I think centrism can win elections though. In my country, the UK, elections are usually won by whichever party captures the centre ground. Keir Starmer won in the UK this year by being centrist. Previously David Cameron and Tony Blair were pretty centrist, and both won multiple elections.
One quote from last night stuck with me (though I can’t remember who said it): “Republicans have been trying to grow their party for 4 years. Democrats have only been trying to grow their party for 4 months.”
All of the Zionists need to be tossed out.
Israel actually doesn’t matter to most Americans, sad as it is.
That’s about to change.
They refuse to actually campaign and address people’s concerns. They gaslight, minimize, denigrate, guilt trip, and verbally abuse people and then are surprised Pikachu when no one is happy or motivated to vote for them.
“You owe it to your country to vote.” “You are a bad person/stupid/russian shill etc if you vote for anyone but Kamala.”
These things just stroke your ego and are otherwise thought terminating. They do not get votes. Like holy fuck, if you just listen to people’s concerns and talk with them, it tends to work.
But with Citizens united, campaigns focus around a capitalist spending strategy like it’s Election Christmas. Bernie Sanders, Stacey Abrams, and AOC all had what I’d call “authentic” campaigns, where they requested help with canvassing and phone calls before they requested donations. Like donations were fine, but most emails and texts were asking for workers, volunteers, and physical help. Those requests were completely absent from Kamala’s campaign.
The status quo just doesn’t want the common person to have political literacy. If they teach us how to canvas, then we’ll do it for someone who isn’t status quo. If they show us how to run for office, then we will just run ourselves like AOC did. They are in direct conflict with themselves because they are trying to suppress anything except status quo Dems.
Absolutely, we need to place blame where it belongs. Democrats fucked up bad, it is basically 2016 all over again
Everyone is terrible here. In the past I could forgive Republicans because “they didn’t get who he was.” They know and don’t care. Billionaires fighting each other over who gets hegemony is boring. This is their world and we just happen to live here.
It’s worse.
Stop treating rural republicans, chugs, incels, and conservatives, as human beings. The problem is that too many democrats want to go back to the “good old days” of bipartisanship. Those days are long gone.
We have to treat any republican, no matter how “reasonable” as an enemy of democracy and the United States. It doesn’t matter if they’re family, friends, co-workers, etc. This is who they really are.
That attitude isn’t helpful either.
Bipartisanship is possible, but only by convincing everyone to come further left.
Because actual left leaning policy is popular.
That’s the true lesson that Democrats refuse to learn. Mostly because they’ve been paid not to.
We need a cardinal voting system.
2020:
2024:
1% less this time around.
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Get organized. Join a Leftist org, find solidarity with fellow comrades, and protect each other. The Dems will not save you, it is up to the Workers to protect themselves. The Party for Socialism and Liberation and Freedom Road Socialist Organization both organize year round, every year, because the battle for progress is a constant struggle, not a single election. See if there is a chapter near you, or start one! Or, see if there’s an org you like more near you and join it, the point is that organizing is the best thing any leftist can do.
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Read theory. A good primer is Blackshirts and Reds. It will help contextualize what fascism is, what causes it, and how to stop it. I can offer a good introductory reading list regarding Marxism if you’d like, but this is a good starting point.
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Aggressively combat white supremacy, misogyny, queerphobia, and other attacks on marginalized communities. Cede no ground.
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Be more industrious, and self-sufficient. Take up gardening, home repair, tinkering. It is through practice that you elevate your problem-solving capabilities. Not only will you improve your skill at one subject, but your general problem-solving muscles get strengthened as well. Theory guides practice, which sharpens theory to be reapplied to better practice.
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Learn self-defense. Get armed, if practical. Be ready to protect yourself and others. The Democrats will not save us, we must save each other.
If I had canvassed for Harris in Tennessee I’d have been shot.
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Hey, I’ll probably delete my account soon because I shilled so hard for this campaign and it feels so gross. I knew day one enthusiasm was going to sink the dems and pushed back against the apathy as hard as I could. I was pretty devastated when kamala took the stage at the DNC and gave her support for, “a strong military” and talked about her gun or what ever. After that was just going through the motions and convincing myself I wasn’t crazy for not wanting trump to win this badly.
