It’s almost time for summer’s meteor shower duet.
The Southern Delta Aquariid and the Alpha Capricornid meteor showers peak at the same time — in the early morning of July 30.— The Associated Press (@apnews.com) July 27, 2025 at 2:00 PM
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President Donald Trump’s tax and spending law will add $3.4 trillion to federal deficits through 2034, the Congressional Budget Office reported, a slight increase in the projection that takes into account the final tweaks that Republicans made before getting the legislation over the finish line.
— The Associated Press (@apnews.com) July 27, 2025 at 9:00 AM
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Republicans should be providing relief to families whose lives have been devastated by historic flooding.
Instead they are trying to rig the election by gerrymandering the Texas congressional map.
These extremists are unfit to govern.— Hakeem Jeffries (@hakeem-jeffries.bsky.social) July 27, 2025 at 12:21 PM
On The Road – Albatrossity – Northward migration – 3
Baud
Fiscal conservatives love deficit spending to lower taxes on rich people.
satby
Great speech by Democratic candidate Isaiah Martin, running for the US House about this gerrymandering. So truthful he got arrested for it.
The Audacity of Krope
@Baud: More debt, fewer services. If Republicans promised to sacrifice every American’s firstborn to mammon, they would be unstoppable with the American electorate.
Scout211
The Editors of the FTFNYT came out against the SCOTUS shadow docket.
The Supreme Court Owes the Country Explanations, Not Just Rulings
(web archive version)
It’s actually a fairly good explainer about what it is and why it’s not a good thing for democracy.
The shadow docket is well known in very online groups but the average voter probably doesn’t know or understand why it threatens democracy.
piratedan
the only way I can think of to make things fair once Democrats retain power is to tax the ever loving fuck out of Republicans specifically to undo all of the harm that they’ve done. Call it a personal tariff, in order to soothe the pundits.
Baud
@The Audacity of Krope:
Seems like a fair trade.
NotMax
Did someone say Portent?
;)
Soprano2
@Scout211: I think the average voter hears about a decision made on the shadow docket and thinks it’s a Supreme Court ruling.
mappy!
They think saying “I didn’t vote for this…” buys absolution.
Anyway
I thought redistricting occurs once in 10 years – remembering the disaster of 2010. What’s the legal premise for redistricting in 2025?
narya
@Scout211: My go-to SCROTUS podcast is “Strict Scrutiny.” All three of the hosts (Leah Litman, Kate Shaw, Melissa Murray) are law professors, so they’re really good at explaining, plus they’re funny and snarky. Dahlia Lithwick is also good, but I listen to her only infrequently. I’ve learned a TON listening to Strict, and I recommend it highly.
prostratedragon
Vicious lunatic Russ Vought needs more exposure:
That his President’s budget has caused.
Vought has a daughter whose cystic fibrosis has been treated because of some of those “DEI” researchers.
Soprano2
@satby: That was impressive. I agree, we need more stuff like that. I get weary with the way people feel they need to talk all around things because it would be “rude” to say the truth out loud. It’s why FFTOUS voters seem so puzzling to so many people. If you know that FFOTUS hates the same people they hate, and gives them permission to hate them openly, it explains a lot of things.
Chief Oshkosh
@piratedan: Or just throw them in Gitmo with a promise of getting around to due process in due time. They’ll be familiar with the procedure.
Soprano2
@prostratedragon: Did Tapper push back at all on the bullshit that the NIH caused the pandemic? This is what some of them honestly believe, that if only we hadn’t followed scientific advice there wouldn’t have been a COVID pandemic. It’s ludicrous.
Derelict
“These extremists are unfit to govern,” says Hakeem Jeffries, failing to notice that Republicans distain governing because their objective is not to govern, but to rule.
Suzanne
@mappy!:
No kidding.
I am in a grudge-holding mood.
Gin & Tonic
@Anyway: “Because fuck you, that’s why.”
Derelict
“These extremists are unfit to govern,” says Jeffries, failing to notice that Republicans distain governing because their objective is not to govern, but to rule.
Raoul Paste
@prostratedragon:
My God, he is a vicious lunatic.
And his domestic government plan is being implemented.
Eyeroller
@prostratedragon: “DEI research” probably includes seeking treatments and cures for diseases such as sickle-cell anemia and endometriosis.
catclub
@Anyway:
10 years is required. But more often is not forbidden.
The Audacity of Krope
@Eyeroller: DEI research” probably includes seeking treatments and cures for diseases such as sickle-cell anemia and endometriosis.
Regardless of what it is, it’s obviously something our government viewed as valuable at one point. The fact that he is sloganeering about DEI instead of describing the actual content of the research suggests he doesn’t want voters thinking about what they stand to lose in services while Republicans also raid the Treasury.
frosty
@Anyway: Legal premise for 2025 redistricting? Legal premise?? It’s “Try to stop me.”
The Audacity of Krope
@frosty: Why bother redistricting while they’re busy relegating Congress to vestigial status?
geg6
@Derelict:
I’ll get flamed for this here but he’s so ineffective in media. And I just don’t find him compelling. I saw an interview with him somewhere and he was as proud of his disdain for anyone to the left of him as his disdain for MAGA. It’s not a good look, IMHO. This is why he has yet to support Mamdani. I think it’s reprehensible.
Ohio Mom
@prostratedragon: As I understand it, Vought is the mastermind behind Project 25. He might be the epitome of the banality of evil.
And yes, cystic fibrosis research has been very well funded and that research has been very successful in extending the life spans of CF patients. Their lifespan has gone from less than 20 years to middle age and beyond. Probably fair to assume research will continue to improve their lives, though I don’t know if CF research is a priority in other countries (since apparently, we don’t be doing it here anymore).
There are most likely other ways Vought’s daughter has benefitted from government funding and regulation, particularly special ed law and the ADA.
He might be proof that it is pointless to wish catastrophe on bad people because they can’t empathize or learn. He is apparently unable to extrapolate from his family’s circumstances to others suffering misfortune.
Anyway
I didn’t know that. Thanks. But feared “F-U- hahaha libtards” was part of the rationale.
The Audacity of Krope
Any chance you can find and share this? I’d like to judge for myself. I don’t have a strong opinion of Jeffries one way or the other, all I really see of him is the relatively positive messaging our FPers out up.
Or anyone else who knows any good videos where I could get an understanding of his thinking.
JML
My aunt tried the “not all Republicans” bit with me today. I’m making myself wait before responding so I don’t say anything I can’t take back, but I am simply not having it with the crowd who does the “I didn’t vote for this” or “Not all Republicans” or any of the other Bee Ess that Republicans are trying to do to absolve themselves of blame for what their party has become, what their stands for today, and what they actually do.
no more hiding. No more nonsensical pablum. No more pretending that you’re not tainted by everything this part of evil does because maybe you didn’t vote for the Orange Idiot for president, but still call yourselves a Republican.
As a liberal Democrat, I get held to account for everything any Democrat does anywhere in the country at any time and I’m sick of Republicans always being let off the hook. Fuck them all.
Eolirin
@JML: When your party has gone full Nazi and you don’t disavow them, you are in fact a Nazi even if you don’t want to be.
Parfigliano
@geg6: I agree. Hakeem Jeffries is not equipped to fight effectively in today’s media environment.
Suzanne
@geg6: I agree with you. I think the tendency to leftward punching (but not to the right or center, of course!) within the party is really damaging to the coalition.
Does he think that there aren’t Mamdani-Jeffries voters?! Does he think alienating Mamdani voters is going to be helpful?
The Audacity of Krope
@JML: Every Democrat and those affiliated will be held to account for the most obscure action of their weirdest activist, whether that activist was right or wrong.
Republican office holders aren’t even held to account for their own actions, they’re instead held up by the highest theoretical ideals one might ascribe to Republicans if they’ve been in a cave the last 60 years.
Shakti
@prostratedragon:
Vought is just Wilhoit’s Law made animate.
Assuming he valued saving his daughter assumes he values his daughter which means assuming facts not in evidence.
That is all I will say about this Trolley Problem LARPer, an upjumped Snidely Whiplash.
NotMax
@Anyway
Remember when Texas Democrats decamped to another state in protest of a redistricting in 2003? Rick Perry had to call thee special sessions of the legislature to eventually ram it through.
prostratedragon
@satby: He said it. People need to start walking out, at least, when they pull these stunts. That group, I’d be willing to stand in their way.
Sandia Blanca
@Anyway: FFOTUS sent a letter to Texas governor Greg Abbott telling him to redraw the lines so there would be five more republican seats. Abbott has dutifully made that a priority for the special session of the Texas Legislature, which should instead be fixing the problems with our emergency and disaster response systems.
All the public testimony has been opposed to this imposition, but the cowardly GOP continues to follow their master.
NotMax
@Shakti
Crud is thicker than daughter.
