The Left better brace itself for war

[Left Vendetta]

"Progressive" is quickly becoming such an empty term especially in that Hillary Clinton is full-throatedly coopting it, but you make a fair point in that the recession could well come even if Bernie is our next president, especially if he fails to enact his signature proposal, the combination of single payer healthcare plus tax reform, which is likely given his lack of support among the establishment. His attaining the White House is not the only miracle he's tasked with pulling off.

Exactly. You cannot "prevent" a Recession (at least within the possibility of our current political context). I personally think that another "Great Recession" is inevitable in the near future.

 

[gavinfielder]

How does single-payer prevent a recession?

Single payer isn't the issue, disposable income versus rising debt is. Of course, the trigger is undoubtedly going to be the financial markets, which is a separate issue, but one in which Clinton has all the keys to the kingdom and isn't compunctuous to unlock every door in its path.

Sanders and Clinton's policies are not that far apart....so what are you voting for, the man or his policies?

Sanders' policies aren't far from what Clinton says of her policies because it's the only way she's staying in this race. None of it jives with her wall street ties. Her administration would be much like Bill's, except that instead of setting up an economic disaster, she'll be presiding over one. To answer the question, both, but it hardly matters because you fail to see what's at stake.

 

[Lethargic Aptitude]

I need to do a quick preamble on a very important topic, first, before I get into this discussion: Why aren't blacks voting for Bernie Sanders? Now after he's begun losing handedly in this demographic, people are now very concerned about why this is, and in response I think there have been some thoughtful responses in the African-American community, which I encourage people to read. The reasons are interesting and worth taking on board, but the reality is, it's too little and too late. At the core of it, there's a fundamental ideological difference between the two voting blocs that are most necessary to the success of the Democratic party. The first are Millennials, and the second are African-Americans/non-Millennial women.


Millennials have been taking it from the system since they got into the job market, they are "shockingly progressive," it's difficult to understate how irritated and mad they are, and it's also difficult to explain how anti-establishment they are. To contrast this, Hillary represents the Establishment, she's made no bones about how much of a part of the establishment she is, she openly takes money from Wall Street/Big Pharma/private prisons, and she openly will not tolerate single-payer healthcare, free tuition for state schools, and she will not break up the banks. That's a long winded way of saying that Millennials are wildly unexcited about Hillary and fundamentally view her as being "essentially no better than a Republican." On top of this, there is a pretty ubiquitous sense that if anyone other than Bernie is elected, there will be a second financial collapse. That means that for Millennials, Hillary is a pill that is going to be very hard to choke down, and this will cost her votes in the general election.

Blacks and non-Millennial women have different motivations, but the thinking is roughly the same: They want to see someone who they can affect a small amount of change and protect them from their extreme enemy, the Republicans. Particularly Southern Blacks (as per the article above) seem to feel that they are always on the losing end of the stick, so slow and steady change is preferable and sustainable. Women (e.g. in Texas) have been the target of many conservative attacks, and their abortion rights and rights in general have been a target of the extreme Tea Party craze of the last 6 years. Even though Sanders' policies would in principle help blacks and older women, there's a general sense that Hillary will handle this better and so they are willing to accept an ***-****ing from the establishment because for them, it's the lesser of two evils. And this general sentiment has very likely cost Sanders the primary, coupled to a set of other factors (i.e. The Establishment doesn't like it when you're against them).


Now, here's the problem. Democrats absolutely need both Millennials and blacks/women and Latinos to win the upcoming election. Those demographics are the key to the Democratic Party's success (If they get them, they will obliterate the Republicans in 2016). But here's the key problem: Clinton chose the nuclear option on Sanders' supporters as a part of her usual dirty tactics (Bernie bros, attacks on youth, etc) and the problem is that we are not thick enough to think that "Oh, well, Hillary didn't say those things personally, so I guess she isn't responsible for them."

