Yes neoliberals, let’s continue to govern from the center. Because that’s worked so well the last forty years as the right has moved the Overton window to the point where we no longer have a left wing party.
I think it’s worth mentioning again that all this hope and excitement comes with the first candidates that aren’t Boomers.
Obama was a boomer?
Generations aren’t written in stone, but the Boomers are generally defined as 1946-1964 and Obama was 1961. So younger Boomer.
Now “boomer” just means old person. Gen Z are happy to refer to older millenials and younger Gen X as boomers, because why bother educating yourself.
because language evolves, and now the word “boomer” is more useful as a word to describe old people with a specific mindset rather than as a word for people born in a specific lapse of time
I think the “specific mindset” is also one that is out of touch with every younger generation.
yea, that mindset of being out of touch and thinking your generation was the last good one, that kinda mindset
(at least that’s how i see it)
They’re all shit lol. But the actual boomer generation were definitely some of the worst of the worst. Benefiting in ways most can’t even comprehend from the generations that came before them. Eagerly gobbling it all up. Acting like they earned it . But then leaving none for those that came after and just generally souring things on every possible measure. I’m doing the things their parents grandparents Etc fought for.
There are always exceptions. Possibly as I’m even an exception to my own generation. But there are definitely some rules that can be broadly applied.
Let’s win elections by just all becoming republicans and letting the billionaires win! That’s what compromise looks like to these people.
The Dems have had control of all 3 House of Reps, Senate, and Presidency for 6 years out of the last 44 years. And you wonder why they’re forced to compromise?
Every time they lose (like they’ve lost for 38 years out of the 44 years), they are forced to compromise and they go to the center to find voters. You want them to not go to the center? Then they need to win first.
I’m happy to see your Ctrl, C, and P buttons are in fine working condition. Do you have a valid argument though?
You mean V, you can’t even get your attacks right.
Argument is valid and was given. And since you were oh so polite, do you have a valid counter, or do you only have attacks?
I may or may not reply since you already showed who you are. More attacks = no reply.
I truly see neoliberals as on the right these days.
They want us to be slaves.
- Americans repeatedly respond to authenticity, even if that authenticity is built on lies (Trump)
- An old white self-avowed Democratic Socialist independent from Vermont overtook a decades-old Third Way household name in under a year, outperforming her in head-to-head polling against Trump.
- Democrats repeatedly water down their rhetoric to appeal to ignorance in the middle-ground
- Said middle-ground is defined by right-wing extremist rhetoric and a shifting of the Overton Window
- Said policies then fail because they watered-down the rocket-fuel too much and it never broke orbit.
- Democrats shocked when grassroots coalition that is the backbone of the party and GOTV movement unenthused.
- Democratic establishment shocked when they lose.
The day Democrats grow a backbone and double-down on progressive policy because it actually works instead of appealing to ignorance is the day Democrats never lose again.
There are some good signs in the party they’re moving away from this; notably ignoring a lot of the advice from Hillary Clinton strategists (thank fuck), while also promoting progressive voices on the national stage such as at the convention — AOC, Bernie, Warren speeches. Still, there are remnants of the old that need to go.
Also:
Don’t ever shy away from our progressive values. One person’s socialism is another person’s neighborliness.
- Tim Walz
That is a well spoken summery of the current issue with our political system. Thank you for taking the time to write that up and share it.
It is sometimes hard to have faith in the future when we are so inundated with our current issues. To cultivate hope in the future it is key to remember that time marches on and the older generations will always be replaced by a younger generation. I believe if we keep our democracy alive for long enough we do have the potential as a society to right many wrongs that the younger generations have lived under for the past 50 years and if we stay on target with our wants and needs and can put empathy and compassion for our neighbors as a core belief then it is only a matter of time before we get elected representatives in power to start affecting change.
I believe we, as a people, can do better for our future generations and that is why we all must do our civic duty and vote, not just for president but in our local elections, no matter how small, and every election above that. We have the power to change all this and I believe we will in time. It won’t be overnight but it can be within our lifetimes. Small steps matter because right now we aren’t capable of making huge steps but when the big steps forward become attainable we are prepared as a society to take those steps.
