Forward Party

[Delphic Oracle]

In my union days in Pennsylvania (granted it was a decade ago), not one person in my shop was progressive. I still have family there and go back to visit all the time, and you'll find more Confederate flags than black lives matter signs by a wide margin.

Roughly the same in central Illinois.

Also amazed me how the guys constantly talked about being screwed by the union. I thought top of the line benefits and taking home $27 something an hour after dues, fees, benefit contributions, and taxes was fantastic. I never figured out where the "screwed" part came in.

 

[Donal]

I always know I'm winning when I get glibness in return.

This you?

Could you fit more buzzwords into your arguments?

 

[Donal]

Roughly the same in central Illinois.

Also amazed me how the guys constantly talked about being screwed by the union. I thought top of the line benefits and taking home $27 something an hour after dues, fees, benefit contributions, and taxes was fantastic. I never figured out where the "screwed" part came in.

Were the black guys getting paid the same?

Also, a popular talking point during the 90s when outsourcing was seen to be taking over was that unions were a major reason. Of course, you couldn't mention that unions were keeping up the salaries of American workers while workers in other countries made pennies on the dollar.

 

[wareyin]

Roughly the same in central Illinois.

Also amazed me how the guys constantly talked about being screwed by the union. I thought top of the line benefits and taking home $27 something an hour after dues, fees, benefit contributions, and taxes was fantastic. I never figured out where the "screwed" part came in.

I was involved in our union contract negotiations exactly one time. Oh my gawd did I/we get bawled out by the guys for screwing them over in the contract that gave them large raises, cheap insurance, even 401k contributions the employer made on their behalf without the employee having to put in anything. Once you get in a union, apparently you're being screwed no matter how good you have it.

Were the black guys getting paid the same?

Also, a popular talking point during the 90s when outsourcing was seen to be taking over was that unions were a major reason. Of course, you couldn't mention that unions were keeping up the salaries of American workers while workers in other countries made pennies on the dollar.

My shop never hired black guys. That way they never had to worry about them being paid the same.

The point is that when you claim blue-collar Pennsylvania is a progressive area with progressive demographics, you're either wrong, or progressive to you means the same thing as conservative to me.

 

[Beelzebuddy]

I'm beginning to think everything means conservative to you.

 

[wareyin]

I'm beginning to think everything means conservative to you.

Well, it wouldn't be the first time you were wrong, would it?

I don't find confederate flag wavers to be particularly progressive, but obviously you do.

 

[Venom]

Could you fit more buzzwords into your arguments?

I mean, I could, but folks may mistake me for a moderate Democrat.

 

[dudalb]

Ah, the "mythical" lost tribe of the middle, it's just that they're not mythical, and they're not lost. But other than that...

I keep on waiting for the huge pool of lost left wing voters to show up.....

 

[Delvo]

Stepping over the troll trough between my last post and this one...

I keep on waiting for the huge pool of lost left wing voters to show up.....

If your claim would be that the left isn't the bulk of the votes Democrats have gotten in pretty much every election for the last few decades, then who does that leave who the DP has been getting most of its votes from?

• If, as your routine dismissal of the left as practically non-existent and irrelevant suggests, you'd say it's centrist voters, then that would mean there's no point to the Yang Gang because what they say they want already is exactly the DP.
• If you'd admit the fact that it's actually leftist voters, then that would mean there's no point to the Yang Gang because that doesn't leave anybody in the "middle" for them to represent.
• Even if you'd call it some kind of combo with substantial contribution from both lefty and centrist voters, there's still no point to the Yang Gang other than maybe to help Republicans, because all they can possibly do is trick some fraction of the DP into self-destructively joining them.

Showing that the Yang Gang is completely worthless and barking up the wrong tree at best is simple even without rehashing the whole thing about what makes Democrats electable or unelectable. No matter which way that works, there's still no even hypothetical version of the world in which the Yang Gang could possibly make a speck of sense.

