Serious The Politics Thread

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Finchinator said:
Spreading any opinion about the 2020 election being rigged without novel, substantial data (spoiler: such data doesn’t exist) to back it is gross. Likening it to what is going on in Venezuela, which is a genuine travesty, is even more gross as it undermines their situation. We can be better than this.
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Convicted felon Orange Jesus is taking notes:

“Vote for me and you will never have to vote again :wink: :wink:”

America, how many times does the he have to tell us he is a dictator?
 
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Institutions will not save the United States. If Vice President Harris does not win, that’s it. 2020 was a failed authoritarian attempt. The orange dictator and his fascist Republican Party do not intend to fail again. Not only is their lust for power insatiable, they fully plan on leading the international crime syndicate straight from the White House.
 
The older I get, the more I think that the Republican Party, which literally played on the fears of “evil commies”, “evil nazis”, “fight fascism“, etc etc, has morphed into something almost as dark and bordering on evil as those creeds they’ve denounced and accused others of being for decades.

Trump being a fascist dictator in waiting isn’t a surprise. What is a surprise is that the Republican Party are voting for it, actively supporting it, developing it, praising it, protecting it.

The mask slips not just from trump but from Republicans generally.

I’m a Brit and maybe I don’t know the USA well enough to make a judgement. But you used to be able to at least rely on the Republican Party to protect the first and second amendments of the constitution.

Now you only have the second, and that’s the big worry speaking from the outside looking inwards.
 
RaikouLover said:
Institutions will not save the United States. If Vice President Harris does not win, that’s it. 2020 was a failed authoritarian attempt. The orange dictator and his fascist Republican Party do not intend to fail again. Not only is their lust for power insatiable, they fully plan on leading the international crime syndicate straight from the White House.
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I mean, do you think the Democrats are that much better?

Biden has in a ten month period reduced his entire legacy to “Genocide Joe”. Democrats were seen falling over themselves to applaud a man who is waiting on an ICC arrest warrant for crimes against humanity last week.

America’s international standing is literally flushed away at this point.

The solution, again speaking as an observer - you need to vote for third parties in big numbers and scare the big two parties into big changes, for the better. Get those third parties on the ballots everywhere, give the red and the blues a big scare.
 
S.A.C. Martin said:
I mean, do you think the Democrats are that much better?
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Is this a serious question or are you trolling?

The Republicans are running on fascism and published a 900 page outline on it.

SittinGamer said:
The US government and voting system is not welcoming to third parties, and to even get them to a 10% electorate would almost assuredly mean losing 2-3 elections straight.
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Disagree SittinGamer. Third parties would be viable if they actually did some real work at the local level. There are thousands of municipalities that can be competitive for third parties if they actually gave a damn about governance. For the most part they are just dysfunctional vanity operations.
 
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RaikouLover said:
Is this a serious question or are you trolling?
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Serious question. Asking as an outsider. The democrats might be better but a significant portion of them supported last week’s visit from Netanyahu. Can you really take the democrats seriously on that basis?

The Republicans are running on fascism and published a 900 page outline on it.
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Yep, deeply awful and the rest of the world is watching on with a mixture of bemusement and horror. Nobody should ever say “couldn’t happen here” - anywhere.

Third parties would be viable if they actually did some real work at the local level. There are thousands of municipalities that can be competitive for third parties if they actually gave a damn about governance. For the most part they are just dysfunctional vanity operations.
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Third parties and independents do good work in the UK, and the last election is showing how desperate the electorate is for a third, better choice than the main two parties (despite the Labour “landslide” which was more about the Tories losing big time).
 
S.A.C. Martin said:
Serious question. Asking as an outsider. The democrats might be better but a significant portion of them supported last week’s visit from Netanyahu. Can you really take the democrats seriously on that basis?
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Problem is the Democratic Party is the only (barely) functional party in the United States. Thus, the ideological spectrum is broad. There are plenty of right-wing conservative Democrats on one side, progressive Democrats on the other side, and everything else in between. Not all the Democrats attended or embraced Netanyahu (there are a lot that fucking hate him) so it is not accurate to paint the entire party as such. There is also the dynamic of Arabic, Muslim, and/or Palestinian Americans often supporting the same party as Jewish Americans. Really just because in 2024 the Democratic Party is literally the tent of “everyone who isn’t a fascist.”

