USPOL: Pulitzer Feeling Increasingly Out Of Place In New York Times Office

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Submarine Sandpaper: May 27, 2007

safely sodomized posted:

just entirely wrong

https://berniesanders.com/issues/racial-justice/

**** after super Tuesday when it was already lost ****

(USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)

# ? Sep 22, 2017 14:56

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# ? May 24, 2024 06:18

Mr Hootington: Jul 24, 2008; I'M HAVING A HOOT EATING CORNETTE THE LONG WAY

The last time we let leftist racism go unchecked we got Hitler. Make sure to go out and punch those rear end in a top hat antifa, DSA, and Berniebros. We can stop them through means tested punching.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 14:56

Killer-of-Lawyers: Apr 22, 2008; THUNDERDOME LOSER 2020

Regardless of when it was put on the website, I think if we learn anything from 2016 it's that check my website doesn't really work for anyone.

I remember the questions Bernie flubbed about racism vs class issues. I remember when he called southern primary voters (Many who are black people) as more conservative than in the north. He did had a messaging problem at the least on the issue.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:00

Submarine Sandpaper: May 27, 2007

Killer-of-Lawyers posted:

Regardless of when it was put on the website, I think if we learn anything from 2016 it's that check my website doesn't really work for anyone.

I remember the questions Bernie flubbed about racism vs class issues. I remember when he called southern primary voters (Many who are black people) as more conservative than in the north. He did had a messaging problem at the least on the issue.

that's a generous recollection of "low information voters"

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:01

Ghost Leviathan: Mar 2, 2017; Exploration is ill-advised.

Killer-of-Lawyers posted:

Regardless of when it was put on the website, I think if we learn anything from 2016 it's that check my website doesn't really work for anyone.

That had to be learned?

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:03

Sheng-Ji Yang: Mar 5, 2014

Submarine Sandpaper posted:

**** after super Tuesday when it was already lost ****

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JOuuiqo6KgE

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:03

Koalas March: May 21, 2007

safely sodomized posted:

just entirely wrong

https://berniesanders.com/issues/racial-justice/

This seems disingenuous. He added that later. I remember it was a big thing in the primaries, he didn't address any of that until BLM took his mic. I guess I should've reiterated that I am speaking about the primary/election.

There is also this big problem: If you are trying to court black people to your movement you need to take their concerns seriously and you need to seem sincere. Often yall get so loving defensive when we call poo poo out. this intersects with white fragility in a way. So many white leftists will blow up at a black person or just stay ridiculously condescending and paternalistic. There is a huge "I know whats best for you" vibe. You're supposed to be enticing us with candles and wine, not taking us to day care. the reason no other groups have to do this is because we already are comfortable with the Dems (especially people who have inroads in our community) and anyone with half a brain has already written off the GOP.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:03

Killer-of-Lawyers: Apr 22, 2008; THUNDERDOME LOSER 2020

Was low information another time? I seem to recall there specifically being a time when he called southern democrats more conservative as well. I could be mixing things up. All I know is it made me pretty steamed and actually got me to vote in my states mostly useless primary.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:05

Taerkar: Dec 7, 2002; kind of into it, really

There was a lot of dismissal of "Southern Democrats" on these forums after Super Tuesday.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:06

Raskolnikov38: Mar 3, 2007; We were somewhere around Manila when the drugs began to take hold

Koalas March posted:

This seems disingenuous. He added that later. I remember it was a big thing in the primaries, he didn't address any of that until BLM took his mic. I guess I should've reiterated that I am speaking about the primary/election.

wasn't the mic incident from like august of 2015? i seem to recall it was ages before any primaries

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:06

Mr Hootington: Jul 24, 2008; I'M HAVING A HOOT EATING CORNETTE THE LONG WAY

Cory Booker, Mark zuckerberg, or Kamala Harris will be the nominee in 2020. Seems silly to be arguing over a section of the Democratic party that will be ignored and isn't the actual base if the party.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:09

Xae: Jan 19, 2005

Taerkar posted:

There was a lot of dismissal of "Southern Democrats" on these forums after Super Tuesday.

The funny part was people saying their votes should count for less than others.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:09

Koalas March: May 21, 2007

Raskolnikov38 posted:

wasn't the mic incident from like august of 2015? i seem to recall it was ages before any primaries

Honestly its hard for me to remember which is why I have been trying to use qualifiers. But truly the reaction to those jumping to defend Bernie and belittle me for my mistakes (not here, necessarily) is another turn off. If you are trying to court people, (and yes, unfortunately us leftists need to court more people into the movement) you have to use a bit of sincerity, grace and finesse. Not the usual "lmao you are wrong rear end in a top hat" internet approach. This is why I used the used the wine vs daycare analogy.

Hoots, are you advocating for throwing black people under the bus there? The Dems can't win without us. Unless they flip to straight racism there is a percentage of the white electorate that they will never capture and Dems need to accept it and move on.

Here's another thing you need to do to get more poc votes: Stop trying to court racists. They have no place in civilized discourse and want nothing more than to support policies that cause human suffering.

