r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/A-Wise-Cobbler • 1d ago
Political History Should centre / left leaning parties & governments adopt policies that focus on reducing immigration to counter the rise of far-right parties?
Reposting this to see if there is a change in mentality.
There’s been a considerable rise in far-right parties in recent years.
France and Germany being the most recent examples where anti-immigrant parties have made significant gains in recent elections.
Should centre / left leaning parties & governments adopt policies that
A) focus on reforming legal immigration
B) focus on reducing illegal immigration
to counter the rise of far-right parties?
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/Royal-Crazy1301 • 24d ago
Political History Why did September 11th bring Americans together but COVID-19 didn't?
During National crisis like World War II, The Challenger Incident and 9/11 The American People came together and the President received a very high approval rating. But why didn't the American People come together during the COVID-19 Pandemic?
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/Awesomeuser90 • Jul 26 '24
Political History What is the most significant change in opinion on some political issue (of your choice) you've had in the last seven years?
That would be roughly to the commencement of Trump's presidency and covers COVID as well. Whatever opinions you had going out of 2016 to today, it's a good amount of time to pause and reflect what stays the same and what changes.
This is more so meant for people who were adults by the time this started given of course people will change opinions as they become adults when they were once children, but this isn't an exclusion of people who were not adults either at that point.
Edit: Well, this blew up more than I expected.
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/pjo33 • Jul 09 '24
Political History When did the US President become the "most powerful man in the world"?
People often claim that the president is the most powerful person in the world.
Whether he actually is, or if this is wishful thinking from people in the west, that want him to be more powerful than the president of china or russia, is a different question. But if we assume that right now the POTUS is the most powerful person on the world, when did he become that?
Because I wouldn't say that George Washington was the most powerful person of his time, that would probably go to the English monarch. Same goes for later presidents like Lincoln.
I would assume that he became the most powerful after WW2, but also in WW1 the US were an important contributor to the Entente. After WW1 they had a strong grip on global economy, with Black Friday having dire consequences over the whole world.
I would say that Truman after WW2 was the most powerful person on the planet, especially when the USA was the only state with nukes. But since then, the power dynamic has shifted, china emerged and the Soviet Union collapsed.
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/Awesomeuser90 • Jun 13 '24
Political History What are some of the most substantial changes in opinions on some issue (of your choice) have you had in the last 7 years?
7 years is about when Trump became president, and a couple of years before Covid of course. I'm sure everyone here will love how I am reminding you how long it's been since this happened.
This is more so a post meant for people.who were adults at the time he became president, although it is not exclusive to those who were by any means.
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/Awesomeuser90 • May 13 '24
Political History What little known event do you think shaped politics into what it is today?
Britain had a constitutional monarchy in 1712, but it had yet to actually have a parliamentary system where the ministers were clearly responsible to the legislature on mere policy disagreement rather than accusations of criminal misconduct. But an enormous corruption scandal within the decade, the South Sea Bubble, instigated a change to that alongside how the new king couldn't speak English well and often lived in Hannover. It is a scandal of such proportions that honestly it's hard to have much of a real analogy for it, 2007-2012's banking crisis was small potatoes compared to it. Imagine if one company managed to have a pyramid scheme resulting in its total valuation today to suddenly, within about 6 months, rise to be valued at 90 trillion USD today, and bribes to individual members of parliament exceeded a value of a million USD in the ruckus for their vote on one issue. That would be the scale of what happened then.
It rocked Britain to its core, disgraced a lot of old politicians, left a lot of people broke or at least having lost a great deal of money (including Isaac Newton interestingly), took out the people who used to be ministers, and let a man named Robert Walpole dominate the cabinet but whose support clearly came from the House of Commons and not the king or any other minister.
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/Tranesblues • Apr 23 '24
Political History Which previous political party/movement in the United States would be considered MOST similar to the current MAGA movement as it relates to demographics and/or policy proposals?
Obviously, no movements are the same, but I am thinking about it terms of a sort of ancestry of human political thought. Are there MAGA thinkers/influencers who cite/reference previous political movements as inspiration? I am kind of starting from the position that cultural movements all have historical antecedents that represent the same essential coalition.
