Exactly. I started a post saying the same and scrapped it. On a bunch of issues, the Democrats base ARE centrists. I don’t think “the Democratic base” or “the center” are concepts that even make sense outside of specific issues.
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I think it is pretty clear the average Dem voter is farther left than the average Dem politician. That is one thing that makes the desire to appeal to the moderates/centrists even more insane (especially considering this has already been the playbook and it hasn’t worked at all).
I think the people who are advocating for it have been duped by the establishment/corporate/big money donor wing of the party. This group of course wants moderates to be appealed to because those are the types of policies they actually benefit from. And look it’s worked. We have people who believe it enough to make hundreds of posts defending it.
The end result is the entire party has been co-opted and controlled by this very minority group for a long time. And so there is a lot of apathy and “both sides” arguments about the Dem party because really they have just been the lesser of two evils rather than any catalyst for real change.
There is a real sense out there that the government hasn’t done much to benefit the masses. We could, I dunno, run on those things AND actually try and accomplish some of them. I know, I know, we risk offending the delicate sensibilities of the moderate Dem voters by doing it but it seems like it would be worth a shot.
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This!
It’s exactly what the GOP does - and to great effect. Forget the wishy washies; just froth up your own guys so that on election day they’re champing at the bit to go and clang that voting lever like mad.
Meanwhile the milquetoast and corporate Dems have just spent that same time fluffing around fretting (or pretending to fret) over whether they can convince a few supposed middle ground voters to change their minds and vote Dem instead of R… [narrator; “That very xxxxxx happens”]. Most of us can fill in the blank quite accurately, I’m guessing.
Once you’ve made your pitch, fuck the undecideds and independents. Rile up the base and get the turnout.
Perhaps you’re right, but I’m not sure what you mean by mechanism. The only mechanism I can think of by which Democrats politic is to serve the establishment. Take Obama who I’m sure most would agree was a good president. I would give him good grades on many facets of his presidency. But he was for the most part, a moderate centrist who wasted his political capital in service of the status quo. Was he a good president?
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If a hurricane or disaster struck a city and wiped out their water supply there would be an immediate national emergency. I feel he could’ve used his presidential power to do more for the Flint water crisis
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He bailed out Wall Street without a single executive going to jail and then it was back to business as usual. Granted he instituted the stimulus package, but welcomed corporate welfare
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He championed TPP and NAFTA, which by any liberal progressive standard is absurd. TPP never made it through, but he signed deals with countries like Panama, which achieved nothing except an outlet for corporate tax dodging
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He literally expanded the nation’s spying tactics through the NSA and went so far as to call for Snowden to be extradited for treason because he dared to blow the whistle on government overreach. This was an abuse of power and breach of rights for personal citizen information! This hardly a left leaning position
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He didn’t close the torture prison camp at Guantanamo
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He also let war criminals like Bushy, Cheney, and Rumsfeld slide, instead of prosecuting them
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It’s also mainly the fault of other moderate Democrats why Obama couldn’t get his legacy single payer through
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If I’m not mistaken Obama deported more people than Bush
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He funded Israel to expand settlements and kick out Palestinians. This is a Republican policy! He also gave Saudi Arabia millions for similar military hawkish reasons. Saudi Arabia! The most brutally oppressive regime on earth to women, gays, and the secular
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He upped drone strikes many of which, if I’m not mistaken were illegal killing thousands of innocent people
I could go on, but you get the idea. Obama was what in most people’s eyes a very liberal to moderate president. This is what the mechanism of moderate centrism looks like and where it gets us. Not just piling on Obama, but ALL the centrist moderate Democratic politicians. The overwhelming majority of Americans oppose these things. It’s not what the people want. And if we put another moderate in office, we won’t have time to undo the damage
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Um… You realize you are AGREEING with me! You just stated Trump is the symptom of GOP incompetence while simultaneously saying you can’t take anyone seriously who says Trump is the symptom. You should jackhammer the cement out of your own head first before complaining about others.
