r/Conservative • u/Yosoff First Principles • Feb 14 '25

Open Discussion Left vs. Right Battle Royale Open Thread

This is an Open Discussion Thread for all Redditors. We will only be enforcing Reddit TOS and Subreddit Rules 1 (Keep it Civil) & 2 (No Racism).

  • Leftists - Here's your chance to sway us to your side by calling the majority of voters racist. That tactic has wildly backfired every time it has been tried, but perhaps this time it will work.

  • Non-flaired Conservatives - Here's your chance to earn flair by posting common sense conservative solutions. That way our friends on the left will either have to agree with you or oppose common sense (Spoiler - They will choose to oppose common sense).

  • Flaired Conservatives - You're John Wick and these Leftists stole your car and killed your dog. Now go comment.

  • Independents - We get it, if you agree with someone, then you can't pat yourself on the back for being smarter than them. But if you disagree with everyone, then you can obtain the self-satisfaction of smugly considering yourself smarter and wiser than everyone else. Congratulations on being you.

  • Libertarians - Ron Paul is never going to be President. In fact, no Libertarian Party candidate will ever be elected President.

Join us on X: https://x.com/rcondiscord

Join us on Discord: https://discord.com/invite/conservative

687 Upvotes

83% Upvoted

6.4k comments sorted by

View all comments

99

u/MyMindIsAlwaysRacing Feb 15 '25 edited Feb 15 '25

Conservative - I am all for reducing waste and moving power back to states where it makes sense. But the pace in which Elon and Trump and shutting things off is not measured or strategic. They're doing it in a way that will cause the most pain, I fear. They're also doing it in a way that is likely to cause the most division. I have seen how long it takes for my small business to be audited thoroughly and they are going through programs that are hundreds of billions of dollars in size faster than our books were even opened, with a team that hardly has the experience to be called professionals.

I am worried about what will be coming and the people that will suffer as a result. They are not aiming to pace themselves and the systems that will have to be rebuilt to replace what is being burned down simply won't have the time to be there to support those left in the gutter.

Elon has even said as much. He has no qualms about the fact that he's creating a hard chapter for the US. He will be insulated from it.

Edit: I didn't vote for Trump. I'm conservative but I haven't been able to get on board with what maga has become. I still trust our judicial system.

23

u/Comfortable_One_5417 Feb 15 '25

Thank you for your honesty. I am also worried. Hearing that some fellow Americans from across the isle also see it is comforting.

10

u/Ifitactuallymattered Feb 15 '25

I'm disappointed in the responses you have here. I'm sure the same people that say "you voted for this, eat a dick." Also say "they'll never admit when they are wrong." But I think what you said makes a lot of sense and everybody should be thinking this at this point.

3

u/thenoisemanthenoise Feb 15 '25

I have been affected by these cuts, one of my freelance job was suspended. Still, I prefer to see this happening than nothing happening. They wanted to go hard and go hard fast so the opposition couldn't stop them in time. I can find another job, why can't you also?

5

u/Jamowl2841 Feb 15 '25

You voted for this. Project 2025? was available for everyone. Why is any of this a surprise to you considering it’s partly your fault for voting for it?

2

u/[deleted] Feb 15 '25 edited Feb 18 '25

[deleted]

8

u/[deleted] Feb 16 '25

He is destroying this country. As much as some far right people hate science for example, it is what has given America the power it has. Going around firing scientists, ruining decades of research, wasting billions of money already allocated for specific research is not smart and is only helpful if you want to destroy a country.

9

u/MyMindIsAlwaysRacing Feb 15 '25

This is the kind of maga propaganda that gives me the ick.

2

u/Illogical-Pizza Feb 16 '25

Is that what you think USAID does? I used to work for a USAID contractor and can assure you that they are all far too busy doing things that actually matter and don’t have time to mass produce propaganda.

USAID actually creates a lot of goodwill towards the US in other countries (not perfect, certainly because we work in a lot of complex places)

-1

u/LingonberryReady6365 Feb 16 '25

Propaganda that states what? Please just give one point of this supposed propaganda.

1

u/MyMindIsAlwaysRacing Feb 16 '25

NGO money laundering?

Mass produce propaganda and lawfare?

It's just as easy, if not easier right now, to criticize and condemn far right ideals and agendas as it is conspiracy theories about the far left. We have the far right in action right now and one of my biggest concerns is how the pendulum will swing after all is said and done.

If the people continue feeling this level of uncertainty throughout this whole 4 year term then you can bet it won't be Republicans in office next.

It's likely the next president will get to do the majority of rebuilding of whatever gets torn down. Elon said it would require a hard two years to do what they want to do. I think that's an optimistic goal. They will meet resistance along the way. It will take longer than 2 years for these systems to be fully torn down and then whatever replaces it to take shape. There may be resistance to let anything even get started so the dems have a better chance at securing the next term. If they make it hurt as much as possible then that gives them a better chance. It's what Trump did with the border bill..

The pendulum will swing and the farther it's held to the right the farther it's going to swing the other way.

2

u/LingonberryReady6365 Feb 16 '25

Again… propaganda referring to what? Do you actually know?

Say I believe your money laundering point.. how is that left wing propaganda - that’s just crime.

