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Comment by 0xblood | Hacker News Reader

Can you give me an example of such a position? I would argue that, for example, social programs in Europe are more popular, but still following a left-leaning position that is just more broadly accepted

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Having universal health insurance available for everyone is a consensus opinion in Germany, no party disagrees with that. In the US "socialized medicine" is a controversial topic.

That's because we (in Europe) didn't know anything else and people are reluctant to change seeing the negative PR coming out of US. I'm pretty sure majority of people in Europe hate how our massive taxation is for the most part wasted.

Generalizing over the entirety of Europe is not useful, the countries and political positions are too diverse for that.

And at least in Germany I don't see anyone questioning universal healthcare. There are of course discussions on the details, but nobody is trying to abolish it. And while there are inefficiencies, the US health care system is even less efficient. So we would not save any money by making our system worse.

People really think that most of their taxes are wasted?

So a consensus position is by definition center? So (democratic) countries can't lean to either side of the spectrum because by definition their positions are supported by the majority, and thus a center position?

It depends on how you’re defining “the spectrum” of healthcare policy. If you placed all European nations on a spectrum comparing their healthcare systems, Germany would be on the right of the spectrum because the private sector has a significant role in their healthcare system. Countries like the UK and Denmark would be on the left of the spectrum because their healthcare system is mostly public. Germany’s healthcare system is only left-leaning if you include the US on the spectrum.

I don't mean a majority supports this position, I mean that really nobody opposes it at all. The US Republican position on health care is entirely outside the German political spectrum, it does not exist here in any party that is represented in parliament.

Typically, if there is no majority in opposition of a position, it is typically referred to as "consensus". I do not understand your argument. Germany has a left-leaning position on health care, historically introduced and defended by left-aligned parties but generally accepted across the spectrum. Just because the far right does not want to abolish socialized health care does not make it a center position, at least that is the argument I am trying to make

Why is this position left-leaning? It's only left-leaning from a US perspective.

Hm, that was the whole point of my argument I believe. That this is an inherent left-leaning position, regardless of who is subscribing to it; possibly because in the discussion on how to handle such healthcare, it defends the social and idealistic dimension ("left") rather than the self-responsible and pessimistic perspective ("right"). Now we can argue about political relativism and that no position is inherently and objectively "left" or "right" and it only depends on who articulates that position - and as you might have guessed this is an idea that I am slightly opposed to. Of course we can start with the Overton window and shifting beliefs and the possibility than in a century from now on, universal healthcare might be considered, for whatever reason, a hardcore right-wing extremist position.

That's an American perspective. The right, in Europe, support universal healthcare (because they own the companies that provide the services and receive the tax money). It's been this way for a very long time.

Therefore, characterising Europe as left wing on this issue is a mistake.

I believe the position you're starting from is already biased by the notion that only a left/right directionality can exist and that other degrees of freedom are not allowed in political systems. Of course this is why I think first past the post the the R/D split in the US is so bad.

oh boy you clearly have no understanding of health insurance.

I would say of the top of my head:

• Employee rights

• Health insurance

• Militarism ("What is an appropriate amount to spend on military")

• Global Warming

• Human rights (reproductive rights in particular).

Well even if you disregard ideologies, just the legislations that are in place influence what the center of a position could be.

For example in my country our right wing government had made good on a right wing promise to increase the maximum highway speed from 120kph to 130kph.

Some years later however it turned out that the presence of highways contributed to dangerous levels of nitric oxides (edited from nitrogen) in the air and a judge forced that same administration to reduce the maximum speed from 130kph to 100kph.

Now legislation (and reality) has changed a right wing position from being "disregard the environment, prioritise economy and increase the speed" to "disregard health, prioritise economy and increase the speed". The same position was basically transformed into a more extreme position due to the circumstances changing.

I imagine that same thing holds for many topics. It sure feels a lot more extreme to advocate gun regulation when doing so in opposition of school shooting victims. I generally support the idea of gun ownership, but the shootings definitely forced me to have a more nuanced opinion that shifted my position from the conservative side to the progressive side.

Air is mostly nitrogen, and that isn't dangerous.

Dutch media is terrible and refuses to name the actual compounds involved (NOx and NH3) because that would require them to distinguish between the different sources of this pollution. So they've just been calling it "nitrogen" and so you get people repeating the assertion that there are dangerous levels of "nitrogen" in the air.

Yeah, I don't know what the proper English name for those compounds is. Is it nitric oxides and ammonia?

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