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First topic in over a year - Idealogy vs. Outcome. Where do you side? (1 Viewer)

Koya

Footballguy
As most know, I took a long absence from the board for reasons I don't need to rehash.  Decided to dip my toe back in the water yesterday, and for a while wondered if I'd made a mistake and should just self banish for good... but the conversation and dialogue, and the outcome, has reinforced to me how amazing this community can be, even when we differ in opinion or perspective.

With that:

At root, I believe in Freedom above all else.  Personal freedom, whereby my rights stop at your nose and vice versa.  Obviously, this gets complicated in modern times... i.e. I have the right to not wear a helmet while riding a motorcycle, but that right stops when I expect you (the tax payer) to cover costs of my medical needs should I crash.  Plenty of other grey areas we can discuss, but at root, its how do we grant individuals the greatest freedom, without imposing upon other's freedom int he process.

As such, I align strongly with libertarian beliefs, but the word has been co-opted to a degree, and the Libertarian party is sometimes so, well, loony, that I'd describe myself as a "left leaning libertarian" - namely, liberal on social issues but prefer more constrained government and certainly the least possible intrusion by gov't into our private lives. I've also always had a "soft spot" for many liberal causes, because I believe they are well intended, and I want to help people... however, when put into action, far too many of the public assistance type and nanny state laws end up doing more harm than good, promote negative outcomes, and get in the way of a proper balance between capitalism/free market and the need to govern private industry to not take advantage of folks or to not have folks just rely on gov't in stead of being motivate to do better, themselves.

Recently, I've begun to evolve to what I'd call an "outcome-oriented" libertarian.  This is hard for me, but it is rooted in my first comment: I believe in freedom, above all else. A good example is healthcare.  The libertarian in me is aghast at the idea of single payer, gov't run healthcare.  But then I think... what about the outcomes? IF through single payer, for example, our nation and its individuals have far better access to healthcare, are they not more free?  Basically, if the gov't makes a law or plays a role in our lives in a manner that promotes more freedom for us in our lives, should I matter that its "government" and not "private sector"?

In a way, this is analogous to the concept that the perfect form of government is a benevolent dictator: the problem is even if you have a benevolent dictator, once that system falls into less than benevolent hands, it becomes the opposite of ideal.

SO TL;DR:  How much of your political leanings and orientation are based on ideology, vs. outcome.  If you are a Democrat, but it's made clear to you that abolishing unions would lead to a better quality of life, would you HYPOTHETICALLY support that (I don't believe that's the case, but do believe that unions have overstepped in many ways to the detriment of their members and our nation's well being as a whole).  If you are a Republican and it's shown that raising taxes on the very wealthy actually results in 95% of our nation's citizens doing significantly better economically (and otherwise), or if additional regulation on a range of businesses has that same effect, do you go with that legislation and approach?

Look forward to the replies and insight.

 
As most know, I took a long absence from the board for reasons I don't need to rehash.  Decided to dip my toe back in the water yesterday, and for a while wondered if I'd made a mistake and should just self banish for good... but the conversation and dialogue, and the outcome, has reinforced to me how amazing this community can be, even when we differ in opinion or perspective.

With that:

At root, I believe in Freedom above all else.  Personal freedom, whereby my rights stop at your nose and vice versa.  Obviously, this gets complicated in modern times... i.e. I have the right to not wear a helmet while riding a motorcycle, but that right stops when I expect you (the tax payer) to cover costs of my medical needs should I crash.  Plenty of other grey areas we can discuss, but at root, its how do we grant individuals the greatest freedom, without imposing upon other's freedom int he process.

As such, I align strongly with libertarian beliefs, but the word has been co-opted to a degree, and the Libertarian party is sometimes so, well, loony, that I'd describe myself as a "left leaning libertarian" - namely, liberal on social issues but prefer more constrained government and certainly the least possible intrusion by gov't into our private lives. I've also always had a "soft spot" for many liberal causes, because I believe they are well intended, and I want to help people... however, when put into action, far too many of the public assistance type and nanny state laws end up doing more harm than good, promote negative outcomes, and get in the way of a proper balance between capitalism/free market and the need to govern private industry to not take advantage of folks or to not have folks just rely on gov't in stead of being motivate to do better, themselves.

Recently, I've begun to evolve to what I'd call an "outcome-oriented" libertarian.  This is hard for me, but it is rooted in my first comment: I believe in freedom, above all else. A good example is healthcare.  The libertarian in me is aghast at the idea of single payer, gov't run healthcare.  But then I think... what about the outcomes? IF through single payer, for example, our nation and its individuals have far better access to healthcare, are they not more free?  Basically, if the gov't makes a law or plays a role in our lives in a manner that promotes more freedom for us in our lives, should I matter that its "government" and not "private sector"?

In a way, this is analogous to the concept that the perfect form of government is a benevolent dictator: the problem is even if you have a benevolent dictator, once that system falls into less than benevolent hands, it becomes the opposite of ideal.

