Act like Democrats.

[WarGamer]

What's up with 2024?

Over the past 10-20 years the DEM Party has veered to the Right...

Swapping spit with Liz Cheney, canonizing Adam Kinziger, Bill Kristol and even Dick Cheney...

Ukraine War... folks pumping their fist like RW'ers on the Eve of "Shock and Awe" in Iraq on the eve of Shrub's illegal war.

It's a full on proxy war and has brought the planet closer to nuclear war than ever before... much more dangerous than the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Why does the current Party clash with the ACLU?

WTF? Liberals used to fight for free speech. The ACLU fought for Nazis in Skokie and Nazis in Charlottesville for fuck sake.

Nowadays, folks want to silence, delete and punish speech they don't like.

The US Justice system... remember the days of the pony tailed, pot smoking defense lawyer who would fight "the man"?

Nope, nowadays folks promote taking businesses away from people, "locking them up" and lickspittle support of LEO.

And who da fuck thought it's a good idea to place WEDGE ISSUES at the forefront of the political fight?

Look at Bill Clinton or Barack Obama... working class folks didn't feel threatened by either.

Today the working class flocks to Trump.

Stop crowing about the economy. Pull a Clinton and talk to the US people, "feel their pain" and make proposals that are targeting the poor.

And stop blaming the voters.

The DEMS parked a metaphorical Greek Food Truck at the corner of Mission and Garey in Pomona CA while Trump parked a Taco Truck.

SELL a better product.

Trump won the battle but not the war. But we need new Generals and a new strategy.

Note to prospective Jurors: This was posted in the new "Way Forward" forum which allows and encourages constructive criticism.

PS and never EVER push candidates who haven't proved themselves in the bitter fire of a national Primary fight... let DEMOCRATS decide. And certainly don't push candidates with a history of being a poor campaigner.

[ck4829]

1. True. I didn't like the cozying up to Cheneys either

We also need to realize though it's not just a proxy war, it is the Cold War II, it is back on, and Reagan certainly did not win it, it started in 2006 when the FSB decided to polonium-poison dissidents like Alexander Litvinenko in NATO countries. And it has roots back even further; when Putin, the FSB, and GRU decided to murder 307 innocent Russians in 1999.

I don't want to fight the Cold War II, but it would be foolish to say it's not happening right now as we speak as the Russian government lets criminals hack our infrastructure and sends assassins to poison people in NATO countries.

[WarGamer]

2. I actually don't believe in a mono-polar world.

I don't think the USA should be "boss"

A multi-polar world is safer and more fair... plus, ethically I think it's wrong for the USA to be "Daddy"

[BannonsLiver]

3. Yeah the whole "Let's just forget about all the evil shit Putin does and be friends" is naive and foolish.

Hard pass. The OP favors isolationism and America withdrawing from the world stage, which did not serve us well between the end of WW1 and beginning of WW2.

[WarGamer]

13. that's a bit black and white.

I want the US to withdraw enough to be a member of the "family of nations" and that doesn't mean isolated.

I don't want to be "Daddy"

We will always be unique just because of the economic power, etc... but we don't need to keep our hands in geopolitics.

I mean... we literally have a long history of propping up dictators, overthrowing leaders we don't like, arming adversaries... sometimes arming BOTH sides of a confrontation...

No more.

That's not isolationist. It's just hoping that the USA becomes more like Spain, Peru or Morocco.

[osteopath6]

20. NATO isn't clean either

Nobody is. War is bad. Nobody in a war has the moral highground IMO.

If its not worth literally ending the world and using nukes, its not worth murdering fellow humans over. And to me very, very, VERY few things could justify the use of "a" nuclear weapon let alone a strategic use of them.

I can't really think of a single situation that would lead me to support going to war.

[ck4829]

4. Another thing to discuss is to fight "the man". We totally should go back to that.

Cops in Uvalde, neo-nazis, proud boys, etc. They are the Man, they are intertwined. When they take off that badge, and put on a hood, do we stop fighting them? That blurs the line, we shouldn't have racist cops, they are a liability to the public.

Funny thing is I support universal income, even for a permanently unemployed neo-nazi with more face swastika tattoos than mommy issues he has.

We probably need to get loud and in front with anti-corruption standards. Our healthcare system is massively corrupt. Our law enforcement system has corruption as well. We want to lower costs, we want to know where our dollars are going, let's get anti-corrupt - 1 system of corruption getting taken down is more beneficial to the public than marginalizing 10 neo-nazis. And I like taking neo-nazis down a peg.

