Is there anyone interested in finding common ground? Instead of hating people because of their perceived political beliefs?

[coati]

I find common ground every time I hike into the local canyons where there is no cell phone service and talk with other hikers. Shed the electronic devices, pack a lunch, and share it with someone who also was willing to leave the virtual world behind.

Happy solstice.

 

[Bn2f]

I havent been attacked yet, I guess many are still asleep.

Yaaaaaawwwwwwwnnnn. Yep, just gettin up. If I may...
I think you've completely missed the point of this entire thread.
I began by admitting that one normally gets scorn when something is said that is deserving. The OP was doing fine, even being naive on the topic of Cox and abortion (Brenda, if you're reading, I'm stating facts. I'm still one here hoping you learn and then DO pick a side that rightfully represents you. You, a trans woman, in america, who may need healthcare, and whose body is purposely misgendered and dehumanized). It was only when the OP took a stance of false equivalency and to blame Dems for Roe that things went off the rails.
I see no need for no one now to attack you for you've said nothing worthy yet of attacking. I have, I believe, mildly attacked you with basic questions that you should have been able to answer but felt offended by. Brenda, to her credit, stayed around and interacted with the advice given and then took the lumps when it went sideways - you, started a thread and then ran. But lemme just state this for you and future posters: If you consider yourself kind, or a Christian, a pragmatist, or a loving person - and you believe that answers to a better life and a better america start with support of a rapist, wife cheating, 2x divorced, 91 criminally indicted, serial liar, 2x impeached donald trump, then yeah, me sitting now at home in my pentagram, with black candles lit - yes! I am a better, more morally decent person than you!

 

[Bn2f]

The nation found common ground four decades ago when it abandoned energy conservation and embraced Reagan's foreign policy of military force and regime change for cheap oil. With cheap energy, we now have cable news, internet, smartphones, and less conversations with neighbors. Town hall meetings, people discussing issues with their communities and councils, may be entirely unknown for most people. We may find common ground again when we literally stand on common ground.

This! This is some really warped thinking, but I can't ever criticize C. I mean, have ya seen his avatar? Cuteness all around.

 

[bobsyouruncle55]

A sincere and happy holidays to you and your family! Thank you for posting this. I do not believe that you will receive scorn. Well, let’s say that I hope not. Americans have always had more in common than our differences. We live, we love music, we love our family, and we want a better life for our children. The method of achieving those goals is where our differences lie. I am an admitted flame thrower here, but I think I only do that after a person says something that is deserved of scorn. Where are you and I could possibly bump heads and I would give you a slight loving nudge in opposition is that I was once like you. I believed the middle, moderate, conciliatory, middle ground was the reasonable and safe place to be. I am off the belief that that is flawed critical thinking, for example, a woman almost died in Texas this past week from men espousing an extreme religious theology. It is incumbent, I now, believe, of good and righteous Americans to speak out against things such as this.

And may i ask the name of this Religion??

 

[Bn2f]

I find common ground every time I hike into the local canyons where there is no cell phone service and talk with other hikers. Shed the electronic devices, pack a lunch, and share it with someone who also was willing to leave the virtual world behind.

Happy solstice.

Have a safe and merry Christmas or whatever you and your gf do or don't celebrate, coati.

 

[Bn2f]

And may i ask the name of this Religion??

Here? In this forum? I try to practice the religion of truth.

 

[bobsyouruncle55]

Let me get this straight. You believe that both parties are to blame equally. So you have no problem with not allowing women to control their bodies or with demonizing LBGTQIA people or anyone else who is not a white Christian. You have no problem with delegitimizing election results whenever your side has not prevailed. You have no problem bowing down to Vladimir Putin or Kim Jong Un or Xi Jingping or other brutal dictators all over the world. In 1930s Germany you would have been telling everyone that the Nazis aren't all bad - they just get a bad rap from the other side. Or there that are really two sides to slavery.

Are you having a laugh??white Christians are about the only ones your allowed to demoniz without consequence's

 

[coati]

Have a safe and merry Christmas or whatever you and your gf do or don't celebrate, coati.

We celebrate all the holidays. If we see 'em on the calendar, that's good enough for us. Hope they're all good for you, too.

