We probably have more in common than we know so called 'left' vs 'right'

I want to test something here everybody. If you could post your policial leaning : 'left', 'right', libertarian etc.
And post your strongest thoughts that make you decide I'm 'left' , or 'right' ?

So I'm libertarian , or I would be called 'right' wing here by most when debating senselessly.

I believe in :

* Freedom . Basically freedom to go out in my car and drive where I want (non tresspassing off course) when I want .
To buy what I want when I have funds to do so , like maybe more investments or just some groceries.
So basically it means independance from government or anyone to me.
* The constitution , as it keeps us protected from overbearing governments like we see in NK/ China .
The democrats seem hellbent on destroying the 2nd for a reason.
* My body my choice , yes this includes pro-choice when it comes to abortion.
* Minimal government in peoples lives. Most people are capable adults that can and want to take care of themselves
* Minimal technology use everywhere. This may sound confusing, but I mean the 'fourth industrial revolution' aka from Klaus Schwab.
Where jobs are replaced by machines and that , we have to do these jobs now for free ,example: self checkout.
* Eductation should be about Math/sciences etc, NOT : CRT, drag queens reading sex stories to 3 year olds , porn books in middle school libraries, woke teachers forcing their beliefs on their students
* Jurical system overhauled so criminals are penalized and victims protected. Not iike we see now in blue states where the criminals take over the streets and if you defend yourself against an attacker you're ostricized
* HIgher education admission based on ability alone NOT : by skin color or gender (affirmitative action )
* Racism is racism period. ACTUAL racism, by any race NOT : using the race card, black on white racism being praised in MSM while any other way is heavily criticized.

There's probably more I can add later when I think of more.

a reply to: ancientlight

Hell I am a classic liberal. I want my mixed race homosexual neighbors to be able to carry firearms protecting their marijuana garden. I want a government whose only jobs are protecting my country from outside influences and aggression, upholding my God given rights and deliver the mail. Everything else is gross overreach creating a bureaucracy which is not what the constitution is about.

I am mistaken for a republican all the time but my beliefs fall in line with Thomas Jefferson and I refuse to play the game at this point. I see very little in redeeming ourselves from the apathetic path we set upon ourselves. We the people have failed ourselves by letting the foxes watch the henhouse.

I am 56 years old. It has been a corrupted America my entire life and has increased significantly in the last 20 years.

My time is coming to an end hopefully.I really despise humanity at this point in my life. Death is the sweet release from this world which we have made into a living hell. At least anyone who has an IQ above 100 and can be intellectually honest can see this reality.

I have chosen to immerse myself in the natural world which is still uncorrupted.

a reply to: ancientlight

So I'm libertarian , or I would be called 'right' wing here by most when debating senselessly.

Apparently it works both ways. I've been a registered Libertarian since the Gov. Johnson days and been called a
a commie on ATS as I sit in my store/studio office trying to make an honest living or out working on a union gig, by members that disagree on my stance politically. I stopped calling people bootlickers because it sounds trashy and accomplishes nothing.

a reply to: ancientlight

I'd mostly align with you, but I don't call myself libertarian for various reasons; mostly because I won't be locked into any political or ideological box. (ETA: I guess that makes me an "independent." Thanks, Mahogany.)

The only lable that I'd be willing apply to myself is that of minarchist. I hold dear to my heart that phrase that has been called the "Jeffersonian maxim" and is sometimes probably wrongly attributed to Thomas Jefferson:

"That government is best which governs least."

The one area where I'd differ with you is on considering abortion to be a woman's right. While I firmly believe that "That government is best which governs least," I hold that the primary purpose of government is to protect the lives, rights and security of the weaker members of a society from those who would use their strength, privilege or power to abuse the weaker or deprive them of essential liberties. The unborn are not masses of unviable tissue any more than is a new-born, six month old baby or an infirm elderly person. Society has not the right, but the responsibility to protect those who cannot protect themselves, and denying abortion on demand as a "right" and limiting access to it is no different from telling a thug that he cannot murder an elderly person.

There are other areas where the social contract hands a minarchist government the responsibilty to protect the overall health and well-being of the society, but I'll admit that the further you get into that discussion, the more slippery and the steeper that slope gets. After all, we know that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely, and once human beings get power, like sharks in bloody water, the feeding frenzy commences.

Aside from those stated ideas, this minarchist can align with your libertarian views.

:

originally posted by: ancientlight

What about the independents? Nobody ever talks about us here, nobody even mentions that word, it's like a taboo word here, I see it written in a post like once a month.

The independents are the largest political group in the US, with about 40% of the voters.


Honest advice here to better the Republican party, think of it as dropping a ladder into the hole you all dug for yourselves:

Focus on the independents. The core 27% of the voters that are registered Republican cannot make their numbers any larger. That's the limit and it doesn't change much. You want to win anything ever again, you need to attract the independents. And it's not happening with lies and vitriol -- it will take a different approach.

But remember this -- the Republican party will never win anything ever again if they only focus on the core Republicans and only what they want and what they believe in.

Conservative.
Stop defunding the police. if anything fund them more.
I think there is too much government spending too much money.
I will concede abortion in some cases but am against abortions of convenience.
our media, news and entertainment, is extremely leftist, foul, sex-obsessed, anti-Christian, anti-tradition. I watch/read less and less.
the Democrat party is totally corrupt and yanked around by leftist extremists. they've gotten away with it so far because the media is the same group.
open borders is insane.

a reply to: incoserv

I'll add an idea here that will perhaps seem strange.

