- cross-posted to:
- politics@lemmy.dbzer0.com
- cross-posted to:
- politics@lemmy.dbzer0.com
archive article https://archive.is/hXQTC
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She’s the only federal level Democrat with any sort of broad public support.
No one else is note worthy or generally liked.
She is literally the only option. Anyone else is risking mass voter apathy and a voter turn out flop in an election that should be a slam dunk.
If you’re going to vote in the dem primaries, don’t fucking vote based on who “is most electable”, vote for who you want to win. Choosing the candidate that “is the most electable” keeps losing elections, because that crown keeps getting chosen by corporate owned media who just anoint that tittle to the most corporate friendly candidate, and voters don’t like corporate friendly candidates.
The most electable candidate is one who excites people, no one else even considered for running excites anyone except for corporate lobbyists.
Totally agree.
That said, vote in the general no matter what. If you find voting for a milquetoast Dem unpalatable, which is totally reasonable, consider vote swapping with someone in a safe blue state.
They’ll ice her out and close ranks against her the way they did for biden against Bernie.
And they’ll lose again.
This sentiment is not actually mutually exclusive. If AOC will get iced out and the corporate candidate is guaranteed to win anyway, then there’s no harm in voting for her during the primaries
And voting for her in the primary, and not the corporate candidate in the general, is the best way to signal exactly what this shit is costing them.
I like her, but I also think Mark Kelly would be a strong candidate. Former military. Retired Astronaut. Wife survived an attempted political assassination. He stood up to the Trump administration who tried to charge him with crimes punishable by execution and waved it off.
Barley anyone knows his name or anything about him. If the candidate doesn’t throw down the gauntlet with the GOP and trump, show they can fight this shit, they will lose. Trying to convince ppl in a few months that that’s Kelly isn’t going to work. AOC is in the trenches fighting visibly, every day, and has Bernie’s backing, bigger name recognition, aligned with mamdani whose showing what’s possible with the next generation of dems, and is probably the best candidate with momentum to build around. I don’t know if even that’s enough though tbh.
It seems to me that Kelly is a centrist who stands for nothing in particular. Why have you decided to support him? Sure being a navy pilot and a member of Nasa is cool, but we dont need cool, we need a dem who will take a stand on the issues for once. Issue support is what we need to win, not some cult of personality.
But have you considered how electable a zionist white thumb is in Trump’s America? /s
AOC voted to continue arming Pissrael, so…
You’re right, she is such a zionist I am sure AIPAC will find her race for president. 🙄
He’s not my favorite. But he’d be a strong candidate.
He would be a strong candidate… if he had a larger public profile with the average voter.
I like him, but the average voter doesn’t know about him. He doesn’t even rank in battle ground polling.
Obama went from a nobody to an unbeatable candidate virtually overnight.
If OP didn’t follow up his name with his CV I wouldn’t have remembered who it was…
I know who he is because I’m a space nerd and follow congressional politics closely, and I like him, but I also know that most voters don’t pay attention to congressional politics, nor remember the kind of news stories he’s showed up in.
I WAS going to Vote for AOC because she Represents America instead of Israel until all I saw Day Old Accounts telling me Newsom was Better! NEXT time AOC NEXT Time!
It’s HIS turn
Right he has AIPAC $ support, so clearly he is the shoe-in. He just has to out-AIPAC Shapiro and Pritzker and he’s the obvious choice from our Israeli overlords.
/s. ?
I would vote for AOC in a heartbeat. I am tired of old men ruining the country, and tired of Israel making us their errand boy.
As far as “experience”, when did that really matter? Obama didn’t have much foreign policy experience either and he was 1000x better than this current troglodyte pedophile.
To me the whole foreign policy angle is a non-sequitur. Unless an candidate has been a senator/congressman for several terms, it doesn’t really apply. And how many presidents were that? Some of the best presidents had zilch in foreign policy experience and weren’t an elected official for much before they became president.
Obama (one half-finished term as senator). Clinton (Arkansas AG and gov…hardly a place that had any need of foreign policy). Bush Jr (gov of Texas). Reagan (gov of Cali).
Not to imply all were great, but they definitely had, at least from our current perspective, a rational viewpoint where they thought from their POV that they were doing the right thing for the country, instead of this chaotic, narcissistic, demagogue, corrupt stupidity.
At this point a gerbil with schizophrenia would be a better option than Trump.
As far as “experience”, when did that really matter?
It stopped mattering to me when I considered myself smarter than the president. And I’m an idiot.
And I’m an idiot.
Yes, but you’re also self aware of it, which further differentiates you from the Oranguturd Chumpanzee.
At this point a gerbil with schizophrenia would be a better option than Trump.
Same was true the last two times highly qualified women lost to Trumpism.
Trump MAY not be on the next ballot, but Trumpism will be.
AOC is THE only acceptable choice. She can win and she can rise to the occasion unlike the milquetoast white men Newsom and Kelly
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is young and lacks experience, especially in foreign policy. But that may be exactly the kind of person we need as president: someone relatively untainted by both the DNC and the GOP, and someone who has not spent decades being shaped by corporate lobbying and the protection of profit margins.
