Oh. I heard Oprah got a mil, but that could be fake
I heard Elon was born on the moon, but that could be fake too. I wish there was a way to know for sure, or at least see a small amount of evidence one way or the other.
That's a mere pittance compared to what the wealthy actually spend on conservatives and messaging. That's 1 billion dollars every 4 years. Fox news, daily wire, OANN, and all the myriad of other propaganda outlets churn through more than that a year.
Yes, but we're not talking about conservatives.
The Democratic party has a problem, and that problem is what Democratic voters want doesn't align with what Democratic donors want. The voters want progressive policies passed, while the donors want the same neoliberalism that keeps them rich. And trying to appease one of those groups obviously alienates the other.
If any Democratic politician truly wants to help the American population, the fact that Kamala raised so much money in such a short amount of time, and the fact that many states passed progressive policies even though they voted for Trump, should tell them that they don't need to kowtow to the wealthy because the voters will support them. Unfortunately, I don't think they're going to learn that lesson.
Republicans, of course, don't have this problem because their voters and their donors all want the same thing.
The whole point of this was asking why Democrats are catering to wealthy conservative donors instead of progressive or left leaning voters. I just stated the reason why. The 1 billion dollars collected from small donors every four years for a presidential run is nice. But it's nothing compared to what the wealthy dump into messaging and campaigning constantly. Until such time as small donors can even come close to remotely matching that. Sustaining entire media Outlet ecosystems to counter the propaganda from conservatives. Democrats aren't going to give up trying to get some of that wealthy conservative money
I donated to Kamala's campaign ($10), but then I realized what direction they were taking around the DNC and stopped giving them money.
Not all doners agreed with her platform, just like how not all voters did.
What happens to the amount they didn't spend?
they're in debt
Maybe if they go bankrupt we can start a new party that cares what its voters think and doesnt shit the bed so often.
nothings stopping you right now
Money, time, and connections are pretty big things you need to start a new political party.
It's not like advertising a garage sale.
I like your spirit though.
another party failing won't make any of that easier
X for doubt on that. Im sure they've said that though. That's a lot of really expensive campaign parties for a three month run
Overall, they are stil about ~100mm in the black.
Iirc, they had 140mm in debt and 240mm in cash on hand.
They spent stupidly, they were buying ads in Kentucky and Texas, instead of focusing on swing states and progressive policies to bring dems out in force.
It was celebrity money, you know, the same people that were telling people they were "just like them."
Really awesome point! I hope that becomes apparent to them
Narrator: It didn't.
Going further right didn't help, now we need to go as left as possible
Radical ideas like Universal healthcare, paid maternity leave, free child care, taxing the rich.
Radical ideas the rest of the 1st world had had for 50 years and successfully implemented.
We're well aware, and it's honestly getting old hearing "wElL tHe ReSt Of ThE wOrLd," yeah, the UK voted to leave the EU and ousted a party to replace them with Labour who don't want to hold another referendum on the vote.
India continues to elect the populist and nationalist Modi as their PM, because he gives them bags of rice with his name on them and tells them it's ok to hate Muslims.
Germany is flirting with fascism again, and they've got all the stuff Americans are apparently too fucking stupid to get done, right?
Dutch police just rounded up a bunch of pro-Palestinian protesters, protesting peacefully, and then started beating them for not moving fast enough.
Oh, and the majority of European countries are freaking the fuck out about immigration and the floods of immigrants trying to come into their countries. And funnily enough, your politicians speak about immigrants the same way our Republicans do.
But you're right, the people who weren't alive 50 years ago when all of this should have been done, yeah, that's our fucking fault too, right?
Like that'll ever happen.
The party is held by a group of political elites who are all about the establishment and power.
There needs to be a new party, a labor party, to represent the working class Americans.
I agree.
I voted for Harris because Dems are supposed to be the establishment. Supposed to be a return normal boring politics.
That's obviously not going to work. Now we need an actual working class, under a few million dollar a year takehome party.
It would be easier for progressives to take over the DNC and state Dems than to form an entirely new party and make it viable.
Why not both? It's easier to force your way under and into that tent/coalition with an organized front to do the talking. A political party that has well defined goals and objectives, while speaking for a big group, is bound to be better at working within a broader coalition than what we have now.
That would be ideal, but the people who are already there will never give it up.
And the problem with creating a new party is that it will divide the votes, while the conservatives are all united under the Republican party. Unless they split too. Maybe the non Trumpists can split off and form a more traditional party. But again, they're too afraid to split THEIR votes.
A reverse tea-party movement. That could work. We were laughing when the tea party started because it seemingly broke GOP unity, but they managed to shift the Overton window so far to the right that the GOP now is the tea party, and Dems are GOP lite. Reversing that trend is extremely necessary.
I instead see them not learning a damn thing and putting up Nancy Pelosi as the Presidential candidate for 2028.
Will she achieve lichdom in time?
Acting as if she hasn't already! There's a reason that dude went after her husband with a hammer and not her. He knew better than to mess with a lich.
Or Manchin or Sinema or Liz Cheney.
In all honesty, Newsom is probably the candidate the party leadershit has already selected.
Correct, Biden just cozying up to Trump when he should be using emergency powers to arrest this madman who under the 14th Amendment isn't even eligible to be President was absolutely sickening to me.
Biden doesn't even know wtf is going on. If he does, the last thing he's doing is trying to salvage his legacy. He's got no fight in him.
He truly fucked us. Not saying Harris would've won necessarily, but having only 3 months to run a campaign against someone who's been running for 8 years is tricky. You can see why given the number of people googling if Biden dropped out...
A legacy of "Used powers given to him by the Supreme Court to stop Hitler 2.0" would be better than "Sucked Trump's dicker harder than Elon did."
For real. Dudes got 15-20 years left on this Earth, at the maximum. Stopping Trump and actually making sure he is charged for his crimes would be quite the footnote in the history books. I can't imagine being that old and passing an opportunity like that up, but then again I am a simple prole.
He's not Hitler 2.0 yet though. This is Hitler 2.0 RC 1.
The history books won't know what will not have had happened.
What I'm saying is, if a madman is stopped before he goes mad, then wouldn't he then never have been a madman? Was the one stopping him, justified? Can you defend their actions based on their presuppositions, even if the descent into madness is already evident?
Right so... "let's do the thing the fascist threatens to do because we're right and it's justified" is not the same thing as the fascist saying "we'll do it because we're right and it's justified".
Easy to justify the means when you believe in the ends... but of course every one thinks they are right and that everyone else will come to believe they are right, thusly conveniently avoiding any bad consequences.
Do you have any idea what would have happened if Biden just arrested Trump?
Breaking the rules isn't fascism though. Fascism is fascism.
What do you think is a more ethical choice:
a) uphold the law, knowing it will let fascist come to power and kill thousands
a) break the law and stop him
Breaking the rules isn’t fascism though. Fascism is fascism.
It is precisely fascism. It's ignoring the rule of law to achieve authoritarian aims. Why is it ok when you agree with the outcome and not ok when you don't? But way more importantly, once you do it you cannot go back. If Biden did this and Trump ended up winning - make no mistake Biden has no authority to remove candidates from ballots - then Trump would feel completely justified in jailing his opponents.
What do you think is a more ethical choice
A. Because the premise of your choice is flawed. You do not know that breaking the law would stop him. You do not know -with certainty- that not breaking the law would result in that outcome. But we do know that being authoritarian to achieve aims we believe in is no better than people we disagree with doing the exact same. What would happen if Biden was successful in stopping Trump but then, because we wouldn't ever keep unfettered presidential power... right? RIGHT? We're the "good" guys... what would happen if MAGA Republicans won in 2028? I doubt we'd ever have another election again.
Uh, Trump feels completely justified in jailing his enemies already. Will it happen? I'm not excited to wait and find out.
True. But the one thing we've got going for us is that it is demonstrably wrong and we didn't fall into the trap of proving it was justified.
Edit: well at least two people think it's ok to use authoritarian political power to counter authoritarian political power. Do you really think that ever works out? Note that this is very distinct from something like civil war or overthrowing the government. It's doing the exact thing you don't want your opponent to do.
Tis a risky game, doing what's right.
"what’s right" is, sadly not an agreed-upon concept.
That may be true, but I happen to believe that truth does exist. All we can do is hold on to it.
I doubt we’d ever have another election again.
With Trump in office, and Project 2025 in the pipeline, I doubt we're ever going to have another election anyway.
I doubt we’re ever going to have another election anyway.
I sometimes feel that way. But I still have some faith in people, particularly Gen Z. I believe after the shit hits the fan and keeps hitting it for 4 years, that we'll turn this around. And because we didn't agree to make presidents kings we can actually do that.
Are you really achieving authoritarian aims if the end goal is not authoritarian?
Ah, the benevolent dictator fallacy. Because no person or party would ever abuse power or fail to give it up once the "aim" is achieved. There certainly would be no expansion in what the "aim" is. And definitely the people we agree with are always good.
What would happen if Biden was successful in stopping Trump but then, because we wouldn’t ever keep unfettered presidential power… right? RIGHT? We’re the “good” guys… what would happen if MAGA Republicans won in 2028? I doubt we’d ever have another election again.
From the standpoint of democracy that wouldn't be ideal, but why is republicans having 2(4) years of unchecked power better? They don't give a shit and gonna do a lot more damage to it.
Why is it ok when you agree with the outcome and not ok when you don’t?
Because the side coming to power wants to gleefully deport, repress and kill people, and the other one much less so. The good guys are "good" not because they respect the rules, but because they believe in humane values, in ending their fists when the others' faces begins and all that good stuff. They are bad not because they break the law, but because they believe and want to do fascism.
If the rules are unjust then breaking them is an ethical imperative. And Trump not being in jail is frankly a crime against lady liberty.
Do you have any idea what would have happened if Biden just arrested Trump?
If he would've done it early in his term, I suspect Trump would not have been elected president again. But instead he pushed the idea through some absurdly bureaucratic system that allowed Trump to run the clock out on everything.
If he would’ve done it early in his term, I suspect Trump would not have been elected president again.
We would have had a civil war or at least an attempted one. Then the next time a MAGA-esque Republican came along, which would probably be in 2028 or 32 they'd feel free to completely take the gloves off. We would have validated and enabled that behavior by doing it ourselves.
I do find it fascinating that you seem to be attributing this all to Biden. We have a relatively weak executive branch and separation of powers through different branches of government for a reason. Overturning that is the worst possible idea.
Yeah, it might be just to arrest him, but America clearly doesn't give a fuck. The fact of the matter is the people picked Trump this election, if nothing else arresting him will only galvanize his followers and legitimatize their own turn to fascism. There's no good outcome in this scenario, we missed that opportunity on election night. It sucks but right now we're the kid playing with fire; obviously we need to learn the hard way. We should've learned from the last trump presidency you say? Yeah, we really, really should've.
Biden cozying up to a candidate the party portrayed as literally Hitler during the campaign will never not be funny to me
"The establishment party must become an anti-establishment party"
Have you all learned nothing from 2016? Democrats will rather let Trump win that let this happen.
The slide to the right is no accident nor is it ignorance. Fool me once...
Are you suggesting that Democrats want alt-right leadership in power?
They and their donors would prefer thst over a Bernie win.
They want corporarions to stay in power.
The 2 parties are just flavours of capital.
Neither are for the public.
Nothing has convinced me of that more than Biden and Trump's sudden bromance
alt-right
Stop pretending this is a thing. It'll make it a lot easier to understand.
Yes, it's good for their fundraising
I've said this before, but I think it needs to be repeated:
The populist, anti-elitist lane on the left is wide open. I don't know that a mainstream "Democratic" party can take that lane, and I don't know if we should bother trying to drag them there. However, what I can say is that there is going to be some significant hay to make in that field.
I think Pramila Jayapal, Ayanna Pressley, Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar, Delia Ramirez, Jamaal Bowman, Summer Lee, Cori Bush, Katie Porter, anyone who has been rat-fucked by Democrats should all abandon their identification with the Democratic party and become independents. And in the time that he has left, at their lead, should be Bernie Sanders, who never needed to be told about the consequences of running with milquetoast policies.
Even if they caucus with Democrats, true progressives need to show them that their votes aren't a given, and if they want them, they need to take a step towards their legislative priorities. Giving up our votes without leverage, giving in to the Washington groupthink: THIS LOSES ELECTIONS!
We shouldn't focus on redeeming the Democratic party. Let them sink. Focus on getting good quality, reliable progressive populists elected. The Democratic party is a fucking anchor and we're better off without it. Let those unwilling to let go of that Washington groupthink sink with it.
Split the non Republican vote so you leave the door wide open for them? That's the problem with first past the post...
While this strategy may feel good, it makes the minorities Republicans want to hurt the cost of doing business. Even if Democrats can't deliver on anything substantial in the short term voting for them in elections is useful.
First, it reduces the harm done to minorities. Second, it demonstrates there is a progressive voter block the democrats could shift closer to. Third, assuming we get more elections and the Democrats aren't all in jail, it creates time for a progressive, like the Democrats your argument listed, to co-opt the Democratic Party. Like what Trump did to the Republicans and Bernie tried to do to the Democrats.
Rather than trying to achieve moral victory over Democrats, let's leverage power for the people Republicans want to hurt.
Or maybe they should just leave the Democratic party and start a new progressive party? We have less than 4 years, but that's also the most time we'll ever have.
The problem with that strategy is that our democracy uses a first-past-the-post voting system which trends towards a two-party system.
There already are two. We must co-opt one with a populist candidate. The Republican Party was already hijacked by Trump. That leaves the Democratic Party.
Bernie tried twice, Democrats demonstrated their ability to stop that shit in its tracks. It will not work.
The only solution is for progressives to abandon the Party and start their own to replace it. The US has replaced parties before, it can be done again.
The Democrat establishment wants power and for that they have to win elections. So having an anti establishment candidate is preferable to them over a Republicans victory. If anything good came out of the last election, it is that Trump as horrible as he is can still win elections against an establishment Democrat, so the Democrats have to change.
Also changing the parties does not work. The problem is systematic and the US really needs to change its election system, to get better politics.
They sure didn't look like they wanted to win this election.
They switch candidates in the middle of the campaign, because Biden's polling was that bad.
And then Harris did everything she could to reassure everyone she was exactly like Biden, completely defeating the strategy.
Trump tried once and it worked. Neoliberal ideas are entrenched in the minds of Americans. Neoliberalism only allows change to the people in charge of systems as it asserts, incorrectly, that our institutions are flawless. Since neoliberals only consider changing people, it is much easier for a fascist to convince a neoliberal to change the people in society. Where as it is much harder for a progressive or a socialist to convince a neoliberal to enact systemic change or redistribute wealth respectively.
In short, people with neoliberal ideas in their head need to fully internalize neoliberalism as a scam.
Abandoning the Democrats will not result in them being replaced. They will continue to exist by moving further to the right, as Democrats like Chris Murphy have already proposed.
Starting a successful third party is mathematically impossible under a FPTP system. Third party candidates can only be spoiler candidates.
Where's the Whig Party?
Why must one of those parties be the Democrats? I don’t see no fucking Whigs around, do you?
Because unlike the Wigs, the Democrats are not divided over slavery. They can just move to the right on contemporary issues as Chris Murphy details here.
The Democrats are divided over Israel. Something like 80 House members boycotted Netanyahu's speech, and the Party base is overwhelmingly anti-genocide. That's enough to get the ball rolling.
