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i'd also like to know why people should bother to vote the "lesser" evil when the DCCC is doing everything in their power at the moment to make sure that evil is the only choice come the GE? in what world is it not enabling the dems to grow more evil if I vote for dem candidates that would be comfortable in the republican party that the DCCC is trying to shove down our throats? how does voting for union busting corporate lawyers doing anything but helping the dems grow more evil? why should we reward the DCCC trying to act like kingmakers?
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Feb 27, 2018 21:20
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Condiv posted:i'd also like to know why people should bother to vote the "lesser" evil when the DCCC is doing everything in their power at the moment to make sure that evil is the only choice come the GE? in what world is it not enabling the dems to grow more evil if I vote for dem candidates that would be comfortable in the republican party that the DCCC is trying to shove down our throats? how does voting for union busting corporate lawyers doing anything but helping the dems grow more evil? why should we reward the DCCC trying to act like kingmakers? This is actually a huge deal not only because it results in garbage Democrats like Manchin or that Virginian fucker with the Soviet Union flag yesterday, but also because the more public this gets (and it will get more public) the less the threat of lesser evilism works because people check out of the system that where the "less evil" ones are actively encouraging them to. People rag on the Republicans for being against democracy but the DCCC and DNC are very clearly putting their finger on the scale in a large way where supposedly left leaning people are told to vote their conscience and saying "well they are private organizations so it's legal  " when it comes out that things weren't fair isn't anymore likely to get people over it than "you should have voted for us so it's all your fault!"
Eggplant Squire fucked around with this message at 21:33 on Feb 27, 2018 |
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Feb 27, 2018 21:26
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Vital, what's your endgame if you vote D tickets and presumably vote progressive in primaries?
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Feb 27, 2018 21:39
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Radish posted:This is actually a huge deal not only because it results in garbage Democrats like Manchin or that Virginian fucker with the Soviet Union flag yesterday, but also because the more public this gets (and it will get more public) the less the threat of lesser evilism works because people check out of the system that where the "less evil" ones are actively encouraging them to. And, what, this is reason to let the gap in the DNC widen in favor of bad Dems? What's your endgame, if not to work up the nerve to not vote in 2018 and 2020?
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Feb 27, 2018 21:41
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Potato Salad posted:Vital, what's your endgame if you vote D tickets and presumably vote progressive in primaries? Convince Democrats that I'm not enough and they need more people willing to vote D tickets.
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Feb 27, 2018 21:41
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Potato Salad posted:This post comes to us under VP Pence. Do you think that sort of aim would result in a second Trump term? Because, to be completely blunt, the current direction of the party will absolutely guarantee a second Trump term.
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Feb 27, 2018 21:43
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VitalSigns posted:Convince Democrats that I'm not enough and they need more people willing to vote D tickets. It sounds more like the fundamental problem is convincing enough primary voters that you're worth it, and that primary voters can't keep going centrist.
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Feb 27, 2018 21:43
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Potato Salad posted:And, what, this is reason to let the gap in the DNC widen in favor of bad Dems? Vote third party? I mean there are arguments against doing so, but why not vote for them? Especially if it is at a very local level. Alongside that, maybe get involved with other forms of political action? I mean it's not as if the DNC is trying to create a broad base outside of simply being "a party you vote for every so often".
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Feb 27, 2018 21:44
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The issue with "just force them at the primary" is that there's a lot of ways to skew the primary, and people already have diminished faith in a D primary that somehow managed to be less democratic than an R primary. This could have been addressed by lowering/removing cutoff dates for registering as a democrat, mitigating or removing superdelegates, and withholding party funding to incumbents during primaries, but that hasn't been done.
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Feb 27, 2018 21:47
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Neurolimal posted:The issue with "just force them at the primary" is that there's a lot of ways to skew the primary, and people already have diminished faith in a D primary that somehow managed to be less democratic than an R primary. This could have been addressed by lowering/removing cutoff dates for registering as a democrat, mitigating or removing superdelegates, and withholding party funding to incumbents during primaries, but that hasn't been done. Brings us back to the need to close the chair and rules vote gap. This also sounds like a reason to register people D where counter-democratic closed primaries still exist.
