Biggest #NetRootsNation ever here in #Philly this weekend for year 13. More than 3k people. In 2015 it was half that. So exciting!#NN19
— Victoria Brownworth ?????? (@VABVOX) July 12, 2019
#NN19 opening keynotes beginning with an emotional denunciation of migrant detention. “We can’t close concentration camps with symbolic actions. It took a war to close the last ones.”
There’s a symbolic “cage” built by activists in the middle of the room. pic.twitter.com/8JX4HKjUEo
— Dave Weigel (@daveweigel) July 11, 2019
Any Jackals in attendance? Or planning to attend over the weekend? Honest curiosity — I’d like to get your impressions!
I can remember when ‘we’ all hoped NN would be the progressive answer to CPAC… but, as people warned at the time, even if we had the same deep-pocketed ‘donors’ as the Repubs, getting Democrats to work together is like herding cats. I’m holding on to the Good Thought that the many, many breakout panels are supporting and training local activists working on local issues, which Murphy knows is every bit and more as important as taking back the White House.
Dave Weigel, for the Washington Post:
… Four thousand or so liberal activists will spend the next three days here, gathering for the 14th annual Netroots Nation conference — the third with a presidential forum. In 2007, nearly every Democratic presidential candidate attended the conference in Chicago, staying for a debate and holding special sessions for attendees. In 2015, Bernie Sanders and Martin O’Malley (but not Hillary Clinton) sat for Netroots interviews in Phoenix, only to be interrupted by Black Lives Matter activists who protested the lack of a focus on racial justice in the questions.
This year, just a handful of the 25 Democratic presidential candidates will make the trek to Philadelphia. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), a frequent speaker at the conference, will join former HUD secretary Julián Castro, Washington Gov. Jay Inslee and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) at the Saturday presidential forum — and that may be it. With Warren’s exception, the highest-polling Democratic candidates will not be in Philadelphia. Joe Biden, whose campaign is headquartered in that city, will be in New Hampshire; so will South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg and Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.). Neither Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif) nor Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) will be attending, and the Sanders campaign says the candidate is off the trail completely this weekend, for unspecified reasons.
Sanders will have a surrogate, of sorts, at Netroots; former Ohio state senator Nina Turner, a co-chair of his campaign, will appear on a panel and join a solidarity protest with hospital workers. But the smaller footprint for presidential candidates is notable, and organizers say that Biden et. al. are making a mistake by skipping.
“Netroots attendees are the core activists of the party and will play a key role in determining who Democrats’ 2020 nominee will be,” said Carolyn Fiddler, the spokeswoman for Daily Kos, the group blog that founded the conference. “Candidates not in attendance are missing the opportunity to speak directly to this ultra-engaged group of voters and engage core progressives the issues they care about most.”
Every Netroots comes with some drama; this year’s is largely about Sanders. In 2015, he was visibly irritated when a protest disrupted his time onstage. Protests are endemic to the conference — activists have interrupted candidates for governor, White House representatives and even then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.). And this year, the presidential forum will be moderated in part by Markos Moulitsas, the founder of Daily Kos and a public critic of Sanders.The Sanders campaign, again, says there is a good reason the senator cannot come. But the professional activists who make up most of the Netroots audience have been cheering for Warren longer than Sanders; in 2014, a brief campaign to draft Warren as a presidential candidate debuted at the conference. Moulitsas said that Sanders was making a mistake…
Biden’s absence is less surprising, though he spoke at the event as vice president five years ago. (He skipped the 2007 conference.) Booker and Harris spoke at the 2018 conference in New Orleans. Organizers made a conscious effort to not invite everyone running for president. To attend, candidates needed to show some level of support in Daily Kos’s biweekly straw poll; most candidates simply didn’t have that support, and, per Fiddler, they were “politely” told they would not get time at the forum…
The forum is just one part of a multiday conference. There is no real “liberal” answer to the annual Conservative Political Action Conference; Netroots comes close, but instead of stacking a long series of speeches and panels over several days, it features a few keynote sessions interspersed with dozens of small panels and breakout sessions. The better-funded organs of the left, like Emily’s List, Planned Parenthood, and the American Federation of Teachers, sponsor the conference and host trainings and after-parties; Tom Steyer’s NextGen typically sponsors an annual pub quiz. (Steyer himself, now a candidate for president, is skipping this year’s conference to campaign in South Carolina.)