It's not enough. The House elections happen every two years. AIPAC can successfully primary progressive politicians if we don't vote for them.
Murphy spells it out. Democrats are moving to the right to get people who aren't 100% with them on social and cultural issues. There is a huge base of people in the US that support Israel. And they tend to be consistent older voters.
Democrats moving to the right are only going to lose more and more voters, because the only reason people vote for them is because they aren't as far to the right as Republicans. It sure looks like moving to the right cost Harris the election, they're destroying their only appeal.
And those voters that they lose will be looking for a new party, because they won't let themselves be dragged to the right. So while the Democrats destroy their own party it makes perfect sense for progressives to abandon ship and reform into a new party to replace them.
This is all academic, of course. In reality we might not be able to vote ever again lol
It will definitely lose them progressive votes. And it probably won't gain them many conservative votes. But the Democrats are still going to try anyway. They look at who voted and chase those people's votes. edit: typo
Most of the country wants a new party, but our FPTP system mathematically guarantees they will never get it.
Third party doesn’t work. You have to do what trump did, 1 man coup from the inside.
Apparently Republican voters are gonna set the mark at R regardless of who it is, so how about having someone like Bernie run in the Republican primary.
It didn't work with Bernie for more reasons than the parties resistance. A lot of people on the left that dislike the party don't seem to understand that you still have to join the party and get involved with it if you want the party to move left. Party members and active involved people shape where the party goes. We absolutely can shift the Dems left, but it means holding our noses and becoming the party. The Dems have always been an open door, big tent, party. Walk into the tent and change minds...
The Dems didn't let a single Palestinian-American speak at the DNC this year. The tent is big enough for Cheney, not us.
Yeah, the Dems are made up of scared moderates, because the left has completely abandoned politics and conceded all their power. If you want the party to move left, become the party. It really isn't mystical or complicated, power goes to those that take it. The left would rather stand on the outside looking in be cause at least they can complain and blame everyone else but themselves.
I tried to run for a small local position with the DNC using one of their arms that is for "funding and supporting small progressives" well that first bit is a lie. First question they asked me was how much money I had and if I had rich family to fund my campaign.
I told them not really but I would rather talk policy and maybe alternatives to spending money and they told me to pretend to be religious to find a good church to get donations from cause there are some rich churches.
I told them I was a Buddhist and happy for it, and they suggested I either find some other wealthy Buddhists cause they were sure I should be able to find some or maybe I should consider not running at all and just donating to this group or volunteering for free to them.
This will take acceptance and support from the people that run the party and all the wealthy party owners that view themselves better than working class because of their connections and wealth.
I've worked for the party and even helped recruit candidates. Some of what you're writing here seems very inconsistent with how we did things at least in Minnesota and Wisconsin. No one would ever address religion or social class at all here. And funding your own campaign is usually a fools errand, because raising money helps people become invested in your campaign.
But candidates are still expected to fundraise in some way shape or form. You can't be a viable candidate in today's world without money. Until elections are publicly funded and banned from raising their own money, money will always be necessary. The ability to fundraise also proves viability, people that raise money show people are quite literally invested in your campaign, making them statistically likely to vote and more likely to volunteer for 'get out the vote' efforts.
I understand all that but instead of starting with ways to start naturally and get your name out there it was directly to money. No, conversation on anything else. Just a dollar threshold for us to hit or get out of their hair.
This was with the "run for something" group while in Florida. But there was definitely people from other states and they were all equally disturbed at the immediate grilling for us to fund ourselves and to be in a major religion.
I do get that it seems ass backwards and incompatible with how a person would actually run for a local position and it's why a lot of people have become disenfranchised by the whole system and party.
Florida
It's like the state has deep pride in their idiocy.
Oh sure. And I left but the group I worked with is national and as they brag the largest entry point for new candidates and they weren't the state.
Florida just ends up an easy excuse to ignore that it's millions of people experiencing situations closer to mine.
It's not like Florida was a swing state or anything with a huge population and economy.
Do you mind me asking, what was the group recruiting?
A political philosophy supporting the rights and power of the people in their struggle against the privileged elite.
Trump didn’t run on any economic populism this year and won. Kamala did, and lost. It’s the electorate stupid!
She scrubbed all economic populism from her campaign in the last couple months and pivoted to campaigning with neoconservatives.
She literally went all out on her economic agenda the last 2 weeks of her campaign.
Where were the price controls to control price gouging? Where were the rent controls to fight corporate landlords and their price fixing? She mentioned this stuff once back in August and then that part of her agenda got really quiet for some reason.
She brought that up in one of her last town halls. And if she already said it, and it was well known, what’s the issue? Remember Trump’s platinum plan.
Did she? I didn't hear about that.
And if she doesn't mention it more than once, people interpret that as her not being serious. Telling people "It's on the website!" is terrible campaign strategy.
Trump ran on a populist platform that wasn't limited to economic populism. Harris didn't have any compelling narrative whatsoever.
It’s the electorate stupid!
It's worth while for the electorate to learn the right lessons. Otherwise there wouldn't be people in this comment section trying to get everyone to learn the wrong lessons.
Agreed, but all the other talking points from Trump weren’t populist, just do whistles
Trump's populism is christian nationalism. Specifically white christian nationalism. So it's not going to look Bernie's populism. And those do whistles are, or at least were before they became so overt, dog whistles.
We have already seen a third party take over a major party. The current problem with the GOP is because it absorbed the Tea Party.
With the right symbol to rally behind, we can do the same thing to the Democratic party. We need to build the Guillotine Party.
I am so down for it as long we get to use the symbol at least once for real.
Oh, I'm all for ranked choice voting, but in order for it to have any meaning we also need a plurality of parties. They also need time to build and I'm sure these two would start a good one if allowed.
Although the likelihood of political parties having any weight at all past January is anyone's guess..
Without rank choice voting any progressive party would act as a spoiler for the Democratic Party. Debilitating ourselves in this way isn't particularly useful for leveraging power to create better outcomes for the environment and minorities.
Then the Democratic Party had best make sure that progressives have no reason to split off and form their own party, huh?
Why does it always fall to progressives to get behind Democrats and never the other way around?
Debilitating ourselves in this way isn’t particularly useful for leveraging power to create better outcomes for the environment and minorities.
Oh thank god Democrats don't throw vulnerable populations under the bus every chance they get.
Then the Democratic Party had best make sure that progressives have no reason to split off and form their own party, huh?
The FPTP voting system ensures that they do not have a reason.
Why does it always fall to progressives to get behind Democrats and never the other way around?
The FPTP voting system and entrenchment of neoliberalism in the minds of the American public for over 40 years from both mainstream political parties starting with Reagan. This is may be the case for western countries and democracies more broadly as well. Currently, neoliberal ideas cause a contradiction when a person encounters progressive or socialist ideas. Along the lines of:
Why would we fix our institutions if they are flawless? What's the hurry to solve our problems if we are at the end of history?
Some useful and correct resolutions of these contradictions are:
Our institutions are flawed because they were made by us, flawed humans. The time to advert climate change, fix systemic inequalities, the reduce the wealth gap is now. Incremental changes will run out the clock, as they don't address the root causes. There will be hundreds of millions if not billions of causalities unless these issues are addressed sooner rather than later.
Neoliberal ideas must be pulled from the minds of Americans like a weed. Or like one of those radishes in Super Mario Bros 2. Then people will be able to embrace ideas like systemic change to institutions and wealth redistribution from the rich to everyone else.
When asked about socialism, if a person responds with 'socialism doesn't work' or 'the Soviet Union collapsed' those are the tells that a person needs to full internalize neoliberalism as a scam.
And maybe a history lesson about how the Soviet Union was actually an authoritarian communist dictatorship and not a socialist country. The government owned the means of the production, not the people, and the government wasn't representative of the people.
Oh thank god Democrats don’t throw vulnerable populations under the bus every chance they get.
It's better than the Democrats intentionally murdering people in camps. Neoliberals in office aren't going to solve our problems, but it gives us time to do the work to solve them. Like educating people and co-opting the Democratic Party in one of their primaries. Like Trump did to the Republicans and Bernie tried to do to the Democrats. edit: typo
It’s better than the Democrats intentionally murdering people in camps.
The would in a heartbeat if they thought they could get one Republican vote for doing so.
Neoliberals in office aren’t going to solve our problems, but it gives us time to do the work to solve them.
Neoliberals ARE our problem. We've had half a century of incrementalists demanding that we just wait a little more for them to get around to moving the needle to the left, and instead they move so far to the right that they're buddy-buddy with Netanyahu and the Cheneys. Incrementalism says "too soon" until it's too late.
The would in a heartbeat if they thought they could get one Republican vote for doing so.
Again, don't lie. The Democratic Party can of course move that far, but they have yet to do so.
Neoliberals ARE our problem.
Neoliberalism is the problem. Neoliberals can be tomorrow's socialists. But we have to put in the work and educate people. My argument already refuted this point, I recommend reading it.
Again, don’t lie. The Democratic Party can of course move that far, but they have yet to do so.
Just wait. Incrementalism will get you there.
Neoliberalism is the problem. Neoliberals can be tomorrow’s socialists
You have unfounded faith in neolliberals' willingness to move any direction other than right.
If your arguments actually referenced mine in any meaningful way you would know I have addressed these points in this comment section multiple times. As it stands, a casual refutation of your arguments is now sufficient. edit: typo
I have addressed these points in this comment section multiple times.
Yes, with "leverage power we don't have against people who would rather lose than stop throwing people under the bus."
We do have this power. We elected Joe Biden in 2020. Your argument pretends we don't at the expense of minorities and our ability to prevent the worst outcomes of climate change.
A few weeks ago, I'd have agreed with you, but now? The Democratic party that just lost 10 million votes.. We'll spoil that party? The one that just lost a fair election to a convicted felon? You want to protect them from being spoiled?
We have 4 years, which is, again, the most time we'll ever get to try something like this because that's how 4 year election cycles work. What is it exactly that they're doing successfully you don't want to spoil?
We’ll spoil that party?
Yes, running third party candidates in a FPTP voting system is how the spoiler effect works.
You want to protect them from being spoiled?
Because of the FPTP voting system our democracy will always trend towards a two-party system. Until we enact systemic change, we will be stuck with the Democrats and the Republicans. As long as the Democrats are further to the left of fascism we should vote for them and avoid limiting our power with third party candidates.
We the people and our interests are what avoiding the spoiler effect protects.
What is it exactly that they’re doing successfully you don’t want to spoil?
The Democrats are neoliberals. They are easier to push on social issues and the environment. The Democratic Party is the party progressives and socialists are going to want to co-opt with a populist candidate. Like Bernie tried to do and Trump did to the Republicans. But more to the point, they do not want to kill minorities and destroy the environment.
Rather than seeking a moral victory over Democrats we should look for ways to leverage power for the people Republicans want to hurt. Doing otherwise makes the harm done to minorities the cost of doing business.
I mean yes, that's been the playbook for 8 years. More like 16 if you count what people actually thought Obama was going to be (and had record turn out). Try, try again?
The lives of millions of minorities and the Earth's climate are at stake now. Minorities will notice the difference in the short term, but we will all notice the difference in the long term. Assuming we still have elections and a Democratic Party going forward, yes. We delay fascism and co-opt the Democratic Party. edit: typos
Look, I don't know if you guys haven't been paying attention but places have been getting ravaged for decades because of what we've been doing. Everyone around me was flabbergasted with what happened in the NC western mountains. They videos were exactly like those I've been seeing in the Philippines and other countries that we just completely ignore when there's a natural disaster (maybe a 30 second blip in the media headline for 80% of it if they're in a really poor region).
The Western mountains were devastated because of the infrastructure in natural valleys and huge amounts of sediment deposited by centuries of mining those mountains out (you can see the natural rock formations that returned, lots of people know the land they built on wasn't there before it was developed). The hurricane wasn't man made, but everything fucking else about that catastrophe was because of our activity.
I don't know what the answer is, but I've been waiting for the democrat heroes to save the day since I started voting during Bush's administration that I was thoroughly against and thought our invasion of Iraq was a war crime. Now we continue to this day with a never ending war machine and a corporation first politics that hasn't ever changed. I'm all for us talking about some alternatives and pushing for everything and anything right now, not waiting to form something later to help "sway" the democrats policies (which it really didn't in the long run did it?)
Look, I don’t know if you guys haven’t been paying attention
I've been talking to people about climate change on this site.
(which it really didn’t in the long run did it?)
If we give up before we succeed then that's a self-fulfilling prophecy. The Democrats are neoliberals. They aren't going to solve our problems. But them being in power will give us the time to educate people and co-opt their party.
It's adorable that you expect anyone to buy that the Democratic Party is movable after they just spent a whole ass year refusing to budge on fucking genocide.
The Democratic Party is the party progressives and socialists are going to want to co-opt with a populist candidate. Like Bernie tried to do and Trump did to the Republicans.
This is the key part I recommend you read.
Also, this is off topic, but Harris did pledge to end the war. It was in the news. She called for a ceasefire at least three times. If you care about the Palestinians, then voting for the party that wants to end the war is more useful than allowing the party that wants Israel to finish the job to take power.
The Democratic Party is the party progressives and socialists are going to want to co-opt with a populist candidate. Like Bernie tried to do and Trump did to the Republicans.
This is the key part I recommend you read.
I read it. Democrats will keep playing the left for fools and moving to the right, no matter what happens.
Also, this is off topic, but Harris did pledge to end the war. It was in the news. She called for a ceasefire at least three times.
BIDEN called for a ceasefire. With the same complete lack of conviction. There was no daylight between her and Biden on Netanyahu's genocide.
If you care about the Palestinians, then voting for the party that wants to end the war is more useful than allowing the party that wants Israel to finish the job to take power.
I voted for Harris and the election is over. That doesn't mean I'm going to pretend that she wasn't as committed to Netanyahu's genocide as Biden was.
I read it. Democrats will keep playing the left for fools and moving to the right, no matter what happens.
No Bernie's campaign and Warren's campaign drove Biden to the left on a whole host of issues, including labor unions.
There was no daylight between her and Biden on Netanyahu’s genocide.
Don't lie.
This comment said it best and lists calls for a ceasefire from Harris.
Harris promised to do everything in her power to end the war in Gaza.
“This year has been difficult, given the scale of death and destruction in Gaza and given the civilian casualties and displacement in Lebanon, it is devastating. And as president, I will do everything in my power to end the war in Gaza, to bring home the hostages, end the suffering in Gaza, ensure Israel is secure, and ensure the Palestinian people can realise their right to dignity, freedom, security and self-determination,” Harris said to applause during a rally in East Lansing city of Michigan, home to 200,000 Arab Americans.
When Joe Biden met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his war cabinet during his visit to Israel, the U.S. president assured them: “I don’t believe you have to be a Jew to be a Zionist, and I am a Zionist.”
Harris wasn't perfect. And that was simply not good enough for some people who didn't want to risk their hands getting dirty. Even if it meant the Palestinians becoming the cost of doing business.
I voted for Harris and the election is over. That doesn’t mean I’m going to pretend that she wasn’t as committed to Netanyahu’s genocide as Biden was.
Good for you. I appreciate it. No need to spread propaganda though.
Don’t lie.
I'm not. Biden pretended to want a ceasefire just like Harris did. There was NO daylight between the two. None. She presented NO policy differences on Gaza from Biden. Not one.