//
RevRick
@Anyway: Mitch McConnell created a new Constitutional order when he blocked Merrick Garland and rammed through Amy Barret Coney. It can be summed up as follows: whatever the Constitution doesn’t forbid, it permits, and whatever the Constitution permits, do maximally.
tam1MI
Daily Beast just published a second poll showing Mamdani in a neck-and-neck 4 way race for the mayoralty and Cuomo beating him in a 2-man race. Given Cuomo’s vindictive tendencies, holding back on an endorsement is probably a wise move.
Chief Oshkosh
@Ohio Mom:
Of course “wishing” is pointless. Duh.
No, if you want bad things to happen to bad people, you have to set that as a goal, create a plan for reaching that goal, and then follow the plan to fruition.
It’s what the Republicans have been doing since Nixon. Oh, and BTW, we’re the “bad people” in their world.
Miss Bianca
@Suzanne: You know, the Democrats have to deal with a fuck-ton of punching *from the left* as well as from every other direction. No lefty I’ve ever met – and I say this as a definitely lefty-leaning ex-Democrat – ever, ever seems to give the Democrats credit for *anything*, even for accomplishing all or part of a lefty’s alleged social or economic agenda. It’s like they’re so allergic to anything that compromises their precious integrity that they are literally incapable of it.
I dunno, maybe that’s got something to do with it?
Eolirin
@RevRick: I wish, but that’s not even true.
zhena gogolia
@JML: I agree.
The Audacity of Krope
@tam1MI: Reasons I avoid New York like the plage…
lowtechcyclist
@Derelict:
Not gonna get my panties in a wad over word choice.
Miss Bianca
@JML:
Maybe just say this to your auntie. Possibly sans the last sentence.//
Sure Lurkalot
@Soprano2:
I read an article in the WSJ about RFK Jr firing the advisory board that recommends preventative screenings (you guessed it….too woke) and the comments were really something, from how much money is wasted on tests to how everyone can tell themselves when “something’s wrong”, with plenty of anti-DEI screeds as a bonus.
We overhauled our entire education edifice to teach STEM to the exclusion of much else and this is what we got…a bunch of MAHA loons.
Baud
@JML:
Good for you.
What are supposed to do with “Not All Republicans”? Search Sodom and Gomorrah for 10 good ones?
Betty Cracker
IMO, Jeffries is a better communicator than Pelosi was, but that’s a low bar. She was lousy at it but great at herding cats.
So far, Jeffries has done a fine job of herding cats in the opposition, but I don’t think we’ll know the extent of his skills in that area until House Dems get a majority that Jeffries leads.
He’s an uneven communicator, IMO. I’ve seen clips where he connected dots effectively and others where he whiffed. (Bluesky links to example of the former and latter.)
Baud
@lowtechcyclist:
Yeah, that’s someone searching for a criticism to fit in with the cool kids.
RevRick
@Eolirin: Oh? Where is the flaw?
snoey
@Soprano2: Way worse than that. “Gain of function research” is code for plandemic conspiracy theory.
Chief Oshkosh
@Suzanne: Here’s some meat to hang on the bones of “grudge-holding” (which is my default attitude about all of these shitbirds):
youtu.be/Z3I9lkVfq38?si=PBW_7RvabOZ-MKTX
It’s one guy’s explanation for why the US is such a political cesspool. Much of it isn’t news for Juicers, but it’s a fairly succinct rundown of US political writ large.
Anne Laurie
From what I’ve read, not many in Jeffries’ district, there aren’t. Mamdani is nationally beloved by ‘leftist’ Dems, but his existing pre-mayoral-run statements & actions garnered considerable side-eye from voters elsewhere in NYC.
Suzanne
@Miss Bianca: I guess we’re all just destined to spend eternity punching one another, which is a bummer. The majority (probably the vast majority) of left-leaners vote for Democrats and our more progressive electeds are good team players. I don’t see any advantage to alienating anybody.
taumaturgo
@Derelict: I am willing to entertain the possibility that Democratic leaders, such as Hakeem Jeffries, may eventually abandon AIPAC and instead of pointing out the obvious to the base, he will ask the base to support a retaliatory gerrymandering in blue states. I dare to dream.
Professor Bigfoot
@Miss Bianca: I notice that the vast majority of those “lefties” who punch Democrats tend to be white people.
Perhaps that’s not a significant correlation for some, but… I remain distrustful of white people who see the horrors committed by the men of the Party of the White Man but only complain about the uselessness and fecklessness of the Black and Jewish and female led Democrats.
Obviously, our ‘lefties’ will disagree.
Suzanne
@Anne Laurie: My understanding is that he came in first in Jeffries’ district, though not all of the neighborhoods. Would be interesting to see a detailed breakout.
Eolirin
@RevRick: They’re happy to ignore fairly clear readings of the constitution and allow the executive to do things that are in fact blatantly unconstitutional.
Baud
@Suzanne:
I can’t speak for others, but I choose not to base my vote on whether random people on the Internet are mean to me.
People can claim to be “alienated,” but they’re still making a choice.
The Audacity of Krope
I’ve been pulling the lever for Democrats for a long time and very little of what I would consider my agenda has so much as been on the table and what little I agree with Democrats on, they’ve made minimal progress.
And so far I’ve been able to live with that. But, frankly, after years of watching my issues hold no sway with Democrats and, indeed, being treated like electoral poison while their “safe” status quo approach continues to see them support immiseration at home and global atrocities. Then they lose elections anyway and a century of progress gets wiped away in an instant.
Trying to meet the electorate where their at is not working. Republicans routinely defy what voters say they want and pay no price. Democrats need to stop being afraid to lead. Take that risky position if it’s important. Make the argument. Attempt to persuade.
I’m really very nearly at the end of my rope with Ds. Especially at the federal level. I’m going to be taking more care with voting decisions next year than I have in a long time because I don’t know who wants to help and who is even capable.
Eolirin
@taumaturgo: This is complicated by the fact that it would be a blatant violation of the NY State constitution to do that here. They’d need to figure out a way to get the current maps tossed forcing new ones to be drawn up because we’re not allowed to redistrict early.
Glidwrith
@Ohio Mom: CF is higher in the Netherlands (?) population. There are drugs specific to the point mutation that alleviate the disease. If you can demonstrate that a particular mutation is treatable, their government supplies it for free, because it’s hideously expensive.
RevRick
@lowtechcyclist: Noah Smith on his blog observes that MAGA Doesn’t Build Anything. It’s all resentment and rage, which is not a sustainable strategy. Look at Trump’s actions with regards to renewable energy and the CHIPS Act. He can only tear down. And his stupid belief that we can “drill, baby, drill” our way to prosperity fails to account that the future is green energy. He is like King Cnut commanding the tides to stop.
trollhattan
@prostratedragon:
Those random letters are doing a lot of work there.
These guys use “DEI” the way Israeli officials throw around “Hamas” every time they need to defend whatever lunatic thing they happen to be doing.
Geminid
@tam1MI: Hakeem Jeffries is not afraid of Andrew Cuomo. For one one thing, he has very good reason to believe Cuomo won’t be mayor. You keep citing outlier polls and never bring up the others that show Zohran Mamdani with a substantial lead, and there is a purpose behind this. You are trying to manufacture a drama with Hakeem Jeffries playing a sinister role
And just for sake of argument, let’s pretend Cuomo does win. What the hell could Andrew Cuomo do to Hakeem Jeffries for Jeffries to be so fearful about?
Shakti
@prostratedragon:
I wanted to find a simpler word or phrase for recissions
1.that would convey how wrong, disgusting this is
2.connote that it is illegal
3.without being some kind of ethnic slur.
Miss Bianca
@Suzanne: I, personally, draw a distinction between progressive electeds who are Democrats and self-described “progressive” non-electeds who may or may not be Democrats. Someone like AOC who came into office and seemed to rapidly absorb the lesson that hey, maybe there’s more to this governmenting stuff than mouthing lefty slogans, is a lot different, imo, than the Usual Suspects I see gassing away on FB or other social media or hell, in my community. Talk is cheap, action usually isn’t.
@Professor Bigfoot: Well, yeah. I definitely won’t argue with you there.
The Audacity of Krope
That’s fair. Trouble comes when I look at electoral returns in D primaries and am frequently reminded; what I see as the mean, selfish, elitist wing of the party tends to win out most of the time.
Suzanne
@Baud: I agree with you, but I’m also keenly aware that people do a lot of irrational things. And people are generally more inclined to feel favorably about groups or candidates if they have good interactions. Like it or not, we are ambassadors of a sort.
I’ve shared before about one of my BILs, who is what y’all here would definitely consider a Berniebro. I find him annoying AF to talk with about politics. But you know what, he shows up and votes for Democrats. He’s not thrilled about it, but he does it (except he loves Tim Walz). If we want to win stuff, we need those people, too. His vote counts the same as mine and yours.
