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The fact that the White House has all but endorsed Perez over Ellison is arguably one of the best arguments for Ellison. Given the awful results that the Clinton and Obama people have produced why would you follow their endorsement?
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Jan 4, 2017 22:18
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Fulchrum posted:Obama is also pro-breathing, I assume you want to stop doing that? Sorry but for an analogy to be effective -- even as a sarcastic throw away -- there needs to be some actual underlying similarity. If you want the party to be under new management then it logically follows that you'd be extra skeptical toward the guy who is being promoted by the current managers of the party. That's not "Tea Party Logic", whatever the hell that would mean, it's common sense. If you want to argue that Obama or the various Clinton allies who have been in charge of the party recently have been doing a good job and should continue to guide the direction the party takes then feel free to defend that position on it's merits. Or are you really so naive as to think that the mobilization around Perez is exclusively because they just genuinely think he's more qualified and isn't intended to derail the candidacy of the guy backed by the Sanders and Warren wing of the party?
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Jan 4, 2017 23:23
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Fulchrum posted:If that were the case they would have coalesced around Dean, not waited for Perez. And you seem to be ignoring that Perez's endorsements aren't coming from any Clinton people, and many aren't even from Obama people. The UFCW and the firefighters unions both broke with the AFL-CIO to back Perez over Ellisson after he announced, I assume food workers and firemen are also the fat cat elites who ruined everything? I'm not claiming anything of the sort. Use your head here and stop trying to make dumb gotcha posts for a second. Hopping on the bandwagon and throwing your support behind a candidate you think is likely to win doesn't necessarily say anything about your ideological preferences, especially in Washington. Arguing that Ellison is the choice of the Sanders doesn't imply that everyone who has voiced support for Ellison is now automatically a progressive in good standing or something. And I'm not really sure why you're citing union endorsements as anti-establishment bonafides within the context of an internal Democratic party selection process. The UFCW also endorsed Hilary Clinton during the primary.
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Jan 4, 2017 23:53
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Fulchrum posted:You don't see aaany problem putting these two thoughts in the same post? Saying that not everyone who backs Ellison is necessarily a strong progressive, and then pointing out that the UFCW's endorsement isn't a particularly strong litmus test for being an establishment outsider, are in no way contradictory statements. This is now the third time in this thread you've avoided any kind of substantive engagement so that you can make really dumb "gotcha!" style posts that have no internal logical coherence. Do you actually think this kind of debate by insinuation is effective or convincing?
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Jan 5, 2017 00:34
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Fulchrum posted:Didn't you start off the debate by claiming that any support for Perez is equivalent to saying that Debbie Wasserman Schultz should be brought back and put in charge? How is your entire style not based on stupid gotcha arguments? No. I said, and would continue to say, that if you think the current team of Democrats in the White House have done a bad job of running the party then you should be skeptical of candidates they endorse for the DNC.
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Jan 5, 2017 01:10
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Brainiac Five posted:Why should this override the candidate's stated beliefs and actions? I wouldn't say it should override everything they've done, skepticism doesn't necessarily mean total opposition, it just means you should be wary of why this candidate is getting the endorsements they are getting. In this case I think he's essentially the anyone-but-Ellison candidate and that elements of the democratic party who are resistant to giving ground to progressives are endorsing him for that reason. TROIKA CURES GREEK posted:But the current people running the white house are doing a pretty good job all considered? All the Obama people in the world can't change the fact that Clinton consistently surrounds herself with an echo chamber of dumbshit sycophants and refused to campaign in key swing states. If you feel that way then it would be logical for you to count their endorsement of Perez as a positive. I don't really share your view that Obama did a pretty good job, even if he did face a lot of hurdles to success. I think he was to the right of his own party on a bunch of important issues and I think his mishandling of certain issues contributed significantly to Republican victories throughout Obama's term, culminating in the election of Trump.
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Jan 5, 2017 01:33
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tadashi posted:Perez isn't popular with Bernie voters because he supported Hillary What's your basis for saying this? quote:People are going to have to put their delicate opinions to the side and largely forget who supported who in the primaries if they want to find the right candidate for the job. Why? There's symbolism at play here. You can't really escape the fact that Bernie and Warren are putting their chips behind one candidate and that a lot of people who are still pissed off over the primary are mobilizing around stopping that candidate. There's a factional power struggle going on here and that power struggle is likely to have implications for how the party interprets it's defeat in 2016. It sounds very high minded and mature to posture about the need to let bygones be bygones but is that really reflective of how political power operates in practice? A win for Ellison presumably emboldens the Bernie Bros. His defeat suggests the party is still resistant to handing them more power. I guess you could argue that it would be better if these overtones weren't projected onto the race for chairman but that's not really avoidable at this point.
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Jan 5, 2017 22:59
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Are you guys really going to let gun control derail this thread before it even hits four pages?
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Jan 6, 2017 20:30
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Regardless of where the candidates stand as individuals they are representatives for particular pressure groups or demographics within the Democratic coalition and you can't just wish away that part of the contest because it makes you feel uncomfortable or distracts from the illusion that politics is nothing but a technocratic exercise in selecting the most qualified individual available.
