Good call. Those threads are containment zones. I think we all do enjoy them much of the time, but they are containment zones.
How common is it in other big cities to see lawn signs for tribal elections in the reservations of the surrounding 200 miles or so?
Look at all we've won, with the saber and the gun, tell me: Is it worth it all?
This video by Ezra Klein is pretty good.
I don't think it's probable on balance that Trump is going to become the American Putin, but if he does, nobody can say Trump's intentions were veiled.
I don't think there is any chance at all of Trump becoming an American Putin. Putin is a very competent guy. Also I think Putin genuinely cares about Russia. Trump is a marginally effective con man who has never exhibited any sign of caring for anything beyond himself.
Dammit, now you've got me craving poutine. I suppose I could call a cab and go over to the bar and get some, or call that BiteSquad nonsense (sounds like a bunch of cats riding around in one of those Smart Cars, biting people). But, probably will not. Ahh, poutine.
American Putin and Florida Man would make a hell of a superteam.
I suppose I could call a cab and go over to the bar and get some, or call that BiteSquad nonsense...
You live near a bar that serves poutine?! Closest place to me (that I know of) that serves poutine is a diner in Indian Lake, NY (in the Adirondacks). They also offer vinegar for the fries ... it's clear they have a lot of cross-border custom.
Cares about Russia, not about Russians. Always remember that he thinks the worst geopolitical catastrophe to happen in the 20th century was the dissolution of the USSR. Not the Holocaust; after all, they were only Jews. Not the Second World War; because, despite the death toll, Russia won. But the almost entirely bloodless collapse of one of the last of the empires. Because it meant Russia lost power and status.
I think you are basically right about that, but Russians do suffer as a result of the lost power. America wouldn't have been able to cause shock therapy without the lost power. The lost status may also add to the appalling Russian death rate.
Bringing this over from the other primary thread: The argument was never that significant numbers of Bernie supporters might actually vote for Trump. That's a silly idea and I'm not sure where it originated. The argument was the opposite--Trump has brought a lot of new voters into the system, many of whom seem surprisingly open to Bernie. (I don't recall seeing polling on this--only anecdotes. It may be a moot point at this stage of the primary season, but I'd love to see polling. To the extent their support for Trump is based on racism, obviously they'll stick with Trump. To the extent it's based on populism, though, Bernie co-opts a lot of that appeal. Clinton obviously co-opts none of it.) In a Trump-Clinton contest,you will have all those new voters on one side, and you may have some depressed enthusiasm (among some percentage of the base) on the other side, and that's a scary combination. The election then seems to come down to two factors: (1) will the left side of the Democratic base be motivated to turn out in strong numbers to once again vote for the lesser evil in order to defeat Trump, and (2) will mainstream Republicans ultimately hold their noses and vote for Trump (in order to beat Clinton) or will they stay home or vote for a third party (or for Clinton)? I feel better about the odds of (1) than (2), but the whole thing seems hard to predict with any confidence. If those factors both break in the Republicans' favor, we're looking at a Trump presidency.
As far as Bernie having trouble in a general election because he would be tarred as a "socialist", I do think this is a legitimate concern, but Clinton is now on record agreeing with most of his policy goals (other than single payer and a $15 minimum wage, which ironically are probably his two policies that have the most popular appeal). Pretty much everything else, she's said she supports the same goals as him but just doesn't think his plans to achieve those goals are "realistic". A general election opponent can therefore easily now tar Clinton as a socialist by association--"the socialist wanted x, y, and z, and she agreed! I'm for free enterprise in America!"--which seems like it would be just about as hard for her to deal with as Sanders (except Sanders I think would better respond directly to that attack, whereas Clinton will no doubt offer an evasive response that sounds to everyone like she's trying to weasel out of admitting something.)
I'm back to feeling nervous and depressed about this election. I do not have faith in the American people.
I personally will vote as always as a civic duty but I have absolutely zero enthusiasm about a Trump-Clinton contest.
14: in that argument -- that being called a socialist would hurt Sanders's chances in the general election -- the label is what matters. Clinton will never be labeled a socialist, so in that argument she comes out ahead of Sanders. An argument based on policy is a different thing entirely, something that is almost surely irrelevant to questions of electability (which are, inevitably, bullshit regardless), because the electorate mostly doesn't choose a candidate based on policy preferences.
America's Putin is Dick Cheney, no? Obviously not with all the physical showing off, but the sinister spook/politician role is all him.