[LiberalArkie]

5. Yes.... We became Maga-lite

Last edited Tue Jan 21, 2025, 05:56 PM - Edit history (1)

I think we need to get back to the FDR thinking.

Look at the Lenard Peltier. Jailed under Clinton as the "Well someone needs to go to jail. Might as well be this redskin"


Correction: The Gerald Ford DOJ. This thought still holds true as why did it take all those Democratic administrations?

But it took 50 years.

We need to be better even if we do not win elections because the electorate has turned nazi.

[dpibel]

6. Peltier was convicted in 1977

Pretty sure Clinton wasn't president then.

The whole thing sucks, but let's not blame a Democratic president for something that occurred solely during Republican administrations.

[LiberalArkie]

11. You are absolutely correct. I believe that was the Ford DOJ.

I think I confused the Ruby Ridge with the Waco and Murrah Building incidents..

Correction: The Gerald Ford DOJ. This thought still holds true as why did it take all those Democratic administrations?

[BannonsLiver]

15. MAGA light?

[The Wandering Harper]

41. I see that

an air of smugness and superiority toward the other
dehumanizing the other
personally insulting the other
I've seen all of that here and often

[BannonsLiver]

42. Doesn't make it maga light though.

[The Wandering Harper]

46. that's a matter of opinion

but I can see how one could arrive at that opinion

[BannonsLiver]

48. Indeed.

Loved the documentary, btw.

[The Wandering Harper]

49. If you can count the KNEECAP movie as a documentary?

that's the only documentary-like thing I remember mentioning around here lately.
Though a couple I'm fond of are
Healing from Hate: battle for the soul of a nation, and
The Great Hunger: the life and songs of Shane MacGowan

[Mountainguy]

17. They went that long because he deserved to rot in prison

I'm really not sure why he's even getting out now, other than it's cheaper to let him die at home.

[doc03]

7. I am not saying we should run Liz Cheney or Adam Kensinger for president. But we need somrone

with their backbone and take no prisoners approach. The Republicans show no mercy and go for the
jugular. While our leadership talks about working with the other side when we can.

[dpibel]

8. It's "canonized"

Placed in the canon. Not shot from, or with, a cannon.

Other than that, it's a very interesting list featuring some fictitious people, e.g., the pot smoking defense lawyer who would fight "the man." Someone sort of like that may have existed once (certainly not, to name a famous name, Kunstler), but to say that was somehow the Democratic party is downright fatuous.

And I'm extremely impressed with the assertion that working class people were not threatened by Barack Obama. As Charlie Pierce would say, "Please to be pulling the other one."

And the idea that Clinton was some kind of populist, or FDR (or JFK or LBJ) Democrat is just plain a hoot.

Not going to take the time to line-item this, but I'm thinking there's a great deal of stereotype and myth here, and not a whole large amount of supportable assertion.

Folks pumping their fists...Jesus.

[WarGamer]

12. noted, tyvm.

[senseandsensibility]

9. I agree that we need better candidates

We need better communicators. There certainly is lots of room for improvement. I also think the Liz Cheney thing was a mistake. But it wasn't the Dems who were bringing wedge issues to the forefront. It was the R's of course, and most of what they said was lies.

[Lunabell]

10. Democrats aren't silencing speech!!!

Name one piece of legislation they brought to censor speech! Go ahead, when did Democrats censor speech?


And didn't putin invade our ally Ukraine? Do you understand what allies do? Are we to just let out allies be invaded? What if putin advances on France? The UK? Italy? Poland? Just sit back and let him conquer Europe? WTF?!?

[WarGamer]

14. You know what you're doing...

Don't look at legislation, look at public statements. I'll wait...

[dpibel]

16. Are you talking about "cancel culture" here?

Do acquaint us with the official Democratic Party position that calls for curtailing speech.

This is yet another canard that was effectively used by the right-wing. Which seems to have no problem with speech curtailment of its own.

But you are, throughout your indictment, conflating personal or institutional positions with the position of the Democratic Party.

I can understand your confusion, because the press has assuredly been all about the repressive Democrats vs. the totes Libertarian Trumpists.

[Lunabell]

18. It's not the Democrats who are censoring.

So that argument is garbage.

And what about our allies? Just leave them hanging in the wind? That argument is garbage too. And sounds pretty nativistic and isolationist. Those are right wing talking points.

[Sailingfish]

22. Opposition to war is not a right-wing talking point.

Yes, there's a faction of "right-wing libertarians" and anarcho-capitalists opposed to war and interventionism but they are surely not alone in opposition to wars on the political spectrum. There's a long history of opposition to wars and interventionism on the left. Especially wars that are fought for ruling class power. I post this example below, not because Debs was a member of the Democratic Party. I'm posting it only to say that opposition to wars is not a right-wing talking point in any way.