I am a member of a large Christian denomination that has deep historical roots. I have come to the conclusion, however, that no Christian denomination is ever destined to remain faithful to orthodoxy for more than a couple of centuries (and that is being generous). Every deomination has, historically, either faded away or been driven into heterodoxy. This is because even when a denomination starts as a truly divinely inspired movement, a some point men get their claws into it and it ceases to be a movement of God and becomes a movement of men; and once it becomes the domain and kingdome of men, it is doomed to failure on a grand scale. I fear that I am seeing the denomination of which I am currently a member go through this exact process.

The same thing happens, I believe, with nations. Regardless how well they start out, it is inevitable - given the rottenness at the core of human nature - that those who wield power (and there always have to be a few at the top of the socio-political food chain) will at some point become intoxicated with that power and will seek to accumulate more.

This is the demise of human socio-political constructs. Democracy is, in itself, not a particularly bad concept, and neither is capitalism. I think it was Winston Churchill who said that democracy is the worst of all possible institutions, except for all the rest ... or something like that. The same would apply to capitalism, IMO.

Any human organization that is established is bound for eventual corruption, be it churches, nations, businesses. We just can't help ourselves.

:

a reply to: watchitburn

I campaigned aggressively for Ron Paul in 2007. I was living at the time in Central Texas. I distinctly remember my mother-in-law referring to him as "that crazy old man." A couple of years later, though, I heard her say that she should have voted for him.

But they would probably have assainated him if he'd gotten into office.

While I used to be a libertarian I am not anymore. The party has been taken over by the left and is only a method used by the left to steal votes from the Republican party now. I find myself drifting farther and farther to the right given the current state of the nation...and I have ZERO in common with the Left/Communist party

originally posted by: incoserv
a reply to: watchitburn

I campaigned aggressively for Ron Paul in 2007. I was living at the time in Central Texas. I distinctly remember my mother-in-law referring to him as "that crazy old man." A couple of years later, though, I heard her say that she should have voted for him.

But they would probably have assainated him if he'd gotten into office.

Yeah either that or they would have invented a slew of false charges and jailed him....like someone else we know

a reply to: OdinsPath

Ron Paul suffered in part from the same handicap that Ben Carson suffered from; both were excessively decent human beings to manage the top eschelons of power in D.C.

I've said before, I think that morally and ideologically Ben Carson would have been a perfect president, but as a decent, moral, honorable man (which I believe him to be), the machine in D.C. would have destroyed him.

They'd have had to kill Paul because I don't think they could have dredged up enough dirt on him to taint him.

:

a reply to: incoserv

Oh yeah. They would have JFK'd him.

originally posted by: OdinsPath
While I used to be a libertarian I am not anymore. The party has been taken over by the left and is only a method used by the left to steal votes from the Republican party now. I find myself drifting farther and farther to the right given the current state of the nation...and I have ZERO in common with the Left/Communist party

This is why I eschew lables, aside from that of minarchist.

Remember the Tea Party? Same thing happened. It had a good start and could have accomplished some positive things, but right-wing establishment politicos invaded and co-opted it and destroyed it from the inside.

The Uni-party will not brook competition!

if you are a Biden apologist who bashes Trump at every opportunity, calling yourself anything is your choice, but you are directly in line with the left. Lockstep in line with the left.

and if you are called out on it, claiming that you don't like Biden either just doesn't sell the sizzle.

originally posted by: Mahogany


But remember this -- the Republican party will never win anything ever again if they only focus on the core Republicans and only what they want and what they believe in.

small government, freedom from stupid rules. Constitution first, America first, Protect children at all costs.

If you think like that, all the other things are just fluff. But the second you claim that's you, and you champion the Transgender story hour for preschoolers, you have to realize you aren't the guy you thought you were.

a reply to: network dude

That's called hypocritical virute-signalling.

a reply to: incoserv

or pulling the "but I'm a Libertarian" after you are called out for being a Biden boi.

originally posted by: incoserv
a reply to: ancientlight

I'd mostly align with you, but I don't call myself libertarian for various reasons; mostly because I won't be locked into any political or ideological box. (ETA: I guess that makes me an "independent." Thanks, Mahogany.)

The only lable that I'd be willing apply to myself is that of minarchist. I hold dear to my heart that phrase that has been called the "Jeffersonian maxim" and is sometimes probably wrongly attributed to Thomas Jefferson:

"That government is best which governs least."

The one area where I'd differ with you is on considering abortion to be a woman's right. While I firmly believe that "That government is best which governs least," I hold that the primary purpose of government is to protect the lives, rights and security of the weaker members of a society from those who would use their strength, privilege or power to abuse the weaker or deprive them of essential liberties. The unborn are not masses of unviable tissue any more than is a new-born, six month old baby or an infirm elderly person. Society has not the right, but the responsibility to protect those who cannot protect themselves, and denying abortion on demand as a "right" and limiting access to it is no different from telling a thug that he cannot murder an elderly person.

There are other areas where the social contract hands a minarchist government the responsibilty to protect the overall health and well-being of the society, but I'll admit that the further you get into that discussion, the more slippery and the steeper that slope gets. After all, we know that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely, and once human beings get power, like sharks in bloody water, the feeding frenzy commences.

Aside from those stated ideas, this minarchist can align with your libertarian views.

:

Isn't that what being libertarian means, minimal government ?

originally posted by: OdinsPath
While I used to be a libertarian I am not anymore. The party has been taken over by the left and is only a method used by the left to steal votes from the Republican party now. I find myself drifting farther and farther to the right given the current state of the nation...and I have ZERO in common with the Left/Communist party

I haven't followed it much, all I know is that it means minimal government involvement, which is what I like about it. I'm really conservative/'right-wing', but I don't want to use those labels as they drive us , united as a nation, apart. That's why IMO the whole political theater exist. To divide and conquer