 

[kookbreaker]

Meanwhile:

https://twitter.com/goodpoliticguy/status/1560612454681530368?s=21&t=BSzzg4xFbkDGrvkJL4DXRg

 

[Donal]

Well, it wouldn't be the first time you were wrong, would it?

I don't find confederate flag wavers to be particularly progressive, but obviously you do.

They may not identify as progressive, but progressive policies like infrastructure investment, expanding Medicare, and legalizing marijuana (and overall justice reform), do really well in those areas. Does that make them "progressives"? probably not. But just because you couldn't sell the entire Green New Deal in those areas doesn't mean there isn't stuff that appeals to them.

And maybe don't worry about labels like "progressive" and focus on policies.

 

[Donal]

I keep on waiting for the huge pool of lost left wing voters to show up.....

Unlike "reasonable Republicans", they showed up in 2020. And waiting on them is the problem. You gotta go and actually get them.

 

[Delvo]

I don't find confederate flag wavers to be particularly progressive, but obviously you do.

They may not identify as progressive, but progressive policies like infrastructure investment, expanding Medicare, and legalizing marijuana (and overall justice reform), do really well in those areas.

Interviews at Trump rallies, during which the Trumpers end up showing that they think like a lefty on economics, have become so common that they're practically a new trope to me. And how could that be a surprise? Trump didn't separate himself from the rest of the party by talking the same as the rest of them; he did it by talking differently from the rest of them: admitting that there are problems (the kinds of problems that economic lefties talk about) that people want somebody to fix (often by the same methods that lefties suggest). If the same kinds of ideas & feelings as those expressed by Bernie fans weren't also common in "red" territory, Trump couldn't have gotten where he got.

The real differences between "red" and "blue" territory aren't on economic thinking at all. They're on social issues. Actual racists & homophobes & conspiracy theorists & such exist, and some lefties' fixation on harassing people who aren't that with bigoted false accusations of being that have created a third group, opposing the left just because the left's behavior on those subjects has proven themselves pointlessly hostile & untrustworthy. (...which might even have been increasing the numbers of the real thing, too, based on the principle that the side that's always lying to them about everything must not have the truth on its side in general.)

That's why Republican attacks on lefties nearly always focus on their behavior on these issues, not on differences in economic thinking; they know that they can win that way because the country's more evenly split on these subjects but pretty solidly left on economics. It's also why, when Republicans do talk about economics, lefty commentators sometimes end up laughing at how far left those Republicans sound while they're on that subject.

* * *

Also, the fact that most of the country is solidly left on economics wasn't even part of the quote that the trolls dishonestly took off with on this tangent in the first place:

If the basic idea had any popular support, then support would be the popular reaction to it. It isn't, which shows that it doesn't.

The fact that nothing the Yang Gang has said has reflected popular thinking at all doesn't depend on the popularity of left-wing thinking. It remains true regardless of what else is popular instead or how evenly split the country is between two or more other things instead. No matter what else is or isn't popular instead, or what anybody might say about the left or the right or the balance between them in this country, there's just never, within the last few decades at least, been a popular demand for middlism. It is, and has only been all along, a figment of ignorant politicians' imaginations at best. And the reaction to the Yang Gang demonstrates that.

 

[TragicMonkey]

Perhaps the left should adopt a new tactic of having reasonable policy goals but couching them in inflammatory, thought-terminating cliches? Scream about "freedom" when they want to expand Medicare to all, foam at the mouth over "families" when they want to raise the capital gains tax. The stupid portion of the population has demonstrated enormous voting power, perhaps they should simply be tricked into doing smart things by having them explained in profoundly stupid ways? Let's put the "Can" back into "American!" (by tightening regulation on investment banking) because FREEEEEEDOMMMMMMMMMMMMM! (is sensible data-driven measures with demonstrable KPIs).

