Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Republicans can’t even be trusted with their own money.

Putin must be throwing ketchup at the walls.

You don’t get to peddle hatred on saturday and offer condolences on sunday.

Their freedom requires your slavery.

I desperately hope that, yet again, I am wrong.

If you’re looking for someone who’s young and athletic, go watch a fucking movie.

I’m starting to think Jesus may have made a mistake saving people with no questions asked.

There’s always a light at the end of the frog.

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires Republicans to act in good faith.

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. let’s win this.

The republican speaker is a slippery little devil.

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

“The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.”

You can’t love your country only when you win.

Give the craziest people you know everything they want and hope they don’t ask for more? Great plan.

You’re just a puppy masquerading as an old coot.

Sitting here in limbo waiting for the dice to roll

I really should read my own blog.

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Monday Morning Open Thread: Still Fighting the Good Fights

Monday Morning Open Thread: Still Fighting the Good Fights

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  3. 3.

    Baud

    As frustrating as things are, I’d much rather be fighting the right flank of the party rather than the left, which is how I felt during the Obama years.

  6. 6.

    Brendan in NC

    @WereBear: Because they figured that she would lash out against her own party. When she just calmly explained the issue, their strategy backfired.

  7. 7.

    debbie

    Is that last tweet’s fury really about SNL? I watched and saw the portrayal as a parody, not an enshrinement.

  8. 8.

    Betty Cracker

    AOC made another great point on the Sunday shows that wasn’t included in the clip above: that 96% of Dems support the $3.5T package that funds Biden’s agenda. Was glad to hear her say that because every single piece of Beltway reportage frames it as “moderates vs. progressives.”

  12. 12.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Baud: AOC also draws eyeballs.

    Yeah, and they made you sit through a metric ton of their usual bullshit framing in order to hear a few seconds of AOC.  Grrrr.

  18. 18.

    MomSense

    One thing I find interesting is that progressives have been saying forever that Democrats should start with a really high number and then negotiate down.  Bernie started with 6T and it didn’t help everyone accept the 3.5T at all.  It just reinforces the misperception that this is about $.  Republicans, Manchin and Sinema have no trouble spending big money.  They have a problem with anything that harms their big donors.
    The dirty energy sector, which includes Manchin himself, do not want anything that regulates or competes with their coal, oil and gas businesses.  Big pharma, which includes Manchin’s daughter, do not want Medicare to be able to negotiate drug prices.  They’ve been running ads on MSNBC and I assume other networks for months.

  22. 22.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Baud: Remember Seneima is a former Green, hard left. I think she refuses to stake any position because she just wants to burn society down.

  27. 27.

    MomSense

    @Baud:

    If they are in power they’ll even say they don’t care about deficits.  Remember Cheney said “deficits don’t matter” on the Meet the Republican Faces this Week Sunday show.

  29. 29.

    CaseyL

    Good morning, BJ!

    Rural Maine is very beautiful. But you can’t  eat scenery, and the dining options out here are… well, let’s just say that McDonald’s seems to be the best option for an early breakfast.

  31. 31.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    I’ve mentioned before that my DIL is a kindergarten teacher. A kid in another class tested positive for COVID, so the whole class is in quarantine. The class’s teacher tested negative but is sick. The school requires her to come in every day and teach her class remotely, since they’re obviously at home. (That policy is set by the school board, which has a number of people on it who believe teachers are overpaid and undeworked)

    Thanks, anti-vaxxers.

    ETA: I forgot to say the school has a mask mandate. Lunatics disrupted the last school board meeting protesting that policy.

  32. 32.

    Geminid

    @Betty Cracker: The House Democratic Caucus went through a very wrenching blowup over emergency border funding in July 2017 2019. The media highlighted some back and forth between Representative Ocasio-Cortez and Speaker Pelosi, but the conflict was broader and very bitter. Tempers remained high for over a week until Progressive Caucus Co-Chair Jayapaul made peace talk with the Speaker.

    The Democratic Caucus seems to have come out of this conflict stronger, though, with greater mutual understanding between it’s two sides. I think we have can see the effects of this dynamic now.

  33. 33.

    Betty Cracker

    @MomSense: It’s true that starting at $6T didn’t get everyone on board, but it’s arguably why such a strong consensus exists within the Dem caucus for the $3.5T. If they started negotiations at $3.5T, the number would probably have been $1.25T before Manchinema deigned to weigh in, and they would now be aiming to whittle it down to come in under $1T. I am SO not a Bernie fan, but he was right to start high, IMO.

    For me, there are two big takeaways from this negotiation process so far. Ironically, one is that Democrats are far more unified than advertised; the number of holdouts is truly tiny. The second is that eliminating corruption really is a precondition of having nice things. Does anyone seriously believe Sinema and Manchin are determined to slash the bill because of fiscal prudence?

  35. 35.

    MomSense

    @Betty Cracker:

    This has nothing to do with the $$ amount.  The 6T gave them talking points about welfare state tax and spend etc.  I don’t think the 6T helped in any way.  They really need to focus on the policy provisions that are popular. The consensus is about the social safety net policies and the climate crisis mitigation.  Corruption by all of the Republicans, Manchin, and Sinema is the problem.  Even when Manchin talks about how West Virginia is a different state and won’t go for x y z people need to counter with the reality that ordinary people in West Virginia will be the big winners with this legislation.  They need to come right out and call him on who exactly in West Virginia doesn’t like this bill.

    They are spending even more on defense that will help far fewer people on their home states directly.  They are trying to turn this debate into dollar signs and we shouldn’t take their bait.

  39. 39.

    Baud

    @Betty Cracker:

    The second is that eliminating corruption really is a precondition of having nice things. Does anyone seriously believe Sinema and Manchin are determined to slash the bill because of fiscal prudence?

    I don’t know how to get voters to prioritize that though.  Obviously, we’re in this position because the entire GOP is corrupt yet controls almost half of Congress.  Meanwhile, some Biden voters in Maine care more about lineage, and voters in NC care a lot about extramarital flings.

  41. 41.

    Betty Cracker

    @MomSense: I agree dollar amounts shouldn’t be the focus in messaging about the Dems’ agenda. You’re right that the focus should be on the programs for that purpose, though there’s zero chance in getting the media on board. My point is that since proposals about how to enact an agenda are hashed out in budget committee meetings, the process is going to entail arguing over how much funding the agenda gets overall, then allocating the agreed-upon amount to programs. So, aiming high seems like an obviously better strategy to me. But I agree 100% that the focus on dollars overall is a serious problem.

  42. 42.