 

[Bn2f]

Are you having a laugh??white Christians are about the only ones your allowed to demoniz without consequence's

Don't. Don't do this. I'm gonna give you the benefit of the doubt as well, bobsyouruncle55 , and ask that instead of barking up many trees and getting distracted - just state your stance. Get to the point you want to make. Stop with the waffling.

 

[Fuzzy1975]

I want to see people find their commonalities instead of negatively focusing on their differences.

And you know what the worst part is? People reading this, are likely spending more energy trying to figure out which “side” I am on, instead of thinking about my lamely presented message. I think both sides are correct… and both sides are wrong.

And I hope I don’t have some ass-hat saying I am a shill for whichever side they hate… instead of actually considering that someone could be asking a sincere concept….

You can find many of my posts on the PB where I have pointed out no one is ever 100% right or 100% wrong all the time. But there are many, here who don't feel that way. They feel one side is always right, and the other always wrong.

My experience is that type of emotional based thinking comes from the same ones here who also avidly support Trump. That is not to say that all of those who support Biden use logic in their support. Some are also emotional about their ideas.

For the most part you can identify them, their favourite describing words are "hate" or "they" "destroy", strung together in sentences starting like "you must hate", or "they are destroying" as examples. It is all emotional thinking. When faced with logic and facts, they fail to see it, instead they discount the evidence as "fake" mostly because it doesn't agree with what they believe to be the answer they are looking for, or agree with.

It falls into a very cultist attitude, where they want a simple answers to complex problems. Which to me is why a populist like Trump can keep driving a wedge between reality and cooperation in the political viewpoints.

I had often wondered how Hitler ( and even Mussolini) came to power, and gained dictatorial powers in countries that at the time were Democracies, with a very open and enlightened and educated citizenship. I can now witness first hand this almost happening in real time.

I'm not sure if the institutions built into the USA will be strong enough to withstand this current acceptance of populism that almost 50% of the voters seem to be cheering for, I hope so, but I do think the 2024 election will be the tipping point and the US will tip one way or the other.

Thanks for starting this thread, I hope it doesn't evolve into the typical shit show that makes up the PB.

 

[RoryN]

OP has left the thread.

Shocker.

 

[HisArpy]

Okay… so perhaps my understanding is very wrong. I apologize for my ignorance.. does that mean we can’t go out and have a laugh together later? Are you morally required to hate me for being wrong? I hope not. I don’t hate you, not at all. Your comment will make me look into my belief, and I appreciate it when I find out I am wrong. That means I will be correct next time.

Thank you!

You mistake my post for an attack. It's not.

The fact that you recognized your shortcomings is a good sign. What I hope is that you also recognize that the REASON you didn't know is because the source of your information has been lying to you either directly or by omission.

I have several sources for information in my daily newsfeed. Some are conservative, some aren't, but I read them all. I look up stuff I'm not sure about from even more and different sources until I'm fairly positive that I know what's going on. And then I come here and discuss those things and learn more.

Eventually what happens when someone does that is that their beliefs aren't based on ideology. Instead their beliefs become factual statements which cannot be disputed but which are subject to change as the underlying facts change.

For instance, in my opinion Dobbs was wrong. Just as Roe was wrong. Roe was wrong for all the reasons Dobbs said BUT where Dobbs went wrong is that inherent in the 4th Amendment is a right to privacy in your person, place, and things. Reproduction involves 2 of those 3 and thus there is an inherent Right to abortion in the Constitution.

On the other hand, the court is correct when they say that no right is absolute. This means that government can involve themselves in reproductive issues in the area of regulation - sanitation, disposal of fetal tissue, licensing, etc.

Thus we have the push/pull dynamic of all Constitutional Rights. And, like all other Constitutional Rights, if you believe your Rights are being suppressed by your elected representatives, you can move to a state where you agree with the laws regarding those Rights, you can fight the laws in court, or you can run for elected office and try to throw the bums currently warming a chair in your state capital out on their keesters.

This is reality when it comes to abortion. The same process also applies to everything else going on in the world, guns, Israel, Ukraine, immigration... It takes awhile to get to a point where you're not being overwhelmed in all that new information and having to look everything up but eventually you begin to see what's right and what's not. At that point everyone else starts to hate you. Not for the color of your skin, the gender role you play, your sex, preferences, or anything else but for the clarity of your mind which highlights how absolutely awful most of humanity really is.

