No, you can still push for change in the party. But don’t tell people to not vote strategically when it matters. What very literally the last election was people deciding not to vote for Hilary rather than people voting for Trump. And now women can’t get abortions. The Supreme Court will never side for the left for the rest of your entire life. Saudis are getting nukes. Russia and Ukraine are still at war. Plus there is a new Iran war that added thousands of dollars of expenses to bills annually. And the MAGA donors and Trump have all enriched themselves at a scale that means even after he his long gone, the government will still answer to them. The left were led towards defeat by our own people.
You people are so out of touch it’s not funny. You don’t fuck around with the big elections. You need to show small scale success and build up. You get your Mamdanis. You build networks and communities with shit you don’t believe in, not because you want them to win. You need MAGA to lose. The left are made of the worst procrastinating arch types who fail at most tasks in life. Like this needs serious self reflection. You don’t have the backing of billionaires so you need grass roots. Instead the left sit around until it’s the big game and you hope ideals push you to victory. Then when you lose you blame everything but yourselves. The reason Trump won is as much the fault of leftist voters as it is the right
That’s exactly what people are doing in the primaries.
Centrist propaganda messaging:
General election: vote blue no matter who! Don’t like the candidates? Fix it in the primary!
Primary: we must choose the electable candidate. Don’t rock the boat. Work to change the party from the inside in vague ways I can’t get into because reasons.
It’s interesting that no matter what the time is, it’s never the time to push for progressive candidates. It’s always “the wrong time.”
Because progressives do not do the ground work. Not effectively. It’s as if taking people who are social outcasts and asking them to compete in a battle of popularity puts them at a disadvantage.
But now is a good time. The left is yet again winning victories only because the right have fucked up so bad that people now want change.
Because progressives do not do the ground work. Not effectively. It’s as if taking people who are social outcasts and asking them to compete in a battle of popularity puts them at a disadvantage.
What are you smoking? Progressives are all about ground game. How do you think progressives kick centrist ass? It’s all about ground game! The DSA is an actual old-fashioned membership organization.
I really don’t know what you’re smoking. Centrists buy TV ads. Progressives focus on ground game. Centrists give their money to corporate consultants, progressives on knocking on doors.
Look at the recent Michigan Senate primary. Stevens outspent El-Sayed 12 to 1!.
Progressives can’t match the dollars of corporate Democrats; their only hope to win is a massive ground game. It’s the only way to win if you’re being massively outspent.
Like, seriously. I am honestly curious how you reached such an insane conclusion. Like, if progressives are known for anything, it’s rejecting corporate funding in lieu of the ground game. What possibly lead you to such a bone-headed and farcical conclusion?
It’s like trying to argue that Republicans are better at protecting abortion rights than Democrats. It’s just pants-on-head silly.
I’m in my late 40’s. 2 years ago, i had the same knee jerk attitude. Since then I’ve been scanning the current political climate, started watching MSM with a more critical eye, and have tried to consume opinions from independent media across the left wing spectrum (i.e pod save america vs. Hasan Piker). Gaza and Iran have changed things. As far as i can tell, a majority of democrats are on gaza’s side, hate the Iranian conflict and have become disillusioned with Israel. Yet, the party leaders, and their talking heads, appear to be to the right of the constituents on these issues. MSM treats the majority left wing opinions as radical, obviously pushing centrist/corporate/aipac talking points. This has devalued MSM opinion generally. Now, when Jake Tapper implies a brown politician that calls gaza a genocide is antisemitic, more and more people are just devaluing the MSM opinions generally. Look at national media talking points regarding the cureent wave of left flank candidates. Unelectable, unreasonable, unrealistic, antisemitic, etc… a majority of the left ain’t listening anymore.
Stop treating politics like it’s still 2008…it ain’t. Vote for the best policy, not for the one CNN tells you is better.
Stop treating politics like it’s still 2008…it ain’t. Vote for the best policy, not for the one CNN tells you is better.
Centrists are insane. Literally definitionally insane.
A definition for madness is “trying the same thing repeatedly expecting a different result.”
We nominate corporate centrists election after election, and they lose again and again. Yet somehow these losers always get portrayed as reasonable and electable. Biden only squeaked out a win in 2020 because of covid. Even with a million Americans dead and in the ground, in large part due to Trump’s mismanagement, corporate dems were so unpopular that Biden was only able to barely get over the finish line.
Stop treating politics like it’s still 2008…it ain’t. Vote for the best policy, not for the one CNN tells you is better.
This is the core of it. Some people form their opinions on what electability looks like in one era and then blindly carry that assessment forward for the rest of their lives. In the 90s and 2000s, being centrist was electable. Pre-2008, things were going pretty well in America. We were still riding the post-Cold War high and the long-term effects of neoliberal economics hadn’t really come home to roost yet. The social compact was still reasonably intact. Not for all, but for most. If you played along with the system - get an education, work hard, get married, buy a house, avoid drugs and other destructive behaviors - your life was most likely going to be fine. Racism still existed. People still had their lives derailed by medical emergencies. But for enough of the population, things were well enough that “don’t rock the boat” was a viable political platform. Some folks still protested of course. But most folks were comfortable enough to simply focus on their own lives.
We are no longer in that world. “Go along with the system and live a private life” is no longer a reliable path to a life of stability and dignity. It hasn’t been that way since the Millennial generation came out of college. And elder millennials are in their early 40s right now. We’re reaching a point where the majority of the electorate has had to live their entire adult lives in a condition of economic precarity. Neo-liberalism is toxic because more and more of the electorate has had to grow up under its effects.