    Geminid

    @Geminid: Two other consequences of the July 2017 Caucus blowup: Mark Pocan is no longer Co-Chair of the Progressive Caucus, and Ocasio-Cortez and her Chief of Staff parted ways amicably a month afterwards. Both men had aggravated tensions with inflammatory tweets directed at the moderate New Democrat Caucus.

    A day after Jayapaul and Pelosi patched things up, Caucus Chirman Jeffries dropped an anvil-like tweet on the chief of staff, from “the Office of the Caucus Chairman.” Jeffries tore into chief of staff Chakrabarti, a founder of the Justice Democrats, over his familiar use of “Sharice” for Congresswoman Davids of Kansas in a very interesting Twitter exchange with Native activist Julian Brave-Noisecat. But more broadly, Jeffries was putting troublemaker Chakrabarti in his place. A month later Chakrabarti was unemployed, no hardship for the man who came out of his Silicon Valley career with a pile of money and a determination to shake up the Democratic party.

  43. 43.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Baud: Maine can be pretty insular. I was told by a native Mainer that you have to live there for 4 generations to be considered a Mainer.

    And Gideon had immigrant heritage. So not a “real” Mainer.

  45. 45.

    Soprano2

    @Betty Cracker: I am SO not a Bernie fan, but he was right to start high, IMO.

    IMHO that’s what did in Obama’s stimulus in 2009, too. They should have started way higher than they did, in order to negotiate down to the number they really wanted. It’s Negotiation 101, it’s how people learned to buy cars! You never start with what you want, then there’s nothing to negotiate about and the other side can’t feel like they “won” something.  They knew they would never get $6 trillion, but it was smart to start with that number.

  46. 46.

    lowtechcyclist

    @schrodingers_cat:

    The Bern brigade may call themselves progressive or Democratic socialists to soften their image but their ideology is Marxist, economics over everything else.

    Nitpicking, I know, but there are economics-above-everything types on the right, too, and I would hardly consider them Marxists.

    At least, not until they advocate for putting ownership of the means of production in the hands of the people.

  47. 47.

    Kropacetic

    @MomSense: One thing I find interesting is that progressives have been saying forever that Democrats should start with a really high number and then negotiate down.

    They should ask for more than they expect to get.  That doesn’t mean making it all about the top-line number, though.  What do you plan on doing?

    The actual problem here is that, between the way the process was designed and the gaming of that process of the opposition, everything is being done in these massive omnibus bills.  They have all sorts of good stuff in them that polling shows people want; but because the impacts are so wide-reaching and disparate, it gets spoken of in terms of vague generalities and “cost.”

    That is if cost is only assumed to be money spent and not new revenue and not weighed against societal benefit.

  48. 48.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Geminid: It is the stated goal of Justice Democrats to take over the Democratic party.  I do see them as a threat no matter how many fawning takes we get about them on the BJ front page or the rest of the liberal and left blogs and MSNBC.

    If they get their way, the Democratic party will be a Corbynite rump totally unable to resist the Republican party.

  49. 49.

    schrodingers_cat

    @lowtechcyclist: I agree. The Marxists and their mirror image on the right, the Laissez faire capitalists are both inimical to democracy.

    At least, not until they advocate for putting ownership of the means of production in the hands of the people.

    They are not there yet but check out what they are doing in Nevada after they took over the state Democratic party. They were tweeting out guillotines and telling people to bend the knee when it looked like the Maple Syrup Messiah was going to win the nomination with 30% of the vote a la Trump.

  52. 52.

    Geminid

    @lowtechcyclist: I think the economic “populism” on the right is situational and insincere. Sanders may have softened his ideology to achieve higher office, but his class stuggle framing is deeply ingrained.

  54. 54.

    Kay

    Rob Portman explaining how no one has to pay for anything:

    “To raise taxes now and to get rid of these tax cuts and tax reforms – importantly, tax reforms as well – that created this strong opportunity economy is a huge mistake. So I would just draw a very distinct contrast between what my colleague and friend from Connecticut was talking about, because you kind of mixed the two. One is infrastructure that’s bipartisan, no taxes. The other is a different kind of spending, social spending, that we cannot afford. And on top of it, huge new tax increases.

    They can “afford” infrastructure, which they did not raise taxes to pay for, but they can’t “afford” social spending, which they will raise taxes to pay for.
    They’re telling wealty people and corporations that they can get the same infrastructure investments they got in the 1960’s, except no taxes to pay for it.
    Of the two , the reconciliation bill is more fiscally responsible. It includes tax increases.

  55. 55.

    Another Scott

    @MomSense: I’m a huge fan of sensible policy proposals, but I’m also in the camp that says that normies don’t have time for them.  Normies are tribal.  (All of us are, to varying degrees.). $6T or $3.5T or $1.275T aren’t what’s dividing people.  It’s Packers vs Raiders vs Falcons vs RedSox.  (Some of them aren’t playing the same game.). Democrats are mostly the same tribe.  GQPers are against us and will use any talking point to try to win.

    Bottom line – we want to promote the general welfare.  They don’t, but they never say so.

    Sinema and Manchin have constructed political stories that are based not on policies, but on tribal markers.  The way to get them on board is to make similar ones that enable them to claim victory.  (That’s what people like AOC and Jaypal were doing when talking about reducing the duration – with the expectation that the policies will be hard to end.)

    Cheers,

    Scott.

  56. 56.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    Yeah, the pay fors are the big difficulty with this bill.

    Good government isn’t exciting, but until voters start rewarding it, they are going to continue to get bad government.

  57. 57.

    Bruce K in ATH-GR

    I keep seeing “Manchinima” and my brain converts it to “Machinima” and immediately connects that to the web series “Red vs. Blue”, which contrary to what most people might think, has nothing to do with politics (except in its Thanksgiving PSA, “Indigestion 2004”).

    (The video should be the first result if you search for “Indigestion 2004”.)

  59. 59.

    Chief Oshkosh

    @CaseyL: Yep, Maine after the kids go back to school from summer break is fairly bleak for culinary choices. Many of the better restaurants close and the chefs move down to Florida for the season.

  60. 60.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    Really, the progressives should demand the 550 billion infrastructure bill should be paid for first, since all the revenue raising for both has been put on their bill.

    I appreciate Portman coming out and saying we can “afford” the spending that benefits wealthy people and business but cannot “afford” spending on the public. Very good summation of this purely ideological gobbedlygook. “Budget hawks” my ass. They don’t pay for anything.

  61. 61.

    Baud

    @Another Scott: 

    when talking about reducing the duration –

    If that ends up being the solution, it might have been a good thing to emphasize the dollar amounts rather than the individual programs.

  62. 62.

    Baud

    @Kay: When Republicans speak, it’s about triggering an emotional response rather than appealing to the logical part of the brain.

