I’m voting blue, and you should too
But if it’s a competition for engagement, why did we have to go with the least engaging candidate possible?
Because the system isn’t fixed yet.
Unfortunately, we have to engage in order to fix it. It won’t just fix itself so that we can participate with a clean ego conscience.
So much this. This is a shitty game, but the only way to fix the game, is to play. Keep voting blue to beat the fascist reds, and in primaries, vote with your heart. A strong voter turnout for both will make the red party irrelevant until they move more to the center, while also pushing blue more left.
A union doesn’t get better treatment by continuing to work the machines that mangle them.
I dont have much of a better answer but I’m getting tired of hearing this.
Okay… But let’s walk it out… Say turn out is good enough to beat Trump this time… Biden gets in again… What’s the next step? How do we then get him and the Dems to fix the system? Probably not even that hard… Ranked choice, end dark money, end gerrymandering… The rest will likely sort itself out… So what? Do we call our elected reps and say, okay, this time I really mean it, you fix this dumpster fire or else… Else what?
(Just to keep this from getting derailed… I’m voting for Biden and so should everyone, especially in the swing states.)
But I’ve heard this song before… Over and over… Just vote like you’re told to this time, and then we’ll fix the system later… And like clockwork we’re right back here every 4 years… And god forbid anyone ever point out that we did this exact same dance last time, and we got them in, and shocker of all shockers, they didn’t fucking fix anything about the system. Shit, they didn’t even try.
So show me the Democrat’s plan to fix the system. Or I guess it is already “fixed”… How are they going to unfuck it?
Step one is that people need to show up for more than just presidential elections. The only way to move left at a national level is to show the establishment that progressive candidates are winning in local and state races and it’s more than just a couple of them here or there. Get more progressives in the kind of offices that can set them up to be governors and senators - those are the people who generally end up as president. There’s no overnight solution, which is what a lot of people seem to expect.
Buuuut voter turnout in non-presidential election years sucks, and it’s even worse outside of midterms. I don’t know how to solve that part. I’ve voted in every single election I could since I turned 18, and I don’t understand the complete lack of engagement. I know how to solve the things that prevent willing voters from doing it, but I don’t know how we fix apathy.
What’s the next step?
The republicans come up with the next boogeyman and the democrats jam some new unpopular shill down our throat “or else we lose democracy” and so on until people stop putting up with it because nothing ever gets better and we do actually lose democracy.
What’s the next step?
It’s not salvageable on the national level. It’s only going to happen with organization outside of the DNC. Unions, community organizations, and activist groups for boycotts and strikes with a clearly defined political objective.
We already have a roadmap for this, thanks to the fascists. The way they took over the Republican party 15 years ago was by aggressively getting involved in the primary process. Once establishment neoliberal Dems start losing their primaries, the rest will get the hint real quick.
(Just to keep this from getting derailed… I’m voting for Biden and so should everyone, especially in the swing states.)
But I’ve heard this song before… Over and over… Just vote like you’re told to this time, and then we’ll fix the system later… And like clockwork we’re right back here every 4 years… And god forbid anyone ever point out that we did this exact same dance last time, and we got them in, and shocker of all shockers, they didn’t fucking fix anything about the system. Shit, they didn’t even try.
So show me the Democrat’s plan to fix the system. Or I guess it is already “fixed”… How are they going to unfuck it?
you keep giving them what they want from you so they have no reason to bother fixing it
You don’t get the Dems to fix the system, that’s not the point. They’re not a solution, they’re one step. The problem is we’ve been leaving it to that one step and just magically expecting things to get fixed for us.
Showing up helps, but it’s only the first step. And you have to show up for everything. Not just once every four years, or even every two. You need to show up for every vote. Down to local dog-catcher. Because that change trickles up.
I’m not a strategist, I don’t have all the answers… but I know giving up cause you haven’t seen the change you wanted through minimum effort is fucking stupid. It’s hard. No one said it wouldn’t be. But that’s no reason to decide it’s not worth the effort.
How do we then get him and the Dems to fix the system?
First step is getting Republicans to stop being literal fascists. And that means that they have to lose so many times in a row that they have to rethink the whole party strategy to try getting elected again.
Then, once republicans go back to being just corporate shills, Dems will have to actually push left because the “we’re not Satan” strategy won’t work anymore.
If we’re expecting democrats to fix our broken, two party system, we’re going to be waiting a long time. The left is going to have to work hard and do it ourselves. Democrats are enslaved in a broken system they helped create.
