To believe there's no real difference between the two parties, you must be either lying or clueless.

[TheWraith]

Sorry, but there's no other realistic way to put it. At a time in history when there's more distance between them than there has been in almost a century, and barely more than a decade after the "no difference" spiel gave us George W. Bush instead of Al Gore, it takes either idiocy or willful self-deception to pretend otherwise.

Let's go back and think about that one for a moment, shall we? Despite the heyday in 2000 of "they're all the same" thanks to Ralph Nader shilling for Bush, is anyone now really willing to claim that Al Gore--"An Inconvenient Truth" Al Gore, Nobel Peace Prize Al Gore, the guy with a 6 page long Wikipedia article about his environmental activism--would have governed exactly the same as George W. Bush and Dick "Oil well" Cheney? The guys who passed an exemption for fracking into the Safe Drinking Water Act? The guys with a hardon for Iraq circa year 2000? The "Mushroom cloud over America" guys?

Can anyone say with a straight face that, well, they weren't the same THEN, but NOW--after a solid decade plus of increasing partisanship, division, and policy disagreements--NOW there's really no difference? Now we're right, even though before we were so completely and massively wrong that it helped derail the entire country, demolish the economy, and set the environment back maybe for decades?

To justify these claims, supporters are literally forced to make up conspiracy theories about Democrats' supposed secret plans to destroy Medicare, or to approve Keystone XL, or extend the war in Iraq, or to avoid repealing Don't Ask Don't Tell. And as each one is proved in turn to be the completely fictional rantings of people strictly intent on bashing Democrats, they rapidly swing around to a new conspiracy theory and never, ever again acknowledge being massively and repeatedly wrong on every previous claim they've made.

And yet some people still have the brass to come here and push a dishonest narrative, built out of lies, half-truths, innuendos, and selective reasoning, and with no real-world reason or justification other than trying to repeat the debacle of 2000 and put another right-wing Republican into the White House.

[RainDog]

1. I think people respond, many times, out of frustration

rather than looking at the big picture.

There is nothing to be gained by not voting for a Democrat in this election cycle - but a lot to be lost.

[Warren Stupidity]

2. Center-right and hard-right.

[coalition_unwilling]

14. +1,000,000 - n/t

[Maven]

47. Exactly.

[NNN0LHI]

3. Every Republican I know thinks everyone is as stupid as they are

[Romulox]

4. The two Parties are closest on Economic Policy. Unfortunately, that's the part of gov't that most

influences the broadest number of American's day-to-day lives.

[phleshdef]

36. They aren't close on economic policy at ALL. The Dems have NOTHING resembling the Ryan plan.

And thats where the modern Republican party's economics are right now, the Ryan plan. I'd love to see much more progressive thought integrated into the kind of proposals we see the Democrats ultimately backing, but its still nothing nearly as bad as what the Republicans have in mind.

[Romulox]

44. But on "free trade" with China, or NAFTA, or bailing out banks, or mortgage reform. VERY similar.

[phleshdef]

48. Not all Dems are for the bad free trade bills.

You will find a lot more opposition in Congress to NAFTA on the Democratic side than you will the Republican side.

And even with the banking fiasco, Republicans don't support Dodd/Frank. And no, of course it wasn't the greatest reform bill ever, but it went a lot farther towards increasing regulations on financial institutions than anything today's Republicans are willing to do. And if you are looking for regulations that go beyond Dodd/Frank, you will only find support for that among Democrats in Washington. You won't find it among any Republicans.

So no, NOT similar at all, not even close. You can cherry pick a few areas of policy where the 2 parties may have found some common ground or you can cherry pick the views half the Senators and Congress critters that are more centrist/DLC types (while ignoring the other half that aren't) and make an argument... but its an argument based on a false premise that doesn't give a fair and accurate accounting of the whole picture.

[RobertEarl]

5. Yes, of course

There is a huge difference between the parties.

Some, tho, are cognizant that there be far too many similarities. And those similarities are not good.

[hay rick]

13. Three Mile Island was much better than Fukushima.

The OP demolishes yet another straw man, pretending that critics of the President and the DNC don't recognize the differences between the two parties. Mostly they do. The problem is, as you say, they also see the similarities.

[xchrom]

6. Oh I think somebody is lying.

Just not who you say it is.