  64. 64.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Kropacetic: I don’t think the rank and file are evil, they may even mean well. But  as they that the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

    I have seen this movie one too many times before, the left splinters itself into purer factions and then RW remains the only game in town

    I trust the Democratic party leadership more than the preening budget hawks or progressive peacocks.

  65. 65.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    AOC really sold out her supporters by working with a moderate devil like O’Biden

    Sad

  67. 67.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    I think Manchin wanted a 4 trillion dollar infrastructure bill 8 months ago that also wasn’t paid for so he could crowd out any social spending. “I cannot support this 3.5 trillion because I just borrowed 4 trillion for the spending my donors prefer”.

  69. 69.

    hueyplong

    @Baud: “Good government isn’t exciting, but until voters start rewarding it, they are going to continue to get bad government.”

    Seems like agreement with this undoubtedly accurate assessment is the path to despair.

  70. 70.

    Kropacetic

    @schrodingers_cat: Even as the so-called moderates act as a literal splinter faction dividing the party.  Thus was the last straw.

    Congratulations, first person I ever pied.

  71. 71.

    Baud

    @schrodingers_cat:

    In this particular fight, the progressives are standing with Biden and on the right side of history.

    What I will be interested in seeing is how they sell the final compromise to their supporters.  We are counting on this to get people to the polls in 2022.

  72. 72.

    Betty

    I like AOC’s reference to Biden as a moderate, meaning he is willing to compromise. The current obstructionists are not moderate.

  73. 73.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    I think it’s much bigger than that for them. The spending on the covid mitigations was wildly successful -saved the economy from a crash, was broad-based and helped lower and middle income people as much as it helped higher income and big business-  it was a practical and wildly successful experiment in liberal economic theory.

    They can’t let that continue. How are they going to go back to paying people 9 dollars an hour if people aren’t absolutely desperate and told no one can “afford” social spending?

  76. 76.

    Geminid

    @Betty Cracker: Pocan was not de-chaired. He just did not continue as Progressive Co-Chair in the new Congress.

    After his side lost a fight over emergency border funding (they had balked at sending more money to the ICE they wanted to abolish), Pocan put out a tweet equating the New Democratic Caucus to the old segragationist “Southern Democrats.” Enraged moderates confronted Pocan on the House floor the next morning. New Democrat Terry Sewell, first Black Valedictorian of Selma (Alabama) High School, let reporters know later that week that she was not happy about being disparaged as a “Southern Democrat,” that she had requested a face-to-face meeting with Ocasio-Cortez three days earlier, and was still waiting (Ocasio-Cortez’s chief of staff had put out a tweet that basically copied Pocan’s). Tempers ran very high until Progressive Co-Chair Jayapal and Speaker Pelosi reached an understanding and buried the hatchet.

  77. 77.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Baud: Badmouthing the infrastructure deal is support?

    The NY Congressional Representative in her own words

    “The diversity of this ‘bipartisan coalition’ pretty perfectly conveys which communities get centered and which get left behind when leaders prioritize bipartisan dealmaking over inclusive lawmaking (which prioritizes delivering the most impact possible for the most people),” the New York Democrat tweeted alongside a photo of the group of lawmakers with Biden on Thursday.

    We will see who talks down whatever gets passed and who supports it enthusiastically.

  79. 79.

    germy

    This morning I took our car in for inspection.

    There’s a big screen TV in the waiting room and usually it’s set to NBC, and its morning blend of Al Roker weather and jocular heavy and light news reporting from the rest of the crew.

    This morning I walk in and I see the guy who waxes the floor every morning. He’s got the remote in his hand and his trying to help an elderly woman find another channel she’s looking for. I thought to myself “she probably wants Fox” and sure enough, she had him pick Fox And Friends.

    I never watch Fox. An occasional clip if someone posts it here, but that’s it. So during my 1 hour wait, I saw guests Mike Huckabee, Tom Cotton, a doctor with the first name of Marty discussing Covid (“It’s not a problem anymore” he said) and two concerned parents who wanted to recall their school boards. One parent said “the left” wanted to break up families, but then insisted her movement wasn’t about politics.

    Here’s the thing, though. The woman who wanted Fox And Friends on instead of NBC (“Because NBC is too far left,” she said) started talking about herself. A sad story. She was originally from Brooklyn. Her husband died a few months ago and she still misses him terribly. She lives partially off his teacher’s pension. Her sons, ages 47 and 50 live out of state. She has to go for cancer screening every six months because they removed a small tumor last year. Just sad, sad stuff.

    And she’s watching Fox And Friends, and murmuring along in agreement with every “concern” they raise. And she starts commenting along with the show, about high gas prices, about runaway inflation, about how she won’t get a booster shot because “It’s all about politics.”  And who is really controlling Biden?

    I saw these confident, well-paid TV hosts, and it really felt like they’d targeted a suffering person, someone with a big hole in her life they were happy to fill, and I felt sorry for her.

    And then Fox mentioned the importance of Securing Our Border, and she murmured angrily in agreement, and then gave a quick, angry side eye to a young Black guy with big hair who was studying his phone and ignoring her. And I thought that it was more likely his family has been in this country for centuries longer than her family, and I thought about how we all suffer. Everyone here on Balloon-Juice, we’ve dealt with sickness, death, lost loved ones. But we don’t chortle along with Murdoch’s bullshit artists.

    And then my car was ready, and I left gladly, because I was the only one in there with a mask.

  80. 80.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Kropacetic: I am not a Manchin fan I didn’t like the way he and Progressive Jesus tanked Neera Tanden’s cabinet nomination. However I do realize that without him Ds would not win a senate seat in WV.

    Without him Mitch M is the majority leader. Manchin knows that and is extracting his pound of flesh.

  82. 82.

    Kay

    @schrodingers_cat:

    This thinking is too narrow, IMO. There are other senators who win in conservative states and don’t bash the Party agenda and block any progress.

    Manchin shouldn’t be the model when we have Sherrod Brown and Tester. Let West Virginia go and shore up the actual Democrats. Better investment.

  83. 83.

    Betty Cracker

    @Baud: I don’t get it either. My husband and I were talking about this yesterday in the context of some local county issues. The flagrantly corrupt shitbags on the county commission now are the children of the flagrantly corrupt shitbags who sat on the county commission when we were children.

    People are getting screwed at every level, and they either don’t have a problem with that or (more likely) don’t think it’s possible to address it. I’m not even sure it’s overwhelmingly a Republican problem, though it is in my county, and it sure seems to be the case at the federal level. But we’ve all seen city and county-level Democratic governments that were corrupt as fuck (ex. Blago).

  86. 86.

