"Sanity" creep

[Iron-Hampster]

I'm finding it more and more annoying that people are throwing the terms "moderate" "sane" and the worst one "closest to the centre" at all of their favourite candidates. The reason for this is because what is "sane" now would have been considered "extremist" a long time ago and as well other countries have different versions of this idea of the political centre. Who decides the political centre, how is it decided, and why is it automatically right? If suddenly we were to outlaw free press and it were all put under control of the government, wait less than 2 years and suddenly you would be an extremist Somalian anarchist for suggesting that right to free press be re-implemented.

So tell me, why is it so important that we choose the candidate that is closest to what the government claims is the political centre when we can't even decide where it is? All it does it hold back social progress, it is why it took so long for black people to get the right to vote, and why it is so hard to move past the stupid gay marriage debate, nor are we going to decide how much welfare is enough.

[Camarohusky]

At 6 minutes ago, Iron-Hampster wrote: Who decides the political center, how is it decided, and why is it automatically right?

It's pretty easy. The political center lies in the middle of the most powerful extremes in any given system. Change those extremes and what was "center" will change to represent those new parameters.

So tell me, why is it so important that we choose the candidate that is closest to what the government claims is the political centre when we can't even decide where it is?

The political center is really big these days. The farther apart the extremes, the bigger the center becomes. The reason a politician claiming to be center means nothing is because the center is such a big place. On top of that, the ideas that aren't uber partisan will often have their fence somewhere in the center.

A center candidate is better, even though it is fairly meaningless, because a center candidate is not extreme. They may be on the far end of center, but far end of center is better than extreme.

[Angry-Hatter]

At 21 minutes ago, Camarohusky wrote:

At 6 minutes ago, Iron-Hampster wrote: Who decides the political center, how is it decided, and why is it automatically right?

It's pretty easy. The political center lies in the middle of the most powerful extremes in any given system. Change those extremes and what was "center" will change to represent those new parameters.

I'd define the political center in a different way. I'd say that any issue that has the support of around 60% or more of the public should be concidered to be smack in the middle of the road. If you look at it this way, issue by issue, you start to see how completely out of the mainstream both of the major American political parties currently are, with the Republicans being a little bit more extreme than the Democrats. Just go down the list, protecting social security, medicare, and medicaid, cutting the defense budget, taxing the very wealthy, etc., all of these things with overwhelming support with the American public, and yet for the politicians in Washington DC, talking about any of these things is like pulling teeth.

This is why when anyone tries to make Obama out to be a socialist, I just laugh and laugh. If anything, he's more right of center than any Democratic President in modern history, and compared to Europe, he's further to the right than what most of the biggest right wing parties there are. And the Republicans? Fugetaboutit.

[MrFlopz]

"Moderates" generally sit better with me. They're not going to turn the US into a socialist country and they're not going to bomb the whole world. Sometimes the middle ground is the best way to go. But I agree that it is overused. And sometime completely misused. For example, Norman Finkelstein is often branded as a radical even though the man doesn't state his own opinion. He just explains what the UN considers to be legal. So again, they're just words, but someone who is genuinely extreme will more than likely be problematic.

[djack]

At 2 hours ago, Angry-Hatter wrote: I'd define the political center in a different way. I'd say that any issue that has the support of around 60% or more of the public should be concidered to be smack in the middle of the road. If you look at it this way, issue by issue, you start to see how completely out of the mainstream both of the major American political parties currently are, with the Republicans being a little bit more extreme than the Democrats. Just go down the list, protecting social security, medicare, and medicaid, cutting the defense budget, taxing the very wealthy, etc., all of these things with overwhelming support with the American public, and yet for the politicians in Washington DC, talking about any of these things is like pulling teeth.

This is why when anyone tries to make Obama out to be a socialist, I just laugh and laugh. If anything, he's more right of center than any Democratic President in modern history, and compared to Europe, he's further to the right than what most of the biggest right wing parties there are. And the Republicans? Fugetaboutit.

Oh look, a Canadian who believes that all American politics lean to the right based on his experience with his government. What a rare and unusual site. It's not like this has been brought up a million times already whenever the political extremes of the U.S. are brought up in the forums and some smart-ass foreigner thinks it's necessary to chime in about how their system is different from ours. You're comment has even less value as Camaro was simply talking about where the center lies in any government system and Iron-Hampster, who started the thread, is Canadian.

On topic, I don't actually see a lot of people trying to go with the most "center" or "moderate" candidate in America as most vote either for who they think will win or for a political party regardless of the candidate. Either that's very different in the Great White North or the OP is talking about individuals saying they prefer a candidate who is moderate in which case it's because moderate candidates really do come closer to their political views (unsurprising considering that the public most often falls between the extremes of their nations political parties).

[VictorGrey]

People who do pride themselves as moderates, for purely moderation's sake piss me off.