This has completely transformed what an “electable candidate” even is.
No, you can still push for change in the party. But don’t tell people to not vote strategically when it matters. What very literally the last election was people deciding not to vote for Hilary rather than people voting for Trump. And now women can’t get abortions. The Supreme Court will never side for the left for the rest of your entire life. Saudis are getting nukes. Russia and Ukraine are still at war. Plus there is a new Iran war that added thousands of dollars of expenses to bills annually. And the MAGA donors and Trump have all enriched themselves at a scale that means even after he his long gone, the government will still answer to them. The left were led towards defeat by our own people.
You people are so out of touch it’s not funny. You don’t fuck around with the big elections. You need to show small scale success and build up. You get your Mamdanis. You build networks and communities with shit you don’t believe in, not because you want them to win. You need MAGA to lose. The left are made of the worst procrastinating arch types who fail at most tasks in life. Like this needs serious self reflection. You don’t have the backing of billionaires so you need grass roots. Instead the left sit around until it’s the big game and you hope ideals push you to victory. Then when you lose you blame everything but yourselves. The reason Trump won is as much the fault of leftist voters as it is the right
That’s exactly what people are doing in the primaries.
Centrist propaganda messaging:
General election: vote blue no matter who! Don’t like the candidates? Fix it in the primary!
Primary: we must choose the electable candidate. Don’t rock the boat. Work to change the party from the inside in vague ways I can’t get into because reasons.
It’s interesting that no matter what the time is, it’s never the time to push for progressive candidates. It’s always “the wrong time.”
Because progressives do not do the ground work. Not effectively. It’s as if taking people who are social outcasts and asking them to compete in a battle of popularity puts them at a disadvantage.
But now is a good time. The left is yet again winning victories only because the right have fucked up so bad that people now want change.
What are you smoking? Progressives are all about ground game. How do you think progressives kick centrist ass? It’s all about ground game! The DSA is an actual old-fashioned membership organization.
I really don’t know what you’re smoking. Centrists buy TV ads. Progressives focus on ground game. Centrists give their money to corporate consultants, progressives on knocking on doors.
Look at the recent Michigan Senate primary. Stevens outspent El-Sayed 12 to 1!.
Progressives can’t match the dollars of corporate Democrats; their only hope to win is a massive ground game. It’s the only way to win if you’re being massively outspent.
Like, seriously. I am honestly curious how you reached such an insane conclusion. Like, if progressives are known for anything, it’s rejecting corporate funding in lieu of the ground game. What possibly lead you to such a bone-headed and farcical conclusion?
It’s like trying to argue that Republicans are better at protecting abortion rights than Democrats. It’s just pants-on-head silly.
I’m in my late 40’s. 2 years ago, i had the same knee jerk attitude. Since then I’ve been scanning the current political climate, started watching MSM with a more critical eye, and have tried to consume opinions from independent media across the left wing spectrum (i.e pod save america vs. Hasan Piker). Gaza and Iran have changed things. As far as i can tell, a majority of democrats are on gaza’s side, hate the Iranian conflict and have become disillusioned with Israel. Yet, the party leaders, and their talking heads, appear to be to the right of the constituents on these issues. MSM treats the majority left wing opinions as radical, obviously pushing centrist/corporate/aipac talking points. This has devalued MSM opinion generally. Now, when Jake Tapper implies a brown politician that calls gaza a genocide is antisemitic, more and more people are just devaluing the MSM opinions generally. Look at national media talking points regarding the cureent wave of left flank candidates. Unelectable, unreasonable, unrealistic, antisemitic, etc… a majority of the left ain’t listening anymore.
Stop treating politics like it’s still 2008…it ain’t. Vote for the best policy, not for the one CNN tells you is better.
Centrists are insane. Literally definitionally insane.
A definition for madness is “trying the same thing repeatedly expecting a different result.”
We nominate corporate centrists election after election, and they lose again and again. Yet somehow these losers always get portrayed as reasonable and electable. Biden only squeaked out a win in 2020 because of covid. Even with a million Americans dead and in the ground, in large part due to Trump’s mismanagement, corporate dems were so unpopular that Biden was only able to barely get over the finish line.
This is the core of it. Some people form their opinions on what electability looks like in one era and then blindly carry that assessment forward for the rest of their lives. In the 90s and 2000s, being centrist was electable. Pre-2008, things were going pretty well in America. We were still riding the post-Cold War high and the long-term effects of neoliberal economics hadn’t really come home to roost yet. The social compact was still reasonably intact. Not for all, but for most. If you played along with the system - get an education, work hard, get married, buy a house, avoid drugs and other destructive behaviors - your life was most likely going to be fine. Racism still existed. People still had their lives derailed by medical emergencies. But for enough of the population, things were well enough that “don’t rock the boat” was a viable political platform. Some folks still protested of course. But most folks were comfortable enough to simply focus on their own lives.
We are no longer in that world. “Go along with the system and live a private life” is no longer a reliable path to a life of stability and dignity. It hasn’t been that way since the Millennial generation came out of college. And elder millennials are in their early 40s right now. We’re reaching a point where the majority of the electorate has had to live their entire adult lives in a condition of economic precarity. Neo-liberalism is toxic because more and more of the electorate has had to grow up under its effects.
This has completely transformed what an “electable candidate” even is.