This means that the Left, in terms of serious supporters, is now divided into two halves that are quickly becoming unwilling to work with each other, because they perceive their interests as being ideologically opposed to each other, and view each other's candidates as being wildly unsavory. I don't know what this means for the future, other than that there's about to be a massive war between the Progressive Left and the Neoliberal New Democrats. The Progressive Left is obviously going to win based on demographics, but that may take time --time that we don't have if there's a second Great Recession.

If the radical Left had the balls to have their own party there would be no war.

 

[gavinfielder]

If the radical Left had the balls to have their own party there would be no war.

Oh they do! So many of them do! So many, in fact, that there are a plethora of leftist parties that can't agree with each other long enough to form any functional coalition. The spread of socialist parties alone and how divided they are on Sanders is incredible.

We're stuck with the democratic party and the war brewing within it.

 

[Left Vendetta]

Calling for a revolution because your preferred candidate is losing free and fair elections doesn't sound to me like "what democracy looks like." Quite the opposite, actually.

The problem is that elections are not free and fair. Surely you must be aware of the media blackout during the early stage of Sanders' campaign, the superdelegates, and "big money in politics." Not to mention our Electoral System.

Nevertheless, democracy is irreducible to elections. In the sense of the people "involving in the decision of their own affairs," the US has never truly been a democracy. But the danger is, liberal democracy, though flawed, is under attack from reactionaries today (Trump).

 

[Left Vendetta]

If the radical Left had the balls to have their own party there would be no war.

Do you know how many social, economic, political, and legal obstacles are there for third parties?

 

[Redress]

The problem is that elections are not free and fair. Surely you must be aware of the media blackout during the early stage of Sanders' campaign, the superdelegates, and "big money in politics." Not to mention our Electoral System

Don't forget the conspiricy theories, the victim playing, and the crying.

 

[Moot]

Sanders' policies aren't far from what Clinton says of her policies because it's the only way she's staying in this race. None of it jives with her wall street ties. Her administration would be much like Bill's, except that instead of setting up an economic disaster, she'll be presiding over one. To answer the question, both, but it hardly matters because you fail to see what's at stake.

I think Hillary will build on Obama's policies and so would Sanders since they both voted the same on 90% of the bills passed through congress. But one of the things that seems to separate the two is that Hillary wants to make incremental changes whereas Bernie wants to make a big change all at once. I think Bernie is a "revolution of high expectations" and his supporters are going to be disappointed whether he wins or not. Of course they'll be disappointed because their enthusiasm wasn't enough for Bernie to win the nomination...and because of their high expectations if he won the presidency they will be disappointed because he won't be able to fulfill his revolutionary promises at all. Millennials need to learn that change doesn't happen all at once...at least not in this country it doesn't. Hillary's approach to change may not be revolutionary, but imo, it is more realistic because it's do able and will have more endurance.

 

[gavinfielder]

I think Hillary will build on Obama's policies and so would Sanders since they both voted the same on 90% of the bills passed through congress. But one of the things that seems to separate the two is that Hillary wants to make incremental changes whereas Bernie wants to make a big change all at once. I think Bernie is a "revolution of high expectations" and his supporters are going to be disappointed whether he wins or not. Of course they'll be disappointed because their enthusiasm wasn't enough for Bernie to win the nomination...but they would be even more disappointed if he won the presidency because due to fierce opposition in congress he won't be able to fulfill his promises at all. Millennials need to learn that change doesn't happen all at once...at least not in this country it doesn't. Hillary's approach to change may not be revolutionary, but imo, it is more realistic because it's do able and have more endurance.

Hillary's "change" to which she has any approach is ephemeral where it is not simply destructive. But you're not seeing the more important dynamic in what you say. If there's an opposing congress, it will be due to low turnout and if there's low turnout it will be due to Hillary's nomination in the first place. The DNC itself is moving in this direction with its refusal to make voter registration a priority for fear of Sanders.

Besides, you claim Congress would be opposed to Sanders but Clinton is not the one that's receiving republican endorsements. She's by far the more polarizing figure on the other side of the aisle.

 

[FieldTheorist]

Sanders and Clinton's policies are not that far apart....so what are you voting for, the man or his policies?

