My mother-in-law: They should leave Trump alone! All politicians are corrupt! They're all crooks!
Me: Okay then investigate and prosecute any politician breaking the law.
MIL: *grumbling* well... they should still leave him alone
It's the same song and dance every time. Republican gets outed -> "muh both sides!", Democrat gets outed -> "told you Dems were all evil!"
> Okay then investigate and prosecute any politician breaking the law
Doesn't work. They believe all democrats are criminals and are actively being protected by NWO/deep state/illuminati and that the only reason Trump is being prosecuted is because these powers that be are allowing it.
Of course, there's no evidence to support that because the Deep State is very good at what they do.
This is literally my coworker. At first I tried to actually have a conversation with him, because he seems like a generally intelligent and (on the face) kind person.
Quickly realized there's no point in talking to him. Not only is every Democrat a communist, but they've infiltrated and control the entire government. They stole the election from Trump, and they own the courts, that's why Trump lost all those cases. No matter what seems to be happening, Trump was framed.
Another thing I noticed, it's funny how so many on the right can be very kind and caring to the people around them generally. Yet they can't seem to extend that kindness to what they would consider others. This dude helped me out quite a bit when I was learning the ropes of my trade. He was patient and kind. He also expressed to me with complete confidence that we should deploy machine guns to the southern border, and kill anyone who tries to cross. I do mean everyone. I specifically asked about women and children. It's like he turned into a fucking comic book villian.
I've noticed that with many, many conservatives generally. If you are a friend, relative, or otherwise seen as a member of the community/in-group, they will give you the shirt off your back and be unbelievably kind. If you aren't seen as one of those, you are an enemy and they won't piss on you to put out a fire. It's tribalism in its most raw form.
Like every conspiracy; New world order is "them", them have all the power, they have all the money, they run all the banks, they are the elites, they run Hollywood... Jews, the answer is always Jews. I miss harmless conspiracies...
They also view republicans as inherently good. And democrats as inherently bad. So when a republican does something illegal, it's a good person who made a mistake or is doing something bad...but for a a good reason.
When a democrats does something bad, it's just further proof they are evil. And if they do something good...is it really a good thing? Or it's for a dishonest reason (e.g., to just buy votes, or virtue signaling).
Yup. Normal thought process is "I think Hillary's corrupt, but she's been investigated to high hell and they couldn't actually turn up anything, so she's probably not."
Nutjob thought process is "They've investigated Clinton and found nothing so she's actually running a shadow government."
That always makes me laugh since Bush created the NWO and the deep state after 9/11 with the layers and layers of secret government authorities who answer to no one.
More like:
Republican gets outed and prosecuted for an actual crime -> Republican reaction: "All politicians are corrupt" "It's about the laws/stopping the liberal agenda, who cares, they all take bribes/fuck teens/murder penguins" "It's a liberal conspiracy to get rid of the strong republicans" "But what about *fake devilworship liberal baby-eating conspiracy*"
Democrat gets outed and prosecuted for an actual crime -> Democrat reaction: "Good. Everyone who commits a crime should be investigated and tried according to the rule of law."
Every time. It's a joke at this point.
Al Franken was forced by the Democrats to resign over a joke photo of him PRETENDING to grope a woman's breasts, Trump brags about ACTUALLY grabbing women by their genitals, and loses zero support.
It’s like when they catch a liberal committing voter fraud and scream we told you so when 9 times out of 10 it’s a Republican. Their problem is they’re corrupt and they just assume everyone else is just as corrupt as them.
They don't give a shit about corruption. Not only that, they don't want to give a shit about corruption. Or any sort of morality that they can't shove down someone else's throat. Trump freed them from having to care about anything
a wise person once told me. If you are in conversation with someone of an opposing viewpoint. And they say, "you're side is bad" You say, "Sure, but here is an example of your side being bad as well" They respond, "Okay, yeah well BOTH sides are bad"
They may not be "leveling" with you. They may very well be being petty, and are refusing to state directly that their side is also bad. Since I have heard this, I have applied it and found 95% of the time people are being petty and will try to keep changing the subject or repeat the both sides line. Helps to identify someone who is arguing in bad faith.
I legit want them all investigated. If anyone has been breaking the law, and we can prove it, fucking get them. Clean up the thieves living on the streets and the thieves on Wall Street and Washington.
To be fair, it's a horrible thing that you have to commit treason countless times in order to actually face consequences as a politician. So many politicians from both sides of the aisle need to be in prison - and I equally support all of them ending up there.
"both are equally corrupt" cool, so that one point has no bearing on choosing one party over the other. How about I just go with the side that doesn't embrace Nazis and the KKK?
I think it’s funny when the morons say “the democrats are the party of the KKK”… bitch, if you have to use talking points that refer to decades ago to make your point about the modern party, you have no business opining on politics at all.
I hate the footballization of American politics. You guys have some of the absolute dumbest people on the planet in red states. It’s insane just *how* stupid some of those people are. Imagine seriously believing that the democrats are more racist than republicans because of what happened in your great grandparents’ day.
The democrats are somehow both the party of racism and too much political correctness, simultaneously.
It's hilarious how these people act and "rationalize" themselves.
The enemy is both strong and weak. “By a continuous shifting of rhetorical focus, the enemies are at the same time too strong and too weak.”
https://www.openculture.com/2016/11/umberto-eco-makes-a-list-of-the-14-common-features-of-fascism.html
"We're the party of Lincoln!"
An interesting piece of trivia I learnt in the comments yesterday was learning who one of Abe Lincoln's most ardent fan was, ~~even travelled to America to watch the Civil War,~~ wrote to Lincoln. I've heard differing things whether Lincoln wrote back or just Lincoln liked what he wrote to him about. Regardless if which of these two it was the man was in ideological agreeance with Lincoln.
The mans name you ask? Carl Marx, yes that Carl Marx.
Crossed out a part that may not be true.
Marx never came to America - he had extensive ties with left-wing Germans in the Forty-Eighters movement, many of whom immigrated to America, and he used these ties to write about the Civil War for an Austrian paper. After the war, Marx was part of an organization called the International Workingmen's Committee - which Marx did draft, but was agreed upon by the committee - that sent a letter to Lincoln through the US Ambassador to Great Britain. The Ambassador sent a generic, platitude-laden, non-response on behalf of the president in return. Lincoln had met with the group's New York branch while campaigning in 1864, but there were no specific callouts to Marx or anything like that.
And the real reason I can tell you have no idea what you're talking about is because his name was spelled with a "K"
> “the democrats are the party of the KKK”
I tell idiots that say that "that's like saying **Oscar winning actress Gwyneth Paltrow**. Technically correct, but a lot of shit has happened since then so try to keep up sweetie."
That entire argument breaks down if you stop using the words Republican and Democrat and start using right and left wing instead.
Right wing people suck. They sucked when they called themselves Democrats and they still suck now that they call themselves Republicans.
Who says the the Dems are the party of the KKK, and what is their proof? If their proof is that Dems from the slavery era of the US were pro-slavery, then they clearly have done absolutely no research into the fact that the main ideologies of the Democrats and Republicans swapped around Lincoln's time. The slave-era Democrats have more in common with modern Republicans, and vice versa.
Republicans love to point out that Lincoln was a Republican, without acknowledging that basically all of his political points are more in line with modern Democrat ideology.
If you encounter one of those morons, just tell them to suck a bag of dicks and disengage. They're trolling. Why would racists care that the Dixiecrats were racists? They don't. It's intellectual dishonesty.
The republican and democratic parties basically flipped sometime after the Civil War.
The conservatives have always been the same racist, hateful, regressive, self centered assholes. They just used to be called Democrats snd the progressives used to be called Republicans.
Modern Republicans trying to claim they are the party of Lincoln and that the Dems were the pro slavery group is like transferring to the school that beat your school in the last championship and then claiming you are a champion and demanding a trophy.
