Not entirely true, laws being to the benefit of the rich requires some cherry picking. Dems have allowed tax cuts to the rich to expire, that was not to the benefit of the wealthy. Obama taxed private health insurance to fund the ACA, that was not to the benefit of the wealthy. Free school lunches are not a benefit to the wealthy, nor is increased minimum wage in many states.
People have forgotten all of this, though, which is a failure in communication imo. I do agree that the dems need to fight more fiercely overall, though.
I wish I had the studies in front of me for the stats, but studies done by schools like Harvard have shown that the US cannot be considered a democracy (technically, we’ve been a republic anyway) and has been an oligarchy since at least the 70s. Nobody gets their way all the time, but since the 70s, laws have been passed in favor of the wealthy twice as often as the majority. You can easily pick out examples for any side, of course. Like I said, nobody gets their way all the time.
I never meant to imply that the Dems are as bad as the Republicans, anyway. Just that they act as a stop gap in the push ever right. There are those among them who are actually actively fighting against the flow as well, but overall, they are the party of the centrist/moderate status quo, and they hamper the more progressive side of the party when they can. There are a few in office who side with Republicans more often than not. Even the ACA, as great as it has been, was cut to be more palatable to Republicans before they ever even saw it. What we got is a very neutered version of the original, which I will forever love to remind Republicans was based on Romney-care, a policy created by a Republican governor of one of the most left leaning states in the nation. A Republican who was re-elected and is still looked upon favorably to this day for his actions while in office.
Before the current MAGA party, the biggest difference between the two parties was that Dems largely believed in equal rights and strong regulations, and everything else was largely arguing over the minor details like just how strong those regulations should be, tax brackets, etc. Like you said, both parties still believe in Neo-Liberalism.
Personally, I think the Dems (the leadership, in particular) just don’t really care to fight because they believe they have golden parachutes just like the CEOs when they bankrupt yet another company in the name of short-term profit. The Dems were more than happy to throw trans people under the bus this election, and then blame them and “identity politics” when they lost. They seem to think that nobody who matters will be hurt in the next 4 years and people will come crawling back to them in the next election. And if we still have free and fair elections in 4 years, they’ll probably be right about the second part.
Ultimately, the Democrats have a leadership issue more than anything, and a changing of the guard is in order if we are going to solve the problems at hand. Our politicians are largely old and out of touch.
I can agree with most of that. I’m not so sure where you get trans people being thrown under the bus and blamed for the loss, though, LGBT folks in general voted at a pretty high rate afaik.
Ultimately, there’s just not enough of us, though. I think that’s the core problem. The general sentiment most prevalent geographically across the nation is right-leaning, and due to the electoral college (edit: and Senate distribution), that gets to determine an outsized amount of policy. We can’t not make something palatable to the gop, or we simply get nothing. That’s what they want, after all, us to get nothing. It’s what we have to work with. We can’t magically just change that without the actual votes to do so.
Especially when the Supreme Court is considered, which we haven’t held in decades. But even in the legislature, our majorities when we infrequently get them are narrow, with no real room to maneuver. The thing I’d personally most like to see is voting rights protections and campaign finance reform, but I know that’ll never pass without 60 Senate seats, which feels like a pipe dream. Nobody’s leadership can do anything about that, they have to work within the rules too.
Not entirely true, laws being to the benefit of the rich requires some cherry picking. Dems have allowed tax cuts to the rich to expire, that was not to the benefit of the wealthy. Obama taxed private health insurance to fund the ACA, that was not to the benefit of the wealthy. Free school lunches are not a benefit to the wealthy, nor is increased minimum wage in many states.
People have forgotten all of this, though, which is a failure in communication imo. I do agree that the dems need to fight more fiercely overall, though.
I wish I had the studies in front of me for the stats, but studies done by schools like Harvard have shown that the US cannot be considered a democracy (technically, we’ve been a republic anyway) and has been an oligarchy since at least the 70s. Nobody gets their way all the time, but since the 70s, laws have been passed in favor of the wealthy twice as often as the majority. You can easily pick out examples for any side, of course. Like I said, nobody gets their way all the time.
I never meant to imply that the Dems are as bad as the Republicans, anyway. Just that they act as a stop gap in the push ever right. There are those among them who are actually actively fighting against the flow as well, but overall, they are the party of the centrist/moderate status quo, and they hamper the more progressive side of the party when they can. There are a few in office who side with Republicans more often than not. Even the ACA, as great as it has been, was cut to be more palatable to Republicans before they ever even saw it. What we got is a very neutered version of the original, which I will forever love to remind Republicans was based on Romney-care, a policy created by a Republican governor of one of the most left leaning states in the nation. A Republican who was re-elected and is still looked upon favorably to this day for his actions while in office.
Before the current MAGA party, the biggest difference between the two parties was that Dems largely believed in equal rights and strong regulations, and everything else was largely arguing over the minor details like just how strong those regulations should be, tax brackets, etc. Like you said, both parties still believe in Neo-Liberalism.
Personally, I think the Dems (the leadership, in particular) just don’t really care to fight because they believe they have golden parachutes just like the CEOs when they bankrupt yet another company in the name of short-term profit. The Dems were more than happy to throw trans people under the bus this election, and then blame them and “identity politics” when they lost. They seem to think that nobody who matters will be hurt in the next 4 years and people will come crawling back to them in the next election. And if we still have free and fair elections in 4 years, they’ll probably be right about the second part.
Ultimately, the Democrats have a leadership issue more than anything, and a changing of the guard is in order if we are going to solve the problems at hand. Our politicians are largely old and out of touch.
I can agree with most of that. I’m not so sure where you get trans people being thrown under the bus and blamed for the loss, though, LGBT folks in general voted at a pretty high rate afaik.
Ultimately, there’s just not enough of us, though. I think that’s the core problem. The general sentiment most prevalent geographically across the nation is right-leaning, and due to the electoral college (edit: and Senate distribution), that gets to determine an outsized amount of policy. We can’t not make something palatable to the gop, or we simply get nothing. That’s what they want, after all, us to get nothing. It’s what we have to work with. We can’t magically just change that without the actual votes to do so.
Especially when the Supreme Court is considered, which we haven’t held in decades. But even in the legislature, our majorities when we infrequently get them are narrow, with no real room to maneuver. The thing I’d personally most like to see is voting rights protections and campaign finance reform, but I know that’ll never pass without 60 Senate seats, which feels like a pipe dream. Nobody’s leadership can do anything about that, they have to work within the rules too.