Tag: Political Attitudes

Moderates, Centrists And Independents

College of Political Knowledge

2026 Election Series #1

To some these are different techniques in approaching government….but to me they are very similar.

AS the 2026 mid-term elections draws near there will be lots said in the MSM about these people…personally I think it is all so much bullshit but that is just me.

I will be write posts on all three of these so-called voters, some of it will be re-posts from days gone by that I wrote whenever I see these terms used.

Have I mentioned I think all that coverage is bullshit?

We know for a fact that Donny’s brand of MAGA will be on the ballot and many seem to think that will be enough to make people vote for Dems….I do not believe that….I do not care what the polls say….their predictions could be just so much farting into the wind.

But let’s look at the so-called political beasts….

While the terms centrist, moderate, and independent are often used interchangeably to describe voters and politicians who sit between the two major political parties, they actually refer to distinct concepts.
The primary difference lies in the fact that independents are defined by their lack of official party affiliation, moderates are defined by the non-extreme temperaments or positions they hold relative to their chosen party, and centrists are defined by their specific ideological stance of blending left- and right-wing policy solutions.
 Direct Comparison

Feature Centrists ⚖️ Moderates 🤝 Independents 🚫
Core Definition An ideological stance that deliberately mixes policies from both the left and the right. A political temperament that avoids ideological extremism and favors incremental change. A party status meaning the person is officially unaffiliated with any political party.
Party Affiliation May be independent or hold membership in a major party. Usually registered members of major parties (e.g., “Moderate Democrats”). Strictly unregistered with major parties; rejects party labels.
Primary Goal Finding synthesized, effective policy solutions regardless of political origin. Achieving stability, compromise, and bipartisan consensus between opposing sides. Evaluating candidates individually based on issues rather than party loyalty.
Ideological Consistency Often highly opinionated with a consistent, balanced mix of views. Generally sits closer to the political center of gravity but leans toward their home party. Highly diverse; can range from radical libertarians to center-of-the-road voters.
1. Centrists: The Ideologues of the Middle

Centrism is a proactive political outlook rather than just a passive avoidance of the extremes. Centrists believe that neither the far-left nor the far-right has a monopoly on good governance.

  • The Policy Mix: A centrist might strongly support a robust social safety net (traditionally a left-wing view) while simultaneously advocating for strict fiscal conservatism or strong border enforcement (traditionally right-wing views).

  • Examples: Organized political groups like the Forward Party or the Problem Solvers Caucus in Congress focus heavily on structural, centrist reforms like open primaries and ranked-choice voting.

2. Moderates: The Pragmatists and Conciliators
Moderation describes the intensity of a person’s political beliefs. A moderate typically operates within a major political party but acts as a check against the party’s more radical or progressive wings.

  • The Approach: Moderates prioritize governance, stability, and consensus over ideological purity. They are the legislators most willing to cross party lines to negotiate deals.

  • Examples: Groups like the New Democrat Coalition or the Republican Governance Group are coalitions of moderate lawmakers who work to pull their respective parties back toward practical legislation. Recently, moderate Democrats launched initiatives like the “Promise to America” to explicitly reaffirm capitalist, non-socialist platforms.
3. Independents: The Unaffiliated Bloc

Being an independent is a statement about institutional alignment, not necessarily about a person’s exact political views. Gallup polling data consistently shows that independents make up a massive portion of the electorate, often matching or outpacing registered Democrats and Republicans.

  • The Spectrum: It is a common misconception that all independents are middle-of-the-road voters. While many describe themselves as moderates, a significant percentage actually hold solidly conservative or liberal beliefs but choose to remain outside the two-party system due to partisan frustration.

  • Behavior: They are typically swing voters who judge candidates case-by-case, or they are voters who feel completely unrepresented by modern political platforms.

There you have the ‘differences’ in the political terms….but to my way of thinking they are the same animal with minor differences….these are canned definitions.

The confusing one is ‘independents’….they look at all candidates without a party affiliation….but in reality they are just disenfranchised voters and will settle on one or the other of the political parties.

Then there is the dream of bi-partisanship….these days it is nothing more than a pipe dream and a not so funny joke.

These so-called voters are still supporting the corporate greed and corruption that both parties breed…..the voters hang onto the lie that either party can change the greed and corruption in politics.

