All purpose news and politics thread part VI: This Is Not The Time For Posing

[worstblogever]

Well this sounds troubling.

This is incredibly troubling. Congress had banned sales of arms to the U.A.E. because they were then flipping those arms to Al Qaeda. Israel was also against these deals.

This is a Trump spite move. He's selling arms knowing they're going to end up in the hands of terrorists, and then blame Biden when the War on Terror takes a turn for the worse.

It's transparently evil.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

This is incredibly troubling. Congress had banned sales of arms to the U.A.E. because they were then flipping those arms to Al Qaeda. Israel was also against these deals.

This is a Trump spite move. He's selling arms knowing they're going to end up in the hands of terrorists, and then blame Biden when the War on Terror takes a turn for the worse.

It's transparently evil.

All the more reason for the 25th amendment to be dropped on Trump's head like an Acme anvil. God only knows what sort of chaos he'll unleash over the next two months out of sheer spite because he lost the election. Unfortunately, that won't happen since Republicans fear losing Trump's base if he's forced out.

[worstblogever]

On this date, in 2014, in 2015, and in 2016, "Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day" published profiles of former Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson, ], the former brain surgeon turned Seventh Day Adventist candidate for the GOP nomination for president who talks about turning around his life after a turbulent youth where he once tried to stab his best friend in the stomach, but through divine intervention, managed to only hit that friend’s belt and break his knife. As crazy as an origin story as that is, we also presented a dossier on the minute he announced he would be making a run for the Oval Office. Coming into this time last year, Carson had already denied the existence of evolution, compared homosexuality to beastiality and pedophilia, said “The Afforable Care Act is the worst thing that’s happened since slavery” or alternatively “worse than 9/11”, claimed progressives were trying to turn the United States into Nazi Germany, praised Cliven Bundy, called the VA Wait Times Scandal “A Gift from God”, claimed the legalization of marijuana was a plot to distract the populace from “what really happened in Benghazi”, that President Obama can wipe out ISIS “but just doesn’t want to”, and informed us that abortion is actually a form of human sacrifice. And that was just in our first profile.

In our second profile, we covered some of the weirder moments from Sleepy Ben, including his “common sense solutions” to the immigration problem in the United States like punishing an undocumented immigrant is caught trying to commit voter fraud, see to it that they have their citizenship revoked. (You know, the citizenship they don’t have to begin with.) Carson had other terrible thoughts on immigration, like that President Obama had committed “high treason” for choosing to deport dangerous criminals among the undocumented immigrant population first, and claimed that his eulogy for the victims of the mass shooting in Charleston, South Carolina at the A.M.E. Emanuel church was designed to tear our country apart with “race wars” and “class wars”. At the annual NRA convention, told the audience that the southern border of the United States had been infiltrated by “radical extremist Islamic terrorists”, and that everyone should not call for better gun control, because mass shooters are easy to take out if you “all gang rush them at once”, or alternatively, as he once did in a Popeye’s chicken, just tell a potential robber to steal from a nearby cashier and to leave you be. Carson also talked about carrying out drone strikes against illegal immigrants, called for a third separate bathroom for transgendered citizens because “they make people uncomfortable”, and later claimed Planned Parenthood’s true purpose is to “eliminate black people”. Dr. Carson said that gay rights and pro-choice advocates practice “hate speech” and are not following the teachings of Jesus, but are ”under the influence of Saul Alinsky”, and asserted that “being gay is a choice” leading to him avoiding the topic for a whole seven weeks. Carson criticizing people who protest against police brutality, saying that doing so “helps Al Qaeda and ISIS”, quoted the philosopher Thomas Hobbes that “Tyranny would never occur in American citizens have guns” (which is amazing because Hobbes died a full century before America was a nation with its own Constitution and 2nd Amendment), and that he also theorized that the Pyramids were not built as tombs for the Egyptian pharoahs, but instead were granaries for storing food. Carson was also caught lying about his involvement with the supplement company Mannatech, as well as his outrageous claim that he was offered a scholarship to Army’s West Point Academy. Oh, and he also claimed that a Muslim should never be elected President of the United States, so there’s that.