S.A.C. Martin said:
Third parties and independents do good work in the UK, and the last election is showing how desperate the electorate is for a third, better choice than the main two parties (despite the Labour “landslide” which was more about the Tories losing big time).
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That’s good to hear. I’d like to see the US Green Party actually do something other than pop up once every four years to bitch about what the Democrats didn’t do enough of. How about they win a few mayorships? Control a few city councils? Let’s start there.
 
Palestinian taken prisoner in Sde Teiman speaks of his treatment there

Iyad helped members of his family to evacuate. But he remained at home with his mother, who had Alzheimer’s disease. “When the [Israeli] army entered the house, they asked me why I did not leave,” he said. “I told them that I was with my sick mother and we could not go anywhere.”

[...]

When Iyad was eventually released, he learned that his mother had been left to die. “The neighbors found her dead on the bed” after Israeli troops had withdrawn from Jabaliya, he said.
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Prisoners in Sde Teiman are subjected to both verbal insults and physical abuse. Iyad spoke about a young man named Fathi, who was released at the same time as him. Fathi, an electrical engineering graduate, had been in good mental health before his detention. That situation changed after Fathi’s jailers beat him and set dogs on him.

“The moment we were released, they told him to walk, but he could not walk because he had leg injuries,” Iyad said. “They beat him and forced him to walk,” Iyad added. “He fell to the ground every time they beat him.”
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RaikouLover said:
Problem is the Democratic Party is the only (barely) functional party in the United States. Thus, the ideological spectrum is broad. There are plenty of right-wing conservative Democrats on one side, progressive Democrats on the other side, and everything else in between. Not all the Democrats attended or embraced Netanyahu (there are a lot that fucking hate him) so it is not accurate to paint the entire party as such. There is also the dynamic of Arabic, Muslim, and/or Palestinian Americans often supporting the same party as Jewish Americans. Really just because in 2024 the Democratic Party is literally the tent of “everyone who isn’t a fascist.”
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idk whether it is the case that adherence to zionism is more prominent among jewish white amerikans than among non jewish white amerikans (historically both were extremely high % zionist and that % has eroded substantially for both groups), but regardless this is an absurd framing because 1 it erases that whiteness is a much bigger 'demographic factor' (and what you wrote obviously erases the existence of jewish arabs as well, fun!) and 2 it subjugates politics to an identity in a way that even liberals do not do on other issues. whether u want to apply the word fascism or some other terminology i dont rly care altho i would question the value of a definition of fascism that doesnt include openly campaigning to exterminate millions of people, a political party that pretends to be not-far-right supporting imperial terrorism that even the centrist UN and Hague recognize as genocide should be considered just as ridiculous as if the democratic party were to embrace any other neonazi ideology.

"Throughout much of the white euro-american left in general and the self-described ‘anti-fascist’ movement in particular, we hear quips like “if there’s a nazi at a table and 10 other people sitting there talking to him, you got a table with 11 nazis” and “anytime, anyplace, punch a nazi in the face.” Then, a Jewish person sits at the table and white euro-american anti-fascists are forced to choose between philosemitism and anti-fascism. The white euro-american anti-fascists make their choice. Suddenly we should make distinctions about those at the table or should pay special attention to their sensitivities. Suddenly there’s a wrong time and a wrong place. Suddenly we must hold our fist, we must carefully choose our words. Suddenly a nazi is not a nazi."

we must reject the framework of imperial philosemitism which insists that before one can criticize neonazis, there must take place an extensive discussion about jewish identity and whether we are being "anti-semitic". (in reality ofc, protecting neonazis can only further antisemitism). resistance against nazis is always justified, even when / regardless of whether they happen to be jewish.
"the anti-zionist resistance doesn’t have the luxury of being philosemitic. While the zionists, the fascists, the anti/philosemites and much of the white euro-american left differentiate between Jew and non-Jew, the anti-zionist resistance only differentiates between nazi and non-nazi."

