Jill Stein
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People aren’t robots who can fight just as well next to enemies when it’s in their interest. When someone embraces people who want to harm them, it’s a struggle to maintain effort and enthusiasm. I will second the notion that this looks like it was why Harris failed – she ran for the right instead of rallying the left, and just a few too many gave up. Let people join your fight, sure, but don’t compromise your real support for them.
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& @ficuswhisperer & @chenille Sorry to break it to you, Liz Cheney had almost nothing to do with Harris losing. Harris lost because of misogyny and racism.
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Here’s an example of someone I would ally with, because he has admitted he was wrong, and he has come to us, rather than asking us to meet him.
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That doesn’t change the fact that once again, you have people saying “Oh the Democrats lost because they didn’t ally with people they disagreed with” WHEN THEY ACTUALLY DID DO THAT AND STILL LOST.
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I didn’t just mean Liz, but I wouldn’t be surprised if she had as much or more to do with the outcome than Jill Stein did.
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No one is shunning moderates in the Democratic Party. Who is shunning them? See, this is my problem with the media. They continually trot out right wing talking points as if they are fact, when they aren’t. The Democratic Party is the big tent party in American politics. Not the Republicans. There are conservative Democrats, moderate Democrats, neoliberal Democrats, libertarian Democrats, progressive Democrats, and socialist Democrats. We have all that, and we mostly work together and get along. Hell, we ally with independents in Congress like Bernie Sanders and Angus King all the fucking time. This is not why we’re losing.
ETA: Also, as far as shunning moderates…the moderates control the party. Not progressives. So if anyone is shunning anyone, it’s moderates shunning progressives. But the progressive wing of the party, unfortunately in my opinion, is a small minority, both among elected officials and among voters. Us shunning moderates wouldn’t have much of an effect on anything.
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You mean like Liz Cheney? Because that’s what’s been put front and center in this discussion. I didn’t bring her up.
If Murkowski crosses the aisle, there are a lot of “progressives” who would shun her, and any Democrats who worked with her. I know you already highlighted Walsh, and I agree it always helps when someone who had been that wrong takes the initiative, but that shouldn’t be the limit to alliance against fascism. Especially now, when we have the opportunity to prevent it from really taking hold.
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No, but you brought up the idea of allying with people we disagree with, and I pointed out that whether or not that’s a good idea is highly dependent on who the person is and what we’re disagreeing about, so I brought up Cheney as an example of someone I don’t think we should ally with. But you did mention shunning moderates, and I don’t see that happening anywhere. Is that actually a thing that’s happening?
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But the central problem in American politics is never who people vote for, it is always whether people vote. Democrats win when they inspire people to turn out. Obama did despite the handicap of racism. Am I wrong in thinking Harris decided to fight for the handful of centrists instead? Because to me that’s the problem, forgetting where your real support is to be found.
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Citation needed. And again, progressives are a very small percentage of elected Democrats and voters, so what difference would that make? Hakeem Jeffries and Nancy Pelosi would absolutely welcome her.
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Yes, I think you’d be wrong to say Harris decided to fight for the centrists. I think she saw support from Democrats across the spectrum (and should have received that support, based on the progressive nature of the Biden admin, which she was a part of) and was working to expand her voting base into moderate and Never Trump Republicans. What she clearly didn’t count on was the racism and misogyny of the entire US electorate, across the spectrum. And that makes me depressed to write that, but it’s the logical conclusion.
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I feel like I’m taking crazy pills. There’s a whole fucking thread here on the topic!
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She campaigned with Liz Cheney and probably promised her a seat in her cabinet. She promised to put a Republican in her cabinet, and that was almost certainly going to be Cheney. She barely mentioned LGBTQ people throughout the campaign. Trans people weren’t mentioned once at the DNC. When Trump was airing all those anti-trans attack ads during football games, she never once addressed them. Complete silence. Also, while she did praise the Biden administration, she also tried to distance herself from it when asked if she would continue those policies. I got the impression she was trying to appeal to the center. I am on the far left. I did not feel appealed to. Fuck, as a trans woman, I felt thrown under a goddamn bus!
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What thread is that?
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Guessing it’s this one:
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That’s not about shunning. What, are we supposed to pretend the Democratic Party is perfect? We can’t criticize it?
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I don’t even know anymore. I feel like I lost the script about 20 replies back, so I’m going to bow out for now.
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I wasn’t aiming my reply at you. Sorry. I didn’t mean to shoot the messenger. I’m going to bed, though. It’s late, and I need sleep.
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For the record, I checked, and she actually had 0.862 million votes making 0.56% of the total – more than RFK Jr. or the libertarians but less than them together. In an election with 64% turnout. I don’t think her voters helped but they are not the main problem, and if we are talking about welcoming potential allies I don’t see the sense in condemning them.
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