    Kay

    @schrodingers_cat:

    We’re pouring more and more investment into a West Virginia senate seat that disappears the minute Manchin cashes out. He’s not an asset if he lowers the value of the rest of the D senators, especially because it’s not a long term investment. It ends when he ends.

  87. 87.

    Ken

    @Betty Cracker: But we’ve all seen city and county-level Democratic governments that were corrupt as fuck (ex. Blago).

    Though Blagojevich was convicted and sent to prison, so Democrats can sometimes police their own. (Until a Republican comes along and undoes their good work, at least.)

  88. 88.

    Edmund Dantes

    @Wvng: bah… Tester is fairly conservative but he doesn’t burn down the party for it. A lot of what was called conservative in the past and now with Manchinema is corporate Dems.

  89. 89.

    Baud

    @Betty Cracker: 

    Right. Our side isn’t perfect (although it can look that way compared to the GOP), and admittedly it can be worse at the state and local level. OTOH, it seems like this is yet another instance where people have this mindset of “either we solve everything at once or we don’t do anything at all.”

  92. 92.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Geminid:

    @lowtechcyclist: I think the economic “populism” on the right is situational and insincere. Sanders may have softened his ideology to achieve higher office, but his class stuggle framing is deeply ingrained.

    Agree that economic populism on the right is bullshit. I was thinking more of the advocates for the libertarian paradise where a handful of wealthy interests control everything.

    Bernie’s class struggle framing is quite appropriate, IMHO: the rich have been fighting a class war since the late 1970s, and they’ve obviously gained a lot of territory over that time.  Fighting back in an organized manner is a necessity.

    The problem is his focus on that to the exclusion of all else.  (But my original point was, that by itself isn’t Marxism, it’s just Dennis the Peasant.)  That framing is necessary, but the pernicious effects of racism in this country are also quite real and can’t be remedied by economics alone.  And of course, if we wait for us to be a socialist (but not Marxist) paradise like Sweden before we attempt to deal with climate change, we’re all gonna be screwed.

    One frame just isn’t enough; reality’s too complicated.

  94. 94.

    SFAW

    @Baud:

    You’re supposed to bag a moose for your meals.

    That’d be one big honkin’ bag, and I don’t think it would fit on the front seat next to CaseyL.
    And, as far as I know, the rural parts of Maine don’t have any MooseDonald’s franchises. Yet

    ETA: Although they might give a free pair of antlers with each Happy Meal.

  95. 95.

    Kay

    I’ll back the infrastructure bill if reconciliation passes, but these people pretending it’s some kind of massive bipartisan achievment are full of it.

    Once they stripped out the tax increases they were assured GOP and US Chamber of Commerce support. It’s an absolute no brainer for business. Public investment that benefits them hugely and costs them nothing.

    It’s really a measure of how incredibly incompetent the Trump Administration was that they couldn’t get it. It’s free ice cream and cake.

  96. 96.

    Baud

    @lowtechcyclist:

    Bernie’s class struggle framing is quite appropriate, IMHO: the rich have been fighting a class war since the late 1970s, and they’ve obviously gained a lot of territory over that time.  Fighting back in an organized manner is a necessity.

    IMHO, it’s also an impossibility.  I just don’t think it’s possible to organize enough non-wealthy people  in the U.S. along class struggle lines.  The most you can hope for is having the class strugglers be part of a broader coalition that includes people who aren’t hostile to the fight, but also aren’t primarily motivated by it.

  99. 99.

    Kay

    @Edmund Dantes:

    I’m interested in the idea that Tester and Brown built a brand where people don’t see them as liberal although they are and they did it without using “social issues” (guns, stripping civil rights, etc.)

    That’s a much more worthwhile inquiry than looking at Joe Manchin’s success, which rides completely on his family connections in the state and is unique to him. Joe Manchin isn’t scaleable. Tester and Brown might be.

  100. 100.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Baud: IMHO, it’s also an impossibility.

    Biden’s agenda, which 96% of the Democrats in Congress have thrown their weight behind, sure seems to qualify.

  103. 103.

    H.E.Wolf

    @Geminid: @Betty Cracker: The House Democratic Caucus went through a very wrenching blowup over emergency border funding in July 2017. The media highlighted some back and forth between Representative Ocasio-Cortez and Speaker Pelosi

     Forgive the question, but is there a typo in the date here? I recall the discussions between the two, but I don’t think it could have been in 2017.

    Ocasio-Cortez was elected in Nov. 2018, took office in Jan. 2019. The 2018 midterms flipped the House, so in Jan. 2019, Pelosi became Speaker again.

  105. 105.

    Betty Cracker

    @Ken: You’re right. Blago overreached and got busted, then the spectacularly corrupt Trump rescued him. But I sometimes wonder if the persistence of local government corruption leads people to believe it’s just not possible to root it out at any level. It’s rampant in Florida.  

    Or maybe voters just don’t give a shit about corruption or it’s not a top priority or whatever. Senator Warren centered anti-corruption in her campaign, and it didn’t work out for her. Maybe a white man needs to try it to test the theory.

  106. 106.

    Kay

    @Edmund Dantes:

    The value of Sinema actually falls apart using the same analysis of Manchin. She’s a one-off. Her “brand” is unique to her so less valuable. It’s why McCain never actually got anything done. McCain’s issues were campaign finance and immigration. He failed on both because he had no coalition in the R Party.

    “One” just isn’t that valuable in a legislature. It’s a romantic idea “the maverick” and media obviously love it but it’s a dumb idea. If your whole persona is contra to cooperation and collective action you shouldn’t be in a legislature. I think that’s why McCain and Manchin and Sinema pretend they are President.

  107. 107.

    Baud

    @lowtechcyclist:

    Biden’s agenda is positive, but he doesn’t frame it as a class struggle any more than Obama did with his agenda.  And I suspect someone really into the class struggle wouldn’t view it that way either.  Not unless we’re defining class struggle incredibly broadly to encompass anything that is left of center.

  108. 108.

    hueyplong

    @Kay: Totally agree with the concept of using Tester and Brown as templates elsewhere in their geographic/demographic slots.

    Also agree about Manchin.  He’s got a lifetime estate so long as WV is needed to hit 50 and he’s alive.  But WV long term is a lost cause no matter what.  US politics is an urban-rural contest, and WV has no urban.  There is probably no city with as many as 70k people.  If Cole plants another willow (too close to the house), he’ll create what passes for an urban area in WV.

    As for AZ, the other Dem Senator is the template for what to do about Sinema’s seat.

  109. 109.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Kay:

    That’s a much more worthwhile inquiry than looking at Joe Manchin’s success, which rides completely on his family connections in the state and is unique to him. Joe Manchin isn’t scaleable. Tester and Brown might be.

