Did you listen to the latest tiff between David Hogg and James Carville?
Carville really wants to push progressives out of the Democratic party while keeping their heads in the sand. I think his last rant was because Hogg wants to replace existing Dems (Carville says he should be replacing Republicans). However, I think Hogg wants to do this because these Dems aren’t really doing anything and waiting to pick up the pieces from this Trump administration. I think agree more with Hogg that it’s more important to show the people that you represent them rather than be like: “we’re not the Republicans”.
I’m not an entire fan of Hogg though, he seems a bit inconsistent but I agree with him here.
To be clear, people should have voted for the Democrats. We’re all in the position we’re in because not enough people did. Would you get what you want? No. But we still wouldn’t be in the mess otherwise. I mean, assuming the election wasn’t stolen.
That being said, all these older people that don’t seem interested in fighting for their people need to be purged from the Democrats. I don’t know if it’s because they’re really old or out of touch or what. There’s a thirst for people to want representation for them to fight (as seen by the AOC and Bernie rallies). I think their inactivity isn’t helping for the most part. Also, they need to get some more names out there.
It’s because the democrats simply cannot fund-raise on the kind of populist progressive policy Americans actually want.
Democrats are up schitt’s creek without a paddle - they can’t fund-raise without the support of the large donor-class, and their increasingly populist progressive base are simply not satisfied by the kind of economic policies those donors are desperate to preserve.
If democrats stay this course they will never hold more than 45% of congress again and only win the white house maybe once every 3 or 4 terms.
If democrats stay this course they will never hold more than 45% of congress again and only win the white house maybe once every 3 or 4 terms.
Yeah I’m feeling that.
You bring up really good points. How do you go to the large donors and say, “give us more money to help take more money from you”.
I’m greedy. I want the live in a clean and safe society. Empirical data exists that shows one way to achieve this is the Scandinavian model; high tax funding social services.
At least, that’s how I dress it up.
I’ve brought it up on other Lemmy comments, but one thing I really want to work on with messaging is “Eat the rich”.
Case in point: Elon Musk is evil. He’s a toe-sucking narcissist who can’t stand that South Africa ended apartheid. He’s a loser that can’t beat the first Path of Exile boss. He’s…make up your own insult, and I’ll likely echo it. But what I can’t stand is commenters saying that anyone and everyone possessing as much money as him is equally evil. Basically the equivalent of so many school “Zero tolerance” policies.
Musk is evil for his actions, not just for personality. Yes, a large number of rich people are also evil - there’s logic behind that venn intersection. But capitalism is our system, even if we decide we want to start changing it. Past the big names of horrible people that have lobbied the system for their own interests, many rich people are just…quiet outside of their main successful ventures. One very ready playbook of the far right is to point out how many Democrats - even honest ones that have made excellent changes - are evil simply for having net worth in the millions. As long as “Eat the rich” is a popular slogan, it tends to work, and convince donors that progressives are out to hunt them down with axes.
My take on a better message would be: We all want a better world. Have you ever wandered the streets of venice, wishing you could have that nice communal feel back in America - unburdened by homeless people, dirty streets, or traffic? This is our goal. House the homeless. Clean the streets, and encourage recycling. Put people on public transit. Progressives will tax you more to make that work, but will make a better world for it; one where people don’t need to hire private security to protect from betrayed employees, or shelter in an SUV to go two blocks. If you’re a businessman, vote Republican. If you’re an honest businessman, vote Democrat.
The message could use some work, but perhaps you get the idea.
But what I can’t stand is commenters saying that anyone and everyone possessing as much money as him is equally evil.
There is no ethical way of acquiring a billion dollars. Get on board with that concept.
That doesn’t mean their evilness is *equal", but it does mean they are all evil. Even popular rich people like Warren Buffett, Gabe Newell, or Taylor Swift are evil for conducting the kind of systematic exploitation necessary to acquire a billion dollars worth of financial assets from consumers and workers.
We need confiscatory top-tier income taxes. We need securities taxes to drive the ultra-rich to pull their wealth out of financial assets. We don’t need to restrict them from acquiring products and services produced by workers: their mansions and yachts and private jets are not the problem. Those purchases all paid worker salaries.
The problem is their portfolio, not their stuff: every item in those portfolios is designed to siphon consumer dollars away from workers. We can, and should, claw back against such excessive exploitation .
But what I can’t stand is commenters saying that anyone and everyone possessing as much money as him is equally evil. Basically the equivalent of so many school “Zero tolerance” policies.
The existence of billionaires while millions of people are starving and homeless is the evil those commenters are pointing to.
Almost as if those people are upset about a system that valorizes and encourages immense wealth inequality, and not, like, which people get to be billionaires.
All the career federal employees that have lost their jobs because of Musk numbers in the thousands. Their knowledge, skills and experience with federal programs just wiped out because of that freak. The true cost of this is just beginning. Nothing is going to work soon.