That's wholly inaccurate. The idea that "Clinton and Sanders are basically the same candidate but Hillary is just more likely to get a little bit less done than Sanders is, and thus you should split the difference and go for the candidate that's more likely to accomplish their more limited goals." is preposterous. That narrative only makes sense if you refuse to read candidates histories and trust them that they suddenly believe "Not X", rather than the position "X" which they've been advocating for their entire careers.

 

[FieldTheorist]

Is it all that apparent? Bernie has become a media darling, and his small donations are nearly keeping up with Hillary's large ones. Where he's hurting is being up against Hillary's built in advantage with Afro American voters, especially in the South, but this is not the result of a flexing against him of institutional muscle, nor is his too early starting point in putting together a "ground game". The political ties are another matter, as they translate into super delegates and there Hillary is killing him. His one chance is taking her in the big state primaries. If he could, super delegates might start peeling away. Right now it doesn't look likely, which very well could be due in large part to Hillary sounding more and more every day like Bernie Sanders.

"Sound more like" is the key part of that last sentence, but yes, I agree.

 

[Left Vendetta]

Don't forget the conspiricy theories, the victim playing, and the crying.

I have no idea what you're trying to say

 

[FieldTheorist]

That's fine, but you didn't answer my question. Would the dethroned neoliberals migrate to the Repubs?

It's extremely unlikely until Republicans sort out their ****, and even then, it's just unlikely.

 

[DiAnna]

...To answer the question: No. And yes, obviously, if I vote for Hillary --which honestly no matter how much I openly despise her at the moment, that's more than likely-- then it will be because of the SCOTUS nominees and because there's at least a chance she'll do something half-way progressive about the environment.

That's a relief, lol.

But let's flip your narrative around. Republicans aren't going to suddenly stop being crazy, and they aren't suddenly going to stop voting. So if your argument is:

"The Republicans are crazy, so concede on almost every political issue because we need to stop them from accomplishing the most abhorrent, extreme policies they want."

Whoa. I never said anything close to that. You aren't "flipping" my narrative; you're creating a brand new one out of whole cloth.

So let me ask you some follow-up questions.

1.) How much are we willing to completely throw overboard (economic justice, social security/medicare, minimum wage, etc) until we are just overtly doing what Republicans want?

2.) How long should we accept this compromise? We give Republicans 90% of what they want, year after year, and then Democrats will prevent them from enacting the 10% of their truly abhorrent economic and social policies.

3.) Is that an acceptable compromise? Does that sound like a healthy democracy to you? Given that the country has been doing this for over 30 years now, and Republicans have only gotten more frothing at the mouth in terms of their extremist positions... Does this sound like a successful solution to you?

Not going to get into this with you. You are presuming that I am not only a liberal, but a progressive liberal. I assure you, I am not. I am indeed conservative on certain issues, and quite liberal on others. I don't want a completely liberal congress anymore than I want a completely conservative one. In my mind, extreme liberal and extreme conservative are simply different sides of the same coin. Both want to enforce their personal ideologies through force of law. That's unacceptable.

Compromise is not a dirty word. I may not agree with many conservative positions; that doesn't mean that under the constitution and the premise of this great country that they are not entitled to hold those positions, and elect people who share them. Congress works best for the people when it compromises, to get results that both sides can live with. That is why I avoid extremists in both parties, and vote for those who show a willingness to be more moderate, working well with others. It's been a while since I've seen a congress that was able to do that, but hope springs eternal.

The idea that most Independents are genuinely moderate is sort of a misnomer. Most Independents declare themselves to be moderate, but tend to fundamentally be aligned to one ideology and exceedingly rarely actually switch their votes.

I am not "Most Independents", and this kind of willingness to pigeonhole someone based upon a single word is quite frankly an example of dismissive divisiveness on both sides that is tearing society apart.

"New Democrats" refers to the Clinton-era Democrats, not the Progressive Left (pick your favorite term here) that represents the Millennials. But I definitely agree, New Democrats refusing to compromise with their base and instead compromising (meaning giving them 90% of what they want) with the Republican party.

