yttriumnope*disclaimer: not american, don't yell at me*
I'm just surprised how idiotic every republican candidate ever really is, they don't even pretend to be slightly reasonable... on the positive side they provide plenty of comedy gold, particularly this time with donald trump and the braindead neurosurgeon in the running
A couple aren't batshit crazy. They're all low in the polls, though, so you probably don't hear about them much.
unfortunately, even the more reasonable ones are suckered into the hilarious circus that every Republican debate has become, it feels like they spend about 3% of each debate talking about literally ANY actual policy at all
and it feels like that because it is like that
WariI'm def voting for Bernie in the primaries for my state, but if he doesn't win the nomination I have no problem going with Hillary.
Reps aren't that bad (sans Trump and Carson), but Dems are just more likely to be actually pushing to solve shit like social and environmental problems from what I've seen. So if you forget about economy (which I'm not an economist so why believe either side with opposing viewpoints (leaning Dem tho)), that's pretty much all that's left. I don't feel like the government is violating muh freedoms so there goes the rest of the Rep platform for me.
Also I don't think any candidate on either side should be even slightly qualified to say "Obama is doing a bad job about ISIS and this is how I'm going to do it better" when the President has all of the best advisers to solve military problems and shit like that. Unless they're a former top-ranking military general or some shit, their opinion is basically worthless.
I have to say, I'm really not a fan of these arguments from authority. You don't need to be an economist to be able to compare the effects of, say, supply-side versus progressive taxation, or regulation versus deregulation of investment banks. Historical patterns are pretty strong and most theoretical models by the so-called "Chicago School" make ridiculous assumptions that no one could ever possibly agree with if they were using common sense.
Same on the military point, for three major reasons:
1) Some presidents (particularly Dubya) have really small inner circles that do not extend to the actual military brass in the Pentagon, and often they do things that top generals explicitly warn against.
2) There's a difference between operational expertise and international relations expertise. A general might tell you the best way to, say, prevent looting or restore an electrical grid in an occupation, but they won't necessarily give you the best advice on international support or lack thereof, or even a broader understanding of the moral challenges of asymmetrical warfare.
3) Even well-meaning military personnel are generally biased towards spending more on defense and putting more boots in the ground. Unless you believe that's the correct solution for literally every foreign policy quagmire, they can't always be right.