The difference between a leftist and a liberal view of Trump.......

[Jim Lane]

75. Unfortunately, responses here are hung up on your choice of words

You've definitely delineated two distinct strands of thought. Of course, there's something of a continuum, because many people aren't all one thing or all the other, but it's a real difference.

The problem is that people who lean more toward what you call the "liberal" view don't want to give up the title of "leftist". What's worse is that, because their preconception is that "leftist" is good, they react as if drawing this distinction in these terms is an attack on them personally.

There's no alternative set of terms that's immediately obvious to me. Maybe "incrementalist" and "fundamentalist"? That would have its own problems.

Using your terms, I'm one of those in-between types. I hold the "liberal" view about some of the horrors of the current administration. For example, Trump and people like Pruitt are wreaking terrible damage to the environment. Those problems would indeed be solved simply by replacing Trump with a standard-issue Democrat. Look at all the Democrats who've been nominated or have even been serious contenders for the party's nomination since 1969, when the EPA was created. None of them would have been nearly as bad as Trump on this score.

On the other hand, the "leftist" view is definitely correct in some areas. Under Carter, Bill Clinton, and Obama -- just to take the three most recent Democratic Presidents -- the federal government's military spending has been vastly excessive. President Bernie Sanders would probably have proposed levels of spending that were somewhat lower than those that would have been proposed by President Hillary Clinton, but I don't think either of them would have been able to get the Pentagon's budget all the way down to sensible levels. One aspect of the "deeper systemic problems with the entirety of the political and economic system of American capitalism" is the enormous power of the military-industrial complex. Given the size of the profits to made from military spending, it's hard to see how we can make fundamental change under a capitalist system.