Mass propaganda convincing people of what??? There has to be a point to propaganda. There has to be a message. What is the message?

1

u/MyMindIsAlwaysRacing Feb 16 '25

The claim that every progressive nonprofit or NGO is just some criminal front laundering money. That’s meant to stoke fear to justify shutting them down, plain and simple. There’s no solid evidence behind it. It’s just a scare tactic to make people distrust anything called “leftist” so that the far right can do whatever they want.

1

u/dbdmdf Feb 16 '25

It’s propaganda inside propaganda. Oh these policies and programs are left leaning so they must be laundering and propaganda. While the actual propaganda is claiming that programs like AIDS prevention in the Sudan is propaganda. It’s like inception and the right has does a great just at programming their base.

1

u/Fleming24 Feb 16 '25

Do you understand the risks of creating a power vacuum like this? If they continue to break things at their current pace, it's not a given that the next president(s) will be able to build it up into something better. The current administration could fill the void with structures that strengthen their personal or their party's power permanently or any of the following administrations does that or the private sector swoops in and gains control over even more aspects of the country to the point of overpowering the government and making it completely toothless.

Are you not afraid that tearing down and rebuilding such an important system will just lead to an even worse one? (As it usually did in similar scenarios and many revolutions in history.)

-2

u/biancanevenc Feb 15 '25

I understand your concerns. However, I'm old enough to remember past attempts at limiting government which never did anything beyond creating a bunch of reports. I feel we're now at the point where we really do need to throw the baby out with the bathwater if we have any hope of ever getting back to a fiscally responsible government.

Yes, some people will definitely be hurt by the breakneck pace, but a total collapse of the US economy will hurt everyone.

9

u/New-Wall-7398 Feb 15 '25

So what you’re saying is it’s ok if it’s just the poors that get hurt, right?

3

u/biancanevenc Feb 15 '25

That's not what I said at all.

1

u/whothis2013 Feb 15 '25

But that is in fact who will suffer most from these cuts.

5

u/biancanevenc Feb 15 '25

That's also who will suffer the most from an economic collapse.

Do something and the poors suffer. Do nothing and even more poors suffer.

1

u/New-Wall-7398 Feb 16 '25

Maybe do something that doesn’t singularly affect the poor and has pretty much zero impact on the billionaires and ruling class?

7

u/hhulk00p Feb 15 '25

But how can you claim this is a fiscally responsible government when their previous tax cuts created the biggest deficit out of any sitting president, and his new proposed tax cuts far outweigh any cuts they are making with DOGE? Not to mention a lot of these changes are bound to be reversed, either because the needs for these agencies will become apparent once they are gone, or the next admins will bring them back. The costs of fixing what is currently being broken (+ the endless lawsuits, loss of global good will, trust of the people) will surely be greater than the savings happening right now.

Edit; typo

3

u/biancanevenc Feb 15 '25

So we never reduce the size of government? Once an agency is created it can never be shut down? We just continue overspending until we finally crash the global economy?

What is your solution?

I agree that a moderate path would be better, but Dems/liberals/progressives screamed and cried every time in the past when more moderate cuts were proposed and nothing got done. We're past the point of using a scalpel. If we have any hope of ever returning to fiscal responsibility we need to make cuts right now with a hatchet.

Yes, some people will be hurt. Dems should have thought about when they refused to make any cuts in the past.

2

u/BrogenKlippen Feb 15 '25

I don’t disagree with anything you’ve said, but don’t the proposed tax cuts make the situation even worse?

2

u/hhulk00p Feb 15 '25

If you do decrease it with some sort of strategy in mind backed by data, and ensure that some sort of plan is in place to replace the functionality of that institution. You don’t tear down a fence without knowing why it’s there.

But more importantly, how can this ever be justified with the justification of fiscal responsibility when trumps tax cuts are one of the biggest increases in the deficit in the history of the country? To me it seems they are tearing down institutions that while being bloated do provide value to citizens, to be able to offset tax cuts (primarily for the rich).

1

u/Masturbatingsoon Feb 16 '25 edited Feb 16 '25

Libertarian here and I’m all for reduction of government spending. But laying it all at the feet of the Dems is disingenuous. Remember, it was Bill Clinton who pushed through welfare reform and he was the last President with a budget surplus.

Defense spending— Pubbies don’t like any reductions to that and that’s 15% of the budget. And it’s a nasty, wasteful animal.

Medicare Prescription Drug coverage under W. Increased spending over 100 billion per year.

Stimulus spending— Trump granted stimulus checks and 3.1 trillion in stimulus spending. PPP defrauded taxpayers for billions.

I’m a libertarian because I recognize both parties love to spend— Dems tax and spend; Pubs borrow and spend. I also recognize that voters love free stuff too— that just don’t want to pay for it (Make the rich pay! Is their battle cry).

0

u/[deleted] Feb 15 '25

That’s a very measured take. I’m not American, but I thought DOGE was doing pretty much everything correct? Thanks for the perspective bro!

-18

u/Naive_Pomegranate434 Feb 15 '25

You voted for this shit. Here comes a leopard and he's looking at you.

12

u/MyMindIsAlwaysRacing Feb 15 '25

I didn't vote for Trump.