We need leadership that is still capable of idealism, somebody willing to push for the kind of social programs this country increasingly needs if we want to reverse the direction things are heading right now.
AOC absolutely could be elected. A 2028 presidential run is not some impossible fantasy. The deciding factor is simple: younger voters would actually need to show up and vote in meaningful numbers.
lacks experience, especially in foreign policy
I honestly don’t think there’s a single real person that cares about this in the slightest. The only people I see unironically bringing up this argument are old people who preffer fascists over anyone younger than them.
O… kay…
So there are other countries on this planet aside from America. In fact, there’s an entire department of the U.S. government, headed by the person fourth in line for the presidency, whose sole purpose is handling foreign policy and relations with other nations.
Foreign policy is arguably the single most important qualification a president can have.
I’m 40 years old, and I’ve been saying this since I was a teenager because I’m not short-sighted enough to think the world ends at America’s borders.
And moreover, I literally said in my original comment that we may need somebody inexperienced like AOC at this point. Did you somehow miss that part?
She’ll pick the right people for her cabinet, and she’ll listen to their advice.
Young? I’d take young over dementia riddled. Besides, this country desperately needs fresh leadership and engagement from people who are younger.
If Emanuel Macron became French President at 39, I’m sure there’s no issue with AOC being 38 by 2028.
Experience in foreign police meaning being completely in the pocked of military industrial?
No? I’m going with a no. 🤷👍
The deciding factor is simple: younger voters would actually need to show up and vote in meaningful numbers.
I umm…got some bad news for you.
I know man… I know… America is so fucked.
Awesome. Be the change you want to see.
Just wait until the DNC tanks her like they did Bernie.
Yea, its about time for the experiment to end. The results are failure.
Should be green. Both to represent the source material, and the clean break we need from the DNC donorcrats.
I mean, in theory, there’s nothing stopping someone from running for president from inside a jail cell. Front porch campaigns are a thing.
Luigi will be 35 on May 6, 2033. Which means the first election he could run in will be 2036. So, yeah better hope he gets off the death penalty at least. I doubt they would let him drag his appeals out that long.
But, let’s say he gets life instead. He could conceivably run for president in 2036. He could in theory run a front porch campaign for president from a jail cell. And precedent has been established that if he were elected, he would essentially be exempt from the enforcement of criminal judgments against him. (This was established even well before Trump came around.) So he could walk right out of that cell.
Alternatively, if you want him out the fastest, the most realistic, but though still long-shot option would be for some progressive firebrands to run for the presidency and governorships of New York and Pennsylvania, promising as one of their platform planks to deliver him a full pardon.
Eugene Debs got a million votes from a prison cell.
I hope not
This lady got me drunk on margaritas in between classes when I was a student at Parsons. We talked about Bernie Sanders and politics and she was cool as hell.
I will definitely vote for her if she runs for president.
I’d rather vote for 2018 AOC personally
I wish I drank those margaritas that AOC cooked up
Idk if I would drink a “cooked” margarita.
Altgough apparently that IS a thing? I’m gonna have the worst margarita or the best hot toddy this weekend.
It was, like, a year or two later when she ran for office, and I was like… I know her… But then it took me a little while to put two and two together and remember where I knew her from. It blew my goddamn mind, lol.
Unfortunately, I didn’t live in her constituency, so I couldn’t vote for her at the time. But I did live in Hakeem Jeffries constituency, so I voted for him.
America isn’t ready for competent leadership
I like AOC. I would vote for AOC. AOC will not win POTUS. We’re tried this twice already, and a woman who has had years of non-stop character assassination attempts lobbed at her is not going to win. It’s terrible that sexism and lies play such a big role, but that’s where we are as a nation. Dems had the right idea in 2020 setting up the first woman president via VP. Then they did the worst job possible of handling any potential transition, because of course they did.
tHiS cOuNtRy Is SeXiSt
points to boring corpo centrist candidates who happen to be women
A lot of people in here keep saying that AOC’s lack of experience doesn’t matter cuz insert MALE example.
They don’t seem to grasp just how sexist, among other things, this nation is. A woman has to try a thousand times harder and STILL lose to a twice impeached felon rapist pedophile.
If you play the politics game based on ideals, you’ll lose. And going with AOC is an IDEALISTIC strategy.
‘DarkFuture’, how many comments have you made across how many threads saying this same thing over and over-- multiple times per thread? Its almost like its your full time job to join threads and say this. Is it? Does it pay well and are they hiring?
You’re getting downvotes, but you’re right. She’s not ready. A Senate seat first.
The reality is she will run as an independent, split the vote, Donnie Junior wins.
Trump didn’t have a senate seat first.
There have been young presidents before
I think the young will come out and vote for her
Bush, Clinton, bush, Regan, Ford, Eisenhower, Truman, Roosevelt, Hoover, Coolidge, Wilson, McKinley.
The majority of US presidents between 1900 and 2000 never spent time as senators, most in no foreign policy position what so ever. Most didn’t even serve time in an elected federal office.
Why is it different here? Why must AOC prove her foreign policy credentials when our largest current issues are domestic? Who would you suggest, who has been “in the senate” or some other role more exposed to foreign policy?