Miss Bianca
@The Audacity of Krope: I get it. Believe it or not, I’m pretty fed up as well. I’m just not sure I see a unilateral way forward on this issue. Being that I’m very much in the “lesser of two evils means LESS EVIL” camp.
Suzanne
@Miss Bianca:
I wish we had better words to differentiate, because I also think of these people differently. I know a ton of people (I’m in my neighborhood progressive group) who self-describe as “progressive” and they are reliable Democratic voters. This is also many of my friends from AZ.
prostratedragon
@Soprano2: If he did, it wasn’t in these clips.
@Eyeroller: Or anything else a non-white-Christian-male researcher might have worked on. A significant member of the team that did the basic COVID mRNA vaccine research was an African-American woman.
@The Audacity of Krope: Good point.
@Ohio Mom:
Vought also wen on Face the Nation yesterday:
Agree wholeheartedly about the epitomizing, if you’re noticing that this guy has got my entire herd of goats.
satby
@Miss Bianca: Word, as we olds used to say.
Baud
@The Audacity of Krope: I guess the not mean, not selfish, not elitist people don’t have much of a constituency then.
@Suzanne:
I’ll never ask anyone to accept abuse or stay silent in a debate in order to persuade irrational people to vote blue.
Jeffro
Q: what are the possible reasons that trumpov keeps showing up with makeup on his hand? Is he getting infusions or IVs or some sort of treatment for his chronic venous whatever?
The Audacity of Krope
I used to be in that camp. I’m starting to come to the view that it’s really the more overt of two evils v the more insidious.
Suzanne
@Baud: How about we just don’t abuse each other?! I will never understand the voters who love Marie Gluesenkamp Perez or Henry Cuellar or a few others, but I can count.
ETA: Republican punching — figurative and literal!
JML
@Miss Bianca: LOL, yeah might do. When you look at how Republican electeds behave, what they actually do in office…that defines the GOP for me, even more than the Orange Garbage Fire. Their elected representatives consistently vote for all of this, consistently pass awful, destructive laws. The ones that stand up against it are few and far between, and are mostly from toss-up districts/states/communities or are retiring (and even then most of them wait until their out of office before displaying their supposed conscience).
This is who the GOP are, and anyone who still calls themselves Republican or votes Republican has to own all of it. For once.
Another Scott
@Parfigliano: Maybe he, and his team, can step up his bloot game, but it seems to me he makes a compelling case in longer forms.
E.g. DemocraticLeader.House.Gov (from July 23):
tl;dr – Always beware the ellipsis.
Best wishes,
Scott.
rikyrah
Good Morning Everyone 😊 😊 😊
The Audacity of Krope
Or the mean, selfish elite hold power over the information environment and people are too busy scraping together a living to take their time having a look behind the curtain.
tam1MI
1. We ignored or dismissed polls in 2024 and got our collective asses handed to us. I’ll be as happy as anyone if Mamdani pulls out a win, I just don’t want us to get blindsided again.
2. Okay, fine. I tried to come up with a logical explanation for why Jeffries was withholding his endorsement, it got shot down. So I guess the lefties in the party are correct on this one – Jeffries hates any Dem to the left of Joe Manchin and is actively trying to strangle Mamdani’s candidacy in the crib Because Reasons. That sound better?
Miss Bianca
@Suzanne: At this point, honestly, I do feel like Dems have nothing to lose – and possibly everything to gain – by taking the gloves off and “telling it like it is”, since that’s what I’m told everyone who votes for Trump loves about Trump. In our case, however, “telling it like it is” faces some significant headwinds in the form of the media accepting and promoting MAGAt framing on everything.
Is that stone wall starting to crack under the pressure of the Epstein thing? I dunno.
chemiclord
@Anyway: The census gives their report on population and its shifts every ten years, and that can change how many reps a state has, which prompts redistricting.
But hypothetically, a state can redistrict whenever they want. State governments really only were reluctant to do so because they were afraid of appearing so nakedly partisan.
Now, the MAGAt hordes have shown them they have nothing to fear on that score, that being so nakedly partisan is actually a boon to their efforts.
Another Scott
@Jeffro: Bruises on oldsters can take a long time to heal, and look very icky.
Uberman 47 doesn’t like looking like an oldster.
Maybe?
Dunno.
Best wishes,
Scott.
jonas
@The Audacity of Krope: Evangelicals would find a way to argue that offering children up to Moloch is actually *approved* by the Bible. They’ve already convinced millions that Jesus’s true message was “fuck the poor and marginalized,” so why not?
schrodingers_cat
@Miss Bianca: I haven’t seen it either. FWIW. All is see is the left trying to sandbag our standard bearer from Clinton to Biden and everyone in between. No one is pure enough for them.
All the leftist kvetching about drones, completely disappeared after Trump was elected. I can come up with many examples as I am sure you can too.
Baud
@The Audacity of Krope:
That explains Republicans. I really don’t see intra-party contests to be very related to control over the information environment. Nothing’s perfect, but if the “good” faction were popular, they would win their fair share of primaries and elections.
Baud
@Suzanne:
Good in theory. Not enforceable IMHO.
Glidwrith
@Shakti: Shitgibbon committed a crime by embezzling Congressional funds and now he’s asking the thugs to make it legal.
scav
@Baud: What?! The most important thing in the election isn’t how I am treated by each and every person at all time in all instances? That my exact tactics and targets etcetera are adopted by all professional and amateur politicians instantly and with all due deference to my predilections for attractive spokesmodels oh, and not to forget, clear attributions to me as the critical core demographic and originator of message? Horrors! I’m getting vapors from all the oppression being endured.
Suzanne
@Miss Bianca: I am skeptical-but-hopeful on the Epstein stuff. Honestly, even if his support just….. erodes slowly, that’s good. If his cult gets a little smaller and too cynical to vote next time, that’s good for us. We should take the W.
I remember thinking, back in the first Reign of Error, that within a few years…… you wouldn’t be able to find anyone who would openly admit to voting for him. Not that these people would become Dems, by any means. Just…. embarrassed. And it would feel like it was all just a Big Bad Dream, and no one ever supported it!
TS
@Anyway:
When you can’t win fair, gerrymander and limit voting opportunities for your opposition.
Scout211
Thank you.
Democrats dissing each other and our politicians online is something that I hear often here because so many jackals are very online. I would never know about most of it if I didn’t read it here. I don’t do social media.
As we get closer to the mid-terms, it might be good to see Democratic voters in a broader sense, outside of social media and the very online community, IMHO.
One personal example: I live in a very red county in California and the Democratic voters I met here (few and far between) read the NYT daily and think David Brooks is brilliant. None are very online but all will vote for the Democrat. The local Democratic Party group works very hard every two years to try to defeat the odious Rep. Tom McClintock but would never call themselves progressives. We need all votes and we all need to learn how to count.
Omnes Omnibus
@tam1MI:
The choice isn’t binary between those two options. His reasons could be strategic, tactical, personal, and/or some combination of those.
Baud
@Omnes Omnibus:
Still time to make a choice. Election is not until November.
Suzanne
@Baud: You’re right, it isn’t enforceable. I would prefer it to become “a norm”. As valued commenter Geminid frequently reminds us, there’s probably less daylight between the left and center wings of the party than we imagine. I would hope we could all be very Eyes-On-The-Prize-y about things and really try to avoid alienating potential allies.
Professor Bigfoot
@Suzanne: That’s the real issue, though, isn’t it?
The “more progressive” electeds have gotten there and understand that WE’RE ALL IN FAVOR OF PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT; where we mostly disagree is in how do we get there.
The electeds understand that things have to be done through a system that’s intentionally tilted against us and through an opposition that frankly hates us; that performative hijinks get headlines and clicks and eyeballs but don’t accomplish very much.
I strongly suspect, though, that some of the “lefties” (if not most of them) are really just examples of the Bigfoot Dictum:
”There is no horseshoe. There is only white people who are at best uncomfortable with any power being held in Black hands. Those white people are at all points of the ‘left-right’ spectrum.”
trollhattan
Whatever this means
Watch out Vlad, Donny
madirked.The Audacity of Krope
I would say the information environment borders on decisive on our side. The media can choose to sink or life a candidacy at any time. Even when candidates are removed from consideration, the information environment affects how we think about issues and our needs.
The media and most other institutional power is always behind the most money-connected and influenced Democrat right up until the moment that Democrat secures the nomination, then that institutional support lines up behind Republicans.
gene108
@Parfigliano:
No body that’s not a right-wing asshole can thrive in today’s media environment. The media environment needs to be changed.
@Suzanne:
The left wing of the party needs to do what the radical conservatives did in the Republican in the late 1970’s and in the 1980’s, if they want a seat at the table.
They need to organize. The radical right did this through conservative churches. I have no idea what the equivalent will be for the left.
They need to run for local and state offices, which is how the radical right wormed their way into taking over the Republican party.
They need to support the Democratic candidate in the general election. The radical right got a seat at the table, because they became good foot soldiers for the GOP come election time. Republicans of any stripe needed them to win elections.
