#establishment democrats

[kaydub80]

Florida is the first one to pull the plug on Democratic Party primaries. So glad I had zero plans on participating long before Marianne even jumped in let alone anyone else.

[daughterofdessalines]

I need the Liberals & corporations to chill this Black History Month… 🛑

[n0thingiscool]

Fuck you, DNC

When the Public Health Emergency ends "for people without insurance, there will no longer be a pathway through Medicaid for free COVID-19 testing, vaccines, or treatment."

“The costs of COVID-19 vaccines are also expected to skyrocket once the government stops buying them, with Pfizer saying it will charge as much as $130 per dose. … People with private insurance could have some out-of-pocket costs for vaccines, especially if they go to an out-of-network provider, Levitt said. Free at-home COVID tests will also come to an end.” (source)

SO so glad that Joe Biden sided with big pharma and blocked the Wellstone Act for greedy corporations like Gilead Sciences back in the year 2000. And SO happy that he was vehemently against Medicare For All. 🤬

The long and short of this is that if you are poor and/or uninsured, you are going to need to pay for your own COVID tests and vaccinations.

Now ask yourself: if an underpaid frontline worker like a food server or grocery store clerk—remember when everyone was calling them “heroes” & essential workers?—if those workers feel sick but don’t have any paid time off and can’t afford to pay for their own test and vaccines, do you think they are going to take a week off without pay, or continue working and possibly spreading the virus? Rhetorical question; this already happens.

Welcome to America. If you’re poor, you’re dead.

[mayasaura]

The thing I really fucking love about Dungeon Meshi's ending is that it has the perfect set up for a generic fantasy divine right of kings angle, both by conquest and blessing bestowed by the previous monarch. People make those arguments on page, it really looks like that's where it going. And then the story swerves on them. Like nah, mate. If that helps convince some people, great, but none of that can make him a head of state.

What puts Laios on the throne is the respect and good will he personally earned from a diverse coalition of the communities he'd be governing, and the willingness of more established foreign powers to recognise and legitimate his government. Now that's fucking politics, baby.

[ms-boogie-man]

Angie/Maddie🦇❥✝︎🇺🇸

[belle-keys]

yall canceling chappell roan is perfectly exemplifying how being liberal isn't synonymous with being progressive

[pjharvey-moved]

i’m constantly conflicted btwn “the us is a world power and an imperialistic force with probably unmatched cultural, economic, and militaristic power worldwide, so people from other countries have every right to have opinions on our politics” and like … being incredibly incredibly exasperated by all the posts by non-americans calling american progressives stupid and varyingly implying that donald trump isn't actually a real threat and we're all so stupid for not realizing democrats and republicans are just the same and not just opting out of the whole system altogether, because that’s apparently a remotely feasible option

[tomorrowusa]

« [T]he albatross was not just Joe Biden; it was the longer-term perception that liberals constituted the country’s ruling class. This is something the otherwise inchoate conservative moment has emphasized consistently and effectively in recent years: that the Democrats were now the party of power and the establishment, and that the right was the natural home for anti-establishment resentment of all kinds — of which, it’s now clear to see, there is an awful lot. Most on the left haven’t seen it this way, frustrated by legislative stalemates and judicial setbacks and too-close-for-comfort elections seemingly every cycle, with a feeling all along that liberals were always swimming upstream. But in profound ways that the party’s voters rarely recognize, the Democrats have been the country’s incumbent political force now for a full generation. »

— David Wallace-Wells at the New York Times. (archived)

It was actually more than just an incumbency thing. In the eyes of much of the population, Democtats had become The Establishment. And whipping up popular grievances is always going to hurt The Establishment.

A problem is that Liberals are still not great at messaging – though there have been some minor improvements. Warning about Project 2025 and climate catastrophe had a little effect, though it wasn't that visceral.

Donald Trump's incompetence in the early months of the pandemic led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of additional American deaths and unleashed 2½ years of recession, unemployment, and inflation. Yet we hardly heard anything about this in the campaign.

Joy is nice. But if you really want to win over an unsettled electorate, you need to make them fear in their bones what the other guy would do if elected. Donald Trump personally created a real life dystopia in 2020. Reminding people of that in a visually graphic way would have offset Trump's unsupported claims about migrants on the prowl for your family pets for dinner.

If you are seen as The Establishment then you have to get voters to view the previous Establishment with greater trepidation. For five consecutive presidential elections, starting in 1932, Democrats successfully pinned the blame for the Great Depression on Herbert Hoover. Trump's pandemic disaster should have been good for at least two such cycles.

[anthonycrowley]

you know what what if i didn’t vote for kamala exclusively because of her empty words on palestine. what then.

[shinobicyrus]

Listen. I'm not foolish enough to expect the Democratic nominee to proudly proclaim some socialist stance. That's just the state of American politics and its terminally myopic two-party system.

This need to appeal to the capital "M" Moderate, though? It's just the steady shift of Democratic policies further to the Right. It's how you get six Republicans speaking at the DNC, but not a single Palestinian-American speaker. It's how you get, for the first time in 12 years, no trans speakers at the DNC during a time when the GOP have put transphobia and anti-queer policies at the forefront of their platform.

Rather than dismiss or ignore the tired Socialist/Marxist/Communist accusations that Republicans fling at everyone to the left of fucking Sauron, Harris feels the need to tell people in an official public speech: "Look, I'm a capitalist."