Koalas March fucked around with this message at 15:15 on Sep 22, 2017

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:12

axeil: Feb 14, 2006

One of the Not-Gawker-Anymore-But-Still-Basically-The-Same-Thing sites did a write-up on Beto O'Rourke. It's pretty good! I had no clue the dude had ties to At The Drive-In / Mars Volta of all things. Makes me like him even more.

http://splinternews.com/if-this-punk-rock-democrat-can-win-in-texas-maybe-we-r-1818632384

Splinter posted:

If This Punk-Rock Democrat Can Win in Texas, Maybe We�re Not Totally Screwed

Beto O�Rourke hasn�t had his coffee yet. It�s 7:30 in the morning in Austin, and the El Paso congressman and Democratic contender for Ted Cruz�s Senate seat looks tired. He should. Just 10 hours ago, Hurricane Harvey made landfall over the Texas coast, where it would hammer cities like Corpus Christi, Houston, and Victoria, one of the congressman�s recent campaign stops. When he gets in the truck, he sets the radio to the local Austin NPR affiliate for an update.

He tells the young volunteer behind the wheel to drive through a Starbucks as he gets his bearings for the day. It�s a Saturday morning, and he�s 29 days into a planned 34-day road trip. The staffers in the month-old Toyota Tundra (built in San Antonio, naturally) have rotated, but O�Rourke, of course, has been there the whole trip. He�s been criss-crossing the state, hitting up coffee shops and breakfast spots in small towns, in a way that feels more like a presidential candidate canvassing Iowa than anything Texas politics has seen in at least a generation.

He�s visited places like La Grange (pop. 4,690), Stephenville (pop. 20,607), Pampa (pop. 17,762), and Hondo (pop. 9,276), none of which are exactly Democratic strongholds. In 2016, Trump pulled at least 70 percent of the vote in each area. This morning, O�Rourke is headed to the Trailblazer Grille in Burnet (pop. 6,359), a place where Hillary Clinton received 17.6 percent of the vote. It�s at least the 35th official campaign stop of the tour. The truck finds a Starbucks, and O�Rourke gets a large drip coffee before pulling onto the highway, the rain from Hurricane Harvey hammering the roof of the Tundra.

The night before, O�Rourke had been in Austin, speaking to a different kind of crowd. In the famously progressive capital of Texas, he packed the Scholz Garden, a longtime political gathering spot a few blocks north of the Capitol. The crowd didn�t look much different from the sort that someone like Wendy Davis, the last high-profile Democrat to seek statewide office in Texas, had drawn. People clapped at the obvious applause lines�a shout-out for science here, for preserving DACA there�as they wore their �Friend of the Pod� (as in Pod Save America) and Progress Texas t-shirts.

Austin�s always been friendly turf to Democrats, but it�s been a long time since that mattered. The last time a Democrat won statewide office of any kind in Texas, it was when Bob Bullock was elected Lieutenant Governor in 1994. Back then, Beto O�Rourke was busy touring the country with his punk band, Foss. All the enthusiasm in Austin hasn�t been enough to push a Democrat to within 10 points of winning a Senate race since Lloyd Bentsen�s last election in 1988.

All of which helps explain why O�Rourke and his Toyota Tundra spent the month of August stopping in places like Burnet, La Grange, and Hondo. Focusing on the friendly parts of Texas�Austin, San Antonio, El Paso, the Rio Grande Valley, and the cities proper (if not the suburbs) of Dallas and Houston�isn�t a winning strategy. The night before stopping in Burnet, O�Rourke was playing to a crowd that already loved him, even if they�d only just met him a few months ago. He announced his longshot campaign in March with such verve that he managed to scare away more entrenched potential candidates, like San Antonio Democratic superstars Joaquin and Julian Castro. It was like watching a stadium rock show, where people mouth the words to the hits before Bono even sings them.

In Burnet, though, speaking to a crowd of about 90 people packed into a diner, O�Rourke sizzles with a different kind of energy. At the Trailblazer Grille, the words �chicken fried� appear on the menu in three separate times, and signs on the wall say things like �There�s a place for all God�s creatures� right next to the potatoes & gravy!� These might be all 90 Democratic voters in all of Burnet, but they�re still a room full of mostly older white folks, largely retirees who are having their morning coffee, where �diversity� means people with gray hair or people with brown hair, and O�Rourke is there to pitch himself as someone to lead them.

He talks about the military, sure�he�s been very active in the House as a member of the Veteran Affairs Committee�but he doesn�t stick to the script of safe applause lines. He gets a cheer from the crowd when he talks about extending VA mental health benefits to vets who received a dishonorable discharge, an initiative he worked on with a Republican colleague. He references the previous day�s announcement of a formal transgender military ban, and gets a room full of older, white voters in a county that Trump won with three-quarters of the vote to offer an ovation for transgender service members.

O�Rourke sticks around to meet every single person in Burnet who wants to meet him. He doesn�t leave until the last hand has been shaken, the last selfie snapped. It wouldn�t be impressive�that�s what politicians are supposed to do�except that nobody in Burnet can remember the last time a Senate candidate stopped by to talk to them at all, let alone hung around until he�d met everybody personally.