Hogg wants to replace old, “do nothing” incumbents with younger versions of Pelosi, Clinton, Jeffries.
Hogg wants young, centrist, corporatist Democrats, not progressives.
Because they win elections in purple districts. Try running AOC in North Carolina.
Yeah, I’ve been low-key following this drama and Hogg is out there spearheading the “tea party style takeover” that people have been saying the DNC needs. Carville, Schumer, and Co. seem to think that letting the republicans off the leash to blow up everything and hurt everyone is the best path forward. Put another way, the plan is to continue offering shitty corpocentrism and hope that voters prefer corpocentrism (clothed fascism) over naked fascism again in two and four years. Fuck that and fuck them, Hogg can take my energy and blast those fossilized assholes with a spirit bomb.
That’s pretty much a given.
You mean Hilary. This is clearly the chance to beat that dead horse again!
I highly recommend reading Ezra Klein’s latest book “Abundance” for a look at why the DNC has been losing the working class. It also offers some optimistic ideas for moving forward.
Ah, the classic “Dems would have won if they ran to the left” + “Left-wingers couldn’t have ushered in the fascist; we’re too small to make a difference!”
What sorts of left-wingers are you talking about here?
The performative kind who insisted that they couldn’t vote for Harris even in the spirit of harm reduction in the face of an obvious, outright, blatant fascist with a very clear shot at winning.
Okay, so you don’t think there is anyone that would have been motivated to vote for Harris if she had adopted positions like universal healthcare that isn’t a ‘performative’ left-winger that would never be happy with her?
I think that choosing to let an open, clearly identified fascist win because one of the most progressive platforms in the past 40 years isn’t progressive enough is either a sign of being purely performative in your leftism, wherein what matters is a pseudoreligious devotion to marking up virtue points for the afterlife (rather than actually forestalling harm or establishing conditions for change in the real world), or a sign of being an utter moron.
Those who chose not to vote Harris can pick which they identify as, I won’t dispute whichever of the two labels they choose.
Okay, but it seemed like the point of the comment I initially replied to was that it was contradictory to assume that Harris could have had a better shot at winning by moving to the left, and that the number of people that decidedly don’t vote based on Harris not being progressive enough is insignificant. Do you really think that’s true?
The point of the comment was that it was contradictory to say that Harris lost because she didn’t move left, while simultaneously denying that certain groups of leftists choosing to let the fascist win are at fault for, well, choosing to let the fascist win.
Either the aforementioned leftists aren’t enough to matter, and moving left wouldn’t have saved us; or the aforementioned leftists are enough to matter, and thus are directly responsible, by their inaction, for letting fascism win.
It seems pretty wild to me to assume that there is a trivial number of people that would be motivated to vote based on something like universal healthcare, that isn’t a pseudo religious devotee of performative leftism.
Really, how do we get viable third parties? How do we change the voting system to not have " spoiler candidates "? The binary is rotting us.
how do we get viable third parties?
By having a third party that’s willing to put in the work and do things the right way.
So, instead of having a do-nothing candidate like Jill Stein who shows up right before every election, then disappears again after only obtaining a half of a single percent of the total votes, we’d have to have a third party that started focusing on winning local/state elections. That would allow them to start having more than ZERO members in the houses of Congress, which is currently the case. And once they have members in Congress, from various districts around the country, then they’d have a real chance at running a presidential candidate who can win.
Make no mistake. Anyone that currently votes for a 3rd party candidate for president is an utter fool. And there are A LOT of them on Lemmy. A 3rd party cannot win. They are nowhere near winning. Because they haven’t put in the work to create a coalition to actually start having a presence in our government.
Don’t neglect that Stein was a Russian plant to spoil the election. Follow the money and Stein’s activities pre and post election.
Yeah, it was pretty obvious.
But whether she was or not, a 3rd party candidate for president can only serve to split votes and increase the possibility of the worst candidate winning. And that will be the case until a 3rd party starts getting serious and getting representatives in Congress.
It’s a literal joke to vote for a 3rd party candidate when they don’t even have reps in either house of Congress. Do the people who vote 3rd party not think about what would happen if one magically won when they have no one from their party in Congress to help achieve their agenda?
1.) Federally and statewide, you’ve got to vote for the party that isn’t making Ranked Choice or Star voting illegal, for starters.
2.) Locally, third parties have to actually run local candidates. They are a vanity party otherwise.
If you can’t manage those two things, math & chaos theory guarantees that you’ll never have a 3rd party.
I want Approval Votingand Sequential Proportional Approval Voting, but will support any electoral reform referendum or bill.
And when those get enough name recognition with the electorate, the GOP will start passing bills to make them illegal in red states.
