Larry,

Your link doesn't work. Do you have a better one?

OK, here's one:

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/443243-orourke-says-he-wont-unconditionally-back-democrats

 Thanks, Mike, for letting me know my link didn't work. I recopied and pasted the link and it now works though I can't figure out why it didn't work before. Weird.

I'm thinking that these are just words based on his agenda Larry.

He is not only against Trumps barrier on the southern border, he is for tearing down some of the existing wall.

He also has his own version of the Green New Deal,  which just takes longer .......2050 at a cost of 5 trillion dollars.

https://www.newsweek.com/beto-orourke-ocasio-cortez-green-new-deal-1328205

"It is the best proposal that I've seen to ensure that this planet does not warm another 2 degrees Celsius, after which we may lose the ability to live in places like El Paso,” O’Rourke, an El Paso native, told BuzzFeed. “It's going to take that kind of effort to ensure that we meet our commitments.”

https://www.newsweek.com/beto-orourke-climate-change-proposal-green-new-deal-1408435

This is with naive or intentional nonsense as CO2 is well mixed in the global atmosphere and our cuts would have little effect while KILLING our economy as China continues to increase emissions(now double ours in 2019, on their way towards triple).

And there is no climate crisis to begin with but if there was, the Climate Accord and Green New Deal wouldn't be having much impact............except to kill our economy. The only thing that these plans do is to extract money from targeted rich(developed country) entities to use for political agenda projects or to send to other poor entities that they have decided will benefit but can't allocate that money for those projects by being upfront about the dynamics of extracting it and how it will actually be used, so they use "save the planet" as the reason behind their plans. 

I just can't imagine somebody with this agenda would vote for/support anybody but another person with similar views. A republican with views that resemble his does not exist or they wouldn't be a republican. 

I guess he could vote for an independent that has very liberal views like some of the current democrats but thats like voting for the democrats agenda.........whats the difference?

. 

Maybe I'm thinking about this the wrong way.

I do agree strongly with your idea/thought though Larry, that it would be wonderful if our politicians weren't so polarized and were focused on ideas, country and whats best for our citizens vs increasing the power of their political party at all costs, including supporting everybody else that belongs to their party...........automatically.

As a hypothertical,  what sort of compromise do you suppose could be reached between a freemarket fundamental constitutionalist and a socialist?

Some Dems will follow the party line all of the time ... and all Dems will follow the party line some of the time ... but no Dem follows the party line all of the time. 

Now if we can just figure out what our party line is ...

Good one Carl.

Unfortunately, the answer is.............unite to stop Trump.

This means, unfortunately, sometimes taking positions that are bad positions because they are the opposite on one of Trumps good positions.

Biden made an epic blunder related to this recently in his opinion about China.

Others are against a southern border barrier and against policies that would help with the illegal immigration crisis because Trump is being aggressive in trying to manage it. 

With regards to the Green New Deal. 

There must be another earth in an alternate universe which I am not gifted enough to see for this plan and the reason for it to make any sense as it would do zero to affect climate and everything to kill the economy. 

 Mike and Tim, I just like the idea of not feeling the obligation to almost always follow the "party line". I'm not a party line kind of guy and I'm not referring to the lines that rural phone users used to share. <G>

 Compromise isn't easy but it isn't being done enough these days. Compromise is a sacrifice that can help keep the country together better. Admittedly, compromise between socialism and 100% free market economy/capitalism isn't easy, but don't we already have that to some extent?

 Carl, I sort of follow you but wonder if you have a typo when you refer to following party lines all of the time twice in different ways....some vs none. Most are going to lean in the direction of one party line or the other. That's understandable. But there's a big difference between going 90%+ party line and going, say, about 67% party line. I'm looking for folks who are more in the 50%-67% party line range. I like unpredictability! Someone like Warner on the Dems side and Kasich on the Pubs side

I often disagree with pubs since, for the most part,they are to the left of me.  I can't remember agreeing with a dem since JFK, as they have largely become the American Socialist party. Expanding the role of government is contrary to my fundamental beliefs.