    This.  Manchin as a vote we need right now is important. Manchin as a lens for our politics, not so much.  He’s in the Senate until 2024, but it’s anybody’s guess whether he’s got a shot at being in the Senate in 2025.

    There’s no percentage in shaping Dem politics in 2021 around the hopes of holding that seat in 2024.  The goal should be to do enough good things for enough people this year so that we have a shot at holding the House and picking up a couple of Senate seats next year.

    Given the states we’d have to pick up seats in to do the latter, getting a better understanding of how Brown and Tester win in states that are somewhere between purple and red is vital to those hopes, IMHO.

  110. 110.

    leeleeFL

    @rikyrah:  Tynisa is my new FAVORITE voice!  She says what I say all the time. Decisions are made by those who show up.  If you don’t want a shit sandwich, don’t let them serve you one!  And FFS DO NOT ORDER ONE!

  111. 111.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Baud:

    Biden’s agenda is positive, but he doesn’t frame it as a class struggle any more than Obama did with his agenda.

    I would disagree.  He’s quite emphatic that the rich have taken more than their share, and that needs to be rectified.

    Maybe he doesn’t use the word ‘class’ but sure sounds like the underlying idea.

  113. 113.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Baud: Class struggle template flattens people’s identities and lived experiences and centers the financial struggles of the privileged demographic (in the United States that is white men) over everyone else’s.

  116. 116.

    Kay

    @hueyplong:

    I don’t know that much about Tester but Brown pulls it off by stating what he’s for and not apologizing for it but taking specific action on issues that affect them. Brown was the force behind getting pension guarantees in the covid bill. He’s been working on that for a decade and he delivered. People remember that. He really, really understands the state, so when he’s selling the health care bill he comes to my county and talks about how it funds drug rehab for opiates. He was talking about opiates 5 years ahead of anyone else. Anyone could do it- it’s just work and specialization and paying attention.

  117. 117.

    Baud

    @geg6: That was awesome.  Really highlights how it’s possible to do journalism correctly, and it’s a choice when they don’t.

    This is the type of liberal media I want, not some lefty version of what Fox brings.

  118. 118.

    Hoodie

    @Betty Cracker: It could be a side effect of massive wealth inequality.   While it’s always been the case to some degree, over the past 30 years it seems like more and more has been reduced to The Hustle, i.e., you have to get yours because you can be sure no one is looking out for you.  Everything is self-promotion.  Public service is just a reflection of this, some people go into it because they can’t make an honest living or they’ve been acculturated into thinking that grifting is an honest living.

  119. 119.

    Kay

    @lowtechcyclist:

    Southern states are the future for Democrats. They should try to hold what they have in the midwest but southern states are the growth strategy, especially if they can’t figure out Florida, which they don’t seem to be able to do.

  122. 122.

    Betty Cracker

    @geg6: What a terrific piece — thanks for linking it!

    Original NYT:

    WASHINGTON — President Biden’s trillion-dollar bipartisan infrastructure plan suffered a significant setback late Thursday night when House Democratic leaders, short of support amid a liberal revolt, put off a planned vote on a crucial plank of their domestic agenda.

    Froomkin’s rewrite:

    WASHINGTON — The House Democratic leadership missed a self-imposed deadline late Thursday night to pass a major part of President Biden’s economic agenda, as negotiations on his wider agenda continued between virtually the entire Democratic party, on the one hand, and two recalcitrant, corporate-friendly Democratic senators, on the other.

    More accurate, more informative, etc.

  124. 124.

    Geminid

    @Kropacetic: “The” moderates!? The moderate New Democrat Caucus (95 members) and Blue Dog Caucus(19 members) make up over half of the House Democratic Caucus Goony Gottheimer couldn’t even get half of his Blue Dog Caucus to go along with his losing gambit.

  126. 126.

    Betty Cracker

    @Kay: It’s self-serving because I live here, but I sometimes wish the Democratic Party would bring its national expertise to bear on figuring out Florida. I truly believe if they could figure out Florida, they would figure out America at the same time. :)

  127. 127.

    Kay

    Caroline Orr Bueno, Ph.D
    @RVAwonk
    ·11h
    CNBC published an article about students supposedly withdrawing from college because their schools implemented vaccine mandates, but they didn’t mention that one of the *two* students they interviewed is a right-wing activist and the state chairman of Young Americans For Liberty.

    This is just junk and no one should pay for it. I know everyone here thinks it’s ideological junk, but I still think it’s just laziness and poor quality work. The people opposing these mandates are at most 3% of any group. Why do we hear from them so much? In this well-researched and rigorous piece they quoted a Boogaloo boy without identifying him as such.

  129. 129.

    sab

    @Kay:There are some seats next year that we might take if the candidates get support.

    I think Tim Ryan has a real shot at Portman’s Senate seat next year. Portman votes really right wing, but until recently (now rhat he is not running for re-election) his public comments about any issue were always blandly moderate.

  131. 131.

    Ksmiami

    Obligatory Fuck Sinema and a Manchin… their antics are cheap, unsportsmanlike and self-aggrandizing at the expense of their voters and millions who support Biden. The image of Manchin atop his yacht yelling down to voters that he doesn’t want to enable entitlements was one of the most politically obtuse acts I’ve seen in years…

  132. 132.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Never mind the DEMs, Republicans have been playing the class war card for decades. It’s at the heart of all the “coastal liberal elitist” talk that exits their mouths with every flap of their gums.

  133. 133.

    Ksmiami

    @Kay: the west first… if we can get Montana, Wyoming and one Dakota plus AZ, hold Colorado and the rest, that’s a good firewall

  135. 135.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Baud: Far Right, slid to the Far Left, so her beliefs are all over the place, just she is sure EVERYTHING is wrong and must destroyed. Like the collage kid profiled in today’s COVID dump – drives and SUV and sees himself as soldier in a right wing revolution to stop police oppression and mask mandates. A lot of that going on.

    This is something else I blame the MSM for since they treat critical thinking as some kind of religious dogma, so whole generations of people trained not to have any opinion on anything.

  136. 136.

    Kay

    @Betty Cracker:

    They have a genuine problem with Latinos and I think it’s weirdly because they put Latinos in a seperate category from Americans. Which is so embarrassing I can no longer read about D outreach to Latinos without cringing.

    It’s this profound CATEGORY error. Why would they ever think this huge and diverse group of people were ideologically identifiable as “liberal” OTHER than their color? They don’t need to “drill down” on Latinos. That’s exactly the wrong approach. They need to back out and examine the whole premise. The underlying idea is wrong. They built a structure on the wrong idea and now they’re trying to change the decorating. Start over. Start with the premise that they are Americans, you morons. 

