this post was submitted on 14 Apr 2025
866 points (91.5% liked)
196
5078 readers
571 users here now
Be sure to follow the rule before you head out.
Rule: You must post before you leave.
Other rules
Behavior rules:
- No bigotry (transphobia, racism, etc…)
- No genocide denial
- No support for authoritarian behaviour (incl. Tankies)
- No namecalling
- Accounts from lemmygrad.ml, threads.net, or hexbear.net are held to higher standards
- Other things seen as cleary bad
Posting rules:
- No AI generated content (DALL-E etc…)
- No advertisements
- No gore / violence
- Mutual aid posts are not allowed
NSFW: NSFW content is permitted but it must be tagged and have content warnings. Anything that doesn't adhere to this will be removed. Content warnings should be added like: [penis], [explicit description of sex]. Non-sexualized breasts of any gender are not considered inappropriate and therefore do not need to be blurred/tagged.
Also, when sharing art (comics etc.) please credit the creators.
If you have any questions, feel free to contact us on our matrix channel or email.
Other 196's:
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Do you want to win an election or do you want to be morally superior?
Everyone in America heard the Republicans go on and on and on about Hilary's emails. That's where they are vulnerable.
Shilling for a 3rd Party at this late date is silly at best.
Late... date? Does the 24/7 campaign cycle mean we can never discuss how we can get the unrepresented in our country involved in the political process?
No. It means that it's impossible to organize a viable 3rd Party before the next election cycle.
Do you have any idea what it take to get a candidate listed in all 50 states? Or how much money it would take to get a candidates name out?
Get back to me when you have an actual plan to start a3rd Party. Include the names of the candidates you'll run for every House seat.
We've known that people don't vote rationally in a democracy for almost three thousand years. Why do you keep expecting this to change?
If you want to win elections you must both appear morally superior and promise material gains. Making morally bankrupt rationalizations just turns the masses away.
Every time someone made the argument "yes we're sponsoring genocide, but Trump will be worse" you lost votes. You just made people more nihilistic.
And what is the great alternative?
It's not like you can create a Third Party in the next 24 months; the Left had four years to make sure Bernie got nominated in 2020 and they blew it.
Stop screaming about the Dems are until you have an actual plan to stop Trump.
The alternative is what every progressive has been screaming about for over a decade now: Actually campaign on popular progressive economic reforms. Actually appeal to the base of the democratic party instead of chasing centrist republicans.
And stop repeating this abuser mentality of constantly lowering our standards. That depresses voter turnout better than the Republicans could dream. The masses don't vote unless they are optmisitic.
Thank you for proving my point. Screaming for a decade and zero progress.
Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.
What an insane reversal of historical reality: Both Obama and Biden ran on promising progressive economic reform and won. They dissappointed when it came time to deliver but they still won.
Clinton and Harris explicitly didn't promise anything other than being "not Trump" and ate colossal shit on live TV.
So where are you getting this idea that progressive economic reform is not electable? Is it because it fails in democratic primaries? Is it because the party itself tries to stifle it?
I'll just point out that the Democratic Party controls the state caucuses. Bernie did better in the cuacus states than he did in the ones with with an election. Yeah, the Dems were trying to stop him so much.
When the fuck did I mention Bernie? You're not understanding the point I'm making. I'm not saying "AOC 2028, Medicare 4 All". I'm saying promise them the fucking pony if you want to save democracy. Go ahead and run Gavin Newsom! But he better be promising something like student debt relief or raising the minimum wage if he wants to win. He doesn't even have to do it!
But no we'll never do the obvious tried and true tactic because even the implication that Bernie might have been even partially right is disloyalty to the party.
But for love of all that is holy please stop think "just not Trump" is an electable candidate. It may be for democratic party loyalists but not for the general electorate.
I hear what you're saying. The problem is that there are plenty of voters who hate the pony!
When the Dems put Harris in, it was a concession to the progressives. They got a Black woman from a state with a long Left tradition. And she lost votes from 'doddering' Joe Biden.
