It’s true. I’m sick of Republicans but I’m also sick of weak, ineffectual Democrats who keep rolling over and snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. When it comes down to it, most Democrats are still capitalists which does not help to solve the issues at hand. We need a real leftist party who will actually take action and change this country for the better.
i always knew we had more in common than we did dividing us
You have a choice between a room temperature Pepsi and being hit in between the eyes with a hammer repeatedly, and while I am also sick of this stupid binary choice, I don’t keep voluntarily choosing the hammer. This is truly a “we’ve tried nothing and are all out of ideas” scenario.
If you cannot refuse both, there is no choice. You’re just forcing people to drink lukewarm pepsi by threatening them with a hammer between the eyes.
For the most realistic path to that end, the hammer would become so unpopular that an actually decent choice would stand a chance of being more than a spoiler to the Pepsi. For that to work, the Pepsi would need at least twice the approval of the hammer, which would require compromise for the sake of common purpose. Then, the decent alternative would need to be united enough to start pulling the balance, which would also require compromise on lesser points.
But that level of unity seems impossible for many of the progressive factions I see. They’re fed up with compromise, and I get it. I just don’t think a lasting improvement will happen without it.
But that level of unity seems impossible for many of the progressive factions I see. They’re fed up with compromise, and I get it. I just don’t think a lasting improvement will happen without it.
Do you think that compromise is what the party has been doing with progressives?
Do you think that compromise is what they have been doing with republicans?
They refuse to compromise with the left. They capitulate to the right and call it compromise.
Democrats need to treat the left like constituents. They need to treat the left better than they do the nazis that want to murder us all in camps. They have refused to do so for decades and it’s really starting to look like they want the same future the nazis want.
Like I said, I get being fed up with compromise. I’m fed up too. But plurality voting sucks, so let’s do some math:
Hammer Party has 45% of the votes. Pepsi Party has 50%. 5% go to some other, minor parties.
Now suppose a Cool Water party appears, clearly better than Warm Pepsi. They start drawing voters, some from the Pepsi, some maybe from non-voters, but the Hammer Party adherents don’t relent. They make it to 10%, with the Pepsi Party now standing at, say, 45%. Hammer are down to 43% thanks to higher turnout. Other parties down to 2%.
Next election, more Pepsi compromise voters are encouraged to vote Water. Water is up to 25%! Hammer is at 38% now – we’re making progress! Except that the Pepsi party now has a maximum of 37%, if there are no non-voters. Hammer party now has the most votes. That’s called the spoiler effect.
Obviously, the Pepsi fraction might see that shift coming and try to avoid it. For that, they’d either have to pull some of the Hammer voters, or accede to the Water voters in hopes of retaining them. Do you think they’ll compromise with Water? And do you think the Water voters are willing to trust that compromise?
Unless you somehow manage to rapidly turn a party up to 50% or win a significant amount of voters from both camps, odds are you’re going to make things worse. Hopefully, they’ll get better after that, unless Hammer Party manages to rig the system in their favour or even get rid of it. Is that a risk worth taking?
For a different example, suppose Water and Pepsi teamed up. Let’s take the initial 5% other voters, manage to push Hammer down to 31% and put the Pepsi party at a solid 64%.
For the next election, hammer and other voters remain the same, but the Water party has split off and immediately pulled a solid 25% of voters. Pepsi is still at 39%, still wins. Not ideal, but better than Hammer, right?
The following election sees even more Water voters, maybe higher turnout too. Hammer down to 30%, other voters 2%. Water and Pepsi are a close race, but turn out 33% to 35% in favour of Water.
That’s what I mean with compromise: strategically creating a statistical base on which change can be built without risking shooting your own foot.
Of course, the best option would be an actually fair voting system, like Ranked Choice (which is probably easiest to explain), but with how things are now, it’d take a lot of prep work and publicity work to get enough people on board so it doesn’t go sideways.
guess who is sick of both rust and bible belt voters
People who don’t want to change their positions to appeal to the electorate.
true. but i guess there might be a bigger party than that…think outside the box…outside the country.
So is the rest of the world. Get your shit together, you maniacs!
So they voted for a dictator to end all this party business.
Edit: I feel like I need to explain this. For those who don’t know, this is from Silence Of The Lambs. The person in the top panel is a serial killer who has the woman in the bottom panel trapped in an old well. He’s telling her that she has to rub lotion on her skin or else he will punish her.
The meme is that we, independent American voters, are the woman trapped in the well, and the two-party, American political system is the serial killer. Liberal technocrats tell us that we must vote for them, regardless of whether or not we feel they will actually represent us, because if we don’t we will get “punished” with the Republicans.