Any thing to add?

Stay tuned for I will look deeper into each of these so-called voters and make my analysis known.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

A Crack In The Wall?

As the midterms approach there have been several reports on our Dapper Donny.

With all his antics you would think that Donny’s supporters would eventually realize that he is not working in their best interests.  Each day he, Donny, does or says something that hurts the very supporters that worship the ground he walks on….surely someone will realize they are being duped and duped badly.

Some think his time has run out….(I am not one of them)….

Writing for the outlet on Tuesday morning, columnist Thomas Edsall cited the well-established statistical trends underpinning Trump’s declining support and the growing certainty that the GOP will get wiped out in the midterms. Per a recent Reuters/Ipsos poll, his disapproval among voters is more than twice his approval, 66 percent versus just 32 percent, with some other recent polls putting him just south of 30. His support among some of his most crucial demographics, Latinos and independent voters, is also cratering massively.

“Voters, in other words, are showing a growing determination to repudiate the Trump presidency,” Edsall wrote. “Their most direct opportunity to express this determination is electing Democratic majorities in the House and the Senate. At the moment, poll data gives Democrats a strong chance of taking the House and modest but strengthening odds of taking the Senate.”

https://www.alternet.org/trump-approval-luck-running-out/

There are some stories that indicate that the MAGA support may be going the way of the dodo.

After years of unrelenting pressure on us all, there’s now a glimmer of what seems to be light at the end of the tunnel. Bit by bit (albeit not fast enough), the US populace is fitfully and selectively awakening to the problems it caused, or tolerated, or ignored, in welcoming Donald Trump and those who came with him.

Fewer and fewer Americans remain in defiant denial.

…

Meanwhile, the hardcore MAGA cult still can’t help itself, can’t reverse course on the most odious characteristics and desires of their leader, so accustomed are they to abasing themselves to his every mad whim. Indeed, the madness at the top continues in ever more dangerous ways — breaking alliances, thrusting up self-monuments, threatening elections, really hurting people.

Trump Supporters Are Beginning to Question What They Enabled

Some conservs are even saying that MAGA is approaching the failed experiment point…..

President Donald Trump’s approval ratings are cratering fast towards a historic milestone, and one that, according to one top conservative analyst, could finally leave MAGA a “failed experiment.”

https://www.alternet.org/sarah-longwell-trump/

Personally I do not see it here in my Red State….the rabid supporter still holds to the misguided BS Donny and his machine have spouted for years.  But that is just here in Mississippi.

Donny seems to get crazier by the week, if not the day, and some are starting to think of a day when Donny takes a powder….With that said there is some belief that Donny may not serve out his full term….

Today the bad thing that feels like it will go on forever—or anyway, for 28 more months—is the presidency of Donald Trump. Is Trump like the national debt, or is he like the Berlin Wall? Trump’s political career has certainly lasted longer than anybody (including me) could have conceived when it began in 2015, and his comeback after the January 6 insurrection was particularly unsettling. But lately I’ve started to consider that our nightmarish political epoch may end sooner than we expect. Even as some worry that Trump will defy the Constitution and run for a third term, I’ve come to doubt that he can finish his second.

My reason for thinking Trump may be like the Berlin Wall is the recent acceleration in Trump’s mental deterioration. Yes, I know that in May Trump passed his Montreal Cognitive Assessment with a score of 30 out of 30 (or anyway that’s what his doctors at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center said). I also know that while that test is said to be pretty good at diagnosing dementia, it isn’t great at detecting mild cognitive impairment. “Mild cognitive impairment” basically means grandpa doesn’t have to check in to an assisted-living facility. It doesn’t mean grandpa should be handed the nuclear codes (which apparently may reside soon inside the Arc de Trump). And mild cognitive impairment can worsen to severe cognitive impairment.

https://newrepublic.com/article/215634/trump-may-not-finish-presidency

I am not buying into this theory…..I think Donny’s ego will not let him walk away even if he is bed ridden ad a drooling shell of his former self.

That is my thoughts….please give me yours.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

To Create Another Donny

Let’s say Donny actually leaves the White House and at his age there maybe another such tool lurking but will the Dems, the status quo Dems, help create the next horrific Donny?

