House Majority Leader Defeated In Primary 932
An anonymous reader writes "For the first time in United States political history, the House Majority Leader has been defeated in his primary election. Long time Republican congressman and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor was defeated by 10 percentage points in the Virginia primary by Republican Tea Party challenger Dave Brat. This shocking defeat is likely to upset the political balance of power in the United States for years to come."
hahaha! (Score:0, Insightful)
Republican voting base has gone full bat shit, the party won't last much longer now.
Hopefully this is a first of many (Score:3, Insightful)
This government is ineffective, and seems to be more about getting things for themselves than their constituents. They use the taxes we give them to spy on us and arm our police forces with tanks rather than give us nationalized healthcare. They take bribes from special interest groups. We need new blood in politics.
Re:rumor is dems voted for him (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a safe republican district.
This is not unlike the reds that are elected from downtown SF. The real election is the primary.
Re:Democrats voted (Score:5, Insightful)
Allowing all citizens to vote no matter what their label is, isn't fair? Interesting.
Anti-incumbent sentiment is running extremely high (Score:5, Insightful)
The Tea Party may be taking all the credit for this, but the reality is is far more grim than any political insider is willing to admit: this has been the most unpopular Congress since the Do-Nothing Congress of 1947-49. [wikipedia.org]
And if anyone paid attention to history, what happened then is what will happen this time, too. The incumbents are in the crosshairs.
Tea (Score:3, Insightful)
Reports of the Tea Party's death are greatly exaggerated.
My only qualm is it's been hijacked well beyond its initial namesake cause of shrinking the bloated spending into almost every old Republican grievance.
Re:Democrats voted (Score:0, Insightful)
Alllowing democrats to vote in a republican primary - yeah, that's wrong.
Allowing independents, ie non-declared voters to vote in any primary - absolutely.
Re:rumor is dems voted for him (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm pretty sure that's how McCain won the primaries. He was regularly booed at from the audience in his own rallies, especially when it came to amnesty or "path to citizenship" or whatever you want to call it. It makes me wonder if these types of primaries are a good idea or not. My state was thinking of doing away with letting undeclared voters pick a ballot on primary day and at the time I was against it, but I can certainly see now how it could be misused. Of course then it's a matter of changing your declared party well enough in advance and then switching it back. So I'm not sure changing it really solves anything.
Re:Tea (Score:2, Insightful)
The 'church republicans' have made a serious effort to take it over. They will be the death of the GOP.
Re:rumor is dems voted for him (Score:2, Insightful)
Don't count on it. Only 14% bothered to vote, which shows a dislike for the party in general.
Re:Democrats voted (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Democrats voted (Score:4, Insightful)
"Alllowing democrats to vote in a republican primary - yeah, that's wrong."
Why? What if the Democrat likes the Republican candidate and intends on voting him in?
Again, why should a label prevent you from voting in any election as long as you are a citizen and meet the criteria for voting rights?
Re:hahaha! (Score:0, Insightful)
I've got a son graduating high school next year. According to the climate scientists, there has been no increase in global temperatures during his entire lifetime.
Who's got their fingers in their ears? Maybe the one's saying "The science is settled!!!!". Hint: Science is never settled.
Re:Democrats voted (Score:5, Insightful)
Correct. Allowing outsiders to inject themselves as spoilers into an internal race isn't fair.
The Koch brothers (and others), many out-of-state- Super-PACs and their advertising campaigns would beg to differ with your opinion.
Re:Anti-incumbent sentiment is running extremely h (Score:2, Insightful)
I will believe it when I see it. Money talks, and a good PR campaign can turn a psychopath into someone holier than $DEITY.
In the past, congresscritters had to survive on merit. Now, no matter what they can do, a couple million dollars can right -any- wrong.
-ANY- wrong, period.
Re:He picked the wrong moment to support amnesty (Score:5, Insightful)
The surge of people we're getting at the border right now are only showing up because they think they'll get amnesty. Its a related concept.
Really the sick thing is the whole immigration problem is driven by a shadow economy of cheap labor.
People say "oh I want these people to get US citizenship" but if they have it will they work for below minimum wage under currently illegal health standards with no insurance or legal rights?
Probably not. And the corporate interests that are pushing for amnesty are very strange in this regard as well because again if they actually get amnesty they're not going to show up for work. They're going to go get EBT cards and welfare because it pays better then those terrible jobs. Which is why most americans don't do those jobs. We're paid more to do nothing then we are to do that stuff.