People are enthusiastic about him�because he showed up, sure, and also because of how he comes off. His staff is protective of his time; even though I was in the truck with him for more than an hour, we were only slated for ten minutes of interview time, so he can make calls to the coast and stream the drive on Facebook Live. But he�s not particularly guarded in how he talks. He�s a legit cusser, and he talks about how he came to conclusions about policy�even ones that may seem contradictory to his party or his background�in a naturalistic way.

He�s big on working with veterans because of the community in El Paso around the army base in town. He�s for ending marijuana prohibition because he grew up across the border from Juarez, where cartel violence once made the city the world�s most dangerous. He�s in favor of term limits, even though they�re an idea mostly championed by conservatives, because he believes that Washington is inherently broken and corrupt�but he thinks that maybe limiting the amount of time people spend in office could fix it. He�s to the left of most of the Democratic Party, but he cherishes bipartisanship as an ideal and an end unto itself.

�When you look at the DNC or the RNC or national politics, it�s corporate rock and roll. It has very little soul to it. Maybe no soul at all.�

That all matters for O�Rourke in order to have a chance of defeating Ted Cruz. He�s running an innovative campaign, avoiding the pitfalls of doomed candidates like Wendy Davis. He hasn�t hired a single out-of-state consultant or pollster, and with the exception of the volunteer driving the car, everybody I�ve met from his campaign is either from El Paso or from the congressman�s D.C. office. But it�s still as uphill a battle as there is in politics right now.

Turning Texas blue, or at least purple, has been a dream of progressives for decades. It�s also one that seems, somehow, to always be at least four to six years away. So can a former punk rock guitar player from a part of Texas that�s never produced a statewide elected official be the one to break the streak?

Robert Francis O�Rourke was born in El Paso in 1972, but he�s been called �Beto� for as long as anyone can remember. If you ask people at the bar in El Paso where the nickname came from, everybody seems to understand that it was bestowed upon him by his childhood nanny. (O�Rourke, for his part, says he�s not sure who first began calling him Beto.) Wherever the nickname originated, it�s how everybody knew him growing up.

That includes some prominent El Pasoans. O�Rourke spent his formative years in the city�s punk rock scene, playing in and watching bands whose members included people like Cedric Bixler-Zavala, who would later be the lead singer of the breakthrough hardcore band At The Drive In and the mid-2000�s arena rock smash The Mars Volta. O�Rourke and Bixler-Zavala played music together in a band called Foss�O�Rourke on guitar and vocals, Bixler-Zavala on drums�and toured the U.S. and Canada in the summers, while O�Rourke pursued his undergraduate degree at Columbia.

Bixler-Zavala credits O�Rourke with turning him on to punk rock touring. O�Rourke, he says, gave him his first copy of Book Your Own loving Life, the DIY touring bible. �He introduced me to that whole subculture�he taught me all the ropes of that,� Bixler-Zavala says. �Yet at the same time, he didn�t even know what he was doing. He was winging it.�

The punk rock thing is a big part of O�Rourke�s story. On the way to Burnet, after we start talking music, a staffer tries to impress him by talking about the drum kit he still has at his mom�s house. O�Rourke played in bands in college, and again when he returned to El Paso in 1998. As he began to enter public life, though, it was harder to remain an underground punk rock dude. When he was just a guy who ran a web design company and a local arts and culture website, that was fine.

When he started to pursue politics�first with the El Paso City Council, to which he was elected in 2005, and then in his congressional run�aspects of his past became a liability. He�d been arrested for burglary after tripping an alarm while jumping a fence at the University of Texas-El Paso in 1995, and again for a DWI three years later. (He wasn�t convicted on either charge.)

But he�s proud of his punk days. In the truck, he brightens immediately when I ask him about Bixler-Zavala. He tells me about being at a birthday party for Bixler-Zavala�s kid with his family. He thumbs through his phone for a minute, looking for a photo of himself with a few At The Drive In guys and their kids. (He can�t find it, but offers to send it to me��Maybe that�ll be interesting?�) It�s clear, talking to O�Rourke, that until pretty recently�probably until he started raising millions in his bid to unseat Ted Cruz�the fact that he was friends with rock stars before they were famous has been one of the cooler things in his life.

He�s not exactly a name-dropper, but there aren�t a lot of locals hanging around El Paso who can tell you about the time he traded a ticket for a Foss show to a teenage Feist in exchange for a lockpicking set outside of a bar in Calgary in 1993, a story he�s probably told dozens of times since �1, 2, 3, 4� was released. It doesn�t seem like it�s dawned on him yet that, if this all goes the way he hopes, she might be the one telling stories about the time she met a future U.S. senator with his punk band.

Bixler-Zavala already talks about O�Rourke like that. When I ask him if, when they were touring North America in a 1983 station wagon, he thought to himself, �Yeah, this guy is gonna grow up to run for Senate,� he laughs.

