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Leftwing senator advises ‘unification of progressive people in general’ because threat from Republican ex-president is too great
Progressive US voters must unite behind Joe Biden rather than consider any of his Democratic primary challengers because the threat of another Donald Trump presidency is too great, Bernie Sanders has said.
“We’re taking on the … former president, who, in fact, does not believe in democracy – he is an authoritarian, and a very, very dangerous person,” the senator and Vermont independent, who caucuses with Democrats, said on NBC’s Meet the Press. “I think at this moment there has to be unification of progressive people in general in all of this country.”
Sanders’ remarks came as Trump continued grappling with more than 90 criminal charges across four separate indictments filed against him for his efforts to forcibly nullify his defeat to Biden in the 2020 presidential race, his illicit retention of classified documents, and hush-money payments to porn actor Stormy Daniels.
Despite the unprecedented legal peril confronting him, Trump enjoys a commanding lead over his competitors in the Republican presidential primary, polls show.
And though polling for now shows Biden generally is ahead of Trump, that has not stopped Robert F Kennedy Jr and Marianne Williamson from mounting long-shot Democratic primary challenges – or third-party progressive candidate Cornel West from running.
Sanders himself was the runner-up for the Democratic nomination in the 2016 White House race won by Trump and in 2020, with West among his supporters. But Sanders this time quickly endorsed Biden’s re-election campaign, a decision which prompted West to accuse him of only backing Biden because he is “fearful of the neo-fascism of Trump”.
The senator responded to that criticism on Sunday on CNN’s State of the Union, saying, “Where I disagree with my good friend Cornel West is – I think, in these really very difficult times, there is a real question whether democracy is going to remain in the United States of America.
“You know, Donald Trump is not somebody who believes in democracy, whether women are going to be able to continue to control their own bodies, whether we have social justice in America, [whether] we end bigotry.”
Sanders didn’t elaborate, but his remarks seemed to be an allusion to the Trump White House’s creation of the US supreme court supermajority, which last year struck down the federal abortion rights that the Roe v Wade decision had established decades earlier.
That court also struck down race-conscious admissions in higher education as well as a Colorado law that required entities to afford same-sex couples equal treatment, among other decisions lamented by progressives.
“Around that, I think we have got to bring the entire progressive community to defeat Trump – or whoever the Republican nominee will be – [and] support Biden,” Sanders added on State of the Union.
Sanders nonetheless said he planned to push Biden to tackle “corporate greed and the massive levels of income and wealth inequality” across the US. On Meet the Press, he suggested he would urge Biden to “take on the billionaire class”.
Those comments came about four months after Sanders called on the US government to confiscate 100% of any money that Americans make above $999m, saying people with that much wealth “can survive just fine” without becoming billionaires.
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Everywhere I go I’m usually the oldest person in the room, and I’ve been hearing that line since long before I’d ever heard of Donald Trump.
Always, the left has to support whatever bland middle-of-the-road candidate the Democrats put forward, candidates who seem idea-free and utterly without passion, because the Republicans have a terrifying candidate. Gotta take boring over terrifying.
And Bernie’s right. I ain’t arguing.
Sure is a bucket of swill we’re always forced to drink from, though.
I guess the important thing is that one should do other things in addition to voting for the bland somewhat shitty candidate that’s at least better than the other guy.
Unionising and getting involved on the local level are two good starting points. Encouraging others to unionise and to get involved locally is also good.
Oh, and reading up on alternative election systems and teaching people about it would be good, but maybe too ambitious. Who wants to listen to anyone ramble on about ranked choice or whatever.
This is the correct answer that so few of us realize. We as a people are able to do more than one thing at once. Yes, we should still vote for the lesser of 2 evils, AND we should also make progress to improve the system itself.
I think yours are better points, but also: voting in the primaries. I’m sure Bernie would support a more progressive candidate as well!
Just show them the CGP Grey videos, they’d short and entertaining way to introduce people to alternative voting systems
Y’all really need to reform your voting system. We have a preferential system over here in Australia. It’s not perfect but it feels like our democracy is a lot more robust and diverse because of it.
Man wouldn’t that be great. Half the country wants ranked choice voting but the ones in power don’t actually represent us they represent who is paying them.
the ones in power
If the “ones in power” represent those who are paying them… maybe the ones in power are the ones doing the paying?
That is exactly correct.
When you have two parties in power that would both lose from a more representative system, how do you go about getting better representation?
Oh I absolutely agree, one party wants a capitalist dystopia while the other pushes for a genocidal fascist hellscape with an out of control climate and the return of Jim Crow or worse.
Democrats are by far the better alternative, but can the Democratic National Convention be trusted to implement a voting system that would see them face competition from the left? Don’t rely on them, people need to push it hard in addition to voting.
This is why I, at the time, was sort of happy that trump won. I hoped that dems losing what they thought was a sure win to an assclown like trump would make them shape up and put forward some actual candidates that the people could truly get behind. Instead they doubled down with milquetoast shitlibs. We’re never going to get out of this rut of voting for the lesser evil without ranked choice voting.
I know this is the wrong server to say it, but there were some things I liked about Hillary. I am still convinced that her gender played far more of a role in people’s hatred of her than they will ever be able to accept.
Yes, she’s still a neo-liberal, but she’s further left than most of the Democrats, and we consistently see that the supermajority of non-Republican voters are simply not as progressive as most of us are. Hillary had a well-conceived labor plan and respected unions. She liked the idea of single-payer, if not enough to spend too much political capital on it. She was left of Obama and of Biden, if still to the right of her “progressive” so-called roots.
Here’s my non-opinionated counterpoint. Trump bested Hillary on Labor when his plan was “kick out immigrants and deregulate coal so you get your dangerous job back”, and she had a 100 page labor plan that involved things like subsidized retraining of coal workers. The Democrats have learned that you will not win Labor by favoring them. A bad lesson.