By all means argue against the welfare state if that's what gets you going but the point is that the whole immigration issue is irrational.
Our society cannot survive open borders. We can't afford it. And if we did that all the cheap labor the companies think they're going to get would suddenly be gone because they'd just sit in subsidized apartments laughing about when they got up at 3 in the morning to go to work.
And that doesn't address how the whole thing depresses the wages of actual citizens or causes all sorts of other distortions of our economy.
The whole thing is sick.
The first thing that needs to happen is that hiring illegal immigrants needs to be something that is ACTUALLY illegal. As in few do it because you go to jail or suffer huge crippling fines.
Do that and most of the illegal immigration stops immediately without having to do anything at the border.
A really effective mean to police the thing would be to offer people a bounty for catching it. Say 10 to 50 percent of collected fines. So if you're fining companies 10 thousand dollars per illegal employee... and some of these operations employ thousands... you'll be looking at 10 thousand times thousands. Who wouldn't turn that in?
It would police itself. Sure, you'd get witch hunts and false positives etc. But I'm not saying you show up with SWAT teams either. Just a federal official with a camera, notebook, and badge. He goes in, sees what is going on, makes some notes, takes some pictures, and then goes back to the office to process the paper work. Nothing aggressive needed. You don't even go after the illegals directly. You go after their employers.
If they can't find work here they won't come. Just that simple.
Re:Tea (Score:2, Insightful)
The Church Rs are exactly like the Leftest Ds.
They ignore history, evidence, science and base everything on their philosophy.
We have two political parties that have 'decided to make policy through ignoring evidence, and going purely with ideology.'
We're fucked.
115 Years (Score:2, Insightful)
http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2014/06/eric-cantor-dave-brat-what-happened [motherjones.com]
I love it how the free-market economist won a primary and now the Republicans are freaking out. Showing their true colors - not the hype they spout to fool ordinary small-government Americans.
Re:hahaha! (Score:5, Insightful)
Republican voting base has gone full bat shit, the party won't last much longer now.
The current GOP is worthless anyhow. No one on the right likes it: they don't serve a financially conservative agenda at all, the don't serve the socially conservative agenda beyond lip-service, and the anti-illegal-immigration feeling on the right is far stronger than the GOP seems to realize.
A new party is needed, as this one is done. If the so-con portion represents a new generation who not racist and rabidly anti-gay (eject the Boomer so-cons) then it has a future again. We'll see.
Re:hahaha! (Score:5, Insightful)
Not really... They are not going nuts...
What's going on is the Tea Party is apparently dragging the republican party to the right of center (politically). Some folks think that this is a good thing, some don't. But I don't think you can make the case that this is a symbol of the party self destructing or going crazy. What is going on though is the party is being forced to recognize that it's base is not happy with it's leadership and that the Tea Party's conservative message has at least some resonance with the base. From my perspective, it is a good thing when a party's leadership represents it's members.
Now, it remains to be seen if this movement to the right translates into more votes and more success in elections or not. I have my theories on that... But the most telling fact one needs to consider is how the other party and the talking heads reporting are becoming apathetic about this. Remember back in May when they declared the Tea Party dead? Now, when it's obvious they where wrong, they are in a panic for some reason? Right....
Re:Democrats voted (Score:5, Insightful)
Allowing outsiders to inject themselves as spoilers into an internal race isn't fair.
What isn't fair is taxpayers footing the bill for internal parties elections. Does the Libertarian party get to use the electorate? or the Tea Party? Why do the Democrats and Republicans get to?
Re:Democrats voted (Score:5, Insightful)
So would George Soros and any number of rich progressives and socialists. You don't need to single out the Koch Brothers.
That said, my issue isn't with money in politics, it is with the demise of Federalism as a governing principle. As a Virginian (and now as a Marylander), I don't consider it any of my business who represents people in say, California. I would never give money to a race in a state in which I don't live in, and have never really bothered with a district other than my own either. I can't vote in California (although they probably wouldn't bother to stop me), and I don't need representation from California.
When I worked in the political world, I used to have that argument all the time -- people wondering why I refused to get mad at, say, Nanci Pelosi for doing what she does. It doesn't matter if I like her or not, so long as she accurately reflects the will of her constituents. If she doesn't, then that's a problem for them -- not me over here on the east coast.