And I no longer trust promises without policy behind them. Democrats are great at promising shit they have no intention of doing and then gleefully announcing that their hands are tied.
I’m not.
You are. I even gave the receipts. They were different, but people on the left didn't want to hear it.
Democrats are great at promising shit they have no intention of doing and then gleefully announcing that their hands are tied.
That's what a refusal to remove the filibuster and a razor thin majority will do. Manchin and Sinema were devastatingly effective in their obstruction. That's what a systemic issue can do in a nutshell. With the Senate, a tiny minority can overturn the will of the majority. Our refusal to fix it is part of how we got here. And things will continue to get worse if we don't take steps to fix it.
They cannot and they will not. Please do not fall for them yanking the football away from you again. AOC and Bernie exist to give you hope and thereby capture your vote for a party that has no intention of ever fighting for the working class in a meaningful way. We need a real alternative but we've given away so much of our collective power (unions) that it's hard to see a hopeful path forward. Organize with your neighbors and start building trusted communities that will fight together when needed.
Do you mean to say that AOC and Bernie are unknowingly treated as pawns by the Democrat party or that they are knowingly misleading voters into thinking the party leans further left than reality?
I would assume if anything it's the former, and Democrat idealism has lost against the reality that a third labor party cannot take root while first-past-the-post is the rule of the game.
Would it matter which?
The DNC insiders clearly have no intention of letting the public have a voice in the party. Having a couple socialists around is supposed to secure the vote from the left. Neither Sanders nor AOC(nor other progressives) are leaving the party anytime soon.
It's fair to argue that splitting the party means losing to the right but the current strategy doesn't seem to be working out either.
Sanders already left the party
Technically he's always been independent but primaried for office under a democratic ticket.
So fair? The dems still use him in this way and he is a close enough ally to be synonymous. Unless there's more recent news?
Good. We all should. The party is dead and barely alive by the shambling corpses of pelosi and Biden assuming they will be able to control it forever.
It would matter if they ultimately decided to break away from the Dems.
As the other comment says, it hardly matters. Fwiw I think they are well-intentioned but if their strategy is working for anyone, it's working for the corporatist dem party.
Just like GOP refugees created the Tea Party, we need to rally around the greatest symbol of the French Revolution, and build a Guillotine Party.
Let's call it the Rule of Law Party. One law for all of us. An end to elite impunity.
I've always thought "the guillotine society" had a nice ring to it... Not party isn't bad either
well just in time for the supreme-court-approved executions of the anti-establishment politicians. imagine not getting this after Bernie had massive support despite all the efforts of the Democratic party, and after the orange cunt winning just by paying lip service to being anti-establishment...
seriously, that's all you needed to do. not actually do anything, not help anybody. just fucking lie and pretend you give a shit about people grievances about being crushed by the system.
you couldn't even clear that bar on the fucking ground, and lost to a cunt who's known for firing people, not paying for anything, and shitting on a gold toilet. because you're physically incapable of criticizing systemic oppression.
I fear it's too late. Unless the party can be taken by force it won't be enough and we only have 4 years. If dems didn't snub Bernie this all probably wouldn't have happened. Our choices used to be two flavors of corporate fascism, now it's far right vs corporate. Dems are better on social issues, but it's not enough.
Dems are clearly better on economic issues as well. Not nearly good enough, but better. The problem is that they will only go so far, and they won't talk about it, out of fear of angering their wealthy patrons.
Well, why don’t you tell your Republican friends and families that the GOP dosent do shit for them?
Not sure why this applies to what I said, but my few Republican friends and family are uncomfortably aware of what I think about their politics.
You stated Dems are better at economics. Have you told your conservative colleagues that?
Or there needs to be an anti-establishment party, since the Democrats can never be one.
The issue is that unless we get rid of our first-past-the-post voting system and then enact further systemic change we are going to be stuck with the Republicans and Democrats.
Thankfully as Trump demonstrated, a political party can be hijacked to be whatever you want. But we need to do that to the Democratic Party, like Bernie tried to do. This will involve educating people out of their neoliberal positions and ideas but it can be done.
This will involve educating people out of their neoliberal positions and ideas but it can be done.
As I get older and meet more people, I find this goal harder and harder to reach. People are dumb.
I think it starts with a smart and leftist, populist candidate, who can convince the dumb ones amongst us to follow them blindly. Then they will be educated by seeing how better things are for them under leftist leadership.
Bernie, like you said, was basically trying to be this for the US.
We can help too by educating people online. =)
Or maybe just ban "parties" and this phony, slaver system
So long as the Democratic Party leadership are reliant on corporate funding, obsessed with American power projection, smitten with Israel, pensive about worker rights and in lock-step with security and intelligence establishment, there is no hope. You will have on one hand a conservative party that shows antipathy and disdain for real liberal norms (Democratic establishment) and a rabid, evil party intent on reshaping America and the world to reflect white Christian nationalist fanaticism (Republicans.)
10 years ago I would have told you that the Dems are playing a dangerous game with their interventionism. Today they consigned 1 million children to starve, be blown to smithereens and die in order to enable the revenge of a leader who is as corrupt as Trump and far more bloodthirsty. Kamala calls Trump a "fascist" and gives Netanyahu a UN veto and 2000lb bounds to drop near hospitals. This is indiciative of a party that is morally rotten and cannot be relied upon to safeguard anyone's rights.
Unfortunately our democracy uses a first-past-the-post voting system which trends toward a two-party system. This makes the Republicans and Democrats the only game in town.
We need to leverage power to reduce the harm done to the minority groups fascists in the Republican party want to hurt. So rather than attempting to achieve a moral victory over Democrats, people on the left should do the most useful thing they can during elections for minorities and vote for Democrats.
Unfortunately our democracy uses a first-past-the-post voting system which trends toward a two-party system
Why must one of those parties be the Democrats? I don't see no fucking Whigs around, do you?
We need to leverage power to reduce the harm done to the minority groups fascists in the Republican party want to hurt
Democrats won't reduce any harm. They'll just send out fundraising emails, like they did when Roe was overturned. During this last cycle, they threw the undocumented under the bus and Democratic candidates were parroting Republican "boys in girls' sports" hatred.
edit: sorry i was replying to to your parent comment.
No. They only hire people who say what they want to hear, which is "move to the right at all costs."
Why must one of those parties be the Democrats? I don’t see no fucking Whigs around, do you?
Because unlike the Wigs, the Democrats are not divided over slavery. They can just move to the right on contemporary issues as Chris Murphy details here. edit: typo
Democrats won’t reduce any harm.
Hi, I'm a trans person. I'm not the most at risk trans person since I'm pre-transition, but it's definitely a case of they would if they could. I would not like to be murdered in a death camp please. Like if Democrats can't get trans messaging right, because they suck at winning, fine. At least they aren't trying to completely ostracize me from society and make me dig my own grave. I hope that gives a different perspective on this.
Hi, I’m a trans person. I’m not the most at risk trans person since I’m pre-transition, but it’s definitely a case of they would if they could. I would not like to be murdered in a death camp please. Like if Democrats can’t get trans messaging right, because they suck at winning, fine. At least they aren’t trying to completely ostracize me from society and make me dig my own grave.
Democrats have no concept of solidarity. None. They just haven't thrown you under the bus yet, but they've let you know that they will. Their candidates have been using the Republican "boys in girls' sports" hatred in their campaign ads.
The undocumented? Under the bus. Muslims? Under the bus. Rail workers? Under the bus. If you expect solidarity from Democrats, prepare to tuck and roll.
Two Democratic politicians already threw trans people under the bus, saying the party is too left on trans-issues, and then parroting the "people don't want biological boys in girl's sports" bullshit.
And then that one Dem who ran the campaign ad "I've never pushed for sex changes," or something like that.
I'm trans too, and honestly, I will never be supporting the DNC again after hearing that from two of their congressional members.
Democrats have no concept of solidarity. None.
Democrats have only recently been openly favorable to gay people within the last decade. Minorities have been using the Democrats to shift things to the left in this country for decades before that.
They just haven’t thrown you under the bus yet, but they’ve let you know that they will. Their candidates have been using the Republican “boys in girls’ sports” hatred in their campaign ads.
I'm aware of the messaging. That's still not the same as a ban on gender affirming care, removal of employment protections, and the rounding up of homeless people.
Rail workers
Biden actually helped rail workers. He should have stuck with them from the start and done more, but it's better than nothing.
The people who I would have expected solidarity from is the left. But instead I am constantly confronted by people who want moral victory over the Democrats. In this arrangement, I am the ball. Instead of kicking me, how about we leverage power to help people.
Vote for Democrats in elections not because they will fix our problems, stand with us, or even do what we want, but because it is how we demonstrate power to the fascists. It's how we protect the people that Republicans want to harm and kill. It's how we buy time to get a populist movement to co-opt the Democratic Party.
Biden taking credit for the work of rail workers whose right to strike he opposed is rich.
The people who I would have expected solidarity from is the left.
You want solidarity in one direction only. You want the left to worship the Democrats no matter who they throw under the bus.
But instead I am constantly confronted by people who want moral victory over the Democrats
You already got your actual victory over the left. You just want critics to shut up about it.
In this arrangement, I am the ball. Instead of kicking me, how about we leverage power to help people.
What power? The left, in your estimation, has only the power to lovingly smooch the ass of the center as they move to the right and ONLY the right.
Vote for Democrats in elections not because they will fix our problems, stand with us, or even do what we want, but because it is how we demonstrate power to the fascists.
THEY. SUPPORTED. GENOCIDE. I get that that's a selling point for you, but some of us see that as already fascist-adjacent. And moving right from that just gets you fascism.
Biden taking credit for the work of rail workers whose right to strike he opposed is rich.
But like he did help them though.
You want solidarity in one direction only. You want the left to worship the Democrats no matter who they throw under the bus.
No, I want people to actually care about minorities instead of virtue signaling. I'm not interested in being currency in your game of moral purity with the Democrats.
You already got your actual victory over the left. You just want critics to shut up about it.
You got your victory over the Democrats at the expense of minorities, but you want 2026 and 2028 too. Well, Republicans might not even give us those elections or an opposition party at all now, we'll find out.
What power? The left, in your estimation, has only the power to lovingly smooch the ass of the center as they move to the right and ONLY the right.
We have the power to stop fascists from taking power, killing people, and destroying the environment. We can even educate people and co-opt the Democratic Party. I recommend you read what I wrote.
THEY. SUPPORTED. GENOCIDE.
Biden supported genocide. Members of his own administration pushed back against him in open letters. You don't care about the Palestinians. Genocide is a word you can type in all caps that you think will win you arguments on the internet. It holds no material implications with you whatsoever or you would be railing against Trump's promise of indefinite genocide.
As someone closer to the chopping block than I would like, I am no longer phased by that bullshit. I've got the right screaming at me that they want me dead, and I've got people like you on the left screaming at me to be silent as they drag me the rest of the way there. The Palestinians are worse off now because of people like you and your virtue signaling and so is everyone else.
Your vote is appreciated. Your rhetoric is not. We don't live in a moral universe. This universe is physics based. You acting in a way that is consistent with your subjective moral values isn't going to help anyone. In fact, it's going to let Republicans and other fascists all over the world run right over the people you claim to care about. Learn to analyze strategies based on their utility. edit: typo
The Democrats are the tool we have at our disposal. I intended to use that tool for as much as it can be used for. Help me.
But like he did help them though.
But like maybe you should have read the article you posted. Then again, since you think that "we totally want to" is a policy, "we're taking credit" is the same as an accomplishment.
I’m not interested in being currency in your game of moral purity with the Democrats.
You're just interested in anyone who is even remotely dissatisfied with Democrats shutting up or being shut up, regardless of what Democrats do.
You got your victory over the Democrats at the expense of minorities, but you want 2026 and 2028 too.
Dude, I fucking tried to warn about what was going to happen and I wasn't the only one. At least here on lemmy, it meant being called a trumper and a Russian every last time. But yeah, the party moved to the right and alienated the base and exactly what I was called a Russian for saying happened. Democrats stayed home. Your faith in the willingness of the Democratic Party to change for the better is misplaced. If they continue on their current course, they will lose 2026 and 2028. And despite your constant pollyanna insistence that if we just care bear stare at them they'll change, I have no remaining faith in the party. Not after this election.
Biden supported genocide.
As did Harris, vague meaningless non-policy promises notwithstanding.
Members of his own administration pushed back against him in open letters.
Ooh. Were they strongly worded?
It holds no material implications with you whatsoever or you would be railing against Trump’s promise of indefinite genocide.
This thread is about Democrats. Of course Trump is worse. That doesn't excuse selling weapons for an ongoing genocide.
As someone closer to the chopping block than I would like, I am no longer phased by that bullshit. I’ve got the right screaming at me that they want me dead, and I’ve got people like you on the left screaming at me to be silent as they drag me the rest of the way there.
I'm telling you not to be a damned fool. The party will sell you out. It's what they do. It's a pattern of behavior that you've been making excuses for.
Your vote is appreciated. Your rhetoric is not.
Who is screaming at whom to be silent?
The Democrats are the tool we have at our disposal. I intended to use that tool for as much as it can be used for. Help me.
They're using you. Not the other way around.
But like maybe you should have read the article you posted.
I did. Biden should have done more. But he didn't do nothing.
You’re just interested in anyone who is even remotely dissatisfied with Democrats shutting up or being shut up, regardless of what Democrats do.
I want people to be vocal. You're doing that. I disagree with what is being said.
Dude, I fucking tried to warn about what was going to happen and I wasn’t the only one. At least here on lemmy, it meant being called a trumper and a Russian every last time.
And I tried to warn you people. You played right into the hands of MAGA and the Kremlin. We knew who Harris and the Democrats were. The goal was to prevent fascism anyway. There was no other viable strategy, but people still tried to sink Harris' campaign anyway.
I have no remaining faith in the party. Not after this election.
The Democratic Party is a tool, not a friend you need to have faith in.
As did Harris, vague meaningless non-policy promises notwithstanding.
I showed receipts. Reiterate the same lie as many times as you want. It will still be a lie.
Ooh. Were they strongly worded?
What matter's is that it was Biden's decision. People in his administration disagreed with him.
This thread is about Democrats. Of course Trump is worse. That doesn’t excuse selling weapons for an ongoing genocide.
No, I mean you wouldn't still be in this thread shitting on Democrats if you cared. You would want to spend your time going after Trump, since he's going to president, but that's not where you are directing your energy.
I’m telling you not to be a damned fool. The party will sell you out. It’s what they do. It’s a pattern of behavior that you’ve been making excuses for.
That's what I'm telling you. We need to co-opt the Democrats. I'm not making excuses for their behavior, I'm arguing for a strategy to advance our goals. Voting for Democrats until the party is co-opted by a progressive and socialist populist movement buys us time to make that happen. If you read my comments you would know my argument's position by now.
Who is screaming at whom to be silent?
You at me. Be vocal. But do it in a way that is useful.
They’re using you. Not the other way around.
People are definitely using you. They got you arguing against your own interests and you don't even know. Or maybe you don't care. That moral victory is too important to you. edit: typo
any chance you are one of the bright consultants who get paid millions by dnc to come up with the brilliant strategies to be so dogsit that they loose to orange buffoon ?
No, I'm one of the trans people you use in your pursuit of moral victories over the Democrats.
more like you are just selfish and rich.