    Black people have this incredibly long history in the Democratic Party. It’s different than Latinos. Thinking is is “black and brown” was just idiotic and it has to be based on color, because it isn’t based on anything else.

    Throw everything they thought out and start over. It’s insulting to both black people and Latinos to create this “POC” category that doesn’t exist in the real world.

  137. 137.

    The Moar You Know

    I saw these confident, well-paid TV hosts, and it really felt like they’d targeted a suffering person, someone with a big hole in her life they were happy to fill, and I felt sorry for her.

    @germy: Bang on.  Fox is like heroin to  those who feel as though they’ve been wronged, that life has dealt them a shitty hand, that they’re victims.  Fox gives them support, identity and an explanation for their feelings that doesn’t rely on economics that they can’t understand or, worse, confront them with the suffering of people they feel “uncomfortable” with.  Can’t be stated often enough.  Fox and their far more powerful companions in arms, Facebook, are dealing these people the drug they think they need.  But like everyone else with problems and suffering, drugs are actually the last thing they need.

    What they really need, most of them, is an asskicking or extensive therapy to get them to give up the pity party, because the vast majority of them are people who by any reasonable standards are successful and have great lives.

  138. 138.

    James E Powell

    @Betty Cracker:

    Totally agree. But what’s the deal with the state party? They have been losing to clowns & comic book villains.

    I feel like a state that large & diverse should be producing at least one major nationally prominent Democrat.

  139. 139.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Ksmiami:  The image of Manchin atop his yacht yelling down to voters that he doesn’t want to enable entitlements was one of the most politically obtuse acts I’ve seen in years…

    He is the senator for West “Oh my god” Virginia so that might be the kind of obtuseness his voters like. “Yes! Senator Manchin, tell them socialist Coastal Elites to keep their hands off of my farm subsidy!”

  140. 140.

    Kay

    @Ksmiami:

    I don’t agree because of black, southern Democrats. They’re a political force that is just beginning to be realized. It’s really their time.

  141. 141.

    Baud

    @OzarkHillbilly: Agree.  The right-wing is all about class, so I can see the temptation of fighting fire with fire.  But I don’t see a class struggle (in the quasi-Marxists sense) on our side being effective given the greater diversity of interests when it comes to regular people.

  142. 142.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Kay: Throw everything they thought out and start over. It’s insulting to both black people and Latinos to create this “POC” category that doesn’t exist in the real world.

    May I add, not just to black and Latinos. That term needs to be incinerated.

  143. 143.

    Baud

    @Kay: Agree.  Partly I think it’s that too many think that the racism of the right should be the top priority for non-whites.  I also think we have been fighting so hard for immigration reform for so long that it’s become the predominant lens through which the party sees that group of voters.  Both of these problems need fixing.

  145. 145.

    Kay

    @schrodingers_cat:

    That a national political Party were shocked that they lost Latino voters to Trump shoud make the political Party replace everyone who was suprised. They weren’t just surprised. They were wrong. Profoundly and deeply wrong. It’s a dumb, made up category and people understandably resist being jammed into it.

    They’re Americans. It’s a pitch to Americans. Start there.

  146. 146.

    Baud

    @Kay: We still won Latinos, just by less than in the past.

    Also, Dems do depend on an extraordinarily high percentage of the non-white vote because so many whites are committed to the GOP.  The whole dynamic isn’t healthy.

  147. 147.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Ksmiami:

    @Kay: the west first… if we can get Montana, Wyoming and…

    Biden lost Wyoming by 70-27 last year.  If we could win Wyoming, there’d be no state in the mountain West or northern/central Plains that would give us any trouble whatsoever.

  148. 148.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    I have a lot of Latino clients, not because they’re Latino but because they’re small business people. They aren’t identifiable as a political group. I know that makes the “POC” Democrats mad but it is also true. They are going to have to stop insisting these people are what they say they are.

    My suggestion would be to treat them as Americans. Try that. Don’t drill down. Go to 30,000 feet and start over.

  149. 149.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Kay: We had an argument at our town Dems meeting about it. An older white guy was surprised as to why Latinos would want to vote for T when hating on Mexicans was his calling card to political stardom.

    I was trying to explain that not all Latinos are of Mexican heritage, and even those that are many have been citizens for generations and are not immigrant or have immigrant parents. Why would they all vote the same way?

  150. 150.

    geg6

    @schrodingers_cat: ​
     
    I am no leftist, but how is this not correct? We’ve made that exact same criticism right here. Many, many times. Your personal prejudices get the best of you too often.

  153. 153.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @schrodingers_cat: @Baud: I don’t have any idea of the best way to proceed, but ignoring what the GOP is doing is ceding that field of battle to them. As the pro union party, DEMs should have the union vote locked down. We don’t. I worked with way *too many guys* who voted GOP every election despite the fact that the Misery GOP never gives up on the idea of making us a “right to work for scraps” state.

    **probably a majority

  154. 154.

    Baud

    @Kay: 

    This is an area that concerns me. Is it possible to campaign in a way that “excites” left-leaning voters we need while appealing to the general normie voter we need, in situations where there is not a Republican in power to rail against? Obama kind of did it, but it wasn’t lasting. Is there a way create a lasting template? I wish I knew.

  155. 155.

    geg6

    @germy: ​
     
    You are a better person than I am because:
    1) I would have immediately explained to the management that I would be taking my business elsewhere if I had to be subjected to FOX News while there. And I would have done it very loudly.

    2) If there was a lull between my being able to talk to a manager and I was being subjected to FOX due that old witch, I would have told her exactly what I thought of her.

    There is a reason I don’t go out to any of our old haunts around here any more and the fact that I refuse to be subjected to that shit is that reason. I refuse to be bullied and marginalized by these assholes. I can’t even begin to understand how you could feel sorry for that awful woman.

  156. 156.

    The Moar You Know

    They have a genuine problem with Latinos and I think it’s weirdly because they put Latinos in a seperate category from Americans. Which is so embarrassing I can no longer read about D outreach to Latinos without cringing.

    @Kay: It’s horrific.  And as you say:

    Throw everything they thought out and start over. It’s insulting to both black people and Latinos to create this “POC” category that doesn’t exist in the real world.

    The Dem party is on the verge of truly losing the Latino vote over this.  The results from 2016 were not accidental, they were Latinos voting their convictions.  Which are not remotely the same as those of black folks.  Quite frankly, it needs to be said and acknowledged that the two groups tend to hate each other.  Shoving them into one group and pretending they have the same concerns because it’s convenient for the sensibilities of white voters is a horrendous mistake.