Clinton will never be labeled a socialist, so in that argument she comes out ahead of Sanders.
Really? I mean, they're already doing that all over the place. They did it to Obama, aggressively, and Clinton is the even more hated face of the left and has been for twenty five years (I mean, an odd choice for cunning left wing extremism, yes, but that's always been the line there.)
Clinton will no doubt offer an evasive response that sounds to everyone like she's trying to weasel out of admitting something.
...will? (God Chris Matthews is awful.)
Cheney was obviously Rasputin. America just dropped the ball on the assassination part.
18: I agree that Clinton will clearly be called a socialist*, but the difference is whether it sticks as a slur. As you know, a lot of people have speculated that part of the reason the youngs seem OK with socialism is that their primary association isn't Brezhnev, but Obama. But aside from young people, nobody who's old enough to remember the Cold War and isn't a GOP true believer is going to believe Clinton is a socialist, for all sorts of obvious reasons. But Bernie actually is a self-proclaimed socialist, and I'm sure there are a lot of people who would have trouble getting their heads around what that means (not that it's complicated, but polling indicates that a plurality of voters is really pretty thick wrt ideology).
*indeed, I expect to hear stuff along the lines of "At least with Sanders he was honest, but tricksy Hillary is a seeekrit socialist, and Bernie just gave her cover."
14.1: Insofar as "populism" means something other than "racist nativism", I don't think Trump's appeal is actually populist. As Drum showed yesterday, his supporters if anything care about the economy less than the average Republican primary voter.
There's certainly an anti-elites message that appeals to both Trump and Sanders supporters, and I'm sure there's some sliver of, say, union Trump voters who'd be open to Sanders' anti-Wall Street rhetoric, but I think the idea that it was a meaningful number was always a pipe dream. While Sanders' support is primarily white, he's still committed to Democratic identity politics, and there simply aren't that many Trump supporters who are OK with that.
That Kevin Drum piece is great and very interesting. It's incredible how basically everyone just falls for the pundit's fallacy of using recent events as support for whatever preexisting theory they had anyway. The internet/social media just gives voice to a billion pundits.
22: Yes, but I don't buy his Bad Man theory of history.
24: Would Stephen Fry's Making History steer us wrong?
13
Yes, Russians suffer due to that lost power and from the continued indifference of their government to their living standards, political freedom, social freedom, etc. Putin gives them a chance to pretend they are still a big power. That can't be good for them even in the short run, except in the "a toke or two makes me feel better" sense.
Analogies between Putin/Russia and Trump/US-or-GOP are of course banned.
25
Didn't he have two more or less equivalent Bad Men available?
Didn't the Russian demographic decline significantly reverse itself in the past few years? (Though it appears to be re-reversing with the drop in oil prices.)
27: Yes, but the strong subtext (or text? I barely remember) was that the Men were taking advantage of the situation.
As Hitler's favorite philosopher put it, "Men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please; they do not make it under self-selected circumstances, but under circumstances existing already, given and transmitted from the past. "
Banned huh? This isn't exactly an analogy but thinking about Putin has made me understand the GOP envy of him. They wish they had someone as good as him in their party. If they had someone with that level of patriotism and competence they wouldn't have any trouble winning the presidency with him.
People would be able to respect a party that had American Putin as its leader.
In that spirit, Cruz should campaign on making Ukraine pay for the wall between the U.S. and Mexico.
And yet more internet-pundit stupidity busting. Primary turnout has zero to do with general election turnout.
The argument was never that significant numbers of Bernie supporters might actually vote for Trump. That's a silly idea and I'm not sure where it originated.
I agree, I've always expected that most Democrats would end up supporting whoever was nominated, and I still think that.
The argument was the opposite--Trump has brought a lot of new voters into the system
Let me re-assure you, without seeing strong evidence of it, I think this is unlikely to be a significant factor in the general election. One of the thing that fivethirtyeight has consistently mentioned is that most of the people who are voting for Trump decided to support him months ago, and that he has consistently done poorly among people who made their decision close to the primary date (that may have changed somewhat as people are dropping out, and supporters are switching to new candidates, but it was fairly consistent). That means that, even if Trump is bringing out new voters, he doesn't seem to be able to bring out an increasing number of new voters. There's a block of people who were excited about him and they've been consistent, but also slow to grow.
On that note, I've found most of the CT threads about the primaries to be painful, but Holbo's post about Trump yesterday was good and generated an interesting discussion.
