If Mort Divine ruled the world

[viewerfromnihil]

Weimar was already a quasi-socialist country. The right's platform was based around restoring the empire and making Germany great again. It was not a platform of gimmedats. The right held 30-ish% of the seats in parliament in 1932, largely from rural voters. Hitler was made chancellor by back-door deals. After what was effectively a terrorist attack with the Reichstag fire, the right won a slim majority of parliament by playing into their narrative of a homogeneous nation was needed and that Germany cannot harbor religious, racial, political, etc. minorities (who they blamed for the fire). Oh, and the fucking Great Depression was going on, and the right played the same "perils of heterogeneity" card to win cheap support. Immediately after gaining power, the right dissolved civil liberties and placed powers reserved for parliament into the hand of Hitler.

Your narrative is utterly miscategorizes Hitler's rise to power. It was much more backdoor dealing and firing up the rural anti-communists that brought Hitler into power than democracy.

 

[Dak]

There's so many incorrect things here. So I guess since you're taking it serious I'll respond.

Hitler didn't run on the idea that Jews should be removed and killed. And the action taken by himself and the SS was something that is incomparable to taxation in the United States. Taxes are approved by congress, but the President and his military force. Hitler used his executive power to kill those deemed unworthy.

Bernie Sanders and most Democrats, run on the idea that they want to pay for a new 'gimmedat,' people have the ability to vote against that opinion. Which is basically all what elections are. Removing or adding gimmedats, but then bullshit people like Milo and apparently you now conflate adding gimmedats with authoritarian regimes because....maybe they're dumb? I guess.

So are the German people somewhat responsible for the genocide? I wouldn't agree, since it was not his platform to commit genocide. I don't even think Hitler had a majority anyways.

What's the last tax/gimmedat to win without a majority in this country?

As far as Hitler specifics go (and this is @Black Orifice as well):

Dirty backroom dealing: Standard politics.
Not fully revealing the details of policy/platform: Standard politics.
Not full majority: Standard democratic politics.

Hitler's views regarding Jews were known via Mein Kampf, and there was no significant pushback even in the early 1930s to the immediate implementation of pogrom(s) and "special status" treatment. Antisemitism in Europe in general has waxed and waned over the centuries as they have been regular non-assimilators in whatever host country - and anti-semitism was waxing at the time.

Defending the Weimar Republic as a socialist project vs the horrors of dirty right wing takeover is a pretty amusing position take in defense of socialism, since the WR died via hyperinflation trying to serve both reparation and socialist projects. I guess that's the death Berniebros wish for the US. If we ignore the moral issues with the Jewish pogroms and the treatment of non-Germans in the expanded lebensraum, the rightwing coup was a smashing success in comparison to WR deathonomics. Only the US engagement and the timing/overruning of the Eastern Front prevented it from achieving all objectives, at least in the short term.

As far as gimmedats in the US go, before I go any further I want you to clarify whether it is simply the current political/legal system you are leaning on for justification of any gimmedats, or "majority rule". I can't properly deal with the problems in either area unless I know on which pillar you are resting.

 

[rms]

before I go any further I want you to clarify whether it is simply the current political/legal system you are leaning on for justification of any gimmedats, or "majority rule".

You are acting as if the policy has changed, Congress has always been the one with the power to levy 'gimmedats.'

Congress is a representation of the majority, since we are basically a 2 party country.

If your point is that politicians lie about taxes they intend to implement or gimmedats they hide but really want to implement, then provide examples because it's not anywhere comparable to this bogus Hitler comparison.

 

[Dak]

You are acting as if the policy has changed, Congress has always been the one with the power to levy 'gimmedats.'

Congress is a representation of the majority, since we are basically a 2 party country.

So in answer to my question, you believe "majority rules" is both ethical and occurs?

If your point is that politicians lie about taxes they intend to implement or gimmedats they hide but really want to implement, then provide examples because it's not anywhere comparable to this bogus Hitler comparison.

What do you count as lying? Introducing bills? Signing onto bills? Veto/non-veto? etc.

 

[rms]

So in answer to my question, you believe "majority rules" is both ethical and occurs?

Well it can be ethical and can occur, but there's human error. It's better than the alternative, which I guess is your libertarian take of the day.

Lying is going against what the politician campaigned for. If Bernie never said he wanted college for all, and then tried to legislate that as President, that would be lying.