We’re nowhere near to it. It has to be a grassroots effort from convincing all of our population it is necessary. Because neither the DNC or the RNC really want it. More parties means they lose power. The DNC pretends to not be opposed, but they undermine third parties all the time. We have to fix first past the post, and neither party is going to help with that.
Not by going directly for a moonshot at the presidency. You spend years getting people involved in local politics, then work your way up. State and local governments have power, even if it’s “boring”.
That or a coup or other violent, abrupt, wildcards.
Local government isn’t boring. It’s infuriating. It’s like if you gave the worst HOAs a police force.
Whatever it is, most people don’t engage with it.
I tried to and then realized that they can’t actually help with the main things I want changed, and that they’re just sad little kings of sad little hills.
You go out and work in the primaries.
Look at AOC. The guy she ousted was a mainstay of the NY Democratic Party for decades.
If you wait until the general election you get no input.
But that’s not the end of it as this still maintains the binary. First, what are the measures for getting third parties on the ballot? Second, how do we get rid of the fptp system so that we can actually vote for candidates we like, rather than the lesser of two evils?
Edit: I responded too quickly at work, and fixed it up later.
I’m no fan of FPTP, but let’s not put the cart before the horse.
You aren’t going to change the rules for the 2026 primaries.
Concentrate on what is doable.
1000% this. Half our problem is people bitching that their perfect candidate is not an option, and that they don’t want to vote ‘against’ someone.
The time to be active is NOW, not complaining about your choices in October 2028. Left media isn’t helping here, since they want to complain about how the election is still years away and yet we’re talking about potential candidates… YES, we are. If you’re not talking now, then you’re not in the conversation. Is it great to have a 24x365x4 political cycle? hell no. But is it what we have? yes.
Join your local democratic organization and get familiar with how things work. Help choose a ‘not fascist’ candidate for now and push for better down the line.
If you’re here, reading this, and you want things to be better, then you have two choices: vote blue no matter who (ceding your choice to others who are involved), or get involved and be part of the decision of ‘who’ is blue.
You push for ranked choice voting initiatives in your state. You grow the party locally, get people into city councils, state legislatures, the house of reps before gunning for the presidency.
We have no third party candidates in the house, an institution with 435 members + some extra non voting ones. There’s a few non-affiliated, but no true third parties. If you can’t get someone in there, you shouldn’t bother wasting time and money on the presidency.
Have you considered just having like a local group organized around something like pro-labor or just the community in general.
Elect officers or organize how you think best. Call meeting invite guess to speak to issues you all like. When elections come around try to solicit questions to all the campaigns. Have the organization vote as a group on who to endorse or not at all.
If it’s worth the effort, work the campaigns for the folks you all endorse.
More people did that stuff then starting a third party in state would be easy. From there you go forward. If you do well or brand then you may have others in their region wanting to do the same. National two parties are federations of these groups with more binding Charters.
Many States have these hurdles for recognized political parties but they can’t stop folks from just organizing how they want.
What you need is a Bernie Sanders funding his own political party, then recruit the AOC and likes. Then they constantly for 20 years present on themselves and refuse to compromise with Democrats and call them on their bullshit whatsoever.
But idk why they didn’t do it sad for you
How? Probably not via voting in 2028 or holding a sign. As in, not within the pre-existing failing/failed system. This one isn’t gonna recover.
After the people are in charge of the smouldering ashes, you can start from scratch! The one upside. Assuming USA doesn’t just submit passively and end up like Russia with a broken people for centuries, which is what I’m expecting.
Copy Canadians. Including the limits on campaign length, so your news cycle isn’t so endlessly exhausting. No wonder 1/3rd have totally tuned out. IMO scrap FPTP like we didn’t have the balls to do.
I guess that’s the crux of the question: does it really require smoldering ashes to get this done? Entrenched power is obviously tough times, but within the system we currently have what are the possibilities?
Not sure anyone really knows yet. I’m a pessimist by nature, so there’s blind spots and I freely admit them.
Because DNC are controlled opposition.
We can’t put up another woman for a decade or two at least. This country is too misogynistic to elect a woman.
I’m not sure that’s true. While yes, America does have a sexist problem, Hillary won the popular vote.
I think the DNC just keeps putting up bad candidates, some of whom happen to be women
Personally, I would be ok with J.B. Pritzker. Don’t love that he’s a billionaire. On the other hand, he’s the best governor Illinois has had in ages and seems to be trying to do right by his constituents.
Democrats are going to push even harder to appeal to Republicans in 2028 by nominating David Duke.
I would not be happy about Pritzker as the dem nominee…
…Because then he wouldn’t be my governor anymore :(
Pritzker’s the man. It pains me to praise a billionaire but he’s been an AWESOME governor. Wish we could get a Pritzker-type for Chicago mayor instead of these chucklefucks we keep electing.
How can you say that when Rod Blagojevich is there… with his hand out… asking for a bribe?
