In theory yes, and there was a segment of the genuine left that either voted for Trump or at least didn’t vote for Hillary. But the main part of the left is motivated primarily by power, and only centralization allows them to have the power that they seek.
You are preaching to the choir grumpy! I totally agree that traditional leftists and conservatives could get along quite well - a few disagreements here or there since some Civil Libertarians on the left think we need federal intrusion to in areas such as civil rights. But they still think and act like this is the 1960’s.
I oppose the WOD, I want that bulwark against government abuse and intrusion on individual liberty, I want broad protections of every civil right (and human right) which includes those enumerated in the Constitution. I consider myself a civil libertarian, but not a leftist at all. Not exactly a Libertarian either.
This is all theoretical fat-chewing but: the Federal Government has become so large, especially with regard to collecting money and then block-granting it back to the states. There should really be only a very small federal budget, taxed by excise taxes and duties, to run the military and the federal courts. We should repeal the 16th Amendment. Then let the states and cities tax to whatever their citizens will permit, to spend on whatever social programs their citizens want - but they cannot do it under the current system with the federal government grabbing the lions share of taxes paid. And not even the GOP fights on this questions anymore. They just tinker at the margins.
I often tell people in the simplest of terms. You wouldn’t open up an auto-repair shop in Virginia to fix cars in San Fransciso, would you? But nobody thinks twice about sending the bulk of our taxes to be administered by faceless bureacrats in Virgina to pay for our schools, roads, welfare, medicaid, etc etc. Nobody really questions it, just the obvious inefficiency alone without having to mention the abuse, corruption, waste, cronyism, patronage, and the misallocations and misappropriations etc. For the most part it’s all on auto-pilot, the budgets are just rubber stamped and increased each year, the money is allocated by Congress but administered by agents under the Executive so there’s almost zero real oversight and no incentive to even maximize what’s in place now - reforming it is not even on the agenda.