[Comrade_McKenzie]

7. I'd like to see more Democrats stop their support for a capitalistic system...

It makes me cringe anytime one of them talks about how great free markets are before they introduce reforms.

[villager]

8. Additionally, to believe there's *enough* of a difference in the duopoly to "save" us,

... is likewise clueless.

All Democrats do is buy slightly more time -- though that may be moot now, with their inaction on climate change, too -- than Republicans do, in order to come up with actual, paradigm-shifting solutions.

[MadHound]

9. The same, no,

But they are certainly close, and getting closer.

They work primarily for the good of the same groups of people, the rich, elite and corporate.

Sure, the Dems throw out a few crumbs here and there, but in the end, it is the good of the rich, elite and corporate that is paramount.

I call it good cop/bad cop. The 'Pugs are the bad cops. They bluster and bloviate, they are radically out there on many issues and positions. The Dems come along and they are the good cops. They are more subdued, they throw out a few crumbs. But in the end it is the good cop who achieves the most.

Look at the Dems achievements over the past twenty years. Who would have thought that Dems would have destroyed welfare as we knew it. The 'Pugs couldn't do it, we would have screamed bloody hell. But Clinton pushed it through with hardly a peep. Same with media consolidation, the same with deregulation of our financial sector. Looking at Obama's record, who would have thought that it would be a Democrat who would push through health insurance "reform" that basically rewarded the bad, but corporate, players with a mandated monopoly, but he did. Same with the war. Under Bush, the anti-war movement was alive and well, under Obama, the steam has gone out.

No, the parties aren't the same. But they have the same primary goal, to aid and abet their corporate masters first and foremost, and we the people come in a poor second, if at all.

[trixie]

51. WTF?

How can you say all of this?

Women's health care?
Contraceptives?
Legal Abortions?
Medical care for all especially for the millions without it?
Rights for all Americans not just the I've-been-married-3-times-Christians
Keeping religion OUT of our government?

There is more, much more.

[DCBob]

55. They are not getting closer.. what rock are you living under??

Were you in a coma during the Rethug primaries??

Clueless is too kind a term.

[freshwest]

10. Major disseminators of this are Icke, Jones, Paulites, 911 Truthers and some Occupy. Not Bill Maher:

About False Equivalency

Even though he has a strong libertarian bent, Bill Maher sees the difference.

[SunSeeker]

31. "One states the facts, the other comes very close to playing with their own poop."

Gotta love Bill Maher. Thanks so much for the video, freshwest. It is a classic.

[phleshdef]

37. Bill Maher doesn't really have a "libertarian" bent.

He said that years ago when libertarian meant something different to him. He is a social libertarian. Most liberals are. He wants the government to stay out of people's bedrooms and is against the war on drugs. But he is for universal healthcare, strong social safety nets, seems to mostly espouse Keynesian ideas regarding economics, is all for stimulus during a recession and taxing the rich more, etc.

[freshwest]

38. True, but he's still known for it. That's the kind of liberal most Democrats are. The kind of ...

Libertarian we're being confronted with now are the Ayn Rand types, described by Monbiot and personified by Ryan, etc.

[dionysus]

11. and this OP will draw them out of the woodwork like flies...enjoy..

there's also some peopel who were stone DLCers in 2008, who suddenly morphed into super duper leftists so they can play the game of attacking Obama "from the left".

not that that means anything in DU3 anyways; all kind of blatant anti dem campaigningthat violates the TOS is allowed to stay...

[NNN0LHI]

16. Remember the head of the Lou Dobbs fan club here about ten years ago?

Yea, he morphed into a super duper leftist since Obama has been elected to act like a liberal attacking from the left now. They think we have short memories.

Every post he starts now gets over a hundred recommendations.

Don

[immoderate]

28. Well, nobody here is to Obama's right.

They'd be shit-canned real fast.

--imm

[rhett o rick]

12. I guess I miss your point unless it's to be devisive.

If you are trying to unite the Party, this is not the way.

[AnotherMcIntosh]

25. x2

[Gman]

15. I settled on clueless whiners

Can't explain it any other way.

[RevStPatrick]

17. Oh, c'mon Wraith, do you really think there's ANYONE...

...who believes there's NO difference between the two parties?
And you're gonna get all worked up about this?

There is one major political party in this country, and it's the money party.
It's got two factions, which I call the Global Corporate Socialists and the Global Corporate Fascists.
I will vote for the Global Corporate Socialists every time.
But I don't like that that is my only real choice.

