Liberal - “favorable to or in accord with concepts of maximum individual freedom possible, especially as guaranteed by law and secured by governmental protection of civil liberties.”

https://www.dictionary.com/browse/liberal

I was not referring to Democrat, but the classical meaning.

Ignoring your no true Scotsman, you're insinuating that essentially either airlines/cruise/rail/trucking/etc are managed just fine, or there's no true conservatives still in power.

Well, that means that cudgy is saying that there are no true liberals in power, either.

But I'd be interested in how you think money is being given to rail companies. Not to passenger rail service agencies, to the actual rail companies.

(And in your list, you forgot the barge companies.)

I'd not disagree with that. My point, which seemed to fall flat, is that Republicans used their majority power to prop up mismanaged companies instead of letting the "free market" do what it does best, destroy bad businesses with nary a whimper from their party about the shortsighted management mismanaging these critical companies.

Sure. Republicans have principles, until they get in the majority. That's been true for decades (at least).

Maybe that's Republicans' moral failings. Maybe it's that they don't actually believe in their claimed positions. Maybe it's just the reality of politics - when you're out of power, you say what you want to do, and when you're in power, you have to do what you can, not what you want to. But it's been observable (and disconcerting) for a long time.

There are clearly limits on what can be done when in power but America's government is pretty ineffective when compared to other nations. There is far more compromising of purpose then there has to be.

This is often repeated, but I doubt well thought through. The best form of government is a monarchy led by a brilliant “perfect” leader. The worst form of government is a monarchy led by a horrible “imperfect” leader. Democracy is like sausage or blended wines and scotch: safer bet if you want please more of the diners and avoid nasty food fights.

What did Republicans even try to do, besides tax cuts for the rich, during trump? Democrats at least had the flawed aca during Obama.

They also killed a good number of people and started a war or two. Does that matter too?

The rushed executions and glorified middle east ops were awful as well...

I think this is a really good example of why this article is pretty damn accurate. Both true liberals and true conservatives look on their own and the opposition party as being too corporate focused because the majority of neither one represents their interest. It's on the fringes of each party that politicians that represent the interests of the people exist and those fringes are those maligned as fascists and communists, since everyone on the other side wants to pick on them and nobody on their own side wants to defend them. There's a suitable Noam Chomsky quote for this

> In the US, there is basically one party - the business party. It has two factions, called Democrats and Republicans, which are somewhat different but carry out variations on the same policies. By and large, I am opposed to those policies. As is most of the population.