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Feb 27, 2018 21:49
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Potato Salad posted:It sounds more like the fundamental problem is convincing enough primary voters that you're worth it, and that primary voters can't keep going centrist. Yeah I agree, Democrats need to be convinced to vote for candidates who will win, and not candidates who will lose! In fact given how bad Republicans are, it's a moral imperative not to nominate candidates who will lose and it's a moral imperative for Democratic candidates not to torpedo their chances of winning by being horribly corrupt, obviously in the pocket of Wall Street, hostile to making things better for Americans, etc, even if they did manage to win a primary and they think it's a blank check to be a corporate tool. Also the party has a moral imperative to stop gatekeeping primaries, stop shutting independent voters out of the primaries with absurd registration deadlines which expire before most voters have even heard of all the candidates, abolish undemocratic systems like superdelegates, etc, and I argue they have a moral duty to do these things even if their control of the levers of power enables them to shut out reformers.
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Feb 27, 2018 21:53
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To make sure we're on the same level WRT the current status of the democratic party; it's hemorrhaged most of the top donors that they alienated everyone else to appeal to, they're massively bankrupt as a result of continuing to fund three elections worth of consultants yearly for no reason, democrats are buckling to republicans WRT stonewalling the budget in defense of dreamers (itself a buckling of pro-immigrant support rhetoric by focusing on 'legitimate' immigrants), democrats are repeatedly being found less popular than Donald J Trump, remaining megadonors are holding funding hostage over holding their buddies accountable to sexual assault, and they are pinning many of their hopes on stirring up enough anti-russian sentiment when the majority of voters struggle to name anything about russia that they take offence with or meaningfully affects their personal life. There has to be a point in the Ultimatum Game where you say "no, this deal is unacceptable, cut a better one next time, no money for either of us". As illogical as it seems in the short term, spite and a moral position of fairness are integral to maintaining an equal system.
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Feb 27, 2018 21:54
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Potato Salad posted:Brings us back to the need to close the chair and rules vote gap. i think voting for poo poo dems in the general doesn't help close that gap also, i agree, we should push as hard as we can in the primaries and organize outside the elections to try to push the dems left. i just don't see how voting for lovely dems forced on us in the general does anything to help push the dems left, or help much of anything at all
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Feb 27, 2018 21:55
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Potato Salad posted:Brings us back to the need to close the chair and rules vote gap. Lol So it's okay to have undemocratic intraparty elections which discourage people from joining said undemocratic system and their discouragement retroactively justifies the undemocratic elections! This is where I make a moral argument that being immoral is wrong to do even if you can get away with it. Or where I make the practical argument that discouraging people from joining your party is loving dumb, and not a self-justification for being so poo poo that people don't wanna join
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Feb 27, 2018 21:57
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Neurolimal posted:To make sure we're on the same level WRT the current status of the democratic party; it's hemorrhaged most of the top donors that they alienated everyone else to appeal to, they're massively bankrupt as a result of continuing to fund three elections worth of consultants yearly for no reason, democrats are buckling to republicans WRT stonewalling the budget in defense of dreamers (itself a buckling of pro-immigrant support rhetoric by focusing on 'legitimate' immigrants), democrats are repeatedly being found less popular than Donald J Trump, remaining megadonors are holding funding hostage over holding their buddies accountable to sexual assault, and they are pinning many of their hopes on stirring up enough anti-russian sentiment when the majority of voters struggle to name anything about russia that they take offence with or meaningfully affects their personal life. I look forward to the You aren't dragging bad Dems left or ousting them by disengaging. The "cut me a better deal" mentality doesn't work. HTH.
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Feb 27, 2018 21:58
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Potato Salad posted:I look forward to the if dems actually care to prevent that kind of stuff they can choose not to kill voter turnout by rigging their own primaries can't they?
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Feb 27, 2018 21:59
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VitalSigns posted:Lol The gently caress? We will only eliminate closed primaries and superdelegates by force, not by sidelining ourselves.
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Feb 27, 2018 21:59
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voting in the primaries/registering dem is a fool's game, it's a privately owned organization and the funders make the calls/rules, not the voters
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Feb 27, 2018 21:59
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Potato Salad posted:I look forward to the Counterpoint: prominent Dems cosponsoring M4A which they definitely loving wouldn't have if "better ideas will never ever happen" had won
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Feb 27, 2018 22:00
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Potato Salad posted:I look forward to the As opposed to yours, which has been such a smashing success, I take it?
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Feb 27, 2018 22:00
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Potato Salad posted:I look forward to the "cut me a better deal" absolutely does work on the large scale. That's the entire point of the Ultimatum game. Strict obedience to a logical assessment of "better than nothing" results in heavy exploitation of the person not cutting the deals. It's funny that you bring up concentration camps, considering democrats have tolerated and/or encouraged them in other countries, but hey, out of sight, out of mind.
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Feb 27, 2018 22:00
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Potato Salad posted:The gently caress? how is voting for the people keeping primaries closed a show of force potato salad?