This is absurd, it is nonsense, any excuse to discredit the only candidate who has real public support, not just a bunch of corporate funded think pieces.
Trump didn’t have a senate seat first.
He ran on the Republican ticket. Republicans have no standards except “immigrants and LGBTQ+ and liberals bad”. Democrat nominees actually have to have serious resumes.
There have been young presidents before
She’s younger than any president, ever.
I think the young will come out and vote for her
Know how many times I’ve seen people say young people would turn out big and then they didn’t? Literally every time.
Ahh yes, the serious resumes have AIPAC money on them. Those serious resumes are an anathema to voters who have consistent standards.
Bush, Clinton, bush, Regan, Ford, Eisenhower, Truman, Roosevelt, Hoover, Coolidge, Wilson, McKinley.
The majority of US presidents between 1900 and 2000 never spent time as senators, most in no foreign policy position what so ever. Most didn’t even serve time in an elected federal office. Even less exposure to foreign policy in a governor position than a house rep.
Why is it different here? Who would you suggest, who has been “in the senate” or some other role more exposed to foreign policy? The other potential candidates that have even close to her level of public support have even less foreign policy experience.
This is absurd, it is nonsense, any excuse to discredit the only candidate who has real public support, not just a bunch of corporate funded think pieces.
The vote for the dems is already split. The DNC wont abandon AIPAC’s genocide support-- and they dont have enough voters to win while a fairly massive block of the party progressives wont support genocide even with a gun to their head. Even a united democratic party barely has the votes to win these days, and the DNC is already playing chicken/hostage games with us again.
Same as last time. Until the centrists learn to have principles and stand up for their voters instead of for donors they will continue to lose what should be easy elections to idiots and criminals.
Sadly, I feel there are still too many bigots and sexists in the US who cannot bring themselves to vote for a woman, esp. one who isn’t ‘white enough’. That, piled on top of the ‘establishment’ Dem factions that will do everything possible to subvert a campaign… which will let the right-wingers/fascists drive right up the middle again.
Feel free to prove me wrong, USA. Please.
the ‘establishment’ Dem factions that will do everything possible to subvert a campaign
What you’re doing now is part of how the establishment subverts campaigns. They always selectively apply the ‘electability’ argument only to progressives and insurgents while embracing identity politics for their own candidates. Whenever a progressive of any minority group runs the nation “isn’t ready,” but when it’s one of theirs “it’s time.”
Exactly. Why is support for Israel, which voters hate, acceptable as a purity test, but Medicare for All, which voters love, is not?
When the DNC run candidates who’s campaign promises are status quo, corporate subsidies and serving Israel then yeah, the bigot and sexist vote becomes significant. People need to stop using that as a condemnation of the country as a whole. It’s a condemnation of the two party system, a corrupt or derelict Democratic party or a “democracy” which is no longer functioning.
Meanwhile candidates who actually prioritize American voters can win without the help of bigots. Obama proved this back in 2008 and Zohran has proved things have only gotten better. Not only did he win without the bigot vote but without all the other piece of shit voters who showed up for Cuomo in the general election.
Harris was a garbage candidate. Biden was a garbage candidate. Hillary Clinton was a garbage candidate. American voters as a whole are not responsible for the abhorrent behavior by the DNC and assholes who vote for people like Biden and Cuomo in Democratic primaries.
But the reason they put garbage candidates forward is because they regard them as a safe bet, not too radical for some, not too weak for others. … they may be right… it depends whether the vaguely inoffensive option results in the largest number of votes overall or whether a boldly progressive candidate with strong support of fewer voters gives them the better result. Dems always go with the safe option.
they may be right.
How could you possibly call this “right” after this strategy lost to an orange blob twice?
Well yeah, last time Americans elected a socialist they kept electing him til he died. Can’t have that happen again. They aren’t going with safe they are going with what they are financially incentivised to do. Look at the funding for democratic candidates, that’s their constituency. You’re projecting your own morals on them, they don’t actually care about what’s good for the country
FDR wasn’t a socialist, he was a man who understood that if he didn’t offer the people a better deal then they’d look to revolution to get it. It pissed off the rich and powerful, but ultimately he was doing what he believed necessary to preserve capitalism.
I have no intention of voting for another pro-corporate, “my turn” Democrat. If we don’t end up with her, or another actual progressive, I think a whole lot of Democrats will be completely turned off the party
Copy paste from elsewhere in the thread.
You seem well-meaning, but the racism/sexism card is way overplayed at this point in the game. The two examples DNC sympathisers point to for why an AOC run is a bad idea both lost not because they were women, but because they were utterly terrible politicians. I wasn’t around for Hillary so I can’t go into too much detail, but Harris specifically did her utmost best to destroy every single ounce of goodwill she had. And as for the racism, well, America did overwhelmingly elect Obama in 2008. Even on the far right you see MAGA elect women and minority politicians they agree with (see: MTG), so there’s no way the everyone left of Reagan coalition wouldn’t be able to elect AOC due to sexism. It’s just a complete and utter non-issue.