The Dems problem is that many voters live in Red states where they hear Fox News 24/7. With the electoral College the way it is, the GOP can lose all the biggest states and still win everything.
Obama had a super majority in both Houses and the ACA barely squeaked through.
We've got Dems who are afraid to talk about the New Deal because the electorate has been poisoned against the Red Menace.
Why do you think the GOP keeps pushing anti-trans laws? Because they know that's an issue that hits people where they pray.
I am not in love with Pelosi or 99% of the DNC leadership. I wish there were an alternative, but unless you can show me anything else, I'm going to stick with the people who have their names on ballots in 50 states.
off topic.
If you enjoy novels of political chicanery I suggest reading Ross Thomas.
https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-fools-in-town-are-on-our-side-ross-thomas/12259060?ean=9780312315825&next=t
https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-porkchoppers-ross-thomas/qHjLHkzDNRTfTrrX?ean=9781453229842&next=t
Yeah those are the centrist republicans who voted Trump anyways. Again, empirically proven failure.
Honestly wtf are you thinking here? She wasn't left wing at all and being black or californian doesn't magically make her progressive. You're literally citing a fake sterotype as a subsititue for real policy.
HE GOT THAT SUPERMAJORITY BY RUNNING ON HEALTH CARE REFORM!
We got a supermajority by promising the pony! "Hope and Change". Sell the fucking pony again. Promise a different pony when you fail to deliver! Jesus Christ you just insist on keeping your head in the sand. You're just insistent on laying down and dying.
He got that super majority because Bush tanked the economy.
Do you want to win an election? Because what the DNC is currently doing hasn't worked very well for that.
Your far left candidate has lost how many times in a row now? Maybe you helping the far right will keep that losing streak going as your country's politicians recognize the far left will just keep losing. If you want to stir to the left, you don't go right, like your country just did this election.
What far left candidate?
The left that's too far from winning.
Yeah, they ran a Black woman and got fewer votes than the White guy.
Almost like the Progressives stayed home.
Yeah, it's almost like progressives aren't interested in identity politics, and stayed home when the supposedly-leftist party told them to shut up.
Yeah, Progressives stayed home in 1968 because they couldn't support Humphrey and we got Nixon.
They couldn't support Hilary and we got Trump.
They couldn't support Biden/Harris and we got Trump two.
So much progress.
Progressives are simultaneously not worth it for the democrats to represent, but also are 100% to blame when blue conservatives lose to red ones?
Maybe when people think literally Hitler is better than you, you should take a step back and try to figure out what you're doing wrong.
Do you really think calling them hypocrites is gonna work when it hasn’t the 5000 other times? Dems don’t need to go after republican voters or smear republican. It’s been shown that obviously does not work. They need to be a party people want to vote for.
I've been saying it for a while now.
In WW2 the most progressive people on the planet lined up to get help from the racist Americans and the British empire because they saw Hitler was worse.
If you need to be coaxed into fighting Trump, you're not anti-fascist, you're desperate for attention.
BTW, I donated to Bernie in 2016, 2020, and 2024. It was the Progressives who failed me, not the Dems.
I’m mostly just confused by what you’re even trying to say about my post here? I said stop doing what doesn’t work and start doing something good? And your response is… uh… hitler was bad? I don’t?
Also, if you think the dems have nothing to do with progressives losing, then lol.
I'm responding to that idea.
If you need to be coaxed into voting against Trump you're not anti-fascist, you're desperate for attention.
And progressives like AOC and Omar managed to win inside the Dem Party.
Like I said, I'd love to be able to vote for an actual Progressive. Too bad they keep dropping the ball.
To think progressives are dropping the ball, but not the DNC, who has sued 3rd parties off ballots, pushed back as hard as they can against progressives(including spending DNC money against progressives in primaries & running attack ads on 3rd party), certainly is a DNC style take.
To say "not being trump" should be enough is fucking wild. That is the epitome of democracy huh? "You can't vote for a good candidate, or one that would represent your ideals. You must vote based on who you hate most! You have to support the system that forces this! it is good! and balanced!"
