Left is Right, Democrats = Republicans

If you follow mainstream media, you’ll be led to believe that progressive Democrats and conservative Republicans are polar opposites. But that is only because the media focuses on their differences, which fall mainly in the areas of the “culture war.” Admittedly, their cultures are different—for now, at least. As Michael Malice says, “Conservatism is progressivism driving the speed limit.” Eventually, conservatives adopt progressive culture until it becomes conservative, at which point progressives have become even more progressive and try to change conservatives along with them, repeat ad infinitum. (Case in point: gay marriage.)

However, culture is only one facet of politics. What about economics and foreign policy? Surely progressives and conservatives must be equally opposed in those areas as they are culturally? But no, they’re surprisingly similar.

Obama and Trump serve as prime examples. They are viewed by both progressive and conservative media as polar opposites, but how different are they really when you examine their Keynesian economics and interventionist foreign policy? The main difference between Obama and Trump is simply their rhetoric and demeanor. They speak in vastly different styles while enacting remarkably similar policy across the board. (Bomb the Middle East? Check. Bailout corporations? Check. Immigration? Obama built those cages.)

The culture war between Democrats and Republicans serves as a useful distraction to obfuscate how similar the two parties truly are. Both routinely raise the national debt, spending taxpayer money on needless foreign wars and corporate bailouts, while continually expanding the size and scope of government, limiting individual freedom in the process. Democrats and Republicans are actually two wings of the same party, which explains why they join forces to prevent any third party from ever gaining political power.

The true left vs. right wing divide politically is classified by libertarianism vs. statism. Democrats and Republicans are actually both factions of the right-wing, competing for increased control of the state, but ultimately, as statists, they will always join forces to fight their true enemy: those who wish to diminish the state—libertarians.

The corporate media (both progressive and conservative) amplify their cultural differences over their policy similarities because they are loyal statists. They both attack libertarians, usually by misunderstanding, straw-manning, or purposefully warping their views—though they are more apt to ignore libertarians altogether and pretend they don’t exist. For two reasons: 1) Neither progressives nor conservatives have legitimate counters to actual libertarian arguments, and 2) If most American citizens heard the ideas of individual freedom and liberty, they’d abandon statism and move to the true political left: anarchy.