www.the-downballot.com Morning Digest: 13-term Democrat could face primary after outburst at constituents
Or, why Democrats should heed progressive ire over their response to Trump
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13-term Democrat could face primary after outburst at constituents | Or, why Democrats should heed progressive ire over their response to Trump
Democrats keep reacting normally to being told to do their fucking jobs. This guy is looking to be on the House Oversight Committee btw (the same one AOC got kicked off from, to pick a 70 year old throat cancer patient who had to resign a few months later).
Lynch, who's represented a safely blue seat in Congress since 2001, was exhorted by rallygoers at a Friday protest to stand up more forcefully to Trump. But he demurred when one attendee asked him to "commit to not voting for any Republican legislation," saying he had to consider the views of his entire district.
"I got 800,000 people that I represent, and I gotta figure out what's in their best interest, not the best interest of, you know, Sally Blue from across the street," said Lynch in a video published by MassLive. One attendee, however, interjected to say, "This is in the best interests of our country and our democracy," which set Lynch off.
**"I get to decide that. I get to decide that," he responded with evident irri
Biden officials vent frustrations in dealing with Netanyahu, decry missed chance of Saudi deal
Biden and Democrats are complicit in genocide.
New reporting from Israel's Channel 13 just further proves how little the US did to stop Israel, and how much they went out of their way to protect them. Any liberal still defending this genuinely has nothing to cling on to anymore.
Despite the disagreements, the top Biden officials professed devotion to Israel’s security, explaining that this dedication was what made attacks by Netanyahu and his supporters, who accused them of abandoning Israel, particularly stinging.
“Having the prime minister of Israel question the support of the United States after all that we did — do I think that was a right and proper thing for a friend to do? I do not,” said former national security adviser Jake Sullivan. “[However], I will always stand firm behind the idea that Israel has a right to defend itself and that the United States has a responsibility to help Israel, and I’ll do that no matter who the prime minister is, no matter what they say about
www.currentaffairs.org MeidasTouch Turns Democrats’ Minds to Slop
Viewers are flocking to “independent” media that serves up a never-ending stream of anti-Trump content. But this stuff is intellectual poison and may even help the right.
"The walls are closing in" every day in your youtube/podcast feed but it's now 2025 and Trump disappearing US citizens and arresting judges but this latest gaffe is definitely for real gonna sink him this time.
The “MeidasTouch” political podcast has rapidly become the most successful in the United States. As the Wall Street Journal writes, “downloads and views of MeidasTouch on platforms including YouTube, Spotify, and Apple, more than doubled over the past month to top 115 million.” This is more than twice what Joe Rogan had during the same period. MeidasTouch is run by three brothers: Ben, Brett, and Jordy Meiselas. Ben, a lawyer, got his start interning for Sean “Diddy” Combs at Bad Boy Records before working in the offices of Hillary Clinton and Rep. Steve Israel. He later became a business partner and attorney for Colin Kaepernick, playing a key role in the quarterback's lawsuit against the NFL. Brett is a producer and editor who previously worked at The Ellen DeGeneres Show, w
Starmer faces Labour revolt over plan to raid bank accounts of benefit claimants | Welfare fraud bill would allow funds to be taken from bank accounts and driving licences to be cancelled
www.theguardian.com Starmer faces Labour revolt over plan to raid bank accounts of benefit claimants
Welfare fraud bill would allow funds to be taken from bank accounts and driving licences to be cancelled
But I was told Starmer was just going to be Corbyn but more competent and not an evil EU leaver? I was told he was merely Corbyn in a suit?
Could the liberals have been...gasp...wrong????
Keir Starmer is facing a rebellion over his plan to use direct deductions from people’s bank accounts and the cancellation of driving licences as part of a government crackdown on welfare fraud and over-claiming.
In an attempt to claw back the annual £9.7bn in benefit overpayments made by the Department for Work and Pensions due to fraud or error, the government has adopted Conservative plans for debt recovery.
A fraud, error and recovery bill would give the DWP the power to require banks to provide data to help identify when an applicant is not meeting the eligibility criteria for a benefit for which they have applied.
