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To be brief, it’s propaganda designed to keep rural voters red. Ie- “those big city folk don’t care about you.”
Partly…
But also that the Dem party today is significantly more “conservative” economically than we used to be, as the article points out:
In 1910, Teddy Roosevelt thundered his warning that “a small class of enormously wealthy and economically powerful men, whose chief object is to hold and increase their power” could destroy US democracy. Roosevelt’s answer was to tax wealth. The estate tax was eventually enacted in 1916, and the capital gains tax in 1922.
In the 1912 presidential campaign, Woodrow Wilson promised “a crusade against powers that have governed us … that have limited our development … that have determined our lives … that have set us in a straitjacket to do as they please”. The struggle to break up the giant trusts would be, in Wilson’s words, a “second struggle for emancipation”.
Wilson signed into law the Clayton Antitrust Act, which strengthened antitrust laws and protected unions. He also established the Federal Trade Commission to root out “unfair acts and practices in commerce”, and created the first permanent national income tax.
Years later, Teddy Roosevelt’s fifth-cousin, Franklin D Roosevelt, attacked corporate and financial power by giving workers the right to unionize, the 40-hour workweek, unemployment insurance, and social security. FDR instituted a high marginal income tax on the wealthy – those making more than $5m a year were taxed up to 75% – and he regulated finance.
Plus, Teddy was the first presidential platform that used universal healthcare…
So part of it is that Republicans lie and propaganda
But if the modern Dem party didn’t think the Dem party platform from a fucking century ago wasnt “too extreme” the modern Dem party would be as popular as it was with FDR.
I think that’s more of a symptom than a root cause. republicans’ goal since the 70’s has been to pull the lower and middle classes to them with wedge identity issues like abortion. the whole “elitism” thing is a part of that too. So now the parties are competing on those wedge issues and identity more than economic progress, as they were in FDR’s time.
Like, you understand that if the Dem party wanted to, they could still be that economically progressive, right?
And that in doing so it mitigate Republicans lying?
The Dem party becoming more economically conservative is solely the fault of the people choosing to do what donors want over what Dem voters want…
Both parties focusing on the “wedge issues” is by design, that way the wealthy who donate to both parties always win…
The only people who control the Dem.platform is Dem party leadership, them choosing wealthy donors over voters is literally no one’s fault except the people running the party who keep repeatedly making that choice.
I get wanting to blame Republicans, but we can’t on this one.
It’s literally as easy as Kamala deciding to do so at this point, it’s a month from election and she’s the candidate. But she’s not, instead she keeps moving to the right economically the closer we get to the election.
I also wish the Dems would promote more progressive policies. At the same time, the media does not celebrate the wins for Dems, such as the creation of the CFPB that Elizabeth Warren established. They don’t celebrate the response to oligopoly through review of mergers and acquisitions by the FTC under Lina Kahn. They don’t celebrate the reduced child poverty rate under the expanded child tax credit. Positive progress doesn’t make it to mass media even when it does happen, which isn’t often enough.
By the same token, they report everything trump says…
The report everything Vance says, but also Biden and Kamala too.
If Biden and Kamala talked about those things, then the media would too.
Kamala just went on an interview blitz, I watched some of it, didn’t see her being up anything you mentioned. Did she in any of the recent interviews you e seen?
She was just on Colbert, he’d have let her say anything she wanted to…
Do you remember what she choose to discuss?
Edit:
Walz just talked about ending the Electoral college, and the media reported on it.
But they also reported on Kamala distancing herself from it.
That’s an example from like today of what I’m talking about. All it takes for the media to report on something is a high ranking politician saying it. There’s so many and so desperate for ad revenue they will cover anything that comes out of someone’s mouth if they’re on the presidential ticket.
Stop blaming the Dem leadership and look at the facts.
The voters heard Donald Trump say that he liked grabbing the pussy and that he didn’t like soldiers who got captured.
People are choosing garbage because they’d happily eat a ton of manure if it meant they could blow stink in a Libs face.
Death had to take him sleeping. For if Roosevelt had been awake, there would have been a fight.
Damn I miss Teddy. One of the last presidents to truly give a fuck and put the actions behind it.
