In my completely unscientific study of differences between right and left, the main difference I could nail down best was the answer to the question: "Do you believe that people in general are good hearted?" With few exceptions, the left answers yes and the right answers no.
It seems to be mostly a trust issue. Most on the right are very limited in their circles of trust, and generally those circles don't seem to reach our own national boundary, and anyone beyond our borders is intensely distrusted. On the other hand, the left often considers national boundaries meaningless and can extend their trust in people to a world wide level without blinking an eye. I see this tendency as a personal trait, much like my own independence trait, not good or bad, not right or wrong, just different.
So I think we have more than politics working against us in trying to push a movement to benefit all, we have actual personal traits to contend with. I don't think the right would consider it fouling "our" nest if we pollute some remote area of this country, and especially not if we pollute somewhere outside our borders. The NIMBY principle is valid to the right. The left sees the whole world as our back yard.
>The problems you point out are not a product of bad decisions
>by immoral people; they are the perfectly predictable precipitates
>of a capitalist economic system (individuals and corporations
>in fact have massive incentives to fuck over others!).
I think its because the people who are running them are people who distrust the rest of the world, not necessarily because the system itself is bad.
>First things first indeed: I don't see how we can buy our
>way out of this dilemma. --In fact, seeing the solution as
>buying or not buying stuff only worsens the problem, because
>it tacitly encourages the belief in "humane" capitalism
>(a hideous oxymoron!).
If leftists were running all the corporations, I think we'd see a real difference. If more on the left started up small green businesses and hired leftwingers, and leftwingers seriously supported those small businesses and quit supporting those run by rightwingers, I think the world could be changed and it could happen quickly if we focused serious organization effort in that direction.. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em, and work right on around them.
--tully