And, since we last left Ben Carson during the waning moments of his ill-conceived and poorly run presidential campaign, he has still stayed in the headlines by becoming a surrogate for Donald Trump throughout 2016. In that role, Ben Carson falsely claimed that like Donald Trump, he also saw news footage of Muslims in New Jersey celebrating the deaths of Americans on 9/11 that does not actually exist, kept pronouncing the Palestinian group Hamas as “hummus”, and began to discuss proposals to “crack down on liberal bias” on college campuses, lamented a supposed “ban on Christianity” in schools (which doesn’t exist, but that’s how he thinks the separation of church and state should be framed) and began suggesting that the Department of Education should be able to secretly monitor classrooms and libraries to prevent any such patterns of thought from being encouraged. He also again commented on same sex marriage, giving his opinion that LGBT citizens shouldn’t be given “extra rights” because they are “abnormal”, and claimed that he’s “read enough conspiracy books” to know that public school lessons teaching tolerance towards the LGBT community and anti-discrimination laws were put in place in the United States by secret communists to damage the republic. Carson also said that Democrats “intentionally destroy black families to cultivate their votes”, and when interviewed by Steve Bannon on Breitbart News, stated his inflammatory belief that “Muslims who accept American values must be schizophrenic” because he doesn’t feel the two ideologies could coexist. Carson was allowed to speak on the second night of the 2016 Republican National Convention, where he, no lie, he lost the crowd by playing six degrees of separation by first linking Hillary Clinton to Saul Alinsky, and then to Lucifer himself, as he goes off of teleprompter in an insane, rambling, incoherent speech. A few weeks later, Dr. Carson decided to weigh in on Donald Trump’s attacks against a Gold Star family, the Khans, by saying that the family should “call a truce” by first apologizing to Donald Trump, so he could then apologize to them. He would later paying into the Alt-Right movement’s conspiracy theories about Hillary Clinton’s health, Carson calls for an “elderly” Clinton to release her medical records, and while stumping for Donald Trump, Dr. Carson compares the difference between the two candidates to be akin to “like picking a paper cut or having both legs chopped off”. Truly, a ringing endorsement. By September, in the middle of an interview, live on CNN, Ben Carson suddenly remembers he forgot to pick up his luggage and abruptly walks away mid-question. A few days later on the same network, he tried excusing Donald Trump’s frequently changing positions on immigration because “he’s still learning” how to develop and stick to policies. In the final month before the election, in a truly astounding interview with CNN’s Brianna Keilar, Carson gives a bizarre reason why the tape of Donald Trump boasting about sexual assault shouldn’t matter to women who are deeply troubled by it… the problem isn’t Trump, it’s THEM because they haven’t heard enough men talk in such graphic, demeaning terms and he finally lost his legendary sleepy, lethargic cool during an interview on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, yelling, “NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, NO…” and demanding the microphone of the woman interviewing him be turned off for asking him questions about Donald Trump bragging about committing sexual assault, and how that can jive with his fondness for Christian values.

Ben Carson , though plainly insane, was inexplicably chosen as a member of Donald Trump’s “Cabinet of Horrors”, not as Surgeon General, which in theory he would be qualified for, but instead as the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, where he sabotages the department’s mission statement from within, gives bizarre speeches to department employees where he refers to African slaves as “immigrants”, and refuses to answer any questions about anything when called before Congress, because he doesn’t have the first clue of what he’s doing. He’s currently facing calls to resign from several angles, because he’s not only committed various ethical violations, he’s not only hired some of the most unqualified people to run HUD, but he’s also been casually making transphobic comments because he’s just revolting.

[worstblogever]