The bill would allow the government to demand bank statements to identify debtors who have sufficient funds to repay what they owe through fraud or error in a claim. The
Bluesky restricts access to 72 accounts in Turkey amid government pressure
stockholmcf.org Bluesky restricts access to 72 accounts in Turkey amid government pressure - Stockholm Center for Freedom
Bluesky has restricted access to 72 accounts and one post in Turkey, marking a shift for the decentralized social media platform that had previously resisted government censorship, according to a report by the Freedom of Expression Association (İFÖD). According to İFÖD, Turkish court orders led to t...
Bluesky has restricted access to 72 accounts and one post in Turkey, marking a shift for the decentralized social media platform that had previously resisted government censorship, according to a report by the Freedom of Expression Association (İFÖD).
According to İFÖD, Turkish court orders led to the blocking of 59 accounts at the internet service provider level. Separately, Bluesky voluntarily made 13 accounts and one post inaccessible in Turkey, likely in response to legal pressure.
Bluesky, known for its decentralized structure, which allows users to create and operate independent servers rather than relying on a central authority, had been seen as a free-speech-friendly alternative to mainstream platforms such as X.
Turkey has increased pressure on digital platforms in recent years, requiring companies to appoint local representatives and quickly comply with content removal requests or face fines and bandwidth throttling. In March Turkish authorities blocked access to 12
www.newyorker.com The Biden Official Who Doesn’t Oppose Trump’s Student Deportations
Why the Holocaust historian Deborah Lipstadt blames universities for “opening the door” to the Trump Administration’s professed campaign to tackle antisemitism.
Someone who claims to be a holocaust historian btw, says they basically agree with Trumps deportations, repeatedly cannot meaningfully answer the obvious question of why would these people genuinely care about antisemitism when they're hanging with white nationalists, invokes "Trump Derangement Syndrome" when talking about deportation without due process...it just goes on.
Liberals, shut the fuck up about how Democrats are "better". These are the people within the admin who were listened to.
Are you pleased that the Trump Administration is talking so much about antisemitism?
I’m pleased that they’re addressing it, because that’s what I did for the past three years, which was to really push the Biden Administration to seriously address it. So I am very, very pleased that it’s on their agenda.
And what do you see that agenda as being?
Well, I guess I’ve gone through a transition. Let me step back for a minute and say that from my first day in
OK, Chuck Schumer. Trump Just Crossed Your Red Line. Now What?
In March, after blowing up Democrats’ unified opposition to the GOP’s government funding bill, which handed President Trump and Elon Musk expanded powers over federal spending, Chuck Schumer appeared on MSNBC’s All In With Chris Hayes to defend his vote. In the interview, the Senate minority leader said he didn’t yet think that our democracy was at risk but made clear what his red line would be: “If Trump doesn’t obey the Supreme Court.” That, he stated, would be “different than anything else. It’s a quantum leap different, because our democracy is then—248 years of American democracy, the Magna Carta is out the window, and we will all have to take extraordinary action.”
This “quantum leap” did not take long to arrive. Last Friday, the Supreme Court unanimously ordered the Trump administration to help bring back Kilmar Abrego Garcia from El Salvador. Abrego Garcia is an immigrant married to a U.S. citizen, with three U.S. citizen children, who has lived in this country for 14 years
cosmonautmag.com The Risk of Being a Communist: A Critique of the ‘Constitutional Revolution’ Thesis and the ‘Strategy of Patience’
Kolya Ludwig takes issue with the strategy of the Marxist Unity Group, arguing that a successful Marxist strategy must identify an intermediate political goal and a specific political enemy.
An interesting, deep look and criticism of the Marxist Unity Group's (DSA caucus) proposal of what communist strategy should be.
Kolya Ludwig takes issue with the strategy of the Marxist Unity Group, arguing that a successful Marxist strategy must identify an intermediate political goal and a specific political enemy.
An interesting conversation has recently developed that speaks to some of the key theoretical and practical questions involved in revolutionary activity in the United States and elsewhere. It began with Steve Bloom’s critique of Donald Parkinson’s argument for the minimum-maximum program,[1] continued through Bloom’s elaborated critique of the Marxist Unity Group’s (MUG) thesis of a ‘Constitutional revolution,’[2] and resulted in a sequence of responses featured on Cosmonaut and in the Weekly Worker.[3] Tracing the debate thus far has led me to offer some reflections about its broader implications for socialist strategy.
[...]