    The GOP can get the majority of the Latino vote.  They can.  They can do it easily.  But it requires them to do something they won’t do, which is forswear anti-Latino racism.  That’s the only thing keeping those voters voting for Dems.  As soon as those in power in the GOP figure that out and act on it, we lose that voting bloc.

  157. 157.

    Baud

    @OzarkHillbilly: I don’t know why we should have the union vote locked down.  There’s not reason union workers prioritize unions issues any more than Latino voters necessarily prioritize immigration.  The fact is, I don’t think right-leaning union members see the GOP as much of a threat.

  158. 158.

    Geminid

    @James E Powell: Florida Democrats have been losing to clowns, but by very narrow margins. And they are fielding a strong Senate  candidate this year in Val Demings, and both of their contenders for Governor look like solid contenders.

    The Florida Democratic party has been the butt of all kinds of ridicule. If they get that last one per cent of voters next year, people will be talking about what geniuses Florida Democrats have become.

  159. 159.

    Betty Cracker

    @Kay: So true, and from what I see, it’s not just white Democrats who fall into that trap, maybe for the reasons Baud mentions at #143. It also leaves us really vulnerable to demagoguery on immigration.

    @James E Powell: It’s maddening, but IMO, the problems include overreliance on consultants at the state level (partly due to the category error Kay identifies at #136, and the cringey outreach strategy is what the consultants come up with!), a crab bucket mentality in lots of places, and Republican institutional overrepresentation (and ruthless use of same) for the same reasons Republicans are overrepresented in US politics, i.e., the population centers are concentrated on the coasts.

  160. 160.

    Kay

    @schrodingers_cat:

    The Latinos where I live are of Mexican ancestry and they don’t care about Mexico, anymore than the people of German ancenstry care about Germany. When they return “home” to the where the majority of their family live they go to Texas. It’s just fucking clueless. LOOK at them. If you want to talk to them about health care, talk about health care. When I pitch them as clients I don’t talk about Mexico. I talk about their small business. I have had Right wing lawyers here ask me if I speak Spanish and that’s why they come. WTF? Do they speak Spanish when they encounter these people 50 times a day? It isn’t some magic outreach trick. I also have a lot of Laotian clients, same reason, self employed. I guess I could put the Latinos and the Laotians in some made up category but that’s insane so I don’t.

  161. 161.

    lowtechcyclist

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Class struggle template flattens people’s identities and lived experiences and centers the financial struggles of the privileged demographic (in the United States that is white men) over everyone else’s.

    Well sure, if it’s the only template you’ve got.  Like I said above, reality is too complicated to see things through just one frame.

    But you can’t just dismiss the fact that income inequality is a serious problem in multiple ways.  At the lower end of the scale, it makes it a real struggle for people to get by.  At the top end, it means that a relative handful of wealthy people and corporations write the rules the rest of us have to live by.

    You can’t just leave that like it is if you want things to get better.

  164. 164.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Baud: I don’t know why we should have the union vote locked down.

    $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

    The fact is, I don’t think right-leaning union members see the GOP as much of a threat.

    Your right, they don’t. Why is that? The GOP is constantly trying to cut our paychecks in half. Why is that not perceived as a threat, while the very idea of gun registration sends carpenters over the edge? Why is wearing a mask to protect one’s fellow Americans from a highly contagious virus seen as a fundamental infringement of one’s rights? Why should Blue Lives matter more?

    I say again, I don’t know have any answers, but ignoring the problem surely isn’t one.

  165. 165.

    Geminid

    @Kay: Latino people I’ve worked alongside and lived among want what every thinking working class and middle class person wants: good jobs with good pay, decent health care, and educational opportunity and upward mobility for themselves and their kids. Demecrats don’t need to pick some ethnic lock here. They just need to forthrightly push progams that promote these goals.

  166. 166.

    geg6

    @schrodingers_cat: ​
     
    You have a personal prejudice against AOC and Bernie. I’m no fan of them either, but they have recently shown themselves to be good team players with the President. But your hatred of them won’t let you give them any slack at all and you always impugn them even when they don’t deserve it. You aren’t rational about it. So it’s a personal prejudice and not based on anything they’ve actually done, just on who they are. That is the very definition of a personal prejudice.

  167. 167.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @schrodingers_cat: There are things like racism that effect ALL people who aren’t White.  We often need a way to talk about the people effected by these things in an inclusive way.  “People of Color” works for that.  It is easier than writing “Everyone Who Isn’t White.”  So people use it for that.  Regularly.  Including, wait for it…People of Color.  I see/hear the phrase most often from Black, Latinx, Asian-American, Muslim-American, Native-American etc., organizers and activists.  It’s used for general statements.  It’s very useful for that.  Obviously using it as a stand in for a large voting block is imprecise, but the term is still very useful in any discussion about White Supremacy and Racism.

  168. 168.

    Kay

    @Geminid:

    I think it’s worth asking how they so lost their way, though, because we have to stop employing people who bought into this nonsense. They’re still doing it – “Puerto Rico Latinos are different than Mexican Latinos..” – they think this is somehow useful. It’s the same bad thinking, they just added some useless detail.

    Drop that whole thing. It was wrong. Fine tuning it so it fails more specifically isn’t the answer. And how fucking racist is it? Why are they in this category again? Because they’re all brown? Wow. You make 300k a year for that?

    Have they noticed advertising? How does Wal Mart advertise to Latinos? They put Latinos in ads talking about low prices.

  169. 169.

    Betty Cracker

    @Kay: Florida might be an outlier in that some people who are themselves fairly recent immigrants or the children or grandchildren of same from socialist dystopias like Cuba and Venezuela really do seem susceptible to Republican demagoguery about communism and have been for years.

    Marco Rubio tweeted the other day that the BBB bill is Marxist, which is nonsense of course, but there are people who believe it. I’m not sure how Dems can address that. On the other hand, that kind of dumb twaddle tends to work until one day it stops working, and I don’t know how Repubs will address that.

  170. 170.

    geg6

    @The Moar You Know: ​
     

    Quite frankly, it needs to be said and acknowledged that the two groups tend to hate each other.

    I am no expert on Latino or Hispanic issues of any kind, but could that be a result of the bigotry of some within the Latino community toward African Latinos? I think it might be why we see so many Hispanics/Latinos in these right-wing militia groups.

    As I said above, I know next to nothing about these communities, but I do know that there are “white” Latinos who see themselves as superior to their darker skinned neighbors, much like there used to be a similar belief (and may still be) among African Americans of lighter skin against darker skin African Americans.

  171. 171.

    Baud

    @Betty Cracker:

    socialist dystopias like Cuba and Venezuela

    IMHO, one of the long-term problems “democratic socialists” face is that they are reluctant to address socialist failures head on, except to say “but see Scandinavia.”  Any system can fail, and people have legitimate fears mixed in with the made-up ones from the right.