I dislike terms like "Millennials", which seem to give certain people an exaggerated sense of entitlement or vilification, depending upon the happenstance of when they were born. Are these "Millennials" Americans or not? Do they want the best options for this country or just for themselves? Do they consider themselves part of 330 million fellow Americans, or apart from them?

Don't answer those questions, because you can't legitimately speak for millions of other individuals any more than you can legitimately label millions of other individuals based upon presumptive analysis of ideology.

If you want to go to "war" with anyone who does not view the country or their lives through the prism of your personal beliefs, then you are not a solution to the problem; you are part of it.

 

[Moot]

Hillary's "change" to which she has any approach is ephemeral where it is not simply destructive. But you're not seeing the more important dynamic in what you say. If there's an opposing congress, it will be due to low turnout and if there's low turnout it will be due to Hillary's nomination in the first place. The DNC itself is moving in this direction with its refusal to make voter registration a priority for fear of Sanders.

Besides, you claim Congress would be opposed to Sanders but Clinton is not the one that's receiving republican endorsements. She's by far the more polarizing figure on the other side of the aisle.

Hillary has more than proven her endurance both in years and stamina. I don't think many people, including Sanders could've survived the kind of political and personal attacks that Clinton has endured over the years and still have a favorable rating in the national polls...or do as well in the primaries as she has. She is one of the few that has survived to tell the tale. So I think she understands the opposition better than most at both the domestic and international level...and certainly more than any of the other candidates, including Bernie.

I don't think she's nearly as polarizing among democrats as you seem to think ...or as polarizing as Trump and Cruz are among the GOP.

You claimed that Sanders received endorsements from Republicans in congress...do you have a link or is it just wishful thinking?

 

[Hawkeye10]

Don't answer those questions, because you can't legitimately speak for millions of other individuals any more than you can legitimately label millions of other individuals based upon presumptive analysis of ideology.
.

Ya Ya, the old " you are not allowed to talk about the forest, you can only talk about individual trees" argument.....you know who say that? Well let me tell you, it is people who know something about the forest that they dont want the rest of us to know.

ARGUMENT REJECTED

 

[Redress]

I have no idea what you're trying to say

Which is part of what amuses me.

 

[Hawkeye10]

1.) How much are we willing to completely throw overboard (economic justice, social security/medicare, minimum wage, etc) until we are just overtly doing what Republicans want?

Exactly. Look, I am for Trump and because he chose to run as a R I am going to vote for him as an R, but God Damn, we have to resist tyranny! At the very very very very least we have to try to resist tyranny.

 

[FieldTheorist]

I cannot say I agree with most of this.

That's fine, but the Democratic civil war is coming one way or the other. We can be in denial of this fact for a while, but it's as obvious to me now as the downfall of the Republican party was to me in 2010 with the rise of the Tea Party. It's fine if you feel differently, but, again, demographics alone pretty much make the case alone.

You said that liberals are being divided into two camps of "millennials" and others (mostly black).

Well, let's be fair now. That's not what I said; what I said was that there are two voting blocs that were crucial to Obama's success and the continued success of the Democratic party. I never said there was only two blocs --quite the contrary, I literally mentioned a third bloc, Latinos, in the OP. There's many others, but they don't seem to care one way or the other, or otherwise openly agree with Millennials, and thus weren't really relevant to the OP.

Sanders' message of "saving the middle class" and "free college tuition" resonate very well with (ex)-middle class white youth. They are experiencing a new kind of economic security and discontent and that is not witnessed by their parents. They are deprived of the middle class jobs and opportunity that their parents have. Sanders is able to capture this new anger and frustration.

Partially agreed, but I think that it's a little sloppy to follow the Clinton framing that it's "white youth." I think it's also naive to, again, accept the Clinton framing of this as "white youth want more free stuff." It's dangerous for a few reasons, but not the least of which is that it takes real Leftist policy choices as boils them down into Rightist claptrap: "Lazy people want free stuff!" with all of the intended connotations. But otherwise, yes, that's clearly true.

