Tweet
There has been much hope–or dread, depending on which party you support–that the embrace of arch-conservative and Tea Party-backed candidates in contest primaries could seriously cost the Republican Party several Senate seats this November. By my count, the GOP could lose at least five Senate race as a result of embracing a more conservative challenger against the establishment choice: Nevada, Kentucky, Colorado, Florida and Pennsylvania. If the Republican Party fails to make significant gains this year because of the close outcome in these races, that would be a strategic failure by the conservative base. But currently, polls don’t indicate that championing right-wing nominees will cause the GOP to lose these races.
While the more conservative or Tea Party candidates in those primaries may not be as electable as the establishment choices, the polling data indicate they could still easily win. A recent SurveyUSA poll found Republican Rand Paul leading Democrat Jack Conway in Kentucky, 51-43. While some polls have shown the race to be close, no independent poll in months has found Conway in the lead. In Colorado, Tea Party favorite Ken Buck is tied with both possible Democratic nominees, according to a recent poll. Quinnipiac’s latest poll of the Pennsylvania Senate race has the GOP’s Pat Toomey tied with Democrat Joe Sestak. While many think Sharron Angle has been a gift for Democrat Harry Reid, Mason-Dixon found Reid with a single-point lead over Angle, and PPP had him with only a two-point lead. Angle could easily overcome that deficit.
According to the polls, Florida seems to be the only state where Marco Rubio’s insurgent challenge against the former establishment choice, Gov. Charlie Crist, has a real chance of costing Republicans a seat. But that requires a lot of luck on the part of Crist, now an independent, to keep his early lead and let two unpopular Democratic candidates battle each other for months. Given that it is a three-way race, the picture could still change in Rubio’s favor. If the Democrat gets a large enough default Democratic vote and Republicans come home, Rubio would have a path to a small plurality victory.
Even if these more conservative candidates end up performing worse than a more moderate Republican would have, that’s unimportant as long as they win. In American politics, getting just one vote more than your opponent has the same outcome as getting a million more votes. These hard-core conservatives only need to be electable enough.
If the electoral environment continues to get worse for Democrats, Republicans who are on the cusp could conceivably win narrowly. If the economy starts to improve and with it Democrats’ chances, many of these Republicans could end up losing narrowly. Whether the conservative primary challenges leave a legacy of brilliant grassroots action or self- destruction will depend on the electorate and the economy. While it is possible that embracing Tea Party-backed candidates could cost the GOP several Senate races this November, the poll data indicate that Democrats can’t bank on this.
76 Comments
LOL!
” What If People Actually Vote for Hard-Right, Tea Party Republicans? ”
This is only now occurring to you?
My main comment is your acceptance of the ‘political class’ meme that somehow electing someone electible who doesn’t represent you is a strategy the base would feel worthwhile. How much would YOU care if a candidate you were enthusiastic about ‘might lose’ whereas, say, Leiberman, would likely hold it? Would you champion Leiberman because your real champion might have a tighter race in the general? I doubt it.
And I could say the same for us and McCain. (In that race there was really no champion. But in, say, Kentucky, there is.)
editor changed the title somewhat. My point is Dem of foolishly giddy about the tea party shooting the GOP in the foot even though few of these tea party candidates are actually looking terrible in the polls.
There, I see your point. Good luck convincing them, though. They seem happy with the ‘call it crazy and everyone will agree’ approach.
Well here’s another one for you: Regardless of the competence or sanity of Tea Party candidates there seems to be movement in the GOP to embrace them as ‘some of their own’. Repuke strategists can see the writing on the wall that most are fed up with corporate politicians (not to diminish the fact that the Tea Party is a horrendous group of patsies for plutocracy!)
But do the Democrats do the same with left progressive candidates? Do they embrace them as authentic change in a time which cries out for a new approach?
No, the DNC seem to reject true progressives for more moderates like Diane Feinstien or Hillary Clinton etc. who are really quite conservative. That is why the Greens, and pseudo-Nader candidates, and even the Ned Lamonts, are never allowed inside the ‘big Democratic tent’, or maybe they are but they are left in the bleachers.
Does this make the GOP more ‘democratic’ than the DNC? I don’t know, but it sure makes them more savvy in how they manipulate angry voters.
The economy isn’t going to get better. That much seems sure at this point. Nothing the Democrats can actually do in the time left will make that happen. The best they can hope for at this point, I think, is to do something that gives people hope that things will get better. And, by that I mean actually do something, not make their “messaging” better.
