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Heaven forbid we try running charismatic candidates like Obama and Bill...
Like, it's insane to me that everyone seems to be aware of what wins elections, but the people running the Dem party just keep insisting we need to shut up and vote for someone very few people actually want.
Like, we can't do this without the voters, they're the irreplaceable part.
We can get different people to run the party, or just coalesce around another.
Democrats need to fall in love. Republicans just need to fall in line.
It's like you read the meme and went yep, totally their fault. I'm ok with my life gets shittier until I fall in love with a politician. It's not my fault. I am owed this.
Is there a term for the political version of an incel?
Yes. It's called a political agitator.
This user canvases lemmy threads with anti Biden and anti Dem strawman arguments completely out of context of the thread. Every thread calling out Republicans for bullshit, this user is there never acknowledging how terrible the GOP is, and going straight into anti dem whataboutism.
Just look at the sheer number of comments this user posts daily. And search the mod logs for deleted comments on this user.
If they're not being paid to disenfranchise progressive voters into abstaining from this election, they should look for a sponsor because they're working for free.
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Your car has a blown head gasket. It still turns over, but the check engine light is always an on the oil looks like peanut-butter.
You need to drive 100 miles to get to the airport tomorrow. All the indications you have suggest your car isn't going to make it. Every piece of reliable data you have says its not going to work. Historically, people have tried to use cars like this to get to the air port, it doesn't work. You have friends and family members with cars would happily drive you to the airport. You could even just borrow their car. Technically you haven't decided what car to drive to the airport yet; this actually doesn't happen till you and your family have a group call tonight. You have alternatives.
Biden is the car. Literally any generic Democrat is the car of your friends or family. The group call is the convention.
You are insisting on a strategy that is going to hand Trump the election. When it does, we'll be pointing to these posts of yours.
Insisting we run Biden when we haven't had a convention and literally every Democratic governor polls higher is you insisting we lose this one.
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You are the one not taking it seriously. I watched Kerry fail to Bush. I watched Clinton fail to Trump.
Biden won in 2020 in spite of being Biden. It's 4 years later and he's become a worse candidate. This candidate can't win.
You need to take this shit seriously instead of insisting on a strategy that guarantees us Trump.
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Don't block these guys, it's what they want.
And I don't mean that in a "don't give them the satisfaction" way. I mean that's what they're paid to do. When people like us block people like them, it's easier for them to spread their propaganda. Because we don't call it out, because we don't see it.
Blocking someone is not silencing them, it's just plugging your ears.
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🫵 🤡
You are completely detached from reality. Go look up the Gallup polling data and check my methods. I've explained them clearly enough to be reproduced.
You aren't interested in a conversation grounded in reality, and you just can't comprehend something that doesn't agree with your assumptions.
Bidens not winning this election. He hasn't been the whole time. In 450 days he hasn't been leading in polling. He's a fucking disaster, and you and others who insist this guy who is visibly incapable of winning are the ones responsible for Trump.
I'm just gonna stick to pointing out one particular lie. Not the most obvious or egregious one, but definitely the funniest one.
I watched Kerry fail to Bush.
HAHAHAHAHA THE FUCK YOU DID
Weird analogy.
Bernie Sanders 2024!
This is a fantastic metaphor but I’m afraid it’ll be lost on Blue MAGA.
It really has become a cult of failure.
"Everyone I disagree with is an agitator, now shut the fuck up about candidates earning their votes and do as you're told because ONLY WE can save the country from fascist policies (even though Biden is doing half of it himself!)
No theres nothing fascist about that attitude or our incessant need to spread misinformation about anyone who thinks Biden sucks, SHUT UP AND FALL IN LINE OR ELSE!"
Yeah ok. Plenty of people were saying the same thing while letting Hitler rise to power too. But what could we possibly learn from history?
You do, of course, realize Hitler was put into power by the conservatives, right? Like, von Pappen was Centre Party, von Hindenburg was a nationalist. They turned to Hitler to avoid losing power to the left.
And come November, what are you suggesting? Biden or Trump, because those are your only viable choices.
And they're our only viable choices, why?
Because people refuse to vote for anybody else, even though the duopoly parties are effectively the same picture. People obsess over the "World ending" scenario but people are always saying the world is going to end - It's just a boogeyman to keep people voting duopoly, Democrat's ONLY platform for decades has been "We aren't Republican, and Republicans will end the world as you know it."
Of course, it's not just pres. People need to run and vote for non-duopoly candidates all the way down, and once establishment candidates start losing votes they'll either shift their positions or double down strengthening the non-duopoly candidates. Ain't nobody moving left so long as you keep rewarding them for sprinting further and further right.
People have made American politics like training a dog not to bark but you're giving them a treat everytime they bark and punishing them when they don't bark then wondering why they bark all the time.
They’re our only viable choices now because the primaries are over, and as much as people here want a super leftist candidate, the reality is that when it’s time to vote, those candidates don’t get enough votes either because these same people don’t actually vote, or this stance isn’t nearly as popular as some may think. I say this all as a Bernie supporter, but vocally against the disinformation agents who push agendas like “both sides” or the previous “Bernie or Bust” mantra.
Like it or not, the reality is, come the general election it’s either Biden or Trump. Unfortunately, anything other than a Biden vote helps Trump.