One has to be at least the 90 percentile to even "feel" working-class these days.

Unless you meant something completely different than this, a straightforward reading of that statement is pretty absurd.

The death of the American middle class simply does not have the same stimulating effect on the black Americans and white Americans. Similarly, this also holds true for Latino.

It's far less true for Latinos than it is for blacks, but either way, I did spend a paragraph discussing this in the OP.

You are right there is a new division between a potential rebirth of the Left and the Democratic establishment. This is due to some arbitrary generation difference (there was young people) but the polarization of classes and death of the middle ground known as the middle class. The frustration towards the ruling establishment create an opportunity, but nothing is guaranteed. Proto-Fascist momentum, as represented by Trump, is feeding of this anger as well.

Agreed, but again, this is another thing discussed in the OP.

I don't see how electing a "Progressive" can somehow "prevent" another Great Recession.

Breaking up the banks, reigning in on Wall Street's fraud, jailing bankers who commit crimes, etc, you think will have no affect whatsoever on the future of the American economic stability?

That's either very ignorant or very naive. Perhaps you mean that until capitalism is removed from the public, there will always be economic instability (and income inequality). That I largely agree with, but let's not pretend like there's no shades of grey here in terms of economic and social equality. Liberal Capitalism is definitely better than Feudalism. Keynesian Social Democracy is far better than Liberal Capitalism. And Neoliberal Capitalism has been very, very, very much worse for everyone (actually, the people who've been most hurt by it are minorities, particularly blacks, and poor whites, which has become a completely missed part of recent dialogues). Keynesian Social Democracy is objectively more stable, is objectively more fair, and objectively leads to more equality. Am I a Keynesian Social Democrat? No, not really. Am I going to fight for it? So long as I live in a society supporting Neoliberal Capitalism, then the answer to that is "Hell yes."

 

[FieldTheorist]

Whoa. I never said anything close to that. You aren't "flipping" my narrative; you're creating a brand new one out of whole cloth. Not going to get into this with you. You are presuming that I am not only a liberal, but a progressive liberal. I assure you, I am not. I am indeed conservative on certain issues, and quite liberal on others. I don't want a completely liberal congress anymore than I want a completely conservative one.

You can say that, but you seem quite perturbed that I would consider not voting for Hillary. It seems pretty clear then that you're rightly terrified about what the far Right has planned for America. You can draw your line in the sand at a different place than I do, but we both agree that making serious concessions to the far Right is dangerous and stupid.

In my mind, extreme liberal and extreme conservative are simply different sides of the same coin. Both want to enforce their personal ideologies through force of law. That's unacceptable.

Yes, I want to enforce my personal political ideology through the force of law. That's called democracy. We all do it every time we vote.

Compromise is not a dirty word.

It depends on what the compromise is. The 3/5ths compromise was a pretty dirty compromise.

I may not agree with many conservative positions; that doesn't mean that under the constitution and the premise of this great country that they are not entitled to hold those positions

No one is arguing for limiting freedom of speech.

and elect people who share them.

They get their vote, sure, no one is saying we should deny them that. I'd love it if they also stopped stymieing minorities and the poor in their states from voting. That'd make me believe their elections were actually representative and legitimate.

Congress works best for the people when it compromises, to get results that both sides can live with.

If there was a good reason to believe that the Congress actually fairly representing the views of Americans (and there isn't any good reason), I would agree with this.

That is why I avoid extremists in both parties, and vote for those who show a willingness to be more moderate, working well with others. It's been a while since I've seen a congress that was able to do that, but hope springs eternal.

I sincerely doubt congress will ever do that again, until the party's have a major shift and one ideology comes out on the top. Then there will be a lasting political narrative for some 40 years, and that'll become the new definition of "moderate."

I am not "Most Independents", and this kind of willingness to pigeonhole someone based upon a single word is quite frankly an example of dismissive divisiveness on both sides that is tearing society apart.

Just to be clear here, you're responding to me responding to someone else, so this section of the post wasn't intended for you. So I wasn't accusing you of anything.