It was on this date in 2017, as well as 2018, that “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” profiled Dennis Richardson, the former Secretary of State of Oregon, who formerly spent twelve years as a state legislator from 2003-2014 before a failed gubernatorial bid in 2014. Richardson spent about $3.5 million on his 2016 campaign, which got him all of 47% of the vote, which thanks to independent candidates and Green Party candidates pulling protest votes away from Democratic candidate Brad Avaikan, was enough to get Richardson a four-year term to oversee things like elections in Oregon. We’re not going to dance around the fact that Dennis Richardson is a widely documented homophobe, not just because he doesn’t think it’s discriminatory to stop gay people from getting married, but because back in 2007, Richardson sent out a fundraising letter to warn of “evils” happening like the Virginia Tech Massacre or same-sex couples getting domestic benefits… which shows he has a lousy barometer for evil. Mass murder should not be mentioned in the same breath as gay people having rights, you know? But it only gets worse from there. Richardson has insisted “pedophilia is widespread among the homosexual community”, and even argued against gay adoption because, “to allow homosexual couples to adopt would require complete disregard of the statistics on the high mortality rate from HIV/AIDS, and high rate of alcohol and drug abuse, as well as the general instability and violent nature of homosexual relationships.” At another point in 2007, Richardson compared homosexuality to “smoking or drinking” because they are a choice. And even though one of the most grotesque murders of a lesbian couple based solely on their sexuality took place in his district, in 2004, Richardson stated his belief that “hate crimes are a myth”. As of September 2017, Richardson has not backed off of his intolerant views of the LGBTQ community, declaring that gay people are “immoral”. As horrible as his views on gay people may be, Richardson has some deranged views on other issues, like say, guns. But days after the Newtown Massacre, Richardson thought more guns were the solution to Adam Lanza’s rampage, and that school teachers should be packing heat to start a crossfire with their students in the way, saying, "If I had been a teacher or the principal at the Sandy Hook Elementary School and if the school district did not preclude me from having access to a firearm, either by concealed carry or locked in my desk, most of the murdered children would still be alive, and the gunman would still be dead, and not by suicide." Dennis Richardson didn’t make it through his full term and died of a brain tumor in February of 2019.

[Mister Mets]

The record high turn out rates in 2020 don't leave a lot of room for speculation do they....as both sides seemed to have fully mobilized their base, it would appear that swing voters may have determined the election.

That being said, I would like to see the data that comes out of Arizona and Georgia.

Did Trump lose those states primarily because of moderate swing voters, or did he lose it because Democrats were able to substantially get a new demographic mobilized to vote. The latter would suggest, an eventual long cold winter for the Republican Party.

All and all I think this election was a referendum on the President, and desire to return to a sense of normalcy.

The big question for Democrats is how long they can keep mobilizing the new demographic.

Will those people come on the ballot in 2022 when elections are a referendum on Biden and Democrats?

Nope. Swing voters weren't a factor this year at all. It was a simple electoral gang war where the Dems and GOP mobilized their base head-to-head for a mega rumble, and the Dem base beat them in the knife fight.

In the so-called rust-Belt, Trump won those three states (WI, MI, PA) by a margin of some 80,000 votes in 2016. In 2020, Biden won those states back with a margin of (at present and still counting),
Wisconsin - 20,539
Michigan - 136,000 or so
Pennsylvania - 45,000 or so.

Combine that and it's a margin of about 200,000 votes more than Trump, double the margin from 2016, and probably gonna be a bit higher before it's over. People who say the Rust Belt is a swing state are deluding themselves. Because these numbers prove 2016 was a fluke.



In the case of Arizona, Biden won thanks to grass-roots activists who mobilized the base, a growing number of Hispanics in the population (and yeah, Biden actually did far better with Hispanics than the early story had you believe), as well as transplants from CA fleeing gentrification, this has helped turned AZ blue. Likewise, Native American voters came out substantially for Biden in Arizona, voting 97% for him, 97%. The Coronavirus mobilized Native Americans against Trump that's for sure. At the same time, Trump made substantial mistakes with AZ GOP, he insulted the memory of John McCain to the extent that his widow not only endorsed Joe Biden but also the Democrat Party of AZ as a whole. Trump also didn't make enough campaign stops in the state. So honestly, it's a wash...Arizona does have potential to be consolidated into blue, going forward.

In the case of Georgia, the answer is Stacey Abrams, Stacey Abrams, and did I mention Stacey Abrams. She and the activism surrounding her, registered a huge chunk of votes, and increased the turnout and that helped her flip the state electorally.



The desire for normalcy doesn't reflect the considerable left wing gains made in this election.
https://www.jacobinmag.com/2020/11/d...ection-day-dsa

And the fact that Moderate Dems did far worse than Progressives even in Swing Elections.

