"Well, what's wrong with slavery?"

[Homicidal_Squirrel]

That makes it a bit hard to communicate. And I'm pretty sure that Obama is not right of center in the US, that more than 50% of the population is further left then he is.

Okay, before we continue with this, what is it that you are referring to when you say "center?" Are you referring to a statistical average of how some people feel about a given topic? Do you mean that out of 100 people 50 would be for and 50 would be against some topic? is that what you are referring to as the "center?"

 

[Morrus]

I am so sorry I mentioned the concept of a subjective centre. I made this thread the most tedious thing on the Internet. I apologise! It's now at a depth of tedium only matched in a particularly tedious layer of purgatory, and it's my fault.

 

[Homicidal_Squirrel]

I am so sorry I mentioned the concept of a subjective centre. I made this thread the most tedious thing on the Internet. I apologise! It's now at a depth of tedium only matched in a particularly tedious layer of purgatory, and it's my fault.

Go sit in the corner and think about what you did.

 

[Umbran]

There are two (and probably more) perfectly reasonable measures of "center".

One, is as prosfilaes says - choose some population, get some measure of the average position, and call that the center.

Another is to lay out the possible policies one can choose, in order of their degree of leaning to one side or the other, and call the middle of those the center.

For an American, Obama is, all and all, probably pretty centrist. This can be seen in the reception of several of his policies - roughly half of the folks out there think the Affordable Care act is a good thing, and half a bad thing. He finally came down on the side of marriage equality - something that now the majority of Americans think is okay. Is approval ratings tend to be in the high 40s, and his disapproval rating hasn't gotten above 50% this year. So, about half the population liking how he's doing his job, and all. This all suggests he's kinda middle of the road.

Interestingly - Obama's current approval rating right now is where Ronald Reagan's was at the same time in his Presidency.

 

[Umbran]

I am so sorry I mentioned the concept of a subjective centre.

Eh. Some folks were probably using it, and others not. Which would have led to argument. So, while it might be dry, it is at least not dry and nasty

 

[prosfilaes]

I think "Western World" is a reasonable comparison between similar democracies for the purposes of this discussion.

I would say that the US, for the most part, is enough for the purposes of this discussion. Especially given that US politics can be defined as right and left, without too much blurring of important distinctions, and we can reasonably agree where the lines are, but once you start mixing the US in with the EU... Obama, for example, has a stronger commitment to free speech then just about any other leader in the world; I am not aware of any other nation that has as broad a view on free speech as the US does. Seriously, no throwing Nazis in jail, criminalizing hate speech, our libel laws put the weight on the plaintiff, etc. Does that push him to the left?

 

[Ryujin]

Conservapedia has a more detailed explanation.

That description reinforces why I don't reference Conservapedia

 

[Homicidal_Squirrel]

That description reinforces why I don't reference Conservapedia

 

[Ryujin]

View attachment 70004

Shake it off

Try looking up "evolution" as an example of why I don't bother with that site.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Wow.