I dislike terms like "Millennials", which seem to give certain people an exaggerated sense of entitlement or vilification, depending upon the happenstance of when they were born. Are these "Millennials" Americans or not? Do they want the best options for this country or just for themselves? Do they consider themselves part of 330 million fellow Americans, or apart from them?

This is kind of a silly point, don't you think? The whole reason democracy works is because people join together in groups and fight for what they believe in. Millennials is a real term, it has real ramifications for the people in that group just like there's real ramifications for being an African-American or being a rich white person. Every group in America is naturally going to share similar experiences, it's going to influence their political views, etc. Saying that most Millennials feel X way (Which is factual), that most Millennials vote X way (which is factual), etc, shouldn't be re-interpreted as a question about whether or not they feel like Americans. That'd be like grilling a woman on abortion about whether or not she was "a fellow American" because she kept on joining feminists in a fight for reproductive rights.

 

[Moot]

That's wholly inaccurate. The idea that "Clinton and Sanders are basically the same candidate but Hillary is just more likely to get a little bit less done than Sanders is, and thus you should split the difference and go for the candidate that's more likely to accomplish their more limited goals." is preposterous. That narrative only makes sense if you refuse to read candidates histories and trust them that they suddenly believe "Not X", rather than the position "X" which they've been advocating for their entire careers.

That's an inaccurate interpretation of what I said. My premise is that Sanders is making promises that he can't keep (IE: free college education and single pay healthcare) and I don't see either of those passing congress which means Bernie isn't going to get anything done. On the other hand, Hillary isn't making unrealistic promises ...but incremental bills toward that same goal could, will and have passed congress...which means she stands more of a chance to get more things done than Bernie.

 

[Lethargic Aptitude]

Do you know how many social, economic, political, and legal obstacles are there for third parties?

Yes, but that is no excuse to take over someone else political faction.

 

[Lethargic Aptitude]

Oh they do! So many of them do! So many, in fact, that there are a plethora of leftist parties that can't agree with each other long enough to form any functional coalition. The spread of socialist parties alone and how divided they are on Sanders is incredible.

We're stuck with the democratic party and the war brewing within it.

You are right, leftists are very opinionated. They spend much time thinking that some faction is to this or that, or not enough.

Most Leftists view Sanders as a liberal. While Liberals view him as a progressive. And progressives pretend that he is a socialist.

 

[gavinfielder]

Hillary has more than proven her endurance both in years and stamina. I don't think many people, including Sanders could've survived the kind of political and personal attacks that Clinton has endured over the years and still have a favorable rating in the national polls...or do as well in the primaries as she has. She is one of the few that has survived to tell the tale. So I think she understands the opposition better than most at both the domestic and international level...and certainly more than any of the other candidates, including Bernie.

I don't think she's nearly as polarizing among democrats as you seem to think ...or as polarizing as Trump and Cruz are among the GOP.

Surviving attacks is not the same thing as getting legislative support from republicans, which is crucial to your argument.

You claimed that Sanders received endorsements from Republicans in congress...do you have a link or is it just wishful thinking?

I thought that was the case, but after some fruitless searching I suppose I was abstracting from the general support he's receiving from republicans, conservatives, and libertarians. I think this article sums up that phenomenon:

The Lifelong Republicans Who Love Bernie Sanders

There was also Ron Paul who basically disavowed his own son to point to Bernie Sanders as the most libertarian of the 2016 race. It wasn't an endorsement, more of a grudging concession of some shared ideals, but it's significant.

 

[Left Vendetta]

Yes, but that is no excuse to take over someone else political faction.

What? I have no idea what you are attempting to say. Political parties change throughout time. The Republican Party was once fill with radical left influence; the Democratic party was a party closely associated with the KKK. What do you mean by "take over someone else political faction?" A mass party does not "belong to anyone." If voters support the change, it usually change. If not, it probably would not. What is the logic?

When you have two political parties having absolute control over the national politics, it is a de facto suppression of other opinions and democratic engagement. The two parties of the US do not even function like traditional parties anymore. It has almost become a part of electoral platform.