- investing more in infrastructure, less on fighting useless, expensive, unwinnable wars.
I generally agree with this. Some battles are necessary, but a lot of ours haven't been.
- recognizing and adapting to the fact that Climate Change exists.
That sounds good
- not giving tax breaks to businesses who ship jobs off to other countries.
That also sounds good
- supporting unions so as to protect workers.
Unions are great in theory, but they've become corrupt husks of what they used to be. We need union reform, if anything.
- raising the minimum wage to something that people can actually live off of.
I don't know much about economics, but I fear that when you raise the minimum wage, it often leads to inflation, raising the cost of living. I'm not so sure about this, but again, I'm no economics expert.
I have a lot of issues with this one, but I'll try to keep it to the point. People should receive fair compensation for the work they do given the expertise and skill they posses; sex/gender should not factor into this equation at all. That is a desirable goal and something I think most people would agree is worth pursuing.
However, I do not believe that many US liberals are dedicated to this; rather, they have the misguided notion that fair compensation necessarily means equal numbers in all cases. Equality is not expected nor necessary in many cases; small (and sometimes large) pay discrepancies between sexes/genders are very often expected given the presence of other important factors. They are trying to solve a problem that doesn't exist, ultimately creating problems where there are none. I believe they are doing the wrong thing for the right reasons. However, intentions aside, they're still causing problems for innocent, hard-working people, and that's something I will always voice my opposition to.
- not creating trade policies that cost the U.S. jobs (e.g. opposes NAFTA, Trans-Pacific Partnership).
The TPP is more sinister than just costing jobs. See
here. Sanders' opposition to it is certainly a good thing.
- making college affordable for everyone.
I absolutely support this. I know there will be significant costs, but I think the benefits far outweigh them.
- punishing criminal bankers who've proven reckless with people's money and nearly destroyed the economy.
Good
- health care as a right for everyone.
Good in theory, but the ACA specifically has some flaws. I'd like to see it worked on, at the very least.
I mean, more than half this stuff are things other developed nations already have/do, and a great deal of Americans claim that they want. An economic model where workers can work 8 hours a day and still not be able to feed themselves or their families while CEOs who don't pay their fair share in taxes get richer and ship jobs off to other countries isn't sustainable. And if you think anyone in the GOP, including Rand Paul, is interested in reversing that trend, then I don't know what to tell you.
Republicans and Libertarians claim to believe more in the ideal of capitalism, where a dedicated individual can (and should) work their way up the ladder through hard work and education. However, many of their politicians don't support it in practice, and I think that's a major problem with their platform.
As for everything else, it's embarrassing that in the year 2015 we're still debating whether or not women should receive equal pay
I think few people are debating the fact that sex/gender should not be a factor in assigning pay. What people are debating is what I've stated above, and that's something that I think is important to talk about, especially since so many liberals are dead-set on calling it an "embarrassing debate."
or that health care should be a right. And there's no reason why the U.S. should be spending as much as it does on the military and on its prisons while its infrastructure rots. Bernie Sanders is on point with almost everything he proposes, much more so than Hillary Clinton or the GOP ever will be.
Military spending tends to be reinvested into our own economy and generally increases our foreign influence. I'm opposed to wasteful military spending, but not military spending. Realistically, it's a necessary and useful thing to spend money on.
If anything, we need MORE spending on prisons (and a lot of reform, too). Our prison system is abysmal compared to other countries'. We need to fix that, not ignore it.
