Their own party treats them with more disdain than their supposed "opposition party."
AOC and the other actual left-wing minority making waves in a sea of right-wing neoliberals and righter-wing fascists is amazing. They can't win, the game is fully rigged and the institutions are fully captured by monied interests with political bribery legalized, but it's like watching Cap get up to face Thanos' army alone, it's inspiring.
Too bad no one, including most Americans, are on their left.
Because were too far into the sunk cost fallacy to reject "free market" rigged crony capitalism.
"We can't re-examine our core economic beliefs! We already gave the owners all the money, and they promised for half a century to whip their dicks out and urinate golden showers of prosperity on all of us!... any day now..."
I read the article, and I agree with Freddie deBoer. This is just liberal apologetics. This is just the same arguments of things are getting better, just wait, blah, blah, blah. I’m old. It’s tired. Give me healthcare and change my mind.
Well, it is literally liberal apologetics in that it's an argument that defends the "liberal" position.
So let me ask you then:
Given the political realities laid out quite clearly in the article (essentially, socialism isn't that popular), what do you think American leftists should be spending their political capital on this cycle in order to get the best policy results in the next presidential term?
So say by some miracle the political will to have a General Strike builds in America in 2026. Do you want to find out if Donald Trump will bring back the proud tradition of using the US army as a strikebreaking force after he has replaced all the leadership across the military with cronies? (The president can do this at will)
Ultimately, no. The results will be the same. I don’t think Trump would call in air strikes on the SAG/ writers strike. As for the national guard, pinkertons, police; both would use available forces. They won’t allow instability to grow, it threatens the system and its money. Honestly, and this is just speculation, it might be better if it were Trump. Then people might get off their asses and fight back.
What do you think happens on Jan 20, '25 if he is elected? The president has essentially unlimited control over both the military and all federal law enforcement.
Trump is angry and wounded.
Do you think it's just going to be a big farce like last time?
Here's a vivid description I think is much more likely.
I read that and it agree it would be bad. And if it weren’t for climate change I would agree with keeping the status quo. There are too many variables to accurately predict which would be worse. Fascism now, or fascism later. It would be better for the planet to have fascism now. But it will suck for humanity. Fascism later might be better for humanity, but be bad for the planet. I vote for fascism later, purely for selfish reasons. But I empathize with those that want to burn it all down. To me, there is no easy answer. You may feel differently, and that should be respected.
Well, it is literally liberal apologetics in that it's an argument that defends the "liberal" position.
So let me ask you then:
Given the political realities laid out quite clearly in the article (essentially, socialism isn't that popular), what do you think American leftists should be spending their political capital on this cycle in order to get the best policy results in the next presidential term?
So until we get single payer healthcare, you won't be happy with any other policy wins and you'd rather burn all your political capital fighting us instead of uniting against the literal fascists?
The left, the real socialist left doesn’t have political capital. So there’s nothing to burn. Incremental policy is great to alleviate suffering, but ultimately is masturbatory. Fascism will eventually overcome America. This explains why. Waiting for real, substantial policy changes with climate change happening is denialism. We’re waiting for enough people to realize this so we can organize and fight for the future.
I think the author's definition of fascism is nonsensical and ahistorical.
I agree that capitalism has the tendency to concentrate power (like every other social or political system ever in the history of humans), but the idea that we should just abandon the levers of power to the kind of people who want Donald Trump to be president is so insane to me.
The author even concedes that Donald Trump is uniquely bad but then bends over backwards trying to get back to his comfortable "both sides" narrative
I agree that it is insane to concede power to fascism. I have kids and will be voting for Biden for this reason. I’m aware that when full fascism comes, it will not be pretty. But I also understand that capitalism will eventually decay into fascism. So, I am sympathetic to those that want to do something outside the system of just voting. I’m not trying to change your mind. I’m just trying to make people understand the situation we’re in.
Civil rights and the voter rights act were pretty big, so I don’t know. Biden has done more for the environment( he needs to do more) and that affects us all. I like Biden. I think he wants to do more. But he is beholden to the DNC and it’s corporate donors. When he gets his next term, expect him to do more.
The DNC won’t let that happen. If they didn’t course correct after Bernie / Hillary, they never will. She should’ve picked him as VP. They would have freaked out.
Incremental progress is not illegitimate. It’s just never going to be enough to solve the problem that is capitalism. If it were, the New Deal would have fixed this system and we wouldn’t be having this conversation.
Social democracies aren’t socialism. They have unions, co-ops, but they don’t own the means of production. They are capitalism with heavy regulation and strong social policies. And they are already regressing. If we were a more socially democratic, my opinion might be different, But, historically, the reality that capitalism decays into fascism would still be true.
They probably mean something of that scale. Working people have only been losing protections, rights, and safetynets for 50 years, not gaining them, all, to lower the taxes of the sliver of the population that already wanted for nothing and got rich thanks to the system they then wanted to avoid paying back into.
The person you're replying to is spot on. As our roads and other commons cumble, as our public education system, that provides a pre-literate workforce that profits the oligarchs btw, sits in utter ruin due to lack of funding, as we have more prisoners per capita in the world to enrich the for profit prison industry, as the world burns from companies polluting with abandon for private profit, this rigged system has proven on no uncertain terms that it works against those who lack significant capital to further enrich those who do not. After so long, yeah, it would reasonably take a massive policy change that helps the people in significant way on the backs of against the desires of the owner to get anyone paying attention's good will back.
Don't worry though, it won't happen.
If you want people to have faith in a system that works against them every day and has for their entire lives on the promise of "maybe you'll kick the ball on try 10,006 Charlie Brown," you don't make any sense.