Quote:
Originally Posted by WI Crippler  Because he lacks vision(insert old age joke here).
Part of the problem with McCain,IMO(although I am not a republican), is that he seems to lack a strong conviction or vision that is in accordance with conservative principles. He's willing to sell those principles down the river, in the name of compromise. Sometimes he might compromise a value you aren't really that concerned about, but over time I think he has been able to compromise on enough things, that he has effectively done it on something one might feel is important. If you look at Obama, why is he supported by a strong base? Because he succeeds where McCain fails. He is able to produce a vision of the future for his party, that agrees with their principles. He might be moving center for the election, but most of his supporters understand that. McCain was already firmly in the center, and only now seems to pander a bit to try and gather votes from the right wing. If people view Obama's move to center as disinngenuous to merely do what needs to be done to gain moderates and independents, then I think we can assume that McCains move to the right is equivalent in nature and many on the right simply see it as disingenuous. |
Have you ever heard the saying "In democracy you get the government you deserve"? This is why things are as they are, because we value strongly held "principle" over the principle of statesmanship. The reason we're in the ****ty situation we're in now is because neither party has been practicing statesmanship because they're too busy showing "vision".
When the rules of the Senate were formed they were largely built in a way so as to protect us from the tyranny of the majority. Minority parties were given powers so as to ensure their representation as well, in the form of ways to shape political realities (i.e. the filibuster) and make it so compromise is required between the representatives in order to move anything forward.
There are two concepts in game theory which are significant to this, one is called "pareto inferiority" and the other is "Nash equilibrium".
So you have the basic Prisoner's dilemma framework, two crooks get busted and in the police department they're taken off into separate rooms, if neither says anything they both get off on probation. If A rats out B and B says nothing B goes to jail, A gets off scot free, and the inverse is also true. If they both rat each other out they each go to jail, albeit for not as long. The incentive structure looks like this:
So considering they can only control their own actions, if they're rational they'll go for the 4 over the 3 or 2
and the result is that they both rat each other out
this is the Nash equilibrium, where everyone acts in their self interest without regard for common efforts.
Now obviously there's a way things could've gone better for the criminals, had they just not said anything they would've both stayed out of jail. This is what pareto inferiority is, when there is an alternative which is better for everyone involved
When a legislator values "vision" over compromise, the only option in the face of opposition is attempted domination. The result of this is you will always in the end wind up with the Nash equilibrium, regardless of if it's pareto inferior. That's what's been happening to us over the last several years, why regardless of who controls congress the results are pure unadulterated ****, it's because people are motivated by "vision" instead of incorporating the realities of the political environment into that vision (thereby making their vision actually realistic).