Meanwhile, this is yet another example of why the country is drifting right politically. Conservatives are smart enough to take their votes elsewhere when their politicians don’t do anything for them. Progressives aren’t.
The Ds show little interest in winning this year. Guess they’re prepping for their lucrative lobbyist jobs. So my guess is it’s the Rs, whether the batshit crazy ones, or the batshit crazy ones squared.
I think you might fundamentally misunderstand the point of the interplay between Democrats and Republicans.
The job of the Republicans is to continually embrace as far a right-wing narrative as they possibly can in any given political climate. The job of the Democrats is to find ways to make that new far-right narrative the consensus/status-quo.
The Democrats would never cater to their angry left “base,” because it’s not their job to push the country left. It’s their job to entrench and institutionalize the reaches of the far-right.
I am not surprised in the least by the rise in right-wing stupidity with the Tea Party and some Republicans in general. There has always been that section of the Republicans and it has always been bigger than the general public realized
But the section will not grow beyond what they are now because they come off to independents (actual independents, not right-wingers crying about how they are independents) as extreme hypocrites with nothing to offer other than being mad that a Democrat is in the White House
Oh, indeed. Which is why getting young people to the polls — a job that putting pro-weed measures on the ballot would accomplish — is paramount, as we need to counter the riled-up far-righties.
If it’s not their “job”, it’s not their job because progressives will always vote for them, no matter what. Politicians need power to do their jobs, and it’s the people who will change their votes who are a threat to that power.
People who will always vote Democratic don’t matter.
I agree with the argument in your post except for a technical point in these two sentences: liberal economic policies (and I mean that in a critical, negative sense) dominate both parties. Progressives have been kicked to the curb (although I still see posts here by progressives saying they will “hold their nose and vote for the democrats” in November). EDIT: and I totally agree with 10 that “People who will always vote Democratic don’t matter.”
Whew! I thought we were gonna have to deal with the batshit cubed bunch. Maybe that’s 2012…
The Dems have behaved in an unimaginably stupid way since 01/09. So many opportunities squandered. Then again, their benefactors are still smiling, and that’s all that counts, right?
Do you really think that will help? If I were a young person who, paradoxically, knows what I know now, I’d be furious at the Democrats for doing such a lousy job of protecting my future. I’d be furious for their continuing two wars that are killing and making cripples of my friends and classmates.
If I bothered to go to the polls, it wouldn’t be to vote for those people.
I’ve probably said this a dozen times, but it’s important to repeat it every time some story about the “struggle” between Democrats and Republicans. There is no struggle between Democrats and Republicans, whether they’re cognizant of it or not. Consider:
1) Which demographic do Republicans service when in government?
2) Which demographic do the overwhelming majority of Democratic leaders/officials belong to?
3) Do those two groups overlap?
There is no struggle.
Damn. You’d think those Tea Partiers would be good for something.
In her regular links page today Yves at Naked Capitalism points us to a Rasmussen poll showing that whereas 67% of the “political class” believe that the US is “headed in the right direction,” 83% of us hoi poilloi do not. Unless and until Obama, Reid, Pelosi et al get out in front of this your fears are well advised.
If by “liberal” you mean that whacko “free market” ideology that’s caught on, then I agree. Otherwise, I don’t. Nothing about the last few decades of economic policy has been liberal or progressive. With the Cat Food Commission, we’re seeing the last of the liberal establishment (in the sense I think of “liberal”) disappearing.
Well, I won’t arm wrestle you about squared vs. cubed.
When there are limits, then that question becomes academic pretty quickly.
Our problem isn’t the teabaggers. Our problem is the fact that the spineless, corporatist “Democrats” have so thoroughly turned off the liberal base. It’s going to cost me every bit of nose holding willpower I have to vote this year. But vote I will. I can fully understand why so many don’t want to bother with it. The teabaggers, (hardcore white conservatives) only make up between a fifth and a quarter of the voting population but they are all going to vote.
What if? What if… What if the world is round? Pres. Obama and the corporate Dems will have only themselves to blame. Pres. Obama and his corporate Attorney General Holder are carrying on the gangster polices of the Bush regime in far too many ways: continued trashing of our 4th Amendment and other sections of our Bill of Rights by killing our right to Habeus Corpus, still spying on all Americans electronically, escalating our criminal assaults on the people of Pakistan, Iraq and Afghanistan by robotic drone murder machines, the watering down of financial re-regulation to protect the Wall Street banking criminals, the half-assed health care “reform,” which is basically a giant taxpayer gift to the insurance industry, and so on, this list is very long…
If anyone votes for the hard-right/tea party/conservative candidates, then that person will have cast a vote to become a beggar to his/her own demise. These jackasses cannot explain the details of their own policies. My guess is they are “policy dunces,” to quote Henry Paulson.
