Progressives (Liberals)

Smearing Democrats and other vile libruls is what Sofia Lash Goth does. She's been doing it for more than 16 years.

They do that all on their own, Lash just lets people know. You need to pick up your ball and go home.

Setanta is unable to argue points I make, so he gossips to everyone on the site that I don’t mean what I say.

He relies completely on ad hom because he can’t argue successfully against my opinions.

Keep telling yourself that. Meanwhile, an argumentum ad hominem means to attack the person, rather than the idea. All I've done is to point out that you have attacked Democrats and other liberals here for sixteen years. That's not a personal attack, that's just telling the truth.

The truth hurts, don't it sweetiepie?

You know it's hilarious that Miss Ocasio-Cortez has so successfully sucked the oxygen out of Plump's "twitterverse" that she has become the one the right loves to hate. It cracks me up that they have become so fixated on her.

Relax, rightwingnuts, she's not old enough to run for the White House . . . yet.

Farmers Can't Find Enough Workers to Harvest Crops—and Fruits and Vegetables Are Literally Rotting in Fields

I thought this was a good place to leave this article. I often go "Eating Well" for good recipes and came across this rather upsetting article. I wonder if this labor problem explains the state of vegetables in stores? Half the time, you can't find decent veggies in stores. You got to go local farmers markets which are not (obviously) available year round.

“Meanwhile, an argumentum ad hominem means to attack the person, rather than the idea.”

Yes, that’s exactly what I said. What’s your problem? You are unable to see that this is EXACTLY WHAT YOU ARE DOING???

You are unable to respond meaningfully to my arguments, so you lamely attack me. Argumentum ad hominem —> Setanta is guilty.

She is the most respectable Democrat I know of, considering that she actually comes straight out with her ideas instead of hanging back and trying to smooth/weasel her way into gaining ground for her agenda.

Her Green New Deal may have been voted down, but putting it on the radar was the right thing to do because now other proposals can follow that have a better chance at garnering broader support.

Even the unpopular parts of her plan needed to be said and consciousness raised in public discourse. The 'farting cows,' for example, is a real problem and people who love meat and hate listening to vegans and environmentalists say anything that interferes with their stomachs wrapping themselves around a lump of dead flesh are going to have to come to terms with the problems of large-scale meat cultivation.

Ultimately, she and other Democratic socialists should be refining their ideas to be less threatening to anti-socialists. They are right to criticize the failure of liberty to achieve a good society in many ways, but they have to pursue socialist solutions in ways that leave room for liberty to take up the slack. The selling slogan of socialism should be something like a bridge over troubled waters that brings liberty back as a functional governing paradigm. The goal should be for the people to govern themselves responsibly, not to permanently enslave them to government.

One thing they should be doing is lowering the cost of socialism. Utilize gig economics and social media and thus help people coordinate reform work as a part-time venture. If part of climate reform involves retrofitting buildings/homes with better insulation, for example, coordinate a social-economic network to get people the insulation they need cheaply and connect people who don't know how to install it with others who are willing to coach them for free/cheap.

Generally, the socialist solution can't always be about attacking wealth/income gaps and proposing massive tax-spend schemes to tax the wealthy for the benefit of those with less. Instead, it should be about coordinating solutions for those with less in ways that minimize the burden on those with more. That shows Republicans that socialism doesn't have to be a threat to their wealth and prosperity, which should take away their reason for fighting against it and make it possible to have political-economic diversity within the same republic/free-society.

This is a great article delineating Bernie from all other politicians who claim to be progressive. Even Alexandria edges over toward establishment /corporatism on a few key policies compared to Bern.

Irritating that the Post dropped a wall on me after I read this article, but for those who have an account and curiosity about the difference between Bernie and Alexandria, this is a big explanation.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2019/03/29/us/politics/bernie-sanders-2020-democrats.amp.html

Here’s how a progressive responds to farmers’ struggles: https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/opinion/columnists/caucus/2019/03/28/bernie-sanders-president-2020-caucus-agribusiness-factory-farming-rural-america-iowa-flood-trump-ceo/3297096002/

Excerpt:
Bernie Sanders addresses big ag in his Des Moines speech Saturday
Sen. Bernie Sanders kicked off his 2020 presidential campaign in Iowa this weekend and used the opportunity to focus on agriculture issues in rural America.
BRIAN POWERS


This past month, hardworking farmers in Iowa saw historic floods kill livestock and topple grain silos in an instant, losing their livelihoods and their way of life. It was just the latest blow to rural communities that have seen farmers’ incomes cut in half, hospitals shut down, school districts consolidated, drinking wells tainted and downtowns decimated by layoffs.

But, despite what the pundits might say, this was not inevitable — and it’s completely unacceptable.

Whether it’s in Iowa, my home state of Vermont or anywhere else, the crisis in America’s small towns and rural communities is the result of deliberate policy choices by a political class that neglects rural America, rather than investing in it.

In the end, the desperation felt by families in rural communities is about basic economic rights and freedom. Farmers have been systematically stripped of their ability to control their own futures and no longer know whether their hard work will earn them future success and stability. Storefronts are empty and farmers have been forced to sell their land that has been kept in families for generations to massive corporations.

Keep reading at link. Get your **** together people, what you want has nothing to do with American traditions and values.
http://www.intellectualconservative.com/the-progressive-left-denies-social-and-cultural-values/

Why are you surprised. She has been a republican operative posing as a democrat for years.