You don’t understand how politics works if you thought that Convicted Sex Offender Treason Trump winning in 2016 would result in anything other than Biden winning the nomination in 2020. The first thing literally guaranteed the 2nd thing.
I think a big part is that progress is slow, I want it faster but as the old generation dies off we will get further left politicians but also right so hopefully with internet and general empathy we can overcome conservatives.
Then be your own Goldie Wilson. Run yourself. Enough of my neighbors have told me that I should run, that I am even though I don’t believe I am qualified.
I’m running for city council, but if I win in 2026, the fascist that currently holds the chair, and constantly complains about it, won’t be attempting to actively harm the community the way they currently are.
Also if I win, and continue winning the 2 terms of city council, 2 terms of mayor, then I’m done, because I’ll be 60 at that point and served 16 years in government. At most they could get another term or two out of me as a state level senator or representative. I’m not sticking around past my 60s. Got too much to do.
Just to clarify that this is something that happened often for primaries? That’s new to me, even the primaries for 2020 election it didn’t seem to have that outright pressure and just politicians and people in public eye endorsing one or the other.
The talk of even if you don’t like then vote for them cuz other is worse I only heard really leading up to presidential election.
For what it is worth though I do not watch the news or talking heads and never have, I always prefer reading articles, so maybe I’m just out of the loop on that part of our culture.
I’ve stopped voting for the worst of two evils. I leave it blank.
Yes, Bernie, we know. We will because we have no other choice. Because of how absolutely broken and corrupt our entire political system is, we can vote for a ideologically repugnant lame-duck conservative or a literal fascist.
No matter how much we hate Biden and the DNC’s corrupt, self-serving conservatism, we still have two brain cells to rub together and do, in fact, understand that “both sides” are most definitely NOT the same.
Yeah, both sides aren’t the same. How do you deal with the 20% of the country that want a fascist government and the 30% who are ok with it as long as it keeps taxes low and punish the “right people”?
I’m just venting in my reply to your comment; this isn’t a criticism of what you said.
How do you deal with them? With patience and honesty. You talk politics, make it OK to discuss things without demonizing people who disagree with you. If it’s impolite to discuss politics, then only the impolite will share their political opinions. And you know who benefits? The fascist. They want the opposition silenced by propriety. They want the extremes to be the loudest voices, because it paints the picture that both sides are unreasonable.
Don’t avoid the subject. Dive headfirst into it, and be prepared to resist the urge to roll your eyes or get emotional. Be calm, be rational, and be direct. Conservativism is a fungus that grows in the darkness. In the conservative mind, they are the heroes, and everyone else is evil. You won’t win that debate with logic. You have to use the gray rock method, and prove to them that you both disagree with them, and you are not their enemy.
Unfortunately, there’s a reason cult deprogrammers are heavily trained. If you’re not an expert, the above behavior can have the opposite effect, helping reiterate to them that their crazy positions are actually reasonable and acceptable. The worst thing you can do to a cult member is acknowledge their beliefs respectfully. The second worst thing you can do is insult them. See the problem?
You have to use the gray rock method, and prove to them that you both disagree with them, and you are not their enemy.
This is the problem. When someone holds a belief that is not ok, telling them that is “ok” doesn’t work. You’ll be “one of the good ones”, but it’ll end there.
I didn’t say that you should tell them it’s OK. You can tell someone their ideas are outrageous without getting emotional or argumentative.
I’ve tried basically everything under the sun with ly parents and family. Including variations of this.
It doesn’t work.
If someone is as set in their ways and conspiracies and worldview. There’s no getting them out if it, if they don’t already want to. They just come up with whatever counterargument or idea that makes sense to them or supports them. Real or imagined. Facts and reality literally don’t matter.
About the only thing left I’m gonna end up trying to do is to effectively give them a form of ideological shock, which may end up just shattering their worldview. Not exactly intentional, mind you, but just by living my own life. Maybe having their child be something they’re supposed to hate will shake up their foundational beliefs enough to question things.
…or it may not. Probably the more likely answer.
Yes, and I’m very sorry you’re dealing with that. You’re right, you’re not going to fix a conservative mind. The strategies I mentioned are recommended to protect and preserve your own mental health, not to fix theirs. Set boundaries, identify gaslighting, disengage emotionally from their outbursts, and protect your self esteem from their whims. It might help them recognize their issues and improve their relationship with you, but there are no guarantees.
The only decent tactic I found is to focus on having the government being the arbitor of who is a good person.
You also have to argue against the programming that relying on any unearned government assistance is bad. So, the best way to respond is asking if there should be a qualification that anyone working shouldn’t get the same benefits of someone who is broke.
It isn’t perfect, though. There is also a lot of tribalism.
This is the same reason I talk about how much I am paid with my coworkers
Sure it makes sense that someone here longer than me will get more, but of two people are hired at the same time and one is making $3,000 more (My own experience) then it’s bs
However recognise also… nothing is solved by voting biden in instead of Trump. Since the issue isn’t Trump the person, but the wider politican movement. There will be next trump after this trump and next trump after that trump. Names change, the situation doesn’t.
It’s just kicking the can down the road for another 4 years. Nothing more, nothing less. US voters and system really need to do some hard long term thinking and planning to come up with a plan to actually solve the issue. Instead of keeping kicking the can down the road for 4 years at a time. Since again (as with Trump in 2016) the can doesn’t get kicked along for yeat another 4 years. Instead when USA goes to kick the can, it is actually this time a glass bottled molotov, that bursts in flames upon being tried to be kicked yeat again.
You throw corrupt around like it has meaning when it’s nothing more than compromise. It’s compromise in order for the party to get into power, not corruption… conflating the two is ignorant to the fact DNC wouldn’t not get into power ever without it.