Gnash teeth and complain all you want, but that’s reality. Anyone pushing another agenda is lying or naive.
The way y'all treat our political system is proof that America is already and has always been fascist. Election after election, decade after decade, the entire Democratic platform is saying "We aren't them" then doing half of what they wanted to do anyway. People CAN make change if they stop rewarding democrats for sprinting right, and if they can't - Well, that's just proof that we AREN'T free, innit?
"ONLY WE CAN SAVE THE COUNTRY AND IF YOU DON'T SUPPORT US YOU'RE THE ENEMY" It's the only argument Democrats have, and like it or not - that's fascist messaging. Blue fascism is still fascism.
Like. lets talk about what happened.
it's reasonable to claim that Gore actually won in 2000. There were sixty one thousand votes that had not been machine-counted because of rampant, clearly partisan, bullshit reasons (among them "hanging chad",). the Florida Supreme Court ordered a manual count of those ballots with SCOTUS, lead by Scalia, decided to stay because the recount would give Bush a veneer of "illegitimacy". (gee. wonder why, ya fucking partisan hack.) To be perfectly clear, Gore lost Florida (and the electoral college) by 570 votes. The decision in Bush V. Gore to stay the manual recount basically handed Bush the win. (and, I might add, cast doubt on the legitimacy of bush's win. it was handed by a court that had no business ordering that stay. But did anyway, because they're partisan hacks. I'm not angry, honest.)
Kerry flip-flopped more than a fish out of water, making it hard for independents and centrists to know what his positions actually were. 2 years prior to the election he was, for example, staunchly against gay marriage (and lets be honest, the US was very hostile to gay marriage then. There's been a massive sea change in that, but it hadn't happened yet.), but in 2004 signed a letter urging Massachusetts to not outlaw gay marriage. Further, he had the personality of a cold fish. and his running mate was an empty suit with nothing to back it up- who couldn't even deliver his home State of North Carolina.... In short, you had a couple warm bodies running. At the time, Bush was still riding high off 9/11 and the Iraq war and americans were still angry at that; the war wasn't unpopular yet. Katrina hadn't happened yet, and Bush was still reasonably popular. So, of fucking course Kerry lost.
Hillary. Where do we begin? her emails? lets start there.
Sure, "HeR EmAiLs" and "LoCk HeR uP" is an idiotic rallying cry of MAGA morons everywhere. But, even so, she conducted official Sec of State business on a personal email routinely. It's such a great rallying cry because it actually has some teeth. it should be scandalous. Even if she was perfectly not-at-all-corrupt, it looks that way. I- and most everyone else- would be legitimately fired for conducting that level of business off a personal email. it should be 100% unacceptable. Not saying she should have been locked up or grilled the way she was. But seriously. It looked bad. and it played in the news.
Then we got Benghazi. an American ambassador died in a terrorist attack. There's some things that hindsight says they could have done differently. Republicans latched onto it for political theater, with 10 different investigations and multiple sessions of grilling Clinton, who even then was the presumptive nominee to replace Obama. there was some funding that her office denied, she might not even have been aware that "she" denied it. Hindsight's a bitch. Anyhow... the republican shenanigans played well in the media.
Oh. "Super Criminals". Hillary was very unpopular with minority voters- particularly Black and Latinos. sound clips calling for law-and-order tough-on-crime calling black people "super criminals" didn't help. there was a lot there, especially with her attitude, but in the end they simply didn't show up for her. Even if you look at women voters, she under-performed compared to Obamma. (i mean, he looks mighty fine in a tan suit... sorry, sorry. couldn't resist.) Like, how unpopular do you have to be as a woman, to lose women voters from Obama's election, when you're running against Donald- "grab them by the pussy", "When you're that rich they let you do it", "Octopus-Arms" -Trump.
Lets also talk about how she boosted trump specifically because he was "a clown" or whatever. She gave us trump and then proceededly arrogantly not campaign in key states.
oh, and there's more that I just don't have time to get into... but we got Whitewater, Travelgate, filegate; and shit rolls down hill so lets toss in Paula Jones and Monika Lewinsky scandals. Like there's a lot of smoke there, and there might be a couple fires, or maybe they're just really not that corrupt as people and it's all a big missunderstanding. but again, that plays in the media, and it looks bad. Hilary was the definition of The Establishment™️ running against an anti-establismhent candidate. Of fucking course she's gonna lose, and she really didn't help matters by fucking around with not campaigning in key swing states because, "naw, it's fucking trump".
Yup. so aside from Gore, there's really rather good reasons to have not liked them, and the DNC idiots thought they new better and ran them anyhow... and we got fucked because of it. blaming voters for your own stupid blunders seems to be a DNC favorite. And they're doing it again.
You missed basket of deplorables which is likely the exact moment she really lost.
Pokemon Go to the polls. That campaign had a death by 1000 paper cuts. Yet she still won the popular vote.
Hell, she's STILL out here working to tank democrats in the name of status quo corporatism,
"What do you say to voters who are upset that those are the two choices? Get over yourself."
Democrats need the boogeyman of Trump but they will 1000% take Trump before they give an inch to the left, but they'll be happy to blame leftists for their loss after 4 years of telling em to eat a dick.
You’re right.