The Marxist Unity Group, a caucus w
A whistleblower's disclosure details how DOGE may have taken sensitive labor data
Elon and DOGE almost certainly siphoning what is otherwise meant to be confidential information from the NLRB, including very likely union members/organisers.
An employee who was trying to investigate had threats involving pictures of them walking their dog being posted to their door.
The DOGE employees, who are effectively led by White House adviser and billionaire tech CEO Elon Musk, appeared to have their sights set on accessing the NLRB's internal systems. They've said their unit's overall mission is to review agency data for compliance with the new administration's policies and to cut costs and maximize efficiency.
But according to an official whistleblower disclosure shared with Congress and other federal overseers that was obtained by NPR, subsequent interviews with the whistleblower and records of internal communications, technical staff members were alarmed about what DOGE engineers did when they were granted access, particularly when those staffers noticed a spike in da
I don't need to put words in your mouth, it's fucking obvious. You literally did the same thing every other Democrat in denial is doing. Lashing out at people who oppose genocide as responsible for the genocide because you refuse to hold people in power to account. It's that simple.
It never occurs to you to suggest Democratic party leaders and operatives were the ones who decided defending genocide was a wholly necessary part of their election campaign. That every campaign repeatedly makes assumptions, estimations and judgements about what to support, what to defend, and what to ignore, criticise or back away from. They know all these things have trade offs with votes they may or may not get, and they decide accordingly. They decided genocide was not beyond them, was not important enough to drop, whilst campaigning with Liz Cheney was apparently vital to winning. They made that choice about how to speak to voters, and they got the voters for the campaign they ran in return. No one else made them do that, just like no one else made Chuck Schumer support a CR that gave away all of the Democrats leverage, nor made Newsom decide to pal around with fascists about how trans athletes are the most important problem in the country.
Show me where I defended genocide. If you’re going to come in here in bad faith and a shitty attitude, at minimum be correct.
What do you think you're doing when you deflect focus and blame from those committing genocide to instead redirect the focus on how random individuals opposed to genocide are the real problem?
Just like climate change denial has explicit (it doesn't exist) and implicit (it won't be that bad, we can solve it with "innovation", markets for carbon credits, we need to maintain fossil fuel production for "national security"), there are explicit (there is no genocide in Palestine) and implicit (Biden was working tirelessly for a ceasefire, Kamala was good actually, It's Hamas fault) denial or defence of genocide.
Telling people it's the fault of those who literally spent months telling democrats to stop funding genocide and that this was going to cost them electorally, and not the people actually implementing the policy, and insisting we need to accept genocide when it's "our team" doing it is functional defence and support of genocide for the purpose of something so absurd and asinine as refusing to hold people with actual power responsible for what they are doing.
It is, funnily enough, in line with the transferral of blame from European antisemites to Arab countries and Palestine to excuse genocide. We have to support Israel and it's war against Palestinians because of what Europeans did to Jewish people. Palestinians are unfortunate casualties we just have to accept, and opposing that makes you an anti-semite, or in this case, a "purity tester" who refuses to accept a little thing like genocide between friends during an election, so really it's your fault when bad things happen for opposing them.
I’m going to go ahead and add to this, if you are willing cast aside progress in the name of perfection, you will never make it to either one.
Why do we have to keep telling you dipshits this insane logic doesn't work?
If the democratic party is willing to cast aside progress (being against genocide) in the name of perfect (funding and supporting Israels genocide), you'll never make it to the presidency.
Why is the responsibility on random voters, vs people who are actually in power and have the means to change policy with the knowledge that the policy is negatively harming their electoral chances? Why is the "electability" argument not applicable to stopping genocide as a reason to criticise democrats, versus, say, insisting we can't have healthcare because people love insurance companies too much as a defence of why Democrats don't support medicare for all?
Why do we justify or criticise some policies by appealing to their perceived/assumed popularity, whilst appealing to the responsibility of voters to simply accept whatever is insisted upon them in others?
Maybe if people like you engaged your fucking brain on questions like this, you might come up with some answers that, however uncomfortable they are for you right now, might make you stop defending genocide as a means to divert responsibility from those in power to those who politicians are meant to be appealing to in order to win an election.
www.mediamatters.org Right-wing media revive manufactured Olympic controversy in push to expand trans athlete bans, label intersex women as “males”
Reminder: There is no legitimate debate. These people are not interested in safety or science or womens sports, they're interested in maintaining a simplistic gender binary against reality.