Now there is a good question….and it needs asking and more important it needs an answer.

This is an interesting look by David Sirota….

When I look back on all of my work over the last 30 years, one of the projects I’m most proud of is Meltdown, an audio series I did in 2021 with acclaimed director Alex Gibney that reveals the untold story of how Obama-era Democrats turning promises of economic hope and change into more of the same created the backlash conditions for the rise of Donald Trump.

It is a miracle Meltdown ever got made, because calling its tale “untold” is an understatement. The story of Obama’s 2008 victory concluding with Trump’s 2016 win involves a sequence of economic facts and events that have been suppressed, shadowbanned, memory-holed, and censored from America’s political conversation. This is particularly true in media outlets that serve liberals, who seek comfort in the idea that Trump is an anomaly rather than a symptom of something their own political party participated in creating.

Every now and again, there are attempts to warn about this perpetual doom loop. Gibney and I did so ourselves after Meltdown debuted in the pages of Rolling Stone, where we cautioned against Democrats coming into office promising big New Deal-style economic changes, then mostly delivering only for their big donors. We warned that such a bait-and-switch would result in the inevitable backlash from disillusioned voters who would ignore syrupy odes to restoring democratic “norms” and decide once again to vote for a Joker-style candidate like Trump promising to blow up the entire system.

The piece went viral, but the message went largely unheard amid Democratic politicians and pundits insinuating that voters were insufficiently grateful for Joe Biden’s allegedly wonderful economy.

Fast forward five years and we are on the verge of the 2028 Democratic presidential primaries. For the most part, Democrats and their media outlets are still soothing themselves with the fraudulent story of Trump as an anomaly rather than a symptom and still promoting the politics of restoration rather than transformation. Indeed, the over-the-top celebration of Barack Obama’s new $800 million monument to himself was an example of this desperate pining for a return to a pre-Trump normal — even though that “normal” was what created Trump in the first place, and even though restoring such a “normal” could create the conditions for an even worse Trump in the future.

https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/how-status-quo-democrats-could-create-another-trump/

Interesting if not a bit terrifying….but do you think Sirota is on to something?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Is It Party Suicide?

The Left has started it’s rise and the old school Dems are rolling up their sleeves for the war for the heart of the Democratic Party.

My opinion is it is about damn time….we have suffered long and hard at the hands of the centrist and their greed and corruption.

The party is in the middle of committing political suicide.

A recent New York Times article, “Moderate Democrats Prepare for ‘War’ Against an Ascendant Left,” describes a disturbing perspective among mainstream, moderate, centrist Democrats. It is disturbing for many reasons.

First, there is the practical impact. If indeed mainstream Democrats attack socialist Democrats in a sustained, organized manner, there is only one possible result: the defeat of the Party in 2026 and the renewed vigor of Trump and his MAGA allies. Especially when combined with the all-out effort that AIPAC will mostly take to support Republican candidates running against Democratic candidates who are socialists. (See my article, “The Unscrupulousness of AIPAC.”)

If Party leaders, such as Obama, Clinton, and others, do not speak out forcefully against this misguided effort, the result could be catastrophic for the Party.

But beyond the practical impact, there is the existential impact. Democrats have for years been struggling without success to define what the Party stands for. As I have frequently quoted, after John Kerry lost the 2004 election, former Vice-President Mondale said, “We really need to work on the question of what we are for. Unless we have a vision and the arguments to match, I don’t think we’re going to truly connect with the American people“ And this was after a presidential election—the quadrennial defining moment for the Party!

The Democratic Party lost to Trump in 2016 and 2020, not because of the rabidness of Trump’s MAGA followers or his magnetism, but because the Party had redirected its attention. In modern times, the Party had always been the party of the people, of the workers. And they returned the favor; those were the Americans that provided the multi-ethnic and multi-color coalition that made the Party the powerhouse of American political life for most of the 20th century.

But after Ronald Reagan’s 1980 election, two unrelated things happened that caused the Party’s traditional voting coalition to split. First, in the aftermath of the election, there was much confusion regarding how the Party should regain its footing. At the same time, Democrats started using PACs to direct corporate funding to centrist candidates not tied to New Deal populism and principles and more focused on working with industry. This desire for corporate $, which only increased with time as campaigns became more expensive, had an inevitable policy impact. You can’t seek major contributions from corporations without providing them with access and policy influence.

https://thefulcrum.us/governance-legislation/democratic-party-political-strategy-return-to-foundational-values

I agree that the party lost it’s appeal to the working class with the election of Reagan and then it further betrayal in the 90s with Clinton and his embrace of the corporate thugs….and as they say the rest is history.