�I never thought that of him. At all. I saw him as this really tall, nerdy kid who hung out with the nerds. In high school, a lot of the nerds were into punk rock music�the Dischord kind of kid,� Bixler-Zavala says, referencing the seminal Washington, D.C. punk label that produced politically-minded bands like Fugazi and Minor Threat. �He turned me onto that kind of thing. He came around and was like, �I know you got the bug, and you want to get out of here.� I never saw him as this overly charismatic, Kennedy-like figure that everyone sees him as now.�

O�Rourke talks about his music career on the stump sometimes. At an event in San Antonio in April, he went on a five-minute riff about how �punk rock, at its best, was just stripping down all the corporate rock I was hearing on the radio in the 1980s and getting down to its most basic roots.� That includes, in addition to not hiring pollsters or consultants, taking a Bernie-like approach to fundraising, rejecting all SuperPAC funds, and focusing exclusively on contributions from individual donors. Between April and July, he raised $2.1 million, $500,000 more than Cruz raised in the same time span.

This all fits neatly into the figure O�Rourke presents.

�We�re connecting with people in a very direct way, booking our own tour,� he says of the trip he�s on right now. �I listened to 70�s FM radio with my dad, and when I came of age, there was something wrong with rock and roll, and I didn�t realize it until someone took me to my first punk rock show. It was, �Holy poo poo!�� He was 15 years old, and he pauses to drop Bixler-Zavala�s name again, talks about watching the future rock star at 13 years old play Misfits covers.

�I got into punk rock because the corporate stuff didn�t get me going,� he says. �When you look at the DNC or the RNC or national politics, it�s corporate rock and roll. The songs sound familiar, but it�s really glossed and produced, and has very little soul to it. Maybe no soul at all.� It�s felt so good, he says, �to do this in as raw a way as possible.�

All of that sounds nice. The question is: Can it work? O�Rourke was an underdog when he ran for El Paso City Council against a two-time incumbent. He won. He was an underdog when he challenged eight-term congressman Silvestre Reyes for his House seat. He won. In both cases, O�Rourke seized some opportunities�an anti-incumbent wave, a push for younger leadership�to defy the odds.

So if you�re talking about �Can Beto O�Rourke beat Ted Cruz?� you can make a few arguments in his favor. Any one of these will get you laughed out of the bar if you�re talking to jaded political reporters in Austin, but let�s make them, anyway: He�s running the most effective ground game of any Texas Democrat in at least a generation, doing so early enough that he can afford to not just visit Burnet or Hondo, but to stop by a half-dozen times in the course of the campaign.

He�s by turns self-effacing, inspiring, and funny on the stump. Listening to Wendy Davis campaign was like mainlining NyQuil, and even her natural constituencies�Latino Democrats in the Rio Grande Valley or progressive activists in Austin�had a hard time understanding what her message was.

Not to mention that 2018 has unique potential, amid a Trump backlash and a slew of new organizing tools and groups, to be a wave election for Democrats, and O�Rourke has already proven that he�s on the radar of people who see Texas as one of the party�s best hopes (along with Nevada and Arizona) to expand the map, rather than just play defense. And Ted Cruz might be uniquely beatable. He�s unpopular with the Trumpist base of his party after his �vote your conscience� speech at the RNC, but also with the Never Trumpers and conservative-leaning Latinos in the state after his about-face in support of Trump at the end of the campaign. If O�Rourke were challenging the state�s senior senator, John Cornyn, none of this might matter�but Ted Cruz? Who knows?

Operating against O�Rourke is literally everything else. It�s the weight of the state�s electoral history, the gerrymandering that�s discouraged voters, the voter ID laws that disenfranchise his core constituency�but not to worry, O�Rourke has a stock response to that: �If you look at it, we�re not really a red state, or a blue state, or a purple state. We�re a non-voting state.� I�ve heard him give that response probably a half-dozen times to interviewers or people asking questions at his events. It explains his campaigning approach. He needs to activate every progressive in Austin, every non-voter in San Antonio, and every dissatisfied Republican in from Lubbock to La Grange.

Even if it doesn�t work, no one will be able to blame him for following the same failed playbook of the Dems of Texas Past. O�Rourke�s rhetoric is part Obama-esque soliloquies aimed straight at the better angels of our nature, part Bernie-esque roadmap for progressive policies. (While he declined to get involved in the 2016 Democratic Primary, and eventually endorsed Clinton after she secured the nomination, O�Rourke�s views tend to align him with the Bernie wing of the party.)

Those policies are probably going to be a part of the campaign against him, if things end up competitive. Republican consultants in Texas have already derided O�Rourke as �more liberal than Wendy Davis� and saying �he would rival Elizabeth Warren� as �one of the most liberal senators in the nation.� As the campaign heats up, it�s safe to expect more efforts to paint him as deeply out of touch with Texas values.

But O�Rourke is interested in values, and interested in challenging the way they play out in politics. The day before Hurricane Harvey made landfall, I asked him if he felt like the storm could help him lead Texans to a place where they�d see government as an entity that existed to help people who were suffering�basically the opposite of the small-government rhetoric American politicians of both parties have gorged themselves on since Reagan.

