2020 Presidential Election

[dark_crystal]

Originally Posted by C0LLETTE

No one is going "you damned kids" on a middle-aged 48 y/0. Someone is trying to point out that maybe her political views, and the courage to maintain/act on them did not just pop out of some seashell on a beach.

BTW, unless you really insist, I am happily done with this aspect of the thread.
Thank you.

i am pretty sure everyone's participation here has been voluntary.

All i said was that Biden is a dumbass for saying the 60s were harder than now. I did not say that anyone's politics popped out of a seashell.

I could say that today's gay teens don't know real struggle because they weren't there with me watching the government kill my friends. But i don't say that because it does not matter that it might be true, as it is not in any way productive.

Say you're a 16-year-old lesbian getting bullied my grown adults on facebook bc your school elected you prom king. Would it help you for me to say "oh cry me a river, at least you don't have AIDS?"

[C0LLETTE]

You insist. OK :

Actually, it would be useful to say "Wow, you got elected prom king. Congratulations! But please do remember, hard as it is, a lot of people probably worked hard and suffered a great deal to get us to this point. Being prom king would have been unthinkable then."

[kittygrrl]

i think all our experience is relevant and we can learn things from each other-we need to stick together and be supportive of all views-that's what we have going for us is our diversity, intelligence and ability to compromise.

[Martina]

I think it's important for people to remember the past, but not so they are grateful or even inspired. The fact is that the past contains possibilities that seem closed off to us now.

Republicans prior to Reagan weren't, for the most part, rabid deregulators. So many things we feel are almost impossible goals now were accepted from the end of the war through the seventies. I wish people knew that.

I don't care if today's activists appreciate what previous folk did, even the terrible loss of life. I would just like it if they had a sense of the world before Reagan when corporate greed had not corrupted most aspects of life. People label as socialist policies that Nixon supported.

We are lying to kids about their future prospects. We don't have the jobs anymore to support most people as middle class workers unless we really tax the rich, create a high minimum wage, and do unprecedented things to make housing affordable. That looks like, and is, socislist. Before we exported jobs and gutted viable businesses to sell them for parts, before our economy was based on finance and services for the rich, it was possible to be a working person and own a house. You could send your kids to college, take vacations, afford health care. We won't be going back to that without also returning to pre-Reagan tax rates. We will never go back to that without changes that seem extremely radical to most Americans. But no Republican of even the Reagan era could have foreseen how fast and deep the decline of the working and middle classes would be.

[dark_crystal]

Originally Posted by Martina

I think it's important for people to remember the past, but not so they are grateful or even inspired. The fact is that the past contains possibilities that seem closed off to us now.

Republicans prior to Reagan weren't, for the most part, rabid deregulators. So many things we feel are almost impossible goals now were accepted from the end of the war through the seventies. I wish people knew that.

I don't care if today's activists appreciate what previous folk did, even the terrible loss of life. I would just like it if they had a sense of the world before Reagan when corporate greed had not corrupted most aspects of life. People label as socialist policies that Nixon supported.

We are lying to kids about their future prospects. We don't have the jobs anymore to support most people as middle class workers unless we really tax the rich, create a high minimum wage, and do unprecedented things to make housing affordable. That looks like, and is, socislist. Before we exported jobs and gutted viable businesses to sell them for parts, before our economy was based on finance and services for the rich, it was possible to be a working person and own a house. You could send your kids to college, take vacations, afford health care. We won't be going back to that without also returning to pre-Reagan tax rates. We will never go back to that without changes that seem extremely radical to most Americans. But no Republican of even the Reagan era could have foreseen how fast and deep the decline of the working and middle classes would be.

In 2016 i would get really mad when i felt like progressives seemed to want to de-emphasize social justice in favor of economic justice.

This remark of Biden's really makes the point about that, though. Because all of the struggles he pointed to, with the exception of the draft, were minority struggles. It was totally possible for the average white person to almost completely ignore them. I know because my parents appear to have experienced the 60s exactly as if they were still in the 50s, although they did remark that we were lucky to be attending already-integrated schools and not living through the process of getting them there, like they did.

Today's economic struggle has started hurting the majority, and in 2016 it was easy to point to this as the reason there were suddenly so many whiteboy Marxists, who then began to make a case for why we should tolerate pro-lifers, risk the supreme court with write-in votes, etc.

But if it's a choice between whiteboy Marxists claiming identity politics are a distraction, or a bourgeois cishet white man pointing to civil rights gains as a way to dismiss what we're doing to our young people? I might switch my morning dogwalking podcast from Rachel Maddow to Chapo Traphouse

[dark_crystal]

Originally Posted by dark_crystal

Say you're a 16-year-old lesbian getting bullied my grown adults on facebook bc your school elected you prom king. Would it help you for me to say "oh cry me a river, at least you don't have AIDS?"

Bullied kids are at risk for suicide, so this would not be helpful-- because i would be shaming the kid and implying she's ungrateful, thus adding to any spiral she's experiencing from having her friends' parents on messenger telling her to drink bleach.

A black kid died bc he couldn't buy insulin. The important thing here is that he wasn't lynched, though, in Biden's world.

[Martina]

Just picking up on part of your post, dark_crystal. I think as you point out, there is privilege on both sides, the third party voters and, as you called them in a long ago post (I think) Democrats who are Republicans except for social justice issues.

I don't think Bernie is either-or. And while some of his followers may be up to no good -- the Beto baiting -- it's obviously possible to care about both inequality and social justice.

Rachel Maddow was horrible during the election. She completely misrepresented Bernie's politics and mocked his supporters. I am so tired of her.

