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If voters bear no responsibility, do you really believe in democracy, or are you thinking about this as an issue to be solved by authority?
The self-righteousness of this discussion is a problem. Politics requires some humility, which we seem to be short of.
You are misunderstanding how the system is supposed to work.
We have a responsibility to vote, but no candidate is owed a vote.
The government is meant to execute the will of the people. That's why we live in a democracy. That means that the government is supposed to work for you. The politicians are supposed to essentially be public workers that are hired via votes of the citizens.
These public workers are supposed to be a reflection of the will of the people. If they don't match what we want, then they don't win.
No one is owed our votes. They are supposed to earn it.
This is maddening. It will never stop. The democrats refuse to campaign on progressive policies, which are incredibly popular among the entire electorate (yes, also among republicans, see the recent ballot measures in Missouri on paid sick leave and higher minimum wage, for example), instead opting to position themselves as "republican light". They completely capitulate to republican messaging on pretty much every issue (border wall, fracking, pro war, etc), and predictably lose to the people who invented this messaging. And then comes the worst part: angry libs start blaming the electorate instead of the people who lost. It's not the lack of the dems even mentioning universal health care, no it's the trans people. It's not the genocide that the current democratic regime is committing, no it's probably actually latino voters. It's not the fact that the Harris campaign asks us to pretend everything is hunky spunky with the economy, offering nothing to relieve the 80% of the population who live paycheck to paycheck. Noooo you know what it's actually white women and muslims faults. You fucking morons.
Can't wait for the 2026 anti-transgender dem ticket, and the anti gay marriage ticket in 2028. It's gonna be great.
then comes the worst part: angry libs start blaming the electorate instead of the people who lost
I feel like even calling them "angry libs" gives them some measure of undeserved credibility. Let's call them "fucking crybaby closet fascists" because that's what they are.
Try some lefty moves or keep losing Dems.
Money.. the big donors won't let them
If Kamala was a garbage candidate, what does that make Trump?
For bonus points, how is it not the voters fault considering any rational answer to the above question? You may open your book to look up topical issues like peace, climate, genocide, rights, hate, juvenile bullying, criminal bullying, felony conviction, bigotry (don't miss misogyny relating to to "garbage candidate", see above), and tariffs.
If Kamala was a garbage candidate, what does that make Trump?
The guy who told voters what they wanted to hear. "I know you're upset at the world, and I'm going to make it great again."
The best Kamala could do was "I won't do anything differently from the Biden administration."
The constant liar who told voters what they wanted to hear.
You and I both know he's a con artist who won't fix anything. But when voters don't feel like the establishment is listening to them, that's when they become desperate enough to fall for a con artist. Because at least the con artist made them think there was hope.
You can complain about that all you want, but the fact that Bitcoin is reaching new record highs tells me that your average person would rather be conned than be told the truth.
It is utterly wild to me that Biden had to withdraw from the race because he was so unpopular and the Harris team was like, let’s just tie ourselves as snugly to that man as possible. Real brain geniuses on that team. I just read she was relying on a ex uber exec. And it all made sense.
Definitely a catch-22. Throw Biden under the bus and you'll come across as two-face and people will wonder why you went along with the administration in the first place. Support Biden and his detractors will see no reason to vote for you either.
Having said that, the answer to "what would you do different?" should have never been "id put a Republican in my cabinet." I think the last 3 weeks of Harris's campaign is going to go down as one of the biggest fumbles in political history.
Turns out, lecturing the voters doesn't make them want to vote for you. Everything you said is correct, but those weren't the concerns that resonated. To quote Bill Clinton's strategist in 92, "it's the economy, stupid." Yeah, the economy is doing great right now, but you have to ask, "for who?"
If Kamala was a garbage candidate, what does that make Trump?
47th President of the USA?
what does that make Trump?
The 47th POTUS.
topical issues like peace, climate, genocide, rights, hate, juvenile bullying, criminal bullying, felony conviction, bigotry
Every single one of those issues was put to measure last week and came up short to "the economy." Idpol has been the Dem's running charge since Occupy and has netted them exactly (1) election since Obama's win as incumbent. It's just not the winning strategy in national elections.
Unpopular opinion: Kamala was a solid candidate.