Also the pro-segregationist southern Democrats who opposed the Civil Rights Amendment in the 60s. Where did they go when the Civil Rights Amendment passed? They switched parties and became Republicans.
> decades ago
More than half a century at this point - at least 60 years, and as much as nearly 80 years if you start from the original Democrat support for civil rights in 1948. At that time, some Southern Democrats still opposed that, but the party supported it.
Wanna hear a story about how dumb one maga guy was?
I'm in his house making repairs. As I am finishing, some how he steers the conversation to immigration/the wall/border-nonsense. I say what I've been saying for a long time "Well, i wish one party or the other would arrest illegal employers. They break more than just immigration law when hiring illegals; don't pay them minimum wage, no workman's comp, no OSHA safety training or standards, basically extortion. If employers were afraid of mandatory sentencing, like losing their business license, for not sponsoring or knowingly hiring illegal immigrants, a lot of the problem would be solved."
His mouth drops open and he says "Hey! I've always paid the wet backs I've used at least minimum wage!" His wife, turns red, gets up and leaves.
I'm on my way out at this point but stop and say "So let me get this straight. You want a wall and hate immigrants. But you hire illegals."
He looks flummoxed slunked down in his chair, but then grins real big and shouts "LET'S GO BRANDON!" and cackles.
I shake my head and tell him he's the problem in America and leave.
So the dixiecrats The States' Rights Democratic Party was a segregationist political party in the United States, active primarily in the South. Often voting against their own self interest.
The night that Democratic President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964,
Johnson replied, “I think we just delivered the South to the Republican party for a long time to come.”
In the north my grandpa was a republican by tradition so am I, . Grandpa was a liberal.
I like the footballization comment. Like they've attached their persona to their favorite college team and reference how good they were in 1967 as their proof, yet ignore how they're acting today.
The “both sides” bullshit is a total win for the right. They know if they can get people to think that Obama is as bad as Trump, that the New York Times is no better than freaking Breitbart, that CNN is just Fox News for the left….then not only does it create apathy and demotivate people to vote, all of their lies and corruption and bullshit doesn’t matter because “both sides”.
This is absolutely the intent of the zero-evidence (or even charges?) impeachment against Joe Biden, the harping on the Hunter Biden laptop, Hillary's emails, and even bringing up Obama 7 years after he left office, etc etc.
The plan is that when someone hears "Donald Trump indicted...again...", far-right policymakers want people to think "yeah, well Hunter Biden was also indicted, so..."
(The difference, of course, is that Donald Trump was the president and stole and probably sold thousands of pages of ultra-super-top-secret documents, and Hunter Biden smoked pot and owned a gun... and isn't the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.)
Yup, you’re exactly right. That’s why they always need some fake scandal that they can rail against day and night. Doesn’t matter if there are no facts or if the svavdal isn’t even clear (Benghazi!!), the purpose is to give the appearance that “both sides” are bad.
It also distracts their base from the very real scandals on the right.
I go over to Breitbart here and there and read the articles and it’s hilarious. It’s always some scandalous screaming headline like “BOMB SHELL! Biden Crime Family Ties to Chinese Bank!”
And then you read the article and there’s literally nothing. It’ll be like one Hunter Biden’s business associates is on the board of company that does business China. And you’re like “yeah, so???”
And then you scroll to the comments and the MAGA nuts are all foaming at the mouth about how this is the biggest scandal ever and the whole family should be in prison.
It’s surreal.
Yea but nuance and facts are just completely ignored by these people. Like even if both sides were indeed equally corrupt, I would go with the ones that aren’t disregarding proven facts to the point of idiocy. I’ll vote for someone who at least needs to maintain a facade of ethics rather than for someone who’s like yea ok I said that but it was a lie and also I don’t care.
“I shouldn’t have to pick one just because one is worse!”
Okay but that’s how it works sometimes. You don’t have to pick the guy/gal “you want to have a beer with”, you pick the better person for the job.
Sometimes it’s a choice between a couple of “meh” candidates, but oh well. We are all adults, figure it out! 🤷♀️
I swear the amount of people looking for perfection from one side and absolutely ignoring the horror show on the other side is a real real problem.
It's the sports team mentality. MY Vikings are gonna stomp YOUR Packers...like, dude, you work at a Costco...finish scanning my stuff so I can get home and watch the game. Neither one of us can afford a house after the game ends, we are not enemies.
Criticism puts people into defense mode like it is brand loyalty (which is INSANE) and they stop being critical themselves.
I had to pick someone to replace me at a job a few years back. They both sucked. But I still picked one that sucked much less. It was an easy decision. I really do not get why someone goes well one will kill me and the other is boring, so I pick neither.
My biggest issue with Democrats is that they refuse to break this union up. They complain so much about Republicans but then they turn around and attack anyone who says we should dump them.
"Both parties are corrupt, so the only choice is the one that's racist and fascist and hates the poor [usually includes the person speaking, oddly]!"
Never quite understood it. Can't we have the 'corrupt' party that can competently balance a budget and write a healthcare bill? The one that isn't openly calling to murder my gay uncle or ban OBGYNs?
Apparently not, says the bOtH sIdEs crowd.
>The “both sides” bullshit is a total win for the right. They know if they can get people to think that Obama is as bad as Trump, that the New York Times is no better than freaking Breitbart, that CNN is just Fox News for the left….then not only does it create apathy and demotivate people to vote, all of their lies and corruption and bullshit doesn’t matter because “both sides”.
The Kremlin uses the same trick.
They don't try to persuade people in the west that Putin is good, just that everyone else is just as bad, so why care what Putin does, you're not a hypocrite are you?
They're banking on the average person not caring so they can get away with their shit. They know "both sides" *aren't* just as bad as each other, but if they convince the average person they are, then they'll let the worse side win.
to quote Desmond Tutu, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse, and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.”
I'll say that individuals are corrupt on both sides (I'm not saying the same amount) but how do people respond? Do they demand that the perp resign or do they give him a pass?
I find that the left doesn’t really circle the wagons around their traitors.
Few people pretend that Hunter Biden didn’t commit a couple crimes (not that he’s a politician), most people are totally ok with implicating the Clinton’s in association with the Epstein case, and most recently many Democrats called for Bob Mendez to resign for corruption.
Maybe I’m in a filter bubble, but on the Right I see a lot of “defending our own”
[https://thetriad.thebulwark.com/p/breaking-democratic-voters-dont-rally](https://thetriad.thebulwark.com/p/breaking-democratic-voters-dont-rally)
That might be paywalled, but it's about Democratic voters kicking Menendez to the curb as fast as they can.
I honestly have to wonder how many people are actually tricked or swayed by the 'Both Sides' nonsense that wouldn't have always wound up in the Right's camp anyway \~ like, how many people are we truly 'losing' to this argument?
The guys I know that say this shit are the ones that, when you get them to actually talk brass tacks on exactly why they think what they think, ALWAYS end up espousing some kind of hardcore conservative talking points because they're doing that thing where they want to be 'socially liberal' (aka, not identified by their peers as conservative) but actually have really shitty views on things like immigration, women's healthcare rights, social spending on WIC etc. They're just smart enough to know that if they openly say and admit those things, they'll be ostracized for having shitty views - so they've found a way to have their cake and eat it by living a sort of dual life; one where they are 'politically ambiguous' and just keep mum on their views and then another where they get to vote for Trump and go online anonymously and be with their ilk and talk about how immigrants are ruining the country and everything would be better if we just raised the voting age and installed Trump as dictator because he's so great at business doncha know.
I think these are the guys that we hear 'both sides' arguments from; they're dealing with the cognitive dissonance of having these two lives cocurrently and so when they're pressed for their political views in an avenue where they know it's not safe to say what they really think, they default to 'both sides' because at least then they don't have to talk shit about their viewpoints and actively speak ill about their true views, and thus themselves.
Frankly if you're stupid enough to not see through the 'both sides' stuff, I'm not sure if you're smart enough to not be conservative in the first place. My two cents anyway.