https://emcohen.medium.com/the-only-way-out-is-through-e9f209d05338
 
juoean said:
idk whether it is the case that adherence to zionism is more prominent among jewish white amerikans than among non jewish white amerikans (historically both were extremely high % zionist and that % has eroded substantially for both groups), but regardless this is an absurd framing because 1 it erases that whiteness is a much bigger 'demographic factor' (and what you wrote obviously erases the existence of jewish arabs as well, fun!) and 2 it subjugates politics to an identity in a way that even liberals do not do on other issues. whether u want to apply the word fascism or some other terminology i dont rly care altho i would question the value of a definition of fascism that doesnt include openly campaigning to exterminate millions of people, a political party that pretends to be not-far-right supporting imperial terrorism that even the centrist UN and Hague recognize as genocide should be considered just as ridiculous as if the democratic party were to embrace any other neonazi ideology.
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The comment wasn’t intended to frame anything other than the Democratic Party contains a diverse set of ideological, cultural, ethnic, and/or religious groups. As such can create some awkwardness for the positions of Democratic politicians.
 
I find it extremely irresponsible for Biden to have dropped out so late. Hopefully Kamala can garner enough support. At the very least she isn’t 70/80 years old, doesn’t seem to be facing some critical health condition and is significantly more articulate than Biden in his current state. She can at least form sentences and is likely to bring on Marc Kelly as VP which is exciting. She can also form full sentences… a sad time to live in the US.
 
kokeri said:
I find it extremely irresponsible for Biden to have dropped out so late. Hopefully Kamala can garner enough support. At the very least she isn’t 70/80 years old, doesn’t seem to be facing some critical health condition and is significantly more articulate than Biden in his current state. She can at least form sentences and is likely to bring on Marc Kelly as VP which is exciting. She can also form full sentences… a sad time to live in the US.
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President Biden was forced out by the snakes in his own party. No one had the gall to challenge him in the primary nor has anyone else ever defeated Trump or received 81 million votes. Yes, it was irresponsible and unprecedented for a duly elected incumbent to be ran out of office in the manner that he was. But at least we don’t have see or listen to the old guy anymore! (No ageism or ableism…?)
 
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Biden dropping out has done the United States a favour.

Now you have an opportunity to say to the rest of the world “we’re not as bad as you think” if she wins.

Foreign countries observing the United States at the minute are absolutely united in their opinion of their foreign policies (including that of their stance with Israel) and much of the damage is already done I fear.

From my POV I have always had a fondness for the United States, a place I have visited often, but I can’t reconcile my humanity with what’s going on in Palestine at the moment.

Every day I watch the news and I wonder, is this the day the United States I know and love comes back in any meaningful way? Or has the slide downwards the last two to three decades put the nails in the coffin?

The big question the United States needs to ask of itself is can it live in a world without forever wars? I’m not sure it knows the answer to that. It looks like “no” at the minute.
 
Third parties can't get a footing in America because we have legalized bribery and without corporate funding, you are not getting anywhere close to the Presidency. Ever.

People like to say "it's up to progressives to move the Democrats left" but the Democrats also have super delegates in order to basically automatically force any result they want. Even if you weren't a "Bernie Bro", the 2016 primary was very obviously rigged against him.

If we were going on sheer electability, people like him have actually stood in front of FOX News' crowds and convinced them that his points have merit. Because the actual truth about most "moderates" and even some "fiscal Conservatives" in America is that most of them have at least some vaguely progressive fiscal policy beliefs that the Democratic Party plays a part in dissuading the efficacy of, and you could easily convince them of at least some straight-up socialist policy.

How do you start a third party in America when the only way the current parties run is because they get literal hundreds of millions in donations on the regular in order to fund their campaigns and political parties.

Local work? Sure, local work makes a difference locally, but that doesn't translate to federal success, at all. Our two-party system didn't start because some Democrats and Republicans ran door to door since the last time a third party existed, the two-party problem existed in the fucking 1800s. Most third political parties got consolidated themselves, other political parties were more feasible because the cost of running elections were lower, and corporate consolidation was in its infancy in America. Also, lobbying (aka bribery) (officially) started in 1946.