Me not going quietly to the death camps is me being selfish and rich according to you, got it. Real ally. =P
death camp ?
you should have said you were in gaza or westbank, my bad. yeah being rich there aint gonna help. if you were here in us, you would atleast be able to work 16 hours to be one paycheque away from homelessness.
thoughts and prayers. best we can do as we don’t care about poor brown people irrespective of gender, age or still in womb.
I live in the US where fascists have put targets on the backs of trans people.
The same fascists have also pledged to let Israel finish their genocide. Weird you don't care about that.
Or you are the wealthy but new hotness in oppressed to the DNC to hook into to prove they care about something while it only amounts to culture identiry. But it allows them to take in heavy donations to further enrich themselves by pretending to fix things.
It's clear that the trans community is still far to small a percentage of the populace to focus on as the main backing and asking other people to care about you and members of your community above their own well-being will not work because people are as selfish as everyone else.
I'm sorry but I really don't care what happens within 2% of the population as long as they aren't being killed compared to workers who make up the most of us.
So you won't see me as a leftist using Trans as any kind of grandstanding cause I really don't care or think you matter other than a funding source for pretend caring wealthy.
Or you are the wealthy but new hotness in oppressed to the DNC to hook into
? edit: I mean, I gave 70 dollars to Harris' campaign this year. I spent more on the Eldrazi Incursion commander deck at my LGS which was like 90 dollars. But I gave about $300 to Warren and $300 to Bernie in 2020 and none to Biden.
above their own well-being will not work because people are as selfish as everyone else.
People are self-interested in that they care about themselves and the people in their immediate social spheres. However it is in the interests of people to vote for Democrats and against fascists.
I’m sorry but I really don’t care what happens within 2% of the population as long as they aren’t being killed
Well it's good of you to be honest, but fascists do want to kill us. Trans people and lots of other people are going to die as a result of fascist policies.
So you won’t see me as a leftist using Trans as any kind of grandstanding cause I really don’t care or think you matter other than a funding source for pretend caring wealthy.
At least you're honest about using trans people in pursuit of your moral victory over the Democrats.
You admit you have spare money to spend and use as donations to politics. Which is my point as most members of the Trans community does when they consider gender identity to be their biggest issue to deal with.
It's not true for all trans people but the ones I hear from tend to have cash and I have known plenty of the LGBTQ community to be the most conservative because of their wealth. So are they willing to use themselves in their pursuit of moral victory?
It's an identity. I literally said I don't care and then you went and repeated your line about how you are more important. As if people are using you or spending you like currency for the election. It wasn't about you.
Lots of people will die. Yeah start being part of the larger topic then and get your head out of your own fart box. Most of them won't be upper class American trans people. And it certainly wasn't about morals it's about other people struggling that you demand agree with you in votes because you get better treatment under one party.
Maybe get with the people who care about not dying and show you do as well. As if saying, ask the DNC party to care about more than the trans community and specific shades of minority to get behind large populace movements for support is some kind of deep moral victory at your expense. Boo. Bad take.
You admit you have spare money to spend and use as donations to politics.
Yeah, I had a job and disposable income before the company I worked for went out of business because of Trump's covid policies.
Me spending that $70 dollars isn't the win for your argument you think it is. Harris got to a billion dollars because millions of people donated to her campaign. People solved a collective problem by working together collectively, not by being rich.
Which is my point as most members of the Trans community does when they consider gender identity to be their biggest issue to deal with.
For me it was stopping fascism. $70 seemed like a small price to pay to stop fascism for four more years. I care about trans people but the Harris campaign barely talked about trans issues so that wasn't really a motivating factor. If they had talked about trans issues favorably I might have donated more. I gave $10 when Harris announced her run, I gave $20 when she picked Walz, I gave $20 when Harris debated Trump, and gave $20 when Walz debated Vance.
It’s not true for all trans people but the ones I hear from tend to have cash and I have known plenty of the LGBTQ community to be the most conservative because of their wealth.
I made $100k working at my job for a little over two years plus over $30k in my 401k after gas, tax, and rent. I'm not rich by any metric. Do you prefer if I can't afford to communicate over the internet so you won't be inconvenienced by my voice? You argument conveniently ignores I donated to Warren and Bernie. Are they not morally pure enough for you?
So are they willing to use themselves in their pursuit of moral victory?
I don't want a moral victory. You clearly do. Don't quit on the honesty while you were ahead.
It’s an identity. I literally said I don’t care and then you went and repeated your line about how you are more important. As if people are using you or spending you like currency for the election. It wasn’t about you.
People are more important than your moral victory.
Yeah start being part of the larger topic then and get your head out of your own fart box.
Please do that for everyone's sake. Thanks.
As if saying, ask the DNC party to care about more than the trans community and specific shades of minority to get behind large populace movements for support is some kind of deep moral victory at your expense.
Refusing to vote for the Democrats until they are perfect on every issue is the pursuit of moral victory. It makes minorities the cost of doing business and isn't a useful strategy for helping anyone. We didn't get the right to marry who we want because people refused to vote for Democrats. Minorities strategically voted for Democrats for decades to get them and the US Overton window to shift to the left on that issue.
A big issue with this approach: The United States is not a law of nature; it doesn't have to exist. The system may only allow two options, but it does not guarantee that either one of those options will keep the system viable. Reduced harm is still harm, and at some point we needed to stop doing it.
This rhetoric is what is known as accelerationism. It's the idea that things have to get worse in order for them to get better. The United States not existing would mean the collapse of a society that supports about 340 million people. Letting the US burn to the ground is not useful, because it doesn't help any of the people living here.
The truth is that things get better when people learn from their mistakes and the bad things that happen to them. They then use that knowledge to make things better. There's no bottom to how bad things can get. Things can always get worse. And they will get worse unless we work to make them better.
Anyone can be tempted by the idea that they can make things better by letting them burn. But letting everything burn is how to harm the most people possible. In order to help anyone, we need to start leveraging power for each other. That means giving up on moral victories and analyzing strategies using utility instead of moral reasoning. edit: typo
It's not accelerationism at all! It's fatalism.
Accelerationism is, "It has to get worse before it can get better."
My point here is, "The system that only allows for getting worse will never get better."
It’s fatalism.
My point here is, “The system that only allows for getting worse will never get better.”
Years of US history demonstrate that is not the case. People have demonstrated it is possible to make things better with our democracy. Women's suffrage and the civil rights movement happened in the US in the 20th century.
Things have been getting worse since Reagan brought neoliberalism to the mainstream. The US wasn't perfect. And on some social issues like gay marriage things have gotten better. But we are where we are now thanks to over forty years of neoliberism allowing the rich to extract wealth from everyone else. We have entered the billionaires forming an oligarchy around a dictator stage of late-stage capitalism.
I live in a nation with more then two party's and first past the post (it sucks). You guys need to stop making up reasons to not have viable 3rd parties.
It's not made up, it's math. And if your nation doesn't enact systemic change to its system, your democracy will inevitably trend towards two viable political parties as well. edit: typo
Democrats are the establishment that needs to be laid out to pasture and replaced
Democrats don't learn lessons.
They have 4 years to tighten up. I'm not optimistic. The only victory they have had since Obama was a fear victory.. nobody wanted Biden they were scared of trump. That is played out.
The right did a good job of parading him around as an anti-establishment, for the common people candidate. I don't think that's true, but a lot of people do.
I hope the D party reorganizes as a populist anti-establishment party and holds a ranked choice primary with some young actually left leaning candidates who can't be bought.
To be honest, if the D party don't reform and earn my vote, I'm not giving it to them out of fear anymore. Before trump I had a "no lesser of two evils" policy for voting. And I'm going back to it. They had 4 years to plan, hold a primary, do some prosecuting of rich criminals, understand why Trump's popular and strategize to beat it, literally fucking anything. Did they?
I'm over it, they can run a fair primary with some progressive candidates and let the people decide, and then I'll vote. Tired of whatever they're doing and it looks like a lot of others are as well. Hope they figure out the obvious issue they have and fix it. Since its a two party system they're hogging the only route that the left has to success and fucking it up remarkably bad. Like I could do a better job and I'm an idiot.
While the plan you've outlined in your argument my feel good, it isn't particularly useful for shifting the Democrats to the left. Under this plan, the causalities of this and future Republican administrations will be the cost of doing business.
Consider leveraging power by voting for Democrats in elections to benefit the people who will otherwise be harmed by future Republican administrations. edit: typo
I live in a really liberal state. So my vote doesn't actually matter.
I'll consider it, and I appreciate the kind response, but to be honest I think if people keep placating them with "lesser of two evils votes" nothing will change.
Hopefully the party can draw conclusions about the 10m people who sat this one out vs 2020, and figure out why.
Edit: do you have an article or transcript for the link? I'm not a video person I prefer to read
Votes in high population states count less than votes in low population states, because of the electoral college, but they still count.
This isn't about placating the Democrats. It's about not using minorities as currency for a moral victory over the Democrats. The moral victory may feel good, but it isn't useful. A moral victory will not prevent key tipping points in the Earth's ecosystem that will cause catastrophic damage to the environment. Nor will it protect minorities from the fascists who want to kill them.
Hopefully the 10 million people will learn to leverage power by voting for the Democrats in elections even if they don't get anything out of it. Because we all have something to lose by Republicans taking power in the short term. Even if we won't all feel it until the long term.
The Democratic Party does need a populist narrative to appeal to a broader base, but the Democrats are unlikely to listen. The party needs to be hijacked the way Trump hijacked the Republican Party and the way Bernie tried to hijack the Democratic Party. Part of doing that is delaying fascism so that there are still elections and people to run against fascists. edit: typo
Edit: do you have an article or transcript for the link? I’m not a video person I prefer to read
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They are the establishment. Why would they ever change? They would rather Trump win, than their easy paychecks be disrupted. You are never going to get a democrat to care about people.
It would be easier for progressives to take over the DNC and state Dems than to form an entirely new party and make it viable.
If that's the case, then it's never going to happen, because the democrats are never going to let it happen, so you're basically saying stop voting or caring about anything and just lay down and die.
There is no future for the democratic party. This election convinced me that they are never going to care about anyone but their donors, and next election I won't be voting for them. I've voted for the candidate they shoved down our throats to defeat Trump three times now, and most of the time they've fucked it up. No more "lesser evil" crap. I'm not voting for evil again, period.
No more “lesser evil” crap. I’m not voting for evil again, period.
The strategy you are describing makes minorities the cost of doing business. Instead of attempting to achieve moral victory over Democrats consider voting for Democrats in elections to leverage power for the people Republicans want to hurt and kill.
Monster grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the strength to change the things I can, and the Noodle to know the difference.
RAmen
I suggest we all get together and form a party. We can hold it somewhere well known; maybe a waterfront, or harbor. I hear Boston is a nice place. Very patriotic even. We can even have refreshments; maybe a nice tea? Who’s in?
There simply won’t be another election.
The whole point is a cow’s opinion. It doesn’t matter.
Then there's no cost to you making this promise:
I hereby swear to not lecture leftists about voting third party in 2026, because there will be no election in 2026.
It doesn't matter anymore, so it should be easy to agree with.
It's "moo".
There simply won’t be another election.
That is a possibility. The US elected fascists who now control all three branches of the federal government. However they do not have a two-thirds majority in congress or control two-thirds of the states. So it will be difficult for the fascists if they choose a purely legal route. However, since they are fascists, they might use violence to get what they want. We won't know until they try.
In the event that we still have elections and Democrats can still participate we should leverage power and vote for Democrats in those elections. This will reduce the harm done to minorities by fascists who want to kill them.
I wanted to add to your point, because people in this comment section are attempting to write off future elections unless Democrats completely meet the demands of progressives. This isn't something Democrats are likely to do. But the people who will be harmed by hypothetical future Republican administrations would prefer if Democrats were clogging up the works and knocking fascists out of power at the very least.
Bit late init
Wasn't there a recent conspiracy theory that the establishment doesn't want Trump (hence the assassination attempts) because he's an easily manipulated loose canon who doesn't follow orders like a good shill should lol?
Point being that dems lost this election because they are inherently more pro establishment and have been for a while.
I think that there is one issue which Trump will deliver the Dems what they really want, and they won't stand in his way as he does it: liquidating Palestine entirely. In the next ten years if nothing is done by Arab nations, the UN or the US left, Israel will likely declare war on the Palestinian Authority itself, exiling or killing its leaders if they do not submit to Israeli sovereignty over the entirety of Palestine.
Sounds like he'll end the genocide! Technically, it's no longer genocide when there's no one left to murder.
They will be the establishment no matter what they do lmfao. Can't claim to not be unless they choose to go the Republican route of lying their asses off
lol, why would they do that?
They’ve got 4 years of donations thanks to Trump. Democrats never learn and will always pour money into an issue instead of actually solving it.
"These bonobo monkeys must become Rhodes scholars" is a more believable headline
Counterpoint: anybody not cheering for Fox News' talking points sufficiently enthusiastically is declared "socialist" and all but suggested as target for public lynching (or in some cases actually the target of a lynch mob storming the capitol) and the masses have been drilled into going berserk at hearing the right keywords, regardless of what happens in reality.
Calling an attempt to break this information monopoly over half the nation an uphill battle is the epitome of understatement.
Honestly, Fox News is going to call anyone against them a socialist. That's just what they're going to do. There are even some Republican policies which can be construed as socialist, such as public spending on schools, even private schools.
The average voter really doesn't care about if something is socialist or not. They clearly don't care if something is fascist. They only care about the perception of how it will affect their life.
If you tell people they're not going to have to pay for healthcare ever again, or that cannabis will be legal, or that you will fix the massive wealth gap, they will vote for you. Nominal Republicans would even vote for you. The downside of using the word socialism like that, is that Fox News that has removed the meaning of socialism from their base, meaning that actual socialism will not seem like such a big deal.
Being called socialist isn't even the issue. My point is that a news monolith has spent decades radicalising half the country and at this point there are enough cultists that will mercilessly tear down anybody Fox&Co paint a target on. Until there is a solid defense against such a hate machine, no party will flourish on its merits as long as Fox-drilled stooges will only be fed a caricature of any opposition Fox designates as the enemy. Even your perfect ideal candidate would lose the election. The boogeyman Fox would paint them to be would be so repulsive and half the country would never even hear their ideas anyway, except what skewed perspective Fox would blast the viewers with 24/7.
My point is that they're construction is inherently self-destructive. They have made their base extremely susceptible to populism.
If a populist candidate from the other direction arises, a large portion of the Fox News base will support them. You mark my words. Just think about how quickly they turn against Fox News when they don't do what they want
Or what? What are you doing to do about it if they don't change at all; if they'd rather lose with a lesser fascist than win with a progressive?
Lol "lesser fascist." tHeY'Re bOtH ThE SaMe!!1
You're failing to grasp the nuance between reluctantly supporting genocide and fully supporting genocide.
There are a whole lot of folk that plain demand full support of genocide as the cost of doing business/having rights. Reluctance to support genocide is viewed as eroding the foundation to their very way of life.
It's the other way around. People want a moral victory over Democrats. In this game of moral purity, minorities are the cost of doing business.
Isn't that what Trump is saying he is? I mean, they're both claiming to be "against the machine..."
The democratic party per se isn't the problem.
First past the post democracies always result in what we have now. The democratic party will completely disappear under proportional representation. In it's place you will see a proliferation of the power that is being grimly clasped by the corporate kleptocracy and their minions. Instead of 1% deciding how we manage our society, everyone gets a say.