This year, it’s all funding a conference that will focus more on labor unions, protest movements and the new members of Congress than on the 2020 race. Three members of the House progressive “squad” will be there: Reps. Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib and Ayanna Pressley. (Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who attended the 2017 conference as an activist and the 2018 conference as an icon, will not make it.) Sens. Sherrod Brown and Jeff Merkley, who decided not to run for president, will talk about the left’s agenda. It will be, again, the biggest gathering of liberal activists in the country, but it’s not lost on anyone that most of the 2020 field is skipping it…
Y’all know my bias, but this seems like a mistake by the Sanders campaign; if he’s going to find a *mostly* sympathetic audience, shunning the meeting gives his detractors a weapon…
Sanders campaign totally shocked to discover man who founded progressive candidates' forum would be in attendance. https://t.co/LtQAQtt5HE
— Ragnarok Lobster (@eclecticbrotha) July 11, 2019
Otherwise…
Inspiring opening panel at #NN19 with @VarshPrakash: “Calling climate change an emergency and treating it like one are two different things. The hurricanes, the floods are here.” #GreenNewDeal @sunrisemvmt pic.twitter.com/XBCHqOaqda
— Julie Anne (@JAMB_BLN) July 11, 2019
“Every presidential election is important. This one is existential. But we have to focus on the state level as well. We HAVE to do BOTH.” @EricHolder #NN19
— Swing Left (@swingleft) July 11, 2019
Who runs the world?!
We do!
These incredible leaders are inspiring. ????Thank you for sharing your stories and leading authentic change in your communities. #NN19 pic.twitter.com/AIaVXCCPGl
— EMILY's List (@emilyslist) July 10, 2019
Prof. @SamWangPhD now discussing the routes to redistricting reform in all 50 states, summarized here, at #NN19 https://t.co/fOLfx6i3PW pic.twitter.com/SeIiptIYOA
— David Nir (@DavidNir) July 11, 2019
Not sure how I feel about Facebook bring a primary sponsor of #NN19 pic.twitter.com/sp9Rc41liX
— jordan (@JordanUhl) July 12, 2019
SiubhanDuinne
So I’m sitting next to a friend at the bar — the friend who made it possible for me to go skydiving last year — a friend who is a staunch Dem, anti-Trumpist, etc. — and tonight i discovered that he doesn’t have the foggiest idea of who his Member of Congress is.
This is a man who is CEO of his company, and he doesn’t know who represents him in Congress??? I am dumbfounded, aghast, and deeply saddened.
I yelled at him. Not sure how much good that will do.
NotMax
Chalk up her absence as a misstep by Harris, IMHO.
Switching gears, Rudy & Joe now playing in the hands down worst remake of The Sunshine Boys ever. (Or maybe it’s Grumpy Old Men,
electricliver spot boogaloo.)germy
@NotMax:
Twin intolerables.
NotMax
@germy
Twin Reeks?
;)
germy
Onion headline:
Nation Not Sure How Many Ex-Trump Staffers It Can Safely Reabsorb
Jim, Foolish Literalist
cain
Lindsey is an asshole of such epic proportions. I want his ass out of congress.. when he gets voted out, I’mg oing to get drunk as a skunk and celebrate like it is 1995.
JGabriel
I’m surprised Harris isn’t attending NN.
I mean, I get why Biden and Sanders aren’t going. They’re old, they’re already up in NH, they don’t wanna travel any more than they have to, and all that website stuff is for the kidz in their 40’s and 50’s and 60’s and early 70’s – not mature pre-boomer adults like themselves.
But I’m surprised Harris isn’t attending. You’d think Harris would have some supporters there she’d want to touch base with and inspire.