I don't really want to vote for people who chase the same corporate dollars and depend upon those dollars to get elected. But I do it anyway. And I'm willing to criticize them when they do things that tow the corporate line and help further the corporate agenda.

Yes, there are differences.
But their similarities really bother me.
Am I merely a clueless idiot who is practicing self-deception?
I think you do yourself a disservice here...

[NNN0LHI]

18. The most ardent anti-globalism people I know drive imported cars

Does that answer your question?

Don

[bvar22]

49. No.

All that does is lead me to conclude you need to
start hanging out with a smarter crowd.



You will know them by their WORKS,
not by their excuses.
[font size=5 color=green]Solidarity99![/font][font size=2 color=green]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------[/center]

[on point]

32. Yep, Fascist right and moderate right. There are no moderate nor certainly any left parties anymore

The DEMS have triangulated themselves right off the cliff into conservative land. Yes they are still somewhat to the left of the crazy party, but that is small comfort...

[quinnox]

19. Its easy to paint a false picture and then attack it, when all nuance is thrown out the window

The critique many make about the corporate friendly nature of both the Democrats and Republicans is more subtle and also makes a hell of a lot of sense. The Democratic party is not a leftist or progressive party these days, and hasn't been for, well, as long as I can remember. Its become more and more centrist and right leaning, not the other way around. And it doesn't help matters when President Obama signs legislation such as extending the Bush tax cuts for the richest, when he promised he wouldn't. (to give just one example, there are others)

[joshcryer]

20. The difference is that the Republican Party is unified, the Democratic Party is factionalized.

What happens is that the conservative democrats or moderate democrats are used to bash the liberal democrats. And who drives the narrative? The right wing. They know that as long as the Democratic Party is factionalized progressive goals cannot be achieved easily.

[progressivebydesign]

21. Big diff. Mississippi, red state, is about to close the one and only abortion clinic in the state.

We absolutely cannot be apathetic or complacent. They are coming for the women..

[freshwest]

35. +1.000

[CleanLucre]

22. "the "no difference" spiel gave us George W. Bush instead of Al Gore"

The SCOTUS and Poppy Bush "gave us George W. Bush instead of Al Gore.

Ralph Nader said both parties were in collusion with corporations and lobbyists.

Lobbyists are running Congress from both sides of the aisle.

That's not conspiracy theory, that's reality.

It seems the young voters are the ones that really need the Democrats to make clear how they're different, because they know how corrupt the whole system is and fall for the "just the same" rhetoric.

[Motown_Johnny]

23. Maybe they are Excalbians

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Savage_Curtain

^snip^


With the fight over, the Excalbian reappears and announces that while evil retreats when confronted with force, there is no great difference otherwise between the two philosophies. At which point Kirk states that the representatives of evil were motivated by a desire for power, while the good side was motivated by the requirement to protect the members of the Enterprise crew, implying that it is not the methods but the ends that distinguish good and evil. The aliens conclude their experiment and allow Kirk and Spock to return to the Enterprise.

[treestar]

24. Very True Wraith, lying or clueless sums it up

It's just plain absurd. Along with a lot of rhetoric about corporations and money and total cynicism and the corruption of the entire government, as though We the People have no say and no power and are helpless in the face of slick ads and always the victims and can't pick our own leaders. And the wild conspiracy theories you cite.

[lib2DaBone]

26. When Big Pharma wanted to come out with a Marijuana Pill...

What did Obama do?

He sent Holder to bust all the legal Medical MJ clinics in California.

Obama loves campaign money.. like all the rest...

[SidDithers]

40. Holder busted all of them? All of them?...nt

Sid

[RKP5637]

27. Well said!!! n/t

[Zanzoobar]

29. Or hopeful.

[heaven05]

30. bravo

you're right:

[SunSeeker]

33. K&R

[stupidicus]

34. ho hum, the same old stuff

wholly lacking in any examples or evidence, other than the frequently observed repetition of the same charge around here from those who can't rebut the facts that justify the criticisms of the dems that they abhor.