The other problem is voters trying to hold on to the Democratic party because of FPTP.
Which in turn makes the Democrats comfortable enough to run bad candidates.
Which in turn makes Democrats lose the election because they did not have to run on good policy to compete with a more left party, only a more right party.
The other problem is voters are idiots. Alaska had ranked choice and threw it in the trash. Massachusetts, and I'm sure several others, passed it up because "it's too confusing".
Too confusing? Motherfucker, have you never ranked things based on preference? Have you not a second favorite color, or ice cream flavor, or child, or season? Who is your next-best-friend? What was your dream job in college, and your fallback?
They have, they were just as beholden to money interests as the Republicans...
They only need to allow equal and fair access to elections to 3rd parties in blue states. They can be blue conservatives much as they want so long as the people have options.
That is the fastest way to turn a blue state red.
Split the vote so that the minority Republican vote can win. Because there are more registered Republicans in California than in Texas.
No, the actual answer is to change the voting system to a Cardinal system, so that there are no such things as Spoiler party's or split votes.
Approval or STAR are the answer. Either would enable third parties to exist and thrive.
As a note RCV is not a Cardinal system, and still has the Spoiler Effect. People lie about it saying it's the fix for all problems, but it's actually worse than what we have (there are parts that are better, but more parts that are far worse)
Could you elaborate or provide a link to some further reading about how RCV is worse than first past the post? I haven't heard this before and would like to learn more.
Let me guess, dems should also focus on courting those Gaza genocide voters too? Should we get the trans vote in there too? That's what, like 15 votes?
Robert Reich, the same idiot who told me to vote for Kamala’s right wing platform.
Go back to doing your stupid little dances, Robert
All of these can be true simultaneously:
Voting for Kamala was 100% the right thing to do, and
The Democrats, including Kamala Harris, have a fucking horrible right-wing platform
The Democrat party needs to be thoroughly dismantled in favor of an actual leftist party
Get out of here with your "nuance" and "critical thinking skills"!
/s, great job, keep up the good work
As opposed to what?
It is, as you know, physically impossible to vote for a liberal one day and be a leftist for the other 364 days of a year.
But I'm tired of those on here thinking the Democrats need to become the "progressive left" when that is not who the Democratic party represents.. Or let's be clear it's only a small but loud fraction of it, that keeps threatening on leaving.
That said I'm not sold trying to go after the "populist right" was the right Move, stick to centrist working class.
Of course if the far left didn't vote.. The party is stuck moving even more to the right .. So.. We will see.
What would interest me more is a "party" of leftist that:
provides people to local town/county elections (and further up as it gains success)
promotes democrats that fit their views (AOC for example) note this is not running as a third party, just promoting those that exist
dosnt run against other stron democrats in the larger races, president in particular this is a central roll elect someone that will help get your policies in place.
More important promote, explain, and teach the pogressive policies and how it will help people, and be willing to debate pros/cons of other ideas. This exists I feel, but not on this echo chamber..
Kamala raised over $1 billion dollars for her campaign, most of which was from small donors.
If that doesn't tell the Dems they don't need oligarch money, nothing will.
They know that. Problem is the WANT billionaires money too ^^
Then they spent it on high per hour political consultants who paid Beyonce to perform
Except Beyonce literally didn't perform for Harris?
Did they?
Oh. I heard Oprah got a mil, but that could be fake
I heard Elon was born on the moon, but that could be fake too. I wish there was a way to know for sure, or at least see a small amount of evidence one way or the other.
That's a mere pittance compared to what the wealthy actually spend on conservatives and messaging. That's 1 billion dollars every 4 years. Fox news, daily wire, OANN, and all the myriad of other propaganda outlets churn through more than that a year.
Yes, but we're not talking about conservatives.
The Democratic party has a problem, and that problem is what Democratic voters want doesn't align with what Democratic donors want. The voters want progressive policies passed, while the donors want the same neoliberalism that keeps them rich. And trying to appease one of those groups obviously alienates the other.
If any Democratic politician truly wants to help the American population, the fact that Kamala raised so much money in such a short amount of time, and the fact that many states passed progressive policies even though they voted for Trump, should tell them that they don't need to kowtow to the wealthy because the voters will support them. Unfortunately, I don't think they're going to learn that lesson.
Republicans, of course, don't have this problem because their voters and their donors all want the same thing.
The whole point of this was asking why Democrats are catering to wealthy conservative donors instead of progressive or left leaning voters. I just stated the reason why. The 1 billion dollars collected from small donors every four years for a presidential run is nice. But it's nothing compared to what the wealthy dump into messaging and campaigning constantly. Until such time as small donors can even come close to remotely matching that. Sustaining entire media Outlet ecosystems to counter the propaganda from conservatives. Democrats aren't going to give up trying to get some of that wealthy conservative money
I donated to Kamala's campaign ($10), but then I realized what direction they were taking around the DNC and stopped giving them money.
Not all doners agreed with her platform, just like how not all voters did.
What happens to the amount they didn't spend?
they're in debt
Maybe if they go bankrupt we can start a new party that cares what its voters think and doesnt shit the bed so often.
nothings stopping you right now
Money, time, and connections are pretty big things you need to start a new political party.
It's not like advertising a garage sale. I like your spirit though.
another party failing won't make any of that easier
X for doubt on that. Im sure they've said that though. That's a lot of really expensive campaign parties for a three month run
Overall, they are stil about ~100mm in the black.
Iirc, they had 140mm in debt and 240mm in cash on hand.
They spent stupidly, they were buying ads in Kentucky and Texas, instead of focusing on swing states and progressive policies to bring dems out in force.
It was celebrity money, you know, the same people that were telling people they were "just like them."
Really awesome point! I hope that becomes apparent to them
Narrator: It didn't.
Going further right didn't help, now we need to go as left as possible
Radical ideas like Universal healthcare, paid maternity leave, free child care, taxing the rich.
Radical ideas the rest of the 1st world had had for 50 years and successfully implemented.
We're well aware, and it's honestly getting old hearing "wElL tHe ReSt Of ThE wOrLd," yeah, the UK voted to leave the EU and ousted a party to replace them with Labour who don't want to hold another referendum on the vote.
India continues to elect the populist and nationalist Modi as their PM, because he gives them bags of rice with his name on them and tells them it's ok to hate Muslims.
Germany is flirting with fascism again, and they've got all the stuff Americans are apparently too fucking stupid to get done, right?
Dutch police just rounded up a bunch of pro-Palestinian protesters, protesting peacefully, and then started beating them for not moving fast enough.
Oh, and the majority of European countries are freaking the fuck out about immigration and the floods of immigrants trying to come into their countries. And funnily enough, your politicians speak about immigrants the same way our Republicans do.
But you're right, the people who weren't alive 50 years ago when all of this should have been done, yeah, that's our fucking fault too, right?
Like that'll ever happen.
The party is held by a group of political elites who are all about the establishment and power.
There needs to be a new party, a labor party, to represent the working class Americans.
I agree.
I voted for Harris because Dems are supposed to be the establishment. Supposed to be a return normal boring politics.
That's obviously not going to work. Now we need an actual working class, under a few million dollar a year takehome party.
It would be easier for progressives to take over the DNC and state Dems than to form an entirely new party and make it viable.
Why not both? It's easier to force your way under and into that tent/coalition with an organized front to do the talking. A political party that has well defined goals and objectives, while speaking for a big group, is bound to be better at working within a broader coalition than what we have now.
That would be ideal, but the people who are already there will never give it up.
And the problem with creating a new party is that it will divide the votes, while the conservatives are all united under the Republican party. Unless they split too. Maybe the non Trumpists can split off and form a more traditional party. But again, they're too afraid to split THEIR votes.
A reverse tea-party movement. That could work. We were laughing when the tea party started because it seemingly broke GOP unity, but they managed to shift the Overton window so far to the right that the GOP now is the tea party, and Dems are GOP lite. Reversing that trend is extremely necessary.
I instead see them not learning a damn thing and putting up Nancy Pelosi as the Presidential candidate for 2028.
Will she achieve lichdom in time?
Acting as if she hasn't already! There's a reason that dude went after her husband with a hammer and not her. He knew better than to mess with a lich.
Or Manchin or Sinema or Liz Cheney.
In all honesty, Newsom is probably the candidate the party leadershit has already selected.
Correct, Biden just cozying up to Trump when he should be using emergency powers to arrest this madman who under the 14th Amendment isn't even eligible to be President was absolutely sickening to me.
Biden doesn't even know wtf is going on. If he does, the last thing he's doing is trying to salvage his legacy. He's got no fight in him.
He truly fucked us. Not saying Harris would've won necessarily, but having only 3 months to run a campaign against someone who's been running for 8 years is tricky. You can see why given the number of people googling if Biden dropped out...
A legacy of "Used powers given to him by the Supreme Court to stop Hitler 2.0" would be better than "Sucked Trump's dicker harder than Elon did."
For real. Dudes got 15-20 years left on this Earth, at the maximum. Stopping Trump and actually making sure he is charged for his crimes would be quite the footnote in the history books. I can't imagine being that old and passing an opportunity like that up, but then again I am a simple prole.
He's not Hitler 2.0 yet though. This is Hitler 2.0 RC 1.
The history books won't know what will not have had happened.
What I'm saying is, if a madman is stopped before he goes mad, then wouldn't he then never have been a madman? Was the one stopping him, justified? Can you defend their actions based on their presuppositions, even if the descent into madness is already evident?
Right so... "let's do the thing the fascist threatens to do because we're right and it's justified" is not the same thing as the fascist saying "we'll do it because we're right and it's justified".
Easy to justify the means when you believe in the ends... but of course every one thinks they are right and that everyone else will come to believe they are right, thusly conveniently avoiding any bad consequences.
Do you have any idea what would have happened if Biden just arrested Trump?
Breaking the rules isn't fascism though. Fascism is fascism.
What do you think is a more ethical choice:
a) uphold the law, knowing it will let fascist come to power and kill thousands
a) break the law and stop him
It is precisely fascism. It's ignoring the rule of law to achieve authoritarian aims. Why is it ok when you agree with the outcome and not ok when you don't? But way more importantly, once you do it you cannot go back. If Biden did this and Trump ended up winning - make no mistake Biden has no authority to remove candidates from ballots - then Trump would feel completely justified in jailing his opponents.
A. Because the premise of your choice is flawed. You do not know that breaking the law would stop him. You do not know -with certainty- that not breaking the law would result in that outcome. But we do know that being authoritarian to achieve aims we believe in is no better than people we disagree with doing the exact same. What would happen if Biden was successful in stopping Trump but then, because we wouldn't ever keep unfettered presidential power... right? RIGHT? We're the "good" guys... what would happen if MAGA Republicans won in 2028? I doubt we'd ever have another election again.
Uh, Trump feels completely justified in jailing his enemies already. Will it happen? I'm not excited to wait and find out.
True. But the one thing we've got going for us is that it is demonstrably wrong and we didn't fall into the trap of proving it was justified.
Edit: well at least two people think it's ok to use authoritarian political power to counter authoritarian political power. Do you really think that ever works out? Note that this is very distinct from something like civil war or overthrowing the government. It's doing the exact thing you don't want your opponent to do.
Tis a risky game, doing what's right.
"what’s right" is, sadly not an agreed-upon concept.
That may be true, but I happen to believe that truth does exist. All we can do is hold on to it.
With Trump in office, and Project 2025 in the pipeline, I doubt we're ever going to have another election anyway.
I sometimes feel that way. But I still have some faith in people, particularly Gen Z. I believe after the shit hits the fan and keeps hitting it for 4 years, that we'll turn this around. And because we didn't agree to make presidents kings we can actually do that.
Are you really achieving authoritarian aims if the end goal is not authoritarian?
Ah, the benevolent dictator fallacy. Because no person or party would ever abuse power or fail to give it up once the "aim" is achieved. There certainly would be no expansion in what the "aim" is. And definitely the people we agree with are always good.
From the standpoint of democracy that wouldn't be ideal, but why is republicans having 2(4) years of unchecked power better? They don't give a shit and gonna do a lot more damage to it.
Because the side coming to power wants to gleefully deport, repress and kill people, and the other one much less so. The good guys are "good" not because they respect the rules, but because they believe in humane values, in ending their fists when the others' faces begins and all that good stuff. They are bad not because they break the law, but because they believe and want to do fascism.
If the rules are unjust then breaking them is an ethical imperative. And Trump not being in jail is frankly a crime against lady liberty.
If he would've done it early in his term, I suspect Trump would not have been elected president again. But instead he pushed the idea through some absurdly bureaucratic system that allowed Trump to run the clock out on everything.
We would have had a civil war or at least an attempted one. Then the next time a MAGA-esque Republican came along, which would probably be in 2028 or 32 they'd feel free to completely take the gloves off. We would have validated and enabled that behavior by doing it ourselves.
I do find it fascinating that you seem to be attributing this all to Biden. We have a relatively weak executive branch and separation of powers through different branches of government for a reason. Overturning that is the worst possible idea.
Yeah, it might be just to arrest him, but America clearly doesn't give a fuck. The fact of the matter is the people picked Trump this election, if nothing else arresting him will only galvanize his followers and legitimatize their own turn to fascism. There's no good outcome in this scenario, we missed that opportunity on election night. It sucks but right now we're the kid playing with fire; obviously we need to learn the hard way. We should've learned from the last trump presidency you say? Yeah, we really, really should've.
Biden cozying up to a candidate the party portrayed as literally Hitler during the campaign will never not be funny to me
"The establishment party must become an anti-establishment party"
Have you all learned nothing from 2016? Democrats will rather let Trump win that let this happen.
The slide to the right is no accident nor is it ignorance. Fool me once...
Are you suggesting that Democrats want alt-right leadership in power?
They and their donors would prefer thst over a Bernie win.
They want corporarions to stay in power. The 2 parties are just flavours of capital.
Neither are for the public.
Nothing has convinced me of that more than Biden and Trump's sudden bromance
Stop pretending this is a thing. It'll make it a lot easier to understand.
Yes, it's good for their fundraising
I've said this before, but I think it needs to be repeated:
The populist, anti-elitist lane on the left is wide open. I don't know that a mainstream "Democratic" party can take that lane, and I don't know if we should bother trying to drag them there. However, what I can say is that there is going to be some significant hay to make in that field.
I think Pramila Jayapal, Ayanna Pressley, Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar, Delia Ramirez, Jamaal Bowman, Summer Lee, Cori Bush, Katie Porter, anyone who has been rat-fucked by Democrats should all abandon their identification with the Democratic party and become independents. And in the time that he has left, at their lead, should be Bernie Sanders, who never needed to be told about the consequences of running with milquetoast policies.
Even if they caucus with Democrats, true progressives need to show them that their votes aren't a given, and if they want them, they need to take a step towards their legislative priorities. Giving up our votes without leverage, giving in to the Washington groupthink: THIS LOSES ELECTIONS!
We shouldn't focus on redeeming the Democratic party. Let them sink. Focus on getting good quality, reliable progressive populists elected. The Democratic party is a fucking anchor and we're better off without it. Let those unwilling to let go of that Washington groupthink sink with it.
Split the non Republican vote so you leave the door wide open for them? That's the problem with first past the post...
While this strategy may feel good, it makes the minorities Republicans want to hurt the cost of doing business. Even if Democrats can't deliver on anything substantial in the short term voting for them in elections is useful.