The reality is that the two-party system isn't a bug, it's a feature of our system combined with late-stage capitalism. Companies own our political parties. While that doesn't mean every single person in a place of power is in some grand conspiracy, nothing is going to happen on that level that a number of large corporations do not explicitly approve of.

Speaking of, I love that Joe Biden got kicked, but if you're gonna say anyone got them kicked, it's also the capitalists lol. The biggest nail in the coffin was likely donators holding back their cash flow to put more pressure on Biden. Imagine a blossoming progressive party that was running on policies that make companies less money, and what would happen with the funding for that race.
 
ant4456 said:
Third parties can't get a footing in America because we have legalized bribery and without corporate funding, you are not getting anywhere close to the Presidency. Ever.

People like to say "it's up to progressives to move the Democrats left" but the Democrats also have super delegates in order to basically automatically force any result they want. Even if you weren't a "Bernie Bro", the 2016 primary was very obviously rigged against him.

If we were going on sheer electability, people like him have actually stood in front of FOX News' crowds and convinced them that his points have merit. Because the actual truth about most "moderates" and even some "fiscal Conservatives" in America is that most of them have at least some vaguely progressive fiscal policy beliefs that the Democratic Party plays a part in dissuading the efficacy of, and you could easily convince them of at least some straight-up socialist policy.

How do you start a third party in America when the only way the current parties run is because they get literal hundreds of millions in donations on the regular in order to fund their campaigns and political parties.

Local work? Sure, local work makes a difference locally, but that doesn't translate to federal success, at all. Our two-party system didn't start because some Democrats and Republicans ran door to door since the last time a third party existed, the two-party problem existed in the fucking 1800s. Most third political parties got consolidated themselves, other political parties were more feasible because the cost of running elections were lower, and corporate consolidation was in its infancy in America. Also, lobbying (aka bribery) (officially) started in 1946.

The reality is that the two-party system isn't a bug, it's a feature of our system combined with late-stage capitalism. Companies own our political parties. While that doesn't mean every single person in a place of power is in some grand conspiracy, nothing is going to happen on that level that a number of large corporations do not explicitly approve of.

Speaking of, I love that Joe Biden got kicked, but if you're gonna say anyone got them kicked, it's also the capitalists lol. The biggest nail in the coffin was likely donators holding back their cash flow to put more pressure on Biden. Imagine a blossoming progressive party that was running on policies that make companies less money, and what would happen with the funding for that race.
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As I kind of got to in my post a few pages back, I think you have to make a ruling coalition that’s convinced that progressive policies = making us richer by growing the pie. As you said, at some level even fiscal conservatives get that roads, bridges, trains and educated healthy workers (physical and human infrastructure) are bedrock to the Empire. Lula’s most recent bid for the Presidency had even some Business friendly Conservative groups backing him over Borsalino— knowing full well he’s a Socialist.

You can be FDR, but only when the ruling class fully knows that if they don’t hand you the bag they’re either going to see the coffers collapse with no workers smart or healthy enough to turn the wheels of enterprise— or they’re going to see their gated communities stormed and burned down. FDR had the later situation.

I guess Lula has a 3rd situation that Kamala might also have where the only other option is fascism— but the ruling class has to buy into the theory that only social democracy can save them from those kinds of perils. (And they do need to be convinced that Social Democracy > Fascism, both with cultural and economic arguments)

The more AoC & the Squad go on MSNBC, endear themselves and their ideas to the Liberal Elite wine Moms, the more there will be culturally a shift in the ruling class that you need Social Democracy, investment in the citizens in order to sit atop lasting long-term empire and not imminently collapsing Empire.
 
I think you have done a pretty good job there of explaining why social democrats are not our friends. People like AOC may try to convince the ruling class that it's necessary to provide citizens of their own countries with some crumbs on the basis that it is strategically beneficial for maintaining empire. Meanwhile, they are on board with endless oppression, death, and destruction, so long as it is pointed elsewhere. What we need is an alternative to this which, as its top priority, explicitly opposes US imperialism.
 
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