2020 Democratic Primary

[Cristalle]

There is always the ever present "You made me do this". So what if so many people are hurt or even die (this was true even pre-pandemic as Trump, McConnell and the rest of that party chose to do its very best to break the back of the ACA).

Yes, it is pretense. Role play. I certainly didn't expect it of Cristalle, certainly of Bubblesort and Aeon, but here we are.

Expect what? You mean you haven't read a thing I said about how I'd vote.

 

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

There is always the ever present "You made me do this".

You'd think anyone that easy to manipulate would be especially vulnerable to a concerted effort by expert psy-ops with decades of organizational experience.

 

[danielravennest]

This state has mail-in voting but only if you qualify with an actual reason - you gotta be disabled, elderly, in the hospital, planning to be out of town on election day, etc.

Pandemic is an actual reason. They could add that as a valid reason and let most people do it that way rather than herds in polling places.

 

[Spirits Rising]

And here we have it. Wah, I can't have my way so I'm going to take my toys and run away. I'm glad that you would feel better knowing your "social obligation" is gone. Here is the real world, we can't just shrug of our social obligation.

I'll add to the above that here in the real world, being Independent politically does not mean that you present yourself as an arrogant, petulant child who must be made to vote for someone (often masked as "earning" a vote). It means that you place your vote where it actually matters and are pragmatic about doing so.

Or rather, it did once upon a time.

There are people in my generation (I'll be 37 this year) who are so bloody deluded by the flashy tactics and empty promises (yes, empty - a Presidential can't snap their fingers and deliver those oh so lovely campaign promises on a whim, no matter how much you believe otherwise) that they're willing to threaten any number of things if they don't get their way. Hell they're willing to swallow the rhetoric as well!

Real change takes time, revolution (and no, not a violence free one) or a catastrophe to implement. Until this shit show of a "Presidency" were were still oh so slowly making needed strides where the Disabled (Hi), POC, LGBT (Hi) and other marginalized groups are concerned.

It used to be that people actually understood that concept. now so many seem to think - by their actions and choices - that it can all be had right now if we only just elect the right people.

There is a lot more involved and honestly people need to wake the fuck up and grow the fuck up.

We do not have a viable system in place to allow for anything beyond a Two Party system - a Third Party Candidate being elected to either the House or the Senate is (last I checked) a relative rarity, let alone anything higher.

Can it happen one day? Sure - we're a long way away from that with none of the actual groundwork laid.

If you wish to create change in the meantime, you'll have to do it from within - meaning actually participate and stop demonizing the present "left leaning" party.

Have an issue with The Establishment? Work to change it. See above.

The worst part of all of this is that we have people who will demonize anyone that understands all of this, demonizing realists for their choices.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Strikes me that, since, because of Covid-19, no one knows what the US' (or anyone else's) health care system will look like this time next year, or society or the economy, other than very different from how they look today, it's probably not too good an idea to take entrenched positions today about what health provision should look like in the future.

While I'm now officially out of the political prophecy game, I'm as sure as I can be that the US healthcare system is going to be tested pretty severely in the coming weeks and months, and parts of it are going break, I fear, and that as a result of the pandemic and its aftermath, some people will be a lot more receptive to the idea of some form of national health service in the US than they are at present.

It's also, I think, almost certainly the case that the Trump administration will be shown calamitously wanting in its response to the multiple crises in a way it's impossible to spin or obfuscate, so many Republicans are going to be rethinking their slavish loyalty to the beloved leader, and it's also actuarially very likely that, because of the current incumbents' advanced years, the senior leadership of both parties in Congress will be quite different by then.

I think things are going to develop very rapidly over the next few years in ways no one can really predict.

 

[Brenda Archer]

Do NOT play these at work or in the presence of small children.

I apologize in advance.

The original:



The remix, which is funnier:

 

[Innula Zenovka]

 

[Aeon Jiminy]

Maybe until enough of them follow the example of people like A O-C by joining the Democratic Party and working within it to transform it into a truly progressive organisation by democratic means and persuasion rather than by trying to hijack it or fire shots across its bows, as you put it, from outside (how well did that work out for you?).