First, it reduces the harm done to minorities. Second, it demonstrates there is a progressive voter block the democrats could shift closer to. Third, assuming we get more elections and the Democrats aren't all in jail, it creates time for a progressive, like the Democrats your argument listed, to co-opt the Democratic Party. Like what Trump did to the Republicans and Bernie tried to do to the Democrats.
Rather than trying to achieve moral victory over Democrats, let's leverage power for the people Republicans want to hurt.
Or maybe they should just leave the Democratic party and start a new progressive party? We have less than 4 years, but that's also the most time we'll ever have.
The problem with that strategy is that our democracy uses a first-past-the-post voting system which trends towards a two-party system.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7tWHJfhiyo&t=31s
Then become one of the two parties.
There already are two. We must co-opt one with a populist candidate. The Republican Party was already hijacked by Trump. That leaves the Democratic Party.
Bernie tried twice, Democrats demonstrated their ability to stop that shit in its tracks. It will not work.
The only solution is for progressives to abandon the Party and start their own to replace it. The US has replaced parties before, it can be done again.
The Democrat establishment wants power and for that they have to win elections. So having an anti establishment candidate is preferable to them over a Republicans victory. If anything good came out of the last election, it is that Trump as horrible as he is can still win elections against an establishment Democrat, so the Democrats have to change.
Also changing the parties does not work. The problem is systematic and the US really needs to change its election system, to get better politics.
They sure didn't look like they wanted to win this election.
They switch candidates in the middle of the campaign, because Biden's polling was that bad.
And then Harris did everything she could to reassure everyone she was exactly like Biden, completely defeating the strategy.
Trump tried once and it worked. Neoliberal ideas are entrenched in the minds of Americans. Neoliberalism only allows change to the people in charge of systems as it asserts, incorrectly, that our institutions are flawless. Since neoliberals only consider changing people, it is much easier for a fascist to convince a neoliberal to change the people in society. Where as it is much harder for a progressive or a socialist to convince a neoliberal to enact systemic change or redistribute wealth respectively.
In short, people with neoliberal ideas in their head need to fully internalize neoliberalism as a scam.
Abandoning the Democrats will not result in them being replaced. They will continue to exist by moving further to the right, as Democrats like Chris Murphy have already proposed.
Starting a successful third party is mathematically impossible under a FPTP system. Third party candidates can only be spoiler candidates.
Where's the Whig Party?
https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/post/18581056/11578151
The Democrats are divided over Israel. Something like 80 House members boycotted Netanyahu's speech, and the Party base is overwhelmingly anti-genocide. That's enough to get the ball rolling.
It's not enough. The House elections happen every two years. AIPAC can successfully primary progressive politicians if we don't vote for them.
https://apnews.com/article/squad-aipac-progressives-congress-cori-bush-0de0a96929368db72145b033261415ca
Murphy spells it out. Democrats are moving to the right to get people who aren't 100% with them on social and cultural issues. There is a huge base of people in the US that support Israel. And they tend to be consistent older voters.
https://apnews.com/article/squad-aipac-progressives-congress-cori-bush-0de0a96929368db72145b033261415ca
https://money.usnews.com/money/retirement/aging/articles/why-older-citizens-are-more-likely-to-vote
Democrats moving to the right are only going to lose more and more voters, because the only reason people vote for them is because they aren't as far to the right as Republicans. It sure looks like moving to the right cost Harris the election, they're destroying their only appeal.
And those voters that they lose will be looking for a new party, because they won't let themselves be dragged to the right. So while the Democrats destroy their own party it makes perfect sense for progressives to abandon ship and reform into a new party to replace them.
This is all academic, of course. In reality we might not be able to vote ever again lol
It will definitely lose them progressive votes. And it probably won't gain them many conservative votes. But the Democrats are still going to try anyway. They look at who voted and chase those people's votes. edit: typo
Most of the country wants a new party, but our FPTP system mathematically guarantees they will never get it.
=/
Third party doesn’t work. You have to do what trump did, 1 man coup from the inside.
Apparently Republican voters are gonna set the mark at R regardless of who it is, so how about having someone like Bernie run in the Republican primary.
It didn't work with Bernie for more reasons than the parties resistance. A lot of people on the left that dislike the party don't seem to understand that you still have to join the party and get involved with it if you want the party to move left. Party members and active involved people shape where the party goes. We absolutely can shift the Dems left, but it means holding our noses and becoming the party. The Dems have always been an open door, big tent, party. Walk into the tent and change minds...
The Dems didn't let a single Palestinian-American speak at the DNC this year. The tent is big enough for Cheney, not us.
Yeah, the Dems are made up of scared moderates, because the left has completely abandoned politics and conceded all their power. If you want the party to move left, become the party. It really isn't mystical or complicated, power goes to those that take it. The left would rather stand on the outside looking in be cause at least they can complain and blame everyone else but themselves.
I tried to run for a small local position with the DNC using one of their arms that is for "funding and supporting small progressives" well that first bit is a lie. First question they asked me was how much money I had and if I had rich family to fund my campaign.
I told them not really but I would rather talk policy and maybe alternatives to spending money and they told me to pretend to be religious to find a good church to get donations from cause there are some rich churches.
I told them I was a Buddhist and happy for it, and they suggested I either find some other wealthy Buddhists cause they were sure I should be able to find some or maybe I should consider not running at all and just donating to this group or volunteering for free to them.
This will take acceptance and support from the people that run the party and all the wealthy party owners that view themselves better than working class because of their connections and wealth.
I've worked for the party and even helped recruit candidates. Some of what you're writing here seems very inconsistent with how we did things at least in Minnesota and Wisconsin. No one would ever address religion or social class at all here. And funding your own campaign is usually a fools errand, because raising money helps people become invested in your campaign.
But candidates are still expected to fundraise in some way shape or form. You can't be a viable candidate in today's world without money. Until elections are publicly funded and banned from raising their own money, money will always be necessary. The ability to fundraise also proves viability, people that raise money show people are quite literally invested in your campaign, making them statistically likely to vote and more likely to volunteer for 'get out the vote' efforts.
I understand all that but instead of starting with ways to start naturally and get your name out there it was directly to money. No, conversation on anything else. Just a dollar threshold for us to hit or get out of their hair.
This was with the "run for something" group while in Florida. But there was definitely people from other states and they were all equally disturbed at the immediate grilling for us to fund ourselves and to be in a major religion.
I do get that it seems ass backwards and incompatible with how a person would actually run for a local position and it's why a lot of people have become disenfranchised by the whole system and party.
It's like the state has deep pride in their idiocy.
Oh sure. And I left but the group I worked with is national and as they brag the largest entry point for new candidates and they weren't the state.
Florida just ends up an easy excuse to ignore that it's millions of people experiencing situations closer to mine.
It's not like Florida was a swing state or anything with a huge population and economy.
Do you mind me asking, what was the group recruiting?
I think you mean popular, not populist, but yes.
No, I mean populist. Populism is what is popular right now.
https://www.wordnik.com/words/populism
Trump didn’t run on any economic populism this year and won. Kamala did, and lost. It’s the electorate stupid!
She scrubbed all economic populism from her campaign in the last couple months and pivoted to campaigning with neoconservatives.
She literally went all out on her economic agenda the last 2 weeks of her campaign.
Where were the price controls to control price gouging? Where were the rent controls to fight corporate landlords and their price fixing? She mentioned this stuff once back in August and then that part of her agenda got really quiet for some reason.
She brought that up in one of her last town halls. And if she already said it, and it was well known, what’s the issue? Remember Trump’s platinum plan.
Did she? I didn't hear about that.
And if she doesn't mention it more than once, people interpret that as her not being serious. Telling people "It's on the website!" is terrible campaign strategy.
Trump ran on a populist platform that wasn't limited to economic populism. Harris didn't have any compelling narrative whatsoever.
It's worth while for the electorate to learn the right lessons. Otherwise there wouldn't be people in this comment section trying to get everyone to learn the wrong lessons.
Agreed, but all the other talking points from Trump weren’t populist, just do whistles
Trump's populism is christian nationalism. Specifically white christian nationalism. So it's not going to look Bernie's populism. And those do whistles are, or at least were before they became so overt, dog whistles.
We have already seen a third party take over a major party. The current problem with the GOP is because it absorbed the Tea Party.
With the right symbol to rally behind, we can do the same thing to the Democratic party. We need to build the Guillotine Party.
I am so down for it as long we get to use the symbol at least once for real.
Oh, I'm all for ranked choice voting, but in order for it to have any meaning we also need a plurality of parties. They also need time to build and I'm sure these two would start a good one if allowed.
Although the likelihood of political parties having any weight at all past January is anyone's guess..
Without rank choice voting any progressive party would act as a spoiler for the Democratic Party. Debilitating ourselves in this way isn't particularly useful for leveraging power to create better outcomes for the environment and minorities.
Then the Democratic Party had best make sure that progressives have no reason to split off and form their own party, huh?
Why does it always fall to progressives to get behind Democrats and never the other way around?
Oh thank god Democrats don't throw vulnerable populations under the bus every chance they get.
The FPTP voting system ensures that they do not have a reason.
The FPTP voting system and entrenchment of neoliberalism in the minds of the American public for over 40 years from both mainstream political parties starting with Reagan. This is may be the case for western countries and democracies more broadly as well. Currently, neoliberal ideas cause a contradiction when a person encounters progressive or socialist ideas. Along the lines of:
Why would we fix our institutions if they are flawless? What's the hurry to solve our problems if we are at the end of history?
Some useful and correct resolutions of these contradictions are:
Our institutions are flawed because they were made by us, flawed humans. The time to advert climate change, fix systemic inequalities, the reduce the wealth gap is now. Incremental changes will run out the clock, as they don't address the root causes. There will be hundreds of millions if not billions of causalities unless these issues are addressed sooner rather than later.
Neoliberal ideas must be pulled from the minds of Americans like a weed. Or like one of those radishes in Super Mario Bros 2. Then people will be able to embrace ideas like systemic change to institutions and wealth redistribution from the rich to everyone else.
When asked about socialism, if a person responds with 'socialism doesn't work' or 'the Soviet Union collapsed' those are the tells that a person needs to full internalize neoliberalism as a scam.
And maybe a history lesson about how the Soviet Union was actually an authoritarian communist dictatorship and not a socialist country. The government owned the means of the production, not the people, and the government wasn't representative of the people.
It's better than the Democrats intentionally murdering people in camps. Neoliberals in office aren't going to solve our problems, but it gives us time to do the work to solve them. Like educating people and co-opting the Democratic Party in one of their primaries. Like Trump did to the Republicans and Bernie tried to do to the Democrats. edit: typo
The would in a heartbeat if they thought they could get one Republican vote for doing so.
Neoliberals ARE our problem. We've had half a century of incrementalists demanding that we just wait a little more for them to get around to moving the needle to the left, and instead they move so far to the right that they're buddy-buddy with Netanyahu and the Cheneys. Incrementalism says "too soon" until it's too late.
Again, don't lie. The Democratic Party can of course move that far, but they have yet to do so.
Neoliberalism is the problem. Neoliberals can be tomorrow's socialists. But we have to put in the work and educate people. My argument already refuted this point, I recommend reading it.
Just wait. Incrementalism will get you there.
You have unfounded faith in neolliberals' willingness to move any direction other than right.
If your arguments actually referenced mine in any meaningful way you would know I have addressed these points in this comment section multiple times. As it stands, a casual refutation of your arguments is now sufficient. edit: typo
Yes, with "leverage power we don't have against people who would rather lose than stop throwing people under the bus."
We do have this power. We elected Joe Biden in 2020. Your argument pretends we don't at the expense of minorities and our ability to prevent the worst outcomes of climate change.
A few weeks ago, I'd have agreed with you, but now? The Democratic party that just lost 10 million votes.. We'll spoil that party? The one that just lost a fair election to a convicted felon? You want to protect them from being spoiled?
We have 4 years, which is, again, the most time we'll ever get to try something like this because that's how 4 year election cycles work. What is it exactly that they're doing successfully you don't want to spoil?
Yes, running third party candidates in a FPTP voting system is how the spoiler effect works.
Because of the FPTP voting system our democracy will always trend towards a two-party system. Until we enact systemic change, we will be stuck with the Democrats and the Republicans. As long as the Democrats are further to the left of fascism we should vote for them and avoid limiting our power with third party candidates.
We the people and our interests are what avoiding the spoiler effect protects.
The Democrats are neoliberals. They are easier to push on social issues and the environment. The Democratic Party is the party progressives and socialists are going to want to co-opt with a populist candidate. Like Bernie tried to do and Trump did to the Republicans. But more to the point, they do not want to kill minorities and destroy the environment.
Rather than seeking a moral victory over Democrats we should look for ways to leverage power for the people Republicans want to hurt. Doing otherwise makes the harm done to minorities the cost of doing business.
I mean yes, that's been the playbook for 8 years. More like 16 if you count what people actually thought Obama was going to be (and had record turn out). Try, try again?
The lives of millions of minorities and the Earth's climate are at stake now. Minorities will notice the difference in the short term, but we will all notice the difference in the long term. Assuming we still have elections and a Democratic Party going forward, yes. We delay fascism and co-opt the Democratic Party. edit: typos
Look, I don't know if you guys haven't been paying attention but places have been getting ravaged for decades because of what we've been doing. Everyone around me was flabbergasted with what happened in the NC western mountains. They videos were exactly like those I've been seeing in the Philippines and other countries that we just completely ignore when there's a natural disaster (maybe a 30 second blip in the media headline for 80% of it if they're in a really poor region).
The Western mountains were devastated because of the infrastructure in natural valleys and huge amounts of sediment deposited by centuries of mining those mountains out (you can see the natural rock formations that returned, lots of people know the land they built on wasn't there before it was developed). The hurricane wasn't man made, but everything fucking else about that catastrophe was because of our activity.
I don't know what the answer is, but I've been waiting for the democrat heroes to save the day since I started voting during Bush's administration that I was thoroughly against and thought our invasion of Iraq was a war crime. Now we continue to this day with a never ending war machine and a corporation first politics that hasn't ever changed. I'm all for us talking about some alternatives and pushing for everything and anything right now, not waiting to form something later to help "sway" the democrats policies (which it really didn't in the long run did it?)
I've been talking to people about climate change on this site.
If we give up before we succeed then that's a self-fulfilling prophecy. The Democrats are neoliberals. They aren't going to solve our problems. But them being in power will give us the time to educate people and co-opt their party.
I give my argument about what that involves in more detail in this same comment section here: https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/comment/11577918
It's adorable that you expect anyone to buy that the Democratic Party is movable after they just spent a whole ass year refusing to budge on fucking genocide.
This is the key part I recommend you read.
Also, this is off topic, but Harris did pledge to end the war. It was in the news. She called for a ceasefire at least three times. If you care about the Palestinians, then voting for the party that wants to end the war is more useful than allowing the party that wants Israel to finish the job to take power.
I read it. Democrats will keep playing the left for fools and moving to the right, no matter what happens.
BIDEN called for a ceasefire. With the same complete lack of conviction. There was no daylight between her and Biden on Netanyahu's genocide.
I voted for Harris and the election is over. That doesn't mean I'm going to pretend that she wasn't as committed to Netanyahu's genocide as Biden was.
No Bernie's campaign and Warren's campaign drove Biden to the left on a whole host of issues, including labor unions.