Welcome to the democratic process.
Yeah try telling that to Hexbear and see how well that goes for you lol
Good thing hexchan’s take is totally irrelevant!
This user is completely making shit up about Hexbear.
Good point lol
Done and done, Bernie.
West to accuse him of only backing Biden because he is “fearful of the neo-fascism of Trump.
That quote shows how frankly, stupid, Cornel West is. Game theory & math show that it is impossible for a 3rd party run to succeed with US style FPtP voting in place. Get rid of that & then we can talk, but not to you, shit for brains.
Yep Bernie is right, 100%.
Yep Bernie is right, 100%.
He always had been. I’ve never known him to be wrong.
Why did he support Yugoslavia’s bombing by NATO?
He supported Serbia’s bombing. And because it was thr right thing to do. They were engaging in a genocide and openly conducting ethnic cleansings.
I did not know there were white fascists out in the open. Seems like socialist left is a lot softer with your ilk.
Or I’m someone who directly experienced the ethnic cleansing and genocide committed against my people by the the Serbs. I have zero sympathy or tolerance for keyboard warriors and actual fascist apologists when it comes to the subject. Educate yourself first and actually think critically sometime about shit you say (as you claim you do), rather than just repeating the tired, and frankly lazy, “west bad/NATO bad” mantra.
Ah yes NATO good Serbia/Yugoslavia bad. You can apply the very advice you give to yourself, since you stan for NATO. NATO is the single biggest evil organisation in human history, and USA the biggest terrorist country.
Except that one time he ran against the Democrat and got a wannabe dictator elected President. Aside from that.
Clinton earned her loss.
A city in Ontario changed FPTP voting and the following year the provincial government forced them to change back even though the majority favored it.
Damn, fake London actually did something good? I’m sure it’s not the first time that’s happened, but it is the first time I’ve heard of that happening, as a non-Canadian.
But I believe that’s not the first, and won’t be the last, time Ontario has regressively overruled the democratic will for genuinely beneficial change.
deleted by creator
Does this inform your opinion?
deleted by creator
Not the other commenter but here it is:
Here’s another link that’s not paywalled.
Don’t put this on people posting links.
Use a browser extension if it’s personally important to you, or just paste the link in yourself. Archive sites go offline; they shouldn’t be primary link sources.
It’s personally important to the person sharing it. The reason they’re not subscribing is because it isn’t personally important.
If you want to share information, you need to take the responsibility of making sure it’s readable. You can’t just throw shit at the wall and expect everyone else to interpret it correctly. That’s a recipe for misunderstanding and divisiveness.
We’re not all rich like Zorque subscribing to 55 newspapers.
You didn’t really read or engage with any of my points, so I’ll ignore your lecture about misunderstanding.
Just because I didn’t parrot something you personally agree doesn’t mean I didn’t engage.
But I suppose if you only want to hear what conforms to your viewpoints, that’s your prerogative.
You’re winning an argument that no one is having with you, great job 👍
You didn’t respond to the substance of my comment. Links to paywalled articles are trivial to paste into a site like archive.is. Archive sites are taken down all the time, it makes no sense to provide them as the primary source of a link.
Or just like, compete in a Democratic primary like Bernie did. Maybe don’t shoot for president on your literal first attempt, but you can if you really want to. Bernie was way more successful in promoting his message running in those Democratic primaries than any of the random Greens have ever been.
I mean, if Trump won and abolished all elections and declared himself dictator for life, then West’s chances of being elected president as a third party candidate wouldn’t actually change one way or the other.
So maybe being a feckless third party candidate in an authoritarian neofascist dictatorship isn’t really that different from being a feckless third party candidate in a constitutional democracy.
a 3rd party run to succeed with US style FPtP voting in place
However as 2016 showed it is also impossible for the FPTP lesser of two evils routine to keep kicking the can down the road forever, you eventually will land on the “bandit” sector on trying to yet again run the Russian roulette of “surely the fear of the greater evil will again make the lesser evil win”.
Since lesser of two evils too long leads to apathy. People won’t be rebelling by voting for Trump, by voting for even Cornel West, they won’t be even really rebelling at all. Instead they will be so disillusioned by decades of lesser of two evil, they will instead sign up for extra shift of work or decide to sleep in bed to rest for a day instead of going voting.
The great enemy of Democrats is not Trump, it is sleeping peoples party and you don’t win against sleeping peoples party with negative campaigning and fear mongering. It will just make them sleep more. Only thing to make them awake is positive campaigning. Likeable, popular, enthusiasm generating candidates and platforms. The message of “no we can make a change” instead of “please help us keep the status guo alive for 4 more years by kicking the can down the road by preventing greater evil for these four years.”
Have you considered that Cornell West supporters don’t want Biden either? Maybe in their eyes the only choices are to vote for West or to not vote at all.
Cornell West supporters
I’ve never met one. Have you?
Ask a Russian.
You should probably leave the house more often then.
I leave my house every day and probably interact with 30 or more people, also every day
People talk politics all the time, never once have I heard anyone mention Cornell West
I drive a cab and talk politics all day in one of the most leftist regions in the US. I’ve never so much as heard the name in person. Including from other socialists and active agitators for workers rights.
This is why the 2 party system is fucking bad. In the Netherlands we have a wide range of parties we can vote for, no need for strategic votes like this.
It’s a symptom of the winner takes all election system… Its most stable with one or two major parties. The hope for more parties is one reason some of us push for instant runoff elections, but it “confuses” people so its not had the traction I’d like.
The US can’t support more than two parties with how the elections are run. Instead the primaries have to filter down the varied candidates into compromises
Britain uses the same system and has some successful third parties like the Scottish National Party.
