Here No Longer

@Pastel Heart

What the US calls "radical left" isn't even on the left in my honest view, they are actually who I call the "centrists", usually call them "fake left" because in my experience that's more accurate. I am what I would consider a leftist, of course not really far left to the point of being a Marxist/Leninist/Stalinist (there are places I agree with Marx, but substantially more places where I would agree with the likes of Noam Chomsky). Philosophically, I would identify more as a Libertarian Socialist or a Syndicalist if I were to label it as something. I believe in ideas like worker's possession of the means of production (not necessarily in the sense like Marxists or Communists would, but more in the sense that if somebody owns a means of production, they should also be a worker that contributes to said production), UBI, Public Banking, Public Ownership of Utilities, Medicare for All... I could probably make a whole blog post about what kinds of things I believe in, but this is just the idea in terms of economics.

It should never be considered okay to have power concentrated to a powerful and wealthy elite. In fact, the problem I have the most with Trump isn't his economic policy, even with how terrible it is in most aspects. It's his seeming desire to see this country become an authoritarian corporate state. Granted, it was already halfway there to begin with. The corporations have had an irrationally large concentration of power, especially in the last 52 years (yes, exactly 52 years). But now Trump seems to aim not only to strengthen that power, but to turn neoconservative ideas even more authoritarian to the point of becoming more like corporate fascism.

What I am hoping for is that we can have the country "for and by the people" promised by the Constitution, and it can be somehow done by peaceful means. If it can't be, well, we may have to resort to revolution at some point in the future for the sake of not only the working class of this nation, but everyone on the planet as this state we have now seems determined to ruin the world for everyone with massive amounts of pollution, offensive wars, and foreign policy that is, in general, aimed to make half of the world our enemy and plausibly there may be the eventuality with war on China, that could turn into the end of the Human race. All I insist on is a nation that doesn't rush head-first into catastrophe where the common people have significantly more leverage individually than they do today.

@Dusknoir

Interesting~ I don't think our view is too different then. I'm also a libertarian socialist. People run from the word "anarchist" so libertarian socialist is a friendlier term for me, it's basically the same thing. I like Chomsky a lot, he's definitely my favorite living thinker today; I really like Stirner, Kropotkin and Makhno too. If you're interested I could send you some reads in a pm sometime :3 I love to talk about this stuff

If he had it he's way we'd be full Outer Worlds, everything is Trump brand or McDonalds brand or something or other. I expected all that when he got elected sadly :/ my life certainly hasnt improved at all. The biggest kick in the teeth for me has been the giant middle finger to trans peeps like me whom got  protections taken away within 3 months of the administration and only JUST NOW getting them back. As far as being a corporate tool I'd say he's definitely giving Hoover a run for his money. Imagine those two sitting down for coffee.

I don't see all this ending peacefully. Those in power are not willing to give up their power, as historically shown. If I recall correctly though, there IS a piece in the constitution that basically gives the masses the freedom to dissolve the US government should it become tyrannical, but everyone who follows that constitution is already sworn in and having their checks paid by the state, which is the issue. This is why I can't realistically call myself a pacifist, as the states first response to the threat of its existence is violence in itself, as shown by people trying to justify violence against the protesters which was incredibly sad. I see history going one of two ways: Either there's a drastic change in how we organise ourselves socioeconomically or we are heading nose first into a dystopia. 1984 eat your heart out. The only way I can see a way to not only save ourselves from extinction and from further disasters is the dismantling of state power into horizontal, decentralized federations where workers own the means of production.

@Pastel Heart

I don't consider myself necessarily an anarchist, though that may be in part because I'm used to the definition of it being "no government." Which although I still do support a government, it would be highly limited in scope and would likely just have the power over executive decisions and plausibly the writing of laws and really that's about it. I don't personally see them as exactly the same thing, though I do see a lot of overlap between libertarian left ideas and anarchist left ideas.

I think an apt comparison would be Handsome Jack, to be honest. They're not dissimilar by any means. Both fascistic, corporatist assholes who justify their actions with hatred of common people. At least Handsome Jack is funny, though. Trump's not only unfunny, he angers me every other time he opens his mouth.

Yeah imagining the conversations they would have... They're both at the least partially at fault for economic depressions (honestly I see this becoming worse than the Great Depression in the 30's), both corporate hacks (in Trump's case, he himself IS part of the corporate elite), and both horrible people as well as horrible presidents (though I could only count on one hand the number of good presidents the US has had).

Oh, they don't follow the Constitution, they only pretend to. They really abandon it whenever politically expedient. The Patriot Act manages to violate at least three amendments in the Bill of Rights all by itself. Yet every single time it's brought up in Congress, it's voted back in by at least 2/3 of Congress. And also their checks don't only come from the state, they come from the corporations too. They pay the politicians to implement policies that benefit them. I'm quite sure all but a grand total of around 5 to 10 people in Congress do not take corporate money.

I don't however share the exact same degree of pessimism. I think it CAN be done in the electoral process if Biden becomes president now (he'll just be Obama 2.0), and somebody like Nina Turner wins in 2024 (granted she'd still have the whole of the party against her). We just have to band together and say that this current situation isn't acceptable. Though if it does come to revolution and there's no choice, so be it. May we then riot in the streets aggressively asking for change or else. I don't support offensive wars, but I WILL support fighting a necessary war.