It's worth conducting a thought-experiment in the safety of your own head. Think about the issue that most gripes you, which you feel in your bones is important and righteous, also personal, which is suppressed by the US political system. It ain't on the agenda. Now imagine that, miraculously, a candidate emerges from nowhere - literally, arising out of a 0% chance that this would happen, so it seemed - and puts that issue on the table. WHAM! Puts it there so forcefully he blows up one of the two major parties, so it seems. Now suppose, additionally, this candidate is obviously a charlatan. But he is YOUR charlatan, insofar as he at least got it on the table, didn't he? He's authentically wrecking stuff up, which is a form of genuine authenticity. How would you feel about that? (Remember that one's own clown face looks better. It's easier to honk the red nose on thy neighbor's face than to see the grease paint round thine own eye.)
In the last set of primaries (15th, I mean) Trump turned out to have caught a decent proportion of the late deciding voters. I think he came in (per state) second for most of them, to either Cruz or Kasich. But it wasn't like previous times when everyone who voted for him had decided to in September. He picked up nearly a third of the late decision voters. So that's something that really might be changing the more people get used to him, or get exposed to his rivals.
So that's something that really might be changing the more people get used to him, or get exposed to his rivals.
It might be, or it might just be that the field is winnowing and people have to go somewhere (in that case, I would assume that people leaving Rubio would be "late deciding" and some of them would go to Trump).
That's what I was thinking. That 30% of Rubio voters are complete assholes sounds low, if anything.
Very nice* article on Vox (from their "first person" series).
I come from a Hispanic family. My grandfather was born in Mexico and fled to the United States during the revolution. Two of my other three grandparents are American-born with Hispanic roots. My full name -- Jose Ricardo Alcantar -- makes this heritage obvious.
For most of my life, I didn't identify with any of that. Growing up, I liked basketball and chicken nuggets and reenacted the American Revolution in a three-cornered hat in my backyard. For my first name, I went by "Ricky." It seemed a little off from "Thomas" and "James," but not too far. And I said my last name with an American accent: "Al (like the name), can (like 'can do'), tar (like the sticky stuff)." It was just easier.
But Donald Trump has done what 30 years of growing up with Hispanic genes could not do: He has made me Hispanic.
* slightly corny, but in this case I'm happy to embrace that.
Good for Mr. Alcantar, but yet another tale of "a problem becomes real when it happens to me, and has absolutely no further implications in any other realm" from a Republican doesn't warm my heart.
Will he need to have a gay son to be willing to marry gay couples?
It might be, or it might just be that the field is winnowing and people have to go somewhere (in that case, I would assume that people leaving Rubio would be "late deciding" and some of them would go to Trump).
Probably, yeah. But those were supposed to be voters that Cruz/Kasich mostly divided between themselves. (I suspect Carson's endorsement may have had an effect.) The general assumption (supported by polling) has been that the number of people who would go to Trump as a second choice after one of the other candidates dropped out would be disproportionately low, so if Rubio's supporters jumped Trumpwards in substantial numbers that's a really big flashing danger sign.
I'm sure we all want your heart to be warm, but a vote for Democrats is a vote for Democrats. Anybody trying to win an election without the votes of people who are looking only at selfish reasons for voting is going to lose.
Will he need to have a gay son to be willing to marry gay couples?
Three responses.
1) It's a Friday, I'm ready to appreciate a bit of schmaltz, I understand if that's not your mood.
2) The essay is clearly narrow in it's focus. He's choosing to not take on broader issues of identity and politics, and I think that's a good choice in terms of structuring that specific essay, but it does mean that he's not addressing what you're interested in.
3) I feel like this gets back to the question of would you shake hands with link to somebody that you generally disagree with but overlap with at a point in time. The essay wouldn't be nearly as effective if it was, "I'm somebody who already leaned left; here's how Trump made me even more left." I am happy to read a story that says, "I was extremely conservative; here's why Trump pushed me away from that, and here's why being a nation of immigrants is what it means to 'make America great'."
23: Maybe it's the Bad Man + Bad Media theory of history that Kevin Drum is espousing.
Slightly more plausible.
http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/03/yes-press-bears-some-blame-donald-trump
What struck me about it isn't that he suddenly realized that it's bad to advocate policies that hurt people when he ended up being one of the people those policies hurt. That's standard for "I am/was a Republican but then..." articles. It was that it was all about identifying as Latino (in a political context*). The most interesting thing about the recent Republican party awfulness (stretching back well pre-Trump but mostly within the last, say, fifteen years) is that we're getting to see a voting bloc/demographic coming into existence.