Don't lie.
This comment said it best and lists calls for a ceasefire from Harris.
https://lemmy.world/comment/13069715
Harris promised to do everything in her power to end the war in Gaza.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/11/4/harris-says-will-end-gaza-war-in-final-election-appeal-to-arab-americans
Unlike Biden, Harris was not a life long Zionist.
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/i-am-zionist-how-joe-bidens-lifelong-bond-with-israel-shapes-war-policy-2023-10-21/
Harris wasn't perfect. And that was simply not good enough for some people who didn't want to risk their hands getting dirty. Even if it meant the Palestinians becoming the cost of doing business.
Good for you. I appreciate it. No need to spread propaganda though.
I'm not. Biden pretended to want a ceasefire just like Harris did. There was NO daylight between the two. None. She presented NO policy differences on Gaza from Biden. Not one.
And I no longer trust promises without policy behind them. Democrats are great at promising shit they have no intention of doing and then gleefully announcing that their hands are tied.
You are. I even gave the receipts. They were different, but people on the left didn't want to hear it.
That's what a refusal to remove the filibuster and a razor thin majority will do. Manchin and Sinema were devastatingly effective in their obstruction. That's what a systemic issue can do in a nutshell. With the Senate, a tiny minority can overturn the will of the majority. Our refusal to fix it is part of how we got here. And things will continue to get worse if we don't take steps to fix it.
The Tea Party did not spoil a GOP election. The GOP caved and adopted their platform.
The Democratic Party will do the same thing with the Guillotine Party.
They cannot and they will not. Please do not fall for them yanking the football away from you again. AOC and Bernie exist to give you hope and thereby capture your vote for a party that has no intention of ever fighting for the working class in a meaningful way. We need a real alternative but we've given away so much of our collective power (unions) that it's hard to see a hopeful path forward. Organize with your neighbors and start building trusted communities that will fight together when needed.
Do you mean to say that AOC and Bernie are unknowingly treated as pawns by the Democrat party or that they are knowingly misleading voters into thinking the party leans further left than reality?
I would assume if anything it's the former, and Democrat idealism has lost against the reality that a third labor party cannot take root while first-past-the-post is the rule of the game.
Would it matter which?
The DNC insiders clearly have no intention of letting the public have a voice in the party. Having a couple socialists around is supposed to secure the vote from the left. Neither Sanders nor AOC(nor other progressives) are leaving the party anytime soon.
It's fair to argue that splitting the party means losing to the right but the current strategy doesn't seem to be working out either.
Sanders already left the party
Technically he's always been independent but primaried for office under a democratic ticket.
So fair? The dems still use him in this way and he is a close enough ally to be synonymous. Unless there's more recent news?
Good. We all should. The party is dead and barely alive by the shambling corpses of pelosi and Biden assuming they will be able to control it forever.
It would matter if they ultimately decided to break away from the Dems.
As the other comment says, it hardly matters. Fwiw I think they are well-intentioned but if their strategy is working for anyone, it's working for the corporatist dem party.
Just like GOP refugees created the Tea Party, we need to rally around the greatest symbol of the French Revolution, and build a Guillotine Party.
Let's call it the Rule of Law Party. One law for all of us. An end to elite impunity.
I've always thought "the guillotine society" had a nice ring to it... Not party isn't bad either
well just in time for the supreme-court-approved executions of the anti-establishment politicians. imagine not getting this after Bernie had massive support despite all the efforts of the Democratic party, and after the orange cunt winning just by paying lip service to being anti-establishment...
seriously, that's all you needed to do. not actually do anything, not help anybody. just fucking lie and pretend you give a shit about people grievances about being crushed by the system.
you couldn't even clear that bar on the fucking ground, and lost to a cunt who's known for firing people, not paying for anything, and shitting on a gold toilet. because you're physically incapable of criticizing systemic oppression.
I fear it's too late. Unless the party can be taken by force it won't be enough and we only have 4 years. If dems didn't snub Bernie this all probably wouldn't have happened. Our choices used to be two flavors of corporate fascism, now it's far right vs corporate. Dems are better on social issues, but it's not enough.
Dems are clearly better on economic issues as well. Not nearly good enough, but better. The problem is that they will only go so far, and they won't talk about it, out of fear of angering their wealthy patrons.
Well, why don’t you tell your Republican friends and families that the GOP dosent do shit for them?
Not sure why this applies to what I said, but my few Republican friends and family are uncomfortably aware of what I think about their politics.
You stated Dems are better at economics. Have you told your conservative colleagues that?
Or there needs to be an anti-establishment party, since the Democrats can never be one.
The issue is that unless we get rid of our first-past-the-post voting system and then enact further systemic change we are going to be stuck with the Republicans and Democrats.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7tWHJfhiyo
Thankfully as Trump demonstrated, a political party can be hijacked to be whatever you want. But we need to do that to the Democratic Party, like Bernie tried to do. This will involve educating people out of their neoliberal positions and ideas but it can be done.
As I get older and meet more people, I find this goal harder and harder to reach. People are dumb.
I think it starts with a smart and leftist, populist candidate, who can convince the dumb ones amongst us to follow them blindly. Then they will be educated by seeing how better things are for them under leftist leadership.
Bernie, like you said, was basically trying to be this for the US.
We can help too by educating people online. =)
Or maybe just ban "parties" and this phony, slaver system
So long as the Democratic Party leadership are reliant on corporate funding, obsessed with American power projection, smitten with Israel, pensive about worker rights and in lock-step with security and intelligence establishment, there is no hope. You will have on one hand a conservative party that shows antipathy and disdain for real liberal norms (Democratic establishment) and a rabid, evil party intent on reshaping America and the world to reflect white Christian nationalist fanaticism (Republicans.)
10 years ago I would have told you that the Dems are playing a dangerous game with their interventionism. Today they consigned 1 million children to starve, be blown to smithereens and die in order to enable the revenge of a leader who is as corrupt as Trump and far more bloodthirsty. Kamala calls Trump a "fascist" and gives Netanyahu a UN veto and 2000lb bounds to drop near hospitals. This is indiciative of a party that is morally rotten and cannot be relied upon to safeguard anyone's rights.
Unfortunately our democracy uses a first-past-the-post voting system which trends toward a two-party system. This makes the Republicans and Democrats the only game in town.
Minority Rule: First Past the Post Voting
We need to leverage power to reduce the harm done to the minority groups fascists in the Republican party want to hurt. So rather than attempting to achieve a moral victory over Democrats, people on the left should do the most useful thing they can during elections for minorities and vote for Democrats.
The Alt-Right Playbook: The Cost of Doing Business
Why must one of those parties be the Democrats? I don't see no fucking Whigs around, do you?
Democrats won't reduce any harm. They'll just send out fundraising emails, like they did when Roe was overturned. During this last cycle, they threw the undocumented under the bus and Democratic candidates were parroting Republican "boys in girls' sports" hatred.
edit: sorry i was replying to to your parent comment.
No. They only hire people who say what they want to hear, which is "move to the right at all costs."
Because unlike the Wigs, the Democrats are not divided over slavery. They can just move to the right on contemporary issues as Chris Murphy details here. edit: typo
Hi, I'm a trans person. I'm not the most at risk trans person since I'm pre-transition, but it's definitely a case of they would if they could. I would not like to be murdered in a death camp please. Like if Democrats can't get trans messaging right, because they suck at winning, fine. At least they aren't trying to completely ostracize me from society and make me dig my own grave. I hope that gives a different perspective on this.
Democrats have no concept of solidarity. None. They just haven't thrown you under the bus yet, but they've let you know that they will. Their candidates have been using the Republican "boys in girls' sports" hatred in their campaign ads.
The undocumented? Under the bus. Muslims? Under the bus. Rail workers? Under the bus. If you expect solidarity from Democrats, prepare to tuck and roll.
Two Democratic politicians already threw trans people under the bus, saying the party is too left on trans-issues, and then parroting the "people don't want biological boys in girl's sports" bullshit.
And then that one Dem who ran the campaign ad "I've never pushed for sex changes," or something like that.
I'm trans too, and honestly, I will never be supporting the DNC again after hearing that from two of their congressional members.
Democrats have only recently been openly favorable to gay people within the last decade. Minorities have been using the Democrats to shift things to the left in this country for decades before that.
I'm aware of the messaging. That's still not the same as a ban on gender affirming care, removal of employment protections, and the rounding up of homeless people.
Biden actually helped rail workers. He should have stuck with them from the start and done more, but it's better than nothing.
https://www.npr.org/2023/02/10/1155763336/freight-rail-workers-union-paid-sick-leave-bernie-sanders-csx
The people who I would have expected solidarity from is the left. But instead I am constantly confronted by people who want moral victory over the Democrats. In this arrangement, I am the ball. Instead of kicking me, how about we leverage power to help people.
Vote for Democrats in elections not because they will fix our problems, stand with us, or even do what we want, but because it is how we demonstrate power to the fascists. It's how we protect the people that Republicans want to harm and kill. It's how we buy time to get a populist movement to co-opt the Democratic Party.
Biden taking credit for the work of rail workers whose right to strike he opposed is rich.
You want solidarity in one direction only. You want the left to worship the Democrats no matter who they throw under the bus.
You already got your actual victory over the left. You just want critics to shut up about it.
What power? The left, in your estimation, has only the power to lovingly smooch the ass of the center as they move to the right and ONLY the right.
THEY. SUPPORTED. GENOCIDE. I get that that's a selling point for you, but some of us see that as already fascist-adjacent. And moving right from that just gets you fascism.
But like he did help them though.
No, I want people to actually care about minorities instead of virtue signaling. I'm not interested in being currency in your game of moral purity with the Democrats.
You got your victory over the Democrats at the expense of minorities, but you want 2026 and 2028 too. Well, Republicans might not even give us those elections or an opposition party at all now, we'll find out.
We have the power to stop fascists from taking power, killing people, and destroying the environment. We can even educate people and co-opt the Democratic Party. I recommend you read what I wrote.
Biden supported genocide. Members of his own administration pushed back against him in open letters. You don't care about the Palestinians. Genocide is a word you can type in all caps that you think will win you arguments on the internet. It holds no material implications with you whatsoever or you would be railing against Trump's promise of indefinite genocide.
As someone closer to the chopping block than I would like, I am no longer phased by that bullshit. I've got the right screaming at me that they want me dead, and I've got people like you on the left screaming at me to be silent as they drag me the rest of the way there. The Palestinians are worse off now because of people like you and your virtue signaling and so is everyone else.
Your vote is appreciated. Your rhetoric is not. We don't live in a moral universe. This universe is physics based. You acting in a way that is consistent with your subjective moral values isn't going to help anyone. In fact, it's going to let Republicans and other fascists all over the world run right over the people you claim to care about. Learn to analyze strategies based on their utility. edit: typo
The Democrats are the tool we have at our disposal. I intended to use that tool for as much as it can be used for. Help me.
But like maybe you should have read the article you posted. Then again, since you think that "we totally want to" is a policy, "we're taking credit" is the same as an accomplishment.
You're just interested in anyone who is even remotely dissatisfied with Democrats shutting up or being shut up, regardless of what Democrats do.
Dude, I fucking tried to warn about what was going to happen and I wasn't the only one. At least here on lemmy, it meant being called a trumper and a Russian every last time. But yeah, the party moved to the right and alienated the base and exactly what I was called a Russian for saying happened. Democrats stayed home. Your faith in the willingness of the Democratic Party to change for the better is misplaced. If they continue on their current course, they will lose 2026 and 2028. And despite your constant pollyanna insistence that if we just care bear stare at them they'll change, I have no remaining faith in the party. Not after this election.
As did Harris, vague meaningless non-policy promises notwithstanding.
Ooh. Were they strongly worded?
This thread is about Democrats. Of course Trump is worse. That doesn't excuse selling weapons for an ongoing genocide.
I'm telling you not to be a damned fool. The party will sell you out. It's what they do. It's a pattern of behavior that you've been making excuses for.
Who is screaming at whom to be silent?
They're using you. Not the other way around.
I did. Biden should have done more. But he didn't do nothing.
I want people to be vocal. You're doing that. I disagree with what is being said.
And I tried to warn you people. You played right into the hands of MAGA and the Kremlin. We knew who Harris and the Democrats were. The goal was to prevent fascism anyway. There was no other viable strategy, but people still tried to sink Harris' campaign anyway.
The Democratic Party is a tool, not a friend you need to have faith in.
I showed receipts. Reiterate the same lie as many times as you want. It will still be a lie.
What matter's is that it was Biden's decision. People in his administration disagreed with him.
No, I mean you wouldn't still be in this thread shitting on Democrats if you cared. You would want to spend your time going after Trump, since he's going to president, but that's not where you are directing your energy.
That's what I'm telling you. We need to co-opt the Democrats. I'm not making excuses for their behavior, I'm arguing for a strategy to advance our goals. Voting for Democrats until the party is co-opted by a progressive and socialist populist movement buys us time to make that happen. If you read my comments you would know my argument's position by now.
You at me. Be vocal. But do it in a way that is useful.
People are definitely using you. They got you arguing against your own interests and you don't even know. Or maybe you don't care. That moral victory is too important to you. edit: typo
any chance you are one of the bright consultants who get paid millions by dnc to come up with the brilliant strategies to be so dogsit that they loose to orange buffoon ?
No, I'm one of the trans people you use in your pursuit of moral victories over the Democrats.
more like you are just selfish and rich.
Me not going quietly to the death camps is me being selfish and rich according to you, got it. Real ally. =P
death camp ? you should have said you were in gaza or westbank, my bad. yeah being rich there aint gonna help. if you were here in us, you would atleast be able to work 16 hours to be one paycheque away from homelessness.
thoughts and prayers. best we can do as we don’t care about poor brown people irrespective of gender, age or still in womb.
I live in the US where fascists have put targets on the backs of trans people.
The same fascists have also pledged to let Israel finish their genocide. Weird you don't care about that.
https://www.project2025.org/
https://www.25and.me/?topics=
Or you are the wealthy but new hotness in oppressed to the DNC to hook into to prove they care about something while it only amounts to culture identiry. But it allows them to take in heavy donations to further enrich themselves by pretending to fix things.
It's clear that the trans community is still far to small a percentage of the populace to focus on as the main backing and asking other people to care about you and members of your community above their own well-being will not work because people are as selfish as everyone else.
I'm sorry but I really don't care what happens within 2% of the population as long as they aren't being killed compared to workers who make up the most of us.
So you won't see me as a leftist using Trans as any kind of grandstanding cause I really don't care or think you matter other than a funding source for pretend caring wealthy.
? edit: I mean, I gave 70 dollars to Harris' campaign this year. I spent more on the Eldrazi Incursion commander deck at my LGS which was like 90 dollars. But I gave about $300 to Warren and $300 to Bernie in 2020 and none to Biden.
People are self-interested in that they care about themselves and the people in their immediate social spheres. However it is in the interests of people to vote for Democrats and against fascists.
Well it's good of you to be honest, but fascists do want to kill us. Trans people and lots of other people are going to die as a result of fascist policies.
At least you're honest about using trans people in pursuit of your moral victory over the Democrats.
You admit you have spare money to spend and use as donations to politics. Which is my point as most members of the Trans community does when they consider gender identity to be their biggest issue to deal with.
It's not true for all trans people but the ones I hear from tend to have cash and I have known plenty of the LGBTQ community to be the most conservative because of their wealth. So are they willing to use themselves in their pursuit of moral victory?
