Just found out that a nice person I know is a Republican

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A lot of the nice people you know are Republicans, OP. They just keep quiet now because two years of being called racist scum, Nazis, white nationalists, and uneducated morons by Democrats is more than enough.

I agree with this.

And, this thread is more evidence that for many liberals, life revolves around politics. Conservatives are more likely to find meaning in life outside of politics.

Life doesn't revolve around politics. I will still be friends with this person and maybe I will get out of my own "bubble" by doing so

But actively supporting policies that will make millions of people suffer in different ways makes it harder for me to take someone seriously as a friend

Obama betrayed immigrants, deporting over 4 million of them. Where were you then?

Obamacare explicitly promoted the spread of abortion, resulting in the death of dozens of thousands of babies. Where were you then?

Over two millions people lost the insurance they had, and over seven million had to pay severe fines in order NOT to buy crazy expensive insurance. Where were you then?

His policies made murder rates increase by 20% from 2014 to 2016, resulting in the senseless deaths of thousands of innocents. Where were you then?

Millions of people struggled to get jobs. Where were you then?

Obama was partially responsible for millions of Syrians being displaced or killed. Where were decent Dems then?

Obama vastly expanded killings-by-drone, resulting in many innocents dead. Where were decent Dems then?

Obama imposed his values on anti-conceptives and gender issues on millions of religious people. Where were decent Dems then?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:sorry, ignorance is no longer an excuse

Wake up. People can be dumb. And that includes a lot of liberals. Don't assume other people know or understand what you know. By tje same token, don't assume you know what they know.

[Anonymous]

Surprise!

"Satisfaction With U.S. Direction Reaches 12-Year High" (In June 2018)

https://news.gallup.com/poll/235739/satisfaction-direction-reaches-year-high.aspx

In other words, its Republicans who actually improve people's living standards -- I'd say that's quite nice, but of course OP and friends may prefer Venezuela revolutionary values over American ones.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Surprise!

"Satisfaction With U.S. Direction Reaches 12-Year High" (In June 2018)

https://news.gallup.com/poll/235739/satisfaction-direction-reaches-year-high.aspx

In other words, its Republicans who actually improve people's living standards -- I'd say that's quite nice, but of course OP and friends may prefer Venezuela revolutionary values over American ones.

Surprise! Obama jump-started the economy and Trump hasn't managed to fully ruin it yet

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How can I reconcile their kindness to me one on one with the Republican policies and actions that are taking away people's healthcare, making future generations pay for tax cuts for today's super rich, tainting our supreme court with partisan operatives with a history of sex assault allegations and undermining our democracy with Trump's swampy cabinet and autocratic attitude about attacking the press and obstructing justice?

My post is sincere. I think the modern GOP is basically evil so I am having a hard time understanding how someone can still be a Republican if they are a decent person.

Perhaps look inward and question whether or not your opinions are based on fact, rather than opinion. Ask your new friend what sources they read, and then actually read those sources and see if there are any facts there you can research deeper. Look for actual documents, rather than opinion.

Exactly. This type of thing is happening all over, and liberals are learning that their kind, generous friends are Republicans - and can't process. I told the story of a neighbor who drove a mutual neighbor to Duke for cancer treatments, multiple times, and he voted for Trump. Liberals were in disbelief, and finally "processed" this story by saying that either a) I lied about it, or b) the kind neighbor was not a Trump voter.

What these liberals seem incapable of doing is accepting the fact that there are many kind, wonderful, giving Republicans - and that they, the liberals, have been wrong with their judgments. But it's sort of like Javert and Valjean - they have their entire existence so wrapped up in hating what they assume is a bad person that they cannot live with the truth. And the truth is: they're WRONG.

I absolutely can accept that there may be Republicans who voted for Trump who are very kind to the people they care about, the ones in their circle of family and friends. Likely they think that the things he's doing don't hurt them, or maybe even help them, and they don't care about the consequences for people outside their little circle or they are too ignorant/stupid to figure out the damage they have done.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Even if you throw out the Kavanaugh allegations, everything else in the OP is true

None of it is consistent with being a decent person

^^^ and another liberal who can't accept they're wrong.