Thank you again for your post, stay strong and motivated and we can do this. Remember this isn’t just about you and me but us as a country, as a species and our responsibility to the future generations that will come after us. We can right our past mistakes and keep hope for that future alive. We have a greater voice now than we realize and are already electing people into positions of power to affect this change. We are not in this alone but in this together; not me, Us!
Aw thanks — and wonderfully said, yourself! Indeed despite everything along with much work to do, I feel quite optimistic. It feels as though we’re beginning to rip band-aids off that were placed there decades ago and I’m all for it. I should also note that I come from a rural Republican blue-collar family who flipped under Bush’s first term… So people can certainly change and I know I can get quite feisty with my rhetoric toward conservatives these days but sometimes it pays to extend an olive branch for some of those still reachable.
IDK if they are shocked at the results. There’s a calculation that needs to be made between convincing voters you have their back, while convincing donors that you have theirs, when those groups have irreconcilable differences of material interest. A cynic would say that a politicians job is to convince the voter base and the donor base that you’ll protect each from the other.
ignoring a lot of the advice from Hillary Clinton strategists (thank fuck)
idk. They seem to be running on the “if you don’t vote dems you hate black people” shtick that didn’t work in 2016. Lemmy users are eating it up though.
Where are they doing that?
The response Harris made to the protestors at the DNC is the best example I can think of. I’m probably exaggerating how much the Harris campaign is relying on this strategy because lemmy is inundated with “DO YOU WANT TRUMP TO WIN???” commenters,
She responded to the protesters and said if you don’t vote you hate blacks? Can you link me to that quote!?
I specifically recall her responding to protesters, “if you want trump to win, then keep talking” at a rally in Michigan. It’s not “hate blacks” but it has the same effect as what Hilary was doing. It’s not a forthcoming approach to tell voters they have to vote for you vs actually doing the legwork and coming up with policy to make them want to vote for you.
It’s really frustrating because it’s obvious the administration has its hands tied but it can’t come out and outright say it, and she’s also absolutely 100% correct in that Trump would just laugh at protesters, mock them, and tell his rally to beat them up.
I remember during the Democratic primaries these more scorched-earth pro-Palestinian protesters (I’m pro-Palestinian; just not to the point I’m shooting myself and them in the foot) would say along the lines, "Well this is the primaries and the time to advance change and protest — and I at least respect that. After the Democrat is locked in, then of course it’s a binary choice, and Trump is obviously far, far worse for Palestinians. So it comes down to 1) what’s more likely, that these protests change official policy ahead of polling, or 2) it leads to wedge-driving and disunity among the Democratic banner, handing the election to the far-worse opponent? Harris and I believe the latter is more likely, hence saying something along those lines.
I mean Jesus, they’re actively working on a permanent ceasefire while Trump is calling Bibi to undermine it. So why aren’t protesters protesting Trump rallies?
VP candidates can appear as progressive as they want because at the end of the day they don’t really have that much power. I won’t believe any real shift is happening towards progressives till we get a presidential candidate talking about more progressive policies. Until then it’s mostly them trying to pay lip service to progressive policies while chasing the moderate as the Republicans continue to drag the country to the right. If the Democrats really wanted to get more votes they would stop chasing moderates and try to activate disaffected voters who don’t care about voting because from their perspective both parties don’t really care about helping them. But then that would get in the way of the donors wants or stop politicians from being able to make lots of money from trading stocks and they would rather lose than give up that.
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Pelosi can fucking go.
She may come off as a darling of the Democrats, but to me, she’s just a old boomer who is part of the old guard of politicians who make money being a politician.
She was born in 1940. She’s older than the Boomers.
I was shocked by how old she is. Her surgeon is doing amazing work
Her surgeon is probably about as good as your optometrist.
Note they didn’t imply she looked young, just that she doesn’t look 84, and I’ll grant that. She also doesn’t look as utterly absurdly surreal as some people who have had work done, so her and her cosmetic surgeon(s) are displaying some degree of restraint about what is realistically worth attempting.
My natural eyes are rather fukt, so yeah I’d agree. They’re killing it.
She’s 84 and I placed her at late 60s at the convention, as someone who remembers the name ‘Pelosi’ once every half-year. I guess it was a tag team cage match with her surgeon and beautician vs me and my perception of older women.
I think that’s how almost everyone sees her these days. I don’t think she’s anyone’s darling, it’s just that she’s still rich, powerful, and connected.