Having a fit because the powers that be don’t defer to them is a dumb strategy for enacting what they want to do.
zhena gogolia
@schrodingers_cat: Has any Republican speech been interrupted by Gaza people?
Another Scott
@Suzanne: 47 and the GQP are counting on the press having a short attention span.
Remember when Hegseth’s days were numbered because of the Signal stuff?
Remember when Patel’s days were numbered because of whatever it was?
This Epstein stuff is only going to have staying power if people and the press insist on it.
They think they can wait out any piece of damaging news.
We know that 47 is soon going to go back to trying to set the news agenda every 1, 2, 3 days. Democrats, and the sensible press, have to be relentless about keeping the focus on things that are damaging to him and MAGA, not saying “how high” when he says “jump”, while also doing everything possible to run up the score for sensible representative government in November 2025 and November 2026.
The battle is never over. Eyes on the prizes.
Best wishes,
Scott.
Omnes Omnibus
Then some will call that cultish behavior and proudly tell the world that they will never shrink from speaking truth to power.
Baud
@The Audacity of Krope:
Like I said, nothing is perfect. But I personally find the media more influential on D vs. R contests than intra-party D.
Even on a national scale, the media is only effective against us about half the time. I certainly don’t believe the media is more effective in putting the thumb on the scale in primaries. The bigger factor IMHO is that insurgent candidates haven’t been popular enough.
chemiclord
@gene108:
The big problem is getting the People’s Front of Judea and the Judean People’s Front to stop letting every minor difference in emphasis be a permanent and unforgivable caucus-breaking issue.
Ironically, there’s a ton of toxic individualism and exceptionalism that keeps preventing socialist movements from getting much of a finger hold in the American political landscape.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Scout211: This place is nothing compared to Blue Sky for elected Democrat bashing.
JML
I’ve been thinking about political fallacies today (hi, nerdy political scientist here) and one that comes to mind is the idea that The Orange Idiot is uniquely dominating the GOP. I see this a fair bit in political commentary both from the left and DC Insiders (who admittedly, I have much contempt for) when they talk about about how Congress is working (or not working) and Republican politics generally across the country.
But is it actually true, or is DJT just more overtly vengeful and public about going after potential dissenters than usual? Prior to 2016, just how often did the congressional GOP break ranks? Even with McCain supposed Mavericky-ness…he didn’t buck the party line all that much. The odious “Freedom Caucus” made a lot of demands and threats, but more often than not got in line and just pulled the GOP further to the right, which the supposed moderate & center of the GOP went along with just fine. The GOP has been primarying what they see as RINOs for 30 years now.
So is there anything really all that unique about how the Current Occupant “dominates” the GOP? Or is he just the most obnoxious and destructive? He’s far more noisy and flashy than W, but from 2000-2008, the GOP was almost always lockstep behind that twit. Doesn’t the GOP always get “dominated” when they have the presidency by their president?
I feel like we can’t let people off the hook by pretending that DJT is some unique evil outlier, because I really don’t think he is, outside of never being held to account for anything he actually says. From a policy standpoint, from a politics standpoint, from an electoral standpoint…this is GOP business as usual. Maybe it’s emboldened, maybe they’re going bigger than they have previously…but it’s not new.
Am I crazy here? (For this, anyways. :P )
Soprano2
@Jeffro: It might be that, or he might be taking blood thinners and it’s making him have bruises on the backs of his hands. I see that with my husband.
schrodingers_cat
@zhena gogolia: Not to my knowledge. Also haven’t heard an epithet like Genocide Joe or Holocaust Harris for the current incumbent.
FWIW its worth the goal of the Palestine protest organizers doesn’t seem to be actually helping people in Gaza but undermining the Democratic party and terrorizing Jewish Americans using social justice and anticolonial language. They have managed to brainwash a lot of young idealistic people though. And that’s troubling.
Suzanne
@Professor Bigfoot:
You might be right, though I have no idea how we would possibly quantify this. If we’re relating personal experience from grass-touching life, though…. I will note that my neighborhood progressive group adores our Congresscritter, Summer Lee, and she easily stomped a white conservaDem type.
Baud
@JML:
If you’re here, you’re crazy.
Eolirin
@The Audacity of Krope: Cool. And so when we go maximally the other way and that works out even worse, maybe we can just come to the realization that the electorate was the problem all along, and that policy was always a distraction from the core divisions around white supremacy that have plauged us since the country’s founding and we’ve never been able to resolve.
Acting like the current status quo wasn’t extremely difficult to get to, and like the core thing that put it under attack wasn’t the expansion of rights to black people and women. Moving further left will definitely fix the problem.
C’mon man.
The reason why democrats don’t support those positions broadly is because they lose them elections. Mamdani has a decent shot at prevailing in the Mayoral race, but Republicans are already using him to try to put a drag on other Democratic candidates in redder parts of the state and there’s a good chance it’ll work. We’ll have to see how much we can use Trump to counterbalance, but he’s in boogeyman territory. They’re doing that because his policy proposals are unpopular with the center of the country, they’re easy to use to enrage Republican voters (anything that makes life better for black people does), and because it’s easy to gin up fear around a Muslim. These are the kinds if dynamics we face everywhere. And key races are frequently unwinnable to begin with, and no strategy is going to make up the difference.
The reason why the party can’t make progress on a lot of issues is because there’s no way to elect a majority that’s willing to enact them in the face of universal Republican obstruction with the voters we have. At the end of the day we still need a majority to do literally anything.
So if you want to get the country closer to your vision of where it should be, figure out how to support cultural change without needing national policy changes. We’re not going to get there through politics unless the right eats itself and causes a self inflicted collapse. The Senate math will not allow it. We’ll be lucky if we can even put the governnent back together at this point.
Which isn’t to say it doesn’t suck to be out in the political wilderness on issues. But jfc, not enough people want what you want for our system to allow any chance of it happening. It drives me crazy that crime is almost certainly going to be a major campaign theme in a city that’s got one of the lowest crime rates in the entire country and that cashless bail might be the thing that tanks Mamdani’s campaign in favor of fucking Cuomo.
But a huge portion of the fucking electorate wants to hurt people, even among Democratic voters, especially those they don’t feel are deserving of good things, and that fundamental cruelty underpins our culture and can’t just be waved away. We can’t, and won’t, have good things because we aren’t good people. We will continue to vote for cruelty because we are cruel.
The fault is not in our politicians, but ourselves. We need to stop treating cultural problems like purely political ones if we want to do anything about that.
Geminid
@chemiclord: Also, redistricting laws vary state to state. Some states’ constitutions bar intra-decade redistricting, others don’t.
New York and Illinois are good illustrations of the differences in state redistricting law. In 2021, New York Democrats tried a fairly aggressive Congressional gerrymander that was shot down by the courts, with a dismal result for Democrats in the 2022 midterms.
That same year, Illinois Democrats got away with an even more aggressive gerrymander; different courts, and possibly different underlying state law.
Also, Illinois’ Supreme Court judges may have known WaterGirl was at her wit’s end being represented by Rodney Fuvking Davis and needed relief badly.
trollhattan
@Scout211: Well put.
IMO, which is mine, is Dems need to pull back those w/o college degrees because that’s the demographic most conspicuously lost by them this century, while at the same time pulling those with college and above away from the Republicans.
In case anybody’s pondering why Republicans are attacking colleges and universities, and the notion of getting a degree at all.
Suzanne
@Omnes Omnibus:
Okay, well, then let’s carry on. It’s serving us well.
Another Scott
@chemiclord: Obligatory repost:
It’s almost too perfect*, isn’t it? All that remains is him wearing a top hat and twirling his moustache as he says it.
:-/
Best wishes,
Scott.
—
* – I wouldn’t be at all surprised if it were fabricated, or mis-attributed.
Soprano2
@Another Scott: It’s a good message, and he looks at the people rather than at his notes. A lot of how people feel about your message is in the delivery of it. I hate how Schumer looks down at his notes all the time – that makes it seem like he doesn’t know what he’s going to say, and that it’s a pre-written, canned message with not much feeling behind it. Delivery matters a lot in these days of video and social media.
Betty Cracker
@Omnes Omnibus: & @Baud: All true, but it is still noteworthy that a top elected Dem is conspicuously declining to endorse his party’s nominee for mayor of the city where he resides. I mean, Jeffries met with Mamdani, and he’s still noping out so far. That’s a choice, and I don’t think it’s unreasonable to wonder why.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
Not unreasonable. I have a bunch of speculative thoughts, but I don’t personally see a benefit to putting them out there.
Geminid
@Suzanne: Trump’s base may or may not be eroding slowly, but he definitely is himself. That could be a factor in U.S. politics this time next year if not before.
schrodingers_cat
Representative of the downtrodden is partying in Uganda celebrating his nth wedding reception but BJ commenters have heat for the Black minority leader who hasn’t endorsed the guy who was one of the organizers of the Uncommitted movement in Democratic primaries last year.