No, not wrong.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Surprise!

"Satisfaction With U.S. Direction Reaches 12-Year High" (In June 2018)

https://news.gallup.com/poll/235739/satisfaction-direction-reaches-year-high.aspx

In other words, its Republicans who actually improve people's living standards -- I'd say that's quite nice, but of course OP and friends may prefer Venezuela revolutionary values over American ones.

Surprise! Obama jump-started the economy and Trump hasn't managed to fully ruin it yet

Surprise, here you have an anti-science Dem

Look at the data in that chart -- you know how, I hope?

From 2009 to 2011, Obama did a great job.

From 2011 to 2016, he was mediocre at best.

From 2016 to 2018, Trump has done a pretty good job. (including taking the economy to levels no even dreamed by Dem neoBolsheviks)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I know a lot of people who are both Republicans and who are otherwise good, kind, decent people.

The problem is that they have limited access to actual facts and figures and the ability to understand them in a way that isn't highly emotionally charged.

My FIL is a multimillionaire former CEO who is terrified of communism, immigrants and an estate tax, he doesn't believe in "handouts" but he and MIL financially support and subsidize most of their kids (as in, they bought houses for their kids, pay private school tuition, provide free vacations and even pay for their kids' housekeeping among other things).

They are all college educated, and yet they still all vote based on fear and taxes and have complete ignorance about things like Islam, Judaism, Catholicism, foreign countries (they have never traveled outside the US). They don't even know that one of our family members is secretly gay, even though he's 50 years old and still unmarried.

Their values aren't derived from logic and common sense and a real-world education.

They simply watch Fox all the time, Listen to AM radio in the car, and believe "reading" is buying Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity books.

They'll still drive you to your chemo, but they think Hillary Clinton should be in prison, even though she's never been found to have committed any crimes at all.

That's the bubble.

Terrified of immigrants? Come now. Surely you mean illegal border crossers, who may (or may not) have additional crimes under their belts.

Your American neighbor may or may not have additional crimes under his/her belt and you might not know.

Stop demonizing the immigrant community. All communities have criminals in their midst.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Surprise!

"Satisfaction With U.S. Direction Reaches 12-Year High" (In June 2018)

https://news.gallup.com/poll/235739/satisfaction-direction-reaches-year-high.aspx

In other words, its Republicans who actually improve people's living standards -- I'd say that's quite nice, but of course OP and friends may prefer Venezuela revolutionary values over American ones.

Surprise! Obama jump-started the economy and Trump hasn't managed to fully ruin it yet

Surprise, here you have an anti-science Dem

Look at the data in that chart -- you know how, I hope?

From 2009 to 2011, Obama did a great job.

From 2011 to 2016, he was mediocre at best.

From 2016 to 2018, Trump has done a pretty good job. (including taking the economy to levels no even dreamed by Dem neoBolsheviks)

Btw, I find that chart very telling about how it was a random guy like Trump could win in 2016.

Republicans still remembered the disaster during W, so Trump was able to defeat GOP status quo exemplified by Jeff B.

And Independents remembered the mediocre Obama years, so didn't want a "third term."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Surprise!

"Satisfaction With U.S. Direction Reaches 12-Year High" (In June 2018)

https://news.gallup.com/poll/235739/satisfaction-direction-reaches-year-high.aspx

In other words, its Republicans who actually improve people's living standards -- I'd say that's quite nice, but of course OP and friends may prefer Venezuela revolutionary values over American ones.

Surprise! Obama jump-started the economy and Trump hasn't managed to fully ruin it yet

Surprise, here you have an anti-science Dem

Look at the data in that chart -- you know how, I hope?

From 2009 to 2011, Obama did a great job.

From 2011 to 2016, he was mediocre at best.

From 2016 to 2018, Trump has done a pretty good job. (including taking the economy to levels no even dreamed by Dem neoBolsheviks)

When will you morons stop attributing the state of the economy to one man, the President, when any fool knows that the state of the economy depends on so many different factors and, in may cases, depends on things that happened long before this moment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Surprise!