I see this

and with no real-world reason or justification other than trying to repeat the debacle of 2000 and put another right-wing Republican into the White House.

used all the time and applied to those who criticize this and that about BHO and/or the dems, but I have never seen a poster here actually claim that the two parties are identical in all ways as you claim. If they did, they wouldn't be here long, now would they, given how intolerant some around here are of ANY dissent or criticisms whatsoever? Naturally you and those like you would be calling for their being banned

Don't be a wingnut (right-wing or extreme-fringe).
Democratic Underground is an online community for politically liberal people who understand the importance of working within the system to elect more Democrats and fewer Republicans to all levels of political office. Teabaggers, Neo-cons, Dittoheads, Paulites, Freepers, Birthers, and right-wingers in general are not welcome here. Neither are certain extreme-fringe left-wingers, including advocates of violent political/social change, hard-line communists, terrorist-apologists, America-haters, kooks, crackpots, LaRouchies, and the like.

Vote for Democrats.
Winning elections is important — therefore, advocating in favor of Republican nominees or in favor of third-party spoiler candidates that could split the vote and throw an election to our conservative opponents is never permitted on Democratic Underground. But that does not mean that DU members are required to always be completely supportive of Democrats. During the ups-and-downs of politics and policy-making, it is perfectly normal to have mixed feelings about the Democratic officials we worked hard to help elect. When we are not in the heat of election season, members are permitted to post strong criticism or disappointment with our Democratic elected officials, or to express ambivalence about voting for them. In Democratic primaries, members may support whomever they choose. But when general election season begins, DU members must support Democratic nominees (EXCEPT in rare cases where were a non-Democrat is most likely to defeat the conservative alternative, or where there is no possibility of splitting the liberal vote and inadvertently throwing the election to the conservative alternative).

since that "AWK AWK they're identical" stuff would appear to violate certain TOS criteria. This is why I see these exaggerated charges as the BS they are, and the product of a less than creative imagination, because they (those charged here) likely would have provided cause for their expulsion in relatively short order. AFter all, if there position incontrovertibly and demonstratably is that there "is no real difference", then that "the same" stuff as an implied advocating for no diff in who you vote for -- an inarguable violation of that bolded above. Are you suggesting that the moderators/owners here aren't doing their job adequately?

It's really nothing more than dodge and an insult to those who do have honest and defensible criticisms of BHO and the dems, and is no doubt designed for and intended to either make social lepers outta them here, silence them, and to spare you the embarrassment of having no credible defense of the things they criticize.

Of course there are diffs between the two parties in terms of policy pursuits, some are just not satified with the size of the diffs across a range of issues important to them and the principles they hold dear as lefties, and who aren't willing to stay silent or be silenced (by efforts like this one) just to benefit from the good graces of those that insult them and their intelligence this way.

WHat's next, BHO didn't choose by his lonesome to use a kill list, issue drilling permits in the arctic, etc, -- a great many things reasonable people can disagree over? If he can't survive politically due to the choices in fact he's made, well, that's political life.

To me that's the most hilarious part about these kinda tirades -- it's almost like you think those that are doing the criticizing are educating people with falsehoods or period, when anyone with any business here discussing or debating the issues should be fully familiar with and have an understanding of them sufficient to form their own opinion that likely won't be influenced negatively unless the facts are there with which to accomplish it. This suggest to me that you think this place is full of impressionable and gullible nincompoops that need to be protected from facts that might cast a bad light on BHO/the dems, lest their full awareness and fear of the rightwingnuts at the gates be overcome and votes are lost to them.

Nobody here as far as I can tell thinks that there's "no real difference" between them, because even the unenthused, disenchanted, disillusioned, etc, with BHO and the dems all say at least they'll vote against Romney as the alternative, which more than indicates their awareness of significant diffs despite the level of dissatisfaction they have for BHO. I've been predicting for going on three years now that the fear of the rising rightwingnuttery would be his salvation, assuming that the repubs didn't find someone to restore some measure of sanity to their party. He was already starting to compile a list of things and disappoints with them and him even then. Your kind around he seem to think that's some kinda deep and dark secret, despite it being evidenced in the erosion of enthusiasm gap, a loss of donors, etc, or even things like this http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/48038023/ns/politics-the_new_york_times/

Is his Keystone approval a product of someones imagination http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/03/obama-defends-oil-record-fast-tracks-keystone-pipeline/ and are you exaggerating about what others have charged in terms of his involvement in potential Mediacre cuts http://crooksandliars.com/susie-madrak/washington-post-how-obama-failed-get-, changing their opposition of that into a charge he's out to destroy in in its entirety? One can reasonably think so, because all those kinda exaggerations fit the narratives of those around here that think all criticisms of him and the dems has some nefarious motive -- like assuring his/the dems election loss, rather than their honest and principled desire to stand in the way of things they don't approve of no matter who is proposing them.