Why do the Ds owe DSA types their loyalty again?
Zohran self identifies as a Democratic socialist on his campaign website
Zohran Kwame Mamdani is a New York State Assemblymember and democratic socialist running for Mayor. Born in Uganda and raised in New York City, he has fought for the working class in and outside the legislature: hunger striking alongside taxi drivers to achieve more than $450 million in transformative debt relief, winning over $100 million in the state budget for increased subway service and a successful fare-free bus pilot, and organizing New Yorkers to defeat a proposed dirty power plant. The cost of living is crushing working people but Zohran believes that government can lower costs and make life easier in our city — he’ll use every tool available to bring down the rent, create world class public transit, and make it easier to raise a family.
prostratedragon
@trollhattan: It means he wants attention.
chemiclord
@Professor Bigfoot: I see a very similar phenomenon in the “Not That Woman” caucus.
Like, we all loved Elizabeth Warren “keeping receipts” and how “she still persisted”… up until she dared share a stage with Saint Bernard of Vermont, at which point it was time for the snake emojis.
Kamala Harris was largely dismissed, occasionally praised… until she dared run for President. Then she was shrill, a genocide enabler, etc…
Currently, the same people who loved “Big Gretch” are now grumbling that she’s “working with Trump” now that are merely rumors that she might be entertaining a presidential run now that she’s term limited.
It’s tiring, and it’s transparent. For a distressingly large enough segment of the left, being a woman or any sort of minority is inherently disqualifying, and they get really angry when you point that out.
Baud
@prostratedragon:
If his attempt to distract people from Epstein leads him to help Ukraine, I’ll count that as a win.
I don’t think he’ll go that far, however.
Miss Bianca
@chemiclord:
As I’ve noted before, I never cease to marvel at the prospect of a bunch of self-identified “democratic socialists” who apparently can’t grok the simplest concept of “collective action.” That, you know, just *voting* for the mainstream candidate (ie, the Democrat) that’s more closely aligned with your values, rather than haring off after crackpot third-parties or just sitting it out because of your moral superiority, is literally the rock-bottom definition of “collective action”.
It would be hilarious to me if it weren’t so deeply depressing/infuriating.
trollhattan
@prostratedragon:
Attention Boy also claims to have stopped six wars (stay tuned, the day is young) and called the Scottish windmills ugly. (Do they need kilts?)
Mr. Bemused Senior
There’s hope!
tam1MI
All I’m saying is that the leftward part of our party has a reason they are proffering as to why Jeffries won’t endorse. It presumes a lot of bad faith on Jeffries part, but it at least fits the facts. I don’t presume bad faith on Jeffries part and I am absolutely stumped as to why he is refusing to endorse. Just got off a sentence, dude, how hard can it be?
Omnes Omnibus
@Suzanne: Yes, that is exactly what I am suggesting.
FFS, I am one of the people who has been arguing for people getting onside and being team players during election seasons. I am describing the response that those arguments get.
prostratedragon
@JML: You’re not crazy, because this sounds like worth thinking about.
schrodingers_cat
@Omnes Omnibus: The leftists idea of unity is we endorse whatever BS they are spouting and praise them for being great leaders no matter how they behave themselves.
Look at how Berners behaved during HRC’s convention.
The DSA is largely white group that is uncomfortable with the institutional power black people have in our party. This is the “establishment” and “gerontocracy” they hate.
Gerontocracy never applies to Magic Grandpa, however only to Clyburn.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@geg6:
You won’t get flamed from me. Jeffries has some good moments which are worth acknowledging when they happen but they are few and far between.
It’s okay for the MattY “liberals” to punch left but when actual self-identified Dems like me (as opposed to the strawman that always gets mentioned about “leftists” who always find excuses to never vote for Dems, aka the Leftier Than Thou Non-Dems) punch right to them, it’s always “don’t be a purity pony” or “you don’t understand coalition politics”, blah, blah, blah.
We understand all those things, we know how to hold our noses come election time. What we’re no longer content to do is let the so-called abundance crowd and the rest of the “New Liberalism” clowns and big tech/big donor interests direct party direction.
That coincides with a big divergence in the Dem coalition along class lines. Massive. It’s on display every day here and across Dem politics. While certain commenters discount that by pointing to how the House (D) caucus votes on certain things, it’s integral to how we campaign, who we target in campaigns and who a lot of Dems ignore at their electoral peril.
This opinion is a minority one in this space.
Suzanne
@Omnes Omnibus: Yeah, and the progressive side of our party gets a bunch of predictable shit, too. I submit that none of it is strategically wise.
What does seem to me to be strategically wise is to observe when a candidate seems to have a big and/or passionate coalition, and reach out to them, make cross-endorsements, emphasize how to make common cause.
taumaturgo
@Eolirin: I hope You will agree that they rule of law ando The laws themselves are trashed daily. If the democrats continue the pussyfooting and devotion to procedure they will reach even lower approval ratings than the current pollings show.
Another Scott
@Baud: He really, really, really wants his own Nobel Peace Prize to show up Obama. That’s what all his half-baked cease fires and peace plans and all the rest are about. It doesn’t matter if his plans are completely unworkable – he wants the announcements and photo-ops and his NPP. What comes after doesn’t matter.
Plus, he wants his vig via control over mines in Ukraine and real estate in Gaza and all the rest.
VVP isn’t playing along, so 47 is pouting and stomping his feet.
He’s so transparent on this stuff…
Grr…
Best wishes,
Scott.
Baud
@Another Scott:
He asked for the US to sit at the talks hosted by Malaysia to mediate the Thailand/Cambodia fight, I think for that very purpose.
Geminid
@Betty Cracker: As a practical matter, when one politician endorses another they’re endorsing what the endorsee has said in the past. I’d be cautious too if I were Hakeem Jeffries or Kathy Hochul. I’d want to see what has yet to come out about Mamdani; and if it’s damaging, see how he explains it.
But one thing I’ve noticed about this controversy: Zohran Mamdani doesn’t seem very strung out about these non-endorsements himself; it’s some of his supporters who say they are.
I suspect most of these people never liked Hochul or Jeffries to begin with, and this controversy is a good excuse to weaponize their preexisting grudges.
Kathleen
@satby: But I thought Democrats were feckless and spineless and doing nothing.
Miss Bianca
@gene108: I agree with you, for what it’s worth. Another of those “Bravo for life’s little ironies” things I will never get over is how laser-focused Republicans have been on using the levers of democracy to promote an anti-democratic agenda, while supposed lovers of democracy, if not Democrats, don’t seem to value democracy *enough* to do the simplest fucking things to preserve it.
Like, yeah – if you want the national Democratic Party to take your agenda seriously, you have to show up and vote. And run for things. Not just POTUS, but town councils, Boards of Education, etc etc.
It takes years and it takes dedication. I hate to think it of “our side”, that progressives/liberals don’t have the stamina or the patience or the guts to face that simple, annoying fact.
schrodingers_cat
@Kathleen: If you read the comments you will find out about fecklessness of Jefferies.//
Heh I need to be inspired, so I need a cute messenger, Zohran and AOC are so dreamy.
Soprano2
@schrodingers_cat: Two things can be true at the same time. 1) A lot of people are sincerely upset by what’s happening in Gaza, and feel powerless to do much of anything about it, so they latch onto any action to make themselves feel better and 2) Bad actors can use that emotion to turn people against Democrats by coining nicknames like “Genocide Joe”. I also think a lot of students are terrified by what they’re seeing happen on some college campuses to people who were involved in the protests, and have decided to keep their heads down for the foreseeable future. I think it’s a combination of the last two that explains why the demonstrations have faded away even though the situation there has gotten a lot worse, and why they aren’t coining vicious nicknames for FFOTUS and demanding he do something about it. I think they believe he won’t or can’t do anything about it, so it’s useless to even try to get him to do so, but IMHO that’s foolish.
Eolirin
@taumaturgo: Nothing Democratic politicians do will stop that. We have zero power right now. We cannot speech our way out of that.
The only thing Democrats should be concerned with right now is winning the midterms, if we’re even allowed to do that.
Because absent a violent revolt, nothing else is going to matter politically right now. And people will have different ideas of what will improve their chances, and the answers will be different for different candidates.
But most importantly, everyone wasting time backseat driving our politicians instead of trying to figure out how they can get involved in moving things to better outcome is part of the problem. And if all you can do is vote for whatever Dem is on your ballots, then do that, and get as many other people as you can to do that.
But politics isn’t going to save us here. We need to be viewing this as a cultural fight. We can’t continue to abdicate responsibility for that culture.
schrodingers_cat
@Soprano2: I am still seeing a lot of hatred directed at the Democrats about Gaza though they are no longer in power. Their actions tell me that the issue they care most about is undermining the Democratic party.