There's nothing inevitable about the idea that there would be a Latino vote, any more than there's a brunette vote or an over 5'11" vote. But it's possible to make one if you do what the Republican party is doing right now: force people into solidarity with other people of the same ethnicity/race/height/whatever, at which point they start to identify themselves with that group (politically) and jump en masse to the other party.
* "I'm a Small Business Owner so I vote Repub... oh shit ok no I'm a Latino so I vote Democratic".
The Latino brunnette vote is probably bigger than the Latino blonde and redhead votes combined.
I am more than happy to take his vote, and I like the potential that MHPH points out. I think Trump will be the nation's Prop 187 and that is wonderful.
...force people into solidarity with other people of the same ethnicity/race/height/whatever at which point they start to identify themselves with that group (politically) and jump en masse to the other party.
like white working-class males?
Ian Welsh yesterday
"Wages for working class white males peaked in 1968, forty-eight years ago."
"but people who are in pain do not react well to some smug, upper-middle-class jerk telling them they are privileged when their lives are clearly terrible."
"It is a FACT that working class whites will not see any improvement worth mentioning under any normal politician, including Clinton. They may see an improvement under Trump, they certainly would under Sanders."
"It is insanity to expect poor white males to accept 48 years of decline and not get angry."
You have to be real stupid to lose control of your society's fighting class. You have to be real stupid to degrade them over a period of decades, to employ them en-masse in jobs where they beat up other people.
Demonizing poor white men as "trailer trash" has simply alienated them. Telling them they are all sexist, racist scum has not "raised their consciousness."
Now maybe black working-class men have done worse.
But white and black women have done much better, and probably black UMC males;others maybe
You will not keep Latino or black working class (which is getting bigger all the time if you build an economy that favors you.
3 choices 1) go class instead of identity and help those people out ; 2) learn and use guns/violence yourself, this means you laydeez, cause they will get violent and they have guns; 3) prepare for fascism and Handmaid's Tale.
Apparently the choice was three; my priorities are listed in the above order.
34: That's a great way to frame the issue by Holbo. It especially works for me because I don't even need to imagine the politician he describes. It's Trump himself.
On Iraq War I:
I know that when his father went in and his father actually did something pretty good because he pulled back. He didn't get into the trap. But I know that Saddam Hussein was taunting the father. You know, the Americans, they were not, you know, they were cowards. He was saying all sorts of things because of the fact intelligently they pulled back and I know that, you know, and you know, also, that the son loves the father and I think he felt very hurt by it.
On Iraq War II:
George Bush made a mistake. Obviously we can make mistakes, but that one was a beauty. We should have never been in Iraq. They lied, they said there were weapons of mass destruction. There were none and they knew that there were none.
"They lied..." What other Republican says that? What Democrat says that? I'm not sure even Bernie puts it that starkly -- that honestly.
Moreover, Trump is wrecking the Republican Party - another issue with a high level of salience for me.
And yes, as Holbo posits, I am fully aware that Trump is a con man - to the point where I believe as president, he would almost certainly find a dumb war for the US to fight.
Obviously, I won't be voting for him.
But still, it's pretty exhilarating watching someone just stand up and tell the truth. I totally, viscerally, get the Trump phenomenon.
34, 49 - if I were British, this would be George Galloway.
The fuck? I just typed a long comment and then it disappeared. Wah. Comment was about the Carson endorsement of Trump. I don't think we've properly discussed how bizarre it was. First an endorsement, then just days later a statement that he "didn't really want to" give the endorsement but only did so because Trump offered him a job in his administration in exchange for the endorsement, and now he wishes he'd endorsed someone else? (But who?) I mean, WTF?! Is this intended as some sort of public confession of sin to cleanse his conscience? This is the most bizarre event (yet) in this very bizarre primary season.
Well he couldn't just go out there and say "Guys, you can't hold me to stuff I say when I'm high! You know that!"
I think it's clear that Carson does not enjoy good mental health.
I thought I wouldn't enjoy avocados until I tried some.
44.last is right. Ever since Judis and whoever wrote The Coming Democratic Majority, people have been warning that future generations of Latin@s are no more certain to vote D than today's largely reactionary Italian-Americans. And that was true as far as it went, but it turns out that the Republicans have embarked on a crusade to make damn well sure that Latin@s become more like African-Americans than like previous generations of European immigrants.