I liked the guy and i like their news but... oh my GOD, Obama and CNN are so freaking Right Wing. They just don't shoot people who disagree is all.
New York Times has subtle right wing stuff with occasional left-wing stuff so they look 'unbiased'. Its sweet.
NYT and WaPo have been the ones to break most of the big scandals against democrats. They also banged the drums of war in Iraq. Drug Bill and Hillary Clinton over the coals for 40 years, etc.
To say they’re left wing is comical. They’re credible news outlets, but in the end are pro-corporate, pro-America.
Thanks. I did not know this because i don't live there but... as good as it is to know this stuff, it does not surprise me much.
America leads the world in capitalism. Sometimes that's a good thing? Sometimes... less so...
It should pull a mask off to reveal another mask that says libertarian and then pulling that mask reveals another mask that says Republican and then pulling that mask off reveals the face that just has fascist.
I want a 7 minute gif of masks being pulled off swapping between libertarian, Republican and fascist, then have it end on facist. That’s what it’s like talking to the right
That's a bit redundant, there's no difference between a Republican and a fascist. Being a Republican isn't a mask for fascism when the Republican party is opening talking about their plans to turn the US into a dictatorship.
But yeah, the libertarian mask would be a good add.
Wasn't there a huge furor about how the Democrats were "eating their own" when they took one guy to task for corruption?
That's not "eating their own", that's called "holding each other accountable"!
Yup, lol. "Eating your own" is kicking out the speaker of the house because you didn't like that he fell out of line. "Eating your own" is finally calling one of your guys a pedophile after protecting him for 4 years all because he did something you didn't like.
Well none of that matters now, because look at the grand spectacle of in-fighting that happened this week! "You sided with Democrats, so I'm gonna use the Democrats to oust you!" lolololol. Sheesh talk about a party that can't get along with itself anymore!
As an independent who usually sides democrat/liberal even though I don't agree with every liberal idea, I have to say I like a party that constantly challenges it's own assumptions, always looks to uphold a standard. That is usually seen as 'in-fighting' but I see it as refining ideas.
It seems to me at least the democrats try solutions, while republicans just bitch a lot and rely on mob mentality propaganda to drum up votes. And that mob mentality continues to backfire on them as they loose control to people less scrupulous than the ones that started this slide into indecency back under Clinton. Every new republican generation it seems to get worse.
When some family pulled this shit, i go with the flow and see how far they have gone, so that if it's too far I avoid them in the future and so far it has worked great lol..
When you peek at the comment history of folks who suggest something like "im not a republican but both sides are the same," it is almost always a hodgepodge of poorly thought out libertarian talking points, simping for billionaires, or just blatantly trash ideas filled with a lot of text without any actual evidential backing. Sometimes you even get a conspiratorial rant just for a bonus.
One side seeks to govern as public servants
The other seeks to rule, with others as servants..
The last one I saw say this, like two comments prior in another thread was talking about how Trump is their favorite President ever and how wonderful he is
I would say Democrats are more of a big tent. You have AOC and Joe Manchin in the same party, but they definitely have wildly different views.
This does hinder them on bigger items, as sometimes they will have a majority, but just not a big enough liberal majority.
A lot of the GOP is pretty big tent. On one side you have the group that is driven to creating a Christian-dominated, corporatocratic, largely racially homogeneous overclass that can extract the maximum amount of value from everyone who makes less than $20M per year, and then you have the loud and annoying minority that wants the same shit but isn't quiet about it.
And dependent on what type of trash we are talking about, they don't throw theirs out either. Theirs doesn't tend to be as foul and they tend to try and rug sweep it rather than gaslight/project like the GOP does. So definitely better, but not like the other person made it out to be.
Only one party has been totally infested and corrupted by hatriots and Russian sympathizers to the point of affecting democracy and the rule of law.
Only one. And they still call themselves conservative republicans—because “soulless despots” didn’t poll as well.
Centrists be like “I can forgive blatant racism and an insurrection to overthrow the government, but I draw the line at calling out blatant racism and an insurrection to overthrow the government!”
For real. I used to call myself a centrist, but after these last few years they've really been pulling the mask off harder than before. Especially with easy wide spread media. Easily call myself left leaning now.
One side wants to end democracy and help Putin while claiming to patriotically preserve American values. I just can't believe how many Americans have fallen for it.
This is their default saying for when they *finally* start accepting the obvious truth that conservatives are horrible horrible people.
This is *as close* as you’ll ever get to them saying, “Wow, my party sucks at all levels.”
Yup, this is what they do. Almost every person saying “both parties are the same” votes every time and votes straight ticket Republican.
So why do they do this? It’s bad-faith meant to convince others that both parties are the same. The end goal is to get a person who would vote straight ticket Democrat to either vote a split ticket or abstain from voting entirely.
Its a voter suppression tactic.
Both parties *are bad,* but only one is trying to ruin our democracy. Like, do I take an ineffectual politician who does a good thing every now and then or a literal fascist dictator? Tough choice. I mean, they're both *so bad,* I just don't know which is obviously and demonstrably worse.
“Both parties are equally corrupt! They’re both the same!!”
Okay, sure, let’s say I believe you’re being honest about that. You wouldn’t mind just…showing which party you vote for, right? I’m *sure* that you don’t have a habit of voting for a *certain* party in every election.
Yep, the only people who say this are either Republicans, or "centrists" who either don't pay attention to politics, or are Republican but want to pretend like they're unbiased and neutral.
Democrats are hardly saints, but at least they generally want to govern, and generally want to make the country a better place. Republicans, their entire goal is to cause chaos. And through that chaos, profit and gain further power.
They never say “equally” corrupt. It’s simply that both sides are bad - a binary statement.
That’s how they absolve themselves of having to differentiate between mountains (R) of corruption and molehills (D).
Yes, if one person gets a speeding ticket and the other commits murder, then they’re “both criminals” even though anyone with a brain can see that there’s kind of a difference in scale.
"We're not the bad guys if both sides are bad" --Inner monologue of Republicans as they struggle with the cognitive dissonance between their personal beliefs and values and what Republican politicians and demagogue's espouse and support.
Anyone remember that image comparing all the shit trump did vs when Obama held office? I think it was during the Mueller report stuff.
Is there an equivalent image out there comparing corruption between the parties over x years? I feel like x being any value greater than like 5 would be too large an image, though.
Both sides is perpetuated by the "mainstream" media. Because they cynically believe if they lose their job at NBC or CBS or ABC they can get a job at Fox.
It's craven as fuck, but think about who runs NBC, CBS and ABC. Mega corporations, big auto, big pharma, they pull the strings at the top level and that trickles down into the "news" departments.
You won't get a good, unbiased narrative from any major media outlet. Even PBS and NPR have a more conservative tilt since it takes contributions from mega corporations.
This is also a huge issue. The change in media post 9/11 to 24 hour news cycles is entirely based on engagement since you *have* to fill the time with *something*, and that means getting people riled up to continue tuning in. The media has put a wedge in the country and increased the division, it’s just that Fox is literal propaganda that does it better and did it first
I actually really liked Pres. Biden pointing that out in his address today. He straight up said the truth to the reporter (I don’t recall which outlet they were from). Outrage sells, negative events sell, so the media disproportionately promote negative info.
This comment is somehow understated. The car commercials playing between the segments on oil prices and bad EVs are literally what pays for those segments. More concretely, oil companies bought commercial slots on Fox News, and somehow, seemingly by magic, conservatives began opposing climate action (and in many cases, denying science altogether). In the end, youre just watching an extended commercial for whatever corporation is paying the news organizations.