I am looking forward to Mueller's actual report though, in part so she can stop obsessing. We know the SOB is guilty of obstruction. It will be a blessing to get that out there.

[dark_crystal]

Originally Posted by Martina

Just picking up on part of your post, dark_crystal. I think as you point out, there is privilege on both sides, the third party voters and, as you called them in a long ago post (I think) Democrats who are Republicans except for social justice issues.

I don't think Bernie is either-or. And while some of his followers may be up to no good -- the Beto baiting -- it's obviously possible to care about both inequality and social justice.

Rachel Maddow was horrible during the election. She completely misrepresented Bernie's politics and mocked his supporters. I am so tired of her.

I am looking forward to Mueller's actual report though, in part so she can stop obsessing. We know the SOB is guilty of obstruction. It will be a blessing to get that out there.

I first heard about Bernie on TRMS, because she was excited about the momentum he had at his rallies and she was indignant that the media were ignoring his movement.

I did listen to Chapo Traphouse today. The hosts are very cool and hip and edgy and ironic. They were having a really good time joking about "accusations of a coordinated attack on Beto" with Liz Breunig, during which they ironically and edgily attacked Beto. I think this was the 12/23 episode.

I think Beto had a big day yesterday, though? With his anti-The Wall video that got millions of views in five seconds or something?

The Wall is some super low-hanging fruit, post-midterms, and i wish liberals and progressives would ignore it.

It would be too easy for BOTH sides to make immigration the focus of 2020, which would be as big of a so-called distraction as social justice.

It's urgent to stop the detentions and restore the asylum process, create paths to citizenship, protect DREAMers, etc,

Many of my friends and family are not citizens, so these are issues that we can get motivated about: the WH has floated the idea of revoking green cards from non-citizens that use social services-- if my mother-in-law gets deported i will have to go with her.

But i don't think immigration affects the majority in the way that healthcare, employment, wages, and education do-- and a Democratic vs a Republican victory on immigration is not going to change their daily lives.

Letting Republicans trick us into making immigration the battleground is going to lower the stakes of the whole election. Most people's opinions about it are compassion- or ideology-based. It's all theoretical to most people. The only people really passionate about it are the immigrants themselves, their families, plus five zillion racists.

If those are the groups driving turnout, Trump wins.

[Martina]

I recall Rachel pretty much shaking with anger talking about Bernie supporters. I recall her saying in a really snarky way that they didn't understand the TPP. One time she was criticizing Bernie for some inconsistency as she saw it, and one of her own wonks fact checked her. I think she showed her ass re Bernie.

I haven't seen the Beto video. I think that Bernie's message re jobs, taxing the rich, Medicare for all, free college, and fighting corporate corruption of politics is the way to go. Clearly, depending on social justice issues alone didn't work. But Bernie is solid on those as well, IMO. Any candidate the Democrats field is likely to be.

[C0LLETTE]

That is clear-eyed realpolitik. Thank you.

Figure out how to get there. Strategy is often not the strongest attribute of the Left as they get pushed further and further out into the weeds by the Right.

You'd think this was obvious to the Left and to the Democrats, but it seems not. How hard can it be to figure that out? If you keep pounding out your point and stop being distracted, ppl will tune out all that other crap. Find your own Kelly Anne Conway ... just as skilled but not as morally corrupt.

I know that it's not as sweet to win through "impure means" ( and there are plenty of ethical/moral arguments about that ) but sometimes, "winning is all" and start from there.

[C0LLETTE]

oops, I was replying to dark-crystal's post.

[dark_crystal]

Originally Posted by Martina

I recall Rachel pretty much shaking with anger talking about Bernie supporters. I recall her saying in a really snarky way that they didn't understand the TPP. One time she was criticizing Bernie for some inconsistency as she saw it, and one of her own wonks fact checked her. I think she showed her ass re Bernie.

I haven't seen the Beto video. I think that Bernie's message re jobs, taxing the rich, Medicare for all, free college, and fighting corporate corruption of politics is the way to go. Clearly, depending on social justice issues alone didn't work. But Bernie is solid on those as well, IMO. Any candidate the Democrats field is likely to be.

Originally Posted by C0LLETTE

That is clear-eyed realpolitik. Thank you.

Figure out how to get there. Strategy is often not the strongest attribute of the Left as they get pushed further and further out into the weeds by the Right.

You'd think this was obvious to the Left and to the Democrats, but it seems not. How hard can it be to figure that out? If you keep pounding out your point and stop being distracted, ppl will tune out all that other crap. Find your own Kelly Anne Conway ... just as skilled but not as morally corrupt.

I know that it's not as sweet to win through "impure means" ( and there are plenty of ethical/moral arguments about that ) but sometimes, "winning is all" and start from there.

It seems like a unique opportunity to me because there should be no need to even engage Trump. We know his tricks, and he can't count on the disruptive novelty factor that he had last time, because he never stopped doing that. He never even stopped doing rallies. His campaign is already going on. It is completely our choice how and with whom to take the battle to him.

The democrats can set literally any agenda they choose. Making it about jobs, taxing the rich, Medicare for all, free college, and fighting corporate corruption, and refusing to talk about anything else would be easy and effective.

It will be the GOP who run on social issues. Even their economic platform usually has hate somewhere at the heart of it, via cutting taxes by punishing freeloaders, etc. Also they have to keep the religious right and the 2a people, and you need hate for gays and "thugs" to do that.

We can ignore it all, because their candidate is weak. He can't run on his record and his agenda holds no surprises. Every democrat is already on the record about all of it. Nobody needs to respond to him in any way. This is what was disappointing about Warren's DNA test.