Good point. Also for those folks who talk about European political parties being further to the left (or at least the center is further to the left) - those parties are relatively closed off, where party members (usually involving those that pay dues) are the ones who get to decide. No ‘open primaries’ or whatnot. It’s more akin to superdelegates deciding who should lead the party.
No, it isn’t. Entryism is the proper term. And, as noted above, for better or for worse, barriers to entryism are quite literally un-American.
It seems apparent to me that entryism is merely a euphemism for hijacking.
The difference is that hijacking is a crime and entryism is a perfectly legitimate political tactic. And probably as old as any politics more complicated than “Do what the King says.”
Because we obviously were talking about prosecuting people for hijacking a party ;).
Yes that’s one difference -along with the fact that those open primaries are paid for with tax dollars. When the two party system is so entrenched that the government pays for the party’s candidate selection process, you have to accept the “big tent” concept and realize that a bunch of people with radically different views must enter one of the tents to meaningfully participate in the democracy.
SlackerInc would if he could.
You shouldn’t be so quick to talk, as it seems that some on the Sanders’ side seem to wish they could prosecute people for defending their party from hijacking.
So you’re basically accusing me of being a fascist. :mad: Nice. I had to do a double take to verify that this was not in the Pit. I guess I really don’t understand how the rules work here.
Not many, and that’s the point that seems to escape you. Just like low-turnout caucuses, they are vulnerable to, uh, “entryism”, but progressives seem unwilling to actually do the work it would require, and instead carp from the sidelines.
Yes, you (and asahi, and Isiddiqui) get it.
Not all state and local Dem party demos are alike, and it’s foolish to extrapolate based on personal experience in one location. It’s a big party in a big country.
That was low grade ore, BG: I’m not sure what you’re saying.
Center-right Europe isn’t dangerous at all; or rather they are about as dangerous as center-left Europe. For example, calling for roundups and expulsion of millions of residents is dangerous. Tightening immigration laws somewhat is not.
If The Party needs the votes of a bloc of people it has to promise what things those people want, and attempt to deliver after. It is not automatically entitled to all votes no matter what — and bugger what voters want. It is entirely free to not demand their votes.
The Party needs voters more than voters need The Party.
Center-right in power = preservation of the status quo, and in the U.S. at present that is extremely dangerous. Just look out the window. Look at the empty factories and boarded-up houses and crumbling infrastructure and desperate people struggling to get by on two paychecks.
Well, they can’t prosecute. But they can sue.
You think most of us see this out our windows? No wonder you are in the Eeyore caucus.
Better Eeyore than Babar.
Metaphorically. Literally, I see no such things out my window, but I know they’re out there, and so do you, and if you do not literally see them out your window now, you might by this time next year. Anybody can fall off the ladder, and there are hardly any safety nets any more.
As Secretary of Labor Perez (from whom I got that “Eeyore caucus” term) noted, this is completely misstating the trends in the economy.
Why? Babar seemed to be a good leader.
The American economy is a bit healthier than it was in 2007, certainly. But the “trends in the economy” go back to the late 1970s and include wage stagnation alongside rising per capita worker productivity, declining opportunity for the middle and working classes, offshoring of jobs, hollowing-out of the American industrial sector, crumpling public infrastructure, crumbling public everything-except-the-military-and-police, and a great deal else that has shown no signs of reversal since Obama took office. All of this coincident with the rise of movement conservatism, and that is no coincidence. No, we really are in a mess and the “center-right” will never get us out of it.
Neither the Center-right and the Center-left are dangerous; they can become ineffectual and they can allow policies which were once effective are no longer to continue past their expiration date. But pragmatists who are willing to work with each other and discuss differences in a way that promotes compromise isn’t dangerous; it’s the essence of the ‘art of the possible.’
What’s dangerous is when you have a faction that binds itself to a platform and vows never to compromise on that platform. When a political faction refuses to listen, refuses to consider, refuses to discuss, you no longer have governance in good faith. The result is that it creates a climate in which the other side, which hitherto has tried to govern in earnest, now becomes (understandably) wary of the motives of others. Nevertheless, their natural impulse is to continue governing with the hope that rationality and dialogue will return at some point.
But sometimes that dialogue doesn’t return. Sometimes factions dig in harder. And then you have counter-factions, which make us feel better and feel like we’re fighting back against the instigators of discord, but in reality, we’re only polarizing, just at two ends, not one.