Regional third parties tend to dramatically outperform national ones. Because FPTP does best with 2 candidate elections, but those 2 candidates don’t have to be in the same party across every district.
For presidential elections - yeah. You run a third party candidate like Nader, you get Bush. You run Perot, you get Clinton.
How is it the same system?
@Tak @Pipoca both the US and the UK have fptp single member districts for national legislature, so the expectation would be that in the UK parliament they’d only have Labour and Tories, no 3rd parties representing regional issues, just wings of the duopoply serving that purpose. But the difference isn’t derived in that both have FPTP, but that the US has a media environment that propagates binary choices, BBC still strives for viewership but not the extent that US MSM does via oversimplification
Doesn’t that not include basically anything else but that factor and then labeled as the same thing for the sake of argument? How does that relate to funding, regulation, power structures, and much more nuanced factors?
The US has always been a two party system from the start back before there was a BBC. Are we going to say Fox news created the original contention of federalists and antifederalists?
It seriously gives some really bad incentives.
Yes, voting for Biden is better… But it also very much allows the Democrats to abuse the situation and put whoever they want on there. Because the alternative will always be worse. And so you’re destined to always having an acceptable president, but never a great one that people really want.
We have a parliament here and, yeah, it’s so much better in basically every way. I can actually vote for what I want and not have to worry that it’s not strategic. Because I’m the end it will just empower the party and thus give them more negotiating power.
The Netherlands has proportional vote, that’s why.
With electoral circles instead of PV, mathematically the two largest parties get way more representatives than the percentage of the public votes they get, and the bigger the electoral circles and fewer the representatives the worse it gets.
(Further, voters own behaviour changes to one of “useful vote” rather than “choosing those who better represents them”, plus tribalism becomes way more extreme when there is only a black & white choice - so lots of votes are driven by team loyalty - all of which makes it even worse)
(Also smaller parties dissapear, both because they can’t secure funding and because their members lose hope of ever making a difference. The closest you get to “small parties” in the US are independents, running for a very specific electoral circle only and whose voice is a drop in the ocean in a place like the US Congress)
The US has single representative very large electoral circles for Congress and double representative State-sized electoral circles for the Senate, so their system is rigged to pretty much the max it can and the result is a power duopoly.
I lived in The Netherlands and now I live in a country where the system is somewhat less so (smaller electoral circles, multiple representatives per circle) and even here you see the two largest parties getting and extra 10-20% each representatives in parliament compared to the popular vote (the governing party has 56% of parliamentary seats on 42% of votes cast) whilst the smaller parties have half as many representatives as their popular vote (in other words, every vote for a smaller party counts less than half as much as a vote for a large party, which is hardly democratic).
Most so-called “democratic” nations have this kind of rigged system, but places like the US and Britain take it to the extreme, so it’s unsurprising that when the economic supercycle is at the point where the many start hurting, in the absence of true choice you get instead the internal takeover of the rightmost of the party dupoly by the Trumps and Boris Johnsons of this world offering an ultra-nationalist far-right populist mix of othering, scapegoating and simple “solutions”.
(Funilly enough if you compare The Netherlands with Britain, whilst even now the far-right is stuck at maybe 20% in the former, in the latter it took over the Tory Party from the inside - which is far easier than convince half the population to vote for them - and hence has been in power for almost a decade with an absolute majority).
We also have more than 2 parties in Spain, however the way votes are counted it’s better to vote for the big parties than the local ones. Literally, voting your local party and them supporting the big “left” party will amount less seats than just voting the big party. Usually people vote locally but since we have the looming danger of the extreme right party, people have been focusing on the big left, just to ensure that we don’t get Vox.
Still having more than 2 parties promotes discussion and makes it really difficult for a party to go rogue.
in theory, in practice strategic votes still matter for the actual government because parties can just decide not to work with someone and the biggest party gets first picks for the coalition
meaning that in practice, having the biggest party still matters massively, and in a mostly right wing country, the right gets to vote for who best represents them, while the left still has to vote strategically if they want to take actual administrative positions
I’d like to disagree. strategic voting means you shift your vote to what you suppose to be more majority carrying, which usually tends to go for centrists with quite some neoliberal positions. And they usually manage to put through the same shit as the right on economic issues, or implementing authoritarian attacks on civil rights, like mass surveilance.
It is the same thing in the US. There is the far right extremist republicans and the right wing democrats (by european standards) because they try to cover the supposed center, and everyone left of that still votes for them. So in the end they still get no health care, no social security, lots of warmongering, bad schools and institutionalized racism…
In Germany we get the same bs with people voting social democrats “strategically”, that end up pushing for neoliberal economic policies and authoritarian social policies.
im not sure what youre disagreeing with
Look. Am I going to vote for whoever the democratic nominee is? Yeah.
Am I going to be saying the democratic party is generally also racist, transobobic, capitalist, and don’t really give a shit about you? Also yes.
The republican party being more racist, transobobic, and capitalist doesn’t mean the democratic party isn’t. And I’m sick of people pretending otherwise.
The system is rigged, hence the only choice is between evils.
No wonder american politicians are constantly harping about how the US is such a “Great Democracy” - it’s to compensate just how much the mathematically rigged for political duopoly american system fails to represent the will of the average citizen, unlike an actual Democracy.
Nah, we almost had Bernie. We had FDR. We will prevail again.
This right here folks, goddamned right. Organize, talk to your friends, and go vote every single election, participate. Get involved, canvas for local people you like, run for something; you’d be surprised how many city council seats or streets commissioner slots are completely vacant. The deck is stacked against us, the Republican party has been cultivating their bigoted base for 70 years and it’s moved the entire country significantly right. We need to begin doing the same thing now if we want to win against the strain of Christo-fascism/Corporatocracy growing here in the U.S. There are only three boxes: soap, ballot, and bullet. We obviously all love using our soapbox, I’d recommend trying the ballot as well. The other box likely ends badly for a lot of people and should be avoided while the other two are still options. If we organize and vote we can absolutely drag the country back to left.
