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355

Ahead of Chair Vote, Progressives Say DNC 'Failing Disastrously' to Learn From Loss to Trump (www.commondreams.org)

submitted 2 months ago by return2ozma@lemmy.world to c/politics@lemmy.world

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[–] WatDabney@sopuli.xyz 88 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Even this analysis doesn't capture the real problem.

Asserting that the DNC "fails to learn" implies that they have some goal they're not meeting.

They don't.

Their goal is to rake in as much corporate soft money as possible, and by that standard, this past election was a resounding success. And nothing else, including winning elections, matters to them.

So they're not really "failing" at anything. In fact they're succeeding nicely. It's just that they're succeeding at being corrupt, self-serving and deceitful.

[–] UsernameHere@lemmy.world 10 points 2 months ago (14 children)

If progressives know how to win elections better than the DNC then why don’t they just win enough elections to control the DNC?

[–] Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world 39 points 2 months ago (2 children)

This implies a fair primary process.

[–] tyo_ukko@sopuli.xyz 25 points 2 months ago

To extend a bit, the DNC controls the machine to run elections. They are friends with the corporate donors and the "left wing" media. Without their support it's very hard to brand yourself as a full blown democrat candidate, which eventually will matter to the voting public.

[–] UsernameHere@lemmy.world 9 points 2 months ago (8 children)

How did any progressives get elected if our primaries are unfair?

How do progressives win against the GOP when they don’t play fair?

[–] Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world 17 points 2 months ago (46 children)

How did any progressives get elected if our primaries are unfair?

They got elected despite the party's interference.

How do progressives win against the GOP when they don’t play fair?

The GOP doesn't control national elections like the DNC/DCCC/DSCC controls primaries.

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[–] distantsounds@lemmy.world 84 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (8 children)

"Unfortunately," Geevarghese lamented, "Democratic leadership is failing disastrously to meet this urgent mandate. Ahead of tonight's forum, the DNC is actively working to silence rank-and-file Democratic activists and base voters calling for a ban on dark money in primaries and the rejection of corporate funding. In a last-minute move, they shut the event off from the public and even deliberately shared the wrong address for where grassroots supporters are allowed to gather."

How can anyone defend the DNC at this point?

[–] Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world 30 points 2 months ago (1 children)

How can anyone defend the DNC at this point?

I know you're not new to lemmy.

[–] distantsounds@lemmy.world 14 points 2 months ago

lol true ✌️

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[–] N0body@lemmy.dbzer0.com 59 points 2 months ago (3 children)

When people are struggling economically, they’re looking for a change candidate. Running on everyone being better off than their actual bank statements and credit card bills say was always a shit strategy. Cozying up to Liz Cheney and her lot was secondary to that.

[–] SirEDCaLot@lemmy.today 28 points 2 months ago (1 children)

This is exactly it. It's white Trump wins. Why people are willing to overlook all of his craziness- because his platform is one of radical change. He may be crazy and he may be full of shit but at least he is talking about change. And when you're hurting and you see the entire country hurting and you see nobody in charge giving a fuck, or worse telling you this is how it's supposed to be, you want radical change.

[–] ECB@feddit.org 12 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Essentially: the status quo of the past 30 years is dead (and its never coming back), some people just haven't realized it yet.

[–] Peppycito@sh.itjust.works 9 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Very hard to identify the end of an empire while your living in it.

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[–] tyo_ukko@sopuli.xyz 41 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (2 children)

The democrats are very good at fighting a change inside their own party. They're very bad at fighting republicans on the national stage. Case in point, voter suppression in the last election, the stolen election of Gore v. Bush in 2000 (Gore had majority in Florida in the end, did you hear CNN reporting about it?)

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 12 points 2 months ago (10 children)

The Dem base has been fully bought out by corporate interests. They are "controlled opposition" in every sense. A vestigial remnant of their 1940s peak that mostly exists to rein in the excesses of the prior conservative leadership (although, one could argue even FDR ultimately filled that role).

(Gore had majority in Florida in the end, did you hear CNN reporting about it?)

The degree to which Florida has been fumbled by Dems for the last 30 years cannot be overstated.

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[–] Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world 10 points 2 months ago (1 children)

The democrats are very good at fighting a change inside their own party.

The democrats are only good at fighting a change inside their own party.

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[–] electric_nan@lemmy.ml 34 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Dems do not care to "learn". They do not want to help you. They do not want to undermine the capitalist empire. They aren't hapless, they just don't work for you.

[–] VitoRobles@lemmy.today 14 points 2 months ago (2 children)

You know how ACAB? Because a good cop will quickly get checked to doing bad cop things out of fear, or they leave (willingly or in a body bag).