I don't think trying to "warn" the Democratic Party was successful in changing anything about the Democratic Party beyond making them more creative with their theatre. The Democratic Party is going where it's going and I'm not sure that any kind of vote is going to stop them. I have to say that the Democratic Party is amazingly effective at vilifying and extinguishing any type of resistance or self-reflection. We learned from our transformation in the early 90's, that core values are more fluid than solid.

This brings us to AOC and Bernie, for that matter. They sure are something. My god, they can inspire a crowd like nobody can. Their story isn't written, yet. They are using their Progressive torches to light up the dungeons of the Democratic Party and show us all of treasure stored there. There's Universal Health Care, blah, blah, blah. We all know these values and believe in them. Amen. It's what they refuse to light up, in the name of the Party, that makes everything pointless... election integrity.

You're right. You work within the system. You become the system. You die within the system. The system is unfolding "Hope and Change 2.0". We're going back before Hillary Clinton, Trump, Sanders, Wikileaks, Manning, Snowden, DWS, Gabbard, Donna Brazile, DNC, CNN, Russia, voter purginging, exit polls, delayed results, caucus, Apps, closed polling places, ... rewind to our happy place. We will have our good friend Joe Biden and an energetic person of color, like AOC, fighting the big bad Republicans to try to get us a Public Option in what promises to be on of the biggest economic disasters this country has ever seen.

You and the majority of this forum, are likely very right. The Democratic Party is a transformative organization. You put in people like Bernie Sanders, AOC, Barack Obama, Jesse Jackson, Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris, Julian Castro, and it spits out Joe Biden to thunderous applause and reverence. That is something. It's change.

It's better than Trump. We've made a difference! It might very well be the only thing left standing. Jill Biden may end up being the prophet of swallowing.

I might end up cheering a victory with you. Who knows at this point? Everyone has their limits.

 

[Brenda Archer]

I don't think trying to "warn" the Democratic Party was successful in changing anything about the Democratic Party beyond making them more creative with their theatre. The Democratic Party is going where it's going and I'm not sure that any kind of vote is going to stop them. I have to say that the Democratic Party is amazingly effective at vilifying and extinguishing any type of resistance or self-reflection. We learned from our transformation in the early 90's, that core values are more fluid than solid.

This brings us to AOC and Bernie, for that matter. They sure are something. My god, they can inspire a crowd like nobody can. Their story isn't written, yet. They are using their Progressive torches to light up the dungeons of the Democratic Party and show us all of treasure stored there. There's Universal Health Care, blah, blah, blah. We all know these values and believe in them. Amen. It's what they refuse to light up, in the name of the Party, that makes everything pointless... election integrity.

You're right. You work within the system. You become the system. You die within the system. The system is unfolding "Hope and Change 2.0". We're going back before Hillary Clinton, Trump, Sanders, Wikileaks, Manning, Snowden, DWS, Gabbard, Donna Brazile, DNC, CNN, Russia, voter purginging, exit polls, delayed results, caucus, Apps, closed polling places, ... rewind to our happy place. We will have our good friend Joe Biden and an energetic person of color, like AOC, fighting the big bad Republicans to try to get us a Public Option in what promises to be on of the biggest economic disasters this country has ever seen.

You and the majority of this forum, are likely very right. The Democratic Party is a transformative organization. You put in people like Bernie Sanders, AOC, Barack Obama, Jesse Jackson, Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris, Julian Castro, and it spits out Joe Biden to thunderous applause and reverence. That is something. It's change.

It's better than Trump. We've made a difference! It might very well be the only thing left standing. Jill Biden may end up being the prophet of swallowing.

I might end up cheering a victory with you. Who knows at this point? Everyone has their limits.

I appreciate that my mind is a bit mush from my usual chronic illness and what is probably the flu, but even I can tell this is word salad.

Again: at the risk of repeating myself: nobody is making you vote for Democrats. Nobody can make you do anything.

If you really believe Republican Dominionists are making the better argument, that’s where you belong.