Was there ever a resolution to that? Seriously the FBI should have been arresting the assholes that were preventing the Mayor from doing his job.
Then run. I am. Not because I wanted to, it wasn’t my idea. My neighbors keep telling me that I should. If I can take the seat away from the fascist that currently holds it, in the 2026 election, I’ll consider that the only real win I need.
…. You watch republicans force kids to detransition and say “yeah but the dems are just as bad”?
Like I get that they’re not perfect but holy fuck shit jesus are the republicans a bunch of ghouls. Not a single candidate even acknowledged that climate change is happening at their debate; I got kids who will have to grow up in this world dude.
Both sides my ass, only one is trying to make gilead a reality and just because the other doesn’t pass leftist purity testing doesn’t put them on the same level as actual fascists.
you missed the word ‘more’
its right here in this sentence (ill make it bold for you):
The republican party being more racist, transobobic, and capitalist doesn’t mean the democratic party isn’t.
the word ‘more’ in that sentence means they’re in fact not saying dems are just as bad, or on the same level as actual fascists, theyre explicitly and literally saying democrats are not as bad
easy mistake to make, hope this helps
Kinda doing some heavy lifting don’t you think? One side is banning books written by minorities and replacing them with pragerU propaganda, the other is…. not doing that? And you’re painting them with the same brush?
And you’re painting them with the same brush?
you missed the word ‘more’
its right here in this sentence (ill make it bold and italicised for you, and put arrows around it):
The republican party being -> more <- racist, transobobic, and capitalist doesn’t mean the democratic party isn’t.
the word ‘more’ in that sentence means they’re in fact not painting democrats and republicans with the same brush, theyre explicitly, literally and unambiguously saying democrats are not as bad
‘democrats are not as bad as republicans’ is not painting them with the same brush
likewise, ignoring racism and transphobia or demanding others do so because its your team doing it is not protecting minorities, its actually just accepting racism and transphobia as the price of doing business, which is horrible
easy mistake to make, hope this helps
We’re staring down the barrel of theocratic fascism and you’re purity testing the only viable alternative.
They’re saying “they’re both sons of bitches but one is more so than the other”, that’s painting them with the same brush.
It’s like saying “someone with a billion dollars is more wealthy than someone with a million” - like yeah it’s semantically true but it completely disregards magnitude. Plenty of people make a million by working hard and paying taxes, but you only make a billion by fucking people over.
ignoring racism and transphobia or demanding others do so because its your team doing it is not protecting minorities, its actually just accepting racism and transphobia as the price of doing business, which is horrible
ignoring or defending exploitation of the poor because its your team doing it is not helping the poor, its actually just further ignoring, defending and normalising their exploitation
It’s like saying “someone with a billion dollars is more wealthy than someone with a million” - like yeah it’s semantically true but it completely disregards magnitude. Plenty of people make a million by working hard and paying taxes, but you only make a billion by fucking people over.
your comparison of ‘democrats actively pushing discriminative and explotative policies’ to ‘poor millionaires who got their millions by just working very hard and who arent hurting no one’ is hilariously tone deaf, thank you
During the civil war, the north was still pretty fucking racist. In the 60s, people were routinely fired for being gay and same sex marriage was unthinkable.
Do you know what the Overton window is?
The millionaire thing was an example that apparently you missed the point of. Doctors, pilots, and other people in high-skill, well paying professions routinely clear a million in net worth on W2 income as honestly as you can in this country. The difference between a million dollars and a billion dollars is about a billion dollars. To say that billionaires and millionaires are both wealthy, but billionaires are just more wealthy, is semantically accurate but completely misrepresents the magnitude of difference between the two.
To bring it back to the point: dems are bad in the way that millionaires are wealthy. Republicans are bad in the way that billionaires are wealthy. It’s not the fucking same.
It would be cool if we had another candidate that didn’t suck instead of relying, once again, on voting for anyone but Trump.
Because I don’t think most people are voting FOR Biden, as much as they are voting AGAINST Trump.
It was the same in the 2016 Elections too. Most left-leaning people I talked to did not want Hillary in office, but they wanted Trump not in office more than Hillary - so a vote for Hillary it was.
Honestly, both parties fucking suck, and it sucks even more that our options are literally “right-leaning centrists” and “fascism”.
Neoliberals need to get this through their head: a sizeable minority of us do not like the Democratic Party and don’t believe we are represented by them, regardless of whatever empty rhetoric they spew. Sizeable enough that you can lose elections without us. We are not a long-term reliable voting bloc and you need to learn tactics other than bullying and fear-mongering to get your way.
To abuse a metaphor, Hillary Clinton and her primary shenanigans were the straw that broke my back. Donald Trump and what he represented was bad enough that I managed to muster enough energy to vote for Hillary in 2016 and Biden in 2020. But I’m tired, and if I’m able to muster the energy for 2024 it’ll be the last time. I’m done voting for people that I do not want to be my president. It doesn’t have to be a progressive, but give me someone I can stomach or you can leave me out of your election math.
And the tired refrain of “Biden is the most progressive president ever” isn’t a consolation prize, it’s salt in the wound.
once the republican party dies, the democratic party is in big trouble for exactly this reason.
He isn’t though. By a long shot. Biden is right of center
I agree, that’s why that phrase is salt in the wound. It’s said by neoliberals who themselves are right of center but don’t realize it. They seem to think it’s supposed to make progressives feel better.
it’s interesting to think about the damage trump has done to the progressive movement simply by “commandeering” 3 election cycles in that way. because the consequences of him winning are so catastrophic, we’ll end up with 12 years of presidents that were either trump or centrists hailed as the best way to beat him. just to clarify, i’m not trying to downplay the damage he’s done in other ways, nor how terrible it would be if he were elected
i wonder how much easier it would have been to elect a progressive if the past 3 republican nominees had been evil in a more mild and traditional way.