Right-wing media spent years demanding that President Donald Trump ban transgender women from competing in women’s sports. He complied. But rather than declare victory, conservative outlets immediately demanded even stricter measures, expanding their campaign to include intersex athletes and calling for invasive genetic testing. Their goal isn't fairness; it's perpetual outrage and ideological policing of women's bodies.
After Trump signed an executive order to ban trans women from women’s sports, right-wing media figures quickly pivoted to a months-old controversy centered around Olympic boxer Imane Khelif, a cisgender Algerian athlete who was falsely accused of being transgender last summer. Khelif was disqualified from the 2023 Women’s World Boxing Championships, even though she was assigned
DHS official defends Mahmoud Khalil arrest
DHS can't articulate a reason that Mahmoud Khalil, arrested and supposedly had his green card revoked for being involved with pro-Palestine prostest, for why he's been arrested other than the fact he organised protests.
President Trump has ramped up efforts to deliver on a campaign promise to carry out the largest ever deportation of immigrants in U.S. history.
Parallel to those deportation plans is a crackdown on what the administration calls antisemitism on college campuses.
Both efforts came to the forefront this week when Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers arrested Mahmoud Khalil, a recent Columbia University graduate student, who has not been charged with any crime yet. This is likely the first high profile arrest of a legal permanent resident in connection with the pro-Palestinian protests that rippled across the nation's campuses last year. Trump has vowed that this is the first of many arrests to come as he lays a framework for increased deportations. Trump of
How ‘no daylight’ from Biden crippled the Harris presidential campaign
"If I'm going down for genocide, you are too, kid."
Imagine consolidating behind this guy in 2020 only for him to be heavily responsible for your loss in 2024. No sympathy for these dipshits.
Donald Trump and Kamala Harris both understood the importance of being seen as the bigger change agent.
For Trump, that meant continuing to promise an antidote to the Biden-Harris years.
For Harris, there was more flexibility to define her brand of change.
She could risk looking hypocritical by making clean breaks with Biden on policies she had supported as vice president, rejecting parts of their record to forge her own agenda. She could identify new issues to run on that avoided the pitfalls of turning her back on the Biden era. Or she could rely on voters to see her gender, her genes, and her “lived experience” — a middle-class upbringing, schools outside the Ivy League, and a career as a prosecutor — as symbols of change.
Biden and his loyalists took the first option off the tab
This isn’t Reddit, you don’t have to reach boiling point just because you disagree with someone online.
Your original comment was dismissive of the realities of what happens to people seeking asylum, and your followup is to be a condescending prick spouting nonsense about reddit because someone challenged you on your dumb fucking bullshit where you didn't consider for 2 fucking seconds the actual reality of what these policies do to people.
Fuck off you disgusting cunt.
I have a German passport but my parents were “legal” immigrants from a non developed country. My wife is a “legal” immigrant (I’m not even mentioning skin colors because I think it’s a stupid way of trivializing one’s whole identity and life experience). They respected the conditions of moving to this country and they abided by them. But you call me a nazi because I don’t agree with your idea of who should be conditionally allowed in our country or not.
"I got mine so fuck you" classic children of immigrants who see nothing wrong with pulling the ladder up behind them because survivorship bias means clearly the system is good and my family is deserving and yours isn't.
Fuck off you disgusting cunt.
And the conservatives scaremongering about this are definitely good faith actors who aren't just scaremongering and harassing a tiny minority of trans athletes who do not in fact represent some massive social problem that requires national level obsession with targeting and identifying trans people to harass, with Gavin Newsom hanging around with a fascist saying "yassss besty" as he literally directly refers to a specific trans athlete to target and harass them.