I'm starting to think that with politics. You go in with the dreams of change. Then you see the bloat and bullshit. You try to pass a bill to make sure that all kids have the right to free food, and some fuck face screams at you and doxxes your family on Rogan and now you got death threats.

I don't have an answer.

[–] SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world 13 points 2 months ago

Nothing will meaningfully improve until the rich fear for their lives

[–] electric_nan@lemmy.ml 8 points 2 months ago

Pretty much. I think that the higher you go politically, the more that good people are filtered out by the system.

[–] lennybird@lemmy.world 32 points 2 months ago (1 children)

The party is dead until they figure out a way to even the media landscape. Harris was a very good candidate with a good campaign relative to the binary alternative option.

But it doesn't matter because Republicans control the narrative on everything and it doesn't help that Democrats blow at messaging and recognizing the all-out war we're in.

[–] NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io 31 points 2 months ago (6 children)

People knew what Harris was selling, at least the people who could be persuading to vote Democrat. The DNC's absolute failure at communication is definitely a problem, but the catastrophic loss they suffered this election can't be explained by that alone. Many people, with full knowledge of what a Trump administration would mean, sat out of this election. People who would volunteer in democrat campaigns either sat out or voted for Harris quietly. The DNC's biggest "failure" (they didn't fail at enriching their corporate donors, so to them it's a success) is relying too much on being the less shitty shit sandwich.

[–] djsoren19@lemmy.blahaj.zone 14 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I'd actually argue people didn't know what Harris was selling. There was a very well written and well thought out policy platform written up on their campaign's website, but none of that reached all the Americans who refuse to read anything. The campaign trail was very focused on how Donald Trump was a threat to democracy, but they refused to really draw attention to the Nazi iconography and truly terrifying promises Trump was making. In fact, an awful lot of the campaign trail was backing Israel, promising a more secure boarder, lying about how great the economy was, and promising to reach across the isle to work with the mythical "good Republican."

And, to give the average American the benefit of the doubt, I don't think many of them knew the potential dangers of a Trump re-election. I think a lot of people saw the weakly worded Democrat warnings as typical political mud-slinging. Both sides were calling each other the devil incarnate, and both sides refused to back up their claims, so it's hard to be surprised that Americans just saw it as noise. I think most of them are just scared they won't make it through the year, like my friends and I are, and got suckered in by the orange man telling them that everything sucks and he'll make it better.

[–] NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io 17 points 2 months ago (2 children)

In fact, an awful lot of the campaign trail was backing Israel, promising a more secure boarder, lying about how great the economy was, and promising to reach across the isle to work with the mythical "good Republican."

That's what I was referring to by "what Harris was selling". She did have well-thought out policy on her website, but she abandoned or watered down said policy whenever her corporate donors requested a "clarification". One example is her promise to instate a wealth tax, which she continued to water down throughout her campaign until she ended up with an unfulfilled promise from Biden's campaign.

I can't seem to find it when I try to look for it, but I saw around here after the election a statistical analysis of Harris's campaign trail that found that she, as election day came closer, progressively stopped using phrases related to progressive economic policy such as "unions", "wealth tax" or "housing crisis" and used words related to democracy and Trump such as "democracy" and "rule of law". Harris started out as a genuinely promising candidate if you ignored her attitude towards Muslim Americans (which would turn out to be her undoing), and as the campaign progressed turned further and further into a right of center corporate stooge until she became Kamala "border wall" Harris and lost all seven swing states to Trump.

[–] petrol_sniff_king@lemmy.blahaj.zone 15 points 2 months ago (1 children)

The enthusiasm of the first week of her campaign announcement was through the roof, and I will never forgive the DNC (and her, to be fair; she capitulated) for knee-capping it.

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[–] conditional_soup@lemm.ee 10 points 2 months ago

I noticed that as well. Her campaign went from electric excitement to, well, I don't know quite what I'd call it. Resignation maybe? It reminded me a lot of the Hillary campaign by the end, and I continually got the impression that Kamala wasn't really in the driver's seat for her campaign. Here's the moment that I started getting nervous, and someone in the campaign should have started smashing the panic button: Obama lecturing down to black men for not supporting Kamala enough.

https://youtu.be/QVD17hg4O7o

HUGE yikes moment when you start finger-wagging a group that's supposed to be your base for not supporting you enough. Obama's a smart dude, so I really have no idea wtf he thought he was doing here, and no idea why anyone ever thought staging and publishing this was a good thing to do. This should have been a red flag visible from space in so many ways.

[–] lennybird@lemmy.world 9 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (2 children)

I think the DNC sucks and messaging could've been better.