There’s not nearly as much as Trump but it’s still a lot, grrr
I'm no Hillary fan, but I thought the consensus was she lost because of Comey's bullshit October surprise.
Her Basket of Deplorables remark is actually the moment she MOST energized her base and grassroots coalition. That was a blip of authenticity I and many others appreciated.
You know, the people who actually go out and do the door-knocking, phone-banking, fundraising, and pushing back against Uncle Bob and their parents while dragging their friend to the poll out of voter-enthusiasm.
And she was fucking right, like she was about everything, and I suspect that deep down you people know it, and are ashamed, and that's why you lash out at her.
It's not just the president, you need to vote for house of reps and Senate. Obama only had control for 2/8 years. In that time he got the ACA. The remaining 6 years of Obama the GOP were more than happy to block everything. They even shut down the government. If you need charisma to feed your emotions every 4 years, yeesh.
*Oh I caught on, it's the thiny veiled Biden bad, hinting he has no charisma and nobody wants to vote for him. "They just have to run someone else nudge nudge. Someone else to run the party wink wink." Nuts to that, Biden is doing great.
I get people want to fall in line at this point and I have and will vote for Biden, but your head is deep in the sand if you believe Biden's senility and lack of charisma isn't hurting him here. The only thing we're lucky on is that Donald is running again who is for all intents just as senile and far more deranged and far less compassionate.
But Biden doesn't hold a candle to Obama.
There it is again "senility". Everyone working with him says he's sharp, but you just gotta get it in. Would I prefer younger? Sure. But he's not senile JFC. Lack of charisma? The guy presents absolutely fine and does great work. How much does one need to appeal to emotions.
How much does one need to appeal to emotions.
you haven't been paying attention, have you? the entire republican platform is an appeal to their emotions. It's why it's successful. appeals to emotion are vastly more successful than appeals to logic or reason, even if they're wrong. Our brains are literally hardwired to consider emotion before reason, to react on emotion before logic; and triggering the emotional response to manipulate people is an entire field of science in neuropsychology. (and probably one of the best funded areas of research...)
This "we need someone charismatic and then we'll vote" is the emotion for the supposed logical, informed, left wing voter, who votes based on policy (or lack of policy when they protest no vote).
So you just like to scream at people while ignoring human nature,
Okay, good to know. I’m sure it’ll work out fine if you just continue screaming at people…
Funny because I think it's the other way around, people screaming "but but but charisma! But but but old!"
I thought maybe it was someone else I just told but no it's you. These are the supposed logical people waiting for the supposed logical platform. But no, they want emotions. Notice that doesn't add up?
And you're still trying to sneak it in. Biden is just fine charismatically.
Not the guy you're discussing with, but on this rare occasion I'll toot my own horn for once: If only the average American were as intelligent — or at least informed — as me. Unfortunately one must get on their level, sometimes. Besides, having a logical platform and having the charismatic youthful platform are not mutually-exclusive things.
Welcome to America, where everything from high school to your career prospects is basically a popularity contest as opposed to a formal job interview based on legitimate experience and qualifications.
They who can thread the needle between populism and substantive policy win.
I'm just happy Donald is the nominee again because I don't think Biden could've beat anyone else.
Well you're just the original guy that tried the senile bit.
What I see throughout this site is these supposed leftists who say they are so well informed, and so well thought, who know all about policies, and what to do, and who think and think and think, and determine that the best course of action is to protest vote. And then they turn around and say "but i want charisma for ma emotions". Yeah it doesn't add up.
That's who I'm talking to on this site.
Oh yeah let me repeat myself to be very clear: I think not voting or a protest vote or a third-party or independent vote is downright stupid. I think anyone suggesting this is either a right-wing operative as it only benefits them, or they're very naive and likely a newcomer to politics. who also lacks an understanding of risk/reward analytics.
Absolutely, at this point we should all vote for Joe Biden.
All I'm saying is that unfortunately you and I are far-and-above average in terms of political knowledge and civic engagement. Most people lack the depth of understanding to look at things logically and so must go off intuition and emotion as shortcuts. So to some extent, I think a party would be crazy not to put a heavy emphasis on this. Unfortunately it benefits the GOP more because of the nature of their deeply-ignorant and gullible and griftable base.
I never once criticized Biden for being old. So no, that was not me.
And I’m trying to side step charisma; you can be uncharismaric and win- but you can’t just appeal to logic and reason- even to logical and reasonable people- and expect to win against a campaign that’s all about emotion.
You have to get people excited. That’s how you win. Not by browbeating your voters, not by ignoring them, and sitting around expecting people to vote because you’re a democrat and that other guy is awful.
You have to get people excited and motivated. You have to persuade them to vote, and no, Biden is not entitled to anyone’s vote.
There are a fair amount of things Biden has done, that are good. You want to get votes for Biden, talk about that, talk about things he’s trying to do right now.
Attacking and antagonizing doesn’t motivate people to vote- at best it does the opposite, at worst it motivates them to vote for Trump.
TL/DR? Even if it’s not your intention, you’re making it worse.
P.S. telling people how to vote is kind of… a thing fascists do…
Well said. Both Hillary and Biden had very lower voter-enthusiasm when people were surveyed... Even for dyed-in-the-wool Democrats. People like Obama or Bernie had high voter enthusiasm. If only institutions followed suit...