There is no question that complying with the serial killer is a better option than failing to comply and receiving his punishment. But, regardless, we’re trapped in a fucking well, held against our will, by a psycho. Similarly, there’s no question the Democrats are a better option than the Republicans, but either way we’re being ruled against our will, by people we do not like or believe in.
Poor analogy that has no relevance to the political landscape. But thanks for trying to mansplain it.
It has no bearing on your life because you’re not in the hole.
Poor analogy that has no relevance to the political landscape.
I think it’s relevant. I can tell you that are many voting age Americans who feel held hostage by our highly restrictive two party system. You’re not one of them. That’s fine, I’m not trying to describe your experience. I don’t know you, so I don’t know how that would even be possible. I’m describing my experience. You can choose to completely dismiss my experience if you want but I think that shows a real lack of empathy. We get it, you don’t care that millions of Americans don’t feel represented by either political party, but I do care.
that’s why I have affordable healthcare in America, thanks to Biden…
Then run.
Maybe you’ll even win and don’t need to align yourself with either party.
I’m running.
Got my passport, now I just have to figure out where I’m running to.
I’m already on the road ahead of you.
Spent 30 years campaigning, calling, sign waving, writing letters, donating to candidates, causes, and groups. Even ran for office a couple of times. Every year it gets worse and I’ve got kids. They don’t need to live in a dystopian place so we’re on the road. Headed to a developed nation. Greener pastures,.but it’s worth a try.
I could run, but I would almost certainly lose.
The problem is our defacto two party system. With only two parties, a large percentage of the electorate is likely to be left without representation. I don’t want to prevent Democrats from having the representation they want, I just feel like I deserve to have representation too.
At large elections. Sure. I get that.
But local small elections, an independent candidate is viable. And there is plenty that you can do locally to help.
What a useless comment.
Most likely they just didn’t vote.
Same thing. Not voting is explicitly saying either choice is equally good to you.
No, not voting is simply not voting. More to the point, not voting is “explicitly” saying you don’t care enough to spend the time or energy on casting a vote or you couldn’t vote. A person might think it implicitly* says “either choice is equally good”, but then I could argue that the Democrat party implicitly considers “either choice equally good” because they didn’t attempt to earn the votes.
When it’s easier to not vote than come out to vote, then the responsibility is on the candidates to convince their potential constituents to turn out for them.
What an entitled, selfish demand to claim others are responsible to convince you to do the most basic of civic duties. Do you also blame your dentist when you don’t brush? Your doctor when you’re malnourished?
You’re an adult, whether you accept that or not. That means you’re responsible for your choices, including the choice to let an election fall to the greater evil because you couldn’t assed to fill in a ballot for anybody. Nobody else is responsible for you, that’s on you.
By claiming people must vote for the “lesser evil” and nothing else then the party of “lesser evil” implicitly paves the way for people to stop showing up for them, which to that side paves the way for their greater evil to eventually win. -If you think that’s selfish and entitled, then that’s your prerogative, but if you want people support your candidate then you have to get them to want to support your candidate, be it selfish or not.
Good thing I didn’t say you must vote for a certain person or party. Keep making excuses.
And so we’ll get another nazi for president.
I mean, if democrats don’t start trying to appeal to voters, that is what will happen. And you will blame the electorate you have been treating with withering contempt for decades like you do every time you lose.
Then enact a form of ranked-choice or instant-runnoff, or quit complaining.
Oh, darn! If only we’d thought of that sooner! Hold my beer for a moment while I go push the “enact a form of ranked-choice or instant-runnoff” button, that’s just been sitting there this whole time. Why didn’t you suggest that sooner? It would have saved everyone so much trouble.
Ok but that has been a button for decades and we keep deciding other things are more important.
We will do that when we rebuild from the rubble and reinvent government again. Til then, we need practical action now to preserve lives, not ineffectual righteous exhortation.
Unless you have a concrete plan to enact sweeping electoral process changes within our current system. That’s sort of the problem, our system is designed to resist change.
Sorry to be curt, but we all know there are better ways to enact democracy. Being right about the way we should have been voting all along helps no one.
Unless you have a concrete plan to enact sweeping electoral process changes within our current system. That’s sort of the problem, our system is designed to resist change.
Fortunately Trump is helpfully taking a sledgehammer to the whole thing, so there’s an opening for this kind of sweeping reform but the work for that starts now.
I don’t think the Democrats or the Republicans would like that. XD
they agree on what’s good for them but bad for the pubic
I only see that as a plus.
Party A told me that party B is bad. I supported party A but now they are hurting me specifically… BoTh PArTieS!!