�After we make sure that everyone�s okay, and help those who aren�t, we need to decide that we�re going to make investments in those areas that are affected, to the tune of tens of billions of dollars,� O�Rourke says. �Maybe that�s because of a philosophical difference, where folks think that�s just not a good use of those resources. Here�s a golden opportunity, as I see it.� He wants the people in small Texas towns, the kind who might see themselves as fiscal conservatives, to recognize they want government to work for them. He brings up a visit he made to Decatur, Texas (pop. 6,648), where the locals told him about their desire for broadband, and a stop in Galveston where they talked about storm surge protection�things that are well beyond the taxpayers� ability to fund in those counties.

�It is uniquely a federal role to invest in those things, and they�ve gotta have an advocate in the Senate who begins with the belief that that�s an appropriate role for government.�

After the event in Burnet, O�Rourke cancels the rest of his tour. Instead, he packs up the Tundra and heads back out to the coast, where he spends some time volunteering with hurricane relief efforts. Then, he barrels through the state, from Port Arthur all the way back to El Paso, across 830 miles to get home in time for two planned events: A campaign rally at a local brewpub, and his monthly constituent town hall in the park. He promised to do one every month as congressman, and in his third term, he�s cutting it pretty close: It�s August 31, and the event is scheduled to start at 9pm.

The campaign rally gets transformed into a rally for Harvey relief. The community turns out in droves�the stacks of bottled water and canned goods overwhelm the facade of the building, and it seems like everybody hip, politically connected, or engaged in activism in El Paso is there. The porch of the brewpub is standing-room-only, as is the overflow room inside. At The Drive In co-founder Jim Ward is there, helping out with the sound system for the band opening the event. On the stump, O�Rourke doesn�t even bring up his campaign, instead telling a crowd full of people who are already firmly in his corner about what he saw working on the coast after the storm.

�I don�t know that I can, in a very honest way, connect with the emotion of what I just saw in public,� O�Rourke tells me before the event. �The devastation was so profound, and the heroism was so amazing. That will change how I see people and what�s possible.�

It�s a good line, and it feels off-the-cuff. O�Rourke�s job as a candidate is to make you feel like he�s telling you things you haven�t heard before, and he does it really well. It�s not a shock that he�s raising money and drawing crowds. If you squint, he does look a little bit like Bobby Kennedy, and his family is politics-ready. His three kids (Ulysses, Henry, and Molly) spend four hours outside at their dad�s campaign rally, and they never once pull out a tablet or an iPhone. He�s a guy running for Senate whose values are inspired by Fugazi, competing against a guy who, after being elected, read the lyrics to Toby Keith�s �Courtesy of the Red, White, and Blue� on the floor of that distinguished body. It seems possible that O�Rourke is sincere in all of this.

After the rally at the brewpub, I make my way down to San Jacinto Park in downtown El Paso for the town hall. The crowd is smaller�maybe a hundred people, and they�re not all supporters. In fact, a lot of them seem like they�re there to argue with their congressman. It plays like a scene out of Parks & Recreation. O�Rourke greets an ornery old vet in a cowboy hat by name, and listens politely as the man insists �We should wipe North Korea off the map.� A woman hijacks the microphone for three minutes to rant to the crowd about GMOs.

Toward the end, though, it gets interesting. A constituent wants to talk about single payer health care. O�Rourke is for single payer, but he doesn�t just give the woman lip service. It�d be easy to just say, �Yep, I�m for it, when I�m in the Senate, I�ll join Bernie Sanders in fighting for it,� then boom, onto the next question. But he doesn�t. Instead, he gets into a seven-minute exchange in which he explains that he wants to get there, but that he doesn�t consider the vehicle she prefers, John Conyers�s bill to eliminate private insurance, to be viable policy.

�This is not about politics,� he tells her. �I want to achieve the actual goal. But we can�t pass this, and we shouldn�t want to pass this, only as Democrats. We have to find common ground. I want to go so far as a single-payer system, but we have to do it the right way. I know that might not be satisfying, but that�s where I am with this one.�

He�s not doing it for the cameras�I�m the only national reporter there, it�s almost 11pm, for all he knows I�m half asleep�but he is there, getting into a protracted argument with a voter he fundamentally agrees with about the details of the policy she wants to talk about.

The simplest solution to �Why is this guy doing all of this?� is because he thinks it might actually be the right way to do politics in 2017 and beyond. He might be rewarded for it, or he might not. Certainly, cynicism has proven correct when it comes to asking whether progressive politics and politicians stand a chance. But the idea that the punk rock dude from the border town could trade in his long hair for a blazer and go on to represent the whole state in the Senate is tantalizing. O�Rourke really seems to believe that being straight with people and embracing your contradictions might be political assets, instead of liabilities.