  172. 172.

    germy

    @Betty Cracker:  Marco Rubio tweeted the other day that the BBB bill is Marxist, which is nonsense of course, but there are people who believe it. I’m not sure how Dems can address that.

    The only thing I can think of (and I don’t know if it’s a solution) is to point out all the other things conservatives like Rubio have called Marxist, like Social Security, Medicare, etc.

    I saw an old newspaper clipping of conservatives calling Ike’s interstate highway plan “overreach of the federal government.”

  173. 173.

    Geminid

    @Kay: Democrat stategists and pundits are overpaid to think, and they overthink questions like this. That’s one reason I like Rachel Bitecofer. She may not be always right, but she has an outsider point of view that I think gives her political analysis a perceptive edge. She also has a good base of social science knowledge.

    I think that @Mangy Jay also shares these qualities.

  174. 174.

    schrodingers_cat

    @geg6: You are wrong. I have explained my reasons for not trusting BS and his band of Justice Democrats and it is fairly typical of the many people that populate the comment section to dismiss that out of hand like you just did. I don’t see any point in repeating myself

    I will leave you guys to your hermetically sealed bubble of self righteousness and get some work done.

  177. 177.

    Betty Cracker

    @Baud: I think referencing Scandinavia isn’t wrong, but it’s incomplete. Maybe they should point out that the Scandinavian brand of socialism operates in a market framework with private businesses, etc. Maybe they should do what germy suggests at #172 and point out past demagoguery, etc. I know Venezuelans who are fairly recent immigrants and who directly experienced trauma from a government that called itself “socialist” who nonetheless know there’s a difference between Bernie Sanders and the ghost of Hugo Chavez. I also know people whose families fled a communist dictatorship in the 1950s who would say there is no difference.

  178. 178.

    Barbara

    @Baud: ​

    I’m all you’ve got left.

    What does this even mean? It’s like however hard they try people like her cannot extricate themselves from the bubble where they have convinced themselves that their views are representative of a majority that can be magically unlocked if you just follow where they lead.​

  179. 179.

    Geminid

    @Geminid: I would add that a lot of these Democratic strategists and pundits live in an upper middle class, white collar bubble that impedes the Democratic Party’s outreach to middle and working class people.

  180. 180.

    sab

    @Kay: That sounds like my Latino friends that I hesitate to even call Latino. They have Spanish or Basque surnames. Period. End of their Latino-ness. Maybe they took Spanish in high school, but more likely they took French. Their families came from Texas, or from either side of the Texas/Mexico border, but it was a while back. They are mostly slightly left of center, but they consider themselves white Democrats, same as me. They do hate the racism of the GOP and feel a bit threatened by it.

  181. 181.

    H.E.Wolf

    @Geminid: ​@H.E.Wolf: You are right, and I was wrong. This conflict happened in July, 2019, not 2017.
     I think of it more as “Geminid was right, but unfairly betrayed by a typo inserted by gremlins.” :)

  184. 184.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @The Moar You Know: Yup.  Elites have used anti-Blackness and xenophobia forever to prevent real solidarity between Black and Latinx voters.  When polled, those groups have a ton of overlap of priorities (jobs, healthcare etc.) but the Right has continually used “scary Black criminals” and “scary, job-stealing immigrant” narratives to keep stoke animosity between them (and Asian-Americans too).  If we are serious about building a multi-racial coalition to save Democracy and give us good things, everyone needs to understand how these attempts at division work and start recognizing and resisting he bait.  Heather McGhee, author of the Sum of Us, has a great interview here that spells this out nicely.  It focuses primarily on Black/White division, but everything she says applies to Latinx, Asian-American, Native-American and any other non-white group as well.

  186. 186.

    Josie

    @The Moar You Know:

    You are correct about this, at least as far as the Latino culture I’ve experienced.  I spent most of my life in an area about 15 miles from the Texas Mexico border, where the population is probably 85 -90% Latino.  There was definitely a strong bias against African Americans among many Latinos.  I have no idea why.

    The other point I would make is that we need to make personal contact (door to door) in Latino communities.  There was a natural distrust of government and voting there, which can only be overcome by reaching out personally and by utilizing Latino activists to talk to them.

  187. 187.

    Steeplejack

    @schrodingers_cat:

    The “Thursday” in that tweet is June 24, and the photo shows Biden standing with Mitt Romney and others. That was a different situation from the current one, to say the least.

  189. 189.

    gvg

    @Kay: ​
      The way the GOP most rabid voters treat them, DOES put black and brown in the same group. The group is “people GOP voters and politicians hate and tend to make laws that hurt you” and they should vote democrat because we try to block those extremists. It is hard for me to see why there needs to be any other outreach. Yes they probably have other specific needs. They can tell us and maybe we con help, but it is dangerous to them to allow any current GOP mob in power IMO.

  190. 190.

    gvg

    @schrodingers_cat: Because the GOP has mainlined hate and even though they know they aren’t immigrants, their are large numbers who look at them and see foreign and “illegals”. I think you and Kay are being naive and so are any darker skinned Americans who don’t vote against the GOP. This isn’t just about Democrats gaining their votes. The current political tide is at a dangerous place. I have come to realize a lot of them don’t actually believe black Americans born here for generations are as American as they are. Some of them are convinced all the Black people they meet are actually here fraudulently somehow. What the spouted about Obama is the kind of thing they think about all kinds of black people they have know for years. And plenty of born American multi generations have still run into police who assume they are immigrants.

    America has a history of being welcoming to immigrants and then attacking them in cycles over and over. Currently we are in the mean part of the cycle. That is reality. My only partial esteem is that from what I have read even other liberal countries are often harsher than we are so far. When I read about other places in more detail, it doesn’t seem any better.

  191. 191.

    Bill Arnold

    @Kay:

    That a national political Party were shocked that they lost Latino voters to Trump should make the political Party replace everyone who was surprised.

    Part of the problem was a blindness to Spanish-language media and social media. In 2020, Republican operatives did a lot of overt ratfucking (including lying) using such media that was not noticed, or not noticed in time, or dismissed, by the Democratic political operation leadership. Major fuck up, that will hopefully not be repeated.

  192. 192.

    Geminid

    @Bill Arnold: Also  the Biden  campaign  was not fully funded until Labor Day last year. They belatedly tried to counteract some of the trump campaign’s  social media microtargeting, but the damage was already done. But I think we learned won’t fall behind next time.

  193. 193.

    J R in WV

    @Kay: 

    I guess I could put the Latinos and the Laotians in some made up category but that’s insane so I don’t.

    Small American businesses? Not TOO crazy…

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