Politics in the USA and Canada, is it politics or Movements?

thank you Marianmo

It is a good Opinion post ACP and I agree for the most part.

However, I do not see a far left in the US if compared to Europe or South America and Asia.

In Canada well there is a left, still not as far left as can be fund in Europe or elsewhere.

The US is dominated by the centre Right, the Right and the far Right.

Left can not even be fund in the so called left. That is Obama his biggest problem since he is more European intellectually then American.

Canada is more based on the European model of multi parties wish is better in my view as well.

Still, Canada is strongly influenced and manipulated by the US and this is not even done with malice or bad intention, but rather of the free will of Canadian them self that wash predominately American TV channels and Shows. There for they mind and conscience is largely set on the US weave length and not a Canadian one as one would assume.

Exception to that is Quebec, that has its own TV and Radio as well as Media and news since they speck French and not English and there for are shielded by their languish from the US and why they have a distinctive mind of their own wish English Canada can not understand since they are already so Americanized that their own Identity is compromised.

Your definition and  mine on the far left are different I guess.  When I talk of the far left I talk of fringe looney movements that are just as damaging as the far right.  Those two movements have stolen America's agenda and I hope we all wake up and stop them before it.s too late.

I live in Europe and see far more serious and dangerous extremes then in either the US or Canada.  I also worked on the Bush/Kerry campaign in Miami (wanted to work on the McCain/Obama campaign, but was involved in a project and couldn't take the time). The media has become extreme in both directions. Here is where I think you miss the point, the people are not silent.  The people completely directed the media coverage of the Obama campaign and took a very active roll in making themselves heard. I believe they are more active and in control then ever before. The media in fact was taken completely off guard and had to scramble to catch up. The so called ligimate media has lost control of dominating the direction of the discussion. The internet has completely changed this forever.

In the US the people have directed the important issues for a long time.  If you just look at what happen to Presidents Nixon, Johnson, Bush and Clinton in our recent history. And many other Senators, CEO's in this current economic situation who have had to quite thier jobs due to beheavior unacceptable to the public speaks greatly of  how people have kept the government and business on their feet.  Public opinion counts!.

GW Bush was a little different due to September 11th.  This event did throw the country off kilter for awhile.  But the election of President Obama spoke greatly of how the change in coverage is allowing people to have a REAL active roll in voicing their opinion. I don't believe that we will see extemes contol the media again. This can only be a good thing even though it also gives the extremes the same opportunity. As you said most of the people are somewhere a little right or left of the center. The extremes are louder, but when it comes down to the line, the majority will take the lead. As we are now seeing everywhere in China, Iran, etc. governments will not be able to completely control the information anymore.  In the end they too will be forced to listen. 

Good story CP, trying to read this story from my cell phone is a pain from my campsite, there is a slight drizzle hence why I am reading this instead of shooting.

Excellent story Albertacowpoke! I have to agree with virtually all of your assertions. The squeaky wheel always gets the grease and that definitely applies to American politics. What many throughout the world don't understand about America and Americans is that from the country's very beginnings there has existed a substantial Judeo/Christian religious component.. That component, nowadays, is certainly not  as dominant as it once was, however it's still there. I believe that this is one of the reasons why others throughout the world (especially Europeans) tend to see Americans as more towards the right end of the political spectrum than they themselves are. For example, Americans remain divided on the abortion issue, gay rights, drug legalization, gambling, prostitution, etc.

The late 1960s and early 70s ushered in a new era of "journalists" from the ranks of the "baby boom" generation. Their politics was much more left of center than their parent's. Up until that time, the news media rarely published stories about the indiscretions and the corrupt practices of presidents, senators, and congressman. JFK and LBJ come to mind and for anyone that believes that both of these presidents were pure as the driven snow, I suggest that they read their history. Vietnam and Watergate was the goose that laid the golden egg for this new breed of journalists and, in my opinion, paved the way for the current tendentious reporting of the news. Indeed, some of the front page stories that I've read lately, in the newspapers, should be on the editorial and opinion pages as opposed to the front pages. Unfortunately it is becoming more and more the case, nowadays, that the news media is more concerned about making a buck than it is with providing its readers and viewers with objective journalism. If Americans can't rely upon the media to get out the truth, then who can they rely upon?

Well said, Karl.

What I agree with is that Hannity is a Reaganite and one of his favorite guests is Bob Beckel, the head of the campaign for Mondale. When Reagan ran against Mondale, that was the first time I didn't vote. Then I saw both parties as in the grip of their more ideologically pure activist wings. But they are both left-of- and right-of-center, with tendencies to ideological purity, not far-right or far-left.

So, to that extent I agree with you, Karl.

CNN has not been mentioned in your post, Karl. I take it that you judge that CNN is objective? How so? 

CNN used to be the paragon of objectivity when it first came out several decades ago. Once they truncated the news, objectivity got lost.

