this post was submitted on 01 Jul 2024
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quick reminder: Democrats have had control of house, senate, white house exactly 4 months of the last 44 years. There's been little opportunity for the 'fight back' part where they fight for democracy when most of their time is undoing the absolute worst of the fascists' hate-ball of regulations. THAT's the exhausting part.
For how long has this trifecta been under fascist control? Because it seems like fascists act with impunity and unlimited power as soon as they control one institution.
Because they don't care about the rules, but they know the other side does. Whenever they act, they defend not their actions, but the process by which they were allowed to do them. If fascists break the rules, liberals can only request that the rules be followed. If they follow the rules, put on a tie and speak like an academic, liberals can only trust that their ideas will be voted against. In either case, they don't know how to call a fascist a fascist, and they don't know how to fight fascism within the current ruleset, and they never will.
You can count by going to party division websites for the house and senate. Then cross reference with the presidency. For what it's worth, 4 months in 44 years is hilarious and a lie. We just had 2 years 2020-2022 with Democrats in a trifecta.
There’s also the fact that even when they have absolute control by the numbers, reality doesn’t really reflect that; The democrat party is not united, and is full of politicians who will refuse to follow the party line unless the party bends over backwards for them.
“Oh, you want me to vote to stop fascism? Sure, I’ll be happy to do that, as long as you add funding for a brand new bridge in my home state.” Repeat ad nauseam until you have a horribly bloated bill that nobody actually wants to vote for.
The real joke of the Democratic Party is running Coal Baron Joe Manchin to replace former KKK member Robert Byrd, on the grounds that only these two people can keep the US Senate free of fascism.
Meanwhile, you've got guys like Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley glad-handing J6ers minutes before they storm the capital, and Biden's AG just kinda shrugs and says "Nothin' we can do! There's not a single law on the books that makes conspiring to overthrow the federal government illegal."
Funny thing is as soon as you or I plan that and they smell any hint of socialism/leftism in our language suddenly they'll have 35287253381 laws that they'll throw all of at us for a combined prison sentence that's longer than the eventual heat death of the universe.
Or they'll just send a few cops around back to suicide us.
In a potential future where Democrats own 100% of the senate, and nobody sane is voting GOP, it’s also possible for third party candidates to make progress in elections since no one has fear of a batshit lunatic getting into office.
Once Democrats control 100% of the Senate, we can finally run a Green Party candidate in the brightest blue state who will lose to the incumbent Democrat 40/60 instead of 5/42/57. But not one minute before! You don't want to risk a Republican winning in Massachusetts, New York, Minnesota, or California, do you?!
You say this like it's satire, but literally yes. We lost the House because we let Republicans win in New York.
Thanks to Andrew Cuomo, no less
Repuglicans still win in California at the lower levels, because local, and possibly state assembly, elections are run NPP. This means the candidates don't officially run for any party. I'm pretty sure the Repuglicans passed that when they realized that an R by your name is a death sentence out here.
Okay, sorry, 93% is also an acceptable number.
But like, 7% Republican votership is still…weird. And unexpected. Given that that party has contributed absolutely nothing but lies and murderers.
If a hungry man is hanging from a rope over a pit of lava, I am not starving him by keeping food on my side of the pit, I am prioritizing getting him off the rope and away from the dangerous situation first, before addressing equity issues.
It contributes a bunch of patronage, both through the private sector via tax cuts and federal contracts and "faith based initiative" spending and via the public sector through our enormous national security state and attendant bureaucracy.
I don't think it can be overstated how much something like the invasion of Iraq or the War on Drugs or the Bush-Era bank bailout or the GOP war on renewable energy has profited both the big corporate interests and the hundreds of thousands of scammy small business shits plugged into the public money spigot.
And that's before you get into the social mobilization provided by the party. Religious organizations and white nationalist groups generally like the GOP because the GOP promotes, defends, and finances their own socio-economic goals. The airforce is swarming with Christian fundamentalists while the army and marines churn out a steady supply of future chud police officers to do the dirty work of suppressing minorities in big urban settings. The tech industry is flush with white nationalism in large part because it trades money and talent with the NSA, the CIA, and the FBI - themselves hot-houses of right-wing social and religious sentiments. Anti-union activists, anti-environmentalists, and anti-DEI/Civil Rights organizers all adore the GOP, because they enable continued socio-economic domination nationally.