This, hopefully, will be a good internal conflict….but sadly the centrists and their billionaire backers will most likely win this battle and sadly the people will find little relief from the crush of the oligarchs.

This is so pathetic….the nation deserves something more than a rehash of old policies….

Even a couple of prominent Dems, centrists Dems like McAuliffe and Buttigieg are seeing he writing on the wall…..

First McAuliffe….

Democrats gathered in Texas last week were supposed to be mapping out their 2028 primary calendar; instead, they spent much of the time wrestling with their own growing pains. With the Democratic Party split between energized progressives and more cautious centrists, former DNC Chair Terry McAuliffe delivered a blunt message: Stop “hand-wringing,” quit “lemon-sucking,” and capitalize on what he called the best political terrain Democrats have had in a decade as November’s midterm elections near. DNC Chair Ken Martin, under fire over finances, leadership style, and a leaked “autopsy” of the 2024 cycle, also insisted the focus should be on the elections “in 80 days,” not internal drama, the Wall Street Journal reports.

Tensions still surfaced at the Austin meeting: Black Caucus members pressed Martin for more get-out-the-vote funding—”the money must match the message”—even as party officials touted record investments in Black and Latino outreach and recent fundraising gains. The party remains in the red, with more than $18 million in debt and trailing Republicans’ cash reserves. “Voters don’t care about internal squabbles,” said Reyna Walters-Morgan, a vice chair of the DNC. “What they care about is how are we going to get rid of this administration?”

Then Buttigieg says that getting rid of Donny will not repair the nation….

Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg warned Democrats on Sunday that defeating President Donald Trump would not be enough to repair the country, while Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey cast her reelection campaign as a defense against the administration’s attacks on immigrants, healthcare and LGBTQ+ rights.

Speaking at a fundraiser for Healey at the Gifford House in Provincetown, Buttigieg argued that Democrats must offer voters something more ambitious than a return to the political and economic order that existed before Trump. Healey, one of the country’s first out lesbian governors, told supporters that Massachusetts must serve as a bulwark against the president, and warned that Trump would attempt to undermine the midterm elections.

https://www.advocate.com/politics/national/pete-buttigieg-maura-healey-provincetown

While these two make good points I still do not see the DNC coming up with a viable plan for change.

Do you?

We need to embrace change….we need relief from the out of control capitalism….we need progressive thought and action.

Thoughts?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

The Damage Is Done

There many people that are hoping that the next election we rid ourselves of Donny and Goon Patrol….and then, they say, we can start getting the country back together….I disagree the damage is done and the repair will be a massive undertaking.

An undertaking that I do not feel the Dems are capable of taking on.

Politicians want us to believe the answers are just an election away….I am not one of them and neither is Buttigieg….

Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg warned Democrats on Sunday that defeating President Donald Trump would not be enough to repair the country, while Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey cast her reelection campaign as a defense against the administration’s attacks on immigrants, healthcare and LGBTQ+ rights.

Speaking at a fundraiser for Healey at the Gifford House in Provincetown, Buttigieg argued that Democrats must offer voters something more ambitious than a return to the political and economic order that existed before Trump. Healey, one of the country’s first out lesbian governors, told supporters that Massachusetts must serve as a bulwark against the president, and warned that Trump would attempt to undermine the midterm elections.

“What our task is before us is not just to reconstruct the broken pieces of the previous status quo,” Buttigieg said. “When we talk about something better, that means not just better than now. It means better than before.”

It was the central argument of his speech. Trump did not emerge from a country functioning as it should. The economic and political conditions that preceded him helped make his rise possible, Buttigieg said, and merely rewinding the clock would leave those conditions intact.

Buttigieg said he and his husband, Chasten Buttigieg, had traveled through about 32 states since he left the Biden administration, including Republican-held communities that rarely host nationally prominent Democrats. He described drawing crowds in rural Wisconsin, Oklahoma, Nebraska and the Georgia district represented by Republican former U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.

