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People, RISE UP
People, RISE UP
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I swear to God, people spend more time blaming Democrats for not fighting Republicans well enough than they do Republicans for doing things that need fighting.
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The ire has to do with the representative government where the representatives are not representing.
Which would, in fact, prevent Republicans from doing things that need to be fought.
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When representatives in democracy aren't representing. You kinda lose democracy.
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Well I think there’s some validity to this, but not just because “democrats bad”
We are seeing across the western world a resurgence in far right parties that are largely running on a populist sentiment that “things are bad and we were great once and let’s go back”
Why does this messaging resonate with so many? Propaganda has its role to play, but propaganda works best when there is a truth to the underlying message.
We are at the tail end of over half a century of neoliberal policy. Now I don’t use neoliberal as so many do as a pejorative, but as a descriptor. As Nancy Pelosi so eloquently stated “We're capitalists and that's just the way it is.”
Now if you enjoy your life subscription under capitalism, especially our super fun late stage capitalism, there’s lots to dislike. The right has decided that while they will wholeheartedly support the capitalist machine, they are going to go out and stump like populists, telling people that they are getting screwed over and a vote for them is a vote to end the screwing, even better, it’s a vote to screw over people you don’t like, you get to do the screwing for once!
The Democratic Party can’t seem to find a coherent message because at the end of the day, the neoliberal project they are working on is going smoothly. The fact that your rent is going up, that private companies own the prisons and all the houses, that’s the free market free marketing baby.
I think the ire is misdirected, but it comes from this gnawing feeling that while the right is awful and doing awful things the democrats aren’t articulating any real alternative. And you don’t have to believe me, I think the trump - Biden - trump pattern shows you that to a lot of Americans things didn’t get better.
Now you and I might sit here secure in the knowledge that within the neoliberal world order as established, Biden did amazingly well. Our economy the envy of the world in how we tackled inflation and had one of the softest landings. But we exist in a system that has expected catastrophic failure roughly every 7 years and we see it happening more and more often. A system that doesn’t seem capable or willing to tackle the most pressing issues that people face. And so it is cold comfort when the Democratic Party goes “yes everything sucks and is getting worse, but believe us this is the best we can do with how the system works”
It’s not super surprising that if someone comes around and says “that system is bullshit” that people are excited. It sucks major ass that the guy saying it has no idea what the system is, how to build a better system, etc. But it also sucks that the democratic party’s response is basically, “put us back in charge and we will restore this system that is hurting a lot of people and really kinda sucks ass and only benefits a few super wealthy donors”
People want someone to stand up and articulate a compelling vision for the future and then deliver on it. For everything wrong with trump, he understands that first part, and he’s unmoored by any kind of morals or ethics so he’s willing to spend hours painting in great and baffling detail just how wonderful his future is going to be. He’s so good at it that his followers don’t even mind that it never happens.
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The thing I object to is saying the Democrats don't have a vision for the future.
Universal healthcare, free education, loan forgiveness, a green economy, a higher minimum wage, all manners of increased social spending, electoral reform, civil rights expansions. The Democratic Party has, as an institution, spent decades trying to accomplish this. It has failed, largely due to the Republicans and splitters within it's own ranks. But the failure to accomplish it's goals is not the same as not having them or not saying they have them.
That's why all the criticism of the Democratic Party is so eye roll inducing. People accuse Democrats of just trying to maintain the status quo when they have a whole platform that would constitute major changes to our country.
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This is bullshit. If they actually wanted these things we would have had them. When we almost start to achieve these, they vote against it. Seems to me they like to talk about it during election season, Then vote in past republican policies. That’s not a progressive platform.
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Universal healthcare
What major figure in Democratic party has seriously fought for this?
electoral reform
No Democrat is seriously looking into real electoral reform that doesn't benefit their party. First-past-the-post will never be changed under their leadership. This voting system allows them to shift blame to voters to the left of them (that they alienate) for voting Green/et. al. They engage in more voter suppression activities than they spend time arguing for serious electoral reform.
https://www.carolinajournal.com/nc-democrats-forced-to-pay-green-party-for-frivolous-intervention
https://arizonaglobe.com/legal/democrats-sue-to-block-green-candidate/
https://thenevadaindependent.com/article/nevada-democrats-sue-to-block-green-party-from-2024-ballot
It goes on and on and on and on if you look at lawsuits and complaints against other parties or look further into the past.
If Democrats had even 1% of the fight that they have against third parties and put that towards positive change and actual solutions, they would've been able to accomplish some of the things you listed.
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I think a lot of the things on this list are not actually goals of the Democratic Party.
Here’s their platform https://democrats.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/FINAL-MASTER-PLATFORM.pdf
The term “universal healthcare” is not in there. Instead they want to continue a market based approach to increase access to healthcare and health insurance. (Page 19)
“Free education” is also not part of their platform, instead they want affordable education. (Page 26)
There is a pretty lengthy chapter (chapter 4) on the climate crisis and how they want to tackle that, so I’ll give you a green economy.
Page 13 does include a paragraph about raising the minimum wage.
Page 50 includes a (to me at least) very underwhelming fig leaf towards some minor electoral reform.
Chapter six talks about expanding civil rights to more people but not really materially increasing the scope of civil rights.
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I would love for there to be a party aggressively pursuing the goals you are talking about, I think you and I would likely agree on the most important things for this country.
A couple real important ones you think the democrats are attempting to achieve don’t appear to be things the Democratic Party actually intends to do. Universal healthcare and free education being the big two that would really make a massive difference in the nation. And you don’t have to believe me, you can read their platform and see they don’t intend to deliver those things, not with any size majority.
Further, platforms are talk and talk is cheap. It’s one thing to say you want to raise the minimum wage, it’s another to do it. The minimum wage was last raised in 2009. That’s 16 years, and this isn’t even a cornerstone they run on because they know it would scare off their moneyed backers. This is why you see pictures of Bernie sanders or the squad fighting for $15 while the rank and file dem politician stays far away.
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That's because after watching mitch McConnell do literally fucking anything he wanted for years, Democratic leaders and the DNC have the audacity to whine about not being able to do anything.
All so Cuck Schumer can suck off Netanyahu.
I hate republicans, and conservatives in general. They are worse than vermin. But democrats deserve a ton of hate for how badly everything is going. The DNC allowed this to happen, Biden failed his oath of office, allowing Trump to even get on the ticket. The Supreme Court straight up granting immunity to Presidents meant that he could have and should have done everything in his power force them to reverse that because that shit isn't in the constitution.
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McConnell managed that because Republicans vote in lock step on basically everything. That's not the DNC's fault.
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That is explicitly the dnc’s fault
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Democrats tend to follow rules. That's kind of their thing. When society prefers those who aren't following rules, and explicitly and implicity give them power, the power imbalance is undeniable.
Unfortunately, if Democrats stop following rules, it will make them not worth giving power, power corrupts and all that.
So while it's very nice to push all the blame on them, the only group of people who actually responsible is that quarter of Americans that still didn't lost their minds. Their job was to elect nit monsters and continue to push them to the right direction. Instead they elected monsters into all the power and now are surprised why monsters have all the power.
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I mean, what's the larger problem: the operator of the orphan crushing machine, or the guy that won't try to stop them because there's a 'no trespassing' sign on the lawn?
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Americans love to complain but hate to take action.
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American democracy is completely broken.
You basically get to choose between fascism and fascism-light.
Yes, Democrats are the better choice out of the two, but it's still absolute shit.
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118 comments