--------

I have been asked if I was opposed to all war and if I would refuse to be a soldier and to fight under any circumstances. No, I am not opposed to all war, nor am I opposed to fighting under all circumstances, and any declaration to the contrary would disqualify me as a revolutionary. When I say I am opposed to war I mean ruling class war, for the ruling class is the only class that makes war. It matters not to me whether this war be offensive or defensive, or what other lying excuse may be invented for it, I am opposed to it, and I would be shot for treason before I would enter such a war. If I were in Congress I would be shot before I would vote a dollar for such a war.

Capitalist wars for capitalist conquest and capitalist plunder must be fought by the capitalists themselves so far as I am concerned, and upon that question there can be no misunderstanding as to my position. I have no country to fight for; my country is the earth; and I am a citizen of the world.

But while, I have not a drop of blood to shed for the oppressors of the working class and the robbers of the poor, the thieves and looters, the brigands and murderers, whose debauched misrule is the crime of the ages, I have a heart-full to shed for their victims when it shall be needed in the war for their liberation.

I am not a capitalist soldier; I am a proletarian revolutionist. I do not belong to the regular army of the plutocracy, but to the irregular army of the people. I refuse to obey any command to fight from, the ruling class, but I will not wait to be commanded to fight for the working class.

I am opposed to every war but one; I am for that war with heart and soul, and that is the world-wide war of the social revolution. In that war I am prepared to fight in any way the ruling class may make it necessary, even to the barricades.

--Eugene Debs (Public Domain)

-----------------

[Lunabell]

23. Well, just tell putin about this.

I oppose his invasion of Ukraine and support all efforts to keep him from invading other countries. I support helping our allies.

The US didn't get involved with WW2 until Pearl Harbor. How many millions of people could have been saved if we hadn't been isolationist?

[Sailingfish]

24. The obsession with Putin from many is beyond laughable.

He is one ruling class asshole, on a global plantation of ruling class assholes, that reside on this rock. War is a racket, and don't think for a minute that the money being shoveled into wars, instead of helping the masses, doesn't factor into people staying home on election day. Warmongering by the United States is a bipartisan affair and always has been. Is everything the fault of the United States and the West ? Well no, that's bullshit campism and reactionary anti-imperialism but that's not the point. People want to make proclamations based on subjective beliefs of history that fit their political ideology, rather than the actual historical realities. That's not critical thinking. It's dogmatic historical revisionism.


I spent thirty-three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country's most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle-man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.

I suspected I was just part of a racket at the time. Now I am sure of it. Like all the members of the military profession, I never had a thought of my own until I left the service. My mental faculties remained in suspended animation while I obeyed the orders of higher-ups. This is typical with everyone in the military service.

I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested.

During those years, I had, as the boys in the back room would say, a swell racket. Looking back on it, I feel that I could have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.


--U.S General Smedley Butler (1933) (Public Domain)

[Lunabell]

25. Obsessed with putin?

How about concerned for the thousands of human beings he has murdered and will continue to murder until stopped. Children. Innocent civilians. Do me a favor and keep your opinions to yourself. Because allowing the murder of innocent children is beyond sick.

[Sailingfish]

26. All wars result in the death and murder of innocents. That's the point.

How many dead Palestinian and Israeli civilians and children have been slaughtered over the decades. How many innocent civilians and children in Iraq died after a bullshit invasion based on a lie. An invasion that many Democrats supported. And on and on. Your post is sophistry and gaslighting in defense of that which you claim to oppose. More Debs below...

They have always taught and trained you to believe it to be your patriotic duty to go to war and to have yourselves slaughtered at their command. But in all the history of the world you, the people, have never had a voice in declaring war, and strange as it certainly appears, no war by any nation in any age has ever been declared by the people.

And here let me emphasize the fact — and it cannot be repeated too often — that the working class who fight all the battles, the working class who make the supreme sacrifices, the working class who freely shed their blood and furnish the corpses, have never yet had a voice in either declaring war or making peace. It is the ruling class that invariably does both. They alone declare war and they alone make peace.

Yours not to reason why;
Yours but to do and die.

That is their motto and we object on the part of the awakening workers of this nation.
If war is right let it be declared by the people. You who have your lives to lose, you certainly above all others have the right to decide the momentous issue of war or peace.