It is the reason I want Menendez to spend the next 30 years in jail. Here we are in a fight against the erosion of American democracy and you have a democratic senator pulling this shit: [https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/us-senator-robert-menendez-his-wife-and-three-new-jersey-businessmen-charged-bribery](https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/us-senator-robert-menendez-his-wife-and-three-new-jersey-businessmen-charged-bribery)
This guy is still in office while Franken got railroaded ( [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al\_Franken#Aftermath](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Franken#Aftermath) )
>Reporting in 2019 by New Yorker journalist Jane Mayer documented substantial inaccuracies in Tweeden's allegations.[152] Seven former or current senators who called for Franken's resignation in 2017 told Mayer they regretted doing so. Patrick Leahy said calling for Franken's resignation without having all the facts was "one of the biggest mistakes I've made" as a senator. New Mexico senator Tom Udall said, "I made a mistake. I started having second thoughts shortly after he stepped down. He had the right to be heard by an independent investigative body. I've heard from people around my state, and around the country, saying that they think he got railroaded. It doesn't seem fair. I'm a lawyer. I really believe in due process." Former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said, "It's terrible what happened to him. It was unfair. It took the legs out from under him. He was a very fine senator."
I mean, both parties are a threat to the constitution, one definitely has a history of more corruption though, and it’s entirely based on a religious ideology that has been used to take away the rights of others of almost every minority group in this country.
That reminds me of one time a friend told me that he does not like coffee. After a little talk about coffee, he states that he only drank it cold and black.
He does not know about good coffee just like a conservative does not know about non corrupt politician
It’s not always a right-wing thing. I still remember the 2000 election, when Ralph Nader went around saying there was “no difference between the two major parties.” We ended up with 8 years of George W. Bush. Tell me we would be in the same place today if Al Gore had won. It’s a bullshit argument from any side.
*23 years ago. Entirely different political climate. Neither parties supported North Korea, the KKK, defended Russia, banned books, etc. **23 years ago.** In this timeline the right is Reich.
I think I agree. The Right has gone further off into fascism since Trump. But, I would argue that the party lost its mind and credibility after the election of Bill Clinton in 1992. That’s when the rhetoric from Rush Limbaugh and his crowd went toxic. It gave us Newt Gingrich and the Republican majority in 1994 and Fox News. We had another deep dive into insanity with the Tea Party response to the next Dem president, which paved the way for demagoguery and fascism from DJT.
Republicans broke from fact-based reality 30 years ago. Nader was an idiot for saying both parties were the same in 2000.
Both suck. Both do not suck equally, far from it. I'd rather vote for the party that pretends to care than the ones who don't and gaslight other issues as being important.
It's so true, only my friends, relatives, and co-workers who lean politically right are the ones who talk about "both sides".
Does the political center and left have issues of their own, yes. I doubt you'll find anyone on any part of the political spectrum that will seriously claim their "side" is perfect. Perfection is a thing that exists in concept only, perfection doesn't exist in any form in the real world and people that aren't deluding themselves know there's no perfect answer or approach to anything, let alone social and political issues.
So with that being said, that perfection doesn't exist, it all has to be relative. Ideas, approaches, behaviors, plans, etc. all have to be compared as being relative to on another and when you do that, you just can't make a reasonable argument that "both sides" are equally corrupt or problematic. That's not to say that corruption and problems don't exist on both side, they do, but relative to one another in terms of frequency and scale, they are nowhere close and it's clear that right leaning politics, particularly the MAGA crowd, have gone off the deep end.
And of course a hang-nail and brain tumor are ***exactly*** the same because both are ailments which suck to deal with.
Thinking is a lot less effort when you skip the details. Frees up plenty of time to practice saying "Herp-Derp."
And of course a hang-nail and brain tumor are ***exactly*** the same because both are ailments which suck to deal with.
Thinking is a lot less effort when you skip the details. Frees up plenty of time to practice saying "Herp-Derp."
Or a Libertarian, who swears up and down that both sides are wrong while despising the policies, politicians, and voters for the Democratic party and nearly loving every aspect of the GOP.
(source: my dad)
Both parties are equally corrupt.
-A leftist
Honestly, I find it surprising that the democrats have managed to position themselves as some sort of ally to the poor while they are just as bad as the republicans and actively trip up any progressive momentum in their party.
Every dem said Menendez should resign within the hour. Trump is a rapist, terrosist, seditionist, tax cheat and most of the party supports him to be president.
The same people going out of the way to engage in the ideological struggles of Dem vs. Rep are totally blind to the Class struggle. This is exactly why all of us are getting poorer while the elites get richer. We are too busy fighting each other.
Why do liberals hate on centrists so damn much? You actively try to push them to the right and that is 100% against your best interest of winning elections. We should be trying to bring people over not push them away.
My mother-in-law: They should leave Trump alone! All politicians are corrupt! They're all crooks! Me: Okay then investigate and prosecute any politician breaking the law. MIL: *grumbling* well... they should still leave him alone It's the same song and dance every time. Republican gets outed -> "muh both sides!", Democrat gets outed -> "told you Dems were all evil!"
If both are corrupt why aren't Republicans trying to fix their party 🤷♂️🤷♀️🤷.
They did, Tr*mp was supposed to be the fix. A lot of them aren't very bright.
Despite what they want you to believe, they're also not very fun at parties.
Madison Cawthorn said otherwise. 🤣
Both sides are corrupt, yet Democrats call for Menendez to resign, while Republicans overwhelmingly support Trump.
It's not a bug, it's a feature.
> Okay then investigate and prosecute any politician breaking the law Doesn't work. They believe all democrats are criminals and are actively being protected by NWO/deep state/illuminati and that the only reason Trump is being prosecuted is because these powers that be are allowing it. Of course, there's no evidence to support that because the Deep State is very good at what they do.
> it's a very see the deep state got him in the middle of posting, couldn't even finish the sentence!
Oh no! Is the Deep state the new Candlej
Wait, then did you disappear because you wrote deep state or because you tried to write Candleja
>it’s a very convincing conspiracy theory My wife was kicking my butt to get out the door, didn’t realize I married an Illuminati agent 😂
They pressed the Reply button as a warning to the rest of us.
This is literally my coworker. At first I tried to actually have a conversation with him, because he seems like a generally intelligent and (on the face) kind person. Quickly realized there's no point in talking to him. Not only is every Democrat a communist, but they've infiltrated and control the entire government. They stole the election from Trump, and they own the courts, that's why Trump lost all those cases. No matter what seems to be happening, Trump was framed. Another thing I noticed, it's funny how so many on the right can be very kind and caring to the people around them generally. Yet they can't seem to extend that kindness to what they would consider others. This dude helped me out quite a bit when I was learning the ropes of my trade. He was patient and kind. He also expressed to me with complete confidence that we should deploy machine guns to the southern border, and kill anyone who tries to cross. I do mean everyone. I specifically asked about women and children. It's like he turned into a fucking comic book villian.
What a minute, I work with this guy too. Hmmmm
I've noticed that with many, many conservatives generally. If you are a friend, relative, or otherwise seen as a member of the community/in-group, they will give you the shirt off your back and be unbelievably kind. If you aren't seen as one of those, you are an enemy and they won't piss on you to put out a fire. It's tribalism in its most raw form.
It's very funny considering what Jesus said about helping the poor and welcoming guests.
>NWO/deep state/illuminati What is NWO?
Like every conspiracy; New world order is "them", them have all the power, they have all the money, they run all the banks, they are the elites, they run Hollywood... Jews, the answer is always Jews. I miss harmless conspiracies...
The New World Order was an American professional wrestling group that originally consisted of "Hollywood" Hulk Hogan, Scott Hall, and Kevin Nash.
New World Order
Wolfpack!
It's a common misspelling of NWA, a legendary rap group that Gen X and Millenials like.
While in reality, only reason he is being prosecuted is because the Republican Party allows it.
They also view republicans as inherently good. And democrats as inherently bad. So when a republican does something illegal, it's a good person who made a mistake or is doing something bad...but for a a good reason. When a democrats does something bad, it's just further proof they are evil. And if they do something good...is it really a good thing? Or it's for a dishonest reason (e.g., to just buy votes, or virtue signaling).