Another example of misplaced blame would be concerns that trans women have too much testosterone or that trans men are gaining an unfairly advantage by taking testosterone (8, 11, 56, 127). Herein lies the myth that cis men, not on gender affirming hormone therapy, will claim to be a trans women to win at female sporting events. However, trans individuals use gender affirming hormone therapy to better match their gender identity, not to gain unfair sporting advantages (132). While it is true that certain morphological changes that occur during puberty may be irreversible, trans individuals on gender affirming hormone therapy clearly do not retain the same physiologic parameters as their pre-transition counterparts (12, 15, 16, 54–56, 129). It is unclear to what extent, or for how long, any hormone mediated advantages may persist once a trans individual begins regular gender affirming hormone therapy (12, 15, 53, 56, 129). It has been shown that parameters affecting aerobic performance transition more quickly than those affecting strength performance (16, 127, 129). However, excluding trans individuals does not prevent cases of athletes having hormonal advantages. The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) found 93 of the 4,422 athletes tested (2.1%) to have “adverse analytical finding” for steroid use (105). WADA does not report how many of those athletes were cis or trans, however, as transgender individuals are underrepresented in athletics, it is likely that these are cis athletes (60). Besides use of exogenous hormones, cisgender individuals naturally vary in their hormonal profiles (40, 59, 66, 133). Thus, restricting trans individuals is unlikely to prevent issues of ergogenic hormonal advantages in sports.
Finally, it is well known that within sports and athletics, competitive advantage is in large part influenced by genetic predisposition (121, 134, 135). It is accepted that some individuals are born with natural advantages, however, the suggestion that trans individuals may enjoy some advantage in certain cases is regarded as unacceptable. Yet there does not seem to be a domination of sports by trans athletes if their advantage is so great. When examining issues that allegedly arise by trans athletes' participation in sports and athletics, the solutions are more driven by a political/cultural divide rather than an honest attempt to actually mitigate inequities or risk of injuries that are occurring (1, 136).
[...]
Individuals should not have to make a choice between being their authentic selves or being athletes (138). While trans athletes competing in various sports and athletic events raises interesting considerations of how certain morphologic and physiologic factors affect performance, these questions are not exclusive to trans individuals. There are wide variations within cisgender populations, even when excluding individuals with differences in sexual development (121, 139). It is expected that about 2.3% of a normally distributed population is likely to fall above two standard deviations from a population mean. These exceptional individuals may be those who are gifted and excel at some sport or athletic performance (121, 135, 140). In contrast only 0.5%–0.6% of the population identify as trans (60). There is no concern for restricting individuals who are exceptionally large or small, those who are genetically gifted, or those with differing hormone concentrations or muscle mass, so long as their gender and biologic sex align (120, 121). The disproportionate focus on the relatively small portion of the population who are trans seems based on the belief that cis men, who cannot succeed in sports among other cis men, would choose to misidentify as trans women to gain an advantage in sports against cis women. However, there are no legitimate cases of this occurring. An individual's sex does not determine their success or failure at any athletic event despite the high level of competition. This can be demonstrated when looking at not average outcomes, but the level of overlap among outcomes. The exclusion of trans individuals also insults the skill and athleticism of both cis and trans athletes. While sex differences do develop following puberty, many of the sex differences are reduced, if not erased, over time by gender affirming hormone therapy. Finally, if it is found that trans individuals have advantages in certain athletic events or sports; in those cases, there will still be a question of whether this should be considered unfair, or accepted as another instance of naturally occurring variability seen in athletes already participating in these events.
There is no legitimate debate. It's scaremongering.
But sure, "complicated issues" requires paling around with a fascist like Charlie Kirk and talking about how he's correct, backing down immediately when challenged on using "weaponize" to accurately describe conservative attacks on trans people and being asked to target and harass specific trans athletes based on nothing.
Just like "complicated issues" requires reaffirming conservative framing of immigration and adopting language about how immigrants are stealing welfare money and smuggling gangs requires further militarisation of borders and out of country processing of immigrants.
You're the useful idiot that the thin end of the wedge is for.
Gavin Newsom breaks with Democrats on trans athletes in sports | The Democratic California governor made the stunning remarks in his debut podcast with conservative guest Charlie Kirk.
Democrats playing footsy with fascist Charlie Kirk over hating trans people. This is the party that's supposed to be the great defenders of LGBT people?
California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a pioneer for LGBTQ+ rights who decades ago upset leaders in his own party when he defied state law and issued marriage licenses to same-sex couples, suggested Democrats were in the wrong in allowing transgender athletes to participate in female college and youth sports.
“I think it’s an issue of fairness, I completely agree with you on that. It is an issue of fairness — it’s deeply unfair,” Newsom said in his debut podcast episode of “This is Gavin Newsom.” “I am not wrestling with the fairness issue. I totally agree with you.”