The way I see it now, and will remember as we go in the future the DNC offers nothing. That’s not fair, they do a lot of good for state and local governments but at a federal level, they will never be able to effect real change. Maybe it’s because the way the fed is setup or for what ever other reason. It’s not that the leadership has failed, it’s that they can’t win. I’ve hopped to lots of different possible solutions for Americans over the years and I guess there is one way out. Until we see liberals migrate away from the cities and take root in the land we will never have a government that represents them. That’s where the war will be fought. Until then, even if Trump doesn’t crown himself king asshole it’s the RNC’s game the DNC just resets the board.
I think the Democrats needed a solid message and populist policy. The “opportunity economy” sounded like a vague platitude, and her policies were weak tea like increasing the child tax credit and helping to fund down payments on houses.
Remember Primaries? Of course that would require the DNC not to turn out the lights when they hear something they don’t like.
“But you had one with Biden and he appointed Harris so you chose that!!!”
“I didn’t hear anyone calling for other candidates.”
That was a response I got from a guy when I brought up the botched primary all thanks to Biden’s hubris.
Like, no shit Sherlock, we couldn’t call for anyone else, there was no time!
My ballot had two choices: Biden and uncommitted. I voted uncommitted.
A primary with one name on the ballot is not a primary.
Biden left his run so late they just appointed someone else and “that’ll do!”
And then called us naive idealists for wanting… Checks notes democracy when the democracy is at stake.
This right here is why the Republicans won. All I see below me is finger pointing and blame tossing. Republicans have got their shit on lockdown. You guys can’t even figure out who to blame.
It’s easy to look like they “got their shit on lockdown” when they’re straight-up copying the fascist playbook.
The blame game isn’t helpful, though. Divide and conquer is from that same fascist playbook. Blaming anyone except the Republican establishment serves only to diminish their primary role in this situation, and further divide us from each other. We have to stop attacking fellow victims and put that blame squarely where it belongs.
The plan is the same as it has been since the dawn of time: The obscenely rich pit the peasants against each other to maintain their wealth and power. That’s it. That’s what it’s always been. The oligarchs have taken over every aspect of our government, including SCOTUS, and personally own most of our former prestigious trusted new sources. Now propaganda organs.
The United States of America as we knew it is over. Welcome to The Fourth Reich. Enjoy the next 2 months, or use them to plan an exit strategy.
They know exactly who is to blame. But that would involve some degree of self-reflection so, on with the show… i guess.
*woops misread the implication
It’s pretty stupid of Dems to think that white conservative racists are going to vote for a black-indian woman? WHAT were they thinking?!!!
Or, apparently, a metric fuckton of Latino males. Muy macho, hombres. Gracias, pendejos.
They were thinking exactly what they were paid to think.
Liberals all over Lemmy are having a genuine, threatening existential crisis right now and it’s so fucking hilarious. Like, I am laughing at them from the depths of my soul right now.
Imagine being a liberal, thinking this entire time that you have the correct worldview, you are a “good person” and on the “right side”.
And then reality comes crashing down on you. That must be genuinely traumatizing for people as weak as liberals.
Looks like the leftists were correct the entire time. Shocker.
No leftist would be bragging about a Trump win. A leftist would be worried about the people who are in danger now. You’re not a leftist if this is your belief.
Their comment history is fucking insane. They appear to support accelerationism, so they got what they wanted.
Wow, you know empathy is free, right?
Nah, for some people empathy has the insurmountable cost of destroying the world view which puts them on top.
Imagine thinking you’re badass alpha male Chad, and falling to your knees the second a Strong Daddy in a suit or uniform tells you what to think and do. You guys are absolutely pathetic. No one admires you.
Like all political “analysis”, this one is just another bit of meaningless preaching.
Seems more like a boastful “I was right” from those that ensured they were right.
Maybe you should call on the candidate to have less bad positions than try to call on voters to support them despite their bad positions. For some reason ‘she’s electable if you vote for her’ seems to keep being a losing strategy.
Reminder - Americans didn’t just vote “no” on Kamala Harris because she had bad positions. They also voted “yes” for a guy with 34 felony convictions and almost no positions except “immigrants are bad”. He vastly fails the standard you’re applying to Harris. I think the two most likely reasons the election came out the way it did are A) it was rigged by Republicans, or B) a vast swath of America is incredibly fucking stupid. Option B seems a lot more rational to me.