Democrats are dumb enough to think that the main problem is that Americans won’t elect a woman, and won’t try a third time. Then they’ll find someone conservative and claim this is the only way to win over Republicans.
The reason Bernie never won the dem primary is that less people voted for him
no, the reason why Bernie never won a primary is because Hillary and Wasserman circumvented voters choice because Clinton wanted to be the first woman president over putting forward the only candidate that could have went head to head with Trump in 2016.
and before anyone says I’m wrong, tell me why Wasserman stepped down as the DNC chair?
Clinton was never an appropriate candidate that could ever hope to go against Trump. Both of them are to blame for the current state of our country because they were blinded by achievements over what is best for our country. it’s a common problem for democrats.
I have no doubt we would be in a better place today if Bernie had been presented as the democratic choice for president in 2016.
Clinton received the majority of votes in the primary. How did they “circumvent voters’ choice”?
But opposition to Wasserman Schultz, both public and private, had been gaining steam following the publication late last week of leaked emails which seemed to show a plot by DNC officials to damage Bernie Sanders during the Democratic primary.
The emails fed the criticism from progressives and Sanders’ supporters that Wasserman Schultz and her team were hostile to his campaign from the start and had done their best to help Clinton win the Democratic nomination at the Vermont senator’s expense.
https://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/wasserman-schultz-wont-preside-over-dnc-convention-226088
Amid furor over an email leak that revealed a bias against Bernie Sanders inside the Democratic National Committee, U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz announced Sunday she will step down as chair.
https://www.npr.org/2016/07/24/487242426/bernie-sanders-dnc-emails-outrageous-but-not-a-shock
“I know that electing Hillary Clinton as our next president is critical for America’s future. I look forward to serving as a surrogate for her campaign in Florida and across the country to ensure her victory,” she said. “Going forward, the best way for me to accomplish those goals is to step down as Party Chair at the end of this convention.”
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/debbie-wasserman-schultz-resigns_n_5795044ae4b0d3568f8397f7
so tell me. why would Clinton have more votes? OH YEAH! because of the bias that Wasserman forced upon the DNC!
I could go on and on with reports just like this but I’m pretty sure my point has been made.
Clinton and Wasserman were working together to circumvent voters choice in order to ensure that Clinton was THE candidate. Unfortunately they gambled with our democracy and lost.
it’s worse than whatever you’re thinking too. the only reason why they were caught is because they were trying to cheat. wikileaks wouldn’t have had anything to leak had they not try to fuck over Bernie.
Superdelegates. They are supposed to make their votes when things are nearly settled. As a collective, they voted for Hillary before the contest even started, which gave people the impression that Hillary was winning.
This is like a judge giving their opinion, before letting jurors discuss their decision.
Superdelegates don’t vote until the convention, potentially they could have still nominated Clinton if Sanders won the pledged delegates, but it never came up, since he didn’t. Like I’m not contesting that the party establishment favored Clinton, but you can’t say they circumvented the will of the voters when the nominee was the person who won the popular vote.
Throughout the primary, the media counted all the superdelegates as Clinton votes, regardless of their theoretical obligation to vote for whomever won their state’s primary. Voters were relentlessly bombarded with the notion that it was impossible for Sanders to obtain the nomination. Yeah, she got more votes, but like, shit wasn’t fair, man.
All voters fall out of coconut trees.
It isn’t about change.
For the whole history of democratic primaries, the nominee was always the one that received the most votes. It probably of doesn’t have to be, but it always is. “they” in question are people of America who know more than nothing about how democracy in their country works.
Progressives are going to bitch and moan about how nobody does what they want, but will refuse to participate in the very process designed to ask them what they want.
It’s almost like some idiots on the internet don’t want change, they want to be oppressed.I’ve voted in every Democratic primary since I could vote for Kucinich. State and local, too. When does participation mean they care what I think?
There is a very lovely pattern I see. Every time there is a conversation on the internet, everyone totally always voted and participated and canvassed and run and also fed the homeless at the same time, and every time there are any elections upcomming, there is no end to the constant anti-democracy messages about how voting is pointless and nobody should do that because both sides.
In the end, around 20% of registered voters are voting in democratic primaries, and I repeat my thesis, every time the nominee was the person who got the most votes, every time. So the answer to your question - they already care what you think, and if more people were agreeing with you, then maybe they would do what you want. So far they’re doing what majority of voters wants, and that’s not on the shadowy democratic demons, it’s on majority.
Okay so I’m just never gonna be happy with my government because I’m too weird.
Maybe I should be an independent. Since I’m in a swing state they might actually care what I think.
“They” being tens of millions of voters in the primaries. You could be one of them, maybe?
Dems are 0 and 2 when squaring off a Woman against a right wing ultranationalist.
so long as there are people like Trump on the other side, I dont think the Dems will ever run a woman again.