It's an identity. I literally said I don't care and then you went and repeated your line about how you are more important. As if people are using you or spending you like currency for the election. It wasn't about you.
Lots of people will die. Yeah start being part of the larger topic then and get your head out of your own fart box. Most of them won't be upper class American trans people. And it certainly wasn't about morals it's about other people struggling that you demand agree with you in votes because you get better treatment under one party.
Maybe get with the people who care about not dying and show you do as well. As if saying, ask the DNC party to care about more than the trans community and specific shades of minority to get behind large populace movements for support is some kind of deep moral victory at your expense. Boo. Bad take.
Yeah, I had a job and disposable income before the company I worked for went out of business because of Trump's covid policies.
Me spending that $70 dollars isn't the win for your argument you think it is. Harris got to a billion dollars because millions of people donated to her campaign. People solved a collective problem by working together collectively, not by being rich.
For me it was stopping fascism. $70 seemed like a small price to pay to stop fascism for four more years. I care about trans people but the Harris campaign barely talked about trans issues so that wasn't really a motivating factor. If they had talked about trans issues favorably I might have donated more. I gave $10 when Harris announced her run, I gave $20 when she picked Walz, I gave $20 when Harris debated Trump, and gave $20 when Walz debated Vance.
I made $100k working at my job for a little over two years plus over $30k in my 401k after gas, tax, and rent. I'm not rich by any metric. Do you prefer if I can't afford to communicate over the internet so you won't be inconvenienced by my voice? You argument conveniently ignores I donated to Warren and Bernie. Are they not morally pure enough for you?
I don't want a moral victory. You clearly do. Don't quit on the honesty while you were ahead.
People are more important than your moral victory.
Please do that for everyone's sake. Thanks.
Refusing to vote for the Democrats until they are perfect on every issue is the pursuit of moral victory. It makes minorities the cost of doing business and isn't a useful strategy for helping anyone. We didn't get the right to marry who we want because people refused to vote for Democrats. Minorities strategically voted for Democrats for decades to get them and the US Overton window to shift to the left on that issue.
A big issue with this approach: The United States is not a law of nature; it doesn't have to exist. The system may only allow two options, but it does not guarantee that either one of those options will keep the system viable. Reduced harm is still harm, and at some point we needed to stop doing it.
This rhetoric is what is known as accelerationism. It's the idea that things have to get worse in order for them to get better. The United States not existing would mean the collapse of a society that supports about 340 million people. Letting the US burn to the ground is not useful, because it doesn't help any of the people living here.
The truth is that things get better when people learn from their mistakes and the bad things that happen to them. They then use that knowledge to make things better. There's no bottom to how bad things can get. Things can always get worse. And they will get worse unless we work to make them better.
Anyone can be tempted by the idea that they can make things better by letting them burn. But letting everything burn is how to harm the most people possible. In order to help anyone, we need to start leveraging power for each other. That means giving up on moral victories and analyzing strategies using utility instead of moral reasoning. edit: typo
It's not accelerationism at all! It's fatalism.
Accelerationism is, "It has to get worse before it can get better."
My point here is, "The system that only allows for getting worse will never get better."
Years of US history demonstrate that is not the case. People have demonstrated it is possible to make things better with our democracy. Women's suffrage and the civil rights movement happened in the US in the 20th century.
Things have been getting worse since Reagan brought neoliberalism to the mainstream. The US wasn't perfect. And on some social issues like gay marriage things have gotten better. But we are where we are now thanks to over forty years of neoliberism allowing the rich to extract wealth from everyone else. We have entered the billionaires forming an oligarchy around a dictator stage of late-stage capitalism.
What?
They are the establishment.
Thus the call to become something else; become being the operative word, meaning to change from what they currently are.
You guys really need a third party already.
The issue is that we have third parties, but because of our first-past-the-post system their candidates act as spoilers mathematically speaking.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7tWHJfhiyo
I live in a nation with more then two party's and first past the post (it sucks). You guys need to stop making up reasons to not have viable 3rd parties.
It's not made up, it's math. And if your nation doesn't enact systemic change to its system, your democracy will inevitably trend towards two viable political parties as well. edit: typo
Hear fucking hear.
Ok, and white must become black.
Al Jolsonmaxxing
LA told me
"You'll be a pop star
All you have to change
Is everything you are."
Democrats are the establishment that needs to be laid out to pasture and replaced
Democrats don't learn lessons.
They have 4 years to tighten up. I'm not optimistic. The only victory they have had since Obama was a fear victory.. nobody wanted Biden they were scared of trump. That is played out.
The right did a good job of parading him around as an anti-establishment, for the common people candidate. I don't think that's true, but a lot of people do.
I hope the D party reorganizes as a populist anti-establishment party and holds a ranked choice primary with some young actually left leaning candidates who can't be bought.
To be honest, if the D party don't reform and earn my vote, I'm not giving it to them out of fear anymore. Before trump I had a "no lesser of two evils" policy for voting. And I'm going back to it. They had 4 years to plan, hold a primary, do some prosecuting of rich criminals, understand why Trump's popular and strategize to beat it, literally fucking anything. Did they?
I'm over it, they can run a fair primary with some progressive candidates and let the people decide, and then I'll vote. Tired of whatever they're doing and it looks like a lot of others are as well. Hope they figure out the obvious issue they have and fix it. Since its a two party system they're hogging the only route that the left has to success and fucking it up remarkably bad. Like I could do a better job and I'm an idiot.
While the plan you've outlined in your argument my feel good, it isn't particularly useful for shifting the Democrats to the left. Under this plan, the causalities of this and future Republican administrations will be the cost of doing business.
Consider leveraging power by voting for Democrats in elections to benefit the people who will otherwise be harmed by future Republican administrations. edit: typo
I live in a really liberal state. So my vote doesn't actually matter.
I'll consider it, and I appreciate the kind response, but to be honest I think if people keep placating them with "lesser of two evils votes" nothing will change.
Hopefully the party can draw conclusions about the 10m people who sat this one out vs 2020, and figure out why.
Edit: do you have an article or transcript for the link? I'm not a video person I prefer to read
Votes in high population states count less than votes in low population states, because of the electoral college, but they still count.
This isn't about placating the Democrats. It's about not using minorities as currency for a moral victory over the Democrats. The moral victory may feel good, but it isn't useful. A moral victory will not prevent key tipping points in the Earth's ecosystem that will cause catastrophic damage to the environment. Nor will it protect minorities from the fascists who want to kill them.
Hopefully the 10 million people will learn to leverage power by voting for the Democrats in elections even if they don't get anything out of it. Because we all have something to lose by Republicans taking power in the short term. Even if we won't all feel it until the long term.
The Democratic Party does need a populist narrative to appeal to a broader base, but the Democrats are unlikely to listen. The party needs to be hijacked the way Trump hijacked the Republican Party and the way Bernie tried to hijack the Democratic Party. Part of doing that is delaying fascism so that there are still elections and people to run against fascists. edit: typo
They are the establishment. Why would they ever change? They would rather Trump win, than their easy paychecks be disrupted. You are never going to get a democrat to care about people.
It would be easier for progressives to take over the DNC and state Dems than to form an entirely new party and make it viable.
If that's the case, then it's never going to happen, because the democrats are never going to let it happen, so you're basically saying stop voting or caring about anything and just lay down and die.
There is no future for the democratic party. This election convinced me that they are never going to care about anyone but their donors, and next election I won't be voting for them. I've voted for the candidate they shoved down our throats to defeat Trump three times now, and most of the time they've fucked it up. No more "lesser evil" crap. I'm not voting for evil again, period.
The strategy you are describing makes minorities the cost of doing business. Instead of attempting to achieve moral victory over Democrats consider voting for Democrats in elections to leverage power for the people Republicans want to hurt and kill.
RAmen
I suggest we all get together and form a party. We can hold it somewhere well known; maybe a waterfront, or harbor. I hear Boston is a nice place. Very patriotic even. We can even have refreshments; maybe a nice tea? Who’s in?
There simply won’t be another election.
The whole point is a cow’s opinion. It doesn’t matter.
Then there's no cost to you making this promise:
It doesn't matter anymore, so it should be easy to agree with.
It's "moo".
That is a possibility. The US elected fascists who now control all three branches of the federal government. However they do not have a two-thirds majority in congress or control two-thirds of the states. So it will be difficult for the fascists if they choose a purely legal route. However, since they are fascists, they might use violence to get what they want. We won't know until they try.
In the event that we still have elections and Democrats can still participate we should leverage power and vote for Democrats in those elections. This will reduce the harm done to minorities by fascists who want to kill them.
I wanted to add to your point, because people in this comment section are attempting to write off future elections unless Democrats completely meet the demands of progressives. This isn't something Democrats are likely to do. But the people who will be harmed by hypothetical future Republican administrations would prefer if Democrats were clogging up the works and knocking fascists out of power at the very least.
Bit late init
Wasn't there a recent conspiracy theory that the establishment doesn't want Trump (hence the assassination attempts) because he's an easily manipulated loose canon who doesn't follow orders like a good shill should lol?
Point being that dems lost this election because they are inherently more pro establishment and have been for a while.
I think that there is one issue which Trump will deliver the Dems what they really want, and they won't stand in his way as he does it: liquidating Palestine entirely. In the next ten years if nothing is done by Arab nations, the UN or the US left, Israel will likely declare war on the Palestinian Authority itself, exiling or killing its leaders if they do not submit to Israeli sovereignty over the entirety of Palestine.
Sounds like he'll end the genocide! Technically, it's no longer genocide when there's no one left to murder.
They will be the establishment no matter what they do lmfao. Can't claim to not be unless they choose to go the Republican route of lying their asses off
lol, why would they do that?
They’ve got 4 years of donations thanks to Trump. Democrats never learn and will always pour money into an issue instead of actually solving it.
"These bonobo monkeys must become Rhodes scholars" is a more believable headline
Counterpoint: anybody not cheering for Fox News' talking points sufficiently enthusiastically is declared "socialist" and all but suggested as target for public lynching (or in some cases actually the target of a lynch mob storming the capitol) and the masses have been drilled into going berserk at hearing the right keywords, regardless of what happens in reality.
Calling an attempt to break this information monopoly over half the nation an uphill battle is the epitome of understatement.
Honestly, Fox News is going to call anyone against them a socialist. That's just what they're going to do. There are even some Republican policies which can be construed as socialist, such as public spending on schools, even private schools.
The average voter really doesn't care about if something is socialist or not. They clearly don't care if something is fascist. They only care about the perception of how it will affect their life.
If you tell people they're not going to have to pay for healthcare ever again, or that cannabis will be legal, or that you will fix the massive wealth gap, they will vote for you. Nominal Republicans would even vote for you. The downside of using the word socialism like that, is that Fox News that has removed the meaning of socialism from their base, meaning that actual socialism will not seem like such a big deal.
Being called socialist isn't even the issue. My point is that a news monolith has spent decades radicalising half the country and at this point there are enough cultists that will mercilessly tear down anybody Fox&Co paint a target on. Until there is a solid defense against such a hate machine, no party will flourish on its merits as long as Fox-drilled stooges will only be fed a caricature of any opposition Fox designates as the enemy. Even your perfect ideal candidate would lose the election. The boogeyman Fox would paint them to be would be so repulsive and half the country would never even hear their ideas anyway, except what skewed perspective Fox would blast the viewers with 24/7.
My point is that they're construction is inherently self-destructive. They have made their base extremely susceptible to populism.
If a populist candidate from the other direction arises, a large portion of the Fox News base will support them. You mark my words. Just think about how quickly they turn against Fox News when they don't do what they want
https://media3.giphy.com/media/HABnBDy6Us8VO/giphy.gif?cid=6c09b952lbtj4oar8yia7k6wgvjmf8y3zuyy61f47p44ozvw&ep=v1_internal_gif_by_id&rid=giphy.gif&ct=g
He's annoying, but he's right.
Or what? What are you doing to do about it if they don't change at all; if they'd rather lose with a lesser fascist than win with a progressive?
Lol "lesser fascist." tHeY'Re bOtH ThE SaMe!!1
You're failing to grasp the nuance between reluctantly supporting genocide and fully supporting genocide.
There are a whole lot of folk that plain demand full support of genocide as the cost of doing business/having rights. Reluctance to support genocide is viewed as eroding the foundation to their very way of life.
It's the other way around. People want a moral victory over Democrats. In this game of moral purity, minorities are the cost of doing business.
Isn't that what Trump is saying he is? I mean, they're both claiming to be "against the machine..."
The democratic party per se isn't the problem.
First past the post democracies always result in what we have now. The democratic party will completely disappear under proportional representation. In it's place you will see a proliferation of the power that is being grimly clasped by the corporate kleptocracy and their minions. Instead of 1% deciding how we manage our society, everyone gets a say.
The other problem is voters trying to hold on to the Democratic party because of FPTP.
Which in turn makes the Democrats comfortable enough to run bad candidates.
Which in turn makes Democrats lose the election because they did not have to run on good policy to compete with a more left party, only a more right party.
The other problem is voters are idiots. Alaska had ranked choice and threw it in the trash. Massachusetts, and I'm sure several others, passed it up because "it's too confusing".
Too confusing? Motherfucker, have you never ranked things based on preference? Have you not a second favorite color, or ice cream flavor, or child, or season? Who is your next-best-friend? What was your dream job in college, and your fallback?
They have, they were just as beholden to money interests as the Republicans...
They only need to allow equal and fair access to elections to 3rd parties in blue states. They can be blue conservatives much as they want so long as the people have options.
That is the fastest way to turn a blue state red.
Split the vote so that the minority Republican vote can win. Because there are more registered Republicans in California than in Texas.
No, the actual answer is to change the voting system to a Cardinal system, so that there are no such things as Spoiler party's or split votes.
Approval or STAR are the answer. Either would enable third parties to exist and thrive.
As a note RCV is not a Cardinal system, and still has the Spoiler Effect. People lie about it saying it's the fix for all problems, but it's actually worse than what we have (there are parts that are better, but more parts that are far worse)
Could you elaborate or provide a link to some further reading about how RCV is worse than first past the post? I haven't heard this before and would like to learn more.
Let me guess, dems should also focus on courting those Gaza genocide voters too? Should we get the trans vote in there too? That's what, like 15 votes?
Robert Reich, the same idiot who told me to vote for Kamala’s right wing platform.
Go back to doing your stupid little dances, Robert
All of these can be true simultaneously:
Get out of here with your "nuance" and "critical thinking skills"!
/s, great job, keep up the good work
As opposed to what?
It is, as you know, physically impossible to vote for a liberal one day and be a leftist for the other 364 days of a year.
I do wonder how much this has changed:
https://www.npr.org/2021/11/09/1053929419/feel-like-you-dont-fit-in-either-political-party-heres-why
But I'm tired of those on here thinking the Democrats need to become the "progressive left" when that is not who the Democratic party represents.. Or let's be clear it's only a small but loud fraction of it, that keeps threatening on leaving.
That said I'm not sold trying to go after the "populist right" was the right Move, stick to centrist working class.
Of course if the far left didn't vote.. The party is stuck moving even more to the right .. So.. We will see.
What would interest me more is a "party" of leftist that:
More important promote, explain, and teach the pogressive policies and how it will help people, and be willing to debate pros/cons of other ideas. This exists I feel, but not on this echo chamber..