But I frankly also believe that for anyone who supposedly what Harris and Trump were selling and found the choice difficult then you're kind of a moron. Ethically; logically... Zero sense. Yes, Stagnation is infinitely better than fascism intentionally sabotaging the system.

So I choose to hope people actually didn't know how good Harris was relative to how bad Trump was because mostly rich white men control the vast majority of what people see.

People need to remember.. The demographics of Lemmy let's just say aren't even remotely reflective of the American electorate. You're lucky if people watch more than the Fox News in their physician's waiting room or work breakroom, supplemented by their social media feed and YouTube algorithm peddling Red-pilled incel bullshit and trash like Joe Rogan.

Like, do you think people are actually tuning into AP or NPR or BBC or ProPublica investigations? You think they're reading long form written journalist pieces or PBS Frontline documents ties? Fuuuuck no. It's closer to work-drink-sports-talk shows-church-work-bar-sports-social media, rinse repeat.

[–] Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world 13 points 2 months ago (31 children)

You're stupid if you're unhappy with the status quo. You're stupid if you have a problem with genocide. You're stupid if you can't afford groceries! Can't you see that billionaires are doing just fine? You're stupid if you notice that the party abandoned you and still demands unearned perfect fealty no matter what they do.

Anyone who disagrees with the republican-adjacent wing of the party has to be stupid because otherwise we might have to listen to them. And we'll never do that. They're stupid and we hate them.

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[–] NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io 11 points 2 months ago (1 children)

But I frankly also believe that for anyone who supposedly what Harris and Trump were selling and found the choice difficult then you're kind of a moron. Ethically; logically... Zero sense. Yes, Stagnation is infinitely better than fascism intentionally sabotaging the system.

It's not stagnation, to make that clear. The Dems were promising a slower slide into rock bottom (they coopted the Republican border wall if you remember that). That aside okay, and? That doesn't contradict my point. You can consider voters morons, which I don't agree with but let's set aside. That is something and whether they were operating off incomplete information is something else; your argument here seems to be built on wishful thinking.

People need to remember.. The demographics of Lemmy let's just say aren't even remotely reflective of the American electorate.

I mean yes but the idea that the average voter is an uneducated, critical thinking-lacking sack of potatoes who never thinks about politics beyond election day is also wrong. The median voter maybe, but the average voter no. The average voter is an average; the concept includes everything from progressives to far right MAGAsz and I'll note that part of the reason Biden won in 2020 was his popularity with the former. To take Gaza for example, there's this poll. People are paying attention more than you seem to be thinking.

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[–] TehWorld@lemmy.world 27 points 2 months ago (4 children)

Biden won the previous election (barely) because Trump's incompetence was on full display and people were angry about it. It'll happen again, but unfortunately, elections are pretty much done in the USA. Between fuckery and intimidation, we're unlikely to see a 'fair' election until a major revolution occurs in the USA.

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[–] YtA4QCam2A9j7EfTgHrH@infosec.pub 21 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Wait. Do progressives seriously think that going fascist lite wasn’t the right thing to do in this last election? What the fuck are they smoking.

[–] NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io 7 points 2 months ago

According to that guy I follow on Facebook the air in American cities has higher concentrations of the poisonous chemicals O2 and H2O, and that's why they refuse to accept the Truth brought to us by Trump and supply-side Jesus.

[–] mlg@lemmy.world 18 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Can we split the party now or are we gonna keep supporting a bunch of grifters

[–] buddascrayon@lemmy.world 9 points 2 months ago (2 children)

In order to split the party we need a strong group to gather around in opposition to the established liberal party. And unfortunately the trademarked Progressive Party™ is owned by insane people that no one wants to have anything to do with. So another name needs to be thought up.

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[–] some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org 14 points 2 months ago

Dems are captured. The only way around that is voting in as many independent members to congress as we can possibly get. Even AOC has traded fighting for us for securing her position as a mouthpiece for the party. Such as lying to voters pretending that Biden and Harris were working tirelessly on a ceasefire.

[–] SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world 11 points 2 months ago

Nothing will meaningfully improve until the rich fear for their lives

[–] yarr@feddit.nl 10 points 2 months ago

Wait, are you trying to say the Democrats are out of touch with what the American public wants and needs, and as a consequence, may not perform as well in the upcoming elections? Gee, if only they had any warning signs.

It should be seen as extra sad that as the GOP fails in any number of areas while having a fairly strong hold on the government, that the DNC can barely do anything. Years of corruption and cronyism have taken their toll and as an institution, they have forgotten what it even takes to get elected. Just being "not Trump" is no longer enough to get voted in. They better do some pretty rapid self-improvement if they even want to remain a viable party much longer.

[–] Maeve@kbin.earth 7 points 2 months ago

No war but _____ war?

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