This is a thing that no one asked or even thought about except for the most terminally online far-right trolls that weren't gonna vote for her anyway. Yet, she felt the need to reassure everyone she isn't some "radical." Whatever that means. This is how you have Harris promising to pass that failed bi-partisan immigration bill that Donald Trump sabotaged. Which, in case everyone forgot, would have been one of the toughest and harshest to date. Can't look weak against immigrants and asylum seekers!

This is how you have the Democratic Nominee for President promising to keep the US military the "strongest, most lethal fighting force in the world."

This is how you have the Democratic Nominee for President's economic policies compared to Mitt Goddamn Romney's.

Anyone remember the Romney's presidency? No, of course not, because he lost.

Will Harris defeat Trump in 2024? There's a good chance that she might win - or perhaps more accurately - that Trump will lose. I truly hope for this outcome.

But what about 2028? 2032? What about when someone less personally offensive than Trump but every bit as fascistic inevitably tops the GOP ticket? One a little more disciplined in speech, less prone to inane ramblings, and lacks dozens of indictments? How can the Democratic Party, ostensibly the "left wing" of American politics, supposed to stay competitive and distinguish themselves in a political arena when they're constantly ceding ground to the Right on immigration, military spending, the economy, guns; trying to hush controversial issues like "human rights for queer people," or "being a party to genocide" in a desperate attempt to appeal to some shrinking "moderate" demographic?

What do they have left, when all they can say is "well at least we're not weird like those guys"?

When NBC News of all organizations asked about the DNC's lack of trans speakers this year or the scaling back of discussions about queer rights, it was met only with silence:

"The DNC and the Harris campaign declined to comment."

Cool.

[kaydub80]

Two whole years. Now, the takeover has been reversed. As the neoliberal-friendly Newsweek points out, progressives taking over the Democratic Party was always going to be a fool's errand--and it didn't help that the governor's mansion was lost due to the neoliberals taking their ball and going home.

[dreamteamemojis]

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[rabbitcruiser]

Republic Day (German: Tag der Republik) was an official holiday in East Germany, celebrated annually on 7 October from 1949 to 1989. Republic Day commemorates the anniversary of the establishment of the German Democratic Republic (DDR) on 7 October 1949.

[plethoraworldatlas]

A longtime Democratic operative and current president of the Center for American Progress issued a scathing statement Tuesday criticizing the Biden administration for accepting the Israeli government's claim that it is adhering to international law with its catastrophic military assault on the Gaza Strip.

"The State Department's shocking assertion that the Netanyahu government is complying with international law in Gaza is a gross disregard of overwhelming evidence and a dangerous precedent in the conduct of U.S. foreign policy," said Patrick Gaspard, who previously served as executive director of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and U.S. ambassador to South Africa under the Obama administration.

"The stakes here are so high that the administration must be transparent and accountable in sharing with the American people all evidence that has led to this determination and the continued sale of offensive weapons to Israel," Gaspard argued, pointing to Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant's stated goal of imposing a "complete siege" on Gaza at the start of the assault, which is now in its sixth month with no end in sight.

Gaspard said that "every aspect" of Gallant's "edict" has "been on open display to the world," with famine, dehydration, and disease spreading across the enclave as Israel persists in obstructing the delivery of humanitarian aid.

The CAP president's statement came after U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told reporters earlier this week that the Biden administration has not found Israel "to be in violation of international humanitarian law, either when it comes to the conduct of the war or when it comes to the provision of humanitarian assistance."

Miller's remarks followed a letter from Gallant assuring the Biden administration that Israel is complying with international law in its use of American weaponry—a written assurance that was required under a new White House policy.

In a press briefing on Tuesday, Miller clarified that the administration's assessment of Israel's compliance with international law is "ongoing" and has "not reached a definitive conclusion."

But Miller reiterated that "we have not reached the conclusion with respect to Israel that they have violated international humanitarian law."

Leading human rights organizations and United Nations experts have concluded that Israel is guilty of grave violations of international humanitarian law—including the crime of genocide—and called for an immediate arms embargo.

Gaspard said Tuesday that "by its own imposed standards," the U.S. "cannot heedlessly deliver offensive weapons as the Israeli government continues to bombard and starve innocents on a mass scale."

"These actions have nothing to do with self-defense; they are clearly intended as collective punishment and are resulting in the complete devastation of Palestinians as a people," Gaspard added. "There is no time to spare in pulling back from this outrageous assertion by the State Department: An Israeli incursion into Rafah promises to bring only more death and devastation to civilians—and will make the administration complicit in one of the worst tramplings of human rights in this century."

Gaspard's statement is just the latest evidence that dissent against the Biden administration's unwavering support for Israel is spreading in establishment circles. Last week, dozens of former U.S. officials signed a letter urging President Joe Biden to consider restricting military aid to Israel, citing its mass killing of Gaza civilians.

On Wednesday, a U.S. State Department official resigned in protest of Biden's Gaza policy, saying in an interview that "trying to advocate for human rights just became impossible."

[future-crab]

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[wastedandbasted]

you guys...y'all don't really look into politicians actual records deeply enough like you should, do you? and no, Wikipedia is NOT enough and not even always accurate...