�I trust a politician who has the same sort of background with subcultures that I�ve been in,� Bixler-Zavala says of his former bandmate. �There�s not this dehumanized view of people. It�s not just that I know him�it makes me feel safe. I want to tell people that he�s actually one of us.�

This feature is part of Splinter�s project to recruit local, embedded reporters, essayists, and photographers across the country. Read more here.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:16

Playstation 4: Apr 25, 2014; Unlockable Ben

I cannot honestly tell the level of sincerity in posts like Hootingtons anymore.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:17

joepinetree: Apr 5, 2012

Every single leftist I know that exists in the actually existing world (as opposed to twitter) perfectly recognizes the shortcomings of the Bernie campaign. A very quick look at the DSA stances on race, the justice system, reparations, immigration, Israel v Palestine or any of those topics should make that absolutely clear to anyone. What makes "leftists" online defensive with regards to accusations of racism isn't a denial of racism, but that 9 times out of 10 those accusations come from someone who supports a centrist democrat. So you end up with a TFA shill like Brittany Packnett talking about how her encounter with Sanders was so deeply problematic even as she continues to shill fo TFA and the charter movement, which is one of the main drivers of residential and school segregation in the country. And then the cherry on top is that after months of Packnett talking about her opposition to Sanders because of her meeting with him, Hillary's book comes out where she essentially openly admits that she has no clue what BLM is about.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:19

Doctor Butts: May 21, 2002

Playstation 4 posted:

I cannot honestly tell the level of sincerity in posts like Hootingtons anymore.

Same here.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:20

Condiv: May 7, 2008; Sorry to undo the effort of paying a domestic abuser $10 to own this poster, but I am going to lose my dang mind if I keep seeing multiple posters who appear to be Baloogan.

With love,
a mod

El Pollo Blanco posted:

There should be no feminists who are anti-sex workers, maybe some who are anti-sex work, though.

that's what i meant. like, i don't think sexworkers should be being put in jail and such, but i'm not sure about promoting sex-work

i've heard good arguments both for and against

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:20

Mr Hootington: Jul 24, 2008; I'M HAVING A HOOT EATING CORNETTE THE LONG WAY

Koalas March posted:

Honestly its hard for me to remember which is why I have been trying to use qualifiers. But truly the reaction to those jumping to defend Bernie and belittle me for my mistakes (not here, necessarily) is another turn off. If you are trying to court people, (and yes, unfortunately us leftists need to court more people into the movement) you have to use a bit of sincerity, grace and finesse. Not the usual "lmao you are wrong rear end in a top hat" internet approach. This is why I used the used the wine vs daycare analogy.

Hoots, are you advocating for throwing black people under the bus there? The Dems can't win without us. Unless they flip to straight racism there is a percentage of the white electorate that they will never capture and Dems need to accept it and move on.

Here's another thing you need to do to get more poc votes: Stop trying to court racists. They have no place in civilized discourse and want nothing more than to support policies that cause human suffering.

Excuse Me? My stance has been to seize the bus, take turns driving, and charge the same fare to everyone.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:22

steinrokkan: Apr 2, 2011; Soiled Meat

Main Paineframe posted:

What's wrong with apologizing?

Absolutely nothing, except when people disingenuously demand others to apologize for actions of unrelated actors as a way of remove their credibility - again and again and again, no matter how many times the accused party had already made amends. Posters who insist on the collective guilt of all leftists are just trying to shut down a segment of the population by making any discussion they are part of about their supposed atonement, not about issues.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:28

shrike82: Jun 11, 2005

https://twitter.com/CillizzaCNN/status/911224143022092289

Lmao

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:31

Koalas March: May 21, 2007

steinrokkan posted:

Absolutely nothing, except when people disingenuously demand others to apologize for actions of unrelated actors as a way of remove their credibility - again and again and again, no matter how many times the accused party had already made amends. Posters who insist on the collective guilt of all leftists are just trying to shut down a segment of the population by making any discussion they are part of about their supposed atonement, not about issues.

What segment of the population are they trying to shut down, and who are to shut them down in the first place? I feel like you're being really vague on purpose, in order to obscure your real opinion.

What are you really trying to say? Get as specific as possible.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:35

RandomBlue: Dec 30, 2012; hay guys!; Biscuit Hider

shrike82 posted:

https://twitter.com/CillizzaCNN/status/911224143022092289

Lmao

Anything I don't like is a lefty concept!

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:35

Koalas March: May 21, 2007

Mr Hootington posted:

Excuse Me? My stance has been to seize the bus, take turns driving, and charge the same fare to everyone.

I know! lol. I figured I misunderstood you. I am still waking up honestly. I had a long night.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:36

Push El Burrito: May 9, 2006; Soiled Meat

The problem with the whole "fixing economics fixes things" is that America is profoundly racist and will burn itself to the ground if they see a black person move into their neighborhood.

Koalas March posted:

I know! lol. I figured I misunderstood you. I am still waking up honestly. I had a long night.

The Holy Trinity

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:45

steinrokkan: Apr 2, 2011; Soiled Meat

Koalas March posted:

What segment of the population are they trying to shut down, and who are to shut them down in the first place? I feel like you're being really vague on purpose, in order to obscure your real opinion.