Except I think you’re nuts if you think that young people will come out in favor of progressive policies. They’ll come out in favor of libertarian policies, which only sometimes intersect progressive policies. Why?
Because libertarianism is predicated on absurdly simple emotionally/viscerally satisfying platitudes that are easy to digest, require almost no depth of study, and are in fashion.
The right-wing is going hard after social networks. They’re disseminating very simple narratives that have no problem taking hold amongst people who have known nothing but the massive propaganda machine that’s been continually refined in the Post-Carter era.
I’m sure that part of it is selection bias, but I encounter statistically significant samples of males between the ages of 12-35 whilst unwinding playing video games online, and almost unanimously the stupid inane political talk that comes up on occasion is starkly of the right-wing talking-points sort.
IMO, the so-called “Tea Party” is ploy being used by both Dems and Repubs to push the nation every rightward and to enhance the benefits of the corporate elites. The Dems love the “Tea Party” as much as the Repubs do. It’s just that the “job” of the Dem pols v. the “job” of Repub pols in terms of the “Tea Party” are somewhat different.
Note that we see very, very few D’s ever really castigate or “call out” the Tea Party, and even those D’s who hesitatingly come forth to cast a few stones do so in a very cowering, kowtowing manner. There’s a reason for that. The Tea Party provides smoke screen (which is why they’re really an astroturfed group, thanks to David Koch, et al) for both sides/faces of our one-party corporate dominated system.
RM & KO take pot-shots at the Tea Party almost daily, and I mostly always turn off those segments because I feel that they’re extremely dishonest and just part of the whole modus operandi of the one-party corporate regime. It’s all about: look over there at that crazy person!! And it works.
Frankly, if some Tea Party candidates get in: so what??? At this stage, can anyone provide me with a convincing argument about what difference it will make?? Anyone??
That won’t be much comfort when the batsh*ttery of the teabaggers becomes national policy.
Agree.
Give that man a gold star! They love Libertarianism until their home burns down or their street needs paved. Almost every one of these people believe in the benefits of society….as long as somebody else pays for it.
I quite agree with you. I certainly see no evidence whatsover that the “youth of today” are somehow overwhelmingly liberal. While I have no links to any type of stats – my observations are merely anecdotal – to prove or disprove the political leanings of the youth, I feel that most youth, if they bother to ever to think about politics at all (which is another goal of the powers that be: have them so distracted by social media, dumb tv shows, video games, and yammering & texting endlessly on their cell phones, so that they are totally disinterested in the rank stupidity of their elders in gov’t), they’re more inclined to be more conservative than is commonly believed. Pot issues, notwithstanding.
I get where you’re coming from, but from my perspective, I feel like the batsh**tery of the Tea Party is already happening and being made national policy. I could be wrong, but I just don’t see how it will make much difference if some are voted in.
Let’s see, we have some certified whackos on the right giving the Democrats tight races after the Bushies crashed the economy. Seems counter-intuitive doesn’t it? Well, that sounds a whole lot like a complete failure of leadership in the Democratic Party to me. What do you do when the leaders mismanage a sure win situation to the point that they may loose their majorities? Well, I can think of nothing more appropriate than to fire them by staying home (since thats the only way that can occur). Lets see, if they couldn’t do anything with 60 senators, how long do you think it will take them to amass the required 70 to 80 senators so they finally will run out of excuses to pass progressive legislation? Won’t happen in this century I would imagine.
Emptywheel has a fresh cross-post up: Prop 8: Fighting about the Stay Already
The Democratic party is like a guy who gets into a boxing ring and starts whining about being punched.
I just finished a book about the stalking and assignation of Martin Luther King (Hellhound on his Trail) with a good description of the supporters of the George Wallace presidential campaign in the sixties. This made me realize that the Tea Party is nothing more than the warmed over George Wallace campaign – but I haven’t really heard it described that way yet in the media.
Perfectly said — the media and Democrat politicians, including Obama, have given credence to far right policy decisions by not calling out how ridiculous, and batshit crazy they truly are — thus, essentially moving the argument further right so the reasonable left positions appear like a communist/socialist ideas to the ignorant and brain dead MSM. Death panels and pulling the plug on Grandma come to mind how such ideas were legitimized in the press by actually having a discussion in the media about this topic. Another more recent example is Paul Ryan and his “economic plan” which sadly, both him and the plan were featured in a puff piece in the NY Times when the paper’s own Krugman stated how ignorant the man is of economics.
