For the record, I think you're obviously intelligent and thoughtful, but I'm reading you as kind of the empty vessel of the NSA here. Your (not entirely unreasonable) concerns about civil liberties seem to overshadow what I consider to be much more pressing concerns about social justice and basic human rights, which probably makes me come across more aggressively than necessary. When you post about how Justin Amash "could be useful," it makes me think that you don't seem to have much time for the possibility that crazy Republicans who want to eliminate vital services that keep Americans from starving are not good candidates even if they want to reduce America's tendency to read people's email.
But in this case I was just annoyed because it really seems reductionist to suggest that all you need to do to get lower taxes is donate to Democrats, as if party platforms are utterly meaningless. Even if we suppose that politicians are always and everywhere corrupt, which I consider a little facile, surely we can agree that it's way more expensive to get a party to reverse itself on a policy position it spent a whole year running on and caters explicitly to its base! It'd probably be cheaper just to pay the taxes, which, I gather, is what most rich liberals are doing.
It's a simple relationship of getting to the articles I do when I see them. Surprise surprise, I tend to never finish reading them before the point of postage (unless I plumb sources like the CBC, and they tend to more or less just echo articles already posted to begin with), or if they happen to be something the thread isn't so quick on (such as intelligence articles). If there was as much interest in NSA stuff, I'd hands-down guarantee you I'd be beaten to anything that wasn't crumbs. That void is nine-tenths the reason I post as much NSA stuff as I do, and frankly, I don't talk very much about social justice and basic human rights because ninety-nine parts of a hundredth of every page falls within my own personal views! Rightly or wrongly, I try not to echo in places that are already well served if I can help it. I've tended toward zones of low density.
And as to Amash, that's another instance where you're reading your own conclusions into my views. Want to know why I hedged and said Amash "could be useful" and not an unequivocal "is useful"? Because I was plainly aware of the fact that so long as he was singing the mad blood feud with Obamacare and aid to the poor, it's silver lining on poison. That isn't something I feel I should need to make explicit in a footnote, in a big [THIS IS NOT AN ENDORSEMENT OF JUSTIN AMASH] disclaimer so as to avoid being lit up like I'm the mouthpiece to this or that social conservative outlet. I can certainly understand where all those disclaimers come from that I see on Twitter, though.
And as to the politics, I didn't suggest that that was all that was needed to get lower taxes. I listed Republicans first and added Democrats second for a reason, the second is at best also hands-directly-on the political machinery and political finance, it's a direct solution if the money or the benefits found any (unlikely) inroads, whereas the first has campaigned and will continue to campaign directly for tax cuts for the wealthy. I was simply saying that the people with money don't need to do anything other than continue to wheel and deal to politicians, a huge chunk of which being already agreeable. That isn't to say that all politicians are corrupt either, or that Democrats caving is likely, just a very general observation on the corrupting influence of funds regardless of which party platform you're associated with, and the likelihood of elected officials making a break with old policy
versus a startup fifth column crippling the Democrats via apathetic voters.
My point of annoyance also lies with reductionism, in this case quite a literal reduction of my meaning when the nuance I employ is bulldozed so as to get at a tasty nugget to zing me with. Ever feel like you've been on the bad end of a hatchet job? That's the feeling I'm getting here, by you.