Two notes here, though:
1. While I know that race is a social construct, most Latin@s (ratio varies by nationality) are darker skinned than any group that has "become white". That is to say, raw "eyeball prejudice" is going to be applied by serious bigots even if there were to be a collective acceptance that Latin@s are "really" white. Obviously, many of them can pass, but that's a separate issue. So the alternative path to "becoming white" is model minority status, a la Asian Americans, but we've all seen how clear it is that that status does not lead to a postracial mindset among the minority in question. IOW, I don't think full assimilation was ever in the cards, but certainly a situation where a really big chunk of Latin@s thought like Mr. Alcantar was possible.
2. I can't help but notice that the defining difference seems to be ongoing immigration. Are there any examples of previous ethnic groups assimilating/becoming white while their brethren were still coming over with their foreign talk and exotic culture? Which in turn makes me think that the Trump Wall almost is necessary for Republican success: as long as we're attached to Latin America, there will always be more Latin Americans immigrating, and as long as there are recent Latin American immigrants, the racist & xenophobic portion of the GOP base will always be reminding all Latin@s that the GOP hates them. But if you could cut off the flow, then the Republican dream of poaching industrious and culturally conservative Latin@s could come to fruition.
But if you could cut off the flow, then the Republican dream of poaching industrious and culturally conservative Latin@s could come to fruition.
Vamos. Es una partido de la cocina.
55.2: Jews in Victorian Britain might count? You had your highly assimilated and respectable British Jews being knighted and painted by Sargent and being Prime Minister and so on, at the same time that there was significant Jewish immigration from eastern Europe.
58 also is good. You're on song today, Hick.
If that means on a tight deadline and not focusing, yes.
48- I read that Ian Welsh piece too. I am a white mail about the same age as Ian, and I get that things have been getting worse for us for my whole life, but we still have it pretty good really. I get that it is normal to get angry and even violent when people are trying to erode your position even rhetorically. It is still hard for me not to see these people as crybabies. We have it incredibly good by any real historical standpoint.. Of course the same perspective could be used to defend class warfare by the rich, but I think that only really works if the rich are taking a pay cut themselves.
If I made a postal joke, would it make you angry.
The white mail says "Trump is the only one that promises to deliver me."
51: I don't remember seeing that he didn't really want you. Not that I doubt you, I'm just saying I didn't notice that detail in the admittedly cursory reading I did. The way I remember it, most people were laughing at the fact that it would be illegal for Trump to offer him that job and Carson apparently didn't even realize it.
I agree with 39 too. Maybe I would have said so myself but I felt a bit guilty about pissing in the punchbowl last night. On the other hand, my tolerance for schmaltz goes down on days like this, not up. It's nothing in particular but I'm really ready to start drinking.
65: Well, remember not to drink out of that punchbowl.
Moreover, Trump is wrecking the Republican Party - another issue with a high level of salience for me.
I do wonder how many people (especially) are turning up to vote for him in the primaries with precisely no intention of actually following through on voting for him in the general precisely because they are so angry with the Republican party.
At this point, I think a lot of conservatives are probably pretty damn angry about the direction in which the Republican party has gone and really just want to watch the thing burn.
(especially) s/b (especially independents)
62: One ought always be suspicious of arguments like Welsh's that openly disdain the truth.
Do not tell me, or them, that they are "privileged."
It's true that they are privileged, he acknowledges, but it mustn't be said.
Strangely, they don't think that all the people who tell them they're bad are right.
But then:
Remember, they don't just hate people who are brown.
They hate brown people, but we mustn't talk about how hating brown people is bad - because they also hate some of the people we hate.
If I have to choose between being in a political coalition with these people and the brown people, I'll pick the brown people. And I guaran-fucking-tee you the brown people are going to make the same choice.
This idea that some weird Sanders supporters have -- that the brown people ought be in league with unrepentant racists -- is ridiculous, and is certainly not a view that Sanders himself holds.
I do wonder how many people (especially) are turning up to vote for him in the primaries with precisely no intention of actually following through on voting for him in the general precisely because they are so angry with the Republican party.
I'd say approximately none. Trump voters who hate the Republican Party hate the Democrats more, and will be even more motivated to vote in the general election.
(People like me aren't crossing over to vote for Trump in the Republican primary. People like me are idiots who, if we cross over, do things like vote for Kasich.)