I didn't say you, I said "people screaming" about old. But you are screaming about charisma.
The people that I see all over this site and who I'm referring to are the supposed logical people, who want the logical platform, and the logical (presumably left) policies, and then they will logically vote accordingly, and until then they will logically not vote because logic. They present themselves as the end all of logic.
But then they turn around and say "but I want charisma for my emotions". That is what I'm saying. Do you see how that doesn't add up?
For someone that seemed so offended that I said "people scream old" seeming to think that was aimed at you, you sure throw an absolute ton of stuff in my direction that I didn't say (including your TLDR prod and PS attack). Like wow. I'm not going to throw them all back because honestly you seem intent on twisting and turning, because:
I said it pretty clear at the start "This “we need someone charismatic and then we’ll vote” is the emotion for the supposed logical, informed, left wing voter, who votes based on policy (or lack of policy when they protest no vote)." but you went off on all directions. Ciao.
I didn’t say you, I said “people screaming” about old. But you are screaming about charisma.
-you.
Funny because I think it’s the other way around, people screaming “but but but charisma! But but but old!”
I thought maybe it was someone else I just told but no it’s you. These are the supposed logical people waiting for the supposed logical platform. But no, they want emotions. Notice that doesn’t add up?
And you’re still trying to sneak it in. Biden is just fine charismatically.
-Also you. (emphasis is mine, though.)
Also, that's not at all what I'm trying to do and if you've been reading my comment you would know that. What the "he's not charismatic" complaint really boils down to is "I'm not motivated to vote for him." him actually being charismatic or not is not the issue. the issue is, he's not engaging voters and motivating them to vote for him; and neither is his campaign.
as for emotions... what I'm trying to tell you is, that people make emotional decisions. You have to engage on an emotional level., specifically:
However, emotions have value. It appears that without emotions to motivate and push us, we would be passive and do nothing. Decisions are very much informed by our emotional state since this is what emotions are designed to do. Emotions quickly condense an experience, and evaluate it to inform our decision, so we can rapidly respond to the situation.
While emotions serve to direct us, they are driven by our automatic survival nature. As such, most of the time emotions communicate their messages below our level of awareness. It is important to note that because of their speed and survival purpose, emotions are not particularly accurate. Their speed and effectiveness compensate for what they lack in being specific and detailed. This is why the emotional system provides many false alarms, which requires us to reevaluate our response and check if it is appropriate to the particular situation.
(Emphasis mine,)
It's quite literally hardwired into our brain to be emotional. It's a matter of survival; your stress responses are keyed to force quick decisions- and frequently unconscious ones. "Fight, Flight, Freeze or Fawn". When you come in hot, demanding we vote a certain way, you're triggering an emotional reaction- and it's not a happy one.Even the most rationally-minded people in the world are still fighting an uphill battle against emotions. As a person whose entire career is researching this, and how to manipulate us into making a bad decision says: "The human brain has essentially evolved to feel first and think next,"and in that article, Carolyn also says:
The ability to think can override the emotional state. The more you spend time thinking and bring your cognitive processes to bear ... you have a shot at basically saying, 'No, I think I'm going to pass,' even though that wasn't your first inclination.
Sure, that articles is about not getting suckered on a black friday sale, but persuading people to a vote a certain way is the same science.
Abortion is an easy point for Democrats because it's inherently emotional, right? When we talk about women having ectopic pregnancies, people aren't talking about it with clinical sterility. they're talking about pain, and fear, and hurt. And when you're talking about women dying, the people you're talking to aren't seeing statistics, they're hearing the pain and the fear; and they're seeing their wives, their mothers, sisters, or themselves; and that hits all sorts of emotions.
It's evocative. It's poignant. you can unprime prior emotions about it; by asking open questions. The goal isn't to immediately get an agreement, it might take days, or months. It took my parents years to break the religious brainwashing about it... but by using open questions to get them thinking about it, rather than feeling about it, eventually they came around. More to it, questions can provide emotional priming to encourage a desired decision while you provide the relevant evidence to support that decision. That, is how you influence people.
The Bernie and Obama campaigns understood this. Take a look at the style differences.
Obama was all about Hope and Change, and fighting for it. He gave people hope, and promised to work to a brighter future. Hope is probably one of the most potent emotions out there. Just a little can topple empires. Bernie's campaign was downright authentic. He cared, he gave people a sense of... something I've only seen from 2 other Boomers in my life. (okay, so Bernie is not a boomer, he's silent generation.) He made us feel powerful and heard. And he promised- and not just a bullshit promise- to help, and empowered us to seek change.
The vast majority of my interactions with boomers... is condescension, authoritarianism and straight up bullshit. Most everyone who is in that generation fights an uphill battle with me. Because of that. It triggers an emotional response. that emotional response gets stronger when they fail to respect that I'm a fucking adult and can make rational choices. It then gets even stronger when they get angry and start shouting. basically, by the time we get to that point, I'm no where near a place where I can even hear what they're saying.
Now, compare the Hillary campaign. Entitlement. Arrogance. Bullshit. Condescension. I remember a conversation with one of her organizers here.... the gist of the conversation was basically that I was sexist because I liked Bernie better. yup. very persuasive.