If you’re expecting anyone to fix a system for you while you sit on your ass, you’re in for a world of disappointment.
This isn’t a fix, it’s one step. You need to do a hell of a lot more than show up once or twice a year to get things fixed. And it takes more than just you. That’s what the whole post is about. People don’t show up because they feel it’s impossible to change.
In no small part because of doom-sayers like yourself who constantly keep saying that “if you do it that way you’re bound to fail, so don’t even try”.
Democrats are a stop-gap. I’m not saying they’re not. But if you remove that stop gap the entire system floods. If you have a better way to staunch the flow, I’d love to hear it. But all I hear from your type is “But I put in the bare minimum possible effort and it didn’t change things, so I’m going to stop trying at all”.
I have participated for over two decades in all ways possible, I can’t support any part of this system with a good conscience anymore. We can do something better, the US constitution and neoliberal capitalism isn’t the ultimate attainment of human progress.
My question still is why does it feel like the democratic party continues to try to mostly target ‘undecided’ voters. Which I’m still not convinced actually exist in any significant numbers. But I know tons and tons and tons of theoretically democrat voters that just don’t bother to actually vote.
Feels like 80% of the messaging is aimed at somehow flipping a red voter blue instead of actually capitalizing on the blue voters they actually have.
Whereas all I see Republicans do is advertise to their own base. I basically never see them legitimately try to flip a blue voter. They seem to correctly recognize that’s a lost cause, so they spend most of their effort on energizing their voter base.
Because we did the same thing in 2016, and no one learned anything from those mistakes.
Because it’s not just a popularity contest. I mean, it is, but you also need money to advertise yourself to an entire country.
Advertising is expensive when you have to pay for it, instead of doing stupid or evil stuff all the time like certain famous Republicans.
So, who has money, and how do you convince them to give you money? This is where the intersection between who we want and who we get lies.
It’s much easier to get 65% turnout when it’s a candidate we can get excited about.
You might notice there are a ton of candidates on your ballot who aren’t running for president
Change starts from the bottom, not the top.
Young people aren’t voting = political parties seeing no reason to appeal to them.
Older generations vote, so politicians who appeal to older generations get promoted over ones who might otherwise have broad appeal.
Don’t complain about there being nothing but geriatric candidates if you’re only engaging in National level races and not taking part in local, regional and state elections that are spring boards for the younger politicians to rise up the ranks to get onto the national level.
You want to see change? Vote. In every election you’re eligible to vote in. And get all your friends and co-workers to do the same. Doesn’t matter if it’s for city council, school board or senate races. Just fucking vote.
when the dem party ran a candidate that young people liked, we went out and voted for him. so it’s not the young people’s fault that they don’t vote, it’s that the party doesn’t care enough to put forward a candidate that young people actually can get behind.
Not to defend dems strategy but look at 2010 for a prime example of what my post above was talking about. ACA is exactly what young voters wanted, what dems pushed for in 2008 and was exactly what GOP ran against in 2010. And in 2010, young voters didn’t show up, so all the congressional members who pushed it through got unseated by conservatives eager to rip it apart and stonewall anything else Obama did.
So yes, my point stands. It’s because young voters do not vote, especially not in midterm years between presidential elections that we aren’t getting politicians who appeal to the under 50-60 block. Because even when Dems go all out and give them everything they want, they still don’t show up at the polls to maintain momentum, and Dems lose a ton of ground. So can you blame them for making the choice between getting once in a generation power plays to change the status quo then go right back to letting GOP rip everything apart piecemeal and load the courts with conservative judges, or pick safer bet candidates who appeal to the ones who regularly turn out to vote even if progress only comes in bite sized changes they can slip through with aid of moderates and independents?
The math is there, you just have to look at the entire equation. GET OUT AND VOTE. EVERY ELECTION.
Not really? The highest turnout for under 25s over the last 58 years was… in 2020 (~50%), when it was literally the same matchup . And that’s still significantly lower than other age groups (62% 25-44, 71% 45+).
There was a small bump in 2008 (assuming you mean Obama), up to 49%. But in 2004 when John Kerry was the candidate the turnout was about 47% so not like. A huge change. And nobody remembers John Kerry.
Looking across the pond, in 2019 when Corbyn was head of the labor party and ran on a lot of lovely progressive issues, the turnout under 24s (they use slightly different brackets) was… Just over 50%
It kinda seems like young people just don’t vote at very high rates, period. So it doesn’t make a ton of sense to focus on them over other groups if you actually want to get elected and hold power.