If a Democrat wins states by less than a percent, those would seem to be swing states.

If Trump had done one percent better, we'd have a repeat of '16.

Michigan wasn't as close this time, but then again, neither was Florida.

So Obama and Obama-adjacent can bank on WI to turnout for them, but that's not transferable to other Dems?

Is winning by less than a percent proof an indication they'll always win Wisconsin?

And which swing district moderates did worse than progressives?

https://prospect.org/politics/donna-...-of-passivity/

More and more information about the epic screwups in the House.

Gotta say, some of these candidates, like Donna Shalala outright deserve to lose.

Shalala had an insider trading scandal, so that might have been a bigger deal.

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/0...-trades-201392

[worstblogever]

Gus Bilrakis

On this date one year ago, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” published its first profile of the U.S. House Representative from Florida’s 12th Congressional District, Gus Bilrakis, who has held office since 2006, jumping in to be a legacy and take over where his father Michael Bilirakis to serve three terms in Florida’s 9th Congressional District before jumping to the 12th District from 2013 to the present. Prior to that, Bilrakis served in the Florida House of Representatives for four terms from 1999-2007.

Now, part of how Gus Bilirakis caught our attention was the day he hosted a women’s summit, that featured an agenda with key topics such as “weight loss” and “gardening” that are relevant to their interests .Perhaps that has a lot to do with why Bilirakis has a long, long history of voting against women’s issues, not just his pathological series of anti-choice votes, but the fact that he’s voted against every equal pay bill that’s come across his path the entire time he’s been in Congress.

Bilirakis is also a climate change denialist to the extend that he defended Donald Trump’s hair-brained decision to pull out of the Paris climate accords, and did so by citing a highly flawed study that claimed 2.7 million jobs would be lost if the United States honored the agreement.

But what troubled us the most as we dug deeper into recent statements by Gus Bilirakis was his town hall in February of 2017. His constituents were highly alarmed that the GOP-controlled Congress and Trump administration might move to repeal the Affordable Care Act, and leave tens of millions stripped of their health insurance. So what was Bilirakis’ response? He decided to begin babbling about “death panels”. Y’know, the same “death panels” that Republicans fear-mongered about in 2009 and 2010 to fear-monger about the Affordable Care Act that NEVER CAME TO BE when the law got passed. The same “death panels” that were named Politifact’s “Lie of the Year” eight years earlier. And for that, Bilirakis was booed out of his own town hall.

In his last term in office, Bilrakis’ voting record looked a little like this:

• January 23rd, 2019: Rep. Bilirakis voted against HR 648, because he was gleefully enjoying the longest government shutdown in history.
• February 28th, 2019: Bilirakis votes against HR 1112, a bill which would have required universal background checks on all firearm purchases, and close the gun show loophole.
• March 14th, 2019: Rep. Bilirakis votes against HJR 46, which sane members of Congress voted for to reject Donald Trump’s “national emergency” regarding the U.S. border and his attempts to reallocate funds for a border wall without Congressional approval.
• April 4th, 2019: Gus Bilirakis is one of 158 Republicans who choose to vote against the re-authorization of the Violence Against Women Act, likely because they feel the 2nd Amendment remaining absolute is more important than preventing people with a history of domestic abuse from owning a firearm (which statistics show, makes them more likely to use those firearms against women in their lives).
• May 17th, 2019: Bilirakis votes against The Equality Act, which would have prevented discrimination towards Americans based on their gender identity or sexual orientation.
• June 4th, 2019: Rep. Bilirakis votes against the Dreamers Act, because he’s too xenophobic and partisan to care about immigration reform. https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/116-2019/h240
• July 16th, 2019: Gus Bilirakis votes against a resolution to condemn Donald Trump for his racist statements that four people of color in Congress should “go back where they came from”.
• December 3rd, 2019: Rep. Bilirakis is one of 71 Republicans who votes against a resolution to disallow Russia from re-entering the G7 and makes it the G8 until it leaves Ukraine.
• December 18th, 2019: Bilirakis ignores his Congressional duty to hold a president who has been proven to commit high crimes and misdemeanors accountable and votes against the impeachment of Donald Trump.
• May 15th, 2020: Bilirakis votes against the HEROES Act, to further support the healthcare industry and citizens affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Florida’s 12th Congressional District has a +8 Republican lean in the Cook Partisan Voting Index, which was within the realm of possibility that he could be upset in 2020. On Election Day last week, it turns out that Bilirakis got 63% of the vote and retained his seat for another two years. Just… greeeaaat.

https://ballotpedia.org/Gus_Bilirakis

[Gray Lensman]

The big question for Democrats is how long they can keep mobilizing the new demographic.