You say that, but I personally know people who voted for Trump over Kamala specifically because she was a woman. I personally know people who voted for Trump over Harris for the exact same reason.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m fine with AOC myself and would vote for her, but to pretend that it’s a “non-issue” assumes that the average person doesn’t care. Many people do actually care, and ignoring the existence of those people is poor strategy. Maybe I’m overestimating the number of people who care, maybe not, but it is unfortunately a real concern that won’t magically go away by pretending people, as a whole, are more enlightened than that.
I mean sure you can find people who think or do basically anything; I haven’t seen any evidence that this is a significant group of people, even though if it was it’d show up on polls before and after the election. I’d also bet good money no such evidence exists, because if it did libs wouldn’t shut up about it. Meanwhile plenty of evidence exists that the most significant factors in Harris’s loss were the genocide and her being a rightwing ghoul.
I didn’t disagree with Harris’s flaws. But I think you might exist in a bubble, there are a lot of dumb people in the world. I consider you very lucky if you haven’t met a significant number of people who voted purely based on sex.
Do I think they’re the majority? Definitely not. But the number of people who don’t think about Palestine even a little bit is a lot higher than you think. So is the number who think “A woman can’t be president, she’ll be too emotional and other world leaders will walk all over us”. Like I said, there are a lot of dumb people in the world. Ignoring them doesn’t make them go away.
Americans voted for a low IQ felon rapist pedo over highly educated and accomplished women…twice.
What bubble are you living in?
And people voted for Trump because he’s rich. Does that mean we only need to run rich candidates. Fuck no. There isn’t a large enough group of people who would otherwise vote for someone like AOC who wouldn’t because she’s a woman. Either her positions are strong enough to win or they aren’t. The woman thing is bullshit, and it’s just people trying to push for a more generic candidate that doesn’t represent us.
And people voted for Trump because he’s rich.
I think they primarily voted for him because he hated the same people they did. I don’t think him having money had much to do with it. The closest I’ve heard is “he’ll run it like a business” which doesn’t really have anything to do with him being rich.
There isn’t a large enough group of people who would otherwise vote for someone like AOC who wouldn’t because she’s a woman.
Willing to bet your future and the futures of millions of others on that assumption?
Either her positions are strong enough to win or they aren’t.
That’s not the only factor in winning presidential elections in America.
it’s just people trying to push for a more generic candidate that doesn’t represent us.
If she doesn’t win then you don’t get represented at all.
I think they primarily voted for him because he hated the same people they did.
I didn’t say everybody. I’m certain not many people didn’t vote for Harris or Clinton because they were women either. It’s an equivalent claim that some did. If we can’t run women because some won’t vote for women then we also need to only run rich candidates because some will vote for rich candidates. Also, the same could be said for black candidates, yet Obama won. Clearly people being bigots is not the reason for a win/loss.
Willing to bet your future and the futures of millions of others on that assumption?
Absolutely. I’d rather bet it on that than another Biden. I have seen incredibly little evidence that women can’t win. I’ve only seen evidence that boring ass candidates can’t. 50% of candidates lose (slightly more if you include third parties). The chances that 2/2 women lose is reasonably high, if we look at raw numbers. If we also take into account that Harris had a grand total of a few months to campaign, with a ton of controversy, it’s even more likely. Far more male candidates have lost than female, yet no one bats an eye when we run male candidates.
If we’re going to elect someone progressive, it won’t fail because of some bigots. Anyone willing to vote for a progressive will not care. The only voters who would be “lost” by this are already lost by her policy positions. There’s no reason to consider their opinions further.
If she doesn’t win then you don’t get represented at all.
Oh no! I guess we should pull Biden back in then! We can’t have anything good because we need to pander to bigots, who are an incredibly small portion of society!
I personally know people who voted for Trump over Kamala specifically because she was a woman. I personally know people who voted for Trump over Harris for the exact same reason
Uh… did you mean to say “Hillary” up there at some point? Because “Kamala” and “Harris” are the same person…
I did, I got distracted mid comment. I edited it.
but the racism/sexism card is way overplayed at this point in the game
Not if America keeps proving it to be true.
And as for the racism, well, America did overwhelmingly elect Obama in 2008.
Yes. A male and one of the most educated and charismatic politicians in American history. That’s what it took.
Even on the far right you see MAGA elect women and minority politicians they agree with
In how many of those instances was there a white male also running on the ticket as a Republican? Conservatives will absolutely support a woman/minority to keep liberals from power. I’d like to see them do so when a white male Republican is also running.
Except when Obama was elected the right lost their ever loving minds. And Fox went off the deep end. The entire right wing propaganda machine has gone nuts for the last 18 years and unfortunately it worked. Acting like it’s currently the environment of 2008 is blind.
As a leftist I have a completely different take.
Obama’s campaign made me realize what it was like to have a politician work for my vote. All that “hope and change” rhetoric actually worked on me. Somewhere in his eight years in office I realized he was full of shit but it gave me optimism for the future. That optimism blossomed as I listened to Sanders speeches.
So when Hillary Clinton came along and started setting herself in opposition to Sanders and ultimately defeating him I realized Hillary Clinton and the entire Democratic party think they can just assume I’ll support them so long as they run against a Republican who is much much worse.
They’re wrong.