To say the party just supplies a few lies and the occasional bloody war drastically diminishes what the party does at the national, state, and local levels. Modern white nationalism can't exist without an ally in the Republican Party. Modern evangelical christianity can't propagate without the endless pogroms and inquisitions conservatives inflict on schools and colleges. Modern extractive corporate interests can't reliably generate bigger profits without the cycles of deregulation and eminent domain land seizures perpetuated by Republican state and national leaders.
None of this shit works without the GOP.
It's not weird when you realize most voters just do whatever their favorite algorithm tells them to.
It is fairly rare for either party to control Congress and the executive for long, so I'm not sure if that's exactly the main pitfall we've run into.
I think this is mostly an unforced error on the part of neoliberalism, specifically 3rd way political ideology. In the 80s and 90s 3rd way politics grew as an idea to work around congressional gridlock.
Basically, the democratic party figured they would work across the aisle with moderate Republicans on policy they could both agree on. Hoping that this would show the American population that they were the party that could get things done.
This worked in part, Bill Clinton the main architect of American 3rd way movement became very popular. However, it had two repercussions that we are still dealing with today. It gave the policy initiative to the Republican party, allowing them to be the directors of this across aisle cooperation. It also drastically shifted the democratic party to the right.
If the DNC is rating Congress members based on criteria of Third way ideology, then the members most willing to cooperate with moderate Republicans are going to fill leadership positions. Which is why the DNC leadership is currently full of center right senior citizens conditioned to bending backwards to the whims of Republican economic policy.
I agree with this, and would also point to the same thing happening all over the world.
Third Way was originally a think tank architected by Wall Street for the sole purpose of committing ideological false flag operations and grossly misrepresenting academic findings for the benefit of their corporate overlords. They once released a study under a headline that basically stated that because of Democrat economic policies, the gender wage was falling. And they were technically right. It was falling. It was falling because men were getting paid less and women were making the same amount.
finally, actual political analysis. on this website it's like finding a drop of water on the moon, or something, hoo lee.
Yeah, tolerance for valid self criticism in politics is dead. The only thing people want to hear is full throated support and validation. Anything else is automatically labeled as extremism in one direction nor another.
Democrats: "We only have 60 votes in the Senate! That's not enough to pass anything!"
Republicans: "The Senate minority will filibuster the debt ceiling bill unless you extend the Bush tax cuts, double border spending, and add birth control pills to the Schedule I drug registry."
Breaking things is a thousand times easier than fixing them. It's easy for Republicans to threaten to break the government unless they get what they want, because it's a win-win scenario for them.
I'm gonna go ahead and ask the obvious question: if it's so effective when the Republicans do it, then....you can fill in the rest.
Not really. I don't understand where you're going.
Are you saying Democrats should threaten to break the government? Republicans would call that bet, because breaking the government is a good thing to them.
How do you figure? If they're in power and let the government, they get blamed for it. Call the bluff. Let the government fail. If it's in a position where one political entity gets to hold it hostage in perpetuity, it's functionally unsalvageable and broken by design.
That's the most naive thing I've heard in a long time, I'm not quite sure where to start.
Demonstrably not true, Republicans love this tactic because people tend to AT BEST blame both sides. Voters are incredibly misinformed.
I don't know how you could get to this conclusion. Let the government fall, because by attempting to break it, Republicans have automatically made it just as bad as if it was already broken? That's an incredibly dumb statement.
The Democrats had a two year period, 2020-2022. GTFO out your lies.
They're talking about a supermajority where Republicans can't stop them. Every other time we've been stopped by Republicans or Democrats working as Republicans (Manchin and Sinema) 2020-2022 we had a razor thin margin that Manchin and Sinema shat all over.
The filibuster isn't a law or Constitutional requirement. It's a self imposed rule they could have removed at any time. In fact the Constitution only requires a simple majority for anything it doesn't specifically mention needing a larger number.
And Sinema and Manchin stopped us from removing it :(
Then kick them out of the party. Make the actual position clear. Don't tell us you have the votes and you just don't want to because voters will take you at your word.
The Repuglicans controlled the House of Representatives during that time. And still control the house. You are lying to yourself.
Here you go. There's helpful websites if you have trouble remembering.