ANd those with dishonest narratives are generally speaking, the first ones to project their guilt of it onto others.

[SidDithers]

39. DU rec...

Clueless indeed.

Sid

[SunsetDreams]

41. Hey Sid :)

I happen to like the direction of that thumb.

[Douglas Carpenter]

42. I agree with Bill Maher: Vote Democratic - "we're lame but the other guys are nuts"

We no longer have a political struggle between left and right or liberal and conservative - both are fundamentally conservative albeit to varying degrees on basic assumptions of economic policy and foreign policy - But we do have a struggle between sane and insane.

No matter how one tries to spin it both parties pretty much hold the same basic assumptions regarding the so-called, "free market economy and to varying degrees embrace a form of neoliberal economics with the likes of Goldman Sachs steering the ship of state. At the same time both parties embrace an interventionist, Pax Americana foreign policy. The healthcare plan that was just sustained by the U.S. Supreme Court has its origins in a Heritage Foundation - right-wing think tank and is essentially the nationalization of Romneycare. The foreign policy is not similar to the first term of the Bush Jr. administration -but in fundamentals varies little from the second term of that administration. However, I will agree that it when it gets down to specifics we do indeed see some concrete differences. The Democratic Party of today is in fact well to the right on economic issues to the old pre-Reagan Republican Party and pretty much the same as Bush Sr. so-called foreign policy realist in support of a highly interventionist approach. But at least they are glued considerably more to reality and are considerably more pragmatic.

[Bonobo]

43. Can I borrow some straw?

You seem to have plenty.

[Dawgs]

45. Unrec for being so ignorant. n/t

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

46. "Not as bad" is still not good.

"I never submitted the whole system of my opinions to the creed of any party of men whatever, in religion, in philosophy, in politics, or in anything else, where I was capable of thinking for myself. Such an addiction is the last degradation of a free and moral agent. If I could not go to heaven but with a party, I would not go there at all." Thomas Jefferson to Francis Hopkinson, 1789.

“Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone, you may cherish the sweetest reflection that your vote is never lost." John Quincy Adams

"Were parties here divided merely by a greediness for office,...to take a part with either would be unworthy of a reasonable or moral man." Thomas Jefferson to William Branch Giles, 1795.

[bvar22]

50. The "Centrist" Party Leadership of the Clinton Administration CREATED Nader.

If the Party leadership had stuck to its traditional Pro-LABOR, Pro-Working Class,
Pro-Corporate Regulation roots of FDR and LBJ,
there would have been no Nader.

As much as you would like to believe it,
Nader was NOT some Superman who knocked the wheels off the entire Democratic Party by saying the NAFTA was not a good deal.


Nader was a geeky little consumer activist who simply told the truth about NAFTA and de-regulation.
He told the economic truth, and thereby stepped into a vacuum created by the "Centrist" Clinton Administration.
Without the Rightward drift of the Democratic Party under Clinton,
there would have been no Nader.

Lets place THAT responsibility where it belongs.
NOW, as far as you entire OP,
it IS an excellent example of the Strawman Logical Fallacy.
Nobody, not Nader himself, nor anybody who voted for him, ever believed that the two parties are exactly the same.

[Honeycombe8]

52. Absolutely true. nt

[demosincebirth]

53. Many call themselves Independents.

[JNelson6563]

54. And the who's who of They're-the-same!1

show up on cue.

Funny how that works.

Julie

[DCBob]

56. I think those that think that are just impatient.. they want immediate satisfaction.

They think the Obama approach is too polite, too cautious and too slow. I happen to totally disagree with that thinking. This country is not ready for rapid change. Republicans still cant handle the simple reality of a black family in the WH. That still pisses them off to this day. Then the stimulus, healthcare reform, DOMA, etc just made matters worse. I think that's about as much change as they can possibly absorb in one term. If President Obama pushed even harded for more changes this country might burst at the seams.

I think the only way forward is slow, methodical, incremental.. its boring and painful but I believe thats the only way we can make further progress given the nature of 21st century America.