--Eugene Debs

[osteopath6]

19. This

I can't express it better. The vibe here is off. Its like someone pushing us toward the right/extremes or of the old right, maybe? Its hard to pin down. But you hit my feelings squarely

[ultralite001]

21. Haven't Dems got any youngsters with charisma???

Smart + funny + tough+ wiley + incorruptible + brave + kind, etc., etc.. If not, why not???

Youngsters In love with the possibilities of Democracy + the rule of Law as well as the opportunities of the American Dream…

Has their hope been killed through the actions of their elders??? Is apathy the new norm???

Just spitballing here… I love Jasmine Crockett, Maxwell Frost, AOC, Hakeem Jeffries, David Hogg + too many others to mention…

What is being done to help support these leaders??? + what is being done to grow leaders that aren’t sheep???

Dems don’t need our own reality star… we need new faces, new blood, new ideas + we need to help them grow strong + confident + well versed in the foundations of our country + the mission of our party.

ETTD… This is why Dems can + will succeed.

[GoreWon2000]

27. Dem leadership growing a spine needs to be the first step

They've been pulling the coward routine since 2000 when they let W steal the 2000 election that put out country on the path to tRump instead of fighting back by defending we the people's right to vote and demanding that the uncounted Florida votes be counted. We the people are tired of watching our votes being thrown out with the dem leadership hiding like cowards. They repeatedly attacked Al Gore for actually defending democracy by fighting to have the uncounted Florida votes counted in 2000. The dem leadership keeps bringing slingshots to the fight while the repugs keep bringing AK-47s to the fight. This must stop.
This a tough post but this cowardly behavior needs to be called out. Too many Americans watched in horror in 2000 as their votes were thrown out and again in the 2024 dem primary when 14 million more dem party primary votes were thrown out. This is showing too many Americans that democracy no longer works and that's why so many of them have shifted to tRump. I say these tough words as someone who spent 24 years working on dem election campaigns, everything from local state legislative campaigns all the way to Presidential campaigns. 15 of my years were spent in Florida.

[electric_blue68]

28. Hmmm...you managed to irk both of my enthno origins...

As a 2nd Gen half Greek-American why are you picking on Greek food aka "a Greek Food truck"?

Some Greek foods have become popular- slouvaki, gyros, crumbled feta cheese is sprinkled on lots of salads these days, and there's plenty in the cheese isle now (I remember when you could only get it at a Greek Deli), lamb shesk kabob.

Then ... as a 2 Gen half Ukrainian-American.... Yes, I cheered but sadly when Ukraine fought/is fighting against an effin' murderous Bully, Putin. Sad bc he did that!
Taking Ukraine lands, resources, murdering, kidnapping people. An Independent Country forced to be reabsorved into Putin's fever dream of a revamped Soviet Union.

If the majority of Ukrainians want to keep their independence by fighting - I support them!

[WarGamer]

29. Ok...

I'm sure you understand the Greek vs Mexican food truck thing was an allegory.

Just to provide a contrast in food styles in a neighborhood where most would prefer Mexican food.

I also support the Ukrainians right to fight as long as they wish... what I don't support is the endless US support making it into a proxy war.

If the EU wants to arm them to the "last Ukrainian" as Noam Chomsky said... then so be it.

Normal people should be hoping for a stop to the killing.

[electric_blue68]

30. Yeas, it was an allegory, but you still picked it as an example... As for Ukraine...

I'm glad the US is providing weaponry. How much farther would Ukraine have been over run by Russian troops.

Who knows what's going happen now that Putin's stooge - Trump is back in the WH.

[WarGamer]

31. Here's what I think... not that it means much.

I've been to Russia. I've been to Ukraine.

I've been to lots of former Soviet countries.

Here's what I believe.

Eastern Ukraine is heavily ethnically Russian.

Just like Eastern Estonia.

Central and Western Ukraine is much more European.

Is war fair? Of course not. But Ukraine is going to negotiate an end to this. They'll probably give up Donbas and Luhansk, Crimes and a land bridge between Russia and Crimea along the Coast.

I think Ukraine will GET EU membership a NATO promise and MASSIVE Western Investment.

I'll make ONE bet. In ten years... Eastern Ukraine will STILL be an industrial/rural area stuck in 1955 while the rest of Ukraine will be rebuilt, modern and thriving... more than ever before.

War sucks. This illegal war was terrible, too bad it wasn't ended before it began.

The only ones to benefit have been the MIC.

[electric_blue68]

32. You've had some first hand experiences! Yeah, I've read about...

the large amount of ethnic Russians in Eastern Ukraine.