He really wasn’t one of the last tho…
Not by a longshot, hell, Ike was the last good Republican and he was long after Teddy.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_presidents_of_the_United_States
Things were going pretty fucking great till the original “October surprise”
According to the allegation, on top of the Carter administration’s agreement to unfreeze Iranian assets in U.S. banks in exchange for the release of the embassy hostages, the Reagan administration’s practice of covertly supplying Iran with weapons via Israel likely originated as a further quid pro quo for having delayed the release until after Reagan’s inauguration, setting a precedent for covert U.S.-Iran arms deals that would feature heavily in the subsequent Iran–Contra affair.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1980_October_Surprise_theory
Which is why I’m so fucking nervous hearing right wingers start using that phrase lately.
They might not know where it comes from, but somewhere the person coming up with their talking points does. They just don’t spontaneously come up with shit, they parrot the phrases they’ve heard.
But anyways, on the timeline of our country things have only been getting worse since we stopped running progressives and started Bill Clinton and the neoliberals.
We had a brief respite with Obama, but when you compare Obama and Carter and remember there was 27 years between them…
Obama wasn’t anywhere near as progressive as we should have been.
“Moderate” democrats is not a successful strategy, we have all this freaking data and history to support it, but we just fucking ignore and keep letting the wealthy run shit cuz it’s easy.
Plus, Teddy was the first presidential platform that used universal healthcare…
So part of it is that Republicans lie and propaganda
Ironic considering that Teddy was a Republican.
But also that the Dem party today is significantly more “conservative” economically than we used to be
But that’s the contradiction. The GOP is even further along this scale, so how can the GOP be seen as the party of the people while the Dems are elitists?
Partly…
I think mainly.
We need to bring back the Bull Moose Party (at the local level, not the Russian-backed spoiler effect garbage like the Green Party is debasing itself at).
A better idea is to do to the Democratic Party what the Tea Party and MAGA did to the Republicans.
Primary out corporate candidates and push for progressive ones at every level. President, congressional rep, school board trustee, dog-catcher: it doesn’t matter.
The problem progressive voters have is that they don’t show up, and the especially don’t show up during off years, in primaries and in down-ballot races. The polticial right, by comparison, has been getting people in place on small races for years.
Sanders did more for progressivism by enthusing Democratic members to vote in primaries and down-ballot races than Stein or any third party has ever done, and we’re seeing results. It needs to continue.
I can see the reasoning that the presidency is the biggest office and gets people talking about third parties the most…
But the reason the Green Party is obviously a grift is they focus on battleground states for those presidential runs.
If they were doing what they said they’re trying to do, they’d focus on states like Cali where they can get the media attention and votes while not handing the presidency to Republicans.
Like everything in American politics, it all depends on what state something is happening in
You wouldn’t bring up the shortcomings of First Past The Post voting and then do nothing to change the voting system… would you?
So glad to hear of your public promise to work towards pass electoral reform in your state. Wishing you and your people the best of luck in this campaign you just signed up for.
Propaganda makes you believe that one of the two party is your fiend. Meanwhile for the past century both the red and blue party has served elites interests and fuck over everyone else (including the planet). The proof is that you are a peasants and it would take you a couple of minutes just to visualize how much a billion is.
The system is working as intended. A country created by the wealthy, for the wealthy, and controlled by the wealthy.
Having said that the two sides of the same coin is a bunch of bullshit when you see 60+ years of hate and fear propaganda conducted by conservatives.
Making every modern amenity a partisan issue and is also no mistake. It is very clear one side is keeping us from free education, free/cheap healthcare, equality, and a living wage. It is even clearer when they are pushing for more child labor, pollution, racism, and sexism.
You are contradicting yourself.
The system is working as intended. A country created by the wealthy, for the wealthy, and controlled by the wealthy.
It’s not hard to understand, in such a system you don’t make it to the top unless you belong to the wealthy
To be fair, there is a kernel of truth there.
https://www.cracked.com/blog/6-reasons-trumps-rise-that-no-one-talks-about
The rural folk with the Trump signs in their yards say their way of life is dying, and you smirk and say what they really mean is that blacks and gays are finally getting equal rights and they hate it. But I’m telling you, they say their way of life is dying because their way of life is dying. It’s not their imagination. No movie about the future portrays it as being full of traditional families, hunters, and coal mines. Well, except for Hunger Games, and that was depicted as an apocalypse.
To Democrats, “elites” mean your in some top percentile of wealth and income. To Republicans, “elites” means having a college degree.
This is the correct answer to the question the Guardian poses. I’ve lived among them and can 100% confirm this is how they think.
Elites is all about having a college degree and being “book smart” vs their “street smart” or “wise in the ways of man” sort of bullshit charlatans throughout history have used to make up for a lack of critical thinking skills.