I think it is worth trying to talk about getting both the "brown people" and the white working class in the same coalition even if it is very hard to make happen. I'd be prepared to make some compromises, though I don't blame people for wanting to hold those compromises to maximum scrutiny.
It occurs to me that 69 makes the implicit argument that Welsh (and bob) are racists. I'd like to make that explicit.
Welsh and bob are racists.
I guess I'd kind of assume you can back that up with regard to bob. How strong is the basis for saying that about Ian Welsh?
69
This idea that some weird Sanders supporters have -- that the brown people ought be in league with unrepentant racists -- is ridiculous, and is certainly not a view that Sanders himself holds.
Wait, what? Are you referring to anything specific? I'll jump in after all, this is related to one of the things that's been pissing me off - some pro-Clinton "Dear Sanders fans" thing that has been making the rounds on Facebook. I really am tempted to make a totally-in-earnest "#notallsandersfans" comment or something.
I haven't the slightest idea who Ian Welsh is.
70
"Don't Blame Me
I Voted for Kasich"
77: That really wouldn't work as a bumper sticker in Ohio.
Because of mandatory, daily, oiling of the bumpers.
74: All I've got on Welsh is this article. I don't read him otherwise.
Ugh, SILIHMHB now thinks Bernie is anti-Semitic because he declined invitation to speak at AIPAC when he earlier spoke at Liberty U.
I thought he wanted to appear by video to prove he's not a Jampire.
81: maybe he was worried about being mistaken for a Norwegian airport worker
Not being 100% compliant with Israel is pretty much the current definition of anti-Semitic.
Oh for fuck's sake,I am so fucking tired of this identity tribal loyalty bullshit. Sexist/not sexist, racist/not racist fuck it I'll just repeat the paragraph that inspired me, with absolutely no hope y'all ever get it.
There's nothing inevitable about the idea that there would be a Latino vote, any more than there's a brunette vote or an over 5'11" vote. But it's possible to make one if you do what the Republican Democratic party is doing right now: force people into solidarity with other people of the same ethnicity/race/height/whatever, at which point they start to identify themselves with that group (politically) and jump en masse to the other party.
Call people racist/sexist long enough, especially from an identity position, and vote in a solid bloc from an identity position and you will change the way they behave. And not for the better.
PS:Ogi Ogas A Billion Wicked Thoughts
45 minute video of a neuroscientist on sexual cues
It's the racists who force people into solidarity with others of the same ethnicity, bob. When racists have the ability to lump you in with a bunch of other people based on common heritage and then lynch, deport and persecute you, then you become people with a common problem to solve and that's what "solidarity" is for.
You've never seemed able to grasp that refusing to see the obvious doesn't make you a daring trailblazer. More often than not it just makes you a dumbfuck.
then you become people with a common problem to solve and that's what "solidarity" is for.
Ian Welsh, though this is old news: "Wages for working class white males peaked in 1968, forty-eight years ago."
Common problem to solve. Castock, what do you suggest?
Sanders never was going to get the nomination. Sanders "movement" dies in the fall.
Should that group that has seen their standard off living decline for 48 years vote for Clinton? We just had 16 of 24 years of neoliberal Democrats and they have made it worse.
Gonna say Who gives a fuck about WCWMs? Then they won't, and shouldn't give a fuck for you.
I acknowledge your point but they should vote for Sanders then he would win. I'd be prepared to be called a racist and give up affirmative action to make it happen but no one cares what I think.
87: Should that group that has seen their standard off living decline for 48 years vote for Clinton?
Since the Republicans are the primary cause of their frozen wages and the primary obstacle to change, they should vote for whatever will weaken that confidence scam masquerading as a political party. And if they can't have Sanders now they should vote against the latest huckster attempting to exploit their hate and ignorance -- yes, for Clinton if need be -- and go on working for the rise genuine socialism in the Democratic coalition in solidarity with working-class people of all races.
What they should not be doing is yammering like mindless cretins at Latinos or Blacks or anyone else who has the nerve to actually vote in their own interests. Because that's stupid, and it's a good idea to be not-stupid.
Gonna say Who gives a fuck about WCWMs? Then they won't, and shouldn't give a fuck for you.
A non-problem since mostly they never did.
We just had 16 of 24 years of neoliberal Democrats and they have made it worse.