Those in power no longer care about the plight of the middle class and poor and either does the press. Democrats now, do just enough to prevent the country from falling into the abyss while lavishing their wealthy patrons with government subsidies either by bailouts or favorable legislation and the press sees this as the norm. The new normal will be 10% unemployment and the Democrats will be perfectly content with that as they will have million dollar paying lobbying or corporate jobs when they are done screwing Americans.
Obama’s statement of the Republicans driving the car into the ditch can be turned on him and the Democrats. In their efforts to get the car out of the ditch, they stripped it down to a chassis with wheels and seats and then expected it to continuing running after they gave it a little push. The Stimulus Bill, Heath Care Bill and the recent Financial Regulation Bill were all stripped down in order to put a band-aid on a gaping wound, and they roundly patted themselves on the back and are trying to convince us it was the best they could do. That is our new normal.
LOL, and then says I don’t want to box, I want to play 11-dimensional chess.
the last thing we need is to put some bat shit crazy repug congress in play to really screw things up, and screw them up they will, I have no doubt. The mama grizzlies will take over this place along with the bat shit crazy tea baggers and ole’ John and Sharron. Won’t that be fun cubed?
Will they attack our Social Security? Expand off shore oil drilling? Force us to give money to insurance companies for worthless insurance policies? Increase drone attacks in country’s where we are not at “war” (whatever that means)? Increase domestic spying?
The oppressed white GOP slobs will rise again! At least they make everything stupid/funny.
Liberal and progressive are not synonyms, at least not in regard to economic policy (they are in terms of social policy, who you can have sex with and how, etc.) Here is an interesting description of liberal economic policy, the author is using the term neoliberal but if you read the classical liberals such as Locke and Adam Smith and even as recent as John Rawls you will find very similar arguments regarding the nature of individuals and of society, and they aren’t progressive.
Talk to my sweetie, then: he’ll give you the unvarnished truth. Seriously, my sweetie’s been saying just that all along. We’ve always had this kind of bigoted rabble out there, and there’s always been Grand Wizard’s of the KKK (or whatever they’re called).
It’s just that, in the past, we had a media that was somewhat more independent and objective, and they didn’t treat these people as if their viewpoint was somehow “valid.” they were treated as nutty outsiders who had an ax to grind. Sure, the media may have reported on what they said, but then those bigoted shriekings were not taken up by pundits as serious points of view that required being discussed.
There’s always been people who believe the earth is flat. In today’s world, it’s like the media would treat this as a serious point of view that requires serious discussion and evaluation.
It’s a load of crock. It’s about distracting citizens from the corporate raping and pillaging by one of the oldest tricks in the book: pit the small people against each other. And how easy is it to do if you give a bunch of racist nutcases front stage prominence and apparent underwriting by the powers that be of their “opinions” which are treated as “factual.”
It’s kabuki. It’s a chimera. It’s crap. But it works, unfortunately.
Actually, I agree with you.
My point was to open a debate on the crustacean-like tendencies of the Dems vs the Repubs., which seems to have happened.
But I know they are one and the same in service to neo-liberalism.
Yess! That I think is part of Shirley Sherrod’s message for the president.
Most of the races mentioned will end up being decided by who stays home, just like the Senate race in Massachusetts.
Cujo you miss it! a lot of us did
There has been a Coup De Tat in the USA, and guess who won? you got it corporations.
The USA is not drifting right because of some Tea Party kabuki. The USA is being drag right because at the current time we have a corporate govt.
Democrats and Republican serve the same master, the top 2% of wage earners.
Ask americans who live close to the Gulf Of Mexico, about who called all the shots during the BP oil Disaster, most if not all will say that BP call every shot, and got to basically run over and trample the wished of americans and the Federal Govt supported BP.
Cujo359 it is time for all americans to WAKE UP! The USA is under the control of a few rich people, with a lot of stupid ideas, and most of their ideas are not good for the USA.
It is also time for americans to stop treating corporations like aliens from out of space, Corporations are a collection of people like me and you.
We americans need to define what an american corporation is:
I don’t think many americans would call an american corporation a company that has a Head Quarters in New York and all their factories are located in China.
Until americans define what an american company is, the USA has a bleak future.