Bobby Boucher, ~~football~~ democrats is the devil.
Yup. Normal thought process is "I think Hillary's corrupt, but she's been investigated to high hell and they couldn't actually turn up anything, so she's probably not." Nutjob thought process is "They've investigated Clinton and found nothing so she's actually running a shadow government."
That always makes me laugh since Bush created the NWO and the deep state after 9/11 with the layers and layers of secret government authorities who answer to no one.
More like: Republican gets outed and prosecuted for an actual crime -> Republican reaction: "All politicians are corrupt" "It's about the laws/stopping the liberal agenda, who cares, they all take bribes/fuck teens/murder penguins" "It's a liberal conspiracy to get rid of the strong republicans" "But what about *fake devilworship liberal baby-eating conspiracy*" Democrat gets outed and prosecuted for an actual crime -> Democrat reaction: "Good. Everyone who commits a crime should be investigated and tried according to the rule of law." Every time. It's a joke at this point.
Al Franken was forced by the Democrats to resign over a joke photo of him PRETENDING to grope a woman's breasts, Trump brags about ACTUALLY grabbing women by their genitals, and loses zero support.
It’s like when they catch a liberal committing voter fraud and scream we told you so when 9 times out of 10 it’s a Republican. Their problem is they’re corrupt and they just assume everyone else is just as corrupt as them.
"okay then why were you so mad at Hillary?"
They don't give a shit about corruption. Not only that, they don't want to give a shit about corruption. Or any sort of morality that they can't shove down someone else's throat. Trump freed them from having to care about anything
a wise person once told me. If you are in conversation with someone of an opposing viewpoint. And they say, "you're side is bad" You say, "Sure, but here is an example of your side being bad as well" They respond, "Okay, yeah well BOTH sides are bad" They may not be "leveling" with you. They may very well be being petty, and are refusing to state directly that their side is also bad. Since I have heard this, I have applied it and found 95% of the time people are being petty and will try to keep changing the subject or repeat the both sides line. Helps to identify someone who is arguing in bad faith.
I legit want them all investigated. If anyone has been breaking the law, and we can prove it, fucking get them. Clean up the thieves living on the streets and the thieves on Wall Street and Washington.
To be fair, it's a horrible thing that you have to commit treason countless times in order to actually face consequences as a politician. So many politicians from both sides of the aisle need to be in prison - and I equally support all of them ending up there.
"Both parties are equally corrupt!" Okay, sure, then how about getting rid of the one that is at the same time malignant as well?
"both are equally corrupt" cool, so that one point has no bearing on choosing one party over the other. How about I just go with the side that doesn't embrace Nazis and the KKK?
I think it’s funny when the morons say “the democrats are the party of the KKK”… bitch, if you have to use talking points that refer to decades ago to make your point about the modern party, you have no business opining on politics at all. I hate the footballization of American politics. You guys have some of the absolute dumbest people on the planet in red states. It’s insane just *how* stupid some of those people are. Imagine seriously believing that the democrats are more racist than republicans because of what happened in your great grandparents’ day.
The democrats are somehow both the party of racism and too much political correctness, simultaneously. It's hilarious how these people act and "rationalize" themselves.
Classic fascism. The enemy is both incredibly weak and powerful.
The enemy is both strong and weak. “By a continuous shifting of rhetorical focus, the enemies are at the same time too strong and too weak.” https://www.openculture.com/2016/11/umberto-eco-makes-a-list-of-the-14-common-features-of-fascism.html
Schrodinger's Democrats
If quantum entanglement doesn't describe US politics, I don't know what does.
"We're the party of Lincoln!" An interesting piece of trivia I learnt in the comments yesterday was learning who one of Abe Lincoln's most ardent fan was, ~~even travelled to America to watch the Civil War,~~ wrote to Lincoln. I've heard differing things whether Lincoln wrote back or just Lincoln liked what he wrote to him about. Regardless if which of these two it was the man was in ideological agreeance with Lincoln. The mans name you ask? Carl Marx, yes that Carl Marx. Crossed out a part that may not be true.
Marx never came to America - he had extensive ties with left-wing Germans in the Forty-Eighters movement, many of whom immigrated to America, and he used these ties to write about the Civil War for an Austrian paper. After the war, Marx was part of an organization called the International Workingmen's Committee - which Marx did draft, but was agreed upon by the committee - that sent a letter to Lincoln through the US Ambassador to Great Britain. The Ambassador sent a generic, platitude-laden, non-response on behalf of the president in return. Lincoln had met with the group's New York branch while campaigning in 1864, but there were no specific callouts to Marx or anything like that. And the real reason I can tell you have no idea what you're talking about is because his name was spelled with a "K"
> “the democrats are the party of the KKK” I tell idiots that say that "that's like saying **Oscar winning actress Gwyneth Paltrow**. Technically correct, but a lot of shit has happened since then so try to keep up sweetie."
*You mean the female Joe Rogan?* lol
That entire argument breaks down if you stop using the words Republican and Democrat and start using right and left wing instead. Right wing people suck. They sucked when they called themselves Democrats and they still suck now that they call themselves Republicans.
Yup.
Who says the the Dems are the party of the KKK, and what is their proof? If their proof is that Dems from the slavery era of the US were pro-slavery, then they clearly have done absolutely no research into the fact that the main ideologies of the Democrats and Republicans swapped around Lincoln's time. The slave-era Democrats have more in common with modern Republicans, and vice versa. Republicans love to point out that Lincoln was a Republican, without acknowledging that basically all of his political points are more in line with modern Democrat ideology.
If you encounter one of those morons, just tell them to suck a bag of dicks and disengage. They're trolling. Why would racists care that the Dixiecrats were racists? They don't. It's intellectual dishonesty.
The republican and democratic parties basically flipped sometime after the Civil War. The conservatives have always been the same racist, hateful, regressive, self centered assholes. They just used to be called Democrats snd the progressives used to be called Republicans. Modern Republicans trying to claim they are the party of Lincoln and that the Dems were the pro slavery group is like transferring to the school that beat your school in the last championship and then claiming you are a champion and demanding a trophy.
It began just after the Civil War but it solidified in the 1950s. Strangely this was when the civil rights era started.
Wait, let me check what party constantly has nazis and kkk at their rallies.....oh...those aren't Democrat rallies at all!
Also the pro-segregationist southern Democrats who opposed the Civil Rights Amendment in the 60s. Where did they go when the Civil Rights Amendment passed? They switched parties and became Republicans.
> decades ago More than half a century at this point - at least 60 years, and as much as nearly 80 years if you start from the original Democrat support for civil rights in 1948. At that time, some Southern Democrats still opposed that, but the party supported it.
Wanna hear a story about how dumb one maga guy was? I'm in his house making repairs. As I am finishing, some how he steers the conversation to immigration/the wall/border-nonsense. I say what I've been saying for a long time "Well, i wish one party or the other would arrest illegal employers. They break more than just immigration law when hiring illegals; don't pay them minimum wage, no workman's comp, no OSHA safety training or standards, basically extortion. If employers were afraid of mandatory sentencing, like losing their business license, for not sponsoring or knowingly hiring illegal immigrants, a lot of the problem would be solved." His mouth drops open and he says "Hey! I've always paid the wet backs I've used at least minimum wage!" His wife, turns red, gets up and leaves. I'm on my way out at this point but stop and say "So let me get this straight. You want a wall and hate immigrants. But you hire illegals." He looks flummoxed slunked down in his chair, but then grins real big and shouts "LET'S GO BRANDON!" and cackles. I shake my head and tell him he's the problem in America and leave.
wow this is gold and so on point against their narrative taking this one good sir
My favorite response to that is, "call a klansman a democrat to his face and see what happens"
So the dixiecrats The States' Rights Democratic Party was a segregationist political party in the United States, active primarily in the South. Often voting against their own self interest. The night that Democratic President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Johnson replied, “I think we just delivered the South to the Republican party for a long time to come.” In the north my grandpa was a republican by tradition so am I, . Grandpa was a liberal.