Also, major lolz at how incompetent the GOP is. They’ve stolen a SCOTUS seat, blocked every landmark legislation the last Democratic president tried to achieve, are filling courts with Republican judges, gerrymandering districts like nobody’s business, and rigging everything in their favor as we speak. So you also might want to re-think who are the REAL incompetents. Hint: It’s the Dems!
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How do words work?
I don’t think “left vs. moderate vs. right” is the correct way to look at this.
There’s no such thing as “the middle” when it comes to voters. I think there are people who trend conservative that hold some progressive views, and people who trend progressive that hold some conservative views. The real question of who the base is might be answered by asking at what point on a sort of sliding scale between these two types of people to we give up on them, and who we consider part of the “base”.
Say we have 12 issues (obviously there are more, but this is a thought exercise): health care, gun control, climate change, voting rights, economy, abortion, minimum wage, gay marriage, immigration, unions, public education, student loans.
Person A: holds progressive/leftist views on 12/12 issues
Person B: holds progressive views on 9/12 issues
Person C: holds progressive views on 6/12 issues
Person D: holds progressive views on 3/12 issues
So, Who do we try for? A and B? A, B, and C? all of them? The next obvious question is, are there weights given to the issues that are more important or defining to the progressive cause? If Person D has progressive views on health care, student loans, and climate change, and the rest more conservative views, is it worth trying for his vote as opposed to if he only has progressive views on abortion, gay marriage, and public education and conservative views on everything else? Is it not worth bothering with him either way?
Is a homophobic gun lover who believes in a $15 minimum wage and eliminating insurance companies part of our base? Because that’s who we’re really talking about when we talk about independents. What about the person who believes in a $15 minimum wage and is an environmental activist who likes their private health plan and is pro-life?
I don’t know the answer, and it’s not an easy one to get to. If we do assign a weighting system to determine who is “progressive enough” for the Democratic platform/campaigns to appeal to, who decides the weighting system? I bet if we asked every person in this thread to come up with which issues are more important, and in what order, we’d get that many different priorities.
I find the very idea of judging people as “progressive enough” to be in the Democratic base to be counterproductive and flat out wrong. I also dislike how the definition of progressive has coalesced around two, and only two issues. Like the secret password to get into the progressive club is that you MUST be in lockstep agreement on those two issues and everything else is ok to have slightly different views.
I think we increase voter turnout (the key to winning) not by choosing one of the other, but by working on BOTH.
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You’re the most thick headed stubborn person here. He is nevertheless the product of a corrupt system that was in place long before he ever got elected. Saying “we” represents those who hate Trump doesn’t mean anything. It has no tangible effect on the outcome of our politics. Trump will be gone one way or another and we still have to deal with the problems of the future
lol, don’t bother engaging me again.
When you say, “How the heck are we losing to Republicans? Centrists and moderates!” you don’t really explain why they cause us to lose Republicans. Maybe you have in the past, but it feels more like you think it is obvious why and don’t need to explain. That’s what I mean by mechanism. I think I’ve made clear why I think centrism is bad ITT. (Please, ask me questions if I haven’t.) I don’t think you have made it clear on this forum, which is why you get resistance from other posters.
Your claim that the overwhelming majority of American oppose your list of items seems wrong to me. I’ve seen numbers that suggest that slightly more Americans tend to think that NAFTA is good than bad and that Democrats and independents are more positive than Republicans about it, but the numbers seem a bit chaotic, so if you just took one poll, you might get the wrong impression. Americans in general are more supportive of Israel than the left is. I think most Americans don’t care about Edward Snowden. At best, those that care are divided on how they feel about him.
