They cannot and they will not. Please do not fall for them yanking the football away from you again. AOC and Bernie exist to give you hope and thereby capture your vote for a party that has no intention of ever fighting for the working class in a meaningful way. We need a real alternative but we've given away so much of our collective power (unions) that it's hard to see a hopeful path forward. Organize with your neighbors and start building trusted communities that will fight together when needed.
this post was submitted on 14 Nov 2024
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So long as the Democratic Party leadership are reliant on corporate funding, obsessed with American power projection, smitten with Israel, pensive about worker rights and in lock-step with security and intelligence establishment, there is no hope. You will have on one hand a conservative party that shows antipathy and disdain for real liberal norms (Democratic establishment) and a rabid, evil party intent on reshaping America and the world to reflect white Christian nationalist fanaticism (Republicans.)
10 years ago I would have told you that the Dems are playing a dangerous game with their interventionism. Today they consigned 1 million children to starve, be blown to smithereens and die in order to enable the revenge of a leader who is as corrupt as Trump and far more bloodthirsty. Kamala calls Trump a "fascist" and gives Netanyahu a UN veto and 2000lb bounds to drop near hospitals. This is indiciative of a party that is morally rotten and cannot be relied upon to safeguard anyone's rights.
Unfortunately our democracy uses a first-past-the-post voting system which trends toward a two-party system. This makes the Republicans and Democrats the only game in town.
Minority Rule: First Past the Post Voting
We need to leverage power to reduce the harm done to the minority groups fascists in the Republican party want to hurt. So rather than attempting to achieve a moral victory over Democrats, people on the left should do the most useful thing they can during elections for minorities and vote for Democrats.
A big issue with this approach: The United States is not a law of nature; it doesn't have to exist. The system may only allow two options, but it does not guarantee that either one of those options will keep the system viable. Reduced harm is still harm, and at some point we needed to stop doing it.
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They have 4 years to tighten up. I'm not optimistic. The only victory they have had since Obama was a fear victory.. nobody wanted Biden they were scared of trump. That is played out.
The right did a good job of parading him around as an anti-establishment, for the common people candidate. I don't think that's true, but a lot of people do.
I hope the D party reorganizes as a populist anti-establishment party and holds a ranked choice primary with some young actually left leaning candidates who can't be bought.
To be honest, if the D party don't reform and earn my vote, I'm not giving it to them out of fear anymore. Before trump I had a "no lesser of two evils" policy for voting. And I'm going back to it. They had 4 years to plan, hold a primary, do some prosecuting of rich criminals, understand why Trump's popular and strategize to beat it, literally fucking anything. Did they?
I'm over it, they can run a fair primary with some progressive candidates and let the people decide, and then I'll vote. Tired of whatever they're doing and it looks like a lot of others are as well. Hope they figure out the obvious issue they have and fix it. Since its a two party system they're hogging the only route that the left has to success and fucking it up remarkably bad. Like I could do a better job and I'm an idiot.
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Kamala raised over $1 billion dollars for her campaign, most of which was from small donors.
If that doesn't tell the Dems they don't need oligarch money, nothing will.
Then they spent it on high per hour political consultants who paid Beyonce to perform
Except Beyonce literally didn't perform for Harris?
They know that. Problem is the WANT billionaires money too ^^
That's a mere pittance compared to what the wealthy actually spend on conservatives and messaging. That's 1 billion dollars every 4 years. Fox news, daily wire, OANN, and all the myriad of other propaganda outlets churn through more than that a year.
Yes, but we're not talking about conservatives.
The Democratic party has a problem, and that problem is what Democratic voters want doesn't align with what Democratic donors want. The voters want progressive policies passed, while the donors want the same neoliberalism that keeps them rich. And trying to appease one of those groups obviously alienates the other.
If any Democratic politician truly wants to help the American population, the fact that Kamala raised so much money in such a short amount of time, and the fact that many states passed progressive policies even though they voted for Trump, should tell them that they don't need to kowtow to the wealthy because the voters will support them. Unfortunately, I don't think they're going to learn that lesson.
Republicans, of course, don't have this problem because their voters and their donors all want the same thing.