I will never forgive the DNC for that. Bernie is salvation. He is pure and impossible to coerce.
I think the establishment knew how much power they would lose and sandbagged him from both sides.
Bernie getting fucked by the DNC was the greatest political blunder in 100 years.
it wasn’t the dnc that caused bernie to be completely terrible with voters outside of the northeast and western coasts.
I mean the reason Hillary only ever needed about 30% to win was explicitly the DNC and that same reason depressed turnout for Bernie (super delegates falling in line with party will for Hillary, and announcing their support for her en masse and up front so that Bernie’s was already badly losing before the first primary vote was cast, which in turn reduces turnout for him.
As for only selling well on the coasts, I’m in fucking WV and we went 53% for Bernie vs 35% for Hillary which is why Hillary only won WV by one delegate. She got 20% here in the general.
again it’s not the dnc’s fault that people preferred hillary clinton, who was a long time democratic party member who had lots of sway, over bernie sanders who had no connection to the party at all until he decided to run in 2016.
Again, Hillary only ever needed 30% of the primary vote to win, and there was already reports of Hillary having an unbeatable lead before the first primary vote was cast, which depressed tuenout. Because the super delegates (who literally exist so the DNC as an organization can put their thumb on the scales in the primaries) linesd up behind Hillary out of the gate. Bernie needed a 70+% supermajority of primary voters to vote for him to win, Clinton only needed one in three.
One of the few things I’ll give the GOP credit for is that they hold a mostly fair primary and stick by the results, without the ratfucking the DNC does.
One of the few things I’ll give the GOP credit for is that they hold a mostly fair primary and stick by the results, without the ratfucking the DNC does.
delusional
Man fuck Pelosi. She’s just worried about being unable to insider-trade her privileged position to wealth. If the play’s not broken, why would they change a damn thing. Fuck these ghouls!
fuck all these liberals. They are the reason we have devolved into a corporatocracy. They are the reason Trump won
no more throwing enough money at homeless housing to LITERALLY SEND EACH TO COLLEGE, yet still having the homelessness rate rise…
Liberals want more bandaids that make their masters rich Progressives want to tackle root causes once and for all
When Harris wins that is not the end of our struggle. We need to push her to be progressive and actually enact the will of the people.
Judging by her speech as the DNC I doubt she’s gonna do anything progressive outside of the price controls she mentioned. All the talk about the border and making sure America has the most lethal military and countering Iran took all my enthusiasm for Harris away.
People want progressive ideals as policy, but losing the messaging war for 4 decades has taken its toll.
You cannot associate these policies with an ideology. Just call it common sense. Or the Fuck Billionaires Agenda. Whatever.
You can’t undo decades of media programming by telling people that they would all agree with you if they just paid closer attention. Losing strategy.
People do like the policies though. Even republicans. You might be the one not paying attention.
That’s what they said, but suggested calling it something other than what it is to appeal to the American public.
Maybe you night not be the one to paying attention.
They aren’t even trying to win the messaging war. Instead of pointing out how unbelievably horrible the republican plan of deporting 20 million undocumented migrants, they capitulated and moved further right on immigration.
What center?
Between the Democrats and Republicans? The GOP that wanted to brutalize Pelosi on the steps of the capital? The GOP that laughed when a man with a hammer nearly murdered her husband with a hammer? The GOP that wants to roll back all civil rights to a time before the revolution? The GOP that wants to install a fascist dictatorship?
Or do you mean the center of where the American public stands?
The center of what Americans want is a hell of a lot more progressive than you, Nancy.
The GOP that wanted to brutalize Pelosi on the steps of the capital? The GOP that laughed when a man with a hammer nearly murdered her husband with a hammer? The GOP that wants to roll back all civil rights to a time before the revolution? The GOP that wants to install a fascist dictatorship?
You are ascribing the actions of individuals to the entire group. Not every GOP person is a MAGA person and not every MAGA person would resort to violence like some on January 6th. Please allow for some nuance.
There is no nuance anymore. If you’re actively supporting the GOP at this point, you ARE MAGA, and if you support MAGA, you’re okay with fascism.
There is no nuance if you yourself do not provide it.
The nuance was lost the minute they tried to overthrow the capital.
All of them did it? We wouldn’t still be standing without McConnell and Pence. As terrible as their policies are they still stood up for the system.