I'll pass dude.
Is that what you'd say to that guy who is sitting in a jail cell in El Salvador right now?
I'll pass dude. You'll just have to wait until I get a candidate I can believe in?
I wish I had that privilege.
I mean, if you think it’s progressives, the group who actually shows up to vote THE MOST, and who also do tend to vote Dem are to blame then I’m glad the DNC propaganda is working for you I guess.
But like, literal studies have shown progressives show up more %wise to vote than any other group. And also you can look at vote numbers and see left 3rd parties are like 1/3rd the votes of right 3rd parties, showing most progressives do still vote dem. A lot who do not are in places like California where Dems gonna win anyways, or Florida where Dems gonna lose anyways since they literally gave up on Florida since the last Governor election.
Too lazy to find the studies again because I’m busy. You can google it if you don’t believe me I don’t care.
Again, people not showing up to vote is the DNC’s fault for not being a party people want to vote for. If they cannot energize the vote they lose. They have not since Obama. They’ve refused to learn from that because money. They are the ones who are allowing Trump. Not progressives. Progressives control almost nothing. They have no say in the DNC. They cannot stop them from doing stupid bullshit. They’ve tried, but rather than learn and adopt progressive policy from Bernie or 3rd parties the DNC has decided to alienate them as hard as possible including fighting against them. They’ve decided they’re owed their votes anyways so they don’t need to appease them.
I guess you don't have anything to say to that guy.
What do you want me to say to him? Sorry dems were busy holding back from sentencing Trump so they could run against him? Sorry Biden decided he had to be the nominee after saying he wouldn’t be? Sorry we waited until after primaries to decide he was a horrible choice and then went with someone who decided “I’m gonna do exactly what he was doing”?
Like do you think I want Trump? Because I am criticising the DNC? I am criticising the DNC because they’re the ones fucking up.
No, but that doesn't mean you aren't helping him.
He's not the one helping Trump, you are.
I would call pushing back persecution until it is too late so he can run so Biden can say “only I can stop him” and run would be helping Trump a whole lot more than saying the DNC should strive to be a party people want to vote for, but you do you I guess.
You got proof anyone 'pushed back' the prosecution?
iirc it was the judge Trump put in that did most of the blocking.
So, you want to make up stories? You do you.
Sorry, I tried googling around for the article but there's so much with that shit that I cannot find it anymore, sorry. Lot of 2021 articles on holding back memo on Mueller report which was I guess a bigger article than a memo that alluded to waiting to persecute him that came out after he already won the election. Whole post got deleted from here, so comment history even did not help.
But here is what I was talking about with research on progressives voting (note they're called progressive left here): https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2021/11/09/political-engagement-among-typology-groups/
I don’t have it saved on here anymore because the whole post got deleted.
If I have time later maybe I’ll try and find the article it was on an internal memo or email or something, but Trump plus memo or email is gonna take a lot of searching to find the correct article now.
So maybe when I have time I can try and find that and the studies on progressives voting but I have a busy week and will almost definitely forget to be honest.
Your comment perfectly represents the moral bankruptcy of the Democratic party. The obsession with elections and compromising, even when the midterms are almost two years away.
A proper opposition party would hammer the substance and put the institutional failures on full display. If you don't have principles, there's no point to winning power anyway.
By your logic, no one who opposed Hitler should have taken aid from the capitalist and racist Americans or the British empire.
Look at the real world. the GOP is using every dirty trick imaginable, but we should lose with dignity and honor intact.
Have you considered that maybe moral bankruptcy isn't the most effective way to win elections, at least not if you're presenting as the slightly-less-right-wing option? The Democratic party is broken, nobody is buying their shit any more, and that's why someone like Trump can get elected. There is no opposition party. It's not a problem that will get fixed by ignoring it.
I love the way you write off all the Asians who were getting killed by the Japanese. To say nothing of the US Merchant Marines who died delivering food and weapons to Murmansk. Stalin was the Donald Trump of his time.