There’s a lot of things to march on the street for, but too be honest as an outsider, national voting reform to bring in a truly democratic system (not first past the post…) needs to be at the top of the list.
So many things broken in your political system flows from it.
You say that, but Biden dominated the Primary in 2020. I wanted Warren. I’d have been ok with Bernie. But I have to admit, Biden just had so many more votes.
The US is filled with conservatives. Most Democratic voters are simply sane conservatives. Biden is their idea of a good candidate. An economic neoliberal that believes in modest safety nets and personal freedom when not at the expense of others. More importantly, he believes in compromise (something Democrats need because their constituents are not single-issue voters, and often have different opinions on the issues)
It would be cool if more people were more progressive in the US. But the media doesn’t really want to make that possible.
That’s all democracy ever is. A check to keep the worst people from being in power. Non-democracies don’t have this, you have to use violence to remove bad people from power. And most likely die trying to do it.
They really should tech in schools how voting really works. Figure out who the worst one is, and vote for the one that is most likely to beat the worst one. You never get everything you want in one election cycle, you have to keep on voting again and again and over a few decades you get some progress. It sucks but it’s better than the alternatives.
That’s why voting is a duty, it sucks, but you have to do it.
Are you confusing democracy with first-past-the-post voting? Democracy is rule by, or at least for, the people. First-past-the-post is a very old, simple and rather primitive way of choosing representatives that, as you said, is just a ‘check to keep the worst people from being in power’. Newer, more representative systems such as proportional representation and approval voting are better at choosing actually good parties / candidates.
Are you aware that voting systems other than First Past the Post exist?
That’s all democracy ever is. A check to keep the worst people from being in power.
I think ours might be broken.
They should run Obama. Not that one. The other one. But Hillary would probably have her murdered.
At least she’d lose a few voters by doing it, not like some other clowns eh?
The whole thing is a circus. All clowns.
I had this whole long post typed up but decided it all boiled down to this:
Fuck you. Give us better candidates. Populism is winning because you keep giving us disgusting ultimatums. Do better.
Agreed, but with one caveat. You are the better candidate. Stop waiting for someone else to take the job, they all have imposter syndrome too, so fucking go for it and keep the fascists out at the local levels, not just the federal.
I am putting my money where my mouth is and self funding my campaign for city council in 2026.
Not to mention, thanks to the electoral college there are only 5 to 8 states that actually get to decide who is President. My current State has voted for a Republican every year since 1964. I would have had to have been born in 1943 to have a fraction of my vote count nationally. I still vote, but I live in a State where I might as well write in someone I believe in for President. If Biden wins, that’s better than Trump, but it’s still so bad. As my body is breaking down at a job that doesn’t pay for a house I can’t afford, asking us to wait 4 years for someone better is insulting.
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Why don’t you do better, democracy is not “them up there”, it needs everyone. You are as responsible as any one else. You know better, why aren’t you in the ballot?
You know the Democratic Party isn’t a monolith right? It’s voters decide mostly who is in charge. If people want a candidate other than Biden they can vote for them in the primary.
Since no viable candidates have shown up, Biden is the best option for now
it is a monolith though. Courts ruled after 2016 that the DNC can’t defraud voters or candidates because they aren’t required to have a fair primary. Their lawyers argued in court that they should be allowed to select a winner undemocratically, and won.
If they need to threaten voters with ultimatums, then they’re not doing good enough.
Cool, but we have FPTP elections, so the choice will always be the lesser evil of the two front runners. Of course a real alternative would be preferable, but until we have a fundamentally different voting paradigm, ultimatums are a mathematical certainty.
They know that. They plan for it. They don’t want any actual liberals to run so the game is rigged against them from the start
Fuck them. They have absolutely no incentive to pass meaningful change and so the country will continue to swing further and further to the right, as bit by bit the conservatives sweep more of the government under their control.
The Democrats are contributing to the problem.
It is true that the game is rigged. The DNC has a pretty good grip on its own primary process. That said, Bernie made pretty amazing headway into their ranks despite the rigging largely due to people actually engaging the process instead of sitting on their ass whining about how unfair the process it.
You don’t like how the system is being run, join any one of the many coalitions who’ve formed up to change it. Or start your own. And if you aren’t up do doing that much, then go the fuck to the poles and vote for who they choose because otherwise the GOP wins and takes over the god damned country in the name of racism, religious hegemony, and oligarchy.
Then show up. You’d be better than what we’ve got. Lord knows that since 4 of my neighbors told me independently of each other that I should run for city council, I’m looking into running for city council, and I would be the first to tell you that I am not qualified, which seems to be exactly why they think I am qualified.
If your whole selling point is “Yeah, things are still gonna be shit for you, but at least we’re not Nazis!” then at some point you’re going to lose again.
Yeah, life is going to be no better under the Republicans either, but some people’s lives will be significantly worse, and for some voters, that’s enough.
“He’s not hurting the people he needs to be hurting.” That’s an actual quote from an actual Trump voter. That’s what you’re dealing with. For some, happiness is a zero sum game. They’ll quite happily suck down a spoonful of warm shit if some other sucker has to suck down two.
The problem is corollary to your point (which doesn’t diminish your point in the least). Most people are rational actors. They won’t eat shit. That’s why the republican traitor filth will never win the popular vote. The problem is the fucking bullshit electoral college. The shit eaters have an undue advantage. The electoral college is tyranny.
Most people are rational actors
Have you met any people?