NotMax
@Jim, Foolish Literalist
That painting of himself Graham must have in the attic is by now enough to send Cthulhu shrieking into the night.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
He’s always been so comfortable around whites who show up to Fox and so uncomfortable among the POC who show up to NN.
kindness
Have to give Markos credit. He built something that is doing a job.
germy
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
@JGabriel: She’s not attending cuz Wilmer’s cult have been smearing her as a “cop” and as an economic traitor to the masses.
She’s better off trying to reach persuadables in early primary states.
dmsilev
@germy: They’ve run that story before. Probably several times, after each very-excellent-appointee flames out.
I went to the first Netroots Nation, though it was called YearlyKos then. Went to the debate/candidate forum, and then to a Q&A session with Obama. Good times. Better times than now really, even if we were in the middle of the Bush Presidency.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@cain: South Carolina may be one of the trumpiest states, but I’m hoping Jaime Harrison can make him sweat.
JGabriel
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch:
Again, I’m still surprised. I suspect Harris has a lot more supporters at Netroots than critics.
But it’s her call, and I’m sure she knows how to campaign for votes better than I do.
NotMax
@David Merry Christmas Koch
Outreach is necessary and laudable. However – especially this early – one ought not squander opportunities presented on a silver platter for the care and feeding of inreach.
Mike J
@JGabriel: My guess is that most media accounts of NN will report on it as being as far out there as CPAC is. Harris isn’t running as a competent adult, not a bomb thrower. While we know that’s not what NN is, I’d guess she doesn’t see anything that could help her with the wider public by going and a lot that could be misrepresented.
germy
@dmsilev: You don’t think there’s more energy now, united against the current administration?
germy
@JGabriel: Harris was a keynote speaker last year at netroots.
dmsilev
@germy: I meant that this administration, and those supporting them, are worse than the Bushies. As impossible as that might have seemed to 2007-me.
germy
@dmsilev: I remember during the bush administration, thinking it couldn’t get any more horrible. And now this president…
Which makes me dread who the GOP will cough up next. Tom Cotton? Gym Jordan? Matt Gaetz?
Jay
So Storm Area 51 is trending,
Storm ICE is not.
Nuff said.
schrodingers_cat
@SiubhanDuinne: That is one of the questions on the citizenship test. To name your Congress critters.
cain
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I will give this guy money (when I’m employed again). I want to see this weak kneed putz outt.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@schrodingers_cat: The Congress Critter that Madame had to name when she took the test ended up in the greybar hotel.
Doug R
@NotMax:
Uncle Joe and Wilmer aren’t there and it’s kinda preaching to the choir.
mad citizen
Harris playing a long game. Watched some of her Maddow interview linked here earlier, and she mentioned she was travelling to some state today, I can’t recall where but thinking west. Anyhoo, she’s got things under control from what I see. It’s a long campaign.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
#Rockstar
TS (the original)
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Doubt that he ever had one, but if he did, the soul of Lindsay Graham has gone to the darkest corner of hell.
lamh36
bullshit…someone needs to make sure the Stanford MD isn’t a pro-Trump plant
Even if they are legit…if the report is bad…we all know Chump co gonna bury it!
Anne Laurie
@Mike J:
Yeah, to be cynical — Harris has a solid fan base at NN, and their feelings won’t be hurt she didn’t take a chunk out of her limited campaigning time to schmooze them personally. But on the other hand, there *will* be ‘Justice’ Dems and other fringe/ratfvcker individuals primed to get their ‘twitter moment’ by slagging off Tha Authorities, maaaan. Low reward, high risk scenario for Harris and her campaign.
Warren, on the other hand, is a natural I-Have-A-Plan star at NN (& it’s much easier to reach Philadelphia from Boston than California). She’ll be targeted by the same famewhores, but how are they gonna attack her? ‘She’s too organized’? ‘She wastes time catering to every selfie-seeking schmoo in the room’? All they’ve really got is the Pocahontas racism and the bog-standard misogyny — anyone tries that in this audience would be lucky to escape with his most prized appendage still attached.
SiubhanDuinne
@schrodingers_cat:
I know. That’s why I was so astonished that my friend couldn’t!!
dr. bloor
@JGabriel:
Who’s going to NN these days? Last time I paid any attention, it mostly seemed to be Bernier-or-busters. I guess I can see how anyone to the right of Warren might feel like it’s not a value proposition.