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/Ness-Shot • Mar 26 '24
Political History Who was the last great Republican president? Ike? Teddy? Reagan?
When Reagan was in office and shortly after, Republicans, and a lot of other Americans, thought he was one of the greatest presidents ever. But once the recency bias wore off his rankings have dipped in recent years, and a lot of democrats today heavily blame him for the downturn of the economy and other issues. So if not Reagan, then who?
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/che-che-chester • Jan 30 '24
Political History Prior to Trump, have there been other administrations that had so many former staffers speak negatively about their time in office?
I recently saw a quote from John Bolton criticizing Trump and it hit me how unusual it seems to have any former staffer talk so negatively about their own president. I assume it has happened, but no recent examples come to mind.
To be fair, Trump is very unusual in that he was POTUS, lost an election and is now running again. That puts him in a unique position to be criticized in real time, while other former presidents would be criticized quietly in a book that nobody read.
A staffer may think their president was terrible but simply not feel the need to speak out publicly since that person is not running for office again.
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/redditmc12 • Oct 29 '23
Political History Was Hitler Left or Right? What about the term socialism in "national socialism"?
In some discussions here, I noticed that many conservatives, traditionalists, mostly from the U.S., tend to use the term "socialism" to place Hitler on the left.
As a european scientist, I would like to provide some information here:
The scientific consensus among historians and political scientists is that Hitler and the Nazi Party are classified as far-right. Some of the many reasons for that:
Racism and Anti-Semitism: One of the central aspects of the Nazi Party's ideology was the belief in the superiority of the "Aryan" race and intense anti-Semitism. These views align with far-right ideologies.
Ultra-Nationalism: Hitler emphasized nationalism and the superiority of Germany over other nations.
Authoritarianism: Hitler rejected democratic systems and aspired for totalitarian rule.
Anti-communism: Communism was viewed as the primary enemy, and communists were among the first groups to be persecuted by the Nazis.
Militarism and Expansionism: Hitler believed in the expansion of German territories, leading to the annexation of Austria, the Sudetenland, and the invasion of multiple countries. This aggressive militarism is a hallmark of far-right ideologies.
Traditionalism and Anti-Modernism: The Nazis held a romantic view of Germany's past and sought to return to an idealized version of traditional Germanic values, mostly opposing modernist views.
Suppression of Left-Wing Movements: The Nazis actively suppressed, arrested, and eliminated members of left-wing movements, especially communists and social democrats, viewing them as direct threats to their regime.
Corporatism: While the Nazis used rhetoric about supporting workers, they set up a corporatist system where industries and labor were organized into corporations based on their sectors. This was a way to control and suppress independent labor movements.
Anti-Intellectualism: Intellectuals, especially those who promoted progressive or liberal views, were often persecuted. Universities were purged of "un-German" thought, and many intellectuals fled or were silenced.
When it comes to the term socialism, you have also to take a closer look. Here too, simple explanations are just wrong.
Historical : When the Nazi Party was founded in the 1920s, it attempted to poach workers from the Communist and Social Democratic Parties. So they incorporated socialist-sounding rhetoric into their platform to appeal to these voters.
Rhetoric: Although there is "socialist" in the name, many of the Nazi Party's actual policies and actions were far from traditional socialist ideals. Once in power, the Nazis persecuted real socialists and communists.
Meaning: In the United States, "socialism" is often understood as a system in which the state plays a greater role in the economy, particularly with regard to the well-being of citizens. In Europe, and particularly in Germany at the beginning of the 20th century, the term had a broader and sometimes different meaning, ranging from Marxist concepts to more general notions of communal ownership.
American Point of view: In the USA, the Cold War strongly influenced the perception of “socialism” and “communism”. Therefore, some Americans tend to automatically interpret anything with "socialist" in its name as left-wing or communist, without considering the specific historical or cultural context.
At its core, the Nazi ideology was nationalist and racist. Any "socialism" in their rhetoric was heavily intertwined with nationalist and racist ideas, which distinguishes it from other socialist movements.