In those places, Buttigieg said, he has encountered independents and people he calls “future former Republicans” who believed Trump’s promises to lower prices and avoid foreign wars. Their disappointment, Buttigieg warned, does not mean they will automatically embrace Democrats.

“An opening is not the same thing as an answer,” he said.

https://www.advocate.com/politics/national/pete-buttigieg-maura-healey-provincetown

I agree with him….just because you are not Trump does not mean that the country can be repaired quickly.

I see his comment is blowing up social media in a good way.

There is so much damage that repair will take more than a return to what Dems call normal….and normal for them is what lead to a Trump victory.

Americans need to hear the truth and not the usual campaign promises that accomplish nothing.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Falling Out Of Love

+++This post ought to get the juices flowing especially from mental midgets.+++

The whole idea of capitalism is losing some of its luster….and some are rethinking socialism….before we go any further most people’s concept of socialism is wrong…..and Dems are definitely NOT socialists.  (It is that damn simple)….instead of believe what dimwit tells you and before you commit to believing bullshit maybe do some research (hahahaha…sorry that was just too funny)

This is a post from IST from 5 years ago….

Who’s Afraid Of The “S” Word

Even back then the capitalistic luster was fading….fast forward to 2025….

Both Democrats and independents view capitalism less positively this year, as well. Less than half of Democrats, 42 percent, have a positive image of capitalism. Just over half of independents feel the same, compared to three-quarters of Republicans (whose views on the economic system haven’t changed since 2010).

What about the alternatives? Socialism still polls positively for 39 percent of respondents, holding steady since 2019.

But if you dig a little deeper, there are two diverging perspectives hidden behind that steady number: Democrats’ view of socialism has been increasing, while Republicans’ view has been decreasing.

While around 50 percent of Democrats had a positive view of socialism in 2010, nearly two-thirds do today. They’re the only partisan group who view socialism more positively than capitalism, at 66 to 44 percent, respectively.

It’s not hard to see why people may be fed up with the economic status quo. The cost of buying a home has skyrocketed, especially after the Covid-19 pandemic, and wages haven’t kept up. And since 2001, rents have risen 10 times faster than income.

Democratic socialist politicians like Bernie Sanders and New York City mayoral nominee Zohran Mamdani have become more popular recently, as voters look to leaders who acknowledge that the cost of living is unacceptable.

Things have gotten so bad, it seems that even President Donald Trump may have lost his faith in capitalism—just ask Intel or Nippon.

(newrepublic.com)

People are starting to realize that all capitalism is doing is expanding the wealth of the already rich and driving more and more people into poverty.

CNN has covered this subject as well…

https://www.cnn.com/2026/07/23/politics/republicans-capitalism-socialism-poll

The House has taken it upon itself to vote on a stupid and worthless issue….

The House of Representatives overwhelmingly voted in favor of a resolution condemning socialism Friday morning, with several Democrats crossing the aisle to rebuke “socialist policies” in the U.S. following Zohran Mamdani’s recent election as the mayor-elect of New York City.

Eighty-six Democrats joined Republicans in supporting the measure in a 285-98 vote. Two members, Rep. Deborah Ross, D-Pa., and Rep. Janelle Bynum, D-Ore., voted present.

Notably, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y. — who endorsed Mamdani just days before the mayoral election — also voted in favor of the measure.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/86-dems-republicans-condemn-socialism-wake-mamdanis-mayoral-victory

I say worthless because their idiotic vote does NOT represent the voting public….and if I am not mistaken their job is to vote what the people are wanting….right?

Donny is governing with his brand of ‘state capitalism’

When House Speaker Mike Johnson (R–La.) lashed out at last weekend’s “No Kings” rallies soon to arrive on Washington’s National Mall, he reached for an old conservative refrain: “They hate capitalism. They hate our free enterprise system.”

I am sure he’s correct about some of the protesters. But the message rings hollow coming from a party leader that stands by as President Donald Trump does precisely what Johnson rightly decries: substituting political control for market choice and ruling by executive order.

Indeed, what began as a populist revolt against so-called elites has become a program of state ownership, price fixing and top-down industrial control. Take a look.