Republicans haven’t gotten stronger. The Democratic party has intentionally weakened itself because rather than serving the American people they want to serve corporations, Israel and their own egos.
Republicans haven’t gotten stronger.
This is incorrect.
I’ve never witnessed conservatives rally around anyone like this in my life. The Republican party is currently netting wins they’ve been trying to get for decades. They own our media. They’re violating our Constitution with impunity.
The Republican party is absolutely stronger than ever.
Now, they might be overplaying their hand and that might come back to bite them in the ass, but that’s not what’s happening right now.
I’ll support them so long as they run against a Republican who is much much worse.
As a vulnerable minority (trans) being targeted for active genocide by the Right, I really wish that WAS enough for Democrats to get elected
That didn’t respond to anything I wrote. The right wing media went nuts and it worked. For 18 years. We can’t act like those 18 years of propaganda didn’t change anything because it did.
But anyway to respond to what you wrote, I think the best way to address this is you’re looking at the parties, while I’m looking at the votes.
Hilary said she’d a map room to (read, go to war on) fight climate change. The left never came out. Biden went to good old politics. Won. Kamala relied on woman’s rights. The left never came out. Guess what will happen next time? They will not rely on the left. They will go after the center. The center that actually shows up. (Also see my other comment.)
This completely misses the point that Kamala didn’t win a primary. You can’t say “didn’t get support” because she wasn’t “the candidate” in the first plac You’re working really hard to tell this thread why voting is pointless
I wonder why
Unreal.
We’re not talking about the right, though; we’re talking about the left and center. You know, the people who voted for Obama, and who would be expected to vote for a Democratic candidate. Why even care what the right thinks?
Acting like it’s currently the environment of 2008 is blind.
Sure, but that cuts both ways. Just like the right is more fascist today, the left and center-left are more progressive and more willing to listen to radical voices. Your implicit assumption that all of America shifted rightwards doesn’t match up with reality.
Your implicit assumption that all of America shifted rightwards doesn’t match up with reality.
I don’t think ALL of America shifted right. But the right definitely shifted more right, and so did centrists. So you could say MOST of America shifted right.
We are definitely not a nation generally shifting left.
My point was about the last 18 years of right wing propaganda. We can’t act like it didn’t happen and that we’re in the same place as 2008. Like it or not racism has revived. Talking about mass deportation was unimaginable back then. And now it was a major platform that won.
You don’t have do go very far to find “my dad was the greatest, didn’t care if people were black” to, well, I won’t repeat much of the Qanon. There’s a whole sub for it, remember? QanonCasualties. That’s the point of propaganda, to spread the message, to increase their numbers. And no it doesn’t cut both ways because left media is beholden to the truth, and right wing media can do whatever they want. And they do. And they grow. Most popular “news” source is what? Fox. You are missing everything. Like fucking everything.
This is more of a rant than a response to anything I actually said.
It’s a little disjointed because I edited in the first paragraph, but yes it does respond to what you said.
Do you want a line by line breakdown? Ok.
We’re not talking about the right, though; we’re talking about the left and center.
Agreed. And guess what? The right wing’s propaganda machine has reached the center. That’s the whole point. 18 years of hardcore propaganda has reached the center. That’s the point of propaganda.
You know, the people who voted for Obama,
You don’t have do go very far to find “my dad was the greatest, didn’t care if people were black” EDIT AT ADD: “and voted for Obama”. And those people changed to, well, I won’t repeat much of the Qanon.
There’s a whole sub for it, remember? QanonCasualties. People that were formely center or Obama voters that got suckered in. That’s the point of propaganda, to spread the message, to increase their voters.
Why even care what the right thinks?
The whole point of propaganda is to reach other people. So it’s not what the right thinks, it’s how the people that were formerly center that have been suckered in to the right’s propoganda will vote.
Sure, but that cuts both ways.
No it doesn’t cut both ways because left media is beholden to the truth, and right wing media can do whatever they want. They lie their ass off. They twist. They appeal to easy emotions like fear and anger. The left media can’t do that.
The most popular “news” source is what? Fox.
You are missing everything. Like fucking everything.
You’re the only one talking sense here.
The Right has shifted the overton window so hard to the right that Fascism is a mainstream opinion. Heck it’s considered more rude to question Fascism than it is to question Trans Rights.
Nobody gives a fuck what the right thinks or your fearmongering in favor of it. Knock it off.
You think I’m trying to fearmonger, or that I’m ??? in favor??? of it? Lol no. I’m baffled how you can even read that.
I am observing that the right wing media has been going nuts for the last 18 years. We can’t ignore that. And the whole point is that it’s not limited to the right wing audience, they got their message to the masses.
You make zero sense, and I read this as fear mongering as well
Why are you working so hard to ensure people feel dejected about voting?
I read this as fear mongering as well
Then you need to work on your reading comprehension. Guy was making an observation. Not fearmongering.
Removed by mod
You’re making complete sense here. If Obama had been white, Trump never would have happened. Hell if Hillary had been a man, Trump never would have happened.
This, back in 2008, North Carolina went Blue for Obama. It went red for Romney in 2012. Why?
Well as someone who remembered the Churches pleading with everyone to “Vote for the Mormon over the Muslim” I can tell you.