If you don’t believe that, you’ll have to enter into coalitions with people you don’t perfectly like, just to get anything done. If you dislike the rabble and the outsiders and the working class people that have made up such a large part of the center-left coalition, why are you even here?

You could, if you need a libertarian party, actually start building one and pull Right wing support away from the extreme Right. That would actually be useful (from my point of view as an antifascist) and it would keep you away from the Bernie coalition that you don’t really understand.

 

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

why are you even here?

 

[Anya Ristow]

CNN publishes op-eds from both Biden and Sanders on coronavirus:

Joe Biden: The virus lays bare the shortcomings of the Trump administration

Bernie Sanders: Coronavirus highlights the flaws in our health care and economic systems

 

[Cristalle]

Right. My post pushed you to it. You weren't already headed that direction. Tell yourself what you want.

Push? No. Your words, not mine.

 

[Brenda Archer]

Push? No. Your words, not mine.

I can’t conceive of a situation that would make me do anything but vote against the Trumpists and it’s unfathomable to me that anyone sensible would consider anything else, especially in the current environment of government fuck ups.

You can’t punish corporate Dems by voting for corporate Trumpists or not voting in purple states. It’s just win win all around for the international corporate types when local interests silence themselves.

But if you really want to be a Republican while McConnell, Pence and Trump fuck up pandemic for profit. Go right ahead.

There is no party loyalty. There is no daddy figure rescuer and no scapegoat.

There’s only activism, most of it underfunded, trying to push ordinary people’s interests in the face of a corporate owned government.

We don’t have a party. But if you can’t see that liberalism still is a sight better than fascism, by all means vote for fascism and see who REALLY winds up getting punished.

It won’t be the corporate types.

Who are you trying to punish?

 

[Cristalle]

I can’t conceive of a situation that would make me do anything but vote against the Trumpists and it’s unfathomable to me that anyone sensible would consider anything else, especially in the current environment of government fuck ups.

You can’t punish corporate Dems by voting for corporate Trumpists or not voting in purple states. It’s just win win all around for the international corporate types when local interests silence themselves.

But if you really want to be a Republican while McConnell, Pence and Trump fuck up pandemic for profit. Go right ahead.

There is no party loyalty. There is no daddy figure rescuer and no scapegoat.

There’s only activism, most of it underfunded, trying to push ordinary people’s interests in the face of a corporate owned government.

We don’t have a party. But if you can’t see that liberalism still is a sight better than fascism, by all means vote for fascism and see who REALLY winds up getting punished.

It won’t be the corporate types.

Who are you trying to punish?

Where did I say any of that? It's like you all are hearing what you want to hear.

 

[Salome]

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Thread

 

[Brenda Archer]

Where did I say any of that? It's like you all are hearing what you want to hear.

But you threaten Dem exit as if it’s persuasive. It’s not.

 

[Cristalle]

But you threaten Dem exit as if it’s persuasive. It’s not.

Just because I'm unregistering from the party doesn't translate to becoming a Republican or all that other stuff. That's directly contrary to "least harm."

 

[Salome]

I think after tonight everyone that has been pushing the “cognitive decline” bullshit needs to examine the sources they trust who helped seed that in their heads.

they won’t, of course. But they should.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

I think after tonight everyone that has been pushing the “cognitive decline” bullshit needs to examine the sources they trust who helped seed that in their heads.

they won’t, of course. But they should.

I was about to post exactly the same thing.

I didn't watch the debate, but from what I've read Biden certainly seems to have given a fluent and assured performance that, at the very least, should put to rest concerns about his "cognitive decline" and so forth.

Does anyone who expressed concerns on this score want to comment?

Seems to me that, since by all accounts he more than held his own against Sanders in the debate, people might begin to wonder what they should give for Sanders' chances in a confrontation with Trump, particularly since he failed to make much headway against an opponent with whom, we were confidently told, Trump would wipe the studio floor.

To borrow a remark attributed to the economist John Maynard Keynes, "when events change, I change my mind. What do you do? "