Who else has their eyes glaze over with these threads about what the Democratic Platform should be? I keep hearing the same old emotional arguments, and the same old labels, the same old language. I'm sick and tired of arguments about how "left" or "center" or "rightwing" some position is.
Let's throw away the labels already.
Yes, you heard me. Throw away the labels "liberal", "center", "conservative", "right" and "left". After years and years of propaganda bombasting people from all sides, these words are meaningless now except for their connotations. Hell, even avoid the words "Democrats" and "Republicans". Don't use them!
The connotations now overwhelm the denotations. To the point where the arguments have become completely emotional.
We don't need emotional arguments. What we need is some good old fashioned common sense.
I don't care what party you're from, unless you're a right-wing idealogue, you're gonna vote for common sense.
Like .......
As in: It's common sense to make sure the population of your country is healthy and that children are immunized so they don't spread disease.
It's common sense, and economic sense, to ensure a clean supply of drinking water for your citizens.
It's common sense to pass laws to make sure that nobody (corporations or whoever) doesn't lay waste to the land that produces our food.
It's common sense to make sure jobs aren't shipped away to other countries so that our own citizens can have a decent amount of money so that they can buy stuff and keep our own economy moving.
It's common sense to give a place for homeless people to at least take a shit so that they're not shitting in our alleyways. It's also common sense to give them a place to go so that they don't depress property values by hanging around and peeing in the corners. (who cares that they "should" get a job? It doesn't matter. They don't have jobs and they are currently shitting in the alleys and that is just plain bad for everybody)
It's common sense to balance the budget.
Most of all, it's common sense to regulate corporations who will do, as has been proved beyond a shadow of a doubt, whatever they can get away with in order to maximize profits. It's nothing personal against corporations. We all know that corporations have to exist in order to give people jobs. But we're all grownups and we know that corporations will pollute if they are allowed, they will make unsafe products if they are allowed, they will put their workers in danger and have them working at slave wages if they are allowed.
We need to not judge this and simply accept it as fact.
You can just go on and on with this. We seriously need to get away from what is viewed as idealogy and dogma and just stick to what makes sense for people.
I am so sick of labels. I am so sick of being called "antiwar" when I know that war can sometimes be necessary, but because I know that invading Iraq made no common fucking sense whatsoEVER, I'm now called "anti war".
I'm sick of being called a "liberal" because I know, in a rational, non-emotional way, that corporations will INHIBIT competition in the marketplace if they can, that leaving corporations alone to fend for themselves does not automatically incrase competition!
I'm sick of having the only label for myself being a "radical left" because I advocate impeaching, convicting, and imprisoning the gangsters who are so obviously hell-bent on currently our country and our government for their own power and dominance and profit.
We need to simply ignore the goddamn republican noise machine. Ignore their labels, ignore their framing, ignore their appeal to emotions, and their connotations of all those words that Newt Gingrich and his henchmen successfully made "bad".
Let's simply dodge those bullets, stand up and proclaim the things that make basic, simple sense.
And let's keep listing the common sense things that we stand for here. I've just barely touched on them.