Fox, at least, has NPR men and women on as commentators to balance Krauthammer and Cristol. Tell me, who are the conservative commentators on Blitz's show to balance the nightly lib propaganda blast?

Beck and O'Reilly are commentators, not journalists. The journalists on Fox are Bret Bauer and Shep Smith. Those are the news shows, not Beck, O'Reilly and Hannity. Bauer and Smith are not far-right at all.

Anderson Cooper, Campbell Brown: they are all very liberal, but they are commentators. CNN is designed to appeal to left-of-center and leftist audience.

I used to love Chris Matthews, but his opposition to the war changed him. Olbermann is a mental case. He belongs in an American Dostoyevsky novel, an American version of The Possessed.

For Paschen: The Euro-socialist/commie left was the Soviet Union's fifth column in Europe. Some democrat socialists were more democrat than acolytes of Marxism, but others, such as the recent Social Democratic chancellor of Germany, Schroeder, have been highly sympathetic to past communist regimes or the secular war on spirituality. Schroeder's father was killed in World War II, and I wonder how many Germans who resent the US do so out of unconscious and semi-conscious rage over their loss as a nation.

A great example of his brand of  "liberalism" is his defense of the founder of the Baader-Meinhof gang. What are the "democratic" values of a man who so defends an anti-democratic psychopath's need to regain his law license?

The European left is so whack-job that even my Berkeley leftist male friends with their actual Marxist women found the Spanish left, for example, to be crazy. They felt what I felt about the Italian left, that they should at least begin the criticism of the US based on historic truths rather than just make it up as you go along.

Italians would tell me that there was no communist party in the US or that it had been banned. One day we were doing a double lesson with another American teacher who had dated Gus Hall's daughter. Gus Hall was the president of the Communist Party USA with Angela Davis as its vice- for decades. The Italian took our word that the commie party existed. Often Italians would simply not believe me.

The Republican party is mostly in the grip of social moderates who are "liberals" on economics, the European term to describe laissez-faire capitalists.

These liberal economic types operate with the democratic left of Clinton's Wall Streeters to allow the export of our manufacturing base to China and have opposed real immigration reform, which would include border control.

Both groups hold American workers in contempt: the Republicans because the workers want unions, which interfere with the capitalism's idiot management class's exercise of its supposed freedom, while the left holds American workers to be "Archie Bunkers", racists who ignorantly practice their traditional religions.

Yes, there is a conservative social wing to the republican party, but the US is so secularized at this point that this is not very important, but they did manage to stop Romney, a genuine moderate, because he was a Mormon and hadn't opposed abortion all of his political life.

Karl, it is not clear from your article what the tenets and definition of "far-right" and "far-left" would be.

How about some clarification on that?

Your posting is a catalyst for many thoughtful comments.  Democracy is a delicate thing and apathy among the masses can kill it.

The biggest problem is uninformed voters. They can't remember what politicians lied about last election and fall for the same lies again.

We need voters who have deep knowledge of politics and not those who onlyt see a 30 second commercial

As Barbara said we need to get engaged and inform ourselves not follow the party propaganda machines.  It boils down to your own value system.

true

As the local Marxist you may feel I have an agenda - and you could well be correct. But, what I do find is that people will not educate themselves - they take what is written (spoken) as truth and run with it.

I have seen it here on NP - so many don't have a clue what Marxism is - to them it is just the way the the CCCP was run so it is evil. Under Stalin the CCCP was a totalitarian State, not Marxist or remotely what Lenin wanted either. But how can you change a persons mind if they are not willing to open up to the fact that they maybe wrong? 

Oddly - I have moved further left as I have got older rather than more to the centrist view. I began to read more and more, both 'right-wing' and 'left-wing' publications.

What you have in the US now is tribalism, it is nothing more. What IS generating this tribalism is the media and those corporations that will not give up profit without a fight.To look at how the US is, I did a lot of searching and it was before my eyes all the time. I just remembered British 18 and 19th century history. And I began to read that all over again. The US is in that fight now - albeit with the technological supremacy that Britain did not have back then - but the political comparisons can be made.

Europe is, in the eyes of a lot of Americans, left-wing, waaaaaay left-wing, yet to Europeans that is not the case, at all. Obama, in the UK would be seen as a Tory, certainly not anywhere near the socialist that many a-commentator would have the American people believe, so ACP I have to slightly disagree with you. The US isn't a matter of being left and right wing - it is more akin to right of centre to right-right wing.

Canada on the other hand is more a centrist nation and closer to European ideals than is the US. Yet you do get a few who are more of the right, but that is acceptable in a parliamentary democracy, but even saying that I can see Canada shying away from real social attitudes and moving more in the direction of the US - but that is understandable because of both influence of the US and Ontario on the rest of Canada adding to that the Western Provinces.

Big business is getting a hold in Canada, and it needs to be nipped in the bud - even at this late stage, but to do that you need a government that will do something about it. I cannot see a Harper government doing that because of its affiliations.

Canada is her own entity - and if I were an incoming PM I would stipulate a renegotiation of NAFTA on day one.