Having said that, I think any time at NN devoted to presidential politics rather than taking back school boards, city councils, and state houses is time poorly spent.
Baud
Cats don’t appreciate the comparison.
rikyrah
@lamh36:
A judge has already ordered that healthcare professionals be allowed into the camps. This is just CYA by this Administration.
TS (the original)
Just watching Rachel – there is so much ratf…ing going on with this administration NOTHING seems to last more than a day or two before something new breaks. trump then just carries on tweeting about the fake media & doing whatever his next evil thought happens to be. I have no idea how congress or the judiciary bring him into line??
RepubAnon
If you’re going to mention herding cats, you need to watch the old “Herding Cats” SuperBowl commercial :https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_MaJDK3VNE
Nobody knew what the company that put the ad on did, but it was a great commercial…
Jay
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/9kx4z8/revealed-this-is-palantirs-top-secret-user-manual-for-cops?utm_source=vicetwitterus
Jay
@dr. bloor:
NN hasn’t been a Wilmer friendly zone in years.
Millard Filmore
@rikyrah:
So they are going about this in the same way Microsoft has acted in its field: the most useless way possible.
Baud
@Jay:
Who did they support in 2016?
Jay
dr. bloor
@Baud:
Baud!, you goddamn ingrate.
Jay
@Baud:
Hillary Clinton.
Followed by the Great Purge.
Baud
@dr. bloor:
Now I feel bad.
@Jay:
I didn’t hear about that. Good on them.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
House votes to extend health care funding of 9/11 first responders by a vote of 402 to 12
Justin Amash joined 11 republicans in voting against the sick and dying.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
House passes defense budget 220-197 with all 189 republicans voting against the troops.
dr. bloor
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: Sick and dying in Jew York, you mean. Won’t cost him a single, solitary, fucking vote in his district.
Jay
The face of a Nazi,
Kent
Pretty sure of themselves aren’t they.
I mean yes, to the extent that some of these NN folks are out there working the ground game in the early primary states, perhaps. But I don’t think Daily Kos keyboard warriors are going to be all that important to who wins South Carolina or California.
I know a bunch of “core activists” in the Democratic Party here in WA and OR and I don’t know of any of them going to NN.
Jay
@dr. bloor: really((( )))
Jay
caphilldcne
@SiubhanDuinne: you would not believe the number of people who don’t know their member of Congress. I work for an organization that is largely about connecting our members to congress and routinely have to help them look up who it is. That said as a ceo he should get engaged. what are his issues? He should totally invite his member out to his company. Maybe work with a local advocacy organization. Truthfully they are pretty easy to engage although not so easy to flip their ideology if they are in the wrong party.
Jay
Ladyraxterinok
@lamh36: Picked by the super conservatives running the Hoover Institute?
Amir Khalid
@Jay:
Saudi Arabia supporting an openly gay presidential candidate in the US? Hmm.
Eljai
I attended NN in 2013. That year there were a lot of headlines about how Nancy Pelosi was booed at NN. But the truth is that she was mostly warmly received. However, during a Q&A I believe, she was asked about Edward Snowden and she said that Snowden had broken the law. That’s when she got some boos from people in the audience. I was more sympathetic to Snowden back then, than I am now, but her statement didn’t bother me.
Jay
@Amir Khalid:
Money buys influence.
Jay
Mike J
@Mike J: is running, not isn’t
grr. Dumb fingers.
Cacti
@Eljai:
Back when being right about him was unpopular.
oatler.
“Where do you find these people, Gonzales? I never see people like this anywhere else.”
Eljai
@Cacti: Well…yeah. ;)
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Amir Khalid: That would be, uh, surprising.
Another Scott
Open Thread? It looks like Most Wuthering Heights Day Ever Berlin 2019 is this weekend.
Is Otmar going?
Hehe.
Seriously, it looks like great fun and a nice tribute to an amazing song from an amazing performer.
Cheers,
Scott.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Cacti: Even here.