Is that true? I remember seeing something in a book by a conservative (fairly recent, a couple of years old) that said if you looked at changed is real median income broken down into 4 categories
White Men
White Women
Minority Men
Minority Women
That all 4 groups saw increases in median income (though less than the increases in productivity) but the overall median didn't change because the percentage of the population which was white was shrinking.
I don't know that I trust that claim, but I also don't know that I trust the claim that things have just gotten worse in the last 24 years. I'd want to see some data.
It's worth keeping in mind that "identity politics" isn't what started the shift of the white working class out of the Democratic Party. It was the Civil Rights Act.
(I stole that from Twitter.)
"The Revenge of the Lower Classes and the Rise of American Fascism"
College-educated elites, on behalf of corporations, carried out the savage neoliberal assault on the working poor. Now they are being made to pay. Their duplicity--embodied in politicians such as Bill and Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama--succeeded for decades. These elites, many from East Coast Ivy League schools, spoke the language of values--civility, inclusivity, a condemnation of overt racism and bigotry, a concern for the middle class--while thrusting a knife into the back of the underclass for their corporate masters. This game has ended.There are tens of millions of Americans, especially lower-class whites, rightfully enraged at what has been done to them, their families and their communities. They have risen up to reject the neoliberal policies and political correctness imposed on them by college-educated elites from both political parties: Lower-class whites are embracing an American fascism.
Wilder at CT:"I do sense that a globalised elite cum supporting professional class is emerging, that is not seeing its dependence on the lower orders, and the lower orders are reacting."
One point is that NAFTA and TPP not only screwed the blue collar class, but directly benefited with IP tech etc, the professional, artistic, and academic classes at the expense of workers.
It was the Civil Rights Act. (s)
Passed without any white participation or support at all I suppose, say the New Historians.
I don't know what "New Historians", but Democrats and liberals are hardly without white support now. They just lost the portion of white people that prefer no government programs to government programs that don't disproportionately benefit them.
That was either very deep or my phone's fault.
One interesting aspect of this primary season has been the Sanders campaign's focus on Native American communities. It'll be interesting to see if this has any effect on the results in the next set of primaries, which includes a lot of Western states with large Native populations.
That came up before. Makes me think the 538 predictions for the Western states where native americans are a meaningful portion of Democrats will be off (they're already favorable to Sanders, but I believe NAs get counted as Clinton favoring "minorities.").
Yeah, I saw that discussion and I agree.
I was born here so I'm a Native American.
What I find most interesting is that it's not clear how much electoral benefit Sanders gains from this even if it does get him the Native vote, which is small and heavily concentrated in the sorts of states he's already been winning.
Maybe the Native Americans really are the Lost Tribes and he's looking for proof before going Mormon.
That's... not really the sort of thing you'd expect a Jewish guy from Brooklyn to do.
On the other hand, neither is running for president.
It's like Sanders has convictions outside of whatever could get him the most votes.
Yes, Hillary Clinton is being made to pay for neoliberalism by - being the overwhelming frontrunner for the Democratic nomination and the odds-on bet for the next president of the united states?
Sanders is even campaigning aggressively in rural Alaska.
For a while Donald Trump was my preferred Republican presidential candidate, because I thought he was as good or better than most on policy (to the extent he has coherent policy, which is "not much," but noncoherent policy is better than coherently terrible policy) and that he would be an electoral disaster in the general election. But as more time has passed, I've come to decide that Carson really would have been the best Republican nominee. I'd feel 100x better about a Clinton-Carson matchup in the general.
Is it just me or is the video linked in 85 really bizarrely bad social science? It starts on shaky ground and just keeps getting worse.
110 Really? Carson tops my list of GOP candidate most likely to launch nuclear weapons.
Sure, but he makes up for that by being by far the least electable.
112 & 113: The depths to which this election has sunk just struck me with renewed force.
Don't worry - this is the part of the election that we generally forget later when we remember how bad an election really was, so comparisons are always tricky. Usually after the primaries it settles down and really gets to sinking to its true depths.
Unfogged: "Quipping in the face of Armageddon since George W. Bush"
(People like me aren't crossing over to vote for Trump in the Republican primary. People like me are idiots who, if we cross over, do things like vote for Kasich.)
I know 2 people who did that! One considers himself a Republican and worked for the CEA under Bush but hasn't voted for one in ages after working in Iraq. But I thought that the other one might vote for Bernie. I know she'll vote for Hillary, but I think she thought that she might be able to stop Trump. Or maybe she voted for Rubio for the same reason. Either way, she felt sick afterwards.