It’s because the beehive hadn’t been kicked yet. The idea of a black president seemed like a wonderful sign of the progress we made as a nation. When it actually happened, that retroactively became a bridge too far.
There was a silent contract, racists could be polite and civil. A black man could be equal to a white man, as long as everyone silently agreed the white man was “more equal”
When the President was black, well, that was seen as a violation of the social contract. The same people who voted for Obama to show how “Not racist” they were, suddenly became furious that he won. Because the “contract” compelled them to outwardly appear non-racist by voting for a black guy, but when it was “violated” by his election, these same people proudly dropped the Hard R to describe the leader of the free world while watching Fox News.
am I making sense?
I agree, but I put it more down to Fox et al than the social contract.
I would change it to: " The same people who voted for Obama
to show how “Not racist” they were,because they were open to the idea of being not racistsuddenly became furious that he wonwere bombarded by Fox how terrible Obama was and how horrible Democrats were. And they slowly but surely absorbed that message. "Fox went absolutely apeshit after Obama was elected, they wanted to do everything they could to bring him down in any way they could. And their rhetorical techniques are good at appealing to people (inb4 lemmy’s seeming misreading, it’s disgusting, but I observe that it works).
Yes, but also I don’t think the Democrats have any stronger candidate to run against Trump. Most of them can’t even meaningfully speak against Trump. If they run another wishy-washy centrist there’s a much greater chance that they lose to disillusionment yet again. AOC is the closest they have to Bernie Sanders and they’d either be idiots or snakes to not do so. Personally, she’s probably the only potential presidential hopeful out there who I would enthusiastically vote for.
they’d either be idiots or snakes
They have proven themselves at this point to be both.
Yes, but also I don’t think the Democrats have any stronger candidate to run against Republicans.
This is a real problem. Who’s in the national Democratic pipeline? Biden kind of sucked the life out of anyone associated with him - Anthony Blinken? Lloyd Austin? Pete Buttigeig was the closest thing Biden had to an attack dog, but he keeps losing elections and I don’t know what he’s doing now. I thought Katie Porter was cool for a while, but she blew her run for senate and is currently choking on a run for governor of California. Bernie’s too old.
I don’t even know who else is out there.
Tim Walz, maybe, if he quits listening to the neolib assholes giving him shitty advice?
Tim Walz seems to have gotten scared off by his colleagues who were assassinated, and he’s not running for reelection as governor and has largely pulled back. He appears to be prepping for retirement at this point
You know, I always thought the prevailing wisdom was that assassination was counterproductive as a political tactic because the faction doing it would lose the moral high ground and galvanize everyone against their cause, but it’s funny how that doesn’t seem to have been true lately.
I really wish he hadn’t stopped calling Vance “weird”, that was actually fucking working.
Honestly hunter biden or J.B. Pritzker aka the great khan of Illinois
Both are bought and paid-for zionists.
Illinois-ian here.
We need prizker where he is.
There is such a thing as being promoted out of ones best place.
He’s where he should be.
Came here to say basically this but I want to live in a world where it’s not true, and I actively, knowingly choose willful ignorance. I want her to run, I will vote for her, I will get out the vote for her. I think we have to.
Not to mention all the progressives that won’t vote for her because she’s not progressive enough, or perfectly aligned on every policy.
Hey look it’s another genocide supporter.
Hey look, another moron.
The same progressives encouraging her to run despite her problematic ideology?
In many cases, yes. Progressives are so quick to turn on their own that all it takes is a little Russian or Chinese media manipulation and they forget their goals. it’s already happening
Criticism is not ‘turning on their own.’
If you cannot handle defending your decisions, you don’t belong on the left. Either as a representative or as a member. If you want to vote to send weapons to Israel while they commit one of the worst genocides in history, you will get backlash and demands to defend your actions from any human being that exists.
Yes, I agree. But once we are in the election, we need to support ‘better’. If we keep pushing people against the viable better candidate then, they will lose and we’ll get the much worse maga option.
No.
Period.
That is how fascism happens. ‘Lesser Evilism’ does not work. The current state of the US proves this. It is so easy to just not be evil. So incredibly fucking easy.
Gavin Newsom, for example, will be worse for the average person than Donald Trump. He would be the ‘lesser evil,’ and would probably redirect ICE to only target male immigrants instead of everyone brown and would probably say gays and lesbians are okay while still targeting trans people; but his economic warfare against the working class will be worse, as he’s competent and surrounds himself with competent people.
Allowing people like that, as an example, to exist on the left because Donald Trump exists is like shooting off your toe because you were aiming at your dick. Yeah, it’s kinda better from a deranged viewpoint that ignores everything, but it does not solve the problem.
Or to borrow a phrase, it’s like only feeding bad children to the orphan crushing machine instead of just turning off the orphan crushing machine. No. ‘Better’ is not good enough in this case. Joseph Biden is responsible for at least 200,000 dead children. Every single Biden voter that just insisted he was the best we could do killed 200,000 children. Would more have died under Trump 2? It turns out no. But we delayed some immigrants getting deported so its fine I guess.