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Jan 18, 2017 22:28
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Main Paineframe posted:I think the worst enemy of the left is overly high expectations, because they can become actively counterproductive. The intense drop in enthusiasm among the left was painful to see, and watching progressives make excuses about "11th-dimensional chess" and "political capital" while Obama was trying to bargain away Medicare and SS was downright excruciating. If people had realistic expectations of what Keith Ellison is going to do (say slightly more leftist things while continuing to support centrist and establishment candidates against progressive challengers), I'd be fine with it. But I don't think they do. Keeping young people involved has always been a challenge, and I'm worried that too much emphasis has been placed on the DNC chair election - to the detriment of other, more important, races. I'm worried that if Ellison wins, people are going to take that as a victory for progressivism and check out of politics for four years, while if Perez wins the angry progressives would react by increasing their efforts elsewhere, which is exactly what I want to happen. So your take away from the Obama administration and from the last primary is that rather than vocally pressing their demands and taking advantage of how discredited the Democratic establishment has become that the left of the party should be negotiating with itself and watering down its own demands. Instead of, you know, emulating much more successful interest groups who advanced their agenda by making their support contingent on receiving some real policy victories. If you really think that huge numbers of people are going to "check out" for four years after the DNC election then you might as well give up now on the Democrats ever accomplishing anything. I mean seriously, this has got to be one of the most bizarre strategic visions for moving forward that I've ever heard someone articulate. "Oh god if we ever were perceived to win a real victory then people will just check out. The best way to keep people engaged is to be constantly watering down their demands and telling them it's unrealistic to ever expect anything."
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Jan 24, 2017 18:09
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Yeah but the solution is to be willing to continue exert pressure even after someone has elected and to have a realistic understanding of the fact that you can't just elect the right person, you have to be constantly pushing them in the right direction. The response should be "ugh it's too hard to keep someone accountable, might as well just let the pro-corporate centrists run things forever so we can maintain our stock of righteous indignation at maximum levels."
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Jan 24, 2017 18:12
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Main Paineframe posted:You can't just elect the right person, you have to elect hundreds of right persons. And they have to actually be the right people - "symbolic wins" aren't worth the paper they're printed in. If Hillary had won in 2008 and proposed the ACA in 2010, progressives would have figured out it was bad in 2010, not 2014. You're advocating an autistic view of politics that completely ignores the role that morale plays. Granting concessions to different wings of the party is part of how a big tent organization functions. This is especially true when there's a lot of justifiable bad blood over past grievances. If the party once again ignores the endorsements of the more energized and progressive wing of the party and picks an Obama administration official whose finger pints are all over some lovely decisions like the TPP, while passing over a more progressive candidate that is the clear favorite of the Bernie/Sanders wing of the party, then that's going to be a signal about what kind of rebuilding the Democratic party is or isn't willing to consider.
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Feb 3, 2017 00:13
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Main Paineframe posted:Concessions are very important, yes...and I would like those concessions to come in the form of progressive policy pushes, not progressive individuals being appointed to meaningless figurehead positions with zero impact or influence on policy. The faction that gets the DNC chairmanship is the one that's going to get screwed, IMO - the factions that don't get ceremonial positions will have to get some kind of policy or messaging concessions, while the "winner" of this fight will be neglected because they already got a concession in the form of a useless figurehead position. Call me an autist all you want - I'm the one with my eyes on the real prize rather being distracted by lovely decoy plays. Do you have any evidence for this supposed trade-off being a thing? Because it seems like regardless of who is elected DNC chair, pushing the Democrats in a more progressive policy direction is going to be like herding cats. The hard fight is going to come down the line, it's not seriously effected by which of these candidates becomes DNC chair, except insofar as now is a time when the Democrats need more engagement and a symbolic victory like this would be a helpful nudge to the forces who are promoting Ellison. I just don't see why letting the establishment pick another DNC chair would make them any more likely to cede ground on policy.
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Feb 3, 2017 23:13
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Main Paineframe posted:The fact that there's even a fight over the DNC chair at all. There's clearly a feeling among the establishment politicians that more than one of the factions in the big tent need concessions right now, as well disagreement about which factions need attention and what level of concession is appropriate for each faction. Ultimately, several factions are going to get concessions - at the very least, the DNC is almost certainly going to come up with something for organized labor and something for the Bernie wing, the two clear forerunners in the chair race. They have only one fake high-level fake concession left to give right now, so it naturally follows that whichever of those two factions doesn't get the fake concession will have to get some sort of real concession instead. Either the party establishment is frightened enough to start opening up space for more progressive candidates and ideas or they are deciding to circle the wagons and resist what they view as an unwanted encroachment on their own turf. There is zero reason to think they'll act the way you're anticipating. This is some seriously ludicrous 11th dimensional chess you're playing in your own mind here.