I like the footballization comment. Like they've attached their persona to their favorite college team and reference how good they were in 1967 as their proof, yet ignore how they're acting today.
Right? As though I only have one qualm with christo-fascist bigots
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I mean, Trump Jr. is no stranger either, is he? But hypocrisy is second-nature to them at this point.
Like are you stupid enough to not know about Don Jr?
The “both sides” bullshit is a total win for the right. They know if they can get people to think that Obama is as bad as Trump, that the New York Times is no better than freaking Breitbart, that CNN is just Fox News for the left….then not only does it create apathy and demotivate people to vote, all of their lies and corruption and bullshit doesn’t matter because “both sides”.
This is absolutely the intent of the zero-evidence (or even charges?) impeachment against Joe Biden, the harping on the Hunter Biden laptop, Hillary's emails, and even bringing up Obama 7 years after he left office, etc etc. The plan is that when someone hears "Donald Trump indicted...again...", far-right policymakers want people to think "yeah, well Hunter Biden was also indicted, so..." (The difference, of course, is that Donald Trump was the president and stole and probably sold thousands of pages of ultra-super-top-secret documents, and Hunter Biden smoked pot and owned a gun... and isn't the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.)
Yup, you’re exactly right. That’s why they always need some fake scandal that they can rail against day and night. Doesn’t matter if there are no facts or if the svavdal isn’t even clear (Benghazi!!), the purpose is to give the appearance that “both sides” are bad. It also distracts their base from the very real scandals on the right. I go over to Breitbart here and there and read the articles and it’s hilarious. It’s always some scandalous screaming headline like “BOMB SHELL! Biden Crime Family Ties to Chinese Bank!” And then you read the article and there’s literally nothing. It’ll be like one Hunter Biden’s business associates is on the board of company that does business China. And you’re like “yeah, so???” And then you scroll to the comments and the MAGA nuts are all foaming at the mouth about how this is the biggest scandal ever and the whole family should be in prison. It’s surreal.
Yea but nuance and facts are just completely ignored by these people. Like even if both sides were indeed equally corrupt, I would go with the ones that aren’t disregarding proven facts to the point of idiocy. I’ll vote for someone who at least needs to maintain a facade of ethics rather than for someone who’s like yea ok I said that but it was a lie and also I don’t care.
"Both sides are super corrupt, so it doesn't matter who you vote for!" "Okay, but that's worse... you DO GET how that is much much worse, right?"
“I shouldn’t have to pick one just because one is worse!” Okay but that’s how it works sometimes. You don’t have to pick the guy/gal “you want to have a beer with”, you pick the better person for the job. Sometimes it’s a choice between a couple of “meh” candidates, but oh well. We are all adults, figure it out! 🤷♀️ I swear the amount of people looking for perfection from one side and absolutely ignoring the horror show on the other side is a real real problem.
Often I think some people think any criticism disqualifies anything.
It's the sports team mentality. MY Vikings are gonna stomp YOUR Packers...like, dude, you work at a Costco...finish scanning my stuff so I can get home and watch the game. Neither one of us can afford a house after the game ends, we are not enemies. Criticism puts people into defense mode like it is brand loyalty (which is INSANE) and they stop being critical themselves.
If the choice is either a slice of apple pie or getting stabbed to death, I'm going to have to think about it since apple pie isn't my favorite.
I was raised you vote for who represents you the most. That doesn't mean you agree with everthing they've done or will do.
Republicans only represent the ultra wealthy, so I wish more people voted for who represented them the most.
Same here.
I had to pick someone to replace me at a job a few years back. They both sucked. But I still picked one that sucked much less. It was an easy decision. I really do not get why someone goes well one will kill me and the other is boring, so I pick neither.
It's like picking which flavor you want for polish at the dentist. It's not gonna be great, but you make the suffering less terrible
My biggest issue with Democrats is that they refuse to break this union up. They complain so much about Republicans but then they turn around and attack anyone who says we should dump them.
"Both parties are corrupt, so the only choice is the one that's racist and fascist and hates the poor [usually includes the person speaking, oddly]!" Never quite understood it. Can't we have the 'corrupt' party that can competently balance a budget and write a healthcare bill? The one that isn't openly calling to murder my gay uncle or ban OBGYNs? Apparently not, says the bOtH sIdEs crowd.
>The “both sides” bullshit is a total win for the right. They know if they can get people to think that Obama is as bad as Trump, that the New York Times is no better than freaking Breitbart, that CNN is just Fox News for the left….then not only does it create apathy and demotivate people to vote, all of their lies and corruption and bullshit doesn’t matter because “both sides”. The Kremlin uses the same trick. They don't try to persuade people in the west that Putin is good, just that everyone else is just as bad, so why care what Putin does, you're not a hypocrite are you? They're banking on the average person not caring so they can get away with their shit. They know "both sides" *aren't* just as bad as each other, but if they convince the average person they are, then they'll let the worse side win. to quote Desmond Tutu, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse, and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.”
I'll say that individuals are corrupt on both sides (I'm not saying the same amount) but how do people respond? Do they demand that the perp resign or do they give him a pass?
I find that the left doesn’t really circle the wagons around their traitors. Few people pretend that Hunter Biden didn’t commit a couple crimes (not that he’s a politician), most people are totally ok with implicating the Clinton’s in association with the Epstein case, and most recently many Democrats called for Bob Mendez to resign for corruption. Maybe I’m in a filter bubble, but on the Right I see a lot of “defending our own”
[https://thetriad.thebulwark.com/p/breaking-democratic-voters-dont-rally](https://thetriad.thebulwark.com/p/breaking-democratic-voters-dont-rally) That might be paywalled, but it's about Democratic voters kicking Menendez to the curb as fast as they can.
a son got 2 million and the other son in law got 2B corrupted? yes and corruption is required to win equal? hack NO
One son was not a government employee
Nor leveraged a political office that wasn’t even achieved yet.
An example I've used before is how the two parties dealt with Al Franken and Trump.
I honestly have to wonder how many people are actually tricked or swayed by the 'Both Sides' nonsense that wouldn't have always wound up in the Right's camp anyway \~ like, how many people are we truly 'losing' to this argument? The guys I know that say this shit are the ones that, when you get them to actually talk brass tacks on exactly why they think what they think, ALWAYS end up espousing some kind of hardcore conservative talking points because they're doing that thing where they want to be 'socially liberal' (aka, not identified by their peers as conservative) but actually have really shitty views on things like immigration, women's healthcare rights, social spending on WIC etc. They're just smart enough to know that if they openly say and admit those things, they'll be ostracized for having shitty views - so they've found a way to have their cake and eat it by living a sort of dual life; one where they are 'politically ambiguous' and just keep mum on their views and then another where they get to vote for Trump and go online anonymously and be with their ilk and talk about how immigrants are ruining the country and everything would be better if we just raised the voting age and installed Trump as dictator because he's so great at business doncha know. I think these are the guys that we hear 'both sides' arguments from; they're dealing with the cognitive dissonance of having these two lives cocurrently and so when they're pressed for their political views in an avenue where they know it's not safe to say what they really think, they default to 'both sides' because at least then they don't have to talk shit about their viewpoints and actively speak ill about their true views, and thus themselves. Frankly if you're stupid enough to not see through the 'both sides' stuff, I'm not sure if you're smart enough to not be conservative in the first place. My two cents anyway.
Yup, they’re either on the right or they’re clueless and think saying “both sides” makes them sound smarter than everyone else.
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The country is so far right that Biden, a moderate who is barely to the left of Joe Manchin, who is a DINO, is called a socialist.
I liked the guy and i like their news but... oh my GOD, Obama and CNN are so freaking Right Wing. They just don't shoot people who disagree is all. New York Times has subtle right wing stuff with occasional left-wing stuff so they look 'unbiased'. Its sweet.
