instead of trying to guilt voters. If you keep giving your vote away guaranteed, your issues will be ignored every time. That's just simple game theory. People need to stop giving away their votes, and they need to do it for longer than one election.
So yeah, basically, I would much rather have Trump in 2016 and someone better in 2020 than Clinton in 2016 and Ted Cruz in 2020. The funny thing is, if Ted Cruz was the nominee, I would agree that he needs to be stopped. He is 1000x worse than Trump easily, and more dependably so. Still wouldn't vote, because of this thing called the Electoral College and the fact that I live in Alabama. But if I DO vote, it will be for a third party to get them more popular support. I cannot and will not support a system that is not working and is not addressing my needs and issues. That's futile, and also political suicide as a voter. Instead, I'll be directing all of my energy and organization away from electoral politics and into direct action... at least, until someone actually worth voting for decides to run.
If that makes me "not progressive", then I don't care. I'm not here for the labels. I'm here for change.
Hmm, "fiery apocalypse" sounds a lot like what the victims of Hillary's bombings will experience.
Also, I have to disagree with the following:
This is not an inherently bad thing.
* Income taxes SHOULD be repealed (and ideally replaced with a wealth, property, and environmental taxes).
* Social Security SHOULD be abolished (and replaced with a universal basic income).
* The EPA does more harm than good because their regulations target specific goals rather than general outcomes (cultural example: Ghostbusters 1984). Also, Gary Johnson supports a carbon tax, which is the ONLY effective way to handle the environment: by internalizing the negative externality of pollution.
* Obamacare SHOULD be abolished, since it forces everyone to buy a private product in a market that shouldn't even exist. This forces poor people to pay MORE on premiums while still not being able to afford the deductible.
* We currently have too much government waste, INCLUDING the military, which Gary Johnson would also cut (though perhaps not as much as Jill Stein).
I will, however, grant that the American Libertarian movement is mostly off its rocker with how far right wing many of them are, leading them to really just be in favor of privatized tyranny. However, the president does not have the power to unilaterally enact laws, only to enforce them. I would trust Gary Johnson to veto a lot of bills that should be vetoed. I would not trust Hillary to veto those bills because she'll want to take credit. I would not trust Trump to veto bills because he will want to do it for his ego.
Furthermore, I don't really agree with most of the underlying assumptions here, such as:
* If you're a True Progressive(tm), you should vote for the Democrat / lesser evil because that's better than the alternatives.
* Al Gore totally wouldn't have gotten into Iraq, despite giving a speech in 2002 about how we should get into Iraq.
* If you don't vote for [Democrat running in year 4*n], then you'll let in the opponent who is literally Hitler and will cause the end of the world.
* Gore lost because of those 40,000 Nader voters, and not because of the 300,000 FL Dems who voted for Bush. Or the fact that he lost NH. Or TN, his home state. Gore's shitty campaigning had absolutely no bearing on his electoral failure, and neither did the Supreme Court.
This really isn't about "liberal > conservative" or "left vs right wing" when both parties hold functionally the same policies when it comes to the things that truly matter. At the end of the day, the simple answer is that candidates need to do better instead of trying to guilt voters. If you keep giving your vote away guaranteed, your issues will be ignored every time. That's just simple game theory. People need to stop giving away their votes, and they need to do it for longer than one election.
So yeah, basically, I would much rather have Trump in 2016 and someone better in 2020 than Clinton in 2016 and Ted Cruz in 2020. The funny thing is, if Ted Cruz was the nominee, I would agree that he needs to be stopped. He is 1000x worse than Trump easily, and more dependably so. Still wouldn't vote, because of this thing called the Electoral College and the fact that I live in Alabama. But if I DO vote, it will be for a third party to get them more popular support. I cannot and will not support a system that is not working and is not addressing my needs and issues. That's futile, and also political suicide as a voter. Instead, I'll be directing all of my energy and organization away from electoral politics and into direct action... at least, until someone actually worth voting for decides to run.
If that makes me "not progressive", then I don't care. I'm not here for the labels. I'm here for change.