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Feb 4, 2017 18:37
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It would be very in character for the Democrats to decide that Trump is so bad that they will inevitably win in the next midterms and the next presidential election.
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Feb 4, 2017 18:41
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Perez is gonna get the chair thrown at him
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Feb 4, 2017 21:00
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Fulchrum posted:Gloria Steinem has endorsed Ellison It's not a rehash but it's a contest that is now inextricably linked to the events of 2016 (and before). The fact it's not a 1:1 mirror of how the primary played out isn't exactly a profound observation but it also doesn't in any way disprove the idea that this contest is in part a proxy battle for different factions within the Democratic party to test their influence over the direction the party is going to take.
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Feb 7, 2017 23:35
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Fulchrum posted:You cannot draw up any form of coherent factional groupings to slot all of the supporters for any side into these camps. It's not establishment v. outsiders, moderate v. extreme or anything, it's purely along individual lines. The most prominent and visible advocate of social democracy within the Democratic party has explicitly endorsed Ellison as the best available agent of change and has framed their support for him around the assertion that he will help carry forward a larger project of fundamentally reforming the Democratic party and excising the influence of monied interests. You're free to completely ignore this and pretend it has no significance, or to pretend that rejecting Ellison wouldn't be seen as a gently caress you to left-leaning parts of the Democratic party who are throwing themselves behind his candidacy, but I think you'd be missing the forest for the trees.
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Feb 7, 2017 23:52
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Why you think that Schumer's endorsement contradicts the idea that this contest is going to be used as a litmus test of how willing the party establishment is to let Sanders and co exercise more influence over the direction of the party? Presumably he's decided that endorsing Ellison is going to help bolster his own credibility as a ranking leader of the party, and perhaps also because he thinks it will help the Democrats as they maneuver themselves into position to take better advantage of the support Sanders was able to develop during his primary run.
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Feb 8, 2017 00:16
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Main Paineframe posted:Well, yes, that is literally the job of the DNC chair. Perez and Ellison both know what the role entails and have signaled their full willingness to carry it out. Ellison has already demonstrated (with actions, not words) that he intends to back establishment candidates against progressive challengers, throw the public under the bus in order to please donors, and give his full and unconditional support to Pelosi and Schumer. It's just that it no longer matters what he says or does, because the narrative's already been built and no one's going to let pesky things like facts get in the way of daydreams about Keith destroying the Democratic establishment forever and singlehandedly laying the groundwork for full socialism at last. It's fair to point out that anyone who has a shot at winning the race for DNC chair is going to be palatable to party insiders and therefore obviously not the kind of firebrand that a lot of restless grassroots Dems would like. But that doesn't eliminate the fact that without throwing some symbolic concessions to the grassroots on the left the party is going to risk driving those people away. Whether or not Ellison was the best choice to be this standard bearer of the Bernie Bros, the die is now cast and rejecting him in favour of Perez is going to send the wrong message. This is true even if it turns out that Perez and Ellison would run the party in almost the same way. I think you're massively exaggerating what people are actually expecting to get out of the race.
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Feb 14, 2017 18:44
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BI NOW GAY LATER posted:I am just not convinced that it's worth our time trying to hunt these ellusive white rust belters who's motivation isn't racism. Maybe I am just sour. Do you think Obama could have won in 2008 or 2012 without winning a share of those racist white rust belters? I think we can say with a fair degree of certainty that many Obama voters in places like Michigan would not have been comfortable with Obama dating their daughter. They still turned out to vote for him when he was either perceived as a change agent or when his opponent was successfully presented as a predatory vulture capitalist.
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Feb 14, 2017 19:47
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BI NOW GAY LATER posted:
That doesn't answer my question.
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Feb 14, 2017 19:49
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BI NOW GAY LATER posted:If you're asking me should we dial back the racial and social justice plank of the platform to appease white voters with lies about stuff, then no. We should be honest and straight forward with them. Again, not the question I asked. My question was "Do you think Obama could have won in 2008 or 2012 without winning a share of those racist white rust belters?" I'm not trying to play gotcha here or anything I'm just trying to figure out what you're actually arguing.
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Feb 14, 2017 20:00
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BI NOW GAY LATER posted:
You don't think McCain and Romney used racist dog whistles? Really? Anyway, you still haven't offered a straight answer to my question. I'm not going to keep hectoring you for one but I find it really weird you can't or won't answer my directly. Again, this isn't a trap, I just literally cannot tell what you're arguing and you're weirdly evasive about clarifying yourself.
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Feb 14, 2017 20:12
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WhiskeyJuvenile posted:TPP members: Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, and Vietnam. Entrenching really lovely intellectual property laws and establishing establishing those terrible Invest State Dispute Settlement provisions were far greater sins of the TPP than any impact on jobs.
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Feb 15, 2017 19:10
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WhiskeyJuvenile posted:Sure but like defending Malaysian workers isn't really a "protect American workers" program I'm not really clear on what you're trying to say here but not wanting to cede political power to ISDS tribunals seems like a rational and intelligent position for labour unions.
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Feb 15, 2017 19:20
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