American politics are primarily shaped by corporations who have an economic incentive to keep the Overton window exclusively center right to far right.

To add to what everyone else is saying, the right wing really controls all the narratives. As Zeppo said, communism/socialism have been demonized for years (starting maybe in the 1950s or so?) And if the right wing doesn't like anything, they call it "socialism."

Single-payer healthcare? Nope, that's socialism. UBI? You damned pinko commie. Rainbow flags? You're one of those neo-Marxist postmodernist scumbags!

And, left wing politicians who don't want to appear too socialist shrink away from such things so as to not appear socialist.

In one recent election, the Democrat/Liberal candidate's slogan was "they go low, we go high." The slogan acknowledged that the right wing in the U.S. cheats constantly to keep what power it has. The majority of right-wing presidents lose the popular vote -- that is most right-wing presidents get less than 50% of the total number of votes in the country -- but still get to be president by virtue of gaming the "electoral college" system we have in the U.S.. Trump broke tons of rules during his (first? 😬) term. The Republicans cheated to get a dispurportionate number of right-wingers on the Supreme Court (the highest court in the U.S. government). Just as a few examples.

That's what the "they go low" part means. The "we go high" means that the Democrats intend to be the adult in the room. The Democrats will stick to the rules. They'll follow the proper procedures for doing things. They won't "stoop to the Republicans' level." And that approach didn't start with that slogan. That's been the Democrats' approach for a very long time.

But in practice what "we go high" means is "we'll roll over and ask them to kick us in the ribs again." More apt would be "they go low and we... do nothing at all."

The Republicans "shut down the government" (long story... they basically prevent funding broadly for most of the federal government to grind the government to a halt -- hold the federal government hostage) over random bullshit like building a wall at the southern border between the U.S. and Mexico. And the Democrats let them. Republicans filabuster and the Democrats let them. Republicans overturn long-established legal precedent and the Democrats let them.

And the Democrats have no plan to change this dynamic. And, who knows. Maybe they like it that way. It's not like the Democrats aren't owned by the special interests just like the Republicans are. Really, the big businesses allow the Democrats to exist and continue to make popular noises and very slightly slow our rapid decline toward total dystopian hellscape while not actually letting them do anything that might appreciably threaten the industries' unrealistic profit margins.

Communism and socialism were heavily demonized for years by the capitalist political machine and their complicit/owned media. Also communist groups in the 20th century were persecuted by the FBI and so forth. As a result, most politicians don’t want to be openly perceived as “socialist” because there’s so much bullshit about it that the average person has no idea what the fuck it means but has a negative association. So, people like AOC and Sanders are the best we can get.

Because the left has been beaten, suppressed, and assassinated out of existence. Sanders represents a small handful of congresspeople that are reform socialists, and for us that's radical.

As someone who was raised evangelical in the very evangelical southern states, I think the American Christian religion has quite the part in pushing things for the country both further right and further capitalist. The evangelical work ethic combined with late stage capitalist propaganda create an environment that is toxic to notions like ownership of the means of production going to the people or the state being responsible for many things at all.

There's a lot of contempt bred in working class people toward the government generally due to capitalists destroying its capabilities to actually make things better. This function is creating a feedback loop that is actively pushing us even further toward a blatant fascist oligarchy (as opposed to the secret fascist oligarchy that has been functioning for at least half a century)

With all that said, as everything for our country is pushed further right the left has been dragged in that direction due to the goalposts being further and further dragged in the opposite direction.

Settler-Colonialism, the highest reaches of Imperialism in the modern era, the latest stages of Capitalism in decay, and a century of Red Scare Anticommunism.

Two things I've noticed about American politics: first, the most left-wing American politician would be seen as borderline far right in Europe. Second, in the US there's no left, because left would imply socialism that eventually lead to communism and that goes against the ideia of America, the American dream, the constitution etc. The entire country was built and maintained on the ideia of being against any form of communism.

Others have already given adequate answers, but another angle from which to view the US is as the very core of the imperial core. You can’t maintain that level of global imperialism and a kayfabe democracy at the same time without massive amounts of propaganda and the suppression of any effective left-wing organizing. The most impressive part is that most USians don’t think they’re even being propagandized.

• List of Atrocities committed by US authorities
• A Detailed Chronological List of US Interventions, Invasions, Destabilzations, and Assistance to Oppressive Regimes (ending in 2002)
• The U.S. Did Not Defeat Fascism in WWII, It Discretely Internationalized It
• Shock therapy (economics)
• World Incarceration Rates If Every U.S. State Were A Country
• Infographic: US military presence around the world The US controls about 750 bases in at least 80 countries worldwide and spends more on its military than the next 10 countries combined.
• Are We The Baddies?
• Michael Parenti: Africa is Rich

The orphan crushing machine works in mysterious ways

Bourgeoisification smdh 😞

This isn't an American only thing. You're comparing to Russia, the former leading Communist power. Not many places would rival Russia in this respect, especially countries that fought tooth and nail against communism.