Recently, the Trump administration quietly converted CHIPS Act subsidies into an $8.9 billion equity purchase in Intel, making Washington a 10 percent owner of one of America’s largest technology companies. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick insists “this is not socialism.” That’s semantics.

Socialism is government control of the means of production. When the government becomes your largest shareholder, that’s a strong first step.

https://reason.com/2025/10/23/the-gops-capitalism-is-central-planning-with-maga-branding/

If you are one of those people that fears socialism even thought you have no idea what it is, then you should be worried about your boy Donny for he is taking a first step.

That should give you something to think about….oh wait….thinking?  That is a novel concept for the MAGA loyal.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Dark Days Of Yesteryear Returns

Lots has been said and/or written about what is going on in the US these days…..some see it as an improvement but most see it for what it is….a return of the fascism of the past.

Donny has set himself up as the supreme leader with is underlings cleaning up his messes…..all this smacks of the aesthetics of yesteryear….

What is most revealing about the MAGA aesthetic is its studied ugliness. On one side stands the grotesque excess of beauty-pageant femininity, plastic smiles, puffy lips, lacquered beach-wave hair, sharpened jawlines, and a hyper-sexualized nostalgia masquerading as “traditional values.” US Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem exemplifies this aesthetic as a badge of cruelty. Carefully styling herself in a Barbie-doll register of hyper-femininity, she delivers media performances staged in front of prisons and other sites associated with the punishment and terrorization of immigrants. The effect is chilling: a glossy, pornographic aesthetic fused with images of confinement, state violence, and racialized cruelty. Beauty here does not soften power; it aestheticizes domination and makes authoritarian violence appear natural, even glamorous. This aesthetic of cruelty is not confined to clothing (heavy on tweeds), posture, or setting. It increasingly takes hold at the level of the face itself, where artificiality is no longer concealed but aggressively displayed.

Fascist Aesthetics Has Come Back with MAGA Politics

There is more if interested….

The United States is not merely awash in brutalizing and murderous acts of state-sanctioned violence. It is being restructured by them. The killings of Rachel Good and Alex Pretti are not aberrations or tragic mistakes; they belong to a longer and darker history that the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People once named with chilling precision. In earlier periods of American turmoil, such killings were called lynchings, acts “carried out by lawless mobs, although police officers did participate, under the pretext of justice.” Today, this violence extends well beyond the bullet and the baton. It takes form in the expansion of prison camps, what Thom Hartmann rightly calls concentration camps, the war on immigrants, and the routine assault on Black and brown lives made disposable through policy, indifference, and neglect. At the same time, the country is saturated with a culture steeped in fascist spectacle and authoritarian display. Under the Trump administration, aesthetics itself becomes a battleground, a weaponized field where power works on desire, memory, bodies, and pleasure to consolidate domination.

https://www.counterpunch.org/2026/02/13/maga-aesthetics-and-fascist-power-spectacles-of-white-supremacy/

All this is pointing to a problem that we have faced before but not with such approval as today….the GOP today seems to be embracing the policies and actions that this country fought against less than a hundred years ago…..

No less an authority on right-wing extremism than Laura Loomer, Donald Trump’s wacko loyalty policeman, said it: Republicans have a Nazi problem, warning that there are those “trying to redefine” the party “so it can become modern-day Hitler Youth.”

When a Loomer admits it, you know this is a real problem, not just a liberal fabrication.

The Republicans’ entanglement with Nazism — especially after a recent kerfuffle involving conservative hero Tucker Carlson, Nazi apologist Nick Fuentes, and Heritage Foundation president Kevin Roberts (more on that to come) — has been much written about, as GOP stalwarts argue over whether they should denounce Nazi sympathizers or make common cause with them. This is a debate that really shouldn’t be a debate at all, and certainly not one that requires another disquisition on the Republicans’ moral bankruptcy.

But I am delivering one nonetheless, because — no matter how much space this courtship has been given, no matter how many pundits decry the celebration of Nazis and the canonization of Adolf Hitler by large segments of the conservative movement, no matter how often conservatives trot out antisemitic tropes, and no matter how often conservative leaders declare that this would be a much better country if it were a dictatorship — the fact that one of our two major parties actively, publicly, enthusiastically embraces Nazism should be a scandal, a horror, and a disgrace. Not something to be promptly forgotten, as it has been, but something that should be a front-page story every single day.