The real problem is that they’re all traitorous filth. Trump is objectively worse, but he also doesn’t hide it, and that appeals to people.
Sanders was the only legit alternative in literally decades but now he has to be subservient to Biden.
There is no solution on the horizon. I agree that people should vote Biden… but in truth Biden should be replaced with an actual leader. That won’t happen. And while the Democrats remain almost as evil as the Republicans it’s gonna be a hard sell.
@sentient_loom @cabron_offsets Sanders has been put into a trance of feeling “heard” by Biden while being neutered in any chance of delivering real material benefit to the people. His career as being a truth-speaker from outside the elite, he’s shot his shot to do some real good and will probably retire next year.
I mean, he is old af too.
and still more progressive than democrats have ever been and will ever be.
That may be so, but isn’t the result always a little bit closer to 50/50 than most of us are comfortable with?
The fate of the most powerful country on Earth hangs on the whims of a tiny percentage of voters in swing states. If you live somewhere like Houston your vote does not matter. That state is going red and always will. It’s batshit insane that a state can be 48/52 and that just counts exactly as if it was 0/100.
If your whole selling point is “Yeah, things are still gonna be shit for you, but at least we’re not Nazis!” then at some point you’re going to lose again.
Exactly what happened in Italy. Why is the left all over the world unable to present an actually competent and charismatic candidate?
Because the capitalist class still controls them, curtailing any candidates that would be a threat to their power.
Literally. When the capitalist class are the ones funding the majority if political parties in your country, you are left with either voting for a really right wing candidate or a slightly less right wing candidate.
“It comes from a very ancient democracy, you see…"
“You mean, it comes from a world of lizards?”
“No,” said Ford, who by this time was a little more rational and coherent than he had been, having finally had the coffee forced down him, “nothing so simple. Nothing anything like so straightforward. On its world, the people are people. The leaders are lizards. The people hate the lizards and the lizards rule the people.”
“Odd,” said Arthur, “I thought you said it was a democracy.”
“I did,” said Ford. “It is.”
“So,” said Arthur, hoping he wasn’t sounding ridiculously obtuse, “why don’t people get rid of the lizards?”
“It honestly doesn’t occur to them,” said Ford. “They’ve all got the vote, so they all pretty much assume that the government they’ve voted in more or less approximates to the government they want.”
“You mean they actually vote for the lizards?”
“Oh yes,” said Ford with a shrug, “of course.”
“But,” said Arthur, going for the big one again, “why?”
“Because if they didn’t vote for a lizard,” said Ford, “the wrong lizard might get in.”
What’s this from?
Ultimate Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
Sounds like one of Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy books
I’m sure you’ve heard this before but it bears repeating that what we call the left is actually the left section of the right wing. There are no left wing parties with a majority anywhere in the world
Then run yourself. Be your own Goldie Wilson. I am, though that is because my neighbors keep telling me to run for city council. The only difference between me and the old fucks that are currently holding the seat is just 40 years of age, and I’m over 40.
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The problem is I don’t want Biden, I don’t like him but I have to vote for him because the alternative is worse
America needs ranked voting so we can get out of this two party loser cycle
And that’s exactly why the USA will never get ranked choice voting.
No-one wants Biden but the electoral math makes it the better choice than Trump or implicit Trump (not voting).
I wouldn’t caucus for him, but if I was a US citizen I’d hold my nose and vote.
By far the lesser evil but the lesser evil is still evil. Would be swell if there was a non-evil option just this once!
As south park so eloquently put it, you’re either voting for a giant douche or a turd sandwich.
Ehh South Park is aggressively centrist. They “both sides” their arguments constantly and provide zero alternative progressive solutions. It’s become satire for satire’s sake.
It was always satire for satire’s sake. South Park never tried to present solutions, they just excell at pointing out the absurdity of current events.
I don’t like him but I have to vote for him because the alternative is worse
as you will be doing for the rest of your life; never voting for the candidates you like and you’ll never be given the chance because of democrats. meanwhile your political opposites will perpetually be getting the candidates that they do like and a plethora of choices.
How many moderate Republicans begrudgingly voted Trump in 2016?
moderate Republicans
There’s no such thing anymore. Moderate conservatives are Democrats like Biden and the GOP is a literal fascist party now.
It’s sad for Bernie and other leftist parties that they can mathematically never get into power, but this is the smartest thing he can do given the system. Use his publicity to promote the closest party to his own so that the fascists don’t get into power.
This is what the extreme Right did. The Moral Majority would show up at every local GOP meeting. If the local club usually had twenty people at the meeting, the MMs would show up with fifty. Picking the candidate for dog catcher or justice of the peace? The MM were there and they made sure they got their candidate in.
Nixon did something similar. After he failed to win the Senate seat he hit the road and campaigned hard for every GOP he could find. By 1968 he had dozens of delegates to the national convention in his pocket.
The system was rigged from the get-go by the slave-owner landowners who designed it along the lines of the Ancient Greek system were only the men of the owner class got to choose how the nation was managed.
Of course benificiaries of it will, whenever the can, take advantage of the systems characteristics to extend how much they get out of it: when “greed is good”, politicians are hardly likely to sideline personal upside maximization for the greater good.
The part you are referencing came from the Greek system. They actually stole a good percentage of both the constitution, and the bill o rights from the Five Nations native nation. Their constitution had created a “communist democracy” that lasted for 15,000 years at least, and there’s some evidence that their claim of 25,000 years may be correct.
Edit: please note that I’m using the terms communism and democracy very loosely here. They were a democracy, but very much unlike the Greek version, and dissimilar to the US version. They were also communist, just not Marxist or any of those thinkers.
Like in the Ancient Greek system slaves and women did not have the vote.