All of them are complicit, yes. It’s not that hard to understand. Go ahead and keep apologizing for them.
I’m not apologizing for anyone. I’m just saying they are not all one person and some of them do the right thing sometimes.
McConnell stood up to that part of the system but still enabled the SC we have today.
Yes, he did, but that was within the bounds of the law. This person cannot honestly claim that the entire GOP tried to overthrow the government.
We wouldn’t be having this conversation if McConnell hadn’t protected trump every step of the way. He made a heat of the moment call on J6 that you’re praising him for, but his behavior after the fact tells me he regrets his decision.
Any credibility McConnell gained on J6, he last 10 fold on February 13th.
The rest of the GOP came out in strong condemnation of those attacks, right? No equivocating, or pretending they were Democrats, or saying they weren’t violent?
Edit: and the Republicans in the Senate voted to remove Trump from office after the House sent them articles of impeachment about this, right?
Again, what did Pence and McConnell do when given the choice to overthrow the republic? I’m not a MAGA or GOP person by any means, nor am I a Democrat, I’m just trying to point out that things are not as black and white as you bullies want to paint them.
The rest of the GOP literally wanted to hang both of them. McConnell didn’t vote to convict on impeachment while equivocating about Trump begin “practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day”. These people are cowards, at best.
Sure, they’re cowards, but did they overthrow the government?
My only point is that you need to treat people as individuals and not put everyone who has ever voted for the GOP in the MAGA camp. There are Republicans who had just enough backbone on January 6th and there are republicans who do not support Trump today. Believe it or not, there are even republicans who support abortion or believe in gay marriage or support sane gun control measures. Everyone everywhere is an individual.
It’s important to allow people to evolve if they so choose.
Buddy, did any of those individuals in power that you are defending vote to remove Trump when he was impeached for running an insurrection? They didn’t and that is the cover they are providing as their brownshirts terrorize the people.
I can’t speak for them. However, if they simply wanted to terrorize people they could have just overthrown the government.
On one hand you’re moving goal posts to make them seem good. The bar is not literally overthrowing the government…great… on the other everyone’s tolerance for these folks in the party is just as bad as the bad actors because it enables and emboldens them. This is quite literally how the Nazi’s got into power. Because of people like you.
No, they are not good, I’m just saying they’re not all the same and they didn’t all commit that particular crime.
What evolution have Pence and McConnell done since then?
McConnell has taken up the game “Red Light, Green Light”…I hear he’s very good!
Not sure, my only point is that we will not allow anyone in the party to do so if we claim them to be a monolith. There is in fact a divergence of opinions within the party on multiple topics.
Not every GOP person is a MAGA person and not every MAGA person would resort to violence like some on January 6th.
And those that don’t are silent on the face of it (implicitly condoning the behavior) or are shouted down and pushed out of the party. Don’t pretend like the political machine and the voting base don’t support this behavior when they keep putting these people back in office.
Don’t forget, the GOP was against J6 until they saw the base was for it. Then even the people who could have been in danger said it was ok. So they absolutely support this shit even if they say they don’t.
Please allow for some nuance.
In this case, nuance is the excuse used to paper over the support these people have from within the party. Come back when the party machinery and base feel that way, because the individual’s “beliefs” are meaningless due to being a nebulous concept that isn’t supported by their actions.
Remember, if 10 people are sitting at a table and a Nazi is allowed to sit down, you’ve got 11 Nazis. And until we see evidence of these beliefs actually being held by a sizable amount of them, I’m not going to pretend it exists outside of their fringe.
Pelosi needs to go
Pelosi is STILL against stock buying bans for Congress because the “free market is for everyone”, meanwhile they get to decide who participates in said free market with advanced warning on news
Fuck you Pelosi.
Moving to the right and calling it the center is why the “good” party is supporting genocide.
Israel has the equivalent of Donald Trump at the helm right now. And Hamas staged the equivalent of ten 9/11s, handing a deeply unpopular conservative PM an extension on his political power for the foreseeable future.
Netanyahu and Hamas both want this conflict to go on as long as possible. Netanyahu because it lets him keep power, Hamas because they want to use the 2 million people in Gaza as a pawn to shift the world against Israel. Their end goal is to wipe out the 20 million people living in Israel, and their own founders have stated that that’s not where it ends. They’re not going to stop until the whole world is under an Islamic Caliphate.