Motivating people to vote for biden isn't about fear mongering, we know trump is bad. we know he's awful, corrupt, stupid, and a raging fucking fascist. We don't need to be told that. we don't need to be told that he's going to kill everyone who doesn't agree with him- Trump tells us that enough on his own.
It's about getting them excited to vote for Biden. Biden himself could be a limp noodle. but somebody coming in, saying 'hey I know it's rough, but here's what I'm doing to help, and can you maybe help?" would be powerful. "Hey, I'm trying to get [something useful] done in congress... can you call your representatives? your senators? can you help me get [something useful] done?" or even "HEY! so I'm trying to do [something useful], do you have any ideas how we can get [people on board]" Or... I know it's daring, actually listening to what we have to say about things.
"Why do you think we shouldn't support Israel?" and then actually listen to the answers. (I mean, it's pretty fucking obvious, but apparently that one's gone over his head.)
Okay, dude — Just humor me for a second:
- A whopping 66-77% of Americans polled again and again view Biden as too old to be President. So in this respect, I'm just reflecting a widespread concern of what millions upon millions of people see and feel.
- His staff, who must literally kiss ass to maintain the privilege of working a job in the White House and like warfare will give no quarter to any argument the GOP makes no matter how true it is - is NOT a good counter-argument to make. It's as outlandish as the Republican senators coming out of the meeting yesterday saying Trump is sharp as ever.
- Even the likes of The Daily Show to SNL mocks this aspect of Biden for good reason.
- Blaming for the stutter works only insofar as you're old enough to remember Biden as VP under Obama in 2008.
NOW, here's the thing: less time needs to be spent trying to shore up the bullshit argument that Biden is "sharp as ever," and more about pivoting to Trump's incoherent rambles and his own age. Acknowledging Biden's age is actually a great one-two punch to use for anyone on the fence because it gives you a point where both can agree: "Yeah, I agree Biden is showing his age clearly. No differently than McConnell... No differently than Donald (give examples), but I think Biden is at least a more compassionate person... And say, while we're at it, can we agree we should have an age limit if we already have an age-minimum on the Presidency?" <clinks-beers and everybody laughs.>
This wasn't about him being old, this was about you saying "senility" and whoever didn't believe that had was "head is deep in the sand". But when I call that out, you have to pivot that to old.
Ok I should have said people that meet him say he's sharp. They are not beholden to him. One guy met him said he remember meeting his mom like a decade prior and remembered her and all the details. Fuck that's better than I do. Now in case you say "but that's not work", but yes also the people that work with him say he's sharp too. Seems to me you just want to get the 'senile' bit out any way you can.
Wow and now you're trying to ignore that he does in fact have a stutter? Ok that's about it, you've shown you're dead set on vilification no matter what. Stutters come and go, how prepared you are for a speech, etc. It's not consistent that never changes one bit.
Thanks for showing the world that your mission is to bad mouth Biden. You sneak in "senile" then pivot when called out. You say everything good must be bootlickers. And you preemptively try to ignore that he has a stutter. I'm probably not going to reply anymore.
Geriatric, old, senile — same thing for all intents of this discussion. Yes, they are head-deep in the sand.
Hell just watch the clips from this Daily Show skit of Biden.. I can tell you three things: (1) Obama never did this, (2) Biden never did this during Obama's first term in office, and (3) this is clearly a sign of senility no different than McConnell just freezing during a press conference.
Wow and now you’re trying to ignore that he does in fact have a stutter?
Not what I said. Work on reading-comprehension, please. Try again and stop putting words in my mouth.
Also I didn't "sneak" senile in anywhere — I said it quite in the open, really.
senile /sē′nīl″, sĕn′īl″/ adjective
Relating to or having diminished cognitive function, as when memory is impaired, because of old age.
Being a disease or condition whose cause is primarily advanced age. "senile cataracts."
No not the same thing.
And attacks. Ciao.
Yes, that's the correct use here.
I'll repeat the deflected:
Hell just watch the clips from this Daily Show skit of Biden.. I can tell you three things: (1) Obama never did this, (2) Biden never did this during Obama's first term in office, and (3) this is clearly a sign of senility no different than McConnell just freezing during a press conference.
You already attacked, hypocrite. Auf wiedersehen.
Right!?
Young and charismatic. That's all that is necessary for Dems to sweep elections. Proven time and time again. With a hearty message of progress and love.
It's that fucking simple.
(signed someone who ultimately voted for Hillary and Biden but they were far from my 1st preference in the primaries).
Edit: Typo.
Young and charismatic might mean higher taxes for the rich and more progressive policies.
The Democratic leadership doesn’t want that. They really like the neoliberal consensus, they like having funding parity with the Republicans. They like being seen as “very serious people “ and they’re deathly afraid of being called socialists.
The problem is that their apparatchiks all came of age, politically, in the 1990s under that same neoliberal golden age. That’s not the world they’re in anymore. They aren’t running against Bush the Elder, and cutting taxes while playing jazz isn’t going to cut it when they’re losing working class votes to fascists.
We saw this play out horribly in the UK: where Labour’s party leaders would rather sabotage their own leader because he was too progressive then risk him winning and give socialism credibility.
The political left really liked the 1990s, but it’s a bygo era and it isn’t coming back.
I agree that the third-way shtick of the Clinton era must go. Watering down reality to appeal to ignorance just doesn't work.
How long til they all die of old age?