Cacti
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
Most definitely here.
dr. bloor
@Jay: We’re about to find out if, as Grandma used to say, God gave Mayor Pete the common sense of a can opener.
Bill Arnold
@germy:
The Onion is wrong. The US eats roughly 8 million tons of pork per year (&); mix in a few tons of long pork and nobody would notice. The Solution To Pollution Is Dilution!
(I am a vegetarian. We’re allowed to make cannibalism jokes. :-)
chris
Fuckitall, I’m going to bed.
Jay
Jay
@chris:
Posted that yesterday.
QAnon nut job as Office of National Intelligence.
Redshift
I got an email from them a week or so ago about how the greater focus on local organizing is in response to feedback from attendees, so I think there’s a good chance you’re right.
(I went the first three years, I think. Got to check “getting my picture on the front page of the Drudge Report wearing a tinfoil hat” off my list of life goals. ?)
plato
@Redshift: drudge report… wonder if that shit is still floating around.
Jay
@plato:
Yup.
Amir Khalid
@Bill Arnold:
I too am a non-eater of pork (yes, really) and I guess I’d be okay with this.
Bill Arnold
@Jay:
Do Palantir tools work on their corporate officers and major investors? Would be nice to see an expose. Some enterprising police department employee somewhere could do this easily with a little crowdsourced help. They’d get fired but would become famous.
Jay
Redshift
@plato: yeah, apparently it still is, and it still looks like a MySpace page.
satby
@dr. bloor: he’s a smart cookie. Probably smarter about it than Biden would be.
plato
Jay
@Bill Arnold:
Works on everbody, but Palantir is Vampire Thiel’s company, he’s big into funding Nazi’s and has tight security, along with a bolt hole in New Zealand.
Gotta love the new Guilded Age.
plato
Another win for Colin Kaepernick.
Ruckus
@Bill Arnold:
That’s not a cannibalism joke. That’s a shit eating joke. Different species altogether.
And on that note, it’s my birthday. Can not believe that I made 7 decades and most things still work OK or at least acceptably. So now the goal is 25 more years, that would be one more day than mom made. OK I have a progressive version of tremors so I’ve got that to look forward to. Life hands you roses, you eat thorns. Friend gave me a card.
On the outside.
We got you something for your birthday.
Inside.
You’re holding it.
So I got a laugh for my bday. Not a bad day as these things go.
Jay
Jay
@Ruckus:
Happy B day, wishing you fish.
MisterForkbeard
@Jay: Palantir is an information aggregator at heart. It’s really impressive, but all it does is take disparate databases and let you search between the simultaneously.
Thiel is also not really involved with Palantir beyond the initial funding. It’s a convenient boogeyman but doesnt deserve the focus it gets from the left.
Bobby Thomson
Harris is probably spending time some place with actual voters and organizers. Hint: It ain’t with a bunch of lily white shut-ins with an overinflated sense of importance.
Aleta
(WaPo Friday)
planetjanet
@RepubAnon: I have a downloaded copy of that video from years ago. Have to revisit it now and then. The company, EDS, was Ross Perot’s firm.
Bobby Thomson
@Kent: I know, right? These people have no idea who the core activists are. They’re in church basements, not hotel ball rooms.
Wapiti
@Jay: Junior enlisted with less than two years in have a base pay of $20-24k per year, and allowances for meals (just for the soldier, not the family members) and housing (if housing isn’t available on post). It’s below the poverty line if you have 2 kids and your spouse doesn’t work.
It’s better than US minimum wage (~15k a year, w/o meals/quarters) and the service trains people. It can be a route out of poverty… but a slow one for junior enlisted.
There used to be a push to discourage/prevent young soldiers from getting married for the first 4 years – I remember Senator Patricia Schroder out of Colorado taking grief over it.
