I don’t mean we need to go Hannity or Alex Jones. We need someone who can wake the American people up and point out just how outside the norm things are to shake them out of their complacency. Imagine what one of the great statesmen of the 20th century would do in this situation. What did we actually get? Nancy Pelosi tearing up a SOTU speech?
Obama could have done it. He has the credibility and the speechwriting skills, but he’s too afraid of tainting his legacy.
How do you lose the messaging war against the evils of a post-truth fascist coup run by one of the most despicable people ever to live? Somehow the democrats have done that for 6 years now.
I’m not sure how he would have done it (or I would be him ) but FDR would probably do quite well in our current circumstances. I imaging that Washington and Lincoln would several choice words as well.
And yet, we saw exactly that in the witnesses at yesterday’s Jan 6 hearings. These were Republican officials who supported Trump, and wanted him to win the election, even after “4 years of atrocious Trump evil”, and yet, when it came down to it, none of them would break the law for Trump. One can hope that their example will sway at least a few people.
And we’re also seeing it among the pro-Trumpers who have taken offices in the last year. Sure, that one committee in New Mexico made noises about not certifying an election last week, but when the courts took notice and told them to cut that shit out, 2 out of 3 of them cut that shit out.
The Democrats already have a huge advantage in the popular vote, even with “uninspiring” candidates. It doesn’t take too many Republicans finally deciding to stay home to improve that advantage enough to make a difference.
So, do you agree that the problem is less that the Democrats aren’t doing enough to prosecute the Trump administration to satisfy our need for revenge “justice”, and more that the Democrats are focusing on fighting with eachother over whether the Democrats are doing enough to prosecute the Trump administration to satisfy our need for justice revenge?
Depends on what we end up with. Liberal, progressive, leftist ideology is no shield against authoritarianism. I’m allied with the Democrats largely because the right is authoritarian, not because I necessarily agree with all of their ideals. If the left starts using the same playbook as the right, then, IMHO, there becomes less and less difference between them.
I almost never watch the news, I pretty much always read it. I think that helps keep things in perspective, you don’t get the breathless anxiety of a newscaster telling you that this, right here, is the most important news item of your life, and up next (after a word from our corporate sponsors), will be the most important news item of you life, delivered with anxious breathlessness.
But the Democrats do have a number of irons in the fire, and there is quite a bit of debate as to which gets priority. And it’s not even that there really needs to be a priority, as all could be done simultaneously if they could work together. The problem is that, as you complain, they need to prioritize the one that tells you what their message is, and that’s really not as easy as the Republican’s simple message of hate and fear.
I’ve used nearly that quote in business. “Don’t listen to what your customers want, listen to what your potential customers want.”
I didn’t know how I would feel about that, but it does seem to be working. I happened to mention the hearings to my mother shortly after the first one, and she went on a huge rant about… well, I stopped listening, to be honest…
But, now that they have dragged on as long as they have, and clips of damning testimony have gotten into the general zeitgeist, she’s actually coming around a bit. She’s not going to be a Democrat supporter, but she may lessen he support for the Republicans.
Maybe Michelle Obama was wrong with “When they go low, we go high,” but what do you do when you can’t even conceive of how to go any lower than they are ?
I will say one thing I’ve realized affects me about messaging:
Democrats in power have a lot to lose of Republicans permanently take over, even if it’s somehow not fascist, and they know it. At the least, they’d lose a ton of money and personal power. At worst, they’d be tortured and murdered.
So because of this, I think I assume on some level that they are taking action commensurate to their ability and understanding of the situation. I mean, they’ve been in politics for decades. They know the systems and players intimately and personally. Otherwise, I’d have to think that they, as an overall group, are incredibly naive or stupid, and I don’t know that I’m ready to accept that yet.
I think that’s one reason why I asked who on the left in power seems to be treating this with the gravitas that (you think) is deserved: so I could compare and contrast their words and deeds with overall messaging.
IMHO, I think that the Democratic leadership think that liberals, progressives, leftists, and centrists can get along and work together if we face a common enemy. I think that they are wildly overly optimistic, and should be disappointed at how much we seem to hate ourselves.
The ideal, IMHO, would be a system like they have in places like New Zealand, Norway, and Sweden. Cuba, Venezuela, the old USSR, etc., are definitely not the answer. It’s just that in order to get there, it’s not enough to sit back and hope the authoritarians self destruct.
ETA: At least as close to the ideal as we have available given the limitations of the real world. If we’re talking about fiction, the Federation as shown in Start Trek TNG would be the ideal.
You believe that for a person who committed countless crimes against the United States during his presidency, who has proven to be above the law, who has never been seriously punished for anything, who launched, with planning and deliberate attempt, an attempt to violently overthrow the government of the United States to install himself into permanent power, whose party endorses his lies and protects him, who are still actively installing people in the right places to pull off another coup attempt - that anyone who would like to see those crimes prosecuted are interested in revenge, and not justice?
I think you saw someone use the “you want revenge, not justice” rhetoric once and thought “hey, that sounds cool and gives me the moral high ground” and so you’re using it here, because it certainly doesn’t apply to this situation. The continued functioning of any semblance of a rule of law in the United States demands that Trump be prosecuted for his crimes, and his party’s ongoing attempts to continue his failed coup are not only a major threat, but winning by default. This is one of the most clearcut situations where prosecution would be justice, and not revenge, and so I cannot seriously see an argument for you throwing around that idea.