The definition of Corporate Govt is real simple
a: corporate govt have corporate politicians ( the USA has these)
b: corporate govt do nothing for the ordinary citizens (this is currently happening)
c: corporate govt fight stupid wars at the expense of the nation (the USA is laying off police officers, teachers, and Hillary Clinton is giving 500 million dollars to Pakistan a nation that helps our enemies kill our soldiers
d: corporate govt own all the media (the USA media is totally control by the elites)
Let’s review shall we?
W and The Dick ruined the country, and for many it was because they weren’t “true” to conservative values. Too big of a government, too much spending, etc.
So, their supporters take a couple elections off to send a message. The GOP loses badly in 2006 and 2008 and now in 2010 suddenly brand new Tea Bagger candidates appear, espousing, you guessed it, the more “true” conservative values of smaller government, less spending, etc. of course taken to a batshit crazy extreme but you get the picture.
The GOP suffered losses after it’s “party” didn’t perform well, and you see real change in their candidates after those losses.
Now the Democrats by all measure don’t perform well, so you would think logically then that their supporters would take an election or two off of supporting them to send them the message, then you would see real change in Democratic candidates after those losses.
Sigh.
Unfortunately, logic doesn’t play well on this side. On this side fear plays well. Fear of the OMG TEABAGGERS REPUBLICANS SARAH PALIN RAND PAUL OMG OMG OMG we’ve gotta support the Democrats.
And we will. Just enough so the message is fuzzy enough to be argued rather than convincingly and soundly sending them a message they couldn’t argue.
And, to paraphrase a poster here,… on it goes.
We get what we deserve. Even us progressives if we let fear decide our actions. We. Get. What. We. Deserve.
So please, no more bitching about the Democratic Party. Because this is as good as it’s gonna get given the facts of today.
OK, let’s imagine:
Picture yourself a Progressive Dem, living in Nevada. You’ve watched Harry crying the blues for years while he simultaneously played footsie in the back room with Lieberman, Ben NO! Nelson of Nebraska, the other Moderates and Republicans – all to dumb down your Progressive dreams.
Who would you like to send back – an insane but entertaining Republican or 6 more years of Harry’s crying?
My choice is easy. How about you?
> People who will always vote Democratic don’t matter.
Bingo.
THE DEMOCRATS MUST BE PUNISHED!
The Democrats must be destroyed so they can be snuffed out or reborn.
To maximize their pain I call for a “Progressive Movement” to:
(A) Register Green (*) (Show you are left of the Democrats).
(B) Vote Republican (no matter how despicable and batshit crazy)
to maximize Democrat pain (voting GOP is like voting
against them twice)
We are going for a cliff, I say “Crank the Nitros to maximum and put the pedal to the floor”.
Of course, the corporate media will try to spin this as “independent voters” becoming republicans.
(*) Can temporarily register Democrat for primary with progressive slam dunk candidates.
Agreed, although I am not sanguine about the Greens, too many upper-middle-class liberals running the show for this worker. I am registered Socialist Party of Florida (the FL branch of the SP of USA), though they seem to not be running anyone, so I may end up voting Green after all.
Well, you can either vote for Tea Party Patriots, or keep what you got.
Tea Party Patriots want a new 9/11 investigation.
you do know that progressives did not vote for the following:
progressives did not support the individual mandate (obama did)
progressives did support the public option (obama did not)
progressive do not support the wars (obama does)
progressives did support drug importation (obama did not)
progressives supported halter (obama supports lincoln)
progressives don’t want to cut social security (obama wants to cut social security)
progressives support privacy rights (obama does not support privacy rights)
prgressives got lied to in 2008, by Obama
progressives did not line up in droves to support the second coming of Bush
hope a doped? does green party candidate always tell the truth?
the Obama Hope a Dope is the story of a Con Man. Not any ordinary con man, but a con man who lied to half of the USA.
voting green sound fun, but what is going to stop a green candidate from lying their way to the white house?
USA citizens need to start attacking the real enemies of the USA the phony corporations that call themselves USA companies, but employ half of china and no americans.
Progressives do not want to fall for the GREEN HOPE A DOPE.
how many GREEN organizations fought for the GULF?
some say Big Oil owns the Green Movement
This progressive desperately wants to vote for someone else, but look at the choices. The Dems are keeping the incumbents even though we want them gone. The Repubs are putting up crazy people.
I cannot bring myself to vote for a Repub because they stand for everything I hate. And they will continue to destroy the middle class. But if I vote Dem, I am rewarding the most cowardly, inept, and now corrupt party that has turned itself into Repub Lite.