Tim,

 Even folks like Sam Nunn, Fritz Hollings. Evan Bayh, and Joe Lieberman?

It's risky to make sweeping generalizations, especially on this site....    Setting that aside...   How well do you suppose the views of someone like Lieberman, Nunn  et al,  would fit in todays dem party with Booker, AOC,  et al?

Mike and Tim, I just like the idea of not feeling the obligation to almost always follow the "party line". I'm not a party line kind of guy and I'm not referring to the lines that rural phone users used to share. <G>

Larry,

I am with you 100% on that idea. I was raised a democrat and even voted for Obama in 2008(I was a never McCain/Palin -anti military intervention abuse by the US guy). 

However, I quickly became a never Obama guy in 2012, especially because of he was THE leader actor in the climate crisis(worlds biggest scientific fraud in history) but now, I'm very sorry to say that the democratic platform  on the presidential level is so pathetic and instead of MAGA, the platform should have the acronyms DTOT "Do The Opposite of Trump"  or "anti" MAGA.

There is only one reason to support Trump and that's because his agenda has numerous policies with major benefits for America. The economy, the immigration issue(that he's being blocked on) withdrawing from the Climate Accord scam.....etc.

If your party's position is the opposite of this............how can somebody like me even think about voting for anybody from that political affiliation.?

With regards to local elections it's a different deal but on a national level the democratic party has acted in a way to completely alienate people like me..........that spent more than the first half of their life voting democrat.

Even if their agenda was not as described above, the excessive hate, smearing and attacking to destroy their opponents from that side(you can think that Trump deserves it because he's not a nice person but they acted dispicable in the  Kavanaugh hearings).

I feel bad for saying this in thinking about the good democrats reading this........guys like you carl.  

I know that there are many, many  good people in the democratic party like this that want the best for this country but the democratic party that I connected strongly with in the past............helping the less fortunate, civil rights, social justice, honesty/integrity, ANTI war/military intervention, etc...has been obliterated with new messages...........hate, smearing, intolerance, climate fraud, economy killing energy policies from the Outer Limits, border/immigration crisis denial. 

I keep wondering what has happened to my democratic party. In some ways, the ideals that they represented for me 40 years ago(Jimmy Carter is still my favorite president) are even more important to me now...........the charity aspect of the democratic party for instance. 

But how does the current democratic party apply these principles today?

Border walls are immoral? Solution? Lets add fuel to a major crisis to make it worse

Reparations for blacks? Let's see if we can bribe blacks to vote for us. 

Today's democratic party does not seek social justice unless it brings power and votes. 

Then, add in the numerous negatives mentioned above and this party has forced me out by changing so drastically. 

Believe it or not, socialism is NOT one of the biggest negatives they represent for me. 

Mike,

 I largely agree with you about the Dems. Plus, I’ve noticed that libs have become more extreme and have been quite nasty in recent years in debates on issues (using profanity laced fighting rather than robust but civil debating), and this tends to turn me off and not want to join their side. 

 However, unfortunately, many Pubs have recently been going more extreme con of late and not willing to compromise on anything for the good of the country. Furthermore, whatever happened to the Christian right favoring those candidates telling the truth, with morals, and with maturity/decency? That’s all out the window with Trump and yet he retains their full support. Why don’t they call him out on this? I’ve also noticed what I perceive to be more dangerous far right white supremacists  (basically Nazis) that are not being put down by the Pubs like they should just because they can’t stand the other side such as what happened at Charlottesville. Our POTUS shouldn’t have sat idly and say their side has “fine people”. Sorry, Mr. Trump, you had your chance to say the right things but you messed up big time there. This was as bad or worse than Obama not defending the police and implicitly supporting the left winged criminals on the other side.

 I’m a right of center person who feels left out by both sides. I am concerned about the survival of our country. Mike and Tim, would you be willing to compromise with the left on some things if, say, it meant the survival of our country or would you rather it fall apart? This is a hypothetical but I’d like to know your feelings about this. Carl on the left, same question to you about compromising with cons on some things.

