Why do leftists have such a skewed view of reality?

I was recently reading this article. After I finished I began reading through the comments. They were typical of WaPo comments "everyone who doesn't vote dem is a moron" that kind of thing. It's pretty typical and is seen on the right as well. Just partisanship, nothing more, nothing less. But then I got to this comment:


It stunned me because it is a complete 180 from reality. A reality that is easily quantified. But this person is convinced that they're right, in spite of the evidence.

Except that my impression from a lot of different sources is that only major investors and CEOs think that the economy is good.

CNN reports that 71% of people think the economy is in good shape. The highest number since 2001.

Wages are just barely keeping pace with inflation if that.

Wage growth was double inflation.
Wage growth for 2018: 3.8% (2018 was the best wage growth since the financial crisis)
Inflation for 2018: 1.9% (which is down from the prior two years)

There are more jobs, but they are at the bottom end.

There are 1 million more job openings than there are unemployed people.
Manufacturing jobs are growing at 2.5x the rate they were growing before trump.
In 2018 there were 2.7 million jobs created. OF those 1.1 million were in professional and business services, education, and healthcare. Those aren't at the bottom end. Then there were another half million construction and travel jobs that opened. Then you add in manufacturing with a quarter million and 1.9 of the 2.7 million jobs were good jobs.

A lot of cities where there are jobs, there are extreme housing crunches making rents unaffordable.

This person has a point, kind of. Housing is getting expensive, but there are jobs everywhere. Not just in cities.

The trade war has upped the price of cars and major appliances.

Car prices are up 2%. Again, wages are up almost double that.

Health care costs and premiums are through the roof.

While this is true over the long term, 2018 was back to normal growth of costs for me. Went up a few percent compared to 20-50% in the five years prior. If we could just get rid of the ACA altogether, we would be a lot better off.

Xmas season was lousy and retailers are leaving middle and lower class malls, doing well only in upscale malls.

Here are christmas sales growth numbers by year:


I don't think a 4.55% gain on top of a 5% gain the year prior is "lousy." Consider this:
The two years before trump the total gain was 6.5%. The two years since trump the total gain is 10.1%. That's 55% better. That's amazing.

I see the second part of this accusation a lot in liberal comments. The part about store closings and whatnot. This has nothing to do with a bad economy or bad retail sales. It has everything to do with ecommerce, which these lefty's take full advantage of (rightfully so).

So I ask again, how do they have such a warped view of reality? They're living in the same economy as me (I've seen my wage increase by 22% over the last two years). They have the same access to information that I have (we all have the internet). So why do they seem to know so much that just isn't so?

a reply to: Dfairlite

It was just as deluded as teh Republican permutation of reality, but then they went full blown apesnip with "Identity Politics" and totally went off the rails of sanity.

Note the Nazi's literally invented the very "Identity Politics" model the "leftists" are running amok with, although they've taken it to new heights by incorporating 'Orgasm Identity' into it.

The title of your thread and the fact your are dissecting an opinion posted by someone on the internet....

Surely you cant miss the irony.

Status updating, bullet point dorks?

Our economy has been doing a little better over the past couple of years, but it still is not very good. We need more factory jobs here in America, we import way too much stuff. Lots of people make money on those imports, especially the areas like California, New York, and Texas and somewhat in Washington state. Those areas actually raise the price of imports up so our factories could compete with the imports. Those areas also do not want to lose all the import money from their economies, so they will fight to keep us from getting factories, mostly by twisting the truth about the shape of our economy. Democrats tend to push us being dependent on government, with government controlling everything. See, they can punish us for something by cutting off imports so we can suffer. That system has been used by lots of governments over many centuries, the practice is not new.

a reply to: AScrubWhoDied

Are you suggesting this person doesn't feel this way IRL? They just pretend to on the internet?

originally posted by: AScrubWhoDied
The title of your thread and the fact your are dissecting an opinion posted by someone on the internet....

Surely you cant miss the irony.

The fact that you can't post a rebuttal to the OP...

Surely you can't miss the irony.

TO the OP, the left has such an iron-clad echo chamber now that they are living in another reality entirely.

One entirely built by the DNC and their PR arm... the media.

Let's see how that goes with the voters going forward.

S&F for taking the time to make the thread.

It will be a good one to reference as we careen towards 2020.

a reply to: Dfairlite

22% raise? I would say that comes from 3 things: 1. Your hard work. 2. Your boss actually rewarding hard work. 3. Your industry doing well enough to allow raises. Good job.

In my area, which is rural, house prices have gone up like 80% in the past few years. Wages have not. Whole neighborhoods are now rentals. Locals cannot afford them. I'd say many liberals have ready counterexamples, anecdotal, to the statistics that the government puts out. And anecdotes are powerful.

a reply to: Look2theSacredHeart

About 1/3 to 1/2 (at most) was my hard work. The rest was all industry related wage growth. Housing has been insane in my area too. I blame california. There's no way people from the local area can afford these homes anymore. But people from the artificially inflated california market can take their equity and buy a house here.