 

[HisArpy]

So here’s what I want to see in the USA, which informs my political leanings:

I want tax funded or affordable healthcare available to all Americans regardless of their income level.

I want tax funded or affordable educational opportunities available me to all Americans past high school regardless of their income level.

I want women to be able to make medical decisions that affect them.

I want two adult people to be allowed to be married and have all the same benefits of any other married couple.

I want all people to be treated equally by everybody regardless of the color of their skin or their political beliefs or their gender or sexual identity (so long as the sexual identity doesn’t involve underage children or animals).

I want police to be properly trained and vetted so that they do not make as many mistakes while doing their job, especially when those mistakes lead to the death of innocent people.

I want police properly held accountable for those mistakes mentioned above.

I want our tax money used to improve the infrastructure of our entire nation instead of being wasted on our bloated military (there’s no reason we should be spending more than the next nine or ten developed nations).

I want everyone in the country to have affordable housing available to them.

I want everyone in this country to not have to worry where their next meal is coming from.

Tell me about the common ground with the right, please.

Start a thread and see where this goes. I think you'll be surprised that most agree with you on these ideals. I also think you're going to be shocked at the solutions to these issues. Not for whether or how they work but because most who believe as you do don't want a solution, they want to be babied.

 

[Lazaran]

Are you having a laugh??white Christians are about the only ones your allowed to demoniz without consequence's

^
(Quoted for posterity and stupidity)

Really???

I want bob-creepyusername to carefully reconsider that entire statement in light of the REAL, DEVASTATING, HISTORICALLY DOCUMENTED "consequences” white Christian Americans have imposed on people who aren’t them, and don’t share their beliefs.

The “consequences” for right wing "white (orange) Christian” Americans when they spout violent, racist, sexist, misogynistic, homophobic, xenophobic hate, is that they get elected president, etc.

JFC

SAD!!!

 

[LLCox]

No

 

[Bn2f]

Brenda? I see that you're still around.
I think I've made my position clear and this will most likely be my last post on this.

Please, please, sharpen your critical thinking skills. I've warned you to look past flaming rhetoric for truth. You received pushback when you stopped asking questions and laid out a misleading assumption of the Democratic Party. This person here also gave you sound advice to follow. Yes, I would take issue with some of the things he said, but on the whole, it was sound.

HisArpy: Not for whether or how they work but because most who believe as you do don't want a solution. They want to be babied.

This here is what I’m highlighting. This is the tell for this member. This line is what shapes his worldview and causes him, even attempting to give a good advice, to run a foul in many of his posts. Who wants to be babied and why? Show proof of this? Brenda, these are the questions you should ask and get answers to. These are the questions, when asked to this particular member, causes him to constantly twist himself into a pretzel in attempts to legally defend criminality and gets him called a hypocrite for showing a lack of objectivity on almost every issue. I’m done here. I exercised way too much patience and I’m running low on civility.

 

[HisArpy]

HisArpy: Not for whether or how they work but because most who believe as you do don't want a solution. They want to be babied.

This here is what I’m highlighting. This is the tell for this member. This line is what shapes his worldview and causes him, even attempting to give a good advice, to run a foul in many of his posts. Who wants to be babied and why? Show proof of this?

Start the thread yourself then. It's not hard.

But, if that's too difficult for your skill level, then hear this;

Society runs the way it does because people band together over commonalities or things they agree on. If a group of people believe otherwise they're free to go elsewhere to either find another group which believes as they do, or start their own society which envisions and encompasses their commonalities.

One of the things our society here in the US praises is the ability to accomplish things on your own and reap the rewards of that accomplishment.

Take affordable housing as a prime example of this. Rich people like to live opulently. If someone cannot afford to live where they are, instead of asking the government to pay their rent they need to FUCKING MOVE to somewhere else where they can afford to live based on their income or upgrade their work skills to a level where their income is able to allow them to stay. Why? Because that's the way society works. You don't get to snivel that you're not living like a billionaire and demand the rest of us to pay for your rich bitch lifestyle fantasies. Rather, everyone gets what they deserve and unless you can earn it, you don't deserve it.