Anyone can pull off a stance of moderation. The state of being middle ground just for a sense of sticking a nose up and thinking one is above anything, in some goal of holding a "moderate" position isn't anything to respect. They won't be getting it from me.

Actually believe whatever it is you do figure to believe with conviction, or else jump off a bridge.

[Angry-Hatter]

At 2 hours ago, djack wrote: Oh look, a Canadian who believes that all American politics lean to the right based on his experience with his government.

A Canadian? Where? (Not Canadian. Swedish national living in Boston, MA.)

It's not like this has been brought up a million times already whenever the political extremes of the U.S. are brought up in the forums and some smart-ass foreigner thinks it's necessary to chime in about how their system is different from ours. You're comment has even less value as Camaro was simply talking about where the center lies in any government system and Iron-Hampster, who started the thread, is Canadian.

What, is that some kind of touchy subject or something? You don't think that it's reasonable to say that the two major American political parties as a whole are significantly to the right of most European countries? I was just using it as an example of how when someone is referred to as a "moderate" or "centrist" in Washington nowadays, that person is most likely very far away from what the actual center of the country is (the 60%+ range of support I mentioned).

[SmilezRoyale]

FIRST let's try and distinguish between the extremity of a person's views and the degree to which they are a partisan.

"Partisan" simply means loyalty to one's political party, often times regardless of what 'position' the party takes and what issue is being discussed.

Here's an example.

Let's assume Advocating for reductions in absolute government spending is taken to be an extremist position [By absolute government spending, I mean spending less in real dollars in one year than in the year previously]. Now this might beg the question of what the moderate position is, but let's ignore that issue for now.

So if a presumably Republican representative votes against a Democratic President's budget proposals on the grounds they fail to meet his extremist position, is he an extremist or a partisan or both? Was the decision motivated by the fact that the president was a democrat or because the bill did not meet his criteria of acceptability?

We can only answer that question by looking at a situation where a Republican president or a Republican congress was voting on a budget which did not satisfy the above conditions. If the same Republican votes against the proposal he is probably not a partisan; Party allegiance had nothing to do with his decision. If he DID vote in favor of the bill, then he is probably a partisan.

"Moderate" is not the proper antonym to "Partisan". "Independent" MIGHT be a better word, in the sense that a person like Ralph Nader or Ross Perot do not take positions on the basis of the positions of a particular political party, but their positions often times fall outside the acceptable range of argumentation between what is called "The left" and "the right" [Which in actuality should be referred to as the range between democratic socialism and neoconservatism]

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SECOND... in political dialogue, the word "Moderate" applied to yourself is typically used as a way of calling yourself "sane" and, by virtue of natural binary thinking, accusing the people around you as being insane.

If a politician or an individual described his views as follows: "I take the two most extreme views I can find and place myself between them" - That description would be far less respectable than saying "I'm a moderate". In fact, while the idea of the middle ground sounds reasonable in theory, the notion of taking a position on the basis of its relative location rather than its actual truth value.

Here's my favorite example from Wikipedia!

"Some would say that hydrogen cyanide is a delicious and necessary part of the human diet, but others claim it is a toxic and dangerous substance. The truth must therefore be somewhere in between."

It's a silly example, but it's what happens when proximity takes precedence over truth-seeking.

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THIRD, understand the difference between party and between political views. Fewer Americans classify themselves as Democratic or Republican then they have in times past. Is this because the people who do call themselves democratic and Republican have more 'Extremist' views than they did in the past? Or because popular opinion of the congress has fallen significantly, as such people are less proud to give themselves particular titles associated with bad individuals, regardless of their rhetoric or their positions.

Saying more Americans are "Moderates" because republicans and democrats are becoming more extreme is also somewhat deceptive even if it's true in a limited sense, because it does not distinguish between rhetoric and actual policy. So while Political Rhetoric can shift wildly in the short term, the long term trends of what activities the Government is engaged in [compared to in times past] tend to move more consistently in a single direction, with a few issues being left to variation.

So things like Federal spending on entitlements, War, control over economic activity, [as measured by the federal register and the total financial burden of those controls specified in the register] Have increased unambiguously since 1946. The GENERAL Trend of the last 70 years has been a nearly unqualified expansion of the power of the Federal Government, Republicans and democrats notwithstanding.

So if a guy like Ron Paul advocates returning to 2006 spending levels and staying there for a few years, this is regarded as an EXTREMIST position. Why? Because it entails absolute cuts to federal spending to a degree that no other politician [except for maybe Rand Paul] is willing to entertain [or even come close to entertaining]

BUT was advocating for 2006 spending levels in 2006 an extremist position? Obviously not.