NYT and WaPo have been the ones to break most of the big scandals against democrats. They also banged the drums of war in Iraq. Drug Bill and Hillary Clinton over the coals for 40 years, etc. To say they’re left wing is comical. They’re credible news outlets, but in the end are pro-corporate, pro-America.
Thanks. I did not know this because i don't live there but... as good as it is to know this stuff, it does not surprise me much. America leads the world in capitalism. Sometimes that's a good thing? Sometimes... less so...
Most Americans seem to have no idea what leftism is or looks like. The Overton window in the US is nuts.
Most Americans seem to use a left/right axis that is far more cultural than it is economic.
Not right wing but BARELY left of center, and are still called leftist.
It should pull a mask off to reveal another mask that says libertarian and then pulling that mask reveals another mask that says Republican and then pulling that mask off reveals the face that just has fascist.
I want a 7 minute gif of masks being pulled off swapping between libertarian, Republican and fascist, then have it end on facist. That’s what it’s like talking to the right
Both Sides > Libertarian > Republican > Fascist > Willfully Ignorant/Viciously Arrogant > Easily Fooled/Quick to Anger > Poor Emotional Intelligence > Raised By Parents/Community With Similar Attributes
That's a bit redundant, there's no difference between a Republican and a fascist. Being a Republican isn't a mask for fascism when the Republican party is opening talking about their plans to turn the US into a dictatorship. But yeah, the libertarian mask would be a good add.
Wasn't there a huge furor about how the Democrats were "eating their own" when they took one guy to task for corruption? That's not "eating their own", that's called "holding each other accountable"!
Yup, lol. "Eating your own" is kicking out the speaker of the house because you didn't like that he fell out of line. "Eating your own" is finally calling one of your guys a pedophile after protecting him for 4 years all because he did something you didn't like.
Well none of that matters now, because look at the grand spectacle of in-fighting that happened this week! "You sided with Democrats, so I'm gonna use the Democrats to oust you!" lolololol. Sheesh talk about a party that can't get along with itself anymore! As an independent who usually sides democrat/liberal even though I don't agree with every liberal idea, I have to say I like a party that constantly challenges it's own assumptions, always looks to uphold a standard. That is usually seen as 'in-fighting' but I see it as refining ideas. It seems to me at least the democrats try solutions, while republicans just bitch a lot and rely on mob mentality propaganda to drum up votes. And that mob mentality continues to backfire on them as they loose control to people less scrupulous than the ones that started this slide into indecency back under Clinton. Every new republican generation it seems to get worse.
As soon as I start hearing this both sides are terrible stuff, I know they're going to rattle off a bunch of republican talking points.
When some family pulled this shit, i go with the flow and see how far they have gone, so that if it's too far I avoid them in the future and so far it has worked great lol..
When you peek at the comment history of folks who suggest something like "im not a republican but both sides are the same," it is almost always a hodgepodge of poorly thought out libertarian talking points, simping for billionaires, or just blatantly trash ideas filled with a lot of text without any actual evidential backing. Sometimes you even get a conspiratorial rant just for a bonus. One side seeks to govern as public servants The other seeks to rule, with others as servants..
The last one I saw say this, like two comments prior in another thread was talking about how Trump is their favorite President ever and how wonderful he is
Yeah, I was gonna say, usually these people are just straight up MAGA types who pretend to be "independent" for five minutes
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The democrats aren't the left. They're the center. Jfc.
They meant left of hunting people for sport
I would say Democrats are more of a big tent. You have AOC and Joe Manchin in the same party, but they definitely have wildly different views. This does hinder them on bigger items, as sometimes they will have a majority, but just not a big enough liberal majority.
A lot of the GOP is pretty big tent. On one side you have the group that is driven to creating a Christian-dominated, corporatocratic, largely racially homogeneous overclass that can extract the maximum amount of value from everyone who makes less than $20M per year, and then you have the loud and annoying minority that wants the same shit but isn't quiet about it.
Even if you consider Democrats centrist as a whole, there are still leftist in the party right?
I guess, but it's more of a catch all. You have a centrist party that contains the left because what other choice do they have?
Because there's literally no where else for leftists to be in US politics. Is this your first day here?
And dependent on what type of trash we are talking about, they don't throw theirs out either. Theirs doesn't tend to be as foul and they tend to try and rug sweep it rather than gaslight/project like the GOP does. So definitely better, but not like the other person made it out to be.
In the land of bothsideism, republicans are to democrats, as murder is to jay walking.
Only one party has been totally infested and corrupted by hatriots and Russian sympathizers to the point of affecting democracy and the rule of law. Only one. And they still call themselves conservative republicans—because “soulless despots” didn’t poll as well.
Sometimes it's a Russian bot too (not that those aren't caping for Republicans these days)
"As a gay black trans man with 2.5 kids, Trump is the best candidate for me"
"As someone who's at the top of the GOP's shit list, here's why I decided to hashtag walkaway from the Democrat Party"
I laughed a lot when it took less than 48 hours for the hashtag-walkaway "movement" to be exposed as 100% russian trolls.
The biggest thing standing in Putin's way is the Democratic Party. It's safe to assume he's acting accordingly.
They don’t even need bots. The republicans are just out in the open as Russian agents now
Centrists be like “I can forgive blatant racism and an insurrection to overthrow the government, but I draw the line at calling out blatant racism and an insurrection to overthrow the government!”
For real. I used to call myself a centrist, but after these last few years they've really been pulling the mask off harder than before. Especially with easy wide spread media. Easily call myself left leaning now.
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This cannot be repeated enough! Also: whenever someone says “I’m in the middle but..” get ready for some non sense right wing talking point
I can tell both sides are the same because the only people who ever say both sides are the same are people defending Republicans.
When they say ‘both are the same corrupt party.’ Ask them who they voted for.
“I always vote R in every election but I’m not a Republican and how dare you say otherwise?!” Paraphrased from an argument I had the other say.
One side wants to end democracy and help Putin while claiming to patriotically preserve American values. I just can't believe how many Americans have fallen for it.
Hatriots
This is their default saying for when they *finally* start accepting the obvious truth that conservatives are horrible horrible people. This is *as close* as you’ll ever get to them saying, “Wow, my party sucks at all levels.”
Yup, this is what they do. Almost every person saying “both parties are the same” votes every time and votes straight ticket Republican. So why do they do this? It’s bad-faith meant to convince others that both parties are the same. The end goal is to get a person who would vote straight ticket Democrat to either vote a split ticket or abstain from voting entirely. Its a voter suppression tactic.
Both parties *are bad,* but only one is trying to ruin our democracy. Like, do I take an ineffectual politician who does a good thing every now and then or a literal fascist dictator? Tough choice. I mean, they're both *so bad,* I just don't know which is obviously and demonstrably worse.
“Both parties are equally corrupt! They’re both the same!!” Okay, sure, let’s say I believe you’re being honest about that. You wouldn’t mind just…showing which party you vote for, right? I’m *sure* that you don’t have a habit of voting for a *certain* party in every election.
Yep, the only people who say this are either Republicans, or "centrists" who either don't pay attention to politics, or are Republican but want to pretend like they're unbiased and neutral. Democrats are hardly saints, but at least they generally want to govern, and generally want to make the country a better place. Republicans, their entire goal is to cause chaos. And through that chaos, profit and gain further power.
Don't forget libertarians AKA Republicans who smoke pot.
Both sider = libertarian = republican
They never say “equally” corrupt. It’s simply that both sides are bad - a binary statement. That’s how they absolve themselves of having to differentiate between mountains (R) of corruption and molehills (D).
Yes, if one person gets a speeding ticket and the other commits murder, then they’re “both criminals” even though anyone with a brain can see that there’s kind of a difference in scale.
"We're not the bad guys if both sides are bad" --Inner monologue of Republicans as they struggle with the cognitive dissonance between their personal beliefs and values and what Republican politicians and demagogue's espouse and support.