Young people aren’t voting = political parties seeing no reason to appeal to them.
Older generations vote, so politicians who appeal to older generations get promoted over ones who might otherwise have broad appeal.
And that works great until the old farts start dying and the young people the party spent so long alienating don’t trust them for some fucking reason.
So the fun thing is that you get older every year. So does everyone around you. What seems to actually happen is that as younger voters age they realize that they should actually vote* – in 2000 32% of the 18-24 bracket voted. By 2020 those people are at the upper end of the 25-44 bracket [the census has wonky ranges], and 55% of them voted.
This trend has been going on back as far as there is data. There is no ‘until’.
And if those numbers seem really low to you - yeah they are. For comparison about 70% of people 64+ have voted every presidential election year, back to like the 80s. And it’s even worse for midterm years! In 2022 people 64+ voted at about a 2.5:1 rate to people under 25.
*in fairness there’s also the factor that as people age they tend to have more stable lives, more ability to take time off, etc. And there are states that DO make voting hard on purpose (notably all governed by the same party). Reasons why supporting early voting, mail in, mandatory time off, etc. Are all also very important. But in much of the US it’s not particularly difficult and people still don’t do it.
I’d agree but when the other candidate is Trump the excitement should be at max level for you, or I’ll have to think you have a secret agenda.
people have short attention spans. and the media circus isn’t helping Biden’s cause. I’ll hold my nose this time and vote biden, just like i did with hillary, but not everyone will do that. a lot of people are going to skip voting, and you shouldn’t blame them, you should blame the democratic party for not putting forward the best candidate for the job.
People are dumb, people are uneducated, people have short attention spans, people are undecided, but people also don’t know if they should vote in the face of a realistic takeover of the US by a fascist movement scenario. Maybe it’s time we take away democracy from people who are actively disengaging from it. Once Trump is president again, it will be too late. End him and everybody who follows him.
Its not secret. I want to dissolve the two party system and force the legacy political parties to compete in a free market of ideas. If they arent competitive because their muscles have weakened from long use of First Past The Post voting as a crutch… that’s on them.
His record is great, and the alternative is the end of democracy.
What more do you want
His record is great
i’m want to assume that you mean his record for the last 3 years because the last 51 years has been very bad; but even those 3 years were hit and miss.
but then again, if you only look at the last 3 years of his life, kissinger was a pretty good guy too.
the best thing biden has going for him is that he’s not trump. and that’s not sustainable.
I’ve heard this before. What do you people mean when you say “end of democracy”?
He’s on record as talking about not being restricted to a third term. SCOTUS has ruled that he can do no wrong, specifically in the context of him being brought to trial for asking for the vote to be rigged in his favour, but also for inciting armed insurrection against the United States government in order to keep him in power after the rules said he should go. He has talked, out loud, about being a dictator on day one and said that he should be allowed to order the death of people who oppose him. You could argue that Russia is a democracy, but the kind of “democracy” where political opponents are murdered and vote counts are changed in favour of the leader are better called dictatorships.
The thinking is that Trump will do something for the republicans to remain in power permanently.
Not clear what that something is.
Be “excited” about the prospect of trump.
Edit: /s or whatever. Vote blue or get trump.
Those % are very much bullshit but I support the message. Vote out the fascist party.
Don’t let the bullshit percentages distract you from the fact that in 1998, the Undertaker threw Mankind off Hell In A Cell, and plummeted 16 ft through an announcer’s table. Vote. 🗳️
I’m not really understand the “70%” part. Can’t they just run again next election? Why would they be “out”?
My source? I made it the fuck up
It’s totally accurate if the extra 15% that shows up is all people voting for Biden.
A 6:9 split in favor of the Democrats is actually more than sufficient. Go crawl back to your “Voting bad actually” disinformation silo.
If the Republicans win this one, you won’t have to worry about voting ever again.
That’s the silver lining I guess. Elections are such stressful events that people living under totalitarian regimes just don’t have to deal with.
Unless the democrats have an actual plan, they can actually get through congress, to unwind the legal framework for fascism that the republicans have built it won’t matter in the long run anyway…
Like seriously we’re in the end game now, without an actual plan to stop it the next republican president will be our last.
The funny thing is that I remember this being said about every candidate since Bill Clinton. Dont worry everything is going to be alright.
gestures broadly at the world that has been increasingly crumbling
You sure about that?
I agree things are crumbling, but Trump is a symptom not the cause. Trump is not going to be the end of things, he is just a dude that likes to talk about himself and be important.