This would be my position. As I’ve said elsewhere, you worry about the water damage after you’ve put out the fire.
In the US as it stands now, a distinctly leftist government (even just as “leftist” as Canada, let’s say) is basically a non-starter. We could wish that weren’t so, but it is so. Anyone who refuses to vote for the Democrats because they “aren’t leftist enough”, in the face of a Republican Party that’s likely going to nominate Trump again, is basically delusional.
Those who want a distinctly leftist government need to do the work of convincing the voters over time that this is a good idea, and then worry about elections. The reflexive “But that’s SOCIALISM!” is so deeply rooted in the average American mindset that it kills any hopes of significant progress, and so that’s what needs to change first. In the mean time, keeping the current Republican party out of power is, by itself, a necessary accomplishment.
Exactly. This isn’t Nixon or Bush Jr. going away to live a life of quiet contemplation away from the public eye in their golden years. This is an ongoing attempt which was merely on pause for a few months after Biden’s election.
ETA: I should say Biden’s inauguration. Obviously the pause didn’t occur after the election.
I take your point, but how much of democratic voter apathy is knowing that the democratic party is not actually going to do anything that benefits them? That they’re being lead by the nose by “well, you have to vote for us, the other choice is republican” over and over again?
I understand the importance of defeating republicans, obviously, but I have to hold my nose to do it, because democrats offer absolutely nothing good; they only offer “you have to, the other option is republican”
If they could actually offer something that inspired people, that made them think their lives might actually be improved, I think you’d be surprised about how much voter enthusiasm that would stir up. You’ve had this idea beaten into your entire life, how we can’t ever do anything to make anyone’s life better because America isn’t ready for that, so the best we can do is make everyone’s life worse more slowly than the republicans would if given power, that you’ve internalized it and assume it to be true. That a democratic party that actually wanted to do some real good would alienate rather than inspire people. I think this is an untested assumption, that the party hasn’t actually done anything that would make you vote for them (rather than against republicans) in decades.
Biden had the “Build Back Better” plan, and that would have improved the lives of a lot of people. If the Dems had had a few more Senators in place, it likely would have passed, rather than the watered-down version they eventually got.
While there are still problems with it, Obamacare definitely improved the lives of a lot of people.
Could both plans have been better still? Of course. But to say they’ve offered nothing at all is just wrong.
And the example of Build Back Better pretty much makes my case: in an environment in which the original version could not pass, there’s no way an even more “leftist” version would have passed. If you want better, you’ve got to improve that environment first.
The thing about the Trump-ists is, it’s an entrenched belief system in which people have invested a chunk of their identity. While a lot of Trump supporters are low-information voters and can be swayed or persuaded, there’s going to be a hard core of around 10% who cannot. So this leaves two problems, to my mind:
How can the Democrats reach the reachable Republicans?
While I sympathize with the people who cry “appeasement!”, we need a two-party system, at least. So rewarding sane Republicans by compromise is actually a constructive policy. The trouble is, as was mentioned above, we can’t yet separate sane from insane. So we have to encourage them to do that, which is precisely what these hearings are for. Give them time.
How can the Democrats deal with the insane forever-Trumpers?
This is, to my mind, a much more serious problem, because we’re not dealing with it. We’re hoping they just go away or die of old age and don’t become domestic terrorists. But there’s a few million of them, and they’re not all stupid. Sometimes you need to be clever to keep creating defenses of your conspiracy theory against reality.
I don’t have a solution for this: free speech and freedom of assembly and a lot of the other freedoms that bring America meaning also protect large groups of batshit insane people.
Late to the party here, tl;dr. But to address the OP:
If you really believe it’s going to be truly that bad, maybe you should arm yourself for the coming civil war? For some reason you seem to think that only fascists can or will use guns, while the progressive Left will simply cower helplessly in fear. Don’t just wail and cry that brownshirts won’t respect restraining orders. Guns are not inherently conservative or right-wing; they’re populist or libertarian.
I would remind you that after Nixon was elected in Nov '68 and the Kent State shootings six months later, the radical Left genuinely thought that martial law was imminent. Figures like Abbie Hoffman and Claire Wolfe advised all who would listen to arm themselves and not surrender quietly.
Some non- white, male, heterosexual, Christian people who advocate arming themselves:
Jews For The Preservation of Firearms Ownership, Inc.
And the opposite is also true. Republicans stand to lose money and power if they lose, and they have probably convinced themselves that they will be tortured and murdered as well. They are a cornered animal, and that the corner is of their own design makes no difference, they will be vicious and cruel and everything it takes to survive.
Can the Democrats emulate that? Should they?
I think that part of the problem is that they’ve been in politics for decades. During the 2020 primaries, I was for Buttigieg, primarily because of his age. My biggest problem with Biden was his age, and not because I thought he was frail or senile, but because it’s about time that the old guard made way for the new. I complain that I moved out of my parent’s house a quarter of a century ago, and yet, I still live under their rules.
Things have changed, dramatically, in the last couple of decades, and these politicians really haven’t kept up.
Not naive or stupid, but inflexible and slow to adapt to rapid change.
There’s a few, Elizabeth Warren, Corey Booker, maybe
Amy Klobuchar, but honestly none of them are good at getting that message out. They aren’t really good public speakers, and/or tend to gaffe at bad moments.
) but FDR would probably do quite well in our current circumstances. I imaging that Washington and Lincoln would several choice words as well.