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Feb 27, 2018 22:01
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Potato Salad posted:The gently caress? Lol "it's the voters' fault we're so corrupt, it's definitely not our responsibility to do the right thing, at all"
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Feb 27, 2018 22:01
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Potato Salad posted:Edit- following is aimed at the few who don't vote The issue with your framing is that you're treating not voting as equivalent to complete political disengagement. At the end of the day, voting is a form of engagement, but it's honestly probably one of the least important and influential forms. Almost any level of activism represents more engagement and political influence than voting. Which kind of begs the question of why people receive so much negative focus for not voting, yet don't receive that same negative attention for, say, just not being involved much politically in the first place. As far as I'm concerned, the only valid argument against non-voting is that not voting doesn't have any positive impact (i.e. it won't convince Democrats to change in a positive way), so it's the optimal option simply by virtue of slightly lowering the chances of Republicans winning. But this argument only applies if you're voting in an election with a non-negligible chance of the Democrat winning, and statistically it won't apply to most people when discussing the presidential election (since most people don't live in potential swing states). As a result, I can't help but think that the people who get angry at others for not voting don't have any sort of rational motivation, because they don't even bother to check if the person they're talking to even lives in an area where their vote had any reasonable chance of influencing the outcome. It casts doubt on the assumption that they're angry because they're concerned about Republicans winning. My feeling is that, if 1. the election in question has a non-negligible chance of being contested and 2. voting doesn't represent any sort of significant inconvenience for you, you should vote. But if either of those things aren't the case (which is going to apply to most people), it doesn't make sense to hold that against them. And even when those things are the case, it's still bizarre and pointless to focus on non-voters instead of the political leadership that results in such a high percentage of people not being politically engaged.
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Feb 27, 2018 22:03
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Hey Potato Salad could you be a consultant for the Republican Party, you'd be a great help at getting Dems elected by advising Republicans on how to lose. "See if you're so unpopular that people are fleeing your party rather than fighting to make it better, that's great because it means you'll have even more control over your platform no matter how unpopular you get with America!"
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Feb 27, 2018 22:05
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tbh i agree with potato salad. it's horrible that trump is going to build concentration camps with the help of centrist democrats. where i disagree with him is his bizarre idea that voting for more centrists will help stop that in any way
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Feb 27, 2018 22:08
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"centrist democrats" is a bit redundant, there isn't a democrat out there who's not a poo poo compromise
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Feb 27, 2018 22:10
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self unaware posted:voting in the primaries/registering dem is a fool's game, it's a privately owned organization and the funders make the calls/rules, not the voters Having participated in day-of ground game in Atlanta during the Perez/Ellison, gently caress off. This is winnable. VitalSigns posted:Counterpoint: prominent Dems cosponsoring M4A which they definitely loving wouldn't have if "better ideas will never ever happen" had won "Better to virtue signal a bill that can't pass in Red Congress than to win a SCOTUS seat" You're probably not worth engaging, but this is indeed fun, and it's helped my doorstep game a lot.
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Feb 27, 2018 22:16
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self unaware posted:"centrist democrats" is a bit redundant, there isn't a democrat out there who's not a poo poo compromise Our political revolution was never about winning the White House alone. It was about building a movement of millions of Americans uniting to upend the status quo and transform our country. It is about fighting and winning, not just in blue states and districts, but also in places Donald Trump won. Because the continued decline of the middle class, grotesque levels of income and wealth inequality, disastrous trade policies and an inadequate educational system affect them, too. -Bernie about 8 minutes ago
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Feb 27, 2018 22:17
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VitalSigns posted:All the more reason for the party to stop supporting the Diane Feinsteins and Joe Manchins of America in the primary then aint it. This is the thing - from a solely pragmatic perspective, someone concerned with beating Republicans should be focusing on changing the Democrats rather than condemning individual non-voters. The fact that they make this choice makes me extremely doubtful that they really care as much as they say they do. I highly suspect the topic of voting just makes for a convenient excuse for them to attack the left. edit: The one situation where I think it makes sense to argue with someone about this is if they're specifically arguing about why they think non-voting is a good strategy. In that case it makes sense to explain why non-voting is unlikely to help any. But otherwise it doesn't really make sense to bring it up, and a bunch of people (on these forums and elsewhere) tend to not only bring it up, but bring it up towards people who haven't even mentioned not voting (and in many cases did vote!).
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Feb 27, 2018 22:18
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If it is "winnable" the question then becomes what are you winning it for. I think part of the problem is that Democrats only ever define themselves as antithesis to Republicans. Just pointing at something and going "I am not that" doesn't work to engage people unless the "that" is particularly bad and people have felt it. Otherwise it is just "So what if you are not that, it's not making my life any worse, and how are you different?" Also as a quick thing Potato Salad, if the democrats lose the next presidential campaign would you be willing to see the advantage in whole sale root and branch reform of the party?