Newsom’s comments on the issue roiling political debates nationwide came in a conversation with influential MAGA-world figure Charlie Kirk, the campus culture warrior who leads the organization Turning Point USA and is a close ally of President Donald Trump and his son,
In a leaked recording, State Senator Elena Parent (D-42) said she’d vote for Republican transgender healthcare bans because trans rights are too “unpopular."
bsky.app Atlanta DSA (@atldemsoc.bsky.social)
In a leaked recording, State Senator Elena Parent (D-42) said she’d vote for Republican transgender healthcare bans because trans rights are too “unpopular." "You can go right to heck. I don’t think I will lose re-election based on you screaming at me"
The video is yet another case of Democrats resenting their base for expecting them to stand up for anything.
In a leaked recording, State Senator Elena Parent (D-42) said she’d vote for Republican transgender healthcare bans because trans rights are too “unpopular."
"You can go right to heck. I don’t think I will lose re-election based on you screaming at me"
The insane flipping back and forth in the video of declaring yourself pro-lgbt whilst signalling you'll vote for anti-trans legislation, to then attack the person asking them obvious questions by declaring that the question implies because Republicans are in charge that they should adopt opposite positions and they're not going to vote for things that are "unpopular".
The democratic politician distilled: You need to vote for me because I support you and I'm not as bad as Republicans, but when it comes down to it I will throw you under the bus and get mad at you for asking me about it and implying I might not be a good perso
The 3 sample bullets are vapid and meaningless at best. "Not being ashamed of your country" = stop talking about and stop doing anything about racism and sexism and bigotry. "own the failures of Democratic governance in large cities" has no detail, but it's Third Way so that will be "immigrants are bad and we need more homeless sweeps and subsidies and tax cuts for businesses".
See e.g.
Advocate for middle-class tax cuts, support public education, and propose spending cuts where needed.
Tax and budget cuts but somehow support public education.
Democrats need to stop demonizing wealth and corporations broadly.
Literally some of the most broadly popular rhetoric and language but this is the one they feel the need to not do.
Engage with small businesses, business podcasts, podcasts like “Earn Your Leisure” that reach the aspiring class, and entrepreneurs to discuss economic policies
Hand over even more of democratic policy to the rich and upper classes while claiming to stand up for working people somehow.
- Be Pro-Aspiration & Pro-Capitalism in a Smart Way
- Recognize that working-class voters value upward mobility and economic success.
- Have a prosperity gospel aimed at the working class.
- Call out corporate abuses individually instead of attacking “corporations” as a whole.
Meaningless drivel that is largely what Democrats are already doing.
Use messengers that working-class voters trust—business leaders, skilled laborers, and community figures.
lmao business leaders.
But they'll do it all with a big hat and a folksy accent hootin' and hollerin' at a gun show this time.
EU Condems Hamas for not immediately accepting Israel trying to force an extension to the first phase of the ceasefire, as Israel refuses negotiations for the second phase
www.eeas.europa.eu Israel/Palestine: Statement by the Spokesperson on the ceasefire in Gaza
The EU condemns the refusal of Hamas to accept the extension of the first phase of the ceasefire agreement in Gaza. Israel's subsequent decision to block the entry of all humanitarian aid into Gaza could potentially result in humanitarian consequences. The EU calls for a rapid resumption of negotia...
This is at the same time as Israel has been stopping entry of all goods and supplies into Gaza. The deputy speaker of Israeli parliament is also calling for the bombing of food stocks in Gaza by the way.
The EU condemns the refusal of Hamas to accept the extension of the first phase of the ceasefire agreement in Gaza. Israel's subsequent decision to block the entry of all humanitarian aid into Gaza could potentially result in humanitarian consequences.
The EU calls for a rapid resumption of negotiations on the second phase of the ceasefire, and expresses its strong support to the mediators.
A permanent ceasefire would contribute to the release of all remaining Israeli hostages while ensuring the necessary conditions for recovery and reconstruction in Gaza to begin. All parties have a political responsibility to make this a reality.
The EU reiterates its calls for full, rapid, safe and unhindered access to humanitarian aid at scale for Palestinians in need and for allowing a
Centrist Dem group rails against leftist identity politics and purity tests | Centrist Democrats produced a five-page document of takeaways at a retreat organized by Third Way.