Do we have that long?
Not if Drumpf gets the electoral college majority.
I mean, big nuts that'll ever happen. There's no glut of idiots no matter what generation you look at, I'm sure they can just keep appointing cynical self-interested assholes to succeed them whenever they drop.
The last time the Democrats ran a progressive candidate allowed Nixon to sweep every state except a few in that election. I mean, just look at this shit!
So yeah, if anyone is wondering why the Democrats don't run progressive candidates, this is why! They've only moved further to the right since then. Expecting Democrats to run a progressive would likely sweep the whole nation blue, but if you thought tRump was bad, a progressive would be just as bad for monied interests, which have only grown more emboldened and enriched the last 40-45 years.
It will take a lot of time, I'm afraid, to undo the damage Republicans have have done with their shitty ideals and politics, starting largely with Reagan's racist, homophobic, anti-union, and regulation gutting bullshit!
In fairness I emphasized young and charismatic — was McGovern charismatic? I don't know about that.
Still, I think this is the exception as opposed to the norm, considering we can point to FDR, JFK, Carter, Clinton, and Obama. RFK was setting up to be another obvious front-runner.
It's a race to the bottom to put forward someone who will water their rhetoric down and cater to ignorance; but of course, some of the country isn't educated enough to understand why progressive policies must be better — hence why you run someone young and charismatic — hence why Obama swept traditionally red counties that neither Hillary nor Biden picked up.
No!…it’s the voters who are wrong. Better blame theme some more, as that will surely boost our historically abysmal national voter turnout come November.
/s
I’m starting to think that the corporations (who own both parties, but prefer republicans) are sabotaging the democrats. That’s why they ran Hillary. And now we have an absolute joke of a Supreme Court that will suck every single nanoliter of jizz from the corporate dick any time day or night.
Blackstone wants democrats to win while Blackrock wants republicans to win. To corporations, the choice between biden and trump is like Coke vs Pepsi because they largely win either way even if they’re a bit disappointed they have to drink Pepsi when they wanted Coke.
I’m starting to think that the corporations (who own both parties, but prefer republicans) are sabotaging the democrats. That’s why they ran Hillary.
Oh my god you're so frustratingly close to realizing the truth that we've been telling you all along.
The corporations (and Putin) did sabotage the Democrats. But not by some bizarre overcomplicated plan of infiltrating of the DNC to send up moderate candidates who consistently win the popular vote yet are just unlikeable enough to not win swing states. They just used propaganda to get people like you to hate perfectly good candidates.
You can see controlled opposition in the Green party and RFK Jr. They put up shit candidates and then try to pull some people away from Democrats. If the corporations and Putin could infiltrate the Democratic party, they would just have the DNC close up shop and we would have Republicans forever. Why the fuck would corporations try to put up a candidate who wants to raise their taxes?
You're coming up with these insane scenarios because it's embarrassing to admit that you are one of the ones who fell for the propaganda, but think about it. Occams Razor. That's the simplest explanation.
Ok
You're totally right they should just put their hand inside the magical candidate bag where all the charismatic candidates are stored, say the magic formula, and pull one out. How stupid can they be!
We could try running a fair and open primary...
If we really want to focus on getting the most popular candidate with voters rather than the corporate favorite moderate...
Dems have complete control of their primary, they can get corporate money out of it at literally any second.
But they dont.
Because the people running the party don't want the candidate that voters are most likely to vote for. They want the candidate that will get the most donations from corporations and billionaires.
Lots of people keep trying to explain why if beating Republicans is the only thing that matters, everyone involved in the process should make choices that maximize the amount of votes that the Dem candidate gets.
However "moderates" keep insisting the wealthy and corporations gets what they want and everyone else need to support them unquestionably....
Which is already what the Republicans do.
So if both parties are catering to the rich and powerful...
Why not try giving the millions and millions of voters what they want and making the rich and powerful compromise?
Why do they always win no matter what?
Historically giving Dem voters a candidate they want translates to a Dem president.
Biden won by less than 100k.votes spread out between 3-5 battleground states. And has nowhere near his 2020 support. Probably because in 2020 he was pretending to be more left leaning.
And 2024 he's just ignoring anyone that's saying anything besides unadulterated praise.
When the other side are fascists openly running on a platform of doing fascists, needing to feel excited to fall in line and vote against them just makes you a fascist who thinks they can get bribes out of it.
"It's not our job to campaign or do politics, the Democrats cannot fail, only be failed" - Democrats, totally caring about fascism.
If you need more than "the fascists will win if we lose", you're a fucking fascist.
Quit trying to make your wanting to be bribed to not let concentration camps happen some kind of moral cause or "well they should have made me want it more!" realist cynic take.
If you need more than "the fascists will win if we lose", you are a fucking fascist, and will be treated accordingly when the people who you're actually hurting have their chance to reap justice for what you let be done to them.
I'd take it more seriously if the Democrats did or treated this as a serious issue. Instead they use it as an excuse to be 99% fascist and use it as an excuse to not campaign or take up popular issues because if they lose, it is because the voters didn't fight to have 99% fascism instead of 100% fascism.
Who cares?
What works is running charismatic candidates.
So why not run charismatic candidates and beat the fascists?
Why not shut the fuck up and vote against the fascists because you're not a fascist?
