Well no. Hillary was a center-right candidate. If she wanted votes from progressives or left-wing voters, she knew exactly what to do. But she threw those votes away, relying on rhetoric like this post. We all saw it happening, and she did it anyway. What if she had pushed for universal health care, or unions, or campaign finance reform, or gun laws, or against wars? It would have been an exciting election.
Except that the left actually did show up and vote for her. Anyone who cares enough about politics to call themselves “left” is not likely to sit out an election, and third party votes didn’t make the difference. Bernie supporters overwhelmingly showed up for Hillary. That shouldn’t have been surprising since Bernie campaigned harder for her than she did for herself.
It’s every day apolitical Americans who stay home and cost the Democrats elections, and the reasons why are clear. Democratic political strategies are intended to be vacuous and put the electorate to sleep. The establishment doesn’t want to win an election then have the voters actually expect them to do something with the office.
The left has been telling the establishment what’s going wrong for decades. Campaigns that actually speak to the people win elections. The Democrats would rather just shoot the messenger.
This. Every single time the democrats have power they do nothing to cement any kind of progressive or moderate holdouts when inevitably the Republicans win an election. They lost the Supreme Court, they watched the Republicans bend the rules, break the law, try and overthrow the government, and here we are. Biden has had the presidency this whole time and has done precious little to actually push back on anything the Republicans have done. Too concerned with appearing civil and considerate to actually hold senators accountable for their words and actions. If Trump wins this election, he will smile and shake his hand as he transfers power to a literal fascist dictator.
I think that a lot of people have an overblown concept of what Democrats can get past Republican obstructionism, and nebulous concepts like “holding senators accountable” are pretty useless.
The way Democrats get policy past the goal is to inspire the electorate to fight with them. That is where establishment Democrats fall flat. Far from being ready to use an energized electorate, they are actually afraid of one. Their campaigns are literally designed to soothe the American spirit to sleep. That worked when the middle class felt secure, but not anymore. We don’t just want competent administrators who can keep things running, we want reformers and visionaries who aren’t afraid to shake things up. That scares the shit out of the establishment.
Trump was a molotov cocktail aimed at DC, and Biden was a response that said “we don’t hear you, go back to sleep.”
In regard to abortion the outcome certainly would have been different had she won the election. Trump put 3 anti-abortion and strongly right wing justices on the Supreme court directly leading to this outcome.
Obviously like other mainstream Democrats there’s a ton to be desired in policy, but the whole point of this post is that it is still important to vote even if it’s the lesser evil.
I think most commenters agree that voting is peachy, but the question is whether to support a real left-wing candidate or a centrist Democrat candidate.
Right? All she needed to do was start parroting Bernie’s platform, get the votes, follow up on none of it like when Obama promised similar things, and… well… it’d not be great, but it’d be better than what we have…
Hillary shouldn’t have bought the DNC and used dirty tricks to get the nomination. Had she felt just a little bit less entitled to the office, I bet she would have run a much better campaign.
Fuck this post. I vote. I did not vote in that election because I had shit choices. It’s not my fault that Dems ran a shit candidate. I did not think that asshole could get elected or I’d have voted against him, while hating the other shithead that I voted in. Dems need to run real candidates. Not vote-for-me-or-else-bad! candidates.
Well no. Hillary was a center-right candidate. If she wanted votes from progressives or left-wing voters, she knew exactly what to do. But she threw those votes away, relying on rhetoric like this post. We all saw it happening, and she did it anyway. What if she had pushed for universal health care, or unions, or campaign finance reform, or gun laws, or against wars? It would have been an exciting election.
Except that the left actually did show up and vote for her. Anyone who cares enough about politics to call themselves “left” is not likely to sit out an election, and third party votes didn’t make the difference. Bernie supporters overwhelmingly showed up for Hillary. That shouldn’t have been surprising since Bernie campaigned harder for her than she did for herself.
It’s every day apolitical Americans who stay home and cost the Democrats elections, and the reasons why are clear. Democratic political strategies are intended to be vacuous and put the electorate to sleep. The establishment doesn’t want to win an election then have the voters actually expect them to do something with the office.
The left has been telling the establishment what’s going wrong for decades. Campaigns that actually speak to the people win elections. The Democrats would rather just shoot the messenger.
This. Every single time the democrats have power they do nothing to cement any kind of progressive or moderate holdouts when inevitably the Republicans win an election. They lost the Supreme Court, they watched the Republicans bend the rules, break the law, try and overthrow the government, and here we are. Biden has had the presidency this whole time and has done precious little to actually push back on anything the Republicans have done. Too concerned with appearing civil and considerate to actually hold senators accountable for their words and actions. If Trump wins this election, he will smile and shake his hand as he transfers power to a literal fascist dictator.
I think that a lot of people have an overblown concept of what Democrats can get past Republican obstructionism, and nebulous concepts like “holding senators accountable” are pretty useless.
The way Democrats get policy past the goal is to inspire the electorate to fight with them. That is where establishment Democrats fall flat. Far from being ready to use an energized electorate, they are actually afraid of one. Their campaigns are literally designed to soothe the American spirit to sleep. That worked when the middle class felt secure, but not anymore. We don’t just want competent administrators who can keep things running, we want reformers and visionaries who aren’t afraid to shake things up. That scares the shit out of the establishment.
Trump was a molotov cocktail aimed at DC, and Biden was a response that said “we don’t hear you, go back to sleep.”
In regard to abortion the outcome certainly would have been different had she won the election. Trump put 3 anti-abortion and strongly right wing justices on the Supreme court directly leading to this outcome.
Obviously like other mainstream Democrats there’s a ton to be desired in policy, but the whole point of this post is that it is still important to vote even if it’s the lesser evil.
I think most commenters agree that voting is peachy, but the question is whether to support a real left-wing candidate or a centrist Democrat candidate.
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Right? All she needed to do was start parroting Bernie’s platform, get the votes, follow up on none of it like when Obama promised similar things, and… well… it’d not be great, but it’d be better than what we have…
Yes, but it’s not a black and white situation where blame falls exclusively on one person or set of people.
Hillary should have run a better campaign, but anyone that is against right wing politics should still have voted for her.
Hillary shouldn’t have bought the DNC and used dirty tricks to get the nomination. Had she felt just a little bit less entitled to the office, I bet she would have run a much better campaign.
That’s just like the Simpsons scene with the two aliens. How is your position different from Matt Groening’s joke?
I voted for Kodos.
Fuck this post. I vote. I did not vote in that election because I had shit choices. It’s not my fault that Dems ran a shit candidate. I did not think that asshole could get elected or I’d have voted against him, while hating the other shithead that I voted in. Dems need to run real candidates. Not vote-for-me-or-else-bad! candidates.