If I had a real choice, I would be voting “none of the above.”
The choices are, depending on the election rules your locality works under:
- Don’t vote in a particular race – always a choice
- Vote third party – sometimes a choice
- Vote Republican – always a choice
- Vote Democratic – always a choice
That is, assuming there’s a choice at all, of course.
This is a better year than 2012 for Democrats to experience defeat. They may or may not learn something useful from defeat, but they will learn nothing from winning again. It’s crystal clear to me that the Democrats are going to do just about everything the Republicans would do. Why do I want to vote for a Democrat this year, at least if he’s an incumbent? I can’t think of a single reason beyond what I might think of the particular incumbents, which in my case isn’t much.
Some say utter nonsense with a straight face. Oil companies make donations to many organizations, including environmental ones. Whether that buys them influence is a question of who else is paying the bills, as much as anything.
As for what “green” organizations are saying or doing, first define what you mean by green organizations, and it will be possible to go and look what they’re saying and doing. My guess is that whatever they’re doing, the mainstream news isn’t covering it very much, if at all. Just because you don’t see something, particularly when you haven’t looked for it, doesn’t mean it’s not there.
Cujo359 the most effective GREEN organization I know is SEA SHEPHERD.
Paul Watson and his followers are willing to die for their cause.
Cujo359 you are always assuming the USA is drifting to the right, without looking at the obvious facts.
Democrats and Republicans both work for the top 2% of the USA.
How many Democrats and Republicans have been outrage by the BP actions? not many!
We are currently looking for americans who care abour america and they are hard to find in Washington DC
The point of the post was not to support the Green party explicitly, I see here in CA there is the “Peace and Freedom” party as a another choice for a progressive party. I am just using party affiliation to (try) to establish that you are not unaffiliated “centrist” that mostly votes Republican when you vote to doubly punish Democrats by voting Republican.
The Democratic party has been revealed to be totally corrupt. The argument that that all alternate parties are corrupt frankly is just FUD, basically saying that all human being are corrupt, so may as well vote Democrat.
It is amazing to me that not one leftist Democrat has told the Party to “go fuck itself” as the party implodes with its corrupt business as usual and Kabuki.
Actually, to take Rand Paul as the example I care most about, he is leading with independents about 3:1 over his opponent. Of course, his father is the only polled Republican who dominates with independents in polls, period. Both Rasmussen and PPP polled Ron Paul head to head against Obama for a hypothetical presidential candidacy in 2012, and while their results are different in the head to head count (RP was one point behind in Rasmussen, more like 10 points behind in PPP’s), in both Ron Paul dominated with independents. Independent does not mean ‘moderate’ so much as ‘disenfranchesed by the two major parties’, which explains why it is now the largest group, above each of the other parties….
-
edit, and to another poster, as against Rand Paul putting pro weed items on the ballot would do nothing for you. For one thing, his opponent is a drug warriar…..
I’d say you’re missing an option.
Option #5 could be: Quit wasting resources losing a game that’s rigged against you, accept that the house, the dealer, and the other players are writing the rules to their favor as they go, get up from the table, walk away, spend your resources on the things you can actually improve, and on things that if improved can have a wide area of effect.
Local politics and popular initiatives tend to fit the bill for such things. Of course, to really get things running for localized politics the local political institutions need their own flexible monetary policy, so they’re not wholly dependent on the largesse of the national government.
No, you’re assuming you know what’s going on in my head. I quite literally wrote “the country is drifting right politically”. It has been, ever since Reagan, and maybe ever since Carter. Whether people differ on issues that exist today and also existed back then is largely irrelevant to that discussion. Within the confines of the District of Columbia, this is a much more conservative place than it was a generation ago. Progressives have not been effective at changing this drift, and it’s easy to explain given how progressives do things versus how conservatives have.
As for Sea Shepard, the day they’re a major political movement, get back to me. Radicals usually don’t attract much institutional support from any quarters.
Here’s something you’re missing – your “option” is orthogonal to my options. I can vote however I want without wasting resources, save for the paper I vote on.
As for local politics, nonsense. I’ve kept in touch enough with local politics to know they’re just as full of petty, feckless, and self-serving individuals as what we see at the national level. Stupidity doesn’t magically disappear at that level – it has the power it does everywhere.
Besides, when my city council starts voting on whether I’m going to receive Social Security, then I’ll criticize them just like I criticize the national government. Meanwhile, I’m reasonably happy with where the roads go and how often the trash gets picked up.
