The Revolution: Part 2

[dexeron]

HEY DERSP.

Not linking out of agreement, but linking out of: "Hey, Desp will appreciate this, even if it's only in a 'That's total bullshit' kind of way."

http://politicartoons.livejournal.com/3711952.html

[Despanan]

Actually that's apt - though of course it displays a distinct misunderstanding of both anarchism and American Libertarianism.

I'm inclined to let that slide though, as it's clearly a rhetorical point - and there's some general truth to it.

American Libertarians, or "Propertarians" (as I've taken to calling them, because when it comes down to it, when they talk about "Liberty" they really mean "Private Property") have their roots in Liberalism & Austrian School economics. Anarchism arose specifically as a challenge to Liberalism, so they're two completely different schools of thought, but they end up sounding confusingly similar because folks like Murray Rothbard misappropriated anarchist language and rhetoric to SUPPORT his particularly brutal & reactionary version of Liberalism.

But on it's face, yeah, Libertarianism is Anarchy for rich people.

[HisDivineShadow]

Just found this interesting little chestnut. You guys know how a lot of Republicans keep clamoring that "The Democrats are the REAL racists! They're the ones who fought so long and hard against civil rights for blacks!"? Well let's always remember why:


"From now on, the Republicans are never going to get more than 10 to 20 percent of the Negro vote and they don't need any more than that...but Republicans would be shortsighted if they weakened enforcement of the Voting Rights Act. The more Negroes who register as Democrats in the South, the sooner the Negrophobe whites will quit the Democrats and become Republicans. That's where the votes are. Without that prodding from the blacks, the whites will backslide into their old comfortable arrangement with the local Democrats."

~Kevin Phillips, Nixon's political strategist

[Zengus]

Is that from Letters of Note? I believe I have seen it before

I have long considered Clinton, Reagan, and Nixon's campaigns to have been some of the most damaging to the US, just because of how their strategies affected the way politics are done.

[Phantomgrift]

Isn't it a proven point of history that all politicians in general have sucked across the board since, well, the dawn of civilization?

[dexeron]

No.

[Phantomgrift]

Sure it has... I just think you didn't like "Angry History 101" much when you were in high school.

[dexeron]

Marcus Tullius Cicero and Robert Ingersoll spring to mind as easy counter-examples.

[Phantomgrift]

You mean the guy who liked to talk a lot, was exiled and suffered from depression after things didn't go his way?
And the Civil War chappie renowned for, among other things, successfully defending a known con-artist and Land Baron of the time?

Sorry, this is me being cheeky and smart-alecy in general. Continuing to stand by a general notion that the greater majority of politicians are for lack of a better term, resoundingly "meh".

Unless you are viewing them through some sort of uplifting filter wherein you hold the orators of yester-year to a different light than those of today.

Or I'm just trying to stay awake on my return to night-shift when I'd like nothing more to do than fall asleep at my keyboard.

[Despanan]