Miss Bianca
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: So are *you* planning to run for office? I mean, granted, it’s harder than railing against the “pale blue” Democrats in Denver forever and a day…but you sure seem to think you know better than they do what the city actually needs.
Professor Bigfoot
They do indeed.
They’ll lose their shit if you point out that it is neither happenstance nor coincidence that they are almost entirely white and that the Democrats they complain about the most are Black, Jewish, or female.
I know I’ve been pied because I absofuckinlutely REFUSE to NOT see the demographic behaviors in play.
Professor Bigfoot
@Mr. Bemused Senior: Well, Coach Walz IS a white man, so, “there’s that.”
Betty Cracker
@Geminid: I can’t help but notice loyalty expectations appear to travel on a one-way street.
taumaturgo
@Betty Cracker: Why? AIPAC bought and pay for.
Professor Bigfoot
@schrodingers_cat: Like Democratic messaging, this is a phenomenon that white people simply cannot see.
A shame, really, but that’s why America is where it is. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
prostratedragon
@Baud:
If he really did it, what then would he have to dangle?
Soprano2
@schrodingers_cat: I direct most of my feelings about this at the spokespeople for the Israeli government. I can’t believe anyone swallows their bullshit at this point. Every other sentence blames Hamas for whatever terrible thing they are asked about, regardless of what it is. That’s their go-to answer for everything. Part of a This American Life podcast was dedicated to talking to doctors who have been in Gaza who observed an abnormal amount of children and teenagers who had been shot in the head or chest coming into the emergency rooms there. They had all worked in war zones before, and all of them said they’d never seen anything like it before. It seems obvious to me that the Israeli soldiers are doing it deliberately, but boy in many places if you even say that you get called an anti-Semite. These aren’t Palestinians saying it, they are doctors who saw it first hand! There are horrible things happening there that most of the world has no idea about. I can understand why people would be rage-filled and hopeless feeling about it, but I can’t understand why they save all of their rage for Democratic politicians. I want to punch Medhi Hassan for claiming that “just like Reagan, Biden could pick up the phone and end this conflict today”. It was a careless, ignorant statement that is backed up by exactly nothing.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Miss Bianca:
Not entirely sure what this has to do with the thrust of my comment other than bring in some of my well worn points about urban Dem areas that are run by that part of the party, aka MattY “liberals” and the naked classism that’s on display in what the City does and how it does it.
I’m fairly plugged in here, in fact I had a morning meeting last Saturday with one of our two “at-large” City Council members. She’s really, really shitty on certain issues (but manages to couch it softer than others on CC) and really really brilliant on others that are more strategic in nature. At least I know with her I can have an honest discussion on stuff we categorically disagree on unlike most of the other entitled white “pale blue” Dem transplants on CC or in groups throughout the City.
She came out of the “Run For Something” program and I thought of her when I read your comment above about “stamina”. Anybody who runs for something like this gives up their life, she was pregnant when she ran, I have no idea how she did it. She’s also 20 years younger than me, whip smart and an unusually effective public speaker in this incredibly low-key, nerdy way. It’s bizarre to see in person. Lotta respect for her despite some of her positions on important stuff.
Despite the implication in your reply, there is a large disconnect here in Denver between longtime residents (which includes most of the remaining black and Hispanic population) and the City’s “leaders” who are considered racially tone deaf in action (despite the fact we have 9 women on a CC of 13, one is black and 5 Latina–our one really progressive CC person was ousted in her re-election bid by another guy with “stamina” and $800K in dark money from one developer) and speak in a lot of platitudes but only deliver to the main demographic they care about: those same entitled white transplants and the monied developer interests that have always run the City.
schrodingers_cat
@Professor Bigfoot: As long as Jewish people and Black people have institutional power in the Democratic party this phenomena will continue.
See the comment above about AIPAC.
Scout211
For a change of pace here, activists are doing some good work:
Suzanne
@Mr. Bemused Senior: My BIL also loves his Congresscritter, Ilhan Omar. Thinks she’s awesome.
That’s part of the structural problem, right? How to get someone who may think Ilhan Omar is great, but lives in another district or another state….. how to make them feel included and represented in the Party.
schrodingers_cat
@Soprano2: I am talking about the pro Palestinian movement and how it is affecting our politics. I don’t see it helping people in Gaza.
You are talking about something else altogether.
Baud
@Suzanne:
IMHO from one end of the party to the other, no one feels included and represented unless they have total control.
Miss Bianca
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: I understand the divide you describe better than you might think. If only because before I moved to the sticks of CO, I lived in Chicago. Denver ain’t got nothing on Chicago for the virulence of the racial element in its so-called Democratic politics. (Although at least Chicago has proven itself capable of electing Black mayors.)
Eolirin
@Baud: I think this is more a function of being excessively online
Edit: where the bar being set for excessively is lower than one would think. Inclusion is inherently a small scale feeling. It works best in person anyway.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
NC Senate recruitment win – fmr Gov. Roy Cooper has entered the race!
We need all the Senate pickup opportunities we can get, and Cooper should be a formidable candidate for us in November.
Suzanne
@Professor Bigfoot: My BIL is obnoxious, but he loves his Rep, who happens to be Ilhan Omar. He thinks highly of Mamdani and AOC, has no use for Nancy Pelosi, and he yelled at me once when I shared a news piece on my social media that mentioned Andrew Cuomo (this was years ago, and I had shared the piece because it was about the opening of a low-income housing project in the town I used to live in, not because I care about Andrew Cuomo). I’m not going to pretend that race doesn’t matter ever, but there’s a fair amount of progressive Dems of color, too.
ETA: I love him and he makes me crazy. LOL.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: Forget control some views are not even given the dignity of being heard. STFU that’s a dead horse. You suck is the response they get
Defend Biden and watch the invective flow in your direction. The new target of the leftist ire is Jefferies. Defend him and see what happens.
piratedan
@Geminid: agreed with your take, I’m having to be cautious taking at face value what people who supposedly represent a candidate say about the election, who likes who, who endorses whom and so on. So much parsing, items being quoted without context.
At this point, you kind of have to go back to basics, read what the candidate has allowed to be published via their web site about what issues they are running on and what positions that they have on those issues, everything else devolves into courtesans with axes to grind and scores to settle or limelight stealing or some bit of attention seeking.
pretty much all you have to do these days for my vote is to point to the GOP and state that you are unequivocally against that shit. I’ll deal with the individual issues as they come up, just don’t be cruel, try and make government help those that require its services and we can argue in good faith about everything else.
Steve LaBonne
@Miss Bianca: I lived in Chicago (while attending grad school) when Harold Washington was elected. To this day I am proud to say that I voted for him in the Democratic primary, when it really counted. What a tragedy his premature death was.
prostratedragon
@Soprano2: That, and college protest is notoriously a September or October to May thing. That’s why Columbia has waited until July to let it all hang out. There’s no one much around, and they hope the fuss will be forgotten by Labor Day, or at least subsumed by the practical matters of moving in and starting one’s semester.
Suzanne
@Baud:
Yeah, and that’s a problem that’s a result of the fact that Dems, as a rule, are less likely to have authoritarian personalities than Republicans. We are just, by our very nature, less inclined to falling in line.
It makes us better people, as a rule. But it also makes us shit at winning stuff! God, this sucks!
Geminid
@Baud: Shoot, Trump’s wants to take credit for an imminent peace treaty between Armenia and Azerbaijan, and I bet he couldn’t locate those two nations on a map. Trump might not even be able to pronounce “Azerbaijan.”
Middle East Eye has an article about this titled, “Why Trump is trying to put his seal on Armenia/Azerbaijan peace deal.” The Trump stuff is the lesser part of a good review of this 33 year-old conflict and the attempts to lay it to rest, so I’ll post this link for those here who can’t get enough Caucasus news:
middleeasteye.net/news/why-trump-trying-put-his-seal-armenia-azerbaijan-peace-deal
It really will be good thing for everyone in the region when Armenia and Azerbaijan settle their conflict, but Trump’s input will be irrelevant.
trollhattan
The crunching sound is my eyeballs rolling completely into their sockets.
schrodingers_cat
@Geminid: He tried to do the same during the exchange of fire between India and Pakistan too.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@trollhattan:
How much payola did the NYT charge Kelly to include that phrase?
Baud
@Geminid:
Maybe Trump should meditate the conflict between Jeffries and Mamdani. 🤣🤣🤣
Professor Bigfoot
@Suzanne: So I propose that we let the “progressive” “leftist” “centrist” rhetoric behind and recognize that white people, and especially white men, are the weakest and most vulnerable part of our coalition.
They are the most susceptible to Republican rhetoric; the ones who have a subconscious negative reaction to all those Black people and Jews with all that power in the Democratic Party but won’t do the internal work to understand their own reactions; the ones most convinced that what THEY believe is most correct, that THEIR opinions are most important, that THEIR needs should be first in line.
Until they’ve done a Joe Biden or a Tim Walz or a John Brown and actually demonstrated true allyship, white people in general are not to be trusted.