What are you really trying to say? Get as specific as possible.

I'm saying that progressives are held to a much higher standard of responsibility for what "their guys" do than mainstream Dems - and that this is just a cheap debate tactic to dodge any consequential conversation, or to make the other person look back by insinuating their association with idiots. I thought that was an obvious point, since it comes up again and again in other threads.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:46

Jazerus: May 24, 2011

Koalas March posted:

What segment of the population are they trying to shut down, and who are to shut them down in the first place? I feel like you're being really vague on purpose, in order to obscure your real opinion.

What are you really trying to say? Get as specific as possible.

bernie supporters & the DSA + affiliated groups are the people who they are trying to shut down, and "they" is a subgroup within establishment dems who are mostly white and simply want to cynically use the language of racial justice as a constant evasion of discussing leftism substantively, rather than out of any genuine interest in advancing the cause of racial justice.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:47

PerniciousKnid: Sep 13, 2006

joepinetree posted:

So you end up with a TFA shill like Brittany Packnett talking about how her encounter with Sanders was so deeply problematic even as she continues to shill fo TFA and the charter movement, which is one of the main drivers of residential and school segregation in the country.

Are black people opposed to charter schools? I thought opinion was more mixed.

shrike82 posted:

https://twitter.com/CillizzaCNN/status/911224143022092289

Lmao

As a non-Tweeter, what are ratio trends?

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:49

Oh Snapple!: Dec 27, 2005

Jazerus posted:

bernie supporters & the DSA + affiliated groups are the people who they are trying to shut down, and "they" is a subgroup within establishment dems, who are mostly white and simply want to cynically use the language of racial justice as a constant evasion of discussing leftism substantively, rather than out of any genuine interest in advancing the cause of racial justice.

Conveniently enough, you can also now spot these folks really easily via donut icon.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:50

Casey Finnigan: Apr 30, 2009; Dumb ✔
So goddamn crazy ✔

Koalas March posted:

What segment of the population are they trying to shut down, and who are to shut them down in the first place? I feel like you're being really vague on purpose, in order to obscure your real opinion.

What are you really trying to say? Get as specific as possible.

The point he's making and the point I'm making is that it's fine to have people apologize for racial missteps in the past. What doesn't make sense it to make this demand specifically of the left wing of the Democratic Party, which to my knowledge (and if I'm wrong tell me) has not been more wrong on racial issues than the center wing has been. I think either you make these demands of apology from everyone who has had a nasty record on race (good) or you don't (bad). You don't single out one group (using the issue as a political tool).

Going along with the rise of the Bernie Bro stereotype (I mean, remember that Hillary Clinton said that women voted for Bernie because they were pressured by men and the unthread example of the charter school lady talking about Bernie supporters' racial issues - there's a definite effort to cast leftists as privileged, racist, sexist white guys) I don't see this demand for an apology as actually being based on a desire for racial justice. It's a way to make the leftists say "sorry we're so racist" so that their political opponents can say "see they're so racist". And then those political opponents will go on to be just as racist or worse.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:54

Doctor Butts: May 21, 2002

USPol: Reality is a bunch of leftists making up conspiracy theories.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:54

RuanGacho: Jun 20, 2002; "You're gunna break it!"

I think it would be useful to consider that there isn't much point in trying to define what centrists and liberals believe because in the very best case its a moving target. It is especially silly to try to weponize the terms as a tool of debate and use them on other posters.

We can talk about what the flaws of apparent political strategies are however between the two major parties, a good example of this I think is the upcoming CNN debate. There doesn't seem to be consensus on what this will or won't accomplish.

Something that I will try to articulate what I mean as far as building consensus, I think it is fair to say that over the course of the Obama presidency there was a sense that Obama would show leadership (I think it is widely agreed he talked a good game at least) in the two things most important to Dem voters, Social and Economic justice.

The problem is, while there was some minor and significant gains like gay marriage, all driven through judiciary decisions, basically all significant economic reform was punted on. Social justice itself became a thing during Obama, (though the substance of the fight is ancient and eternal) and those whom are wrong decided that it must be sucking the oxygen away from the more "left" ideas they care about.

We have to treat the Leadership on our side the same way we treat Trump, through his deeds, not his words. Our people are suffering now, the world needs change years ago and their phony now is not the season is not leadership, its triangulating. The Dem party is literally older than the GOP both in history and the people who reside in it, their average age is higher than the Republicans, if they're not a Bernie they -must- be driven out, because they're no longer gate keeping, theyre standing in the way.

This is getting overly long but I'll try to end with this, the people who want the status quo love to turn every political discussion into about who you are rather than what your end goal is. When Hillary shares a video of young people dancing around with her book like its some magnificent totem that's not share worthy. When a POC shares a video of the police attacking BLM, that is, that's about justice not being served, that's a policy problem.

These people very much can be lacking substance, look at Trump Twitter if you have any doubt about it, we only have so much bandwidth to interact with the world, being the case, do they use their voice to try to help others, or to oppress them or to commit whataboutism or say nothing?

