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If the argument is that we are motivated by self interest, wouldn't we support the fundamentalists who will reduce our tax burden?
(Furthermore, this meme that Republicans are financially beneficial is fallacious. The problem is that economic effects take a long time to become apparent, so the current guy gets blamed for the effects of the last guy)
I think if you ask different people you'll receive different answers because it ultimately comes down to how you value those benefits. If not, why would any intelligent person ever vote for a Republican?
My original comment wasn't as a blue partisan, but rather a leave-me-alone libertarian. In 2016, yes "both sides" just channel popular frustration into corporatist policies. Abstract abortion vs abstract guns kayfabe, but really centralization and corporate welfare uber alles. I was the one telling my blue tribe friends why Trump was going to win, while they didn't want to hear it. I had never voted for a major party candidate in any national race (until 2020).
But in 2023? The inmates have solidly taken over the Republican asylum, in a way that the extremist wackos in the blue tribe have not (yet?). The only intelligent reason I can see to support the insanity is that you want to see the system run aground and crash. This isn't meant as an indictment - 20 or even 10 years ago I would have been right there with you.
If you want to explain another intelligent reason to vote Republican, I'm all ears. I'd love to return to my prior state of understanding the merit in both tribes' points of view. Just please don't base it on opposing cherry picked blue tribe insanity that hasn't actually captured the Democratic party, or things that are still basically symmetrical (eg Biden's student loan giveaway vs Trump's Covid giveaway).
As became clearly to many for the first time after the SC decision, abortion laws in the US would be considered extreme even in western Europe. I mean, elective abortion in the third trimester? This is literally justifying anyone who ever called it baby-killing.
The fact that you summarize this kind of policy extremism as "modern medical care" that any "analytical person" would agree with, and any opposition to it as fundamentalism and backwards... that's a perfect illustration of the woke mindset yes.
Utterly provincial, zero empathy for anyone who disagrees, and a massively unwarranted sense of self-importance.
A basic scenario: A pregnant woman with ultrasound and genetic tests indicating severe birth defects. But there is still a "fetal heartbeat", an electrical signal that is necessary but not sufficient for life. It is now illegal to provide treatment for this condition in Texas [0], in favor of attempting to carry the non-viable growth to term and possibly dying as a result. So no, my characterization is not "policy extremism". Rather, what's extremist is this desire to prohibit straightforward medical care in favor of uninvolved collectivist woo.
The reference to third trimester elective abortion "baby killing" is political nonsense. If someone is "using abortion instead of birth control", they're doing it in the first trimester, where they can take a pill rather than waiting and undergoing an invasive medical procedure. As for third trimester abortions, Pete Buttigieg put it extremely well:
> So, let's put ourselves in the shoes of a woman in that situation. If it's that late in your pregnancy, that means almost by definition you've been expecting to carry it to term. We're talking about women who have perhaps chosen the name, women who have purchased the crib, families that then get the most devastating medical news of their lifetime, something about the health or the life of the mother that forces them to make an impossible, unthinkable choice. That decision is not going to be made any better, medically or morally, because the government is dictating how that decision should be made
[0] eg https://www.wbtv.com/2022/09/08/texas-woman-travels-abortion...
If you push and push and push, and call anyone who dissents an extremist, eventually someone will do that to you.
You'd think the woke would have realized that by now. But they seem incapable of modeling their opponents as anything other than evil.
Personally I think that if women want to unilaterally decide to keep or abort, then fatherhood should be opt-in. Fair is fair. And if fathers can't wiggle out of parenthood, neither should women.
The argument that he should've kept it in his pants is the exact same as saying she should've kept her legs shut. Either you agree with both, or with neither.
Would it help convince you that I'm not a member of this strawman "woke mob" by saying I wholeheartedly agree with you on this?
As I said in another comment, I'm not coming from this as a blue partisan, but rather a leave me alone libertarian who has been reluctantly pushed into voting conservative (which in 2023 means Democrat).
Your argument here is just both sidesing "extremism" into moral relativism. In the real world, providing straightforward necessary medical care has been criminalized. This isn't hypothetical, but direct backwards-thinking oppression caused by a specific political movement, focusing on a straw man of third trimester elective abortions while writing off the collateral damage.
For this not to be a straw man, you'd need to put forth statistics about the number of third trimester elective abortions (healthy normal pregnancies with no birth defects, etc), showing it's a significant topic. And if you want to advocate for banning that specifically, then I will understand where you're coming from. But so far you've just used it as a motte and bailey to ignore the scope of what has actually been criminalized.