Bill Arnold
@Baud:
Borrow-and-Spend Republicans.
Geminid
@Suzanne: I have a lot of respect for Rep. Omar even though my politics are closer to those of my own Representative, Eugene Vindman. One would be considered “Liberal” and the other “Moderate,” but they’re both pragmatic and that is what I want to see in a Democratic politician.
geg6
@Miss Bianca:
I’m pretty left. I give more centrist Dems praise all the time. For instance, I love my rep, Chris Deluzio. He’s pretty middle of the road as a Dem but he has won in a pretty purple district. I’m fine with that because of his situation. I just think leadership in DC are terrible and very condescending to anyone to the left of them. I have very little use for most of the current party leadership because they are ineffective on top of being condescending assholes.
Suzanne
@Professor Bigfoot:
Agree.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Soprano2: Blue Sky they get into these flame wars about Gaza and as they say, when people get angry they forget to lie, so one can pick out the sincere but frustrated liberals and the bad actors. I have to say the bad actors really come across as young Arab men who clearly frustrated we American don’t see them as white and think the only problem with geocide is the wrong group is dying.
The Audacity of Krope
@Eolirin: No lie detected. It’s why I’m becoming increasingly inclined to let the consequences of cruelty actually come to fruition. People need to see where their greed and myopic views take society.
Soprano2
@schrodingers_cat: Ok, that’s fair. I think most people believe they’re the same thing.
Kathleen
@Professor Bigfoot: 3 Thumbs Up Emojis!
Suzanne
@Geminid: @geg6: The reason I think it’s absolutely terrible strategy to get engaged in alienating any side of our party is because, for example, we need to get more Dems in Wyoming or wherever. I guarantee you there’s someone (probably a fair number of people) out there who has progressive politics, but we need to get them to turn out for someone much more center-y. (Also the inverse situation). They might need to be convinced to vote strategically rather than stay home.
Kristine
Just want to say that I am enjoying the featured photos so much.
Kathleen
@Miss Bianca: One thing that very few commenters here mention is that there are many reps who have flipped red/purple seats and need some Independent/Republican voters to win (my district OH#1 is Exhibit A). While so many are eager to tag Dems as feckless/spineless it could be they have to be cautious because, you know, they want to be reelected and they have to keep their ear to the District to determine when and what boundaries can be crossed. It’s easy to be “brave” when you’re in an uber blue district. It takes real talent to flip and hold purple/red seat.
Gloria DryGarden
@Geminid: I:think this would interest you:
there’s an interesting discussion about advance earthquake warnings in Turkiye, on blue sky ( env sci feed). Apparently, accurate detection and warnings to the public are not allowed; there’s some kind of political pressure against it.
mrmoshpotato
@prostratedragon:
What is this dumbshit smoking?
geg6
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
Absolutely. That’s one of the reasons I stick around here (although much less than I used to). The group think among too many Dems is so much of what holds us back. I’m happy to support any Dem that can win in my district because it’s a tough district. But that doesn’t mean I should hold my tongue any more. Tired of doing that and it hasn’t gotten us anywhere but the mess we are in now.
geg6
@Suzanne:
This. 1000X.
Bill Arnold
@RevRick:
We might see more of the Tenth Amendment in the discourse(s):
JML
@Geminid: I would not call Ilhan Omar “pragmatic”. In fact, I think she’s about as far from that as you can get.
And having dealt with her and many of her biggest supporters, and seen how they treat people inside the party, along with her shaky ethics, and narcissistic BS…she’s one of my least favorite Democrats. But it’s not my district, so…
chemiclord
@Suzanne:
That’s true… but I’ve noticed how a lot of it is conditional. Like I watched in real time the narrative start to shift on AOC when it was RUMORED that she was entertaining a Senate run. If even unconsciously, it was clear they only liked AOC as long as remembered her place.
It’s not a majority or even a significant minority of the caucus, but it’s enough to swing close elections.
prostratedragon
@Suzanne: As a side.note, people should keep that in mind when considering what contribution Hakeem Jeffries might be making. Those Democratic Congressional cats won’t just herd themselves, even in the galvanizing presence of the other side.
geg6
@schrodingers_cat:
Too funny. I am definitely to the left of you and I supported Biden over what the leadership wanted. I also don’t have much good to say about Jeffries. I guess I don’t count.
Kathleen
@schrodingers_cat: Very troubling.
JML
@chemiclord: I love AOC, even if our positions don’t always align. She’s one of the smartest, most media-savvy politicians we’ve seen in a while. I think she’s probably going to be more influential in the House than the Senate (where she can build more of a voting block and take on leadership roles with committees faster, etc) but it was disappointing to see the old “I’d vote for a woman but not THAT woman” sexism immediately start to come out with even a hint that she might be looking at the Senate.
(AOC has the streak of pragmatism that I DON’T see from Rep. Omar)
Kathleen
@Betty Cracker: Torres (NY15) & Hochul also declined to endorse him.
Eyeroller
@Professor Bigfoot: White men are also opposed to power held by women, of any race/religion/ethnicity. Unfortunately so are a lot of women, and not just white women.
Political scientists have found that people are OK with women in various levels of government but not President. I wonder how much that is due to the fact that we intermingle political and military power in this country into one office.
Baud
@Eyeroller:
Relatively new phenomenon.
Kathleen
@schrodingers_cat: I do also, considering DSA is loud and proud about its mission to destroy the Democratic Party.
Kathleen
@chemiclord: Exactly.
Democrats need to say this.
(Democrat says this).
Not that Democrat and that was the wrong way.
Suzanne
@Eyeroller: I also think it has a lot to do with how visually/aurally present the President is in our lives. All of us see a lot more pictures/video and hear more from the President than anyone else in government. That’s why the complaints about “I don’t like her voice” or “she doesn’t seem likeable” are incredibly indicative. Beauty standards and femininity are, in some conceptions, incompatible with leadership.
Eyeroller
@Baud: True, took several decades after women achieved the right to vote before they started running in and winning elections.
But there’s still very much a glass ceiiling. It doesn’t necessarily extend to the Senate since there are quite a few female Senators, though that may vary by state or candidate (referring to the discussion about AOC possibly running for Senate in NYS). It’s definitely a factor for the Presidency.
LAC
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Maybe, but the dedication of the “swear allegiance to whoever we or Pod Save the White Guys says is the voice of a generation” gives bluesky a bit of a run here. We went from discussing republicans to “Jeffries didn’t say/do I want so I will be in tantrum mode and will not be engaging”
Yeah, the future is bright…
Geminid
@JML: My question is: is it Rep. Omar, or some of her supporters who are the problem?
Another Scott
Meanwhile, … VirginiaMercury.com:
(Emphasis added.)
Everyone chasing the same new thing (Beanie Babies, NFTs, “AI”, etc.) never ends well. Maybe the bubble in “AI” is starting to deflate?
People showing up, and taking the time to understand what is happening locally, is very important.
Relatedly, …Dean Baker at CEPR.net:
Reality always gets a vote, eventually.
Don’t panic, but be careful out there…
Best wishes,
Scott.
schrodingers_cat
@geg6: Of course you count.
I can’t reference every faction of the Democratic party in every comment.
Kathleen
@LAC: I know, right?
Shakti
@Glidwrith:
Definitely describes what’s happening. But I’m not sure it gets the fighting words connotations across to people with a median reading level of 6th grade or people who might truly not understand what tariffs are.
And I honestly think recissions being used this way should make more people very angry, like pitchfork angry.
They are “cheats” and “thieves”
There’s specific terms to describe someone who agrees to pay you money or give you a gift, perform a service that is rightfully yours as part of a contract or agreement but decides not to pay that money or take that thing back. It is not merely being a “cheat” or a “thief.”
[And besides being insulting, I’d never want to use words that everyone might not even know because they are old.]
Recission implies they have a right to take that money back, refuse to to perform the service, refuse to pay that money because the person who would receive it committed fraud, is a thief, is a cheat.
But this use of recissions (in this way) is a thief and a cheat stealing from you by claiming that you are the thief and the cheat acting in bad faith.
Why should the American people represented by the Congressional members who negotiated that package in good faith be treated as thieves and liars?
I associate recission with health insurance companies claiming that you lied on your underwriting application when you develop an expensive illness, so they can take back money they already paid for your previous treatments. I associate recission with your employer claiming they overpaid you so they reach into your bank account and claw that money back.
The implications is that they are doing this because you the employee, or you the person with the health insurance policy, lied, committed fraud, cheated.
Are you an employee of Congress or is Congress supposed to work for you?
And for people who like this trick — The Congress members using it think you’re a dummy who won’t notice your pockets are being picked when they call someone else a thief. Are you a dummy? Are you a mark?
That’s what they think you are when they use DOGE and recission bills to play games with the budget. They’re counting on you being a dummy who can’t read and can’t tell which numbers are bigger or smaller to rob other people so when they take your money, nobody can stop them and nobody will care —regardless of who is in power.