So the bitchfest really isn't about "affordable housing." It's about someone crying that they're not being given what they want. Or, to put it another way, someone wants to be babied and have everything handed to them without needing to work for it.

 

[BrightShinyGirl]

Start the thread yourself then. It's not hard.

But, if that's too difficult for your skill level, then hear this;

Society runs the way it does because people band together over commonalities or things they agree on. If a group of people believe otherwise they're free to go elsewhere to either find another group which believes as they do, or start their own society which envisions and encompasses their commonalities.

One of the things our society here in the US praises is the ability to accomplish things on your own and reap the rewards of that accomplishment.

Take affordable housing as a prime example of this. Rich people like to live opulently. If someone cannot afford to live where they are, instead of asking the government to pay their rent they need to FUCKING MOVE to somewhere else where they can afford to live based on their income or upgrade their work skills to a level where their income is able to allow them to stay. Why? Because that's the way society works. You don't get to snivel that you're not living like a billionaire and demand the rest of us to pay for your rich bitch lifestyle fantasies. Rather, everyone gets what they deserve and unless you can earn it, you don't deserve it.

So the bitchfest really isn't about "affordable housing." It's about someone crying that they're not being given what they want. Or, to put it another way, someone wants to be babied and have everything handed to them without needing to work for it.

The cost of housing is directly connected to government regulation.

For example, mandatory parking minimums drive up the price of building dense, cheap housing in cities.

Sprawling car suburbs aren’t affordable for most people without government subsidies.

 

[Bn2f]

OMG! I said I was outta here, but you have not replied to any of my posts in many a month.
How can I not reply back?
Happy Holidays HisArpy to you and your family! Sincerely!
This may come as a surprise to you, but - ya got me! Ya called me out and exposed me out cold.
I can't respond to what you wrote calling for America to embrace a kind of 'separate but equal' mentality within its states because, as a troll, I don't really do too well at starting my own threads so don't hold your breath waiting for me to create one.
In the coming new year, I promise i'll stay in my troll lane if you promise to stay in yours: Garbage men giving bad legal advice.

Pssssst. I was not denigrating a profession. You are literally a man of garbage.

 

[HisArpy]

The cost of housing is directly connected to government regulation.

For example, mandatory parking minimums drive up the price of building dense, cheap housing in cities.

Sprawling car suburbs aren’t affordable for most people without government subsidies.

Oh for the love of God... not this shit again.

People band together because they believe in commonalities. IF one of those commonalities is that government needs to regulate construction and density, then that's what they believe.

To later come along and complain that government has made housing unaffordable because of the regulations is FUCKING STUPID. It's even more imbecillic to blame non relevant things as the basis.

Cars, parking lots, and freeways don't make housing unaffordable. PEOPLE make housing unaffordable by implementing rules and requirements which control how much housing can be built based on factors such as the environment and services which can be provided (in Southern California this means water). The amount of available housing under those rules determines the cost of that housing based on the law of supply and demand.

If you want to change the cost of housing, you need to eliminate the rules/regulations controlling housing. The consequence for doing that will ripple throughout society and the effects will be spontaneous combustion of the economy. The people you think you're helping will no longer have a job as the company they work for closes down. The other people who have invested their money in the housing you seek to devalue will either go bankrupt or reinvest elsewhere. Wages will go down and property/income taxes will go up to pay for the hand outs you demand from government even as entire areas of the city become vacant of residents and businesses.

One needs only to look at SF to SEE this happen in real time.

And yet here you are advocating for what is being proven before your eyes as something which doesn't work. Why? Because you're not interested in "society" you're only interested in "you" and if getting what you want means everyone else has to pay for it, you're good with that.

Except it doesn't work that way. As you're slowly finding out by the fact that you've lost the battle for social change.

 

[LeatherChaps]

The cost of housing is directly connected to government regulation.

For example, mandatory parking minimums drive up the price of building dense, cheap housing in cities.

Sprawling car suburbs aren’t affordable for most people without government subsidies.

Im curious if you consider the spending habits of Americans when you talk about the need for government subsidies?