Yet more Democrats doubling down on "we have to be more racist", "we need to have less principles", "it's actually the lefts fault somehow".
Reminder that here in reality, Democrats ran republican campaign messaging during the election whilst Kamala failed to distance herself from literal fucking genocide in response to the bases concerns nor did they provide any meaningful economic policies as answers.
When several dozen Democratic political operatives and elected officials gathered at a tony resort off the Potomac River last month, frustration boiled over at the left wing of their party.
**Democrats had become too obsessed with “ideological purity tests” and should push back “against far-left staffers and groups that exert a disproportionate influence on policy and messaging,” according to a document of takeaways from the gathering
In a perfect world, people would stop feeling the need to redirect every criticism of Democrats into pointing out how someone else must be worse, and maybe realise Democrats as they exist and as the party is structured is an almost useless vehicle for any meaningful change or opposition.
In a perfect world, liberals would stop idealising Democrats in the way they did in the post I was responding to, where they implied the Democratic alternative would save lives, after that party literally full throatedly endorsed genocide right up until they lost the election (and still do).
The thread is talking about how it ought to be acceptable to criticise the Democratic party, and the reality of what you're doing is needlessly deflecting back to Republicans in a context in which it's irrelevant.
Brooklyn Rail, mainly an arts magazine but they have a great politics section, Field Notes, from which books like Hinterland by Phil A. Neel have been published.
Current Affairs - Useful for keeping up with Doctor Who and his amazing adventures.
The Plot to Destroy the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
prospect.org The Plot to Destroy the CFPB
Declarations in a court case involving the union of the consumer protection agency detail a desire to whittle it down to ‘five men in a room.’
A remarkable set of declarations from current and former employees of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau detail Acting Director Russ Vought’s scheme to illegally eliminate the agency, and the consequences for thousands of CFPB employees and millions of consumers left vulnerable to predatory financial scams.
The fourteen declarations, filed on Thursday in National Treasury Employees Union v. Vought, provide an unusually direct window into how the Trump administration sought to cripple an agency that has returned more than $21 billion to consumers over its lifespan. And the employees call out CFPB’s current chief operating officer, Adam Martinez, for lying in his declaration to the court that the agency is just going through a normal transition process in the transfer of political power.
CFPB has been under a “stop work” order since Vought took over the agency on an acting basis. No work has been performed and employees are on paid leave; the order was characterized as a wor
Ex-White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre Says Biden Forced Out of Race by Democratic ‘Firing Squad’
www.thecrimson.com Ex-White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre Says Biden Forced Out of Race by Democratic ‘Firing Squad’ | News | The Harvard Crimson
Former White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre lambasted Democratic leadership for attacking Joe Biden like a “firing squad” at a Harvard Kennedy School Institute of Politics forum Wednesday, saying the party should have united behind the former president.
Certain Democrats remain inexplicably in denial about Biden and his brain leaking out of his ears during a live debate and even internal polling showing repeatedly he was almost certainly going to lose badly.
Former White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre lambasted Democratic leadership for attacking Joe Biden like a “firing squad” at a Harvard Kennedy School Institute of Politics forum Wednesday, saying the party should have united behind the former president.
“I have never seen anything like that,” she said. “It was truly, truly unfortunate. And I think it hurt us more than folks realized to have done that.”
Jean-Pierre attended a discussion with spring IOP fellow Brittany Shepherd and Anoushka Chander ’25 — her first public event since leaving the White House in January.
**Jean-Pierre stood by Biden’s achievements, his cognitive fitness, and his decision to run for re-election during the talk. She echoed statements from Michael C. Donilon — a senior advisor to Bide
cosmonautmag.com Teaching Liberation: The Rhetoric & Writing of Socialism
Elia Newsom reflects on the struggles and successes they experienced teaching a university course on socialism during the Fall 2023 semester at the University of Colorado Boulder.
An interesting article describing the experience of YDSA organisers running an introductory course into socialism and Marxism.
