Do liberals understand conservatives better than conservatives understand liberals?
No.There are probably a lot of ways to break this question down. One of them has been studied, and it’s the other way around,with conservatives on average much better at understanding liberals:(1) When asked to fill out a survey about their values, and then fill out another survey describing what your political opposite says they value, conservatives are better than liberals. This doesn’t get into underlying subtleties, it doesn’t weed out misinformation — even at the surface level, liberals tend not to understand conservative values.Conservatives tend to have a large set of values than liberals: liberals stick to compassion, fairness and a particular definition of freedom. Conservatives also directly value leadership/followership, loyalty to your community, and sanctity (it’s hard to label these, but the surveys show clear patterns even if the labels aren’t clear). Liberals tend to misunderstand those values.See Jonathan Haidt, The Righteous Mind, p.287, orLiberals Don’t Understand ConservativesIt’s quite likely that this lack of knowing your opponent is part of why on surveys that are issue-by-issue liberals tend to do better than election-by-election: in surveys significant majorities generally want pre-existing health issues covered, don’t want kids separated from their families, are fine with very minimal gun regulation, but Democrats can’t seem to build this into winning campaigns.(2) A second way that liberals or conservatives could misunderstand each other is the difference between voters (like family members) and political leaders.I think, again, conservatives are better at understanding liberals than vice-versa, partly because there is less of a division between candidates and voters on the left: at least so far, the psychological studies of Obama, the Clintons or Sanders are likely to show up broadly similar patterns as their voters. For conservatives, there is often a big gulf: for example, it’s pretty easy to imagine that Trump wouldn’t have voted for a candidate like Trump, he might well hate a similar person who beat him out to the role of being leader.When liberals decide that their conservative uncle has Trump’s values because he voted for Trump, this tends to be a misunderstanding; again, much of why Trump is in office is from Democrats not figuring out the real values of voters who are frustrated with Democrats.See: The Authoritarians by Bob AltemeyerThere are probably lots of other ways to understand and misunderstand each other…
Do conservatives understand that a judge determined there was probable cause to investigate Trump?
The FISA court authorized the Special Counsel investigation based on affidavit testimony alleging probable cause that a crime had been (of is being) committed. Not only that, but every 90 days Robert Mueller must go back to the FISA court to renew his authorization. During these renewal applications Mueller may NOT rely upon information which was used to justify a previous renewal. He must present NEW evidence to maintain the warrant. And this has been going on for 21 months - that's seven renewals... seven times Mueller was able to present NEW evidence of crimes... seven times the FISA court has found ongoing probable cause.
Do the conservatives understand that the Mueller report is just the end of the first act?
As far as the drama of Washington politics goes the Mueller report was just the end of the first act. We aren't even to intermission yet. The House will demand the full report, not just a summary letter from a Trump appointee and once they get a copy they'll decide if it warrants an impeachment investigation, act 2. If they truly think this is over I guess they didn't pay attention to the investigations headed by Republicans over the past 30 years.
Do conservatives understand that without a minimum wage the price of unskilled labor would reach equilibrium at a subsistence wage?
Do you understand that all prices reach equilibrium according to supply and demand, which in the case of wages has little or nothing to do with subsistence?What affects a person’s wage are primarily things like their productivity, what other options they have, how many available workers there are, how useful or desired that kind of work currently is and so on. If my “needs” increase, that has no effect on my income. It MIGHT have an indirect effect, by motivating me to work more hours or in a higher-paying job but that’s quite different.The minimum wage (MW) law does nothing to address the above factors. It’s a simple but stupid and fallacious idea which has miraculously survived to this day. Making certain voluntary transactions illegal does nothing to help those people involved. Whether someone is willing to work for $8/h or not is their choice, not the government’s. The MW can take away that option, but not provide an alternative. And it’s quite ridiculous to assume that a higher rate of pay can simply be enforced with no effect on unemployment rates. As long as there are unemployed people, the real MW is zero and mandated price controls make it harder for those people to get a job.The policy does indirectly help people who already have well-paying jobs by reducing their competition. That’s why it’s popular among unions and in South Africa during Apartheid as a method of holding blacks back. Milton Friedman called it the most anti-negro law on the books. I think he knew a thing or two about economics…
Do conservatives understand that Mueller's investigation is far more legitimate than Trump's presidency?
No, because they are profoundly stupid and gullible.