Jay
@MisterForkbeard:
Key people
Peter Thiel (Chairman)
Alex Karp (CEO)
The company was valued at $9 billion in early 2014, with Forbes stating that the valuation made Palantir “among Silicon Valley’s most valuable private technology companies”.[7] As of December 2014, Thiel was Palantir’s largest shareholder.[7] In January 2015, the company was valued at $15 billion after an undisclosed round of funding with $50 million in November 2014.[9] This valuation rose to $20 billion in late 2015 as the company closed an $880 million round of funding.[2] Palantir has never reported a profit, and in 2018 Morgan Stanley valued the company at $6 billion.[10]
British Parliament Inquiry (2018)
Edit
During questioning in front of the digital, culture, media and sport select committee, Christopher Wylie, the former research director of Cambridge Analytica, said that several meetings had taken place between Palantir and Cambridge Analytica, and that Alexander Nix, the chief executive of SCL, had facilitated their use of Aleksandr Kogan’s data which had been obtained from his app “thisismydigitallife” by mining personal surveys. Kogan later established Global Science Research to share the data with Cambridge Analytica and others. Wylie confirmed that both employees from Cambridge Analytica and Palantir used Kogan’s Global Science Research data together in the same offices.[68][69]
Bobby Thomson
@Jay: only after months of The Bros bullying and shouting down everyone else. By then the damage had been done. Kos shares some blame for the brats getting as out of hand as they did.
Another Scott
Meanwhile, in Virginia – BlueVirginia:
This is after Fairfax’s lawyer suddenly claimed (5 months after the story first was in the news) that there’s a witness that backs him.
I think Sen. Ebbin’s right. Fairfax may serve out his term (somehow), but he’s done in NoVA and VA politics.
Cheers,
Scott.
Jay
@Wapiti:
I was Seaforth in the ‘70’s.
Pay ranked up there with a 7-11 cashier.
Didn’t need a Food Bank, there were no such things.
Looked at my first “real job”, union, retreading factory. $186k, full medical full dental, pension, adjusted for inflation today.
Today, the job pays $9.80 an hour, no benifits, 1% RRSP , ( our 491k) match.
Kay
Interesting that it went up:
I have been to NN twice and it’s worthwhile going, IMO, but my impression was a lot of the people there are employed in liberal or Left-leaning non-profits along with labor unions. Which is fine! It’s certainly true of CPAC and God knows there’s a huge, paid conservative “movement” so it’s good there’s a liberal “side”, as long as you keep in mind they are MUCH more plugged in than rank and file voters. So they can have some huge controversy and 99.99% of people won’t even know it happened :)
It’s good for what it is as long as you’re clear on what it isn’t.
NotMax
@Ruckus
All the best wishes.
Ruckus
@Kent:
It is undoubtably better than no NN but it seems to me that a lot of organizations like this exist for the people to get together and pat each other on the backs. What do they do, day to day? What do they truly know about politics? People ask what I do and I tell them my current job is a machinist. How many people actually know what that entails? I ask the same question about politics. How many people actually know what a politician does day to day? (and I’m talking about an effective one, not a placeholder) Yes this can be said about a lot of jobs. Driving a big rig is a lot different than a car but how many people know how to do that? A lot of people think they know how to do a job, either because they’ve seen it on TV or they work with someone who does that job. I worked in professional sports as a manager, but not of the participants, of the organization putting on the events. Same title but completely different job. So, how many of us actually know what a US national politician does day to day? How to influence one, or how not to? How does one actually get a bill through congress, the different rules for the two houses? What do the rules mean, how do they help or block constituents desires? What are the pitfalls of being a member of congress. And we are talking about a normal time, not the one we are in now.
Most of us are educated, some far more than others and a lot of us don’t know a lot of this stuff. We should, it is after all our country, it is a representative democracy, we elect people to do the day to day work, but that doesn’t mean we don’t/shouldn’t pay attention.
Omnes Omnibus
@Another Scott: Dear god.
Jay
@Bobby Thomson:
Wasn’t just Bro’s. Lots of “ inauthentic” accounts. Some of us learned from 2016.
The St. Petersburg troll two days ago here, shows that a lot didn’t.
Omnes Omnibus
@Bobby Thomson: Can they be shut-ins if they are at NN?
Omnes Omnibus
@Wapiti: Oddly enough, I remember mentioning the enlisted pay issue a while back and getting a lot of “they shouldn’t have kids” responses.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Ruckus: Happy b-day.