However, I also have an issue with people using the tactic of injecting themselves into their opponents primary in order to try and cause them to choose the worst candidate rather than trying to select the best candidate that their party can themselves. It's that kind of bullshit tactic that leads to polarization and animosity. Unfortunately, it seems as if that's the type of thing you need to do in order to have your voice heard, because if enough people are doing it then being honest becomes a liability. (And that, right there, is what is wrong with America today).
Re:Anti-incumbent sentiment is running extremely h (Score:5, Insightful)
Most incumbents get reelected even when Congress's approval ratings overall are low, however, because people's approval ratings of their own Congresspeople are almost always considerably higher. People generally think Congress sucks, but they usually blame it on everyone else's Representatives.
Re:Democrats voted (Score:5, Insightful)
I didn't complain. I just think its silly.
Run offs are also silly, why not just have people rank their choices in the first place and not bother wasting time with another run off election.
Re:hahaha! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Democrats voted (Score:5, Insightful)
Voters end up with the exact same number of choices in the general election: two.
The party system itself is the issue there -- not open or closed primaries. The way to give more choices would be to do away with "primaries" and have every candidate on the general election ballot and have runoffs or a different method of voting (like a ranked system).
There are of course trade-offs for doing that.
Re:Democrats voted (Score:5, Insightful)
WHAT??!
Brat is actually the poster child for "getting the money out of politics." Cantor had him outspent 4 to 1. He was the little guy in this race.
From what I've heard about him, he's also very libertarian leaning. I think libertarian leaning Republicans have a bright future. I think the old guard and the social conservatives will have a hard time against them in the future as well.
Re:He picked the wrong moment to support amnesty (Score:5, Insightful)
Because being a US citizen has benefits that are paid for by the US economy where as being a citizen of Mexico or Honduras or Guatemala has few benefits and Americans can't enjoy them even if they try to go through the legal process.
Riddle me this... which country do you think its easier to become a citizen in... The United States or Mexico?
Do you know what you have to go through to become a citizen in either? Compare them. The US has pretty much the loosest immigration policy in the Americas. I don't think there's any other country in the America's that even close... north or south America.
And yet as loose as our policies are it is we that are called the racists and monsters for having a policy more humane and inclusive and permissive then any other in in the Americas.
Explain the logic on that.
You want open immigration? Fine... no really... we'll do that. But understand this, if you do that and leave the welfare system intact the country will go broke very quickly.
The welfare state and open immigration are exclusive concepts. You cannot do both at the same time. The simple math on that should be obvious to anyone that thinks about it.
Re:hahaha! (Score:5, Insightful)
and the anti-illegal-immigration feeling on the right is far stronger than the GOP seems to realize.
If you look at polling that sentiment is shared in the center and center-left. Opposition to immigration is one of the few truly bipartisan things in the American electorate. The political establishment doesn't acknowledge it because big business wants cheap labor and Democrats think Hispanics are always going to vote for them. You can see similar trends in any developed country, fly over to one of the better developed EU countries and ask John Q. Public how he really feels about immigration. It's not popular even when it comes from other EU members (migration from Eastern Europe into Western Europe or the Nordic States), and $deity help you if you're one of the poor bastards coming there from Africa or the Middle East.
Another issue with a broad consensus in the electorate that's soundly ignored by the political establishment is non-interventionism. People are sick of interventionism, be they left, right, or center. The establishment ignores the electorate on this issue because of a combination of perceived economic interest, bureaucratic inertia in the national security apparatus, and entangling alliances set up after WW2 specifically to prevent an American retrenchment.
Cut it out Slashdot (Score:2, Insightful)
A pure political story, with absolutely no geek angle whatsoever, has no place here. It brings in a lot of page hits, and a lot of comments from politically-frothy Slashdot posters, but long-term it rather undermines the credibility of the site.
Re:Democrats voted (Score:3, Insightful)
However, I will be interested in seeing how brat does against the dem.