DOGE and Recission bills are Trump and the Republicans stealing from you by calling YOU thieves, liars and frauds. Make no mistake, today it’s [program you hate] tomorrow it’s [you]. And by then no one will help you get away from FAFO.
Geminid
@Kathleen: I think Rep. Dan Goldman also hasn’t endorsed Mamdani yet, so that’s another NYC Rep besides Jeffries and Torres– maybe Greg Meeks as well.
I think most of the upstate Democratic Reps have not endorsed Mamdani either. Laura Gillen is one. I’d probably have a list if I thought this controversy was that important, but it’s pretty low on my list.
Geminid
@geg6: There are plenty of Democratic Representatives to the left of Hakeem Jeffries, and I never hear them complain that their leadership team of Jeffries, Clark and Aguilar disdains them, or complain about their leaders in more general terms. And I expect they’ve had plenty of opportunities too, because journalists love any kind of Democrats-in-Disarray story.
chemiclord
@Geminid:
A lot of Dems haven’t, some of them are for somewhat justifiable reasons, some of them less so.
The entire “Globalize the Infitada” debacle is one of the less reasonable ones, simply because I’m tired of judging ANYONE for their word choice (I had enough of THAT nonsense when people wanted to censure AOC and Omar for echoing “from the river to the sea”).
CAN such phrases be said in bad faith? Sure. Is there ANY reason to think ANYONE in the Dem caucus is calling for jihad against the Jews? If so, why would you think that?
That said, there ARE decent reasons to wait and see. The dude WAS (and maybe is) part of a coalition that has declared war on Democrats and claimed they wanted to destroy the party. Would YOU be ready to play nice with someone who said YOU needed to lose your job and be humiliated?
Omnes Omnibus
@Geminid: Why would upstate NY politicians endorse in a NYC race?
Ramona
@Miss Bianca: Thanks for crisply articulating my vague sense about those on the left not grasping a basic tenet of how to engage in collective action by refusing to vote for those closer to their ideal.
Gin & Tonic
@Omnes Omnibus: Reps from the areas people commute to NYC from sometimes weigh in. “Upstate” in that context can mean Rockland County, although Laura Gillen (mentioned upthread) represents NY-4, which is Nassau County – out on Lawn Guyland, not upstate.
Betty
@tam1MI: To help Cuomo? From what I have seen bandied about, both Jeffries and Schumer are following AIPAC’ s position on Mamdani.
schrodingers_cat
DSA Bingo
AIPAC, Feckless Ds, Gerontocracy, Establishment Ds, Late Stage Capitalism (haven’t heard that one in a while), DNC, messaging, billionaires
What am I missing.
Geminid
@Omnes Omnibus: I’m not saying an upstate Democrat should or should not endorse in a NYC Mayoral race. Rep. Gillen has gotten caught up in this controversy nonetheless.
Personally, I don’t care if any New York politician doesn’t endorse Mamdani so long as they don’t endorse one of his opponents.
@Gin & Tonic: Yeah, I mistakenly thought Laura Gillen represented an upstate district, but now I see Gillen reps a Long Island district that she flipped last year. Tom Suozzi represents NY03 which is also on Long Island and I think he hasn’t endorsed Mamdani either.
In case you missed it, I linked to a decent article on the Armenia/Azerbaijan peace process at #171. I remember you asking about it the other day. The article has material on the roles of regional powers Turkiye, Russia and Iran that I thought was interesting.
The Audacity of Krope
Your marbles.
Miss Bianca
@The Audacity of Krope:
Uncalled-for.
Omnes Omnibus
@Gin & Tonic: Well then, suburban CT and NJ should get in the game as well.
The Audacity of Krope
@Miss Bianca: Disagree. She called for it, personally. Every day, once per thread, minimum.
Or do we just let people slag on broad groups of people? I strongly doubt that if I identified a few named groups associated with the Democrats and harped on how awful they were day in and day out, I wouldn’t get the patience or defense from others that she seems to benefit from.
The Audacity of Krope
Hmm, do I choose the racist, sexist, Islamophobic party that wants me dependent on an owner class or the ageist, sexist, Islamophobic party that wants me dependent on an owner class?
Decisions, decisions…
Geminid
@Suzanne: Please be careful with that “valued commenter” appellation. I know it’s supposed to be complimentary, but it always reminded me of something the Soviets might say about an official right before he was packed off to Siberia, and airbrushed out of official pictures. I guess I’m paranoid that way.
zhena gogolia
@prostratedragon: I spend a lot of time on a campus. There was zilch activity from November to May this past year.
Suzanne
@Geminid: LOL! Fair enough.
zhena gogolia
@Miss Bianca: Yes, absolutely uncalled for.
Geminid
@JML: I didn’t think much of Ihlan Omar either for her first term and a half. But I’ve seen some things from her since then that I respect.
JML
@Geminid: vicious cycle? there’s been some cult-like behaviors going on there too, where disagreeing with Rep. Omar’s positions, votes, or public statements automatically makes you evil, and someone to be attacked without mercy at all times.
Miss Bianca
@The Audacity of Krope: In other words, you think you should get a pass for your cheap shots. And you slag on whole groups of people often enough that I ain’t buying your shitty excuses for why you should be getting away with it. Fuck it and suck it up, and stop playing the “Well, TIMMY gets away with it, so why shouldn’t I?” line of excuse-making. That shit is weak in a grade schooler.
Mr. Bemused Senior
We’re taking you to a clam bake.
The Audacity of Krope
@Miss Bianca: Yeah, well, I don’t obsess over these groups and I put names and specific actions to my criticisms. What she’s spreading is pure, unadulterated hatred. It just doesn’t bother a lot of people here because a lot of people here have deemed her broad generalized target worthy of hatred.
Scout211
@The Audacity of Krope: Hey, Krope. Maybe try the pie filter right now.
The Audacity of Krope
@Scout211: Eh, I save the pie filters mainly for liars and slanderers. She does not appear to be either of those things.
Anyway
@schrodingers_cat:
Pushback against linking criticism of AIPAC with Jewish and Black Ds having leadership roles in the party. AIPAC is an anti-Dem institution and has been critical of D presidents — despite D presidents and house and Senate leaders being very friendly and fair towards Israel. It exists to suppress even the mildest criticism of Likud.
Geminid
@JML: My observation is that for some of these leftier office holders, their most vehement supporters are in fact their biggest enemies. Same with candidates, from Zohran Mamdani to Kat Abughazaleh. I don’t think Omar, Mamdani or Abughazaleh ask these “flying monkeys” to swarm their detractors; they just attract a certain type of man– and these seem almost all men– who are full of hate.
Kathleen
@Geminid: Same here. Not my city, not my election. I’ve got my own election in Cincy, where JD Vance’s half brother is running against incumbent Aftab Pureval. Our mayoral race is not partisan though everyone knows the candidates’ party affiliation.
Kathleen
@The Audacity of Krope: Uncalled for.
Kathleen
@Mr. Bemused Senior: Will the clam bake be on a balcony 15 stories up?
Another Scott
@Mr. Bemused Senior: [ snort! ]
Best wishes,
Scott.
Professor Bigfoot
@Eyeroller: They’re opposed to ANYONE holding ANY power other than straight white Christian men like themselves.
But they’re more willing to accept a white woman than a Black one.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Mr. Bemused Senior
That was the former ambassador, who fell onto an exploding bomb and was killed in a shooting accident. [Monty Python, the Cycling Tour]
I have a tremendous amount of camel dung in my head.
ruckus
@RevRick:
If he had one watt of brain power, or even one ounce of actual brain mater, he’d MAYBE be able to actually have a realistic thought in there. But alas he’s not even a half a watt human. Now of course he’s not the only human with a brain that needs an overhaul and reconstruction, along with the addition of more actual properly working brain cells. But alas that won’t happen in this lifetime. Now it re-whatever actually exists, and I’m not holding my breath waiting for it, he is so broken from the actual human base model that it seems to me that the rebuilding would very likely fail to make any substantive difference.
ruckus
@Mr. Bemused Senior:
I have a tremendous amount of camel dung in my head.
I really don’t want to know how that got in there……
Now I was a mental health counselor – a very long time ago – and I’ve heard of humans being described as having a head full of dung – likely of dung of a variety of brands of dung, and even had one or two mental health patients whom it seems might have been very good examples of heads full of dung, but really that’s not how the human body works, without a rather large restructuring or with having one’s head stuffed up the rear exit orifice.
Mr. Bemused Senior
@ruckus: that one is a quotation, too, from the Tiger and the Brahmin. The character who says it is a jackal! You have to admit, it fits me.
Citizen Scientist
@Miss Bianca: This, yes, this!
planetjanet
@The Audacity of Krope:
That was mean and counterproductive.
satby
@The Audacity of Krope: You’re so full of shit.