Deeds not words.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:54

Jazerus: May 24, 2011

PerniciousKnid posted:

Are black people opposed to charter schools? I thought opinion was more mixed.

As a non-Tweeter, what are ratio trends?

ratio of replies to likes & retweets

there's no way to register disagreement except replying, so a high ratio means lots of people replied without liking or retweeting - and so the comments are mostly negative responses.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:56

haveblue: Aug 15, 2005; Toilet Rascal

PerniciousKnid posted:

As a non-Tweeter, what are ratio trends?

To make a long thinkpiece short: The ratio between likes/retweets (people who approved of the tweet) and replies (people who had a bone to pick with the tweet). Way more of the latter means you probably hosed up.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:56

steinrokkan: Apr 2, 2011; Soiled Meat

Casey Finnigan posted:

The point he's making and the point I'm making is that it's fine to have people apologize for racial missteps in the past. What doesn't make sense it to make this demand specifically of the left wing of the Democratic Party, which to my knowledge (and if I'm wrong tell me) has not been more wrong on racial issues than the center wing has been. I think either you make these demands of apology from everyone who has had a nasty record on race (good) or you don't (bad). You don't single out one group (using the issue as a political tool).

Going along with the rise of the Bernie Bro stereotype (I mean, remember that Hillary Clinton said that women voted for Bernie because they were pressured by men and the unthread example of the charter school lady talking about Bernie supporters' racial issues - there's a definite effort to cast leftists as privileged, racist, sexist white guys) I don't see this demand for an apology as actually being based on a desire for racial justice. It's a way to make the leftists say "sorry we're so racist" so that their political opponents can say "see they're so racist". And then those political opponents will go on to be just as racist or worse.

Exactly.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:56

Eggplant Squire: Aug 14, 2003

From what I've read on charter schools they are a weird issue in terms of support. Like when you are a parent and have a kid and you don't have time for politicians to VERY slowly fix the educational system a decent charter school in your area is the best option. By the time things are fixed it could be a decade or never. A parent can absolutely support charter schools because they need immediate results for their kids and sometimes that's the only option they have if their district is massively underfunded. For politicians however there is really no excuse for pushing them over fixing the problems with our deteriorating educational system, especially when if you look at the results they aren't statistically better than public schools. By fixing I mean actually fixing and not bullshit like allowing Republican to destroy it slower or promising changes the smart people in charge will do if we just keep waiting forever.

Decoupling education from property taxes should be a huge movement within the Democratic party but instead you have liberal politicians stabbing public school in the back by acting like charter schools are some magical fix since they have also bought into the lie that private anything is better than public when they are just held to less standards and can more easily remove "problem" students.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 15:58

boner confessor: Apr 25, 2013; by R. Guyovich

Radish posted:

For politicians however there is really no excuse for pushing them over fixing the problems with our deteriorating educational system, especially when if you look at the results they aren't statistically better than public schools. By fixing I mean actually fixing and not bullshit like allowing Republican to destroy it slower or promising changes the smart people in charge will do if we just keep waiting forever.

the educational system isn't deteriorating for middle class whites who have "school choice" by way of housing choice

lower middle class families (suburban/urban POC, rural whites) just take what schools they can get along with the housing they can afford

# ? Sep 22, 2017 16:02

Yeowch!!! My Balls!!!: May 31, 2006

Koalas March posted:

What segment of the population are they trying to shut down, and who are to shut them down in the first place? I feel like you're being really vague on purpose, in order to obscure your real opinion.

What are you really trying to say? Get as specific as possible.

people are still grumpy over the events of the primary, wherein the Clinton campaign dusted off the old Obama Boys attack about how gee it sure it is suspicious how many young men think Hillary's bad, added "and they're racist, too," and the Bernie Bro Believers were born

in the eyes of this (thankfully small) group of people, there was no commitment to minority issues that could be sufficient, because their issue never was their concern over minority representation, it was supporting a candidate other than Hillary Clinton.

due to the malevolent echo chamber effect of being Extremely Online, this tiny fraction of people using minorities as a smokebomb to distract from economic justice concerns- a strategy most painfully demonstrated with "will breaking up the banks end racism"- became the most prominent voices talking about race to a similarly tiny fraction of Bernie voters, some of whom walked away with the impression that whenever democrats talk about race it is exclusively as a tool to shut up the left.

both factions are not wrong to claim that the other faction exists. claiming the other faction is at all representative of the larger mass of democrats is where things get hazy.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 16:04

Eggplant Squire: Aug 14, 2003

Even if they have a way around it, the fact that upper middle class people have to consider the massive discrepancies in terms of school quality when they buy homes is evidence that the system is crumbling.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 16:05

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# ? May 24, 2024 06:18

Xae: Jan 19, 2005

Charter schools are just Union Busting by any other name.

When you look at the studies that adjust for income, learning disabilities and parental involvement they under performing public schools whole costing more.

They are also becoming a huge target for fraud and embezzlement.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 16:05

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > USPOL: Pulitzer Feeling Increasingly Out Of Place In New York Times Office

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