Blah blah, BoTh PArTieS
There are a very significant number of shitty, entrenched, high-ranking members of the Democratic Party both in government and throughout the organization itself at the federal and all lower levels who are absolutely in on this. They’re providing a false opposition, appearing to oppose what’s happening intentionally without opposing anything at all. They sabotage and undermine any attempt at resistance or true opposition. They refuse to make an issue of anything that might gain significant traction. They are quiet when they should be loud, and loud when they should be quiet, and this is not an accident, it is a misdirection and a form of self-sabotage.
Remember when they rug-pulled Bernie who was winning the primaries? This is not a new or sudden phenomenon, either. They’ve been working towards this for awhile, and billionaires and corruption have infiltrated both parties maybe not to the same extents but these parties are not your fucking friends. Thinking there’s “one good party” vs “one bad party” is exactly how they want you to think and keeps you locked in that two-party system where both parties are corrupt, “I voted for Kodos” is not a useful choice. The reality is there are very bad people in both parties actively working against the working class real humans just trying to live our own damn lives without getting completely fucked by the economy, the police, healthcare, laws, taxes, social supports or any of the other things they manipulate to make our lives difficult and keep us line. This is class war and the Dems, largely, aren’t going to save you. Some of them are great. You’ll notice none of the “great” ones actually have control over anything, and there’s a reason for that. AOC and Bernie are a threat to the Democratic establishment, and they don’t want that shit any more than the Republicans do.
Trump took over the Republicans and purged everything that wasn’t useful to turn it into his own fascist party. If we all want to rally behind the Democratic Party to oppose it, they must be similarly purged of the corruption that allowed this to happen and continues to enable it. Then and only then can they provide a credible grassroots opposition. Otherwise, we’re just running on the same corrupt treadmill we always have been on.
If we all want to rally behind the Democratic Party to oppose it, they must be similarly purged of the corruption that allowed this to happen and continues to enable it. Then and only then can they provide a credible grassroots opposition. Otherwise, we’re just running on the same corrupt treadmill we always have been on.
Unfortunately a sizable chunk of people would rather burn the whole thing down than put in the necessary work to do this. (See: every fucking primary turnout ever).
democrats successfully argued in court that they don’t have to run honest primaries. They eschewed the primary process entirely for president in 2024, like they had been itching to do since Obama beat clinton in '08.
progressives are absolutely right to not trust the party’s primaries.
The idea that primaries will fix this has been demonstrated beyond doubt to be false by Bernie 2016 and 2020. You won’t force the party to change by playing by its rules.
“Bernie didn’t win so primaries aren’t useful” is a pretty weak ass argument.
I like Bernie. I voted for him, I door knocked for him, I phone banked for him, I’ve been to his rallies. Bernie. Did. Not. Get. Enough. Votes. End of story. If you can’t win the Democratic primary (even with DNC bullshit), I’m skeptical you’ll win the general. We didn’t turn out in high enough numbers in both the 2016 and 2020 primaries. That’s what happened.
You won’t force the party to change by playing by its rules.
And you won’t beat the 2 party system without capturing one of the parties or burning the entire thing to the ground.
Jessica Cisneros. Jamaal Bowman. Cori Bush.
Your party fights progressives but not republicans.
No amount of primaries can solve it either, imo. The problem is parties. One party, two parties, many parties… they all end corrupt. A politician loyalty is not to the voters, or the people, or country. It is first and most to the party, because the party put them in that place, and it can take them away if they don’t stay on their lane. Parties can be, and so most have been, easily infiltrated and corrupted since money is what wins elections.
Citizens United was the nail in the coffin for American democracy IMO. No democracy can survive unlimited money being used as free speech. Those who have the most dollars speak loudest, plutocracy is inevitable, and from there are only paths to even worse forms of government.
Prove it
I mean, give them someone else to vote for first. Have you seen how liberals react when you even hint at the idea of a third party?
Or that they meaningfully be a second party?
source is literally the post.
edit: thought he was referring to OP, not the public
Whoosh.
They say that but they need to prove it by voting differently.
oh, sorry you were complaining about OP, not the public.
I’m complaining about the public. Talk is cheap.
oh, glad we’re clearing it up,
friends?
Acquaintances.
Someone needs to run third party promising to run for only one term and clean up politics in Washington. Ethics reform, a ban on lobbyists, ban advertising in political campaigns, set up public funding for campaigns that reach a certain threshold of support, enact bribery laws with teeth that apply to public servants, etc.
Promote the best advisors and use best judgment on other pressing matters, but focus on taking a sledgehammer to this broken system and restoring democracy.
I’m afraid you’ll need more than one term for that.