 

[Delphic Oracle]

Meanwhile:

https://twitter.com/goodpoliticguy/status/1560612454681530368?s=21&t=BSzzg4xFbkDGrvkJL4DXRg

https://twitter.com/blackosiris87/status/1560622289078865920?t=7DpVsfSmfcejF1Nomduc9Q&s=19

"Abortion? Forward
Guns? Forward
Corporate money influencing the political process? Forward
Preventing Climate change? Forward
Nuclear disarmament? Forward
WWIII? Forward"

But seriously, their immediate goals are ranked choice voting, nonpartisan primaries, and independent redistricting.

All things needed to make a third party viable.

Which they can't implement until they are in power.

Alternative paths to power involve getting people interested.

Their immediate goals are ranked choice voting, nonpartisan primaries, and independent redistricting.

All things I agree with. Not really high-priority "kitchen table" everyday problems, however...

 

[Delvo]

Perhaps the left should adopt a new tactic of having reasonable policy goals but couching them in inflammatory, thought-terminating cliches? Scream about "freedom" when they want to expand Medicare to all, foam at the mouth over "families" when they want to raise the capital gains tax.

They've been doing something like that for years. Unfortunately, they chose entirely hostile, negative, accusational thought-terminating clichés that push people away instead of positive, affirming/inspiring thought-terminating clichés that could bring people together.

(...and then they brilliantly doubled down on it when called on it, coming up with excuses for their mind-reading claims that just amounted to "why yes, we can in fact read your minds", such as the "dog-whistle" addendum.)

 

[Susheel]

I am a "Centrist" who freely admits the GOP has gone stark raving mad.
I just don't think that to go bonkers in the opposite direction is a answer.

And yet you will continue to scream communism the moment issues about access to healthcare and other socialised interventions are brought up... Let's face it, your "centre" Is still quite a distance away on the right.

 

[Donal]

https://twitter.com/blackosiris87/status/1560622289078865920?t=7DpVsfSmfcejF1Nomduc9Q&s=19

"Abortion? Forward
Guns? Forward
Corporate money influencing the political process? Forward
Preventing Climate change? Forward
Nuclear disarmament? Forward
WWIII? Forward"

But seriously, their immediate goals are ranked choice voting, nonpartisan primaries, and independent redistricting.

All things needed to make a third party viable.

Which they can't implement until they are in power.

Alternative paths to power involve getting people interested.

Their immediate goals are ranked choice voting, nonpartisan primaries, and independent redistricting.

All things I agree with. Not really high-priority "kitchen table" everyday problems, however...

They also aren't issues that would be addressed at the federal level. At least, not at first. Maine already has ranked choice voting with instant runoff and NYC uses it for primaries.

And there is nothing to say they can't be "kitchen table issues".

 

[wareyin]

They may not identify as progressive, but progressive policies like infrastructure investment, expanding Medicare, and legalizing marijuana (and overall justice reform), do really well in those areas. Does that make them "progressives"? probably not. But just because you couldn't sell the entire Green New Deal in those areas doesn't mean there isn't stuff that appeals to them.

And maybe don't worry about labels like "progressive" and focus on policies.

I mean, other than their hyper-agressive hatred towards infrastructure investment (seriously, say "build back better" and you'll get them frothing at the mouth in rage), expanding Medicare (all tax is theft! How're we gunna pay for it??!?!?), and justice reform (sure, defund the police polls really well up there), blue collar Pennsylvanians are really supportive of these policies.


I skipped over legalizing marijuana because that's popular even among conservatives. It seems like only GOP politicians who are against legalization currently, but if FOX/Newsmaxx/OANN ever decide to become anti-weed then so will the majority of conservatives. Including those blue-collar union workers you have zero experience with but know so well.

 

[wareyin]

Stepping over the troll trough between my last post and this one...If your claim would be that the left isn't the bulk of the votes Democrats have gotten in pretty much every election for the last few decades, then who does that leave who the DP has been getting most of its votes from?

Ah, yes, 'the bulk of Dem voters are the far left, they just tend to vote for the center left candidates' nugget that gets trotted out without any introspection every time this discussions comes around again.