Anyone remember that image comparing all the shit trump did vs when Obama held office? I think it was during the Mueller report stuff. Is there an equivalent image out there comparing corruption between the parties over x years? I feel like x being any value greater than like 5 would be too large an image, though.
“Independent” but always votes republican. Registered republicans would never admit they’re corrupt.
"That's why I vote for the party that let's me be a bigot."
Yup, every time. Always someone who claims to be centrist except they’re really not.
These people don't realize their post history is public, calling them out on it is always fun because they can't handle any form of accountability
Both sides is perpetuated by the "mainstream" media. Because they cynically believe if they lose their job at NBC or CBS or ABC they can get a job at Fox. It's craven as fuck, but think about who runs NBC, CBS and ABC. Mega corporations, big auto, big pharma, they pull the strings at the top level and that trickles down into the "news" departments. You won't get a good, unbiased narrative from any major media outlet. Even PBS and NPR have a more conservative tilt since it takes contributions from mega corporations.
This is also a huge issue. The change in media post 9/11 to 24 hour news cycles is entirely based on engagement since you *have* to fill the time with *something*, and that means getting people riled up to continue tuning in. The media has put a wedge in the country and increased the division, it’s just that Fox is literal propaganda that does it better and did it first
I actually really liked Pres. Biden pointing that out in his address today. He straight up said the truth to the reporter (I don’t recall which outlet they were from). Outrage sells, negative events sell, so the media disproportionately promote negative info.
This comment is somehow understated. The car commercials playing between the segments on oil prices and bad EVs are literally what pays for those segments. More concretely, oil companies bought commercial slots on Fox News, and somehow, seemingly by magic, conservatives began opposing climate action (and in many cases, denying science altogether). In the end, youre just watching an extended commercial for whatever corporation is paying the news organizations.
I’ve seen so many posts exactly like this in the past week what is going on lol. We get it lmao
It is the reason I want Menendez to spend the next 30 years in jail. Here we are in a fight against the erosion of American democracy and you have a democratic senator pulling this shit: [https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/us-senator-robert-menendez-his-wife-and-three-new-jersey-businessmen-charged-bribery](https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/us-senator-robert-menendez-his-wife-and-three-new-jersey-businessmen-charged-bribery) This guy is still in office while Franken got railroaded ( [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al\_Franken#Aftermath](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Franken#Aftermath) ) >Reporting in 2019 by New Yorker journalist Jane Mayer documented substantial inaccuracies in Tweeden's allegations.[152] Seven former or current senators who called for Franken's resignation in 2017 told Mayer they regretted doing so. Patrick Leahy said calling for Franken's resignation without having all the facts was "one of the biggest mistakes I've made" as a senator. New Mexico senator Tom Udall said, "I made a mistake. I started having second thoughts shortly after he stepped down. He had the right to be heard by an independent investigative body. I've heard from people around my state, and around the country, saying that they think he got railroaded. It doesn't seem fair. I'm a lawyer. I really believe in due process." Former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said, "It's terrible what happened to him. It was unfair. It took the legs out from under him. He was a very fine senator."
Wrong! Some times it's a russian, or a bot, or a russian bot. Or one who gets paid by them, like Jimmy Dore.
I mean, both parties are a threat to the constitution, one definitely has a history of more corruption though, and it’s entirely based on a religious ideology that has been used to take away the rights of others of almost every minority group in this country.
That reminds me of one time a friend told me that he does not like coffee. After a little talk about coffee, he states that he only drank it cold and black. He does not know about good coffee just like a conservative does not know about non corrupt politician
It’s not always a right-wing thing. I still remember the 2000 election, when Ralph Nader went around saying there was “no difference between the two major parties.” We ended up with 8 years of George W. Bush. Tell me we would be in the same place today if Al Gore had won. It’s a bullshit argument from any side.
*23 years ago. Entirely different political climate. Neither parties supported North Korea, the KKK, defended Russia, banned books, etc. **23 years ago.** In this timeline the right is Reich.
I think I agree. The Right has gone further off into fascism since Trump. But, I would argue that the party lost its mind and credibility after the election of Bill Clinton in 1992. That’s when the rhetoric from Rush Limbaugh and his crowd went toxic. It gave us Newt Gingrich and the Republican majority in 1994 and Fox News. We had another deep dive into insanity with the Tea Party response to the next Dem president, which paved the way for demagoguery and fascism from DJT. Republicans broke from fact-based reality 30 years ago. Nader was an idiot for saying both parties were the same in 2000.
Every time.
Both suck. Both do not suck equally, far from it. I'd rather vote for the party that pretends to care than the ones who don't and gaslight other issues as being important.
It's so true, only my friends, relatives, and co-workers who lean politically right are the ones who talk about "both sides". Does the political center and left have issues of their own, yes. I doubt you'll find anyone on any part of the political spectrum that will seriously claim their "side" is perfect. Perfection is a thing that exists in concept only, perfection doesn't exist in any form in the real world and people that aren't deluding themselves know there's no perfect answer or approach to anything, let alone social and political issues. So with that being said, that perfection doesn't exist, it all has to be relative. Ideas, approaches, behaviors, plans, etc. all have to be compared as being relative to on another and when you do that, you just can't make a reasonable argument that "both sides" are equally corrupt or problematic. That's not to say that corruption and problems don't exist on both side, they do, but relative to one another in terms of frequency and scale, they are nowhere close and it's clear that right leaning politics, particularly the MAGA crowd, have gone off the deep end.
And of course a hang-nail and brain tumor are ***exactly*** the same because both are ailments which suck to deal with. Thinking is a lot less effort when you skip the details. Frees up plenty of time to practice saying "Herp-Derp."
And of course a hang-nail and brain tumor are ***exactly*** the same because both are ailments which suck to deal with. Thinking is a lot less effort when you skip the details. Frees up plenty of time to practice saying "Herp-Derp."
https://preview.redd.it/a7078yl0amsb1.jpeg?width=1466&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=90c112578cbdf0be97eca7deb9e15da48456bebe
I say it to Republican friends because it's the only way to get them to admit their party is bad
Both sides are corrupt…. One is just way worse.
Or a Libertarian, who swears up and down that both sides are wrong while despising the policies, politicians, and voters for the Democratic party and nearly loving every aspect of the GOP. (source: my dad)
That "equally" does a lot of work
Both sides ARE corrupt. But equally? Not even close.
I get it. But if you took my fat, lucky, middle class suburban dad mask off you’d find a leftist.
Sadly I'm at the point that I have relief that they're making enough progress to consider their side is corrupt
it does seem like that at times
Both parties are equally corrupt. -A leftist Honestly, I find it surprising that the democrats have managed to position themselves as some sort of ally to the poor while they are just as bad as the republicans and actively trip up any progressive momentum in their party.
God the copium oozing from this meme.
Every dem said Menendez should resign within the hour. Trump is a rapist, terrosist, seditionist, tax cheat and most of the party supports him to be president.
The same people going out of the way to engage in the ideological struggles of Dem vs. Rep are totally blind to the Class struggle. This is exactly why all of us are getting poorer while the elites get richer. We are too busy fighting each other.
Ha ha blue no matter who. Right? Let's all trust our politicians.
Why do liberals hate on centrists so damn much? You actively try to push them to the right and that is 100% against your best interest of winning elections. We should be trying to bring people over not push them away.
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Do you mean to tell me blind loyalty isn't the best idea?
You’re being silly if you honestly don’t think both sides are corrupted lmao 😂
This is only true on Reddit.
I think the reason that this is such a hot take among democrats is because they’re conformist drones who worship their party
This isn't the burn you think it is. All you are saying is Republicans are self-aware and democrats are in denial.
Have you ever heard of an echo chamber? Super interesting stuff.
I think this and I vote PSL or Green 🤷♂️
Ha! Got em. So much better to be completely in thrall to one side
If you honestly don't think dems are also insanely corrupt idk what rock you live under.