Democrats shouldn’t be trying to get Republicans to vote for them. We know who they are. They’ve told us over and over and over again. Forget them. Work on turning out your base, and the independents, and people who don’t normally vote. Have a strong, populist message and a solid narrative.
Democratic strategists keep refusing to learn the lesson that presidential elections are about driving turnout. Centrist swing voters are a red herring and the way to win is to enthuse the base. Her positions failed to enthuse the base and so they were bad. It’s much easier for the right to enthuse the base because their base is morons who are going to project whatever they believe onto the candidate as long as they dog whistle enough.
Trump is horrible and wrong, but he had a solid message. I could tell you what he’s about in 5 minutes without having to think about it.
What could you say about Harris besides “she isn’t Trump”? She wants an opportunity economy? What is that? How would it work? Why was she even running?
Refusing to wat?? Driving voter turnout was probably the central theme of the whole Harris campaign. Maybe not in enough memes, I dunno.
Maybe if you get enough celebrities to endorse you, that’ll drive turnout. Oh, and the Cheneys. Because everybody loves them.
In part, yes, but it’s a more complicated issue though. It’s a death by thousand cuts.
There’s also the whole doubling-down on the Israel-Palestine conflict, Twitter propping up the far-right everywhere it can, etc.
I find this whole Israel-Palestine vote-boycott so stupid and irritating.
Did anyone ever think beyond virtue-signaling? What were they hoping, that Trump forgets he wants to stand behind Nettanyahu no matter what?
In order to “boycott” a “fascist President”, they let their own country elect another one. Great, now there are two of them.
Seriously, they want to “stop fascism at all costs”, but when they actually have the chance to stop a fascist from taking office, they refuse.
I have lost all hope for humanity, have a nice day.
The harris campaign decided to be pro-war and buddy up with incredibly unpopular warmonger dick cheney.
She put no significant distance between her foreign policy and trump’s. If you really think lemmy lefties are the reason harris lost then you probably haven’t been outside in a long time
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“Are the Russian bots in the room with us right now, or only outside so you don’t come in contact with reality?”
So many times I saw people on Lemmy saying they weren’t going to vote because of [insert Reason X]
Everytime I told them they should, I was brushed off with some stupid Argument.
Well, I congratulate everyone who did that. You now live in a country headed by someone openly flirting with fascism. I really hope [Reason X] was worth it. And I really hope [Reason X] won’t get worse under Trump (it will). You failed to prevent a fascist from raising to power just so you could virtue-signal.
Harris lost by significant margins. Lemmy lefties had no impact on this outcome.
Not just here. This was on all social media
Social media lefties had no significant impact on this outcome. Twitter is not real life
I doubt that. Consider what we saw with all of the COVID disinformation on social media. I think the idea that social media has no impact on election results is very wrong.
Extremely wrong
It has an impact on right wingers, not normies or center/left people
The democrats shifted right, and yet the fault is still on those that didn’t vote?
Democrats since Clinton have been Reagan Republicans. I don’t like that at all. But they ain’t Nazis, like the modern Republican party. Fuck, I’m depressed.
yes. yes, it is. Those that didn’t vote failed to stop fascism from rising.
Even if you think that Democrats are too conservative, the alternative you chose and got is Trump.
Also the phrase goes “stop fascism at all costs” not “stop fascism at all costs except when the alternative has shifted a bit to the right (but in no way as far as the fascists we would be trying to stop) and now is too conservative for you”
Those that didn’t vote failed to stop fascism from rising.
The Democratic party, who failed to rally non-voters and instead chose to try and court Republican voters to their cause, failed to stop fascism from rising.
Stop blaming voters for politicians running on unpopular policies. I’ve checked repeatedly today, Harris lost Michigan by under 100,000 votes, but there were over 100,000 protest votes during the primary.
Before the election, 35% of Pennsylvania voters and 37% of Arizona voters polled said they would be more likely to vote for Harris if they would agree to cease weapons shipments to Israel without contingencies. The DNC sent Bill Clinton to lecture the residents of Michigan about why Israel is justified in killing their loved ones instead of, idk, taking a stance that could win you much needed votes in a swing state. They brought Republican after Republican to speak at the DNC, but allotted no time for Palestinian Democrats to speak.