It seems (I could be wrong) that in giving up those areas a lot the wheat growing fields would be lost. They are called "The Bread Basket".
Have to substitute some other industry to replace that, if that's so.

[WarGamer]

33. Opportunities will be readily available.

Investment will FLOW into the country...

Hell, Ukraine might become the chip-fab country, who knows? Get a BMW factory?

Everything is possible.

Lviv and Kyiv will more closely resemble Vienna in a decade.

[BannonsLiver]

34. Utterly delusional.

[WarGamer]

36. Just wait and see... Ukraine will come out of this better than going in... in some ways.

[Red Mountain]

43. ONLY because they fought

and Western nations supported them.

And the ONLY way they'll come out of this better off is if we (hopefully) and the rest of the Western world keep supporting them until there's a negotiated settlement.

[WarGamer]

44. I wish I was a fly on the wall during the pre-war negotiations.

Was Russia willing to settle the whole deal for the same thing they'll get in 2025?

Were a million casualties a waste?

Or did fighting back serve geopolitics well?

I look forward to reading the post war history.

[FSogol]

35. Bullshit. Why should a sovereign nation give up territory to a corrupt aggressive neighbor?

Fuck the Putin regime.

[WarGamer]

37. Look at a map or a globe and find a nation that's never given up territory in a war... I'll wait.

NOTE: There are a FEW exceptions... but I'm talking 99% of the globe.The USA literally exists because of war... an insurgent campaign and if you're using real definitions... "treason"

[Passages]

38. What was the net gain from Liz Cheney? Nothing.

“We haven’t lost a wink of sleep about it,” a House GOP strategist said. “We know it’s there, but it’s really irrelevant. … Our coalitions have shifted so much. Now we’re picking up these blue-collar, working class former Democrats, and they’re all in for Trump https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4964853-liz-cheney-democrat-endorsements/

Some seem to have forgotten the significance of how and why Trump was able to take over the Republican Party fairly easily.
He channeled ANGST, and he won TWICE now.

How much longer do we want to lose??

How Neoliberalism Failed, and What a Better Society Could Look Like
August 7, 2024

By Joseph Stiglitz
https://rooseveltinstitute.org/publications/how-neoliberalism-failed/

[KentuckyWoman]

39. I agree.

Yes, we do need to fight for the vulnerable and stand up for the margins. But front and center needs to be the ability to live our lives. How do we pay for roof and food all the way to the grave... including that time at the end when the body will no longer work well enough to earn a living. How do we afford to leave a little something behind for the kids and grandkids. How do we get them a chance to have it a little easier.

I'm not saying we shouldn't fight for the right to choose or the right to get trans kids appropriate medical care. We absolutely should. But we have to do something about allowing the media to paint whole party and nothing but people running around in (excuse me) pink pussy hats and demanding schools cater to kids who identify as cats.

I expect to get flamed but I see what I see. I love the Democratic party for it's diversity, but putting the fringes front and center doesn't do us any favors.

[WarGamer]

40. no flames here...

Job #1 is to improve peoples lives.

[Passages]

45. Acting like Democrats is challenging for some:

Mehdi Hasan@mehdirhasan
Duffy is a climate change denier, a lobbyist, & a supporter of Trump’s Muslim ban and anti immigrant bigotry. Yet here is a top Democratic senator not just voting for him but introducing and vouching for him.

This is the Democratic ‘resistance’ to Trump term 2.
Kill me now.

Link to tweet

Yashar Ali 🐘
@yashar
The Senate has voted 97-0 to invoke cloture on the nomination of Sean Duffy for Secretary of Transportation.

Duffy, a former Wisconsin Congressman, was introduced at his hearing by Senator Tammy Baldwin who said it was a “pleasure” to introduce him and that he was “the right person for this job.”

[Paladin]

47. I'll just be God-DAMNED if I'll stop blaming the stupid fucking voters.

And if by some non-existent chance I need a screed like yours, shitting all over Democrats, I'll just curl up with the NY Times opinion section...

[JHB]

50. 10-20 years? Please double that.

It was Bill Clinton who acquiesced to Reaganomics, in much the same way that Eisenhower acquiesced to the basic New Deal structure, by emphasizing the need to be seen as "pro business" and working within the basic Reagan framework rather than pushing back. In the conditions of the time it may have seemed like the right move, but it undermined the Democratic Party's brand as "the party that looks out for the little guy". in retrospect, it has cost us repeatedly. It's the reason Hillary lost to Obama in the 2008 primaries, and Obama's going along with that perspective was a major factor in the 2010 "shellacking."