"Carl on the left, same question to you about compromising with cons on some things."

Larry, it would be easy to say yes but it would depend on what was being compromised. Please don't ask what issues, because I don't want to start another debate.

You can always tell how serious they are about creating legislation when they start talking about a comprehensive package. There's always something there that is not acceptable to both parties.

Why can't issues be decided piece-meal ?

Thanks much Larry,

Yes, I would definitely be willing to compromise but then, only if it didn't hurt our country.

The interesting thing about Trump is that, yes, he lies more than any other president in history. You can never believe anything that he says. 

What's interesting is that his actions show him to be one of the most honest presidents in history. He is coming thru in spades doing almost exactly what he promised to do with his platform running for president. 

I am not justifying his lies, I greatly detest them. Remember, my favorite president was Jimmy Carter for exactly that reason, his honesty. Trump is obviously very intelligent. One would think that he is smart enough to know that when he exaggerates stuff, which is all the time that it gets recorded and then doesn't do well when compared to the actual facts. Why would he keep giving these gifts to the MSM and dems to use in order to hurt his credibility?

We know that politicians are seasoned  veterans at b-sing tactfully but Trump has acquired a trait, probably from early in his life in the selling of himself and real estate of blatantly b-sing with no filter.........saying whatever he wants as a cheerleader to sell whatever he is selling or whatever he stands for. Arrogance and narcissistic for sure. 

What is authentic in Trumps case however, is what he is selling and what he stands for. We can trust him on the promises that he made when campaigning. He is doing almost exactly what he said he did to get elected. 

In looking back at my fondness of Carter it was completely the admiration of his character and morals....which Trump is lacking(other than him doing exactly what he said his actions would be before being elected) I have read many  descriptions of his leadership and decision making that make a good case for him to be rated low as a president. He made some bad decisions, was very naive and sometimes changed previous positions though I'm convinced that he understood many elements of the world better than Ronald Reagan, who had the charisma and was more fortunate in the timing of his presidency but importantly, had better underlying political agenda.........that was the recipe for success for out country.

   I think that Trump has similar success destined political agenda that is light years better than what the current dems offer. I had been thinking until recently that I would take an honest Jimmy Carter type president over Trumps good agenda if for no other reason than it would have a chance to unite the country.

But have changed that.

I don't see a person like this right now but what if there was somebody that united our country but at the same time, had policies that meant a compromise for me. The Green New Deal for instance would cost double digit trillions and kill the economy...unemplpyment would go up a great deal. The life blood of every developed country is cheap, reliable and abundant fossil fuels. This one incredibly detrimental fact by itself far outweighs the benefits of having even the most uniting president in history(which could never ever happen with a Green New Deal plan because it and the person that imposed it would be vehemently rejected by one side).

I could definitely compromise with the immigration policy  but can't understand why enforcing legal immigration laws would not be top priority of anybody leading our country.........again,  one side will not unite if the leader does not address this issue aggressively. 

We know that for sure, whoever the next president is, they will not be as divisive as Trump. The MSM will not hate him as much and they are the ones pouring massive fuel on the division fires intentionally. Once this subsides, this country will become less divisive. Trump may be providing a reason for there to be divisive fire with his very inflammatory communicating and lack of tact.......in fact, taunting the other side and picking fights at times..........but the MSM is dumping tons of emotional and biased gasoline on the flames. 

So whoever and whenever we have another president, they will be less hated.

If its a dem with the current country wrecking agenda in their platform..........it seems like a divisive country with people doing extremely well is a better option. 

"Our POTUS shouldn’t have sat idly and say their side has “fine people”. Sorry, Mr. Trump, you had your chance to say the right things but you messed up big time there."

I suggest you do some research  on his actual comments in context instead of buying the prepackaged drivel produced by the likes of CNN and MSNBC.

https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2017/aug/14/context-president-donald-trumps-saturday-statement/