They gave their own constituents the middle finger, like always, while demanding their unwavering support. All while being more concerned about trying to win over Republicans instead of rallying their own non-voters to the polls.
Gee, that sure worked out great for them, is that the voter’s fault too? It’s astounding how the same people who were insulting and condescending to conflicted Dem voters the last couple weeks are now screeching and crying that it’s the fault of the people they insulted and bullied that they lost.
Y’all don’t have mirrors you can look in? Maybe start there, and understand why you can’t dismiss the concerns of entire swaths of your constituency and still feel entitled to their support, regardless of the dire threat that the Democrats didn’t take seriously enough.
Hard to argue against these points. The DNC does not know how to play to win. It’s like they’re all living in 1998. Moreover, they don’t seem to want to win. Which is palpable. They are woefully out of touch and it seems incredibly difficult to pierce the veil of sanctimony that enshrouds the party elites.
The DNC’s abject blunders have committed America to 12 continuous years now without any effective government. Which is untenable. The message to Dem elites needs to be crystal clear: You aint gotta go home, but you can’t stay here. Retire, or otherwise fuck off.
“If liberals are so fucking smart why do they lose so goddamn always?”
- Will McAvoy “The Newsroom”
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.”
–Upton Sinclair
“Vote for my shitty policies or the other guy will have shittier policies” is not a platform.
The point of a democratic republic is that elected officials enact the policies those who elect them want. If you don’t offer to enact those policies you don’t get elected.
Yes, non-voters were stupid to not vote for the lesser evil, but the Harris campaign violated the very basis of democracy and thought they could simply use Trump to bully people into voting for them.
Imagine a system where a fascist Boogeyman is held up every election and people reliably vote against them without regard for who they vote for. The other party could put up whatever shitty candidate they wanted whether they espouse the views of the population or not.
Not only is that not at all a fucking democracy, it was the documented strategy of the Democratic party! Except it doesn’t fucking work, which they should have learned in 2016.
Imagine a system where a fascist Boogeyman is held up every election and people reliably vote against them without regard for who they vote for. The other party could put up whatever shitty candidate they wanted whether they espouse the views of the population or not.
Except when the other party sees they lose 3/4 elections in a row by putting up fascist boogeymen, they will statistically stop doing that, since it’s a losing strategy. They can only keep doing that because Americans are showing them that they actually like it better than an actual human being.
5·4 hours agoThe other party could put up whatever shitty candidate they wanted whether they espouse the views of the population or not.
Like genocide! Or 99% of the other candidates facist policies. Or …
If you don’t vote, you are part of the problem.
Yes, its random lemmy posters that made Harris have a shit campaign that didn’t get out the vote. Vote for another centrist in the primary in 4 years whose main appeal is “I’m not Vance” and lets see how 2028 goes.
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Not saying it’s your “fault” but not voting means you’re ok with the republicans being in power. That’s all I’m saying.
Let’s change the language a bit: voting is every citizens’ civic duty.
Whether we have a favorite candidate or not, the duty is still to show up, just as it’s a candidate’s duty to present their campaign platform. Both sides have to show up in order for the plane to get off the ground.
In this case, the plane sits on the tarmac, a smoking ruin.
Really think it was the the leader not offering enough.
I genuinely think it can be both. Voters were too short-sighted to see their self-interest and Dem leaders didn’t convince them
That is your Opinion, and you’re entitled to that.
But all of those that decided not to vote could have stopped the rise of fascism and chose not to.
I don’t blame that on the opposition. I blame that on those accepting its rise and refusing to stop it.
You don’t blame the fascism on the literal fascists?
Interesting
You can blame the fascism on the literal fascists. They’re backed by the neo-monarchists who have tons of money to spend (and spent it!) converting discontents into more fascists.
Do you want to blame the discontents without a reasonable option who saw their news agencies and social media pointing towards the new Mussolini? There’s millions of them, and they can barely reason to tie their own shoes. The GOP has been banking on them since the 1970s, though the propaganda projects started when great depression living conditions weren’t sweet enough for the proletariat, and FDR created the New Deal to stop communist revolution.