Re:hahaha! (Score:5, Insightful)
I really think the GOP has a strong future if it can become the "pro-capitalism, anti-big-corp" party. The Left thinks that's impossible, so that ground is unoccupied (ha!) today. Get the focus back to trust-busting and local monopoly breaking and consumer rights, and leave the Left wondering what just happened to them. But the current guys are too entrenched with the current sources of funding, not realizing they're stuck in an ever-diminishing local maximum.
good (Score:2, Insightful)
I have no problem with this. Even though you would say my politics are on the Left part of the spectrum, I believe there is more of a chance of finding common cause with Tea Party people than with the Republican establishment. I've noticed a marked change in the way the Tea Party types talk about capitalism, crony capitalism, corporate power and the military. If the Tea Party decimates the establishment GOP that have been pushing neo-conservative foreign policy and neo-liberal economic policy (Austrian school), it can only be a good thing.
Citizens that are ready to get out into the street I can deal with. Politicians who are prepared to turn the keys of government over to corporate interests, I cannot. I've heard Tea Party types saying some of the same things about corporatism that you'd hear coming out of the Occupy movement. The cultural stuff doesn't matter, because ultimately, those issues (say, gay marriage) are going to be decided by society as a whole. The Tea Party can holler all they want, but if people start accepting gay marriage, it's going to happen, and by all accounts and polls, it's happening. Same with other issues. Women's rights? Good luck trying to convince women to go back to being subservient to men.
Of course, I have a problem with some of the racism and gun fetishism, but even that is starting to shift. The percentage of families in the US who own guns has gone down steadily since the beginning of the 2nd Amendment movement in the '80s.
But the mainstream GOP, the ones that loved creating the Surveillance State under Bush and (despite what they say) love it under Obama, are just evil. They will continue to promote the upward redistribution of wealth and the aggressive foreign policy that has exploded since the 1980s. They're the ones blew up the economy with deregulation. They're the ones dreamed up the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars. They're the ones ready to attack Iran and do Israel's bidding.
Plus, despite the rhetoric, they support the policies of Barack Obama who (and I say this as someone on the Left) has been a wolf in sheep's clothing for corporatism, surveillance, and concentration of wealth and power in the hands of a very few.
I will enjoy watching the collapse of the Party of Reagan. And (again, despite the rhetoric), the Tea Party is anything BUT the Party of Reagan. They have some hagiographic image of Ronald Reagan that does not match reality. That's OK, let them have their mythology.
Re:hahaha! (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, science is never settled and is also always highly political, in spite of most scientists fooling themselves that it is "the search for the Truth". But dude, honestly, just stop it. I really can't believe how nay-sayers with half a brain can keep it up - there is a MASSIVE pro-oil/gas/coal lobby that tries to sow the seeds of doubt. What do the 98% of scientists that maintain AGW is real have to gain? It's not like there is some secret society of super-rich Gaia Illuminati that is trying to brain-wash the world into... spending less by using less. Sure, some are benefiting - some are even financing pro-AGW studies - but it is NOTHING like what is happening in the other direction. And still there are only 2% that hold on to the "it's not happening" or "it's not because of what humans are doing" line.
Politics and self-interest are everywhere and in everything. But if you are going to posit a major global conspiracy then it at least has to be realistic - a government/group-of-super-rich would have great interest in hiding an alien visitation to keep the tech for themselves but "use energy more efficiently, spread generation around the globe using various different technologies that don't upset the current atmospheric balance" is hardly something that qualifies as something of interest for some nefarious group of super-villains...
Re:hahaha! (Score:5, Insightful)
OK. Just remember that at this point your opinion is not objective, but subjective. The elections are what really matter, and THAT is the real objective measure of the Tea Party's success or failure....
BTW, I consider anybody who uses the "teabagger" name a dishonest broker and liberal robot. If you start by trying to offend your opponent (and make no mistake, this term is intended to offend) you really must have nothing better to say than the standard liberal talking points, which I find boring on top of being offensive. You could at least try to be clever or somehow unique, other wise, I don't have the time for boring offensive leftist ideologues.
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Re:Democrats voted (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah.. THIS!! I'm an Independent voter in Nevada, up until the middle of BushyJr's second term I was a life-long Republican.. The Republican party has gotten so FAR from its roots, I couldn't remain a "member"... Since I am no longer a Republican, I'm prohibited from voting for ANY candidate in our primary yesterday other than the non-partisan races, like Judge, Sheriff, etc.. This is a crock of SHIT, so I now do not vote in primary elections.. There were several Republican candidates for state and national office that I'd loved to have voted for, but the State of Nevada has seen fit to prohibit me from voting for them, unless I attach a label to my name.. I'M NOT A REPUBLICAN NOR A DEMOCRAT, I'M AN AMERICAN....