Will those people come on the ballot in 2022 when elections are a referendum on Biden and Democrats?

If a Democrat wins states by less than a percent, those would seem to be swing states.

If Trump had done one percent better, we'd have a repeat of '16.

Michigan wasn't as close this time, but then again, neither was Florida.

Is winning by less than a percent proof an indication they'll always win Wisconsin?

And which swing district moderates did worse than progressives?

Shalala had an insider trading scandal, so that might have been a bigger deal.

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/0...-trades-201392

I read elsewhere that only one cosponsor of AOC's Green New Deal lost reelection, so maybe those progressives?

[Tendrin]

Oh WBE-EEeeeeeeeeeee....


https://www.mississippifreepress.org...trump-lawsuit/

Rep. Price Wallace, a Republican member of the Mississippi House who represents Rankin and Simpson counties and ran for office unopposed in 2019, wrote back.

“We need to succeed from the union and form our own country,” Rep. Wallace wrote, misspelling “secede.”

[Steel Inquisitor]

It doesn’t matter whether or not it’s harsh, but whether or not it’s true (and it is).

Except it's not the truth, it's a justification not a reason.

This isn’t a surprise to anyone. The main difference between Democrats and Republicans is that the former will opposite bigotry in the long run because bigotry goes against the capitalist principle that we are all interchangeable cogs in the machine. The point that economists make about racism and homophobia not being market-efficient for the rich is correct. That is why, in time, we can expect the lesser-evil/pro-status quo party to come out more and more in favor of equality for any issues related to identity. This isn’t entirely meaningless – it’s one of the reasons it’s smart to vote for the lesser evil – but it’s hardly “proof” of them not being political enemies. We can use that same logic to argue that wealthy whites in the 1800’s weren’t enemies to black workers just because they (correctly) concluded that the market become a more efficient means of exploiting those workers than through slavery.

This completely misses how complex politics is and just because the Democrats get everything done is not one use to castigate them as being the same as Republicans. There is no acknowledgement of what obstacles the Democrats have to go through to make progress and no acknowledgement of the good they've made in office. Sure Dems should get complained about but that only matters when the right people are blaming blamed and with he right proportion. The Democrats are a coalition, and they're not all good but by making the Democrats as a whole into "enemies" all that does is help the GOP who want the left confused, distracted and scattered. What economists say that? Except if the Democrats were enemies as you say they are why would they bother helping the LGBTQ community? Enemies attack, they don't help out. And now connoting Democrats with slave owners.

Also, what do you mean that “I need to explain this” to the LGTBQ community? See, this is another pet peeve I have with a lot of internet liberals. You guys seem to be under the impression that it’s only straight white men that take issue with the Democrats, or that only straight white men get fixated on economic issues. The reality is that dissatisfaction of both parties is widespread across all identity groups and often for the same reasons, especially if you’re a Millennial. I don’t think you are doing this intentionally, but you are contributing to essentialist narratives and being an apologist for some very powerful people when you make moralistic statements like that.

Dissatisfaction comes in many forms, the LGBTQ community have valid complaints about the Democrats without calling them enemies. The Democrats have been very necessary to bring progress for their cause, which isn’t easy in a country that elects bigots like Donald Trump. The fact they haven’t made the progress we want isn’t proof they’re not trying their hardest, the biggest obstacle is the GOP – so why aren’t they in this paragraph as the bigger fish?

Is it? Do you think most of these people are born like that or that they become like that through their environment? We know that only a small percentage of humans are born psychopaths and narcissists. Simply saying “these people are bad” does not address how millions across the country (we are talking 1 in 4 or 5 Americans) come to hold these beliefs. You say we should do what Bernie and AOC do, but they’ve both made the same point I just did on multiple occasions.