A faulty system is bound to be worked around and taken advantage of by everyone that is able to. The US is very far from a democracy because of it, and it won’t change because the most powerful people will do anything to keep it in place.
The DNC wouldn’t be in this mess if they didn’t play the women card in 2016 while screwing Bernie over. Now we’re stuck with two old men who’s out of touch with the younger generation of Americans.
Bernie has it right again.
I like Bernie but he should retire and coach the next generation of Dem leaders
He has been mentoring for years. He is a better mentor while still in office where he can work side by side with freshpersons.
He’s coaching now.
Both Bernie and Biden seem like great people, but I’d much rather see them consulting a younger generation than having either of them at the top.
Being called a “great person” imo should take a history of fighting for equality and dignity for everyone, and for most of his long career Biden has been doing the opposite of that.
Both Bernie and Biden seem like great people
a 30 second google search and the plentiful articles and videos it’ll show you of biden being racist, homophobic and classicist during his entire career and defending those racist, homophobic and classicist decisions during his campaign in 2020 proves that you’re either patsy or a shill.
Sure, I haven’t done my research, and the politics of the last few years is basically all I’ve got to go by. And that’s mainly through Norwegian media, which maybe doesn’t dive too deep into the history of the people.
With that said… Chill dude.
Why or how the F is trump still even a candidate
There’s no way he makes it as the actual candidate.
I’m a republican and I can say that I and plenty of others like me will be voting blue if that absolute disgrace becomes the primary candidate.
Are you a billionaire tycoon? Just curious…
I’m having trouble coming up with any other reason why a person would voluntarily describe themselves as “republican” in 2023.
It’s not just Trump. The Republican party is rotten to the core. Maybe it’s time to reevaluate things.
What a way to start a conversation. Try imagining the person on the other end of the computer and try again.
I don’t follow…? I was just asking a question. Legitimately curious.
You are legitimately curious to know if they are a billionaire tycoon?
If you have a question for a self-proclaimed republican then ask it. Don’t pretend to inquire with them for an opportunity to insult them. That’s not respectful.
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I have thought about your comment for a little bit and would like to respond candidly.
I am just a regular person who has a differing belief about what constitutes a well-functioning government. There are possibly more views that we agree upon than disagree.
At this exact moment,(because everyone’s beliefs are constantly changing with new ideas and information), the views I expect we differ on are: capitalism has been more socially beneficial than destructive, we should have a smaller more efficient government, and we should prevent erosion of the constitutional right to bear firearms.
The views I expect that we agree on are: capitalism has not been properly regulated with regards to the environment (global warming was certainly caused by us), the ability to have an abortion should be codified in law, we should prevent the erosion of constitutional rights like free speech, privacy, and the ability to freely travel, while socialized healthcare will be very expensive and increase everyone’s tax burden, it will also be well worth the cost.
I am a republican because I believe that my political viewpoints align with those of republicans. But I am not blind to the charlatans that have disgraced not only the republican party but also the broader American institution. I take comfort in the fact that I did not vote for Trump in either instance, choosing instead to vote for Biden when that time came.
As for why I voluntarily “describe” myself as a republican because I genuinely believe that people discussing opposing views contributes to incrementally uncovering truth (which is often in the middle) and also serves to stave off the seemingly natural pull of humans to develop tribalism described by the phrase ‘us vs them.’
I say this as a Democrat that used to be a republican. You think our side is all sunshine and rainbows? Neither side is perfect it really is the option of the least bad candidate and that is the issue. The two party system is a failure but it’s what we have.
Yes in my opinion the democrats are better than the Republicans but that doesn’t mean they are without fault. Everyone has an agenda and can make mistakes we are human after all.
I didn’t really say anything about the Democratic party in my comment. Not sure why you brought them up. No whataboutism needed here.
Conservatives are continually voting against their interests when they vote R. Period. End statement.
Hmm, i think that the Democrat voters are as well. I knew exactly what i would get with Biden, hated him the most during the primaries, and yet, voted for him knowing he didn’t have my best interests at heart.
And this election i am expected to do that twice? Against that same convict? who tried and will try again to seize power forever?
I’ve held my nose long enough. I can’t breathe.
Yeah, constantly having to fight off fascism is fucking exhausting.
It’s by design. Once the people become apathetic enough, or get “outrage fatigue”, that’s when fascism can slink in and wrap its filthy little tendrils around our political discourse.
It fucking sucks. I’m with you. I’m tired.
Despite the fact that it’s a statistical likelihood that voting R is voting against your class, T is still far and away the most popular pick for R leadership.
Cut the middleman, just vote CPUSA already
While I tend to agree with your sentiment, I would really prefer people followed Washington’s advice. No parties. He believed that partisan politics would be the downfall of the US, and given the last 239 years of evidence, I would have to agree.
I didn’t know that. What would the US political landscape look like without parties ?
No freaking clue. We promptly ignored him and became a two party system almost immediately after he left office.
I was always going to vote for Biden, or at least against Trump, but I have to say between the NLRB CEMEX decision and finding out that the train workers did get some paid time off with the Biden admins help, I’m more enthusiastic than I was 6 months ago.
Ultimately, despite constant obstructionism they (Biden admin) are making more progress than they get credit for.
Republicans lie about the things they do and get attention for it because of how they get the message out.
Democrats need to do a better job of promoting the things they do accomplish. Don’t need to lie, just do a better job of getting the press to write stories about the positive things they do. They need to call Republicans who have racist policies racist instead of dancing around it. A few are doing it, but are ignored because they aren’t party leadership.
Biden needs to call Trump a racist and a fascist on national TV. Get the public motivated! Taking the higher ground doesn’t get people motivated, it just means more of the status quo.
I’m really sick of thhe fact that avoiding Americas descent into full blown 4th Reich fascism is dependent on idiots in the voting booth.