So your solution is to support maga? I agree a revolution would be better, but it seems Americans can barely even do demonstrations on the occasional weekend. The U.S. has a choice between bad and much much worse. Do you really want to choose ‘much much worse’? What else is your plan?
I don’t think those types are comfortable going outside long enough to actually vote. Doesn’t seem like a real constituency to me.
Lots of them here on Lemmy, but you’re probably correct that they wouldn’t actually vote anyway.
You’re not wrong at all. America isn’t ready for this yet sadly.
I remember when everyone said this about a black man and he went on to win two Presidential elections by a wide margin. Your defeatist attitude is exactly why Democrats lose elections. You’re giving up before the battle has even started.
They don’t want her to win because it would be yet another condemnation on the DNC, establishment Democrats and liberal (read: corporate first, Israel first, ego first) policy. It would be embarrassing for someone like AOC to win after their big hitters losing to Trump and MAGA.
I don’t think that would be any more embarrassing than them losing to Trump 2/3 times.
More .world team sports.
AOC is a Zionist. Disqualified. Next?
Reality: if you don’t vote or waste your vote because you’re unwilling to make the better bad choice, you are part of the problem.
This one issue voting stuff is a trap, it’s how the USA got where it is today.
Stop knee-jerking and go do something useful.
Actually this lesser of two evils shit is how you got here.
Voting for a lesser evil only legitimizes evil. I suppose it’s too much to ask for people to have principles though. Our childhood heroes would be ashamed of the adults we have become.
“We should all swear fealty to Saruman, because technically he’s less evil than Sauron.”
This one issue voting stuff is a trap, it’s how the USA got where it is today.
thats … nuts. Issues arent all of equal importance.
School vouchers are not worth single issue voting. Nor is naming of a post office. But something like genocide support, or the civil rights act, or womens right to vote? Each of thsoe are 100% worth single issue voting. I say murder of innocents is important. You evidently …dont care.
thats … BS. Issues arent all of equal importance which makes your statement nuts.
That’s not what they’re saying at all which makes your statement disingenuous. Why are you talking about naming post offices? It’s the idea is no single, one, issue should be enough to outweigh every single other one.
The people who didn’t vote Kamala to “protest” her on Isreal literally contributed to Trump getting elected. Making the original comment very accurate so it’s kinda wild you’re calling it “nuts”.
Is she really though? I know about her seeming to vote for “defensive weapons” during a MTG ammendment vote as part of a larger negotiation, but theres also this – so maybe she just flubbed the one vote:
Yeah, AOC’s record on Israel isn’t as good as Tlaib’s or Omar’s, but it’s still better than 95% of Democrats. Only an idiot or a liar would call her a Zionist because she didn’t vote for a symbolic amendment for a bill she voted against anyway.
Also, you’ll notice that the people who gleefully brand her a Zionist or a Neoliberal never have an alternative to tell you about. They’ll tell you why every promising progressive is actually an imperialist, or why the DSA are actually corporate shills, why no one is actually a real leftist, but they never have someone they actually want to get elected. They just want to say “no,” or at best, they demand, “next,” without doing any work to find that next person.
You named one - I’d gladly vote for Tlaib.
Most people saying that kind of thing don’t believe in electoralism at all. They don’t think voting is useful. They believe in a litany of other things as alternatives, specifics depend on the group and individual.
But I found most of the people in that camp also aren’t… doing any of the alternatives they like to suggest as meaningful. It’s more like excuses to not do anything, take a “holier than thou” position, or to avoid being associated with something that could fail.
Some anarchist groups actually do “mutual aid”, which is to say, charity work effectively. Which is commendable, but also, like, not a replacement for participating in the political system that currently exists.
YUP. I once had someone tell me that the educating people on Marxism was more important that voting, because giving more people an understanding of theory would bring about a post-capitalist society. Meaning, “actually, my internet arguments are very important.”
If you don’t believe in electoralism, fair enough. It’s certainly hasn’t been serving us well the last 40 years (and especially the last ten). But if you’re going to judge everyone that engages with the political process, then you better find something better to do: join a grocery co-op, organize a union, start a commune. If voting isn’t the answer, do something else. Something besides talking. (Anecdotally, I’ve found anarchists are more likely to do something community oriented, or at least risk getting their heads kicked in at a protest, than a lot of other leftists I’ve known).
Yes, AOC is a Zionist. She believes Israel has a right to exist.
I think she’s a good representative as in she didn’t get corrupt and votes the right way most of the times but I’m yet to see any proof she would be good president. I keep seeing videos about AOC “crushing” people in hearings and they always disappoint. She struggles to explain her ideas or deliver convincing message and she’s simply bad at confronting people. I think she’s over-hyped because all other candidates suck and she would get crushed in presidential elections. People really need to start looking for a candidate that can actually win.
Bingo.
I like her and I respect her and she’s on the right side of history, but she can’t win a presidential election. It takes a lot more than people who already agree with your ideology agreeing with you to win an election. You have to convince a lot of other people who don’t fully agree with you to support you, and she can’t do that.
I would prefer Mark Kelly, but she’s way better than Newsom at least.
Yup.
A white male astronaut senator with military experience who has openly stood up to Trump has a better chance than a woman of ANY qualification in this country.