The problem isn't that we don't know how they're made, it's that we don't know how to deprogram them. This isn't simply about narcissists and psychopaths, it's also about propaganda, education, racism, sexism, and white supremacy. Except there are millions of Republicans in varying stripes across America, and Trump's tenure improved their numbers! There are millions of people like this. What was Bernie and AOC's point?

These things are never pure and simple. There is no “pure and simple” when you are talking about geopolitical events that involve literally millions and millions of people, a lot of them who don’t even know each other or have the same culture. “Pure and simple” exists at the local level (I can, for example, go on all day about what a horrible human being my racist neighbor is), but when trying to understand a phenomenon like the election of Trump and how to respond? Utter nonsense – worse than nonsense, it’s straight-up dangerous because you are blaming systemic problems on individuals and being an apologist in the process.

This is bizarre. It wasn't a secret how energised Obama made the GOP with the progress he made and being a Black man. And they don't need to know each other, but many do have the same culture they're not isolated from each other - especially with the internet. Many cultures and sub-cultures also have similarities across nations and communities. Sexism and racism Trump was the conservative backlash against Obama, just like Obama was the left response to George W. Bush and Biden was the response to Trump. Systemic problems are made by individuals who perpetuate it, without them the system wouldn't be as entrenched, they give it oxygen.

And that right there is the core problem with a lot of liberals, or at least liberals you come across on the internet – you guys want to go around saying you’re liberal and against Trump, but also engage in lazy generalizations about Americans and don’t want to do any homework into understanding history or the materialist conditions that give rise to someone like Trump (let alone have a conversation on it). The go-to for you guys is always that 1 in 4 Americans are just stupid/racist, in spite of the fact that racism by itself explains nothing. Seriously…what does “Americans are racist, end of story” actually explain? America has always been racist. The question then becomes why no Far-Right candidate was elected in the Great Depression when unions were strong, or in the 1960s when income inequality was low. The second we ask that question, we are now in policy territory and absolutely have to talk about neoliberalism and the lack of a left-alternative to Trump. This is why we need a materialist understanding of these things combined with a basic level of empathy. It’s not about “being nice”, it’s about the need to be smart and strategic at combating these issues.

Wrong. Trump is a symptom of the Republican party and white supremacy, and the GOP have deliberately fostered a candidate like him for generations.

But America as a massive problem with millions of Americans who are stupid and racist, created under conditions by the GOP itself by undermining media with propaganda, education, institutions of various aligned churches and culture wars. America has a massive problem with racism. Obama trued empathy, look where that got him. What’s puzzling is why is there more mercy for Trump/Republican voters over Liberals/Democrats? Being smart requires acknowledging policy and the difficulties in making progress so why are the GOP not in the crosshairs of this post, instead it’s Democrats.

[Steel Inquisitor]

Serious question: What is the difference between your view and the way Conservatives view Middle-Easterners? Conservatives think all Islamic terrorism can be summed up to entire geopolitical sections of the Middle-East simply being a monolith of bigoted brown men and that any discussion of systemic issues is Lefties making excuses for their actions. You're implying entire geopolitical sections of America can be summed up to Americans being a monolith of bigoted white men and that any discussion of systemic issues is Lefties making excuses for their actions. Please explain why the latter way of looking at the world is any less cartoonish than the first.

This is a strawman. The problem with the GOP is that they’re not just white men, those are just the biggest, most high profile voting bloc. Republicans come from all demographics, because being a good person isn’t determined by what ethnicity you are. But many arguments in this post support attacking systemic problems, like with racism. Leftists aren’t immune from being wrong, see Bernie supporting Joe Rogan. That “alliance” didn’t last a week before Rogan switched to Trump, which was painfully predictable.

I wasn’t talking about Romneycare. The idea of Obamacare came from the Heritage Foundation, which was initially a right-wing alternative to Medicare-For-All. Nixon and Bob Dole have suggested similar healthcare plans before.

Your argument misses one point about why ACA was shaped how it was, and that was how many conservative politicians the Democrats had to please to make it a law. If they barely got the ACA as it was out, why would a more left proposal improve those odds? Why would Lieberman have signed ups for that? The ACA was a shell of itself and it needed far more to protect people but that wasn't in the cards because it's legislation.