Stop posting stupid centrist crap and I won’t engage. I suppose I could block you so I don’t have to read what some moderate who I could care less has to say, but it would be easier if you just blocked me because I can’t help responding to shit strategy suggestions
And btw… I’m not the voter you have to convince. I’ll vote Dem regardless of who it is. But many progressives will again sit out this election rather than vote Biden or some other centrist. You are not helping the cause even though you think you’re some political genius
They cause us to lose to Republicans because they aren’t much different than Republicans. They are bought and paid for corporate shills and that’s what they govern on. And okay. Why do you think centrism is bad? I could/should go back and read your posts, but if you can explain it now, I’d appreciate it
And this is due to brainwashing by MSM. Israel good. Russian bad. NAFTA good. Snowden bad. Millions like nunnehi have been brainwashed by too much MSNBC and CNN watching. Corporate media is not on the side of progressives
I am confused by this whole exchange. You quote two words that appear in the post that Cactus is replying to, but not in the reply. Then, you ask how words work, which suggests that you think Cactus is not good at using words.
An argument can be made that the rot within the Republican Party began with Richard Nixon and his southern strategy. (Or maybe with Goldwater, who inspired it.) This begat Ronald Reagan, Newt Gingrich and the Republican Revolution, and George W. Bush. This was always going to end with Donald Trump or someone like him. It would be reasonable to say that he is the metastasized cancer in that he is not the primary tumor and that his presence means that the Republican Party has gone beyond the point of no return and can no longer be cured. It would be wrong to think that if we can just get rid of Trump, our national nightmare will be over and we can return to normal.
I think that centrism is bad in two ways. The first is that they avoid the bold measures that will inspire future voters. They ensure that Democrats won’t develop yellow dog constituencies that will support the party loyally at the ballot box. A lower intensity of support means that Democratic voters are less likely to turn out.
The second way that centrism is bad is that it isn’t realistic about the changing political landscape. Republicans should be treated as bad actors who do not argue in good faith. Political polarization is the new normal. Bipartisanship is a thing of the past unless the Republican party changes.
You can’t have it both ways. Either the overwhelming majority of American oppose those things that you oppose, or the mainstream media has brainwashed them into not opposing those things. Which is it?
Think winning the Senate is more critical.
He said that I was saying metastasized cancer is a symptom of the disease. That is the result of the symptoms. I said that anyone who says Trump is a ‘symptom’ is someone I don’t take seriously about politics because that statement proves to me that the person doesn’t understand anything about politics as a system to say that. He said I was agreeing with him, and I am 180 degrees opposite on what I’m thinking vs. him.
He calls me a centrist, when that is one of the most laughable things I’ve ever heard. He has right around the worst reading comprehension of anyone on this site, and gets so much wrong about everything, there’s no point to responding to him (it wasn’t until he outed himself to me that I stopped engaging him, as he was doing all of this same stupid crap on exiled). See his work in the gun thread for numerous examples of this, and, well, see here.
This is how I think about it. Very few people have actual moderate views. They have a mix of conservative views.
My view has been that Democrats should prioritize things like health care and the economy. For me, that means pushing Medicare For All and taking on corporate interests. And I tell people that this means I am more willing to compromise on things like abortion instead of those issues. And I get massive pushback on that. Which tells me that they either don’t understand the idea of having priorities or they have different priorities.
Which two issues do you think are the two issues that are used to define progressive? Of the ones you listed, I would say that abortion and gay marriage are the ones where there is the least variation among people who are considered progressive.
Now that I read the rest of your post, you’re thinking he said metastasized cancer. He didn’t, I did. He says Trump is a symptom. I largely agree with you. He’s the result, and it ain’t going away. This is the new GOP. They’re saying the quiet parts loud from now on.
You’d do better to pick one social and one economic issue to determine that. There are a lot of GOP members, and even Trump die hards, who are completely okay with pro-choice and gay marriage.
I know you said metastasized cancer. I find it weird that you quoted him with those words.
Cactus thinks that calling Trump that is the same as calling him a symptom. I find that to be reasonable. Both of you are saying that Trump is not the root cause of our current insanity. There may be other things you disagree upon, but this particular point shouldn’t be one for you to butt heads over.