You aren't owed exciting candidates, you owe keeping fascists out of power to not be considered a collaborator by the people who'll actually suffer because you felt like you were owed feeling excited about your duty as a person who is not completely without moral fiber to shut the fuck up and vote against the fascists.
It isn't patronization when it is the genuine state of affairs. If you want to claim you aren't a fascist, you owe that fucking vote as the price of admission. You are just a horrible fucking person if you need more than "they're fascists, vote against them." You do deserve to be looked down at and condescended to for needing more motivation than "this is a vibe test and some the fuck how you are managing to drift dangerously close to failing what should be the easiest shit on the planet by even needing it explained to you that you do indeed just owe voting against fascists to not be regarded as a collaborator."
If you need more than "they're fascists", you're a fucking fascist and if the acceleration you're betting on happens you'll be lined up with all the rest of the collaborators by the people who are actually going to suffer the consequences of your brilliant plan of "I just need to vote for someone!"
Grow the fuck up and look at the lay of the actual land you whining, entitled, naïve as a cherub child. They are fascists, you have to vote against them, you have to, the time for demands and negotiations and "excitement" came and went a long time probably even before your parents were born, now we are at war, we have a duty to the people of this nation who are unable to speak for themselves, and if your response to being presented that duty is to ask what you get out of it, you have no business counting yourself as any sort of ally or help to the cause.
I can’t control how other people vote, but the party’s can. That’s their job.
I knew the DNC fucked up when they tanked Bernie’s run.
And look what we got.
It's insane that in my lifetime I've seen the Dem party at the point where they've completely given up on courting and just yell at people that they have to vote for them.
Like, who the fuck is coming up with this strategy, and why is anyone listening to them?
It just makes zero sense.
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YOU DO HAVE TO VOTE FOR THEM
THE OTHER OPTION IS LETTING FASCISM HAPPEN
WE HAVE FOR OVER TWENTY YEARS NOW ACTUALLY BEEN IN A SITUATION WHERE, YES, GENUINELY, YOU DO ACTUALLY JUST HAVE TO VOTE FOR THEM
GOOD PEOPLE DO NOT TO BE MADE TO BE EXCITED BY DOING THEIR DUTY TO PROTECT THE MOST VULNERABLE WHO CANNOT SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES
YOU DO ACTUALLY JUST HAVE TO VOTE FOR THEM TO NOT BE AN AWFUL FUCKING HUMAN BEING WHO DESERVES SCORN FOR BEING FUCKING AWFUL
When you only have one choice, you don’t have a choice.
Yea obviously we’re at the point where the only non fascist choice is to vote for an unpopular incumbent, but it seems like the choice has been completely removed from the democratic process in the US and you have to wonder how much of it is exactly by design, and whose.
to be honest, I'm not convicd Biden is not also fascist. look at his Immigration policies. How he supports Israel's genocide. Sure, Trump is vastly more fascistic than Biden, no question there... but "lesser of two evils" bullshit is exactly how we got in this mess.
It's by the design of the Democrats, though I think our current situation is an unintentional cascade effect.
It's the result of one of the oldest election strategies in the world that remains incredibly popular for one simple reason: it's easy and it works. "Vote for me because I'm not the other guy" is a much easier policy to convince people on than actually having any policies of your own.
For many years now Democrats all over the country have been funding the campaigns of the most unhinged and extremist of their opponents to set themselves up for an easy win - there was even a lady who wrote a book about her doing it, only to lose to that same extremist in the very next election.
And that's why we find ourselves in the situation that we're in. Because the Dems keep thinking that they can court some mythical moderate Republican voting block by propping extremists up as the nominees. But that doesn't exist because the Republicans have always been voting against Dems rather than for people they like. Republicans don't care if the nominee is Bush, Biden, Putin, or Stalin himself, risen from the grave to finally put an end to capitalism. So long as they have an R next to their name instead of a D, that's who they're voting for.
When you only have one choice, you don’t have a choice.
damn, never thought about it like that, but that's a pretty succinct way to put it
Your approach isn't working. It never works. Because all it does is makes people more defensive, and it divides the DNC even further. it just makes me roll my eyes and think "okay, boomer, time to change your diapers again." And yes. I know that's totally ageist of me, but frankly, at this point, I'm tired of it.
So what are you suggesting come November? All I read when I see comments like yours is “I just want to complain and wish really hard that the Democrats had a unicorn for a candidate”.
Reality is there are only 2 choices in November, and one of those choices will lead this country directly into facism.
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Big caps with bold! Listen to meeeeee!
Maybe if y'all were capable of saying shit that didn't instantly wanna make me pull my hair out at the sheer, oh I dunno draw a fucking deadly sin out of a hat at this point, I wouldn't feel like y'all need the markdown equivalent of the gunnery sergeant hartman treatment to explain basic morals to you abject failures of human empathy.
But why are the uncharismatic conservative candidates the only other option when we know for a fact they're not what Dem voters want?
Why not run someone voters actually like and who will get the most votes?
Why don't you understand that gets the most votes for the Dem candidate?
Although I would like to thank you for not insulting me this time, we're making progress. Would all caps help you more? I know it's easier for some to read so I can do that if you're doing it so you can read easier.
Depending on what you're using you can make the text appear larger or a better font too.
I notice you're doing your one sentence per paragraph again.