Re:Anti-incumbent sentiment is running extremely h (Score:5, Insightful)
Assuming "being productive" is passing laws.
Doing nothing might be the best thing.
Re:He picked the wrong moment to support amnesty (Score:5, Insightful)
True, though Reagan was promised border enforcement in return for that. The deal as understood at the time was "I'll give you amnesty now as a one time deal and in return we fix the system"...
Reagan delivered his end and then fixes promised never happened.
Its something republicans are still extremely bitter about and one of the reasons they're not respective to the same idea all over again. We're being told "just give us amnesty now and we'll fix the border after"... well... one bitten twice shy.
Re:Democrats voted (Score:5, Insightful)
Thing is, just about all of those things you listed are so-called "wedge" issues that have very little bearing on most people, even if they deeply affect some consequential number of people. Remember that we are mostly talking about federal government here, which is supposed to be tackling things that make sense on a federal level:
- Public funding of stem cell research: While it might be promising, there aren't any real therapies as of yet and the republic will boldly march on in any event.
- Abortion: The republic will boldly march on.
- Same sex marriage: Almost completely inconsequential to the health of the republic.
- Discrimination based on sexual orientation: There is probably some meat to this one, as it is difficult to call yourself a democracy with a repressed minority.
- Flag Burning: This would probably have zero practical impact on free speech.
- Affirmative action (well, technically use of quotas): another inflammatory issue, but probably some meat to it as we do need to decide what criteria needs to be met to measure the success and need for these programs.
- Gun control: 30,000 traffic deaths per year shows that society can function perfectly well with a similar number of gun deaths.
Notably absent from your list are things like:
- Debt, government spending, taxes, budget, etc.
- Domestic spying
- Foreign policy
- Military policy
- The role of federal vs state government
- Using the federal government to alter people's behaviors.
And on those issues, I bet he looks surprisingly similar to his Democratic colleagues. Even on wedge issues, I'd bet he's not far off. For instance, I'd wager that for every politician you can find who supports curtailing free speech by restricting flag burning, I can find another who would like to ban hate speech. I'd argue those people are both the same kind of politician, even if they have different motives.
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Re:hahaha! (Score:2, Insightful)
...and the anti-illegal-immigration feeling on the right is far stronger than the GOP seems to realize.
As an independent voter, it is stronger than most politicians realize. My ancestors (verified family history) fought in the American Revolution and came across via Ellis Island as legal immigrants. Today, you run across the border and hope the border patrol doesn't catch you. Those people wanted to be in this country so much, the first thing they did was to violate its laws. That is crap.
All government benefits should be denied to all persons, until proof of citizenship/legal residency has been established. If you are not a citizen or legal resident alien, you are not entitled to a drivers license, food stamps, etc., and voting is limited to citizens only. In Oregon for example, there is a history of giving illegals food assistance, drivers licenses and granting them in-state resident college tuition rates. Denying those funds to Americans and legal aliens.
All companies that hire illegal aliens should be forced to pay a penalty to the gov't (half to border protection and half to the general fund) of twice the monies paid to the illegal. Pay the illegal $500, the fine is $1,000 for a total of $1,500 to use that person. That person is also transported back to their own country at the employers expense. Now the cost of the illegal alien is $1,500 + transportation for $500 of work.
If benefits stop and employers stop hiring them, most of them will leave the way they came here. On their own...
The first word in "illegal alien" is "ILLEGAL". By being here, they are violating the laws. Treat them that way and most of them will leave.
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Re:hahaha! (Score:0, Insightful)
By 1931 the theory of relativity was widely accepted by scientists as true. The "Hundred Authors" were the last denialist fringe.
Today, the AGW deniers are the "Hundred Authors."
Re:Anti-incumbent sentiment is running extremely h (Score:5, Insightful)
The reason you see a 95% retention rate, even when anti-Congress sentiment is high is because:
"*MY* Congresscritter is doing good. It's all those other assholes that are the problem."
Re:Democrats voted (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:He picked the wrong moment to support amnesty (Score:5, Insightful)
It also depresses automation that we would have put in place ages ago and of course removed labor that was traditionally done by teenagers.
My father worked in a California fruit boxing warehouse for a few summers. Not because he was poor but because kids were expected to get summer jobs back then.