That said, the wages are starting to make a dent in the pay vs cost of living gap. I was lucky enough to buy a house before the increase of the last few years. Now I have a bunch of equity I could sink into another home if I need to move. But anyone who wasn't so lucky is stuck paying the high rents, for now.

One question.

Do you honestly believe a group of people who think men can be women and women can be men have a grasp of reality?

a reply to: SocratesJohnson

That cuts right to the core of it. Well done.

originally posted by: Dfairlite
I was recently reading this article. After I finished I began reading through the comments. They were typical of WaPo comments "everyone who doesn't vote dem is a moron" that kind of thing. It's pretty typical and is seen on the right as well. Just partisanship, nothing more, nothing less. But then I got to this comment:

It stunned me because it is a complete 180 from reality. A reality that is easily quantified. But this person is convinced that they're right, in spite of the evidence.

When reading these things, you really need to look at the data.

They include alink to the research data. In the research, they gave the breakout of political views of the respondents. 44% of the people answering are independents. Less than a third are Democrats (liberals, presumably.)

So if every single Democrat stood up and said "it's the pits" and everyone else said "just fine"... you'd have only 68% saying the economy was great. Likewise, if you read over a lot of the questions, it's pretty clear that it's not just left-leaning people who think this... a lot of independents also agree and even some Republicans.

So... be careful how you interpret data and always look at the breakdowns. You've been trying to pin a single issue (Trump and economy which is only a small portion of what the poll was about) on the liberals and it's very clear when you look at the data that people of all political persuasions are critical of his performance.

a reply to: Byrd

While I appreciate the time and effort you took to make this post, it doesn't address the question I posed. The economy is doing well by every metric and most people (71%) agree. Yet this person (and many others I have the pleasure of reading) doesn't seem to know basic facts about the economy that's supposedly so terrible. Like wage growth being much higher than inflation. Like the jobs being created are good jobs. Like Christmas sales being really good.

The person I referenced has gotten the facts wrong which are shaping his view. Why does this person not know the facts?

I'm making this too much about the individual I used as a stand in. This is a phenomenon that you inadvertently (I think?) are highlighting. There is a large subset of people who don't see that the economy is good despite every single indicator showing that it is, indeed. Why do they refuse to see reality?

What have the Democratic contenders for 2020 said they believe in and is part of their platform that anyone but a socialist or NAZI in hiding could agree upon ? Old style totalitarianism "NAZI " not the latest incarnation.

Do away with the 9 supreme court justices because constructionist are now in the majority. Make it 11 or 13 justices or just declare term limits so each new president gets to stack the court with at least 3 nominees..
Buy votes by promising to give everyone one thousand dollars a month for government coffers.. (Government does not have money unless they take it from someone else )
Do away with the electoral College (let N.Y., Chicago, L.A. and other big cities nominate all future presidents )

Infanticide...and that is exactly what they profess to support... I guess in their minds it is easy to kill a baby who cannot defend itself ? Disarm everyone and then we will all be in the same boat, No?

Warren said there is no such thing as an illegal human being when talking about border security.. Nice twist on words, No ?

The green new deal estimated at 100 trillion dollars .. Besides I like a good steak for starters (no cows is their new green deal platform)

I still have not figured out who and what is to like about the current DNC hopefuls ? But I darn sure have figured out I want no part of just about anything they have to say with regards the direction they want the country to head....

a reply to: Dfairlite

It's no coincidence to me that the first election after Obama repealed the propaganda ban this huge division happens and the media are the most rabid we have ever seen them.

a reply to: Dfairlite

Liberals were living in pampered luxury during the 8 years of Liberal President Obama.

They really believed it, because Obama told them so!

(His advisors (correctly) told him that Democrats were Low-IQ.)

I think that comment is very accurate. Where I live in the midwest there are jobs but the pay scale in general is stagnate and has been for decades. Sure there's people doing well and receiving cost of living increases but for the most part most are check to check. Last year I had to take a job where I was making the same wage I was making in the early eighties. General pay scale is in the crapper.

Why do leftists have such a skewed view of reality?

Boys can be girls and vice versa.

The planet is out to git them.

Guns get up all on their own and go around killing people.

Russia stole an election from a 'person' that stole her nomination from someone else.

White people are the root of all evil.

Rich people are the root of all evil.

Corporations are the root of all evil.

Bankers are the root of all evil.

Leftists have a skewed view of reality because they've been brainwashed since kindergarten.

When left and right can't compromise and you get all this identify politics BOTH sides are to blame.
You are all being played and you are falling for it.

a reply to: MyToxicTash

It's really quite a spectacle isn't it?