Hamas absolutely does not give a damn about anyone living in Gaza. And they’ll continue to brainwash and sacrifice the children, either as meat shields when they’re young, or as soldiers when they get older. Israel grants asylum to gay Palestinians that escape from Gaza or the West Bank. Sometimes their families will kidnap them, bring them back and behead them.
I don’t think it’s pure coincidence they go looking for Pride Parades.
Terrorists do terrorist things. If we want this to ever end, realistically the only way to do it would be to kill the Hamas leadership in any way possible and somehow undo 20 years of brainwashing they inflicted on the Gaza population. As for Israel, think how racist the average American living in a border state is. How much worse do you think they’d be if Mexico was shooting rockets at our border towns every few days? Even without the rockets, we’ve been messing with South America for a hundred years, making sure we’d never have competition on this side of the pond.
Are they racist? Absolutely. We’d be way worse under similar circumstances. Can you imagine what we’d do if Mexico invaded Texas and killed 20,000 people and kidnapped another 4000 and took them as hostages?
The US claimed everything from California to Texas after a war with Mexico. Technically they were here before we were. Should we all pack up and leave too? Why are we expecting folks to do things we’d never do ourselves?
Israel has the equivalent of Donald Trump at the helm right now.
Which is why they have your support. The rest of your screed of genocide apologia just reinforces this.
Clearly, because reading my comments it isn’t immediately obvious what my political inclinations are.
Israel is the one that was founded on ethnic cleansing, used the peace process to expand it’s settlements, and is currently engaged in genocide. Both Hamas and Fatah have agreed to a Two-State solution based on the 1967 borders for decades. Oslo and Camp David were used by Israel to continue settlements in the West Bank and maintain an Apartheid, while preventing any actual Two-State solution
Oslo Accord Sources: MEE, NYT, Haaretz, AJ
The settlements represent land-grabbing, and land-grabbing and peace-making don’t go together, it is one or the other. By its actions, if not always in its rhetoric, Israel has opted for land-grabbing and as we speak Israel is expanding settlements. So, Israel has been systematically destroying the basis for a viable Palestinian state and this is the declared objective of the Likud and Netanyahu who used to pretend to accept a two-state solution. In the lead up to the last election, he said there will be no Palestinian state on his watch. The expansion of settlements and the wall mean that there cannot be a viable Palestinian state with territorial contiguity. The most that the Palestinians can hope for is Bantustans, a series of enclaves surrounded by Israeli settlements and Israeli military bases.
- Avi Shlaim
How Avi Shlaim moved from two-state solution to one-state solution
‘One state is a game changer’: A conversation with Ilan Pappe
I know I wrote a lot and I wouldn’t expect you to read it all, but I addressed this as well, using the US-Mexico war as an example.
We haven’t given back Texas and California yet. If you invade a country and they take your territory, you can ask for a do-over, but it’s probably not going to happen.
As I’ve noted, WE created this whole mess. And we shouldn’t expect others to comply to standards we would never accept ourselves.
If you want to take it a step further, I posited a hypothetical situation where Mexico invaded and killed 20,000 Americans and took another 4000 hostage.
And what our response would likely be. If you aren’t lying to yourself, you know exactly what we would do, especially if we have someone like Donald Trump at the helm when it happens.
The Zionist Settler colonists were the in invaders, what are you talking about. Are you trying to paint all Arab/Muslims in the region as the same? Or do you recognize that the surrounding countries invaded the newly founded Israel after months of Israel ethnicly cleansing hundreds of Palestinian towns and also for their own interests? Transjordan colluded with Ben-Gurion to acquire the West Bank. Egypt also had their own ambitions. In 1967 Israel started the war in order to gain control of the West Bank and Gaza Strip to gain control over all of historic Palestine. It’s been a permanent occupation so the ethnostate that is Israel can continue settlements while rejecting the humanity and citizenship of Palestinians to solve it’s ‘demografic problem.’
I can’t tell if you just aren’t bothering to read what I wrote or if you are just looking for the closest tangentially related thing to copy-paste.
I just said expecting them to return land when we’re keeping Texas and California is a case of “Do as I say, not as I do.”