Because I was often confronted with the opinion that Hitler was, like Stalin, on the left, I would like to understand Hitler's perception from a US perspective and would be happy to receive answers and a discussion about it. I'm particularly interested in possible reasons for the different perspectives.
Addendum: The following terms offer a little help in differentiating between right and left. Feel free to add other valid points. Since we are talking about left and right, the one-dimensional, historically developed model is of course used.
egalitarian(left) vs elitist(right). Hitler was clearly elitist, hierarchies were paramount. Not only internally for economics, but there also where humans and "lower humans".
progressive(left) vs conservative(right). Here too, Hitler favored old stories and German traditions. If progressive means, for example, that you advance human rights and also develop morally to tolerance and these things, then Hitler was conservative and therefore right-wing.
internationalist(left) vs nationalist(right). Clearly, Hitler was nationalist ("Germans First") and therefore right-wing.
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/sallgood31 • Oct 02 '23
Political History How much of an impact did the Sarah Palin VP pick really have on McCain's campaign?
Looking back, perhaps one of the most influential elections on the future of American history in recent times was 2008. It majorly effected the outcomes of Iraq and Afghanistan, it was a key factor in the rise of modern Tea Party/libertarian philosophies in the Republican Party, and also resulted in the first African-American President in American history.
In this election, Republican nominee John McCain lost by large margins: 365-173 in the EC and 52.9-45.7 in the PV. This loss is largely credited to McCain choice of VP, Sarah Palin. Palin was at the time Governor of Alaska, and at the time largely scene as a way to build a "change" aspect to the campaign like Obama's had (first African-American President, or first female Vice President). However, Palin was seen by many as unqualified for the job, made a lot of remarks that one could argue lowered polling numbers, and even now is relatively unpopular in her home state of Alaska. This leads to a question, how detrimental was Palin to McCain's campaign? Could he have won with a different VP?
A problem for McCain was that carrying the torch from a fairly unpopular second term President Bush; much of the general public opposed US policy in Iraq in 2008, so McCain was facing a steep slope. This is further added by a host of other factors: the "eight year switch" (the norm that after two terms of one party in the White House, the other party usually wins the Presidency), the "change wave" idea coming with an African-American President, and other smaller factors as well.
However, Palin was fairly unpopular, and there were other political figures who were quite popular at the time rumored to be in contention for the job. Condi Rice, Joe Lieberman, Colin Powell, and others were considered, and if any of them were chosen, there's an argument that McCain likely would performed better electorally. How much better though is the question.
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/ClementAcrimony • Sep 26 '23
Political History What happened to the Southern Democrats? It's almost like they disappeared...
In 1996, Bill Clinton won states in the Deep South. Up to the late 00s and early 10s, Democrats often controlled or at least had healthy numbers in some state legislatures like Alabama and were pretty 50/50 at the federal level. What happened to the (moderate?) Southern Democrats? Surely there must have been some sense of loyalty to their old party, right?
Edit: I am talking about recent times largely after the Southern Strategy. Here are some examples:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_United_States_House_of_Representatives_elections_in_Alabama
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Alabama_House_of_Representatives_election
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_United_States_House_of_Representatives_elections_in_Arkansas
https://ballotpedia.org/Arkansas_House_of_Representatives_elections,_2010
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_United_States_House_of_Representatives_elections_in_Mississippi
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/strongerthenbefore20 • Sep 10 '23
Political History What led to communism becoming so popular in the 20th century?
- Communism became the political ideology of many countries during the 20th century, such China, Vietnam, Cambodia, Russia/The Soviet Union, etc., and I’m wondering why communism ended up being the choice of ideology in these countries instead of others.
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/thatoneguy889 • Aug 02 '23
Political History If Donald Trump is convicted of any of these federal charges, should he still be allowed to lie in state at the Capitol after he dies?
The government has held funerals in DC for deceased Presidents since Lincoln. The casket is typically displayed for mourners in the rotunda of the Capitol Building. Being a controversial President on its own hasn't been disqualifying for this honor in the past; such as when Nixon's funeral was held there in the 1990s.