The Democratic Party puts left leaning Democrats on a Reservation. Camp Dum Dum. There they live in squalor, watching their corporate counterparts growing fat on scraps from the Oligarch’s table. As long as the Democratic Party is able to neutralize the left the right will continue to loot the country.
The Tea Party is no worse than the establishment. Personally, I hope Reid goes down.
True, I was extending your options to include advocacy. My apologies.
National-level politicians are going to take your Social Security whether you want them to or not. They’re just not accountable to you (us). There are lots of things that can be done at the local level to make big improvements in your life, but there’s almost nothing you can do at the national level to make even small improvements. It’s the imbalance of the relative required resources to make changes, and the inverse condition of accountability the higher up the political chain you go.
There is an appearance of a struggle. Its a diversion created for serfs who want to participate in politics. There is not even the appearance of a struggle where the real struggle ought to be. That is between the working class and the Oligarchy. That’s because the working class is a lamb to the slaughter. Totally defenseless. Ignorant, not even knowing they ARE the working class.
Isn’t that part of the mythology that keeps the dysfunction going? People constantly voting for rich assholes who don’t give a shit about them, because they’ve been conditioned to believe that they’re just one more ounce of elbow grease and deported immigrant from being in the rich-asshole club themselves?
I’d call this an inevitable consequence of the inherent contradictions of representative democracy. Once you allow yourself to believe that self-governance is “mob-rule” then you’ll do anything to maintain the condition of rule by a tiny cadre of “chosen” people.
I’m with you jake. Having seen Obama and his gang of whores in the Senate in action, I no longer fear Republicans. Now I fear Republicans and Democrats.
I think, as a result of looking through these responses, that it can be clearly said : “Both parties are so cliche.” :>)
As I said, local issues are things I don’t have much of a problem with. If I do, maybe I’ll get involved. I’ll certainly do something.
And I’ll point out that at the local level there usually aren’t the resources on either side that you see at the national. And there’s just as much pissyness and obstructionism. “You can’t fight City Hall” isn’t a phrase that originated at the federal level.
Right now, my city and state aren’t keeping me in wars we don’t need to be in, insisting we arrest people for smoking or growing marijuana (mostly), or taking away SS. That’s all being done at the national level, as are a great many other crazy things.
Taking over the state party? Too bad Montana Maven doesn’t have her blog going anymore. You could read about that can go, even in a really small state.
The same logic applies at all levels – if you don’t like what’s being done, vote the people out who are doing it. The next group will be less likely to try. Complaining about conspiracies or systems is just an excuse not to try.
The whole idea that America is a classless society certainty qualifies as mythology. If you are, as you say, “conditioned” to believe that you are a rugged individual, striving in a meritocracy, then you will have only yourself to blame for circumstances over which you actually have no control.
I get lost in your second paragraph and would like to question you about inevitable consequences and inherent contradictions. But I have been called away. If you care to elaborate I will know it in the mourning but for now I am unable to respond.
Huh.
I can tell you that young people like myself are much less likely to support progressives if they think (and argue, as you have done here) that we’re predisposed to “absurdly simple emotionally/viscerally satisfying platitudes that are easy to digest, require almost no depth of study, and are in fashion.” In short, you argue that we’re too stupid to consider the long-term consequences of voting. Pro tip: displaying this sort of condescending attitude toward young voters isn’t going to secure our support.
Given their voting record over the past few decades, I’d say that as a bloc the Baby Boomers are demonstrably too stupid to consider the long-term consequences of voting (to say nothing of their various other behaviors). Why don’t you place the blame where it belongs?
My point is that simplicity without nuance or depth is seductive to lots of people. There are plenty of adults who are libertarians, and they’re such for the same reason. People like neoclassical economic theories not because there’s any empirical evidence that they’re even remotely correct or constructive, but because they’re simple, approachable, and digestible. The profound wrongness of them isn’t even a consideration, or even understood.
Adolescents are even more likely to gravitate toward and comprehend their world through similarly wrong, but satisfying, positions and platforms.
Spend 1 hour a day, for a week, on Xbox Live. Bring up the subject of politics. Record it. If there is any nuance at all to what few responses you’re actually able to extract I’ll give you $100 per person. For every right-wing talking point you hear, you pay me $100. For every left-wing talking point I’ll give you $100.
Also. I’m 30. As far as politically active people go, I’m still on the shallow end of the pool with the rest of the kids.
The fact is, young people are predisposed to simple emotionally/viscerally satisfying platitudes. Everyone is, but adolescents are especially so.