Yes, Israel removed Palestinian settlements. At our behest. We told them that land was now theirs. And the countries surrounding Israel telegraphed invasion plans for days before the six day war.
Revisionism aside, are you still trying to lay this at the feet of the Israelis instead of ours? We did that. It’s cowardly to try to pretend otherwise.
Israel has been the one doing the settler Colonialism and ethnic cleansing, the fact that the US and other western countries have financially and militarily supported it for decades does not mean that Israel is not the one responsible for it.
Yes, the US was founded on genocide of the natives and continues to disparage them to this day with reservations. Obviously I don’t support that, they deserve reparations and yes that includes land and financial compensation.
The Israeli plan to occupy the West Bank and Gaza Strip were planned for years. That’s not revisionism, 1967 war: Haaretz, Forward . Forcible ‘Transfer’ (ethnic cleansing) is fundamental to Zionism since the 1880’s long before the US had a major role in the region since the 1960s.
The whole point of the Uncommitted and other anti-genocide movements is to end US military support for the genocide. That’s what is needed to start pressuring Israel to end being an Apartheid State.
You say that and yet, we have protests about Israel/Palestine and not a peep about reparations for Native Americans. We killed 99.9% of their population. It’s easy to pay lip service after the fact, it’s done.
Guess it’s easier to pretend you care when you don’t have settlements being raided and entire families being scalped. And you killed so many of them that there aren’t enough of them left to complain about their treatment. We know what we did do when that was the reality though.
I ask again, what would we do if a tribe went rogue and started doing that now?
Do you think we’ve grown over the past 200 years? Think we’d react differently today?
Be honest.
The headline completely mischaracterized what the article (and Lee) said.
Lee is clearly sticking pretty close to the party line, but still emphasizing the appeal of progressive policies. “I have to disagree a bit” is just not the same as saying Nancy Pelosi is wrong.
The article said:
Lee somewhat cautiously said she disagrees “a bit” and that “anecdotal evidence” from around the country indicate it’s better to run “to” not “from progressive ideals.”
And Lee herself said:
I have to disagree a bit. I think that we have data, we have polling, we have anecdotal evidence from American – Americans all over the country, but especially out in Pennsylvania, in a swing state, where we’re not actually asking for our – our candidates to run away from progressive ideals. We’re asking them for – for them to run to them.
Agreed. Her comments were more nuanced than that. And I think what she said was correct. These policies might better come down to how they are framed if we want them to succeed.
Some progressive ideals are what the average American wants. Many are still very hard sells. What the Dems need to realize is that the political-junkie conceptions of ‘centrist’ and ‘progressive’ mean very little to the ‘swing voters’ they’re trying to appeal to. They don’t want a coherent ideological approach. Not that that seems to stop ‘centrist’ Dem reps from constantly trying to chase policy rightwards.
Why the fuck is Pelosi still a voice that anyone in the goddamn party listens to? She’s been doing nothing but fucking up since she entered Congress. She’s literally almost single-handedly responsible for the absolute deterioration of the Democratic party in our government. The only one who outstrips her in that department is Harry Reid.
Biden didn’t step aside until she asked him too, so she’s at least done one good thing.
who’s gonna ask her?
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
Pelosi is now irrelevant since she retired and just wants people to listen to her like the rest of the boomers.
She is technically Silent Generation. She’s too old to be a Boomer, just like Biden.
She served her purpose by getting Biden to drop out. But now she can go away.
Beautifully stated. Summer Lee rocks.
lived in her district in PA, voted for her twice
she’s never done anything with power, all she does is campaign and go on the news
That’s all governing is now though. Prostrate yourself to gather up as much money so you can buy your next election and smuggle enough away to enrich yourself or at least pay for all the nice things you want and then provide sound bites to keep your political party relevant while you rely on the already existing infrastructure that you pray doesn’t deteriorate further while you are in office so that you don’t have to do anything.
The problem is that it’s all been in place for so long that we aren’t going to do anything if it costs money or effort and the elder elites of the party set the standard of money being the most important metric for your contributions to the government and party that its all you can focus on.
We are back to positions being mostly an indicator of money and family conmections which is why young power hungry men like the Republican party more simply because the threshold is lowered if you are engrained enough in their political zeitgeist.
The empire is receeding but those in power don’t care as long as they get to enjoy the fruit of their parents labor just a little bit longer.