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Feb 27, 2018 22:19
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Potato Salad posted:Our political revolution was never about winning the White House alone. It was about building a movement of millions of Americans uniting to upend the status quo and transform our country. yes, and how is voting for centrists that will help continue the decline of the middle and lower classes, encourage grotesque levels of income and wealth inequality, and force disastrous trade policies and gut our education systems fighting and winning? seems more like giving in and losing to me.
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Feb 27, 2018 22:19
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Potato Salad posted:"Better to virtue signal a bill that can't pass in Red Congress than to win a SCOTUS seat" To someone who can't afford to pay $20,000 out of pocket to use their insurance, yeah it does matter whether the Democratic Party changes into something that would potentially help them if it got elected on down the road. It's that whole coalition-building thing, if Dems had offered M4A they might have turned out people who care about that more than they cared about a SCOTUS seat. Since they didn't turn out those people, they lost that SCOTUS seat. To someone who cares more about affordable health care than they do about SCOTUS, they came out ahead by not voting. It was stupid of the Dems to make not voting a superior option in that person's personal calculus.
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Feb 27, 2018 22:19
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 "At least losing this time around resulted in lip support for a bill that can't pass before 2020."Do you deny that the ACA is going to cost us ~25B more this year despite covering fewer people?
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Feb 27, 2018 22:19
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Potato Salad posted:
Do I have to repeat the word "coalition" to you? To someone who would rather have a single-payer platform in 2020, not-voting turned out to be the superior option. Maybe they suck and are bad for having that personal calculus, but short of Jedi mind-melding them to have different priorities, the only thing Dems can do is make voting D more attractive to that person than not-voting.
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Feb 27, 2018 22:23
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Potato Salad posted:"Better to virtue signal a bill that can't pass in Red Congress than to win a SCOTUS seat" The existence of the bill at all sets a useful precedent; X democrats voted for M4A -then-, why are they not voting for M4A -now-? It's not completely useless because it's a 100% free method of establishing party stances and catching the eye of the public. Republicans did this constantly when they were out of power, because it establishes a positive theme of genuity and reliability with their base that gets them voting. And when they gained power they found themselves bound to those stances or else face primarying in a party less capable of protecting their elite. There's always going to be something at stake in an election, just like how there will always be some share of the pot dealt in the ultimatum game. By not refusing progressively weaker deals you open yourself to exploitation via testing the limits of your willingness to accept. Even if it's a bluff, the willingness to leave with nothing ensures a better deal than establishing absolute loyalty.
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Feb 27, 2018 22:23
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Potato Salad posted:
 lip support and the possibility of it happening in 2020 vs "nope, it'll never ever ever happen"i think "maybe in 4 years" is a lot of progress past "never"
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Feb 27, 2018 22:23
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Potato Salad posted:Our political revolution was never about winning the White House alone. It was about building a movement of millions of Americans uniting to upend the status quo and transform our country. why do I care about what Bernie "Vote for Hillary" Sanders has to say? I mean, he's better than 99% of federal level politicians, but he's still a far cry from "good" and his claim to fame is being the only american politician who seems to desire taxing the rich in order to pay for bombing brown children overseas as opposed to just doing it on credit. Potato Salad posted:Having participated in day-of ground game in Atlanta during the Perez/Ellison, gently caress off. This is winnable. it's not but keep telling yourself that (and everyone else, I'm sure the billionaires choosing your political party's agenda will be happy)
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Feb 27, 2018 22:24
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Josef bugman posted:If it is "winnable" the question then becomes what are you winning it for. Winning it for the capacity to eliminate superdelegates, get a progressive into the chair. I'd like to see a chair to prioritizes support for local footsoldiering, which more than anything in the last year has turned people out. Josef bugman posted:Otherwise it is just "So what if you are not that, it's not making my life any worse, and how are you different?" gently caress yeah. Josef bugman posted:Also as a quick thing Potato Salad, if the democrats lose the next presidential campaign would you be willing to see the advantage in whole sale root and branch reform of the party? Reform by who, the guys who didn't turn out?
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Feb 27, 2018 22:29
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self unaware posted:why do I care about what Bernie "Vote for Hillary" Sanders has to say? I mean, he's better than 99% of federal level politicians, but he's still a far cry from "good"  FYI you're far enough out that I'm not going to read this further.
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Feb 27, 2018 22:31
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