Lest we forget — and Republicans seem to have forgotten — the Nazis were the bad guys, the very personification of evil, the force that hundreds of thousands of Americans gave their lives to defeat, and the gleeful, bloodthirsty murderers of millions. They needed to be destroyed, forever castigated as the very worst of humanity, not emulated. Yet emulated they are.

So, yes, Ms. Loomer: The Republicans do, indeed, have a Nazi problem, and that means America has one too.

America’s Nazi Problem

What amazes me is that many average Americans see no problem with the direction the government is taking….I have people I know that see no problem with the direction that I do not understand for they see and hear the same information I do yet they are content with the erosion of our rights as Americans.

How can this be?

We live in a ‘Dual State”…..

Life under authoritarianism is actually, for the most part, weirdly normal. It’s often even, well, boring. The average person can go about their day as usual. You take your kids to school, you head to the office, and yes, you even host dinner parties. You live in the realm that Fraenkel referred to as “the normative state,” and from within that realm, it’s easy to think that if you just keep your head down and avoid making waves, you’ll be perfectly fine, thank you very much.

Fraenkel’s book is called The Dual State for a reason. This first state, the business-as-usual one, actually exists to lull you into a sense of complacency such that you don’t realize that another state is also operating in parallel with it. That second state, which Fraenkel calls “the prerogative state,” only becomes visible to you when you do something that the powers that be don’t like. Then suddenly you’re in a realm where the rule of law does not exist, where citizens can be killed with impunity, where you — even you, who thought you were invulnerable — can become a target.

The dark genius of this setup is that most people don’t realize that the prerogative state is active until it’s too late. They only wake up when the knock comes on their very own door — or when the door is forcefully broken down.

“The Dual State lives by veiling its true nature,” Fraenkel wrote.

That’s why it’s not surprising to me that your friends have been politically inactive. If they think of themselves as “not the target” — if they’re citizens, if they’re white, if they don’t speak with the “wrong” accent or express the “wrong” political views in public — it’s extremely easy for them to think everything is mostly normal, because the whole political apparatus is designed to make them think exactly that.

(yahoo.com)

Cut it any way you like but the ugliness of the Goon Platoon and Donny’s sycophants is getting out of hand.

We are entering into a world that was crushed before and it will again….but only if the American people have the courage to step up.

Do we?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Our House Divided

Most of us see the division in our country….it is really bad in our politics and this country is in trouble when the people that govern hates about half of the population.

At September’s televised memorial service for Charlie Kirk, President Donald Trump commented on the conservative commentator’s character, saying, “He did not hate his opponents; he wanted the best for them.” He then added, “That’s where I disagreed with Charlie. I hate my opponents. And I don’t want the best for them.”

Like too much of the political class across the ideological spectrum, Trump is prone to despising those he disagrees with. It raises questions about why people should ever submit to the governance of those who hate them—and whether politicians realize they’re a big part of what brought us to this unfortunate moment.

“It’s long past time for all Americans and the media to confront the fact that violence and murder are the tragic consequence of demonizing those with whom you disagree,” Trump had told the nation on the day of Kirk’s assassination, at a perhaps more self-aware moment. “This kind of rhetoric is directly responsible for the terrorism that we’re seeing in our country today.”

…

Trump and his allies regularly accuse their opponents of anti-Americanism—”I really believe they hate our country,” Trump said in July. Trump’s 2016 Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton, dismissed her foes as a “basket of deplorables,” characterizing them as “racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic—you name it.” As a presidential candidate in 2008, Barack Obama sniffed at many small-town dwellers as “bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them.”

No matter which of the big political parties wins national office, around half the people over whom the victors exercise power know they’re governed by people who hate them—and they return the favor.

Among Americans, partisan hostility is intensifying. “About three-quarters (73 percent) of voters who identify themselves as Republican agree that ‘Democrats are generally bullies who want to impose their political beliefs on those who disagree,'” a poll by the University of Chicago’s Institute of Politics found in 2022. “An almost identical percentage of Democrats (74 percent) express that view of Republicans.”

https://reason.com/2025/11/06/politicians-make-political-tensions-worse/

I can understand the opposing of views but these days it has gone so much further…..it is entering into the twilight zone of hatred.