HRC stopped being in favor of a public option after she started taking money from the health insurance companies, and the reason LBJ never managed to pass it is because American unions at the time weren’t putting pressure on anyone to pass it. American unions at the time were putting pressure on their employers to grant healthcare to their members, while Canadian unions were putting pressure on the government to grant healthcare to everyone. It’s one of the reasons why Canada got universal healthcare in the 60s and the US didn’t. I don’t think that’s applicable now. If anything, it’s only more the reason to put pressure on Biden to pass Medicare-For-All.

Citations, please? Put pressure on Biden how? Unions are very weak in America.

How is this an argument for why Democrats aren’t bad guys? Trump’s handling of COVID was exceptionally bad even by Establishment standards. Are Bloomberg and most of Wall Street “good guys” now because they would technically be better than Trump?

Trump is bad for more than Covid, that’s just the tip of that iceberg with his evil. “Establishment” is a meaningless term, who are you specifically talking about? And we are the people referencing by Wall Street? It’s incredibly vague. Bloomberg is not “good” but Democrats would be fools to ignore what he brings to the party as an asset. It’s politics, and it’s not like the left haven’t gotten into bed with unsavory people before – in America or elsewhere. This is also reducing complex systems to binary positions, Bloomberg is a Democrat but he doesn’t speak for all Democrats.

[quote]What do the Democrats have to do to qualify as bad guys? Would them, say, working to sabotage the populist candidate of the Democratic Primaries for two elections in a row count as sufficient evidence that they’re not just imperfect friends?

Really? They didn't need to do anything to sabotage Bernie, he imploded after every Super Tuesday and made many, many bad decisions that lead to his downfall.

Awesome. So then why are you going around arguing with people making this exact point?

Your argument was that Democrats were the enemy, not that grassroots organising wasn't good. I agree with that, too. How it is done, however, matters.

[PwrdOn]

To me that's signs of vulnerability not strength, desperation not tenacity. The Republicans are in siege mentality having far more Democrats and Blue Voters in Red States than Red voters in Blue States. Democrat candidates can run Lindsay Graham and Ted Cruz on margins no Republican candidate can score in CA and NYS. Lindsay Graham has to go begging on Fox News to even make it.

These people are desperadoes in a fortress, not in any sense a viable thriving party.

The right has always thrived under these conditions though, because once they can declare that their way of life is under existential threat, they can throw out all the pretense of morality and consistency and just go all in with the forcible suppression of any opposition. The standard Republican platform of small government and religious social conservatism never really appealed to that many people anyway, they were really just indirect pathways to the kind of militant nationalism and white supremacy that most of their voters have now openly embraced. The GOP can't just hit a reset button and go back to what it was during the Reagan years because that image was always fake anyway, you can't start talking about welfare queens and small town values now and not expect people to know exactly what you mean by that.

[GindyPosts]

Oh WBE-EEeeeeeeeeeee....


https://www.mississippifreepress.org...trump-lawsuit/

If they're so hell-bent on leaving, why not buy land from a corrupt South American leader, move down there, and build your damn country from scratch.

I'd like to see them try and build infrastructure and govern with their policies. It would be a disaster.

[Tendrin]

If they're so hell-bent on leaving, why not buy land from a corrupt South American leader, move down there, and build your damn country from scratch.

I'd like to see them try and build infrastructure and govern with their policies. It would be a disaster.

Because they know it'd be a disaster.

[SUPERECWFAN1]

Because they know it'd be a disaster.

Plus we already saw that play out in 1800's if no one ever knew (I didn't til a few years ago). In an article a bunch of angry Confederates who had watched Lee surrender decided to go to South America and set up their own country. They soon discovered how it didn't work and many returned home. Only a few stayed. I wish I could find the article or what to search under.

[Tendrin]

Plus we already saw that play out in 1800's if no one ever knew (I didn't til a few years ago). In an article a bunch of angry Confederates who had watched Lee surrender decided to go to South America and set up their own country. They soon discovered how it didn't work and many returned home. Only a few stayed. I wish I could find the article or what to search under.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confed...%20Civil%20War.