 

[viewerfromnihil]

Defending the Weimar Republic as a socialist project vs the horrors of dirty right wing takeover is a pretty amusing position take in defense of socialism, since the WR died via hyperinflation trying to serve both reparation and socialist projects.

I'm not going to debate with you about politics because it always turns into "you say x," "somebody counters y," then "you say x and y are false because all government is authoritarianism," and the process repeats further down the rabbit hole. I will point out, however, that Weimar didn't die because of hyperinflation--hell, hyperinflation was half a protest policy. Nor did the right-wingers take over after hyperinflation. Weimar died a decade later at the hands of actual authoritarians in the midst of a global economic crisis. Weimar was hit particularly hard because they relied on loans from the US, so that they could repay France and Britain. US gave these loans because they needed for Germany to pay France and Britain, so that they could pay back the US. It wasn't the best system and Weimar got fucked when US dollars stopped flowing.

 

[Dak]

I'm not going to debate with you about politics because it always turns into "you say x," "somebody counters y," then "you say x and y are false because all government is authoritarianism," and the process repeats further down the rabbit hole. I will point out, however, that Weimar didn't die because of hyperinflation--hell, hyperinflation was half a protest policy. Nor did the right-wingers take over after hyperinflation. Weimar died a decade later at the hands of actual authoritarians in the midst of a global economic crisis. Weimar was hit particularly hard because they relied on loans from the US, so that they could repay France and Britain. US gave these loans because they needed for Germany to pay France and Britain, so that they could pay back the US. It wasn't the best system and Weimar got fucked when US dollars stopped flowing.

Because TANSTAAFL. It's so rudimentary, so elementary, and yet people think some Rube Goldberg machine or another is going to cancel out this basic fact.

 

[viewerfromnihil]

Because TANSTAAFL. It's so rudimentary, so elementary, and yet people think some Rube Goldberg machine or another is going to cancel out this basic fact.

That's an easy way to say that complicated situations are simple, but they're not. US strategy after WWII followed a similar path with Bretton Woods and the Marshall Plan. The difference is that the stock market didn't collapse half-way through Europe being rebuilt, in part because sensible regulations were put into place on Wall Street. The Dawes Plan wasn't some failed venture. It was successful until the economy tanked for other reasons.

 

[rms]

The difference is that the stock market didn't collapse half-way through Europe being rebuilt, in part because sensible regulations were put into place on Wall Street.

Not isolationist economic policies?

 

[Dak]

That's an easy way to say that complicated situations are simple, but they're not. US strategy after WWII followed a similar path with Bretton Woods and the Marshall Plan. The difference is that the stock market didn't collapse half-way through Europe being rebuilt, in part because sensible regulations were put into place on Wall Street. The Dawes Plan wasn't some failed venture. It was successful until the economy tanked for other reasons.

Bretton Woods is what allowed the arrangement to last longer than a decade - and failed dramatically itself (not the equally simplifying "regulations"). The difference being that by the time the "game was up", there was no balance of powers to start a fight over it. The Bretton Woods system hid the losses that earlier had rolled back to Germany, and eventually the US said LOLOWELL in 1971 when everyone else under the system realized their loss.

 

[SentinelSlain]

So much of social science is absolute drivel. I fucked hated so much of what I read and heard at university. It still kind of gives me chills, thinking how fucking disgusting it all is.

 

[Baroque]

So much of social science is absolute drivel. I fucked hated so much of what I read and heard at university. It still kind of gives me chills, thinking how fucking disgusting it all is.

Absolutely. Hard science ftw

 

[Matt]

Hard science is hard though.

 

[Dak]

There's a reason the social sciences put out a terrible product - it's overwhelmingly a proggie enterprise, to say nothing of the sex imbalance.

 

[CiG]

Hard science is hard though.

Only if you're soft.

 

[Oblivious Maximus]

Not an April Fool's joke:

https://twitter.com/GreaterGlasgPol/status/715867273261662208

 

[Dak]

^

In other news:

 

[CiG]

Looks more like Daniel Radcliffe lost a dare.

 

[Dak]

Yeah it's obviously not the same person if you look at key features but it's close enough to be funny.

 

[CiG]

To me the most interesting thing happening in political culture right now is the civil war going on within the Left.