This cannot continue on this path or it will be curtains for sure.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Political Polarization: Where Did It Begin?

I know in the past decade or so this subject has been examined by many…..but it is getting out of hand and deserves a closer look and often.

This is a report I read recently….it is a good look at what has been happening in this country for at least twenty years. (Personally I think it began way before their assertion)(I shall explain my disagreement later in this post)

This article posits that this polarization began in 2008 or the Obama years….

Forget Donald Trump. A new analysis suggests the U.S. public’s sharp lurch into polarization began in 2008, years before his first presidential campaign.

Researchers at the University of Cambridge’s Political Psychology Lab tracked shifts in Americans’ views across nearly four decades and found that divisions were broadly stable through the 1990s and early 2000s, before rising steadily from 2008 onward. Using more than 35,000 responses from the American National Election Studies between 1988 and 2024, they estimate that issue polarization has increased 64% since the late 1980s, with almost all of that change occurring after 2008.

The research uses a machine-learning approach to move beyond party labels and better understand what actually drives Americans’ political views. Instead of relying on whether respondents identify as Republican or Democrat, the team grouped people based on patterns in what they believe across a range of issues, from abortion and “traditional family values” to race, inequality, and health insurance. That distinction matters because in many countries politically opposite parties do not exist, says David Young, a psychology researcher at the University of Cambridge, U.K., and one of the study’s authors. “You might even want to study countries where there are no parties, like Saudi Arabia,” he says.

The paper challenges the idea that polarization is solely a Trump-era phenomenon. It points to 2008 as the “major turning point,” a year that also included the financial crisis, Barack Obama’s election, and the widespread adoption of the iPhone-era internet. “Our ability to nail down when it starts is slightly divided by the fact that we only have data points every four years,” Young says. Still, “we know that this increase starts from our 2008 data point,” he adds. “That’s our best guess at the starting point.”

https://www.fastcompany.com/91487819/political-polarization-started-a-lot-earlier-than-you-might-expect

Now my disagreement.

I say that the polarization began with the election of Reagan…..he weaponized the religious Right and emboldened every conspiracist that waddled out of the ether.

One could go back to the Goldwater years as the fodder that lit the flame of polarization.

We can say that conservatism is about free enterprise, smaller government, lower taxes, yada, yada…..but let’s be real in conservatism there is the privileged class and then us peasants…..we disguise it anyway we like but the simple fact is wealth knows best.

Thanks to Uncle Donny we see their true colors now….they no longer hide their distaste for the people.

This must be met with equal force by those that think that the people of this country are the important nay the only important issue.

Until then this slide will continue and god only knows where it will lead.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

MTG Does It Again

Okay the whole thing around MTG has got me fascinated…..she has done  a 180 from her earlier days in the House….and now she goes on national TV and spills what is possibly the truth….

Marjorie Taylor Greene sat down for a tense and revealing segment on 60 Minutes, and she did not hold back. During the conversation, the interviewer pressed her on what lawmakers really say about Donald Trump when the cameras are off. Greene didn’t hesitate.

When asked whether politicians speak differently behind closed doors, she simply said yes. But when pushed to explain what she meant, Greene made it clear the shift she witnessed was dramatic.

When asked whether politicians speak differently behind closed doors, she simply said yes. But when pushed to explain what she meant, Greene made it clear the shift she witnessed was dramatic.

She shared that before Trump secured the 2024 primary, several of her colleagues regularly joked about him, mocked the way he spoke, and even took shots at her for standing by him. According to Greene, the tone flipped the moment he became the party’s nominee.

Greene described a sudden wave of support, claiming that the same figures who previously cracked jokes were now attempting to cozy up to Trump and publicly align themselves with his base. She said the overnight change was so extreme that some were eager to throw on a MAGA hat for the first time.

The comments add new fuel to ongoing conversations about how Washington operates privately compared to what the public sees. Greene’s claims shine a spotlight on the political shifts and strategic alliances that play out far beyond the televised interviews and podium speeches.

More information on the interview…..https://www.cbsnews.com/news/marjorie-taylor-greene-trump-relationship-change-60-minutes/

Does all this ring true?

What is our blonde really up to in this drastic turnaround?

How many more shoes will drop with MTG?

This is fascinating!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”