Ok let's go through this chronologically (not that I agree Biden is conservative, he's center).
Bill Clinton: When you run against an incumbent (Bush senior) you run from the center. So that's what he did.
Gore: After the population hopefully warmed up with Bill Clinton, he stuck his head out left with climate change. And bam he lost the election. Thanks 3rd party protest voters!
Obama: So guess what Obama learned? Don't stick your head out. He ran on vague "hope", hoping the ambiguity would be enough considering Bush's disastrous wars. And he won.
Hillary Clinton: After the population hopefully warmed up with Obama, she stuck her head out just a tiny itty little bit with the Map Room to fight climate change. And guess what happened? Bam she lost. Thanks protest non-voters!
On to Biden. Just like Obama learned from Gore, Biden learned from Hillary that you don't stick your head out left. And he was running against an incumbent, so once again when you do that you run center. He's actually been governing more from the left, but he ran center.
And you're amazed that they don't run an extreme left platform? Every time they stick their head out a little itsy bitsy tiny bit left they lose. And the next guy learns to go to the center to win.
So how do you get them to move left? By giving them victories. Consistent and overwhelming victories. Because when they lose, like they've lost 20 years out of the last 24 years, they will go to the centre to find votes.
Tanked his run by counting all the votes not cast for him?
Why am I still surprised that people who need to be dragged kicking and screaming to generals, nevermind primaries think that people who don't need any convincing not voting for their guy for them is cheating?
No, by obstructing his and his supporters efforts in key primaries, because the DNC knew they wanted Hillary for reasons.
This is a rather unique thing you see on Lemmy I've noticed. I mean everyone knows the Democratic Party pulled some bullshit during that primary, but the delusions you see on Lemmy take it so much further. It honestly kind of reminds me of Lost Cause myths. It's very much in the same vein.
I have legit seen people suggest the very normal and totally socialist thing of counting individual donations instead of ballots as the only legitimate way to run the primary.
The socialists. Wanted to create a literal donor class. That is recognized in party procedures. Because they were that mad that working class black voters identified more with the southern lady than a darkhorse from Vermont who's not even a party member 99% of the time. Even after a bunch of white liberal arts majors talked at them about how he's totally down with the culture because he got arrested at a protest one time.
Why not shut the fuck up and vote against the fascists because you’re not a fascist?
Mate...
Do you think you can have this argument with tens of millions of Americans, and it will convince them?
We know what will get enough votes to beat Republicans. But for some reason people just keep repeating that these "moderate" and uncharismatic 70+ year olds have a better shot.
They don't.
We're not even arguing if they should have a better shot because of their views.
Because we have literal decades of history to show they're not what wins elections.
So if all that matter si beating trump, why is this the third election in a row we're not using the best strategy?
What's the point of running more conservative candidates than voters want when it makes it more likely the fascists win?
Do you think you can have this argument with tens of millions of Americans, and it will convince them?
Nah bruh. They think they're arguing against you. That if they abuse you enough that you'll cow: but if there is one thing we have excellent evidence for, its that abusing or guilting voters into doing what you think they should does not work. Not for Democrats or Republicans.
They are taking the criticisms they should be putting at the feet of the DNC and its associated cheerleaders in media, and blaming the voters. But we all know, they're just wrong. Like, they're completely wrong about how voting works, how campaigning works, and how winning elections work.
If they really cared about winning elections, they would bring this criticism to the DNC and demand better candidates; and not budge until they do so. But they actually don't care about winning the election. They know (I believe) they've committed to a losing strategy, and they are setting up the rhetorical case on the back-end so that they have some one to blame for them insisting we do something that isn't going to work.
Mate how about you stop making excuses for fascists and stop giving them the benefit of being presumed to have a reasonable position that deserves anything but getting called out for their collaborationist shit.
"Tickle my funny bone or I'll let your kids get sent to camps!", that's the mentality you're trying to argue is fair and reasonable and worth having a debate with as if it's anything but abject failure of one's own ability to not be one of the worst kinds of people imagineable.
"Make me excited about not letting the morality police happen!"
"I wanna feel good about preventing contraceptive bans!"
"What am I getting out of preventing them putting machine gun nests on the wall with orders to shoot to kill anyone who approaches?"
Yeah I agree Biden's boring, I agree Clinton and Gore and Kerry were boring too, doesn't change that they ran against christofascist candidates, and the supposed not fascists of this country abjectly failed to do their bare minimum duty because "I don't really feel like it."
how about you stop making excuses for fascists
Who's doing that?
I'm saying we need to do what has the best chance to beating the fascists.
Which is run a charismatic candidate who agrees with Dem voters.
You on the other hand, keep insulting people and saying voters need to compromise but politicians don't.
That's not democracy. Especially when the DNC has argued in court they can interfere with a primary as much as they want, because the results are non finding anyways.
Think about that.
It means Dem voters never get any day in who represents them.
When the goal is getting more votes than fascists, that's not a good plan. We need to start out with a popular candidate that most Dem voters already want to vote for. Not pick someone most dont want and then try to breathe literally tens of millions of people into holding their noses.
You just have a bad plan, and I feel like maybe if you just calm down, you could realize that what matters is beating republicans, so we should run candidates Dem voters want.
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^Someone who doesn't actually want to win elections.