Cujo359 answer this simple question
Is a company that has a head quarters in New York City and all of its factories a USA corporation? yes or no
You do know the Ayn Rand ideas fail, remember 2008. Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush, gave us 2008.
You do know the policies of Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush, Obama have resulted in this current depression.
Maybe the USA needs to drift to left.
Until you realize, that the USA has been taken over by corporations, you will forever be loss.
Democrats and Republican policies only benefit the rich.
like George Carlin said the AMERICAN DREAM IS BIG CLUB, and 90% of americans are not part of it!
The inherent contradiction in representative democracy is the fundamental precept that you are incapable of governing, so you must instead pick someone better than you to do it, it’s entirely undemocratic.
In such a situation there will always be an exalted tiny cadre of rulers elevated above everyone else simply because they happened to be the very best at convincing you that you aren’t as capable as they at governing.
Answer me this – if you’re running for office, and there are three voters, one who will always vote for you no matter what, one who won’t no matter what, and one who might vote your way and might vote the other candidate’s way.
Whom do you try to please? Whom do you aim your campaign toward? When you can answer that question correctly you’ll have proved yourself worthy of implying I’m a clueless asshole. You’ll be wrong, but at least I’ll no longer think you have yet to buy a clue on this subject.
What I’ve described is the US electorate in microcosm, and the reason that you don’t need to posit conspiracies or systematic corruption to explain what’s been happening. It’s a simple fact of politics that it runs on power. Politicians who can’t gain power can’t do anything, and in our system that usually means they have to get elected. And frankly, even when politicians don’t have to get elected, that’s how they behave, because there’s always someone they have to please.
So you chew on that one awhile, and then maybe you’ll figure out why I know perfectly damn well what a US corporation is, and why it doesn’t make a whole lot of difference. You’re like a guy falling off a cliff complaining that he’s doomed because the wind’s coming out of the west. You’re completely ignoring the primary force that’s acting on you.
Adolescents cannot vote. Persons 18 and older can. By definition, in the U.S., once you turn 18 you are an adult. Again, it does no good to infantalize a constituency.
Adolescent isn’t a legal determination. Your brain chemistry and biological development doesn’t care that the law says you’re an adult David.
It does do a tremendous amount of good to understand human psychology, development, and the propaganda that is used to exploit it. You can call that infantalization if you like, it also turns out to be neuroscience.
Toddlers cannot comprehend birth and death, that’s not a value judgement. It’s just the way it is. Teenagers are more susceptible to simple pedantic messaging. It’s not a value judgement. It’s just the way it is.
Rand Paul just previewed his general election campaign platform for supporters via email. What in it don’t you like?
” “But I want to take a moment to remind you why I am not your typical politician, and why this is not a typical campaign or movement.
Among the many reasons:
•I will never, ever vote for a taxpayer bailout of a private industry. Whether it’s big banks, automakers, or any other industry — you succeed or fail on your own.
•I will not vote for an unbalanced budget. I will not vote for a tax increase. Ever.
•I will fight for new rules like a Balanced Budget Amendment and Term Limits.
•I will not take ANYTHING off the table in the fight to balance the budget. Anyone who says something like they will “freeze non-defense discretionary spending” is blowing smoke at you and hoping you won’t notice. That would balance the budget — MAYBE — in about 80 years.
•We have to keep our promises to seniors and keep our country strong, but every area has things that can be cut. Every agency has things that are duplicative or that could be done better or cheaper.
•I will propose and force a vote on an Enumerated Powers Act, to force Congress to point to the part of the Constitution that justifies their bills.
•I will fight for the Bill of Rights. Democrats often love the 4th amendment. Republicans the 2nd. I will fight for them all, which means fighting for your free speech, gun rights, and civil liberties. Laws that infringe on ANY of these make the federal government more powerful, and we cannot continue to allow that.
•I will not allow our troops to be the world’s policeman, and I will force a vote on a Declaration of War if any President seeks to commit our military to battle.
What you’ve just read above is an agenda unlike any politician in the country. While solidly conservative, it also shows first, a great loyalty to the Constitution and to our freedom. You cannot fight for liberty while voting for bills that embolden the state. You cannot fight for some of our founding rights without others. And you cannot enable change in Washington by sending the same old people there. “
That statement alone should be considered a disqualifier. Painful as taxes are, they are also a necessity and to issue a blanket statement that he would never ever vote for a tax increase of any form, shows an astounding level of mendacity and poor judgment.