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You’re joking, right? They’re the majority of the active voters on the left. It’s progressives that protest by abstention and vote third-party when they don’t get an ideal candidate. Turnout cost Democrats the election in 2016, then we got Biden, not Sanders in 2020.
Those polls are exactly why the DNC keeps moving candidates toward center. They try to capture the reliably active voters rather than roll the dice on the inconsistent participation of the far left.
I voted for Bernie in the primary, and Hillary in the election. I know many who did the former, but did not do the latter.
In 2008, when centrists didn't get their absolute very first choice, they formed a PAC to get McCain elected. A greater percentage of Sanders supporters came out to vote for Clinton than Clinton supporters came out to vote for Obama.
Running the single worst candidate who ever drew breath did that. Clinton earned her loss.
The DNC moves to the right, not the center.
Your justification for abstention has no bearing on the repercussions of the action.
Progressives felt rightfully disenfranchised by the DNC’s support of Hillary over Bernie, so many abstained in the November election.
The DNC looked at active voter demographics from 2016, and backed Biden over Bernie in 2020.
Abstention does not make your voice heard. It’s just forgoing your say in our current election and potential next candidate.
Stop lying about my position just because you are completely incapable of defending yours.
You justified the voter abstention in 2016 by stating that Hillary was the worst candidate that ever drew breath. I’m not citing your actions, but your stated opinion.
Twist the narrative any way you want. At the end of the day, it’s a simple numbers game. If Democrats show up, a Democrat is elected. If not, candidates move more towards the active voter demographics, which would be right from their previous candidate.
No, I said it's why she lost.
Clinton supporters in '08 threw a bigger tantrum than you accuse Sanders supporters of throwing in '16.
And Clinton was shit at getting people to the polls. Turns out, "fuck you, shut up, you're voting for me" is a shit message. And before you accuse me of being a child who needs to be coddled to vote or whatever thing I can mark on my "centrist thought-terminating cliche" bingo card, I voted for her. Civic duty and all that. Unlike centrists, I can still recognize that you need to have a message and a candidate that gets people to the polls, and it's clear she didn't and wasn't.
Democrats love the old saw about Republicans falling in line but Democrats falling in love, but they still give us candidates no one loves and order us to fall in line. And then blame everyone but themselves for ignoring the political reality because they felt entitled to everyone's votes, regardless of how they acted.
Again, you’re spouting opinions to justify inaction. The reason was turnout.
https://www.cnn.com/2016/11/11/politics/popular-vote-turnout-2016/index.html
Believe whatever lie you want. Under all your self-deceit, you know that a better candidate would have beaten Trump.
That I agree with.
Where we disagree is the impact of Democrats forgoing their right to vote.
I think, along with political analysts and pundits, that it allows Republicans to win and pushes the next candidate right.
You disagree, but don’t seem to have a clear argument, reason, or source to support your opinion.
You disagree and can't imagine any other idea having merit, particularly from your left, so you simply ignore what I'm saying or pretend I'm saying something else.
Voters are humans, and will act like humans. If you want them to vote for you, you have to get them to vote for you. Sitting back and being like "Lavish me with votes, worthless peons, for I am the Lesser Evil" has predictable results. Well, predictable to everyone but centrists who think that's a winning message because it's their internal monologue.
That’s what primaries are for. Once we have a candidate, that’s it. It’s either them or the Republican candidate. Biden is incumbent. He’s the candidate. The options are vote for him or accept President Trump. It’s really that simple.
I'm already voting for him. That doesn't mean I can't read the writing on the wall.
I’m not trying to convince you of anything. You always debate the same way. This wasn’t a debate about your vote. It was a discussion about what caused previous elections to fail, and why we have centrist Democrat candidates. Your self-centeredness makes it impossible to maintain focus of a discussion outside of your own interest.
As do you. When I've made a point you can't argue against, you start arguing why to vote for Biden, and when I say you're preaching to the choir, you call me selfish.
Biden still needs to convince voters to vote for him, and it doesn't matter that you think they should just be happy with what you're happy with.
Do you even remember the point of this discussion? I disagreed with another commenter on the reliability of the moderate Democratic vote, citing the sizable abstentions in the 2016 election by progressives. You blamed the candidate. We’re looking at the exact same situation this election. It’s too late for Biden to step down, and he against Trump again.
Are you really going to blame the candidate again now that America saw the direct impact of abstention in 2016 giving Trump the win? The repercussions of this election rests completely on the shoulders of voters.
You are pathologically incapable of imagining that voters are humans with agency.
And you seem to think voting is some personal commitment to a candidate and not the simple numbers game that politicians use to gain control.
Centrists are so fucking exhausting. Do any of you see voters as humans instead of demographics to be marketed to and exploited?
I’m not a centrist. I’m an informed progressive who leverages my vote to get the closest elector to my ideals that is available. That absolutely results in “settling” to prevent another backslide in policy from a Republican win.
if you say so.
And yet you can't see that humans aren't numbers.
I never said humans were numbers. That was your accusation.
I said elections were about numbers. Ask any political scientist.
Numbers of what?
Strategic votes. Not people. If it were an actual representation of people, then Trump would never have been President, having lost the popular vote in 2016.
Yes, Numbers cast votes in your universe because numbers can be manipulated without putting in as much work.
Clinton was such a shitty candidate that she didn't take the electoral college into account and didn't campaign to all those non-people you despise in the worthless flyover states. They were beneath her because numbers were gonna vote for her instead. Look at how that worked out.
Yep, stone cold fact