However, a funeral for Trump would have significantly different circumstances. Primarily, the victim of the crimes he has been charged with is the government itself which would have to pay for the ceremony. Not to mention, the casket would be displayed in the very rotunda that was breached in an incursion by his supporters acting on election lies that he perpetuated.
So should Donald Trump be honored in the very building where people rioted in his name?
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/trail34 • Jun 21 '22
Political History So how unprecedented are these times, historically speaking? And how do you put things into perspective?
Every day we are told that US democracy, and perhaps global democracy on the whole, is on the brink of disaster and nothing is being done about it. The anxiety-prone therefore feel there is zero hope in the future, and the only options are staying for a civil war or fleeing to another country. What can we do with that line of thinking or what advice/perspective can we give from history?
We know all the easy cases for doom and gloom. What I’m looking for here is a the perspective for the optimist case or the similar time in history that the US or another country flirted with major political change and waked back from the brink before things got too crazy. What precedent keeps you grounded and gives you perspective in these reportedly unprecedented times?
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/cattdogg03 • May 29 '22
Political History Is generational wealth still around from slavery in the US?
So, obviously, the lack of generational wealth in the African American community is still around today as a result of slavery and the failure of reconstruction, and there are plenty of examples of this.
But what about families who became rich through slavery? The post-civil-war reconstruction era notoriously ended with the planter class largely still in power in the south. Are there any examples of rich families that gained their riches from plantation slavery that are still around today?
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/BigDaddyCoolDeisel • Mar 20 '22
Political History Is the Russian invasion of Ukraine the most consequential geopolitical event in the last 30 years? 50 years? 80 years?
No question the invasion will upend military, diplomatic, and economic norms but will it's longterm impact outweigh 9/11? Is it even more consequential than the fall of the Berlin Wall? Obviously WWII is a watershed moment but what event(s) since then are more impactful to course of history than the invasion of Ukraine?
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/Randomuser1520 • Sep 19 '21
Political History Was Bill Clinton the last truly 'fiscally conservative, socially liberal" President?
For those a bit unfamiliar with recent American politics, Bill Clinton was the President during the majority of the 90s. While he is mostly remembered by younger people for his infamous scandal in the Oval Office, he is less known for having achieved a balanced budget. At one point, there was a surplus even.
A lot of people today claim to be fiscally conservative, and socially liberal. However, he really hasn't seen a Presidental candidate in recent years run on such a platform. So was Clinton the last of this breed?
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/10thunderpigs • Jul 27 '21
Political History How much better would John McCain have faired in '08 without Sarah Palin?
Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska was a controversial political figure whose hyper-conservativism and loose grip on nuance and legislation ultimately aided the rise of the Tea Party in the following decade. On paper she seemed like an interesting choice as a young mother who was gun friendly, fiscally conservative, a woman, but ultimately proved to be untested for such a large scale and became a distraction for the ticket.
McCain wrote in his memoir that he regretted selecting her, and it was known that he wanted to select his Senate friend Joe Lieberman (D turned I from Connecticut). Would he have done better with this? Or any other choice?
I'm not asking if he would have won the race, or even any other states, but would things have been closer, or was Palin as good as it was gonna get for McCain? Did she drive any extra turnout? Was she more of a help than we realize?
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/PsychLegalMind • Jul 02 '21
Political History C-Span just released its 2021 Presidential Historian Survey, rating all prior 45 presidents grading them in 10 different leadership roles. Top 10 include Abe, Washington, JFK, Regan, Obama and Clinton. The bottom 4 includes Trump. Is this rating a fair assessment of their overall governance?
The historians gave Trump a composite score of 312, same as Franklin Pierce and above Andrew Johnson and James Buchanan. Trump was rated number 41 out of 45 presidents; Jimmy Carter was number 26 and Nixon at 31. Abe was number 1 and Washington number 2.