It really is the right answer. But I think we can sharpen it if we look at how the media around Democrats elevates and highlights elitism as a quality to be pursued, for example, in a candidate.
A great example of this was the treatment of Pete Buttigieg, and specific media outlets elevation of him to a nationally relevant political actor. Harvard, then Oxford Rhodes scholar then a decade long McKinseyite (that alone should have disbarred him from running for president), then intelligence officer US Navy. He was the definition of “qualified” to the CNN and NPR editorial boards.
But how well had only political bonafides were a failed run for treasurer in Indiana, and a mayoral victory where he garnered all of 10k votes. So the guy has never actually won any significant state or federal elections. Yet in 2020, suddenly this guys is gets treated like a serious contender in the Democratic primary. Why?
Democratically aligned corporate press is obsessed with credentials, and specifically, the kind that comes from “elite” schools and organizations. Partially because they themselves also come from these elite schools and organizations.
We really have become addicted to certifications and tags and qualifiers for everyone because it’s easier to “understand” them at a glance and that’s decided as all you need.
On paper is good enough for far to many, it’s just easier to categorize people and move on.
Being in your categories is the easiest way to automatically think of then as moral and good because they must be, you are. It’s fucked up both parties. Look at Eric Adams and Marco Rubio.
So they basically turned anti elitism to anti intellectualism so they can fool their audience.
I mean, I thought we all knew that.
I wonder what kind of people ran on anti-intellectualism in the past? Maybe around the time of UdSSR, or some German leader? Maybe some famous leader in Cambodia as well?
It means the nerds you shoved in lockers who learned to read and now have successful lives while you scrape by trying to make alimony at a job that would pay a living wage if you didn’t live in a right to work state.
See that’s the elitism. Plenty of bullies made it out and plenty of their victims didn’t. Ruthlessness is profitable and you don’t have to be a good person to go to college.
How exactly is that elitism? You’re specifically arguing against the meritocracy that they consider elitism, all that fancy book-learnin.
Their mascot shits on a golden toilet in his own private country club ffs.
This is one of the greatest scams that conservatives get away with IMO, not just in the US but it happens in the UK and other places too. Conservatives get in, go hog wild cutting taxes, selling off public assets and throwing huge contracts to their friends, and then as soon as the other side gets back in they find that they have to now balance the books, the conservatives start complaining and saying they’re the fiscally responsible ones.
It’s literally happening right now in the UK - we just got rid of the Tories finally after about 15 years, and the new Labour government immediately found a £20 billion hole in the economy which they now have to make harsh cuts to sort out, and they’re the ones getting criticized for it by the media.
We need a government report card.
At the end of every administration, we need to compare the national debt and all important factors.
It’s one thing people missed in coming up with democratic systems. If different people take turns to steer the ship then you need to define what their goal is so you can evaluate each.
That generally also does not go over well in the media.
Conservatives make a mess to their advantage and win/win every time
Don’t say this around any conservative. They only believe in cutting taxes.
They always have these “household budget” analogies when it comes to the government, but even in a “household budget” situation one solution to overcoming debt is to find a way to raise your income so you can pay down the debt faster…
not just in the US but it happens in the UK and other places too
Damn. Can’t believe New Labour is getting tarred with accepting soccer tickets, fancy clothes, and vacation packages from British Peer Lord Alli. Seems so unfair. Wish people would stop accusing the Labour government of being corrupt, when they are very obviously following the rules of accepting gifts and definitely not operating on any quid pro quo.
the new Labour government immediately found a £20 billion hole in the economy
New Labour has a set of accounting rules that count investment in capital as an expense and insists on running daily budget surpluses for their operating expenses.
Popping open your household account, making cartoonish bug-eyes, and announcing “We owe $200k on our 30 year mortgage but we only make $80k/year! We’re bankrupt for the next three years until we pay this house off!” This is New Labour accounting. It’s laughable and only ever used as an excuse not to spend any money.
On the flip side, this is the same party that insists on privatizing everything. From Thames Water to British Gas to UK Rail, every once-public service has to be turned over and rented back from the private sector. The Brits pass out these privatization contracts as sinecures, guaranteeing their financial friends huge piles of free no-risk revenues at the expense of the British taxpayer. And then they complain that the country has no money.
That New Labour slid directly into the driver’s seat the Tories left and gunned it isn’t something you can ignore, simply because the party leadership has changed.
Because the media continually accepts and perpetuates the right wing framing of everything.
Because the media is owned and operated by rich men who benefit from putting the blame on others and calling it “news.”
Because rich Republicans also own the media.