It’s why in the states communism is a word of disparagement when the alternative is monarchism, and capitalism always drifts towards autocracy, then monarchism, and then collapse.
Blame who you want, but ultimately it is a machine running on natural forces. Even in the end of this campaign (when – in retrospect – it was already too late) the media was trying to inform some people (who?) that the comparisons between the Trump campaign and policies, and Hitler’s campaign and policies were very similar, enough to call both one-party autocracy propped up by fascist enemy-within rhetoric.
Nothing to do now but watch everyone get what they bought and paid for.
I think you missed that they know that they’re Nazis and are proud of it.
Don’t blame people for wanting to hide from the nazis
Flags really checking out here.
Oh sod fucking off.
Trump has openly stated his support, unconditional, for Israel. And yet I am here opposing him, advocating for the candidate that had a more nuanced and reasonable take. Chastising those that let him get elected and let him and Nettanyahu have their way. And now you’re trying to turn this on me?
sod fucking off.
Yup. Democratic leadership would rather trump win than run a left-facing campaign and candidate. What’s the definition of insanity?
Unchecked Pathological Greed. The entire reason The United States was founded.
Democratic Party : Republican Party :: Washington Generals : Harlem Globetrotters
Democratic leadership has to call corporate donors before they can make any decisions
Same with Republicans. They follow the Koch funded Heritage Foundation script to the letter.
100%
Here in deep-red Missouri the $15 minimum wage passed in a landslide, but for some reason, all Democrats wanted to talk about was tax cuts that no one thinks they’ll actually pass anyway.
Democratic consultants. The problem.
Democratic leadership is those of us who do the thankless work of playing politics to help others.
Find something different. You won’t. Sure Progressive Party Whatever - they’ll run into the exact same thing. You’re re-inventing the wheel because you don’t know that.
That’s…
I’m not sure we’re all talking about the same thing. The Democratic Party has been playing to the “center” longer than any of us have been alive, while shunning, excommunicating, and often literally arresting anyone to the left. And all that accomplishes and has ever accomplished is the Overton window shifting further and further right. Kamala was running on bragging about hiring “the good” republicans while sidestepping the massive issues anyone even slightly progressive wanted to talk about (and what almost surely turned off a huge portion of voters), which is the ongoing genocide in Gaza. She finally said the day before the election that she would do “everything in her power to end the war,” which is still not nearly enough when discussing a fuckin genocide.
So many of the people I know are leftists. None of them voted for her because of it. Sure, the democrats and liberals I know did—my parents, for example. But they have voted democrat the entire time I’ve been alive. They are solid, reliable Dem voters. They’re not the people she needed to appeal to either—but keeping them was certainly more important than any mythical “centrist/swing” voter.
Everyone that was arrested for sitting in school buildings protesting the genocide, everyone who is sickened by what we’re seeing. Who couldn’t stomach voting for someone who didn’t feel the need to say it was a genocide that sickens them. THOSE are the people the dems gain when, like in 2020, things are so bad they hold their noses and increase turnout, and they’re the votes they lose when they hold office and maintain the genocidal status quo.
Who has been arrested for not being Dem enough? Oh, that’s right. Nobody. And the Republicans have never, will never, and absolutely will never stop Gaza genocide.
Fuck Putin.
The Democratic Party is basically dead now. Time to sit back and watch the MAGAs eat themselves. Clock ticking.
You won’t live long enough to see the end of MAGA. You will live to see the end of American Democracy.
Well that’s one way to look at this positively.
How do you see this going down? Internal power struggles and tantrum hissy fits?
Yeah no. I hate the democrats, I’m a registered libertarian. The popular vote said they’re fine with project 2025.
I don’t really care what issues anyone had. It was exesetential. We failed. That’s not a party issue, it’s an American issue. I don’t care about turnout, if you didn’t turn out you don’t care. Thats not on the party that’s on you. I don’t care about policy, it’s all about to get worse, we’ve seen it. Parties cease to matter when there’s dead bodies in the halls of government. We all saw the worst fucking coup attempt in history… And it worked. There is no party to blame for that. 2016 came down to poor leadership, this is just… deserved.
We’ll see what’s left to re-build with.