Bullsh*t . . . I have simply pointed out your years-long propensity for attacking Democrats and liberals of any description. That only becomes a personal attack if you claim that you don't do that. But you do, and you've been doing it right along in this thread. There is no argument you can offer which negates the fact of the attacks you make. Democrats don't need that, no matter who turns out to be the standard bearer.

You are nothing more than argumentum ad hominem because you can’t address my opinions in any meaningful way. You can tell a person has completely given up when they resort to ad hom—the cheapest response to an opinion.

Man up.

And this photo of Mahatma Gandhi too?

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/mar/07/bernie-sanders-2020-iowa-enthusiasm?CMP=share_btn_tw

Bernie Sanders reignites enthusiasm on 2020 campaign trail
Progressive firebrand focused on signature message of economic populism, social justice and sweeping change at Iowa rally
Eric Lutz in Council Bluffs, Iowa
Thu 7 Mar 2019 22.11 EST Last modified on Thu 14 Mar 2019 08.07 EDT

Bernie Sanders after speaking at a rally in Council Bluffs, Iowa, on 7 March.

The enthusiastic support that fueled Bernie Sanders’ insurgent bid for the Democratic nomination in 2016 does not appear to have waned heading into the 2020 race.

The Vermont senator officially got back on the campaign trail Thursday, beginning a trip across Iowa with a large, boisterous rally in Council Bluffs – a small city at the westernmost end of the key caucus state, just across the border from Omaha, Nebraska.

Here in the Hawkeye State, where presidential aspirants drop in every four years to pitch themselves to voters, it’s common practice to kick the tires a little bit – to check out an array of candidates as they make their way through town. But that didn’t appear to be the case in Council Bluffs, where those who turned out to see the firebrand independent largely seemed set on showing their support for the man they say is the most “authentic” champion of progressive causes in the crowded field.

“All his ideas they said were radical, they’re embracing them now,” Bob Jordan, a resident of Council Bluffs, said after the rally. “[The other candidates] are jumping on the bandwagon.”

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The energy at the Mid-America Center Thursday recalled the movement that surrounded Sanders’ campaign in 2016 – and suggested that the momentum he built could carry over into the current cycle.

“I didn’t think I was going to be a Bernie supporter, but he said a lot of things that appealed to me,” said Joan Minikus, Jordan’s wife, who supported Hillary Clinton in 2016. “He has an awesome message.”

Sanders mostly played the hits Thursday night, focusing on his signature message of economic populism and social justice and calling for sweeping changes to the American political system.

“It’s not only that we’re going to win the Democratic nomination. It’s not only that we’re going to defeat Donald Trump, the most dangerous president in modern American history,” Sanders told a cheering crowd. “With your help, we’re going to transform this country and create an economy and a government that works for all of us, not just the 1%.”

That message resonated with his supporters here, where he said his “political revolution” began in 2016.

“He’s the only one that tells it like it is,” Joe Driscoll, a farmer who came to see Sanders from nearby Honey Creek, Iowa, said.

Sanders was edged out in Iowa by Clinton in 2016, but now enjoys perhaps the largest national profile of any of the Democrats who have officially entered the fray so far. He’s performed well here in early polling, and has posted extraordinary fundraising numbers since launching his latest campaign. Sanders, Senator Kamala Harris, and the former vice-president Joe Biden – who has yet to officially enter the race – appear to be leading the crowded pack of Democratic candidates so far.

Sanders also faces some obstacles. He struggled last election to appeal to black voters; if that struggle continues, it could spell doom for the 77-year-old in a cycle where Democrats increasingly appear to be looking for fresh faces that better reflect the party’s diversity. He’s also facing a different political landscape than he was in 2016 – one in which some of his signature policy positions are being championed by his competitors.

Bernie Sanders may run again, but has his outsider's edge worn off?

But Shirley Nelson, who supported Sanders in 2016 and came to Council Bluffs from neighboring Omaha on Thursday to see him for the first time, said she can’t be sure if more mainstream Democrats truly support such a progressive platform, or if they are backing such positions because of the momentum Sanders has built behind them.

“He’s been fighting the good fight forever and ever,” Nelson told the Guardian. “I don’t know what [the other candidates] truly feel, but I know how Bernie feels, because time has borne out that truth.”

Not everybody came to the Mid-America Center feeling the Bern. Rahian Kocer is socially progressive, but more moderate fiscally, and parts of the Vermont senator’s democratic socialist agenda concern him. He supported Clinton in 2016 and likes Harris in the early going of the 2020 cycle. But, the Council Bluffs resident said, the most important thing to him is defeating Trump – and he’ll support whichever Democrat gets the party nod.

I’m here with an open mind,” Kocer said ahead of the event.

But his friend, Ashley Barrett, doesn’t share his reservations about Sanders. She “loves what he stands for” – so much so that she got her boyfriend, William Dunn, who supported Senator Ted Cruz in 2016, to come with her to the rally.

“I love Bernie Sanders,” she said.

I guess you need to read it several times for it to sink in. I wasn't responding to your witless opinions. I was just pointing out that you have been attacking Democrats here for sixteen years. Let that sink in. Pointing out your habitual behavior is not a personal attack.

I guess you need to read it a few times for it to sink in: when I post a political opinion and you immediately run into the scene and repeat the same personal accusation for the hundredth time over a three year period, it is obviously an ad hominem attack designed to censure my opinions.

You can’t meaningfully address my opinions, so you attack me personally.

Like a coward.