The fact that the RHETORIC of a Republican sounds more free market [Capitalist, Plutocratic, or whatever derogatory term you prefer] , or the Rhetoric of a democrat sounds more Egalitarian [Class warfare, marxist, whatever derogatory term you prefer] Doesn't say much about the actual direction of the Government. Nor does it say whether public opinion
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And this brings me to FOUR,

As the OP suggests, the danger of placing stock in "Moderation" and "Moderates" is that Public Opinion can be manufactured by powerful opinion molders too easily.

If people are lead to agree that "Moderate" is synonymous with 'correct', To describe a position as "Moderate" and others as "extreme" makes it possible for anyone with a wide enough audience to attack good ideas and promote bad ones purely by making a subjective claim about it. The prophesy of moderation tends to be self-fulfilling and hence self-validating. In other words, a claim which in reality should have no bearing on the truth, influences what is seen as truth because it BECOMES true merely by being stated by a large enough group of people.

This isn't to say that removing the obsession with being moderate will completely eliminate the fact that Academia and the "big-media" can influence public opinion so strongly [absent the internet, possibly now more than ever]. However if people stopped being ashamed of taking positions other people called 'extreme', it remove one arrow in the quiver of institutional opinion molders.

[djack]

At 12 hours ago, Angry-Hatter wrote: A Canadian? Where? (Not Canadian. Swedish national living in Boston, MA.)

I must have mixed your posts up with someone else's during a different thread then. Still, Swedish or Canadian doesn't matter as your post is still the same.

What, is that some kind of touchy subject or something? You don't think that it's reasonable to say that the two major American political parties as a whole are significantly to the right of most European countries? I was just using it as an example of how when someone is referred to as a "moderate" or "centrist" in Washington nowadays, that person is most likely very far away from what the actual center of the country is (the 60%+ range of support I mentioned).

Not touchy, just repetitive beyond all reason. Literally every thread where the extremes of the U.S. left and right are brought up someone from some other country feels the need to talk about how their country is so far left compared to us that all Americans are at best moderate right wingers. It's also pretty obvious to everyone that American politicians, even when relatively moderate, are more extreme than the majority of the actual public. But centrist doesn't have to be what over 60% of the population agrees with to qualify, just in the middle of the two extremes in any given country as the public will most likely gravitate towards center over time anyways.

[Angry-Hatter]

At 1 hour ago, djack wrote: Not touchy, just repetitive beyond all reason. Literally every thread where the extremes of the U.S. left and right are brought up someone from some other country feels the need to talk about how their country is so far left compared to us that all Americans are at best moderate right wingers. It's also pretty obvious to everyone that American politicians, even when relatively moderate, are more extreme than the majority of the actual public.

So you're pouring hate over a statement that you're not really arguing against, for the reason that it's been stated on a number of different occasions and you're just sick of hearing it?

Proteas called, he want his shtick back.

But centrist doesn't have to be what over 60% of the population agrees with to qualify, just in the middle of the two extremes in any given country as the public will most likely gravitate towards center over time anyways.

Well, as mentioned, who and what is "centrist" and who and what is "extreme" is a hard thing to determine, since they're both relative terms, but I think that measuring the amount of support for any given issue within a population is a decent measuring stick for what the political center of that population is. If say, 70% of the public overall is in favor of raising taxes on the rich, but 70% of people in Congress are in favor of cutting taxes on the rich, then those two populations are at odds with one another, and the "centrist" position is different depending on which population you look at.

And like Smilez noted in his post (great post by the way, very insightful analysis), taking the middle of two extremes doesn't make any sense in certain cases; some people say cyanide is great for you, some say it's horrible for you, I'm in the middle. A more relevant example: some people think we should teach unfounded pseudo science in science classes, while some people think we should teach our kids evidence based sience in science classes, I'm in the middle.

[djack]

At 11 minutes ago, Angry-Hatter wrote: So you're pouring hate over a statement that you're not really arguing against, for the reason that it's been stated on a number of different occasions and you're just sick of hearing it?

I was also pretty frustrated at something else when I came online and wrote that so plenty of hate from that spilled into my post also. I do hate excessive repetition though and would probably have commented on it anyway.

Proteas called, he wants his shtick back.

He can have it when he pries it from my cold dead hands.

[VictorGrey]

I think SmilezRoyale is a pretty cool guy. Eh doesn't let party partisanship or pointlessly empty candidate rhetoric always affect logic, and doesn't afraid of anything.

[LordZeebmork]

If you value 'moderation' in 2012, would you have valued it in 1912? Or 1812? Or, for that matter, 12?

[Iron-Hampster]

It has kind of come to a time where "moderation" isn't locking in good progress and blocking out bad anymore, it is doing the opposite, it holds back good and necessary progress while locking in the bad. Candidate 1. "hey I know you all hate these laws so I plan to abolish them" Candidate 2: "woh woh woh not so fast hahaha you will never win the election if you go all out like that! vote for me and I will do nothing about these laws but I might certainly throw our voters a small bone if they vote for me!" key word might, as in won't.