The whole point of this was asking why Democrats are catering to wealthy conservative donors instead of progressive or left leaning voters. I just stated the reason why. The 1 billion dollars collected from small donors every four years for a presidential run is nice. But it's nothing compared to what the wealthy dump into messaging and campaigning constantly. Until such time as small donors can even come close to remotely matching that. Sustaining entire media Outlet ecosystems to counter the propaganda from conservatives. Democrats aren't going to give up trying to get some of that wealthy conservative money
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They will be the establishment no matter what they do lmfao. Can't claim to not be unless they choose to go the Republican route of lying their asses off
Like that'll ever happen.
The party is held by a group of political elites who are all about the establishment and power.
There needs to be a new party, a labor party, to represent the working class Americans.
I agree.
I voted for Harris because Dems are supposed to be the establishment. Supposed to be a return normal boring politics.
That's obviously not going to work. Now we need an actual working class, under a few million dollar a year takehome party.
I've said this before, but I think it needs to be repeated:
The populist, anti-elitist lane on the left is wide open. I don't know that a mainstream "Democratic" party can take that lane, and I don't know if we should bother trying to drag them there. However, what I can say is that there is going to be some significant hay to make in that field.
I think Pramila Jayapal, Ayanna Pressley, Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar, Delia Ramirez, Jamaal Bowman, Summer Lee, Cori Bush, Katie Porter, anyone who has been rat-fucked by Democrats should all abandon their identification with the Democratic party and become independents. And in the time that he has left, at their lead, should be Bernie Sanders, who never needed to be told about the consequences of running with milquetoast policies.
Even if they caucus with Democrats, true progressives need to show them that their votes aren't a given, and if they want them, they need to take a step towards their legislative priorities. Giving up our votes without leverage, giving in to the Washington groupthink: THIS LOSES ELECTIONS!
We shouldn't focus on redeeming the Democratic party. Let them sink. Focus on getting good quality, reliable progressive populists elected. The Democratic party is a fucking anchor and we're better off without it. Let those unwilling to let go of that Washington groupthink sink with it.
Split the non Republican vote so you leave the door wide open for them? That's the problem with first past the post...
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I instead see them not learning a damn thing and putting up Nancy Pelosi as the Presidential candidate for 2028.
Will she achieve lichdom in time?
Acting as if she hasn't already! There's a reason that dude went after her husband with a hammer and not her. He knew better than to mess with a lich.
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They have, they were just as beholden to money interests as the Republicans...
There simply won’t be another election.
The whole point is a cow’s opinion. It doesn’t matter.
There simply won’t be another election.
That is a possibility. The US elected fascists who now control all three branches of the federal government. However they do not have a two-thirds majority in congress or control two-thirds of the states. So it will be difficult for the fascists if they choose a purely legal route. However, since they are fascists, they might use violence to get what they want. We won't know until they try.
In the event that we still have elections and Democrats can still participate we should leverage power and vote for Democrats in those elections. This will reduce the harm done to minorities by fascists who want to kill them.
I wanted to add to your point, because people in this comment section are attempting to write off future elections unless Democrats completely meet the demands of progressives. This isn't something Democrats are likely to do. But the people who will be harmed by hypothetical future Republican administrations would prefer if Democrats were clogging up the works and knocking fascists out of power at the very least.
It's "moo".
Bit late init
Hear fucking hear.
Wasn't there a recent conspiracy theory that the establishment doesn't want Trump (hence the assassination attempts) because he's an easily manipulated loose canon who doesn't follow orders like a good shill should lol?
Point being that dems lost this election because they are inherently more pro establishment and have been for a while.
I think that there is one issue which Trump will deliver the Dems what they really want, and they won't stand in his way as he does it: liquidating Palestine entirely. In the next ten years if nothing is done by Arab nations, the UN or the US left, Israel will likely declare war on the Palestinian Authority itself, exiling or killing its leaders if they do not submit to Israeli sovereignty over the entirety of Palestine.
Sounds like he'll end the genocide! Technically, it's no longer genocide when there's no one left to murder.
Democrats don't learn lessons.
Democrats are the establishment that needs to be laid out to pasture and replaced