Peale
@Jay: he’ll turn the intelligence agencies towards proving once and for all that Obama smoked crack with a Muslim gay lover as a rent boy out of Columbia.
Ruckus
@NotMax:
BillinGlendaleCA
Thanks!
This was next up and possibly more relevant at one point in time.
Jay
Omnes Omnibus
@Ruckus: Happy b-day, you cranky old bastard.
Kay
And they make an effort to include non-professionals, there are lots and lots of forums and specific events, so you can go listen to the Secretary of State candidate from Arkansas, or “how we passed an increase in the minimum wage in Seattle” if you want to, but those aren’t the big draws or the big events- the areas where there are conflicts and disagreements with national politicians just naturally draw the biggest crowds. It’s a weird thing because it’s both adversarial towards powerful people while at the same time trying to elect or re-elect those people, and that tension is always pulling in two directions. They’re trying to straddle two things- they want to be influential (insiders) while at the same time be “insurgents” (outsiders) and that’s a hard thing to pull off! I don’t think it’s surprising that it sometimes seems incoherent. It’s inherently conflicted.
Kay
And you see it sometimes, the weird result, because they will go off on some strange tangent chasing the “insurgent” prong and just be in the weeds. My favorite example was 2005-6 when they decided that Sherrod Brown was the establishment Party candidate so following the insurgent impulse led them to back this former Republican sort of gun-nutty fellow because he opposed the Iraq war. But so did Sherrod! It just didn’t make any sense. So in that example their effort to be insurgents led them to inexplicably reject the long time liberal who wins and instead chase Mr. Maverick in a…primary? What? They don’t always resolve the insider/outsider tension in a coherent or even rational way.
Jay
@Kay:
I am not a member of any organized political party. I am a Democrat.
Will Rogers
Kay
@Jay:
Right, but I think that underestimates the cause of the conflicts. Because it’s not just chaos. What it is is a power struggle. And they’re not entirely comfortable with that (although to his credit, Kos is comfortable with seeking power, I think he knows exactly what the fights are about) because wanting influence veers dangerously close to wanting to be part of “an establishment”. Which means you give up your insurgent status. So one year they’re campaigning for Obama and two years later they are literally seating whole panels opposing him and some of them are most comfortable as the opposition.
Ruckus
@Omnes Omnibus:
I didn’t think we’d actually met, but it’s like you know me.
Thanks man.
Uncle Cosmo
@Baud: :””Anyone who thinks you can’t herd cats never heard of a can opener.” (Jim Hightower) Found that out the first (& last) time I ever cat-sat.
Ruckus
@Kay:
A lot of progressives are chasing outsiders. President Obama was, at least as many are concerned, an outsider. Not a lot of years as an elected politician, a very good speaker who could get a crowd to respond to his speeches very well. An outsider. Once he was elected he became the state, the power, the insider. And that’s the enemy, the insider, unless of course the insider has something they want. But what an insider has is the power and that is the one thing that a lot of groups don’t want anyone to be, the power, the insider. The groups that fall into this are the groups that have no traditional power and never will have, because they don’t work inside or have much idea how the inside works, how the sausage is made. Because no one wants to watch that, they will eat the sausage but watch it made, no way.
ETA OK I see that you fully understand, I was typing slower than you.
JoeyJoeJoe
@Wapiti: I know this isn’t the point, but Schroeder was a representative, not a Senator. She was in the House from 72 to 96. I recently saw her on an MSNBC show, so she’s still active
Yutsano
@Ruckus: Happy Womb Eviction Day ya old codger.
BTW the head therapist at my clinic is a year older than you.
horatius
@schrodingers_cat: I’m so glad that ghoul Barbara Comstock is not my Congresscritter anymore.
daryljfontaine
I’ve always wondered how much trickle-down (ugh) influence something like NN has. A few thousand attendees is a small/medium SF convention; I attend some nerd-pursuit conventions that regularly draw 30K-60K annually. For something which has a sort-of national profile, Kos’ ProgCon doesn’t seem to be building a very large audience (more evidence of the “online political groups are never as large as you think”), so are the attendees at least coming out of it with useful tools to help build their local/state parties?
D