MAny an American would not recognise news reporting in Canada - it is, still, pretty objective. But once 'News' organisations like Fox get a hold you can forget it. Fox, in my opinion is about to get Americans killed, and that is not tinfoil hat philosophy - I can see it happening with the likes of Beck, Hannity and O'Rileanybody continuing to add fire to the flames.

I watch CNN, and I cringe when people say that they are 'liberal or leftists' - they simply are not. Ask Lou Dobbs.

The one person who is, as far as I can see, objective is Jon Stewart, and he's a comedian.

Thanks for you comments Cynic.  I think you misunderstood what I was saying in my story. I said that most people are centrist and that agendas are being driven by the far right and far left which amounts to probably about on fifth of the population, if that many.

I appreciate your frankness in identifying what you believe in.  Having looked at some of the same literature as you have, it has taken me in the other direction.  But that is what humanity is all about, diversity.  The key is to respect each other's views.

In regards to Europe, we agree again.  European democracies are democracies with some social programs.  I would not consider them leftists.  I would call them societies with some compassion.  Europe has gone through several wars through the centuries and hopefully they have now taken that collective experience to put it to good  use.

The European Parliament, though in some respects, not the all powerful, is a step in the right direction.  National priorities and prejudices will have to be dropped before that parliament becomes an effective body for Europe.  The common currency was also a step in the right direction.

Big business in Canada is not only courted by  the Conservatives   The Liberals while in power did their fair share of courting as well.  

Politics is about power and to the victor go the spoils.:)

Politics is about power and to the victor go the spoils

I can see where you are intimating with that, ACP, but, again - I have to disagree slightly. Politics has been made a fight of the fittest, and what we do know is that it isn't always the fittest that wins rather the lay of the land and pure luck. I don't know if you have read about it, but I would recommend reading about the city states of Athens/Greek politics and then of Roman politics, fascinating reading - and I may add to that they of old would make our politicians look decidedly whimpish. And certainly not the literal knifing in the back of your opponent - the rules of engagement in Rome, well...it was a verbal joust on a daily basis, debate was the weapon for many, many centuries. I have read up and am coming up to speed on both the conservative side and liberal side of politics in Canada - and from that reading I would not in any way take any other opinion than yourself, the liberals have sided with business for their own ends.

I said that most people are centrist and that agendas are being driven by the far right and far left

I do take your point, I did while reading your OP. Yet we have to look at, and question what is centrist, that was the opinion I was trying, myself, to get across. For example, in the UK, you have, what would normally be deemed, a left-wing governmental party - the Labour Party, yet to the mass of left-wing out there they are, in fact, following Thatcherite policies which can never be called left, in any sense of the word. Now we have a Tory party - a government in waiting - who hates taxation with a consummate passion who are, openly, advocating increasing taxation through VAT (Value added tax) much like the current HST in Canada. This figure was set at 17.5% and they are proposing a rise to 20%. That is more left-wing than the current government. And the Tories are right-wing or, at the very least, right of centre.

I get your point the lines are in fact gray.  I think in some respects I was trying to make the same point just from a different ankle.  To me a centrist is one that believes in fiscal conservatism, but also realizes that we have to show compassion for those that are less fortunate.  Keeping in mind that we can't be all things to all people.  Some of those things have to be taken up by the community and can;t all be handled by the government.  I think as such we have a great record of voluntarism and support for charities.

Added Value Tax has been around in Europe for quite a while.  If I recall correctly it was introduced in the 70s in Germany.  Even then, if my memory is correct, it was in the 10% plus category.  In some ways it's not much different than a flat tax that some are advocating in lieu of income tax.  Maybe that is the fairest tax if done right.  It would ensure that the wealthy pay their fair share, without tax loopholes.  But that is another subject.

The GOP and Democrats might exaggerate the smallest of their differences.  But when it comes to their actual platforms, they stem from the same strand of classic capitalistic liberalism with just slight modifications on a few social liberalism and social liberterian issues - issues like restriction to abortion, sexual rights, health care, educational reform, foriegn intervention that I am sure we are now all sick of hearing.

The truth is both US parties are right of the centrist line no matter how much Republician propaganda tell you otherwise in their usual labeling of anything remotely left of them as 'socialist'. 

And on Canada... no such polarization on actual platforms exists. If anything, the parties are closer than ever in all their ideologies with only some differences on economic issues and welfare spending.  The NDP is becoming increasingly liberal and pro-business and they are definitely no more socialist than the Labour Party (UK) is.  The Liberal Party is moving slowly right with an increasing non-intervention stance on economics and The Conservative Party, well... tries hard to stop themselves from being too Right and does try to move towards the center to hold on to their power.  Green Party is just environmentalism slapped onto a mixed platform between the grits and conservatives.  Indeed, the trend for most parties in Canada is a tendency to move right or towards the center.

Polarization? I think not.  It only exists in their usual theatrical rhetorics and attacks.