Biden was headed to a humiliating defeat. Another couple debates, and maybe he loses NY and CA and we have a Dukakis- or Mondale-level annhilation. Kamala stepped in and ran a solid campaign on very short notice. Trump didn't even have time to come up with a good nickname for her! She kicked his ass in their only debate, and he was literally too scared to do it again.
In the end, she lost by a couple hundred thousand votes in 3 states. She was wrong about Gaza and the economy, but PA, MI, and WI are credibly winnable in future elections. Kamala was not a garbage candidate.
I think you are partially right. For starters.. this was not short notice by any standard. She ran a "solid" campaign.
I'd argue the campaign was flawed because the whole premise was flawed.. moving to the right does not help the democratic party. And the risk the Dems now face is that never trumpers join the democratic party and complete the transition of the US electoral system to a choice between maga (Christo fascism) and republican.
If the democratic party had an inkling that the victory of Trump would be as big as is now being said.. running Kamala was a doomed endeavor.. she was tainted by the Biden years.
I hope you realize this but Harris ended up in a humiliating defeat.
Little bit of A, lotta bit of B.
Trump was the most garbage candidate in every way in the history of our country.
He basically coasted to victory.
Double-standards for days.
Perfection is the enemy of progress.
I can tell that many people in these comments have given up on every artistic skill they've ever tried to learn because their attempts were never good enough right out of the gate.
Why do American voters dodge personal responsibility better than bullets?
Since we are asking questions, why are you taking bullets for the DNC after making the exact same mistakes again. You wanna talk personal responsibility, where is the responsibility expectation for the multi billion dollar campaign.
makes me happy seeing politically intelligent people in the thread here.
These type of threads always suck for the first few days to a week though lmao.
It's kinda crazy to me that a sizable amount of people expect a perfect completely spotless candidate, or they don't vote and hand over the win to fascism.
In a rational world, Harris would have won without even doing a single rally, because the alternative is Trump and his cronies.
People generally don't realize that the only way to get an option to the left of the democrats is if Republicans no longer win elections. But with each "punishment", voters give the democrats, the Republicans' grip on power gets tighter and tighter, with more cronie judges, more gerrymandering, more voter purges, more ID rules, and more propaganda.
So, are the voters, or rather those who didn't vote, wrong? Fuck yes, for the reason that because of them, we now have Trump as the US president rather than him going to prison like he deserves. Of course they are wrong. How is that even a question?
Good luck with shaming people into voting for you. It didn't work in 2016 and it didn't work now. Letting the DNC off the hook won't change anything.
People generally don't realize that the only way to get an option to the left of the democrats is if Republicans no longer win elections.
Absofuckinglutely wrong. The number of Democrats still buying this bullshit is astounding. THIS is why you lose so damn much.
No Democratic candidate has had more support from right leaning voters than Bernie Sanders in the last 30 years. Explain that with your model. It's not just about some smooth gradient from left to right and capturing the middle. We are in a populist age. The people are totally fed up with the status quo.
It's disruptors that win, not whomever captures the center of a spectrum that only policy wonks even care about. Anyone who's chief concern is left vs right is already a decided voter.
Cool, so, we'll see the voters in the primaries going forward, right? Unlike in 2016 and 2020, when they nominated said garbage candidates?
If the only reason you voted for trump as a form of ‘punishment’ towards dems, then yea that is on the voters. You should be voting for what helps you. Not to be a petty idiot.
Who here actually votes in more local elections? Have you voted for the mayor or council members of your city? Sheriff? Literally any office lower than governor, senator or president of the entire country?
The top problem (garbage candidates) is literally caused by the bottom one (voters). There is garbage at the top, because nobody cares enough about the bottom.
Then again, it's not like Trump was ever a politician before running for president...
I am deep in MAGA country (Trump won this county with 70%). All of my local elections are single person.
I do vote in my local elections. I think the problem is actually too much money in politics. The oligarchs support and donate an infinite amount of money to campaigns. That leaves genuine candidates with nothing and little exposure.
I think we should severely limit how much they can donate to campaigns as well as having ranked choice voting, which can help people vote for candidates they like without "throwing" their vote away.
However, the democrats didn't put up kamala against others in a primary for us to vote for. She was simply selected. Moreover, the last time Bernie ran, the democratic party basically sabotaged him. There are deep issues that we need to solve.
The voters aren’t wrong. It’s the non-voters that are wrong. Democracy should never be collateral for a protest..
EVER.