SO TL;DR:  How much of your political leanings and orientation are based on ideology, vs. outcome.  If you are a Democrat, but it's made clear to you that abolishing unions would lead to a better quality of life, would you HYPOTHETICALLY support that (I don't believe that's the case, but do believe that unions have overstepped in many ways to the detriment of their members and our nation's well being as a whole).  If you are a Republican and it's shown that raising taxes on the very wealthy actually results in 95% of our nation's citizens doing significantly better economically (and otherwise), or if additional regulation on a range of businesses has that same effect, do you go with that legislation and approach?

Look forward to the replies and insight.
Welcome back. We can use all the good dudes we can get.

Political affiliation is all down to tribalism and imagination. The Right is a club, the Left is an umbrella. The Right wants order. The Left welcomes chaos. The Right wants all hierarchies completely settled and spelled out. The Left wants to let it all hang out. The Right needs enemies. The Left needs friends.

Actually, the Left doesn't really exist but in the persecution fantasies of the Right. I've been to underground revolutionary meetings, cooked breakfast in Black Panther kitchens, started unions, spoke @ Communist Party USA conferences and sat in the Carter suite at the 1980 Democratic Convention. None of em are affiliated unless and until they have to be, when unions & teachers make us consolidate for political purposes. Soon as its played, see ya. Aint changed in the 50+ years since i been politically active. What the Left as an entity actually is is "everybody who isn't with us are gathered against us" in what little imagination the Right can indulge. We actually seldom get along and almost never consult. We have being open to new ideas, not wanting to be pinned down and hoping for fairness in common and that's about it. Being the Bogey Party for paranoids is fine with us too, sometimes fun.

 
I'm outcome driven in terms of policy.  I don't care a ton for how it gets done as long as it's done with good intentions and with the goal of making the US stronger as a result.  I think I am ideologically driven in terms of morality.  I have a standard I expect out of people.  They can be for all the same things I am and want to do them the exact same way I do, but if they're doing these things for immoral reasons or taking immoral approaches to accomplish those things, I want nothing to do with them and certainly wouldn't ever consider supporting them with my vote.

 
I'm an ideology guy and as I've often stated I think almost all policy approaches from most people at most times can be explained that way.

 
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I will claim to be outcome-oriented. My ideologies are formed by the belief that they work. That doesn't mean all of ideologies do lead to positive outcomes. There's a high probability that many of my ideologies don't lead to positive outcomes, or there are other ideologies that lead to better outcomes, but I'm ignorant of those facts. So, if someone has facts that prove one of my ideologies wrong, I will look like an ideologist to them. However, I'm probably only holding onto that ideology because I haven't learned that it doesn't work.

I think that description probably applies to everyone. I don't know many people who have an ideology that they believe is wrong...because it would no longer be their ideology at that point; their ideology would change with the new facts they learned. Now, there are many people, probably even including me, who will claim an ideology while fully knowing that ideology doesn't lead to a positive outcome because it's a different outcome that they really care about and professing that particular ideology helps that ulterior outcome. I think that's basically how politicians work.

 
quick-hands said:
Ends justify means?    
That is one way to put it. Though I would say my point does not all all mean doing unscrupulous or immoral acts to forward a greater overall whole, so it’s quite the different than the traditional end justifies the means (ie - so three innocent people die so 100 can be saved). 

legislation has real effects on people’s lives. If you improve those life’s even if the tool/vehicle may run against your root ideology, do you choose better outcomes, or ideology?

Is the ideology itself not based on improved outcomes, in the first place (hypothetically speaking). 
 

 
Outcome matters the most. But rarely does a poor plan yield a good result.

Koya said:
do believe that unions have overstepped in many ways to the detriment of their members and our nation's well being as a whole
This is an interesting topic and would be a good standalone subject. They've become popular again and maybe they should, but in my experience unions are just another avenue for corruption. I worked for a national company and we had union contracts in some states. We simply couldn't do work there because union workers were awful. When bidding the work we had to use a 1.5 coefficient on man-hours because union workers were so slow. Their rates were also higher (of course) but the real kicker is you had to basically bribe someone to get halfway decent workers. So companies like us were losing bids due to our union contracts while our competitors without union contracts were winning all the work, Darwinism was at work... the unions were killing themselves off. And in that case, good riddance. 

My overgeneralized take on unions is that they absolutely had a place back in the day (when labor laws were non-existent and unions basically forced them into existence), but with labor laws progressing, largely they are no longer be needed. I'm not ruling out their need in select cases, but in my experience they served only to enable the lazy and corrupt. 

 
This is something I've been thinking a lot about lately. I've gotten a lot more involved with the democratic party at the local level, and, well, I wasn't expecting to be a moderate but here we are. 

I don't actually have strong policy disagreements with the people on the way left, and I've been trying to put my finger on what the difference is. I've described it as incremental vs total improvement. I'm willing to make things a little bit better even if it isn't perfect, and they tend to chuck a small improvement in favor of no improvement because it could have been better. 

I think we're trying to describe something similar. I'm definitely on the outcomes side, I'm not an ideologue for anything except making the world a better place. 

 

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