As Will Rogers said around a hundred years ago.. "Americans are the only people in the world who drive a car to the poor house".

 

[LeatherChaps]

For that tiny minority of Litsters who actually ARE interested in hearing both sides... this website will be a font of information for you.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/

 

[BrightShinyGirl]

Im curious if you consider the spending habits of Americans when you talk about the need for government subsidies?

As Will Rogers said around a hundred years ago.. "Americans are the only people in the world who drive a car to the poor house".

If you want to live in the middle of nowhere on a dirt road, I don’t care. But I do object to city dwellers being taxed to pay for suburban streets. If you have enough money to afford a house in the country, pay to pave your own roads. Don’t ask people who walk to work to pave them for you.

 

[BrightShinyGirl]

Oh for the love of God... not this shit again.

People band together because they believe in commonalities. IF one of those commonalities is that government needs to regulate construction and density, then that's what they believe.

To later come along and complain that government has made housing unaffordable because of the regulations is FUCKING STUPID. It's even more imbecillic to blame non relevant things as the basis.

Cars, parking lots, and freeways don't make housing unaffordable. PEOPLE make housing unaffordable by implementing rules and requirements which control how much housing can be built based on factors such as the environment and services which can be provided (in Southern California this means water). The amount of available housing under those rules determines the cost of that housing based on the law of supply and demand.

If you want to change the cost of housing, you need to eliminate the rules/regulations controlling housing. The consequence for doing that will ripple throughout society and the effects will be spontaneous combustion of the economy. The people you think you're helping will no longer have a job as the company they work for closes down. The other people who have invested their money in the housing you seek to devalue will either go bankrupt or reinvest elsewhere. Wages will go down and property/income taxes will go up to pay for the hand outs you demand from government even as entire areas of the city become vacant of residents and businesses.

One needs only to look at SF to SEE this happen in real time.

And yet here you are advocating for what is being proven before your eyes as something which doesn't work. Why? Because you're not interested in "society" you're only interested in "you" and if getting what you want means everyone else has to pay for it, you're good with that.

Except it doesn't work that way. As you're slowly finding out by the fact that you've lost the battle for social change.

The YIMBY movement is growing. It will take decades for us to undo the past century of car-centric central planning, but we have the advantage of people hating traffic and liking walkable neighborhoods.

 

[Comshaw]

When I first read the OP, I thought I might need to reassess my claim that ALL “both sides” arguments are apologia for conservative misdeeds. Now after reading the last few hours of posts, I can see that I was right all along. Many “centrists” are just embarrassed conservatives. They can’t own up to the real-world consequences of their toxic beliefs, so they pretend that liberals are just as bad to salve their egos.

Bullshit. Total, utter, embarrassingly emotion-based bullshit. What most centrist are, are people that hold views from both sides of the political spectrum, but do not hold ANY extreme views from either side. Because I hold a view that is tagged "conservative" by extremists on the left, I'm labeled as a Trumpist, a mindless conservative. Because I hold views that are considered to be from the left side of that indefinable (but concrete to extremists) line separating the two sides, I'm labeled a "fucking lib" by those extremists on the right. Centrists are the sensible section of the populous, the ones who argue for freedom of speech and will allow those they disagree with their say without trying to drown them out or silence their voices.

So what am I talking about? Let's take the gun debate for example.

I'm a legal gun owner. I obey all the laws. I'm trained in the use and safety of firearms. I believe that law-abiding citizens should have the right to own a gun. With all that the extreme left calls me a fucking brainless conservative gun nut who wants to allow all those gun deaths we have every year so that no more gun laws are enacted.

But when I tell people I support red flag laws, I support registration of gun owners, I support not letting convicted felons have guns, I'm labeled as a lily-livered, pansy-ass Lib who wants to take away ALL the guns by those on the extreme right.

Most of those on the extremes use the exact same argument you have, an appeal to emotion rather than a logical fact-based argument.

I do hold some views from the conservative side of what you consider the dividing line. I'm not embarrassed about it, nor if all my views are taken into account can I in any way be classified as conservative, or a liberal for that matter. I can state though that anyone from either side who would ignore facts and dismiss a viewpoint out of hand for emotional reasons isn't someone whos argument I'll be taking seriously.


Comshaw