We did just fine before the rampant illegal immigration. Those that think we can't survive without it either suffer from an unforgivable lack of imagination or are spinning tales.
Re:Democrats voted (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Democrats voted (Score:4, Insightful)
I guess the progressives and socialists are given a pass, because they advocate for equality and peace, while the cocks advocate for vagina inspections, religious govt, and shooting brown people.
Re:Anti-incumbent sentiment is running extremely h (Score:4, Insightful)
This, but only because of rampant gerrymandering.
"Just find me enough people that like me, and call that my district. I don't care if they're spread out all over creation. [allthingsdemocrat.com] Just draw a line around everyone who voted for me last time, and call it done." [pjmedia.com]
Politicians have been, for years, systematically altering their districts so that their particular flavor of nutjob are all in the same district. Be it birthers, gun nuts, 9/11 conspiracy folks, or whatever. Pick your favorite flavor, wrangle up enough people, wherever they may be, and reelections will take care of themselves. We can sprinkle the sane/moderate people around so that their votes are barely heard. Certainly not enough to cause a ruckus
The real problem, however, is just now starting to surface. If you wrangle up enough staunch believers of any one type in a particular area, a crazier candidate will surface and take advantage of that. We no longer get anyone with a hint of "moderate" in a general election, because they get destroyed in the Primaries by someone even crazier than they are.
Re:Democrats voted (Score:4, Insightful)
Just because I live in California does not mean that I do not have a real and valid interest on who the people of Utah send to DC.
The question really isn't do you care what they do, the question is do you have any right to help them select the people that they send to congress to represent THEIR interests. To that, that answer is a clear and resounding NO, you do not.
If you believe you do, then you should realize that your system would allow every voter in the country to vote on every senate and house race, and the Senate would become a body representing only the most populous areas of the country and not every state as it was intended to do. And the House would be the same. The voters in less populous states would effectively be disenfranchised. That's great if you live in and have the same views as the majority of people in the larger states.
Thinking otherwise is simplistic and wrong.
The simplistic and wrong thinking is to believe that because the people elected to represent others can vote on matters that impact your life that you should get to vote on those representatives, too. They represent other people; you get to elect the ones who represent you. Having one national election for the Senate and House would result in a stultifying homogeneity of ideas in a place that should have a plethora of views available.
And before you say "but but but the Koch brothers...", you need to realize the difference between campaign contributions and actual voting. As human beings, the Koch brothers have the same free speech rights that you do, and if you feel that you have the right to comment on elections in other parts of the country, then they have those rights, too. What they (and you) do not have the right to do is vote in other states or districts, and voting is how people get elected.
The idea of "open primaries" is based in large part on this demonstrated lack of understanding of this "fairness", and in large part on the dishonesty of wanting to "help" the other political party select a "better" candidate. The truth of the latter is that such voters are either trying to select a candidate for the other party who is "in name only" and is really one of their own philosophically, or select an unelectable candidate so their party's offering will have no real opposition. Both are dishonest and both are why open primaries should be abolished.
Re:He's not against immigration. (Score:4, Insightful)
If you give them amnesty, they become legal then. Legal is what the law defines to be legal, no more and no less. Yet he has problems with that - in fact, a decidedly non-libertarian objection:
"Adding millions of workers to the labor market will force wages to fall and jobs to be lost."
(hey, what happened to free market? or does that not apply to labor somehow?)
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Re:hahaha! (Score:2, Insightful)
The Tea Party is the movement of prejudices, egoisms and phobia. "Not in my backyard" is the battle cry.
Re:Democrats voted (Score:4, Insightful)
You do realize that George Soros was a major anti-Communist activist against the rule of the USSR and helped former quasi-occupied Communist sstates of the Warsaw Pact, like his home country, move towards liberal market democracies.
And Bill Gates? *Bill* *Gates*? A totalitarian Communist supporter? Really? REALLY? A hedge fund trader and a technology billionaires, now because they don't agree with some of the lunatic wingnuttery are now seriously considered to be a sniff away from Trotskyite madness? And people don't recognize how totally insane that thought is? And if some of the smartest leading hedge fund and capitalist technology billionaires are going for the (comparatively) *left* party then that may mean that the right-aligned party maybe could be hurtling into insane madness?
Do you know what a Communist actually acts like and what they do and want? Hugo Chavez and Fidel Castro were socialist dictators.