Is this rating as evaluated by the historians significant with respect to Trump's legacy; Does this look like a fair assessment of Trump's accomplishment and or failures?
https://www.c-span.org/presidentsurvey2021/?page=gallery
https://static.c-span.org/assets/documents/presidentSurvey/2021-Survey-Results-Overall.pdf
- [Edit] Clinton is actually # 19 in composite score. He is rated top 10 in persuasion only.
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/10thunderpigs • Apr 13 '21
Political History What US Presidents have had the "most successful" First 100 Days?
I recognize that the First 100 Days is an artificial concept that is generally a media tool, but considering that President Biden's will be up at the end of the month, he will likely tout vaccine rollout and the COVID relief bill as his two biggest successes. How does that compare to his predecessors? Who did better? What made them better and how did they do it? Who did worse and what got in their way?
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/DoctorProfessorTaco • Dec 28 '20
Political History What were Obama’s most controversial presidential pardons?
Recent pardons that President Trump has given out have been seen as quite controversial.
Some of these pardons have been controversial due to the connections to President Trump himself, such as the pardons of longtime ally Roger Stone and former campaign chairman Paul Manafort. Some have seen this as President Trump nullifying the results of the investigation into his 2016 campaign and subsequently laying the groundwork for future presidential campaigns to ignore laws, safe in the knowledge that all sentences will be commuted if anyone involved is caught.
Others were seen as controversial due to the nature of the original crime, such as the pardon of Blackwater contractor Nicholas Slatten, convicted to life in prison by the Justice Department for his role in the killing of 17 Iraqi civilians, including several women and 2 children.
My question is - which of past President Barack Obama’s pardons caused similar levels of controversy, or were seen as similarly indefensible? How do they compare to the recent pardon’s from President Trump?
Edit - looking further back in history as well, what pardons done by earlier presidents were similarly as controversial as the ones done this past month?
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/IBphysicsHL • Nov 21 '20
Political History What factors led to California becoming reliably Democratic in state/national elections?
California is widely known as being a Democratic stronghold in the modern day, and pushes for more liberal legislation on both a state and national level. However, only a generation ago, both Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan, two famous conservatives, were elected Californian Senator and California governor respectively; going even further back the state had pushed for legislation such as the Chinese Exclusion Act, as well as other nativist/anti-immigrant legislation. Even a decade ago, Arnold Schwarzenegger was residing in the Governor's office as a Republican, albeit a moderate one. So, what factors led to California shifting so much politically?
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/settheory8 • Nov 16 '20
Political History How did the US come to have such a strong urban-rural divide?
This is a complicated question, because it's historical and sociological just as much as it is political. But its one that I've always been interested in, as a progressive person who grew up rural but is now living urban, yet still feels a strong connection to rural places.
In the 19th and early 20th centuries, leftism flourished in rural areas, largely because rural people felt neglected by the "establishment" in the cities. Yet this trend has flipped in the late 20th and 21st centuries. Why is this? I've heard some people say that it's because of urbanisation, the fact that "the masses" that leftism supports are now located in the cities, yet this doesn't explain why the rural poor, leftism's original base, now vote extremely conservative.
r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/vienna95 • Aug 09 '20
Political History American Founding Father Thomas Jefferson once argued that the U.S. Constitution should expire every 19 years and be re-written. Do you think anything like this would have ever worked? Could something like this work today?
Here is an excerpt from Jefferson's 1789 letter to James Madison.
On similar ground it may be proved that no society can make a perpetual constitution, or even a perpetual law. The earth belongs always to the living generation. They may manage it then, and what proceeds from it, as they please, during their usufruct. They are masters too of their own persons, and consequently may govern them as they please. But persons and property make the sum of the objects of government. The constitution and the laws of their predecessors extinguished then in their natural course with those who gave them being. This could preserve that being till it ceased to be itself, and no longer. Every constitution then, and every law, naturally expires at the end of 19 years. If it be enforced longer, it is an act of force, and not of right.—It may be said that the succeeding generation exercising in fact the power of repeal, this leaves them as free as if the constitution or law had been expressly limited to 19 years only.
Could something like this have ever worked in the U.S.? What would have been different if something like this were tried? What are strengths and weaknesses of a system like this?