That’s simply the truth in these Divided States of America.
Mark Kelly would have a solid chance. I hate that I can’t imagine AOC ever winning.
Few imagined her winning in The Bronx, and yet.
Women have won in districts all over this country for decades. Never been president though.
I look forward to that no longer being the case, but I vote on platform and performance. Not gender.
The Bronx is a bit different from the US presidential.
Don’t get me wrong, I love her, and I hope to see her as president some day. I just don’t know if now is the time to play that hand…
It’ll always be the wrong time.
Everything we’ve witnessed about this country over the last decade really indicates this isn’t the time.
And the hands are getting progressively more risky every time we lose. People are losing rights now. Fascism is here. Long shots are not called for.
When is the right time?
Rhetorical question. Your answer doesn’t matter. The people who are willing to move ahead will do so with or without you.
Not necessarily, but that’s a bit of a thought-stopper if I’m being completely honest
Well I meant it as a thought-starter, the subtext is no better time than now.
That completely ignores strategic thinking and long-term planning, which are essential parts of effective political praxis. The best option isn’t always “Do it right now.”
Have you heard the phrase “Play your cards right”? Just because you have the Queen of Spades doesn’t mean you should play her at the first possible opportunity.
Why would you endanger her political career by asking her to make a premature run for president? Even if she makes it through campaign season without being smeared into obscurity by the billionaire-funded propaganda machine, and even if she gets elected, then she still would have to start her term with the disaster inherited from the current admin, and likely spend years cleaning up the mess while being blamed for the mess that was handed to her.
She’s said herself that she still has work to do in Congress. Let her focus on that for a few more election cycles while the progressive movement builds momentum. She’ll be able to do far more as president with more progressives in Congress anyway. Especially if she can start from a sane baseline and focus on progress, not just disaster cleanup.
Running her now just seems like wasted talent, on top of recklessly endangering a relatively young political career.
Same goes for Mamdani. Let him serve a few terms as mayor, prove his policies work. Then a couple terms as governor before running for president. That maximizes the good that he can do, because after serving two terms as president his political career would essentially be over, even without being slandered by his opponents.
Why Kelly? He’s pro Israel and pro big business. Pro ACA but anti medicare for all. He’s just the same old cookie cutter biden model centrist with no ideas-- that the public has already rejected as out of touch. I dont care at all that he was a navy and nasa pilot. Show me someone with ideas and a drive to lead in a positive direction? its not Kelly.
He’s just the same old cookie cutter biden model
Reminder that Biden is the only person who has beaten Trump. The two women failed.
And progress was made under Biden if you were paying attention. Maybe not tectonic shifting, but still progress. Which was a whole hell of a lot better than what we’re experiecing now.
There’s a very clear interpretation of events that the “America will never elect a woman president” completely seems to miss. Since 2008 every president that has been elected has promised significant change to help average Americans.
Obama promised hope and change as the country was in the midst of a massive recession and had just gone through a housing market crash of historic proportions.
Trump promised to drain the swamp, to self-fund his campaign and made some surprisingly progressive promises while he was campaigning (he then did absolutely none of that, jacked up the economy and grossly mishandled a global pandemic)
Biden also made some surprisingly progressive promises (and tried to pass them all in a single easy to block bill. Though in the background there were some brilliant policies which were passed)
Trump promised more change while Kamala was promising to maintain the status quo.
I think there’s a sizable voting block that just wants something to happen. They want to throw the electoral equivalent of a molotov cocktail into the mix so that maybe things will get better. They’re tired of nothing ever happening to help them and they want to reshuffle the deck so that maybe they can get a slightly better hand this time around. This is the nerve that trump found, he’s the molotov cocktail they threw into the government in the hopes for some kind of improvement. Now that that’s not working and he probably won’t be able to run again, it’s time to find the next candidate that will promise something other than “more of the same”
As a Californian, I truly believe there is no way in hell that the country will elect a Californian.
This is completely separate from the undeniable fact that Newsom has always felt like a slimy used-car salesman with his greasy slicked-back hair, and now only seems like he’ll do anything at all in the quest for MOAR POWER. There’s only so much goodwill slapping back at Trump’s tweets will get you and it certainly is nowhere near enough to get him the presidency.
As a Californian, I truly believe there is no way in hell that the country will elect a Californian.
Honestly I have to agree. California Democrats have a distinct style of politics that I don’t know if it sits well in a national election. I do wonder what happens if they seriously run a Midwestern Democrat rather than a coastal one. It completely changes the vibes when they’re from somewhere close to the outdoors and the farms, but without the baggage of a southerner
I can’t say I’m overly well informed about how politicians differ, but I think much of the rest of the country sees California as the evil west coast elites, and nothing will change their minds. Especially not Newsom.
I love AOC, but this would lead to another lost election for Dems. My dream ticket would be Mark Kelly and Adam Kinzinger. Followed by Kinzinger and AOC in the next election cycle…
The average voter doesn’t know who mark kelly is.
They don’t know where he stands.
They know where AOC stands.
Of the commonly proposed candidates for 2028, she routinely preforms best in polling in battleground states.