Excerpt:
At the start of this class I was confused about socialism. As most of American society is. I was conflicted between what I had learned about Marx and Marxism in my past classes and all of the times I had been told it failed. I was not aware that in actuality the examples we’ve been told about the cautionary tales of socialism were not examples of true or pure socialism. I’d been told that Cuba was a poor, struggling, tyrannical state where the people were suffering. I had no idea that none of this was true and Cuba was strides beyond American society in many ways. I didn’t understand what unions did or their cultural and historic significance, and I was unaware of the capitalist greed going on within our campus affecting my own teachers. In my position statement I don’t think I was fully aware that so many of the causes I’m passionate about are
I've changed it, but Nitter sites have often been incredibly unreliable in my experience. Not much use in a url if it breaks randomly, so I also put the original link in the main post just in case.
I've changed it and added original link in the post in case nitter instance fails/people want original url.
Literally in the post you're responding on:
I also remind dipshit Democrat defenders to hold Democrats to account. They ran a failed election campaign. They decided adhering to genocide was more important than winning. This is how they respond to their base expecting literally anything of them, is to resent them and tell them to shut the fuck up and plead there isn’t anything they can do so they just have to roll over.
What is it with you fucking morons who incessantly turn every criticism of the Demcoratic party into some insane notion that purely by virtue of existing they are owed votes? That's not how politics works. That's not how election campaigns work. Also, do do you think the organisations doing this didn't campaign for Democrats? Do you have any reading comprehension?
You did nothing. Now, this is what you get.
Liberals and wishing harm on others when they fail.
"You did nothing" Did you phonebank? Did you go canvassing at all? Did you deliver or distribute campaign material? Did you incessantly post online enough about how it's your duty to vote Democrat, the most significant and important contribution to every election campaign?
No? Oh, you're just still whining months after the fact that because you saw liberal orgs that actually did campaign for Democrats are not satisfied with how Democrats are responding to Republicans and the excuses they keep making?
Well, this is what you get. Clearly you just didn't want it enough.
Liberals turning into "fake news!!" idiots when faced with direct quotes of Democrats literally telling their base to fuck off and stop expecting anything of them.
The article directly cites at least 2 liberal orgs directing people to call Democratic politicians to do as much as they can to oppose Republicans, and directly quotes multiple Democrats directly relating to this and trying to insist there's nothing they can do. I don't know what more you want.
They won't because they're the ones making money from it. The only reason they care about this is likely because they don't get money from ads as they don't have any related advertising business like Google and Apple does.
It's the same as when they kicked EA off of steam. EA allowed buying DLC without going through Steam. If they're not getting a cut, but you are being hosted/distributed by them, they don't want it.
Locked
No no no
Locked
No no no
There was absolutely zero chance that any politician with a chance of winning was going to side will Palestine. Full stop. The Harris campaign was the best option anyone had for any semblance of a peaceful resolution to this.
So there it is. You just get to declare genocide as inevitable to suggest other people shouldn't or can't care. It's always the same fucking bullshit - you're the noble Palestinian defender with their best interests at heart, whilst declaring them an acceptable target we should just not have to really care about or show any interest in. The typical Democrat approach of "I care about minorities only as far as I can throw them".
Trump wants to speed run the genocide so he can build a resort.
And according to yourself, Democrats were going to genocide them anyway. So what's with the faux concern? It was inevitable regardless. Anybody who cared just needed to suck it up and accept mass murder and expulsion of a people. Actually the Democrats lost because you cared too much.
As always, there's a scapegoat to show the Democrats can never fail. They can only be failed. It was Bernie bros in 2016 that singularly caused the Democrats to lose. Now in 2024 it's anybody who cared about Palestinians.
If Palestine was your single issue that caused you not to vote against fascism, you’re a moron and are complicit in the upcoming genocide in the US. Full stop.
Again, wild that dipshits like yourself don't hold Democrats in power to account. Are the Democrats not morons for refusing to budge on genociding Palestinians? Are Democrats not complicit in their actions and their campaigning? Democrats signed on to the Laken Riley act. Fetterman spent months taunting people who cared about Palestinians and calling everyone who criticised Israel terrorist supporters and Hamas. Democrats ran ads saying they're against trans people whilst also claiming to be defending and speaking for them. They ran anti-immigrant ads talking about immigrants stealing welfare. Kamala when asked about anti-trans laws answered "they should follow the law".
Because look what happened. Did sticking it to the Harris campaign change anything for the better at all?
Did Democratic leadership sticking it to their base and their voters change anything for the better at all? Look what happened. They still lost even after caping for genocide!