"Satisfaction With U.S. Direction Reaches 12-Year High" (In June 2018)

https://news.gallup.com/poll/235739/satisfaction-direction-reaches-year-high.aspx

In other words, its Republicans who actually improve people's living standards -- I'd say that's quite nice, but of course OP and friends may prefer Venezuela revolutionary values over American ones.

Surprise! Obama jump-started the economy and Trump hasn't managed to fully ruin it yet

Surprise, here you have an anti-science Dem

Look at the data in that chart -- you know how, I hope?

From 2009 to 2011, Obama did a great job.

From 2011 to 2016, he was mediocre at best.

From 2016 to 2018, Trump has done a pretty good job. (including taking the economy to levels no even dreamed by Dem neoBolsheviks)

When will you morons stop attributing the state of the economy to one man, the President, when any fool knows that the state of the economy depends on so many different factors and, in may cases, depends on things that happened long before this moment.

Hey, it's morons like you who spent years arguing that Saint Obama saved our economy...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Surprise!

"Satisfaction With U.S. Direction Reaches 12-Year High" (In June 2018)

https://news.gallup.com/poll/235739/satisfaction-direction-reaches-year-high.aspx

In other words, its Republicans who actually improve people's living standards -- I'd say that's quite nice, but of course OP and friends may prefer Venezuela revolutionary values over American ones.

Surprise! Obama jump-started the economy and Trump hasn't managed to fully ruin it yet

Surprise, here you have an anti-science Dem

Look at the data in that chart -- you know how, I hope?

From 2009 to 2011, Obama did a great job.

From 2011 to 2016, he was mediocre at best.

From 2016 to 2018, Trump has done a pretty good job. (including taking the economy to levels no even dreamed by Dem neoBolsheviks)

When will you morons stop attributing the state of the economy to one man, the President, when any fool knows that the state of the economy depends on so many different factors and, in may cases, depends on things that happened long before this moment.

Hey, it's morons like you who spent years arguing that Saint Obama saved our economy...

You have just proven yourself an especially stupid person. I have never said that or would say it, because...read my post!
You know you are on an anonymous forum where you cannot attribute specific posts to a specific person unless they sign in, right? No, you don't grasp this, because you are an idiot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Households headed by Republicans give 30 percent more to charity than do households headed by Democrats. Plus, conservative men are much better tippers than are liberal women. So maybe begin with you if need be. Be the change.

Does that include tithing? Church offerings should not count; the giver gets the vast majority of that back in church programming, facilities, etc.

No amount of creative and wishful thinking can make Fems the winners here. They have a tightwad problem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, a lot of studies show that liberal vs. conservative is largely about differences in psychology. If you have a stronger fear or disgust response to disturbing images, you are more likely to be conservative. If you think in global rather than national or local terms, you are more likely to be liberal.

Along these lines, one of my very nice Trump supporting friends is concerned about national and local identity - wants strong borders strong defense and limited federal government.

One.of my relatives is very conservative. We get along fine. But she has a strong fear response, she is afraid of all kinds of things in life that don't bother me nearly as much. Politically, she is afraid of MS-13 and terrorists, so Trump's rhetoric played directly into her fears.

These are just examples from my own experience. The main point is that your conservative friend is likely having a different emotional response to political issues than you are. But how you treat your friends is not a political issue (unless you want it to be) so you can have a good friend with different politics

A quick glance at threads here and knowledge of neighborhoods establishes that married liberals very much fear schools with high FARM rates and diverse neighborhoods.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Obama was partially responsible for millions of Syrians being displaced or killed. Where were decent Dems then?

Obama vastly expanded killings-by-drone, resulting in many innocents dead. Where were decent Dems then?

Obama imposed his values on anti-conceptives and gender issues on millions of religious people. Where were decent Dems then?

Sorry, on this one, you are wrong. If you don't believe in non-binary people or don't want an abortion, that is up to you. But you don't get to project your religious insecurities on to other people.