I’m not in the US, but it seems to me that the Republicans keep breaking norms and procedures, including politicising impeachment and ignoring illegal, immoral and plain bad conduct.
They also seem to be fine with not applying the same standard across the isle.
On the other hand, either Democrats follow new precedent, with even more devolving, or they keep the old decorum and get their asses kicked by Republican foul play.
What ways out of this spiral are there?
You’re not wrong, but I don’t see the relevance to the topic? Unless this is part of the public revolt?
Organising to protect immigrants in your area is admirable, but how do you get rid of the necessity to do that? You’ll have to replace the politicians, no?
And you’ll probably need to be revolution sized and well organised to be able to do that when they ignore any procedure or deal that doesn’t benefit them in the specific moment.
I believe this is the right video. It should go a long way to answering your question.
Top down organization of political parties like the Democrats in the US is relatively new. Last 50+ years or so, and antidemocratic. Look to when the Democratic party was much better for the average man. And one of the differences you’ll see was it was much more bottom up. Local organization and community building is vital. Not just for left anarchist/libertarians like myself. But to any common man looking for a political party to represent them. Leaving leadership to their own devices is how leadership became so out of touch.
Iirc, Reagan was the first to strongarm a party line and establish the strategy of voting for power over anything which has proven very effective, with courts, gerrymandering, and stalled electoral reforms very helpful to form this current opportunity.
But with the current system where it is, I have trouble seeing any such grass roots being able to accomplish much until they gain a majority enough, for long enough to re-establish the checks & balances. Electoral voting and the two party system makes it incredibly hard for a new party to establish, and even then they will get bogged down in the same malintent behaviour exhibited now. At least enough to appear powerless, ineffectual or otherwise not making change enough to keep taking seats, like the Democrats of the last few cycles.
Do you envision some kind of path short of a revolution to throw out the current politicians?
We don’t need a new party though. And no one should be arguing for one. As it would be ineffectual until we change the system as you said. What we need is local and Community leadership for the Democratic Party. What we need is to not leave the leadership decisions up to those in Washington.
Yes top down leadership can be very effective. But not in the long term. Otherwise the Soviet Union would still exist. Otherwise our parties would still represent us. If we want a party to start representing us again. We need to stop making it them and us. And just make it us. And the only way to do that is to stop relying on someone to lead nationally. Start leading locally. With the national parties only duties to coordinate between new York Democrats, Florida Democrats, Missouri Democrats, and California Democrats. And we get there by community action.
Am I understanding you correctly that you’re advocating for grassroots campaigning for the Democrats?
As in: drumming up public support to vote in a Democrat majority, presumably in the hopes of creating a long term Democrat rule where they could address the checks & balances, the skewed system, the dysfunctional ethics and decorum situation, etc.?
That would indeed be a path forward, but I’m worried that the Republicans would counter campaign very hard, and as proved aren’t hesitant to use any trick they can to not give up power.
It’s what historically worked, but is it still feasible?
Not for national Democrats. State and local Democrats. In a red state like mine. The state apparatus is practically non existent. Republicans run unopposed almost as often as they run against a non Republican. Which includes non Democrats.
Small towns and hamlets organizing as for instance in my case, Missouri Democrats. Run by locals, for locals. Who don’t prostrate themselves at the foot of the National Party as a simple reaction. That would go against the national party when it serves their interests.
Yes the fascists have spent decades putting out antidemocrat propaganda. But when it’s Dave from a few blocks over running. Not some faceless person largely supported by groups outside the state. That sort of propaganda tends to fall flat when they can’t "other” you.
Do this in enough towns and possibly get one of the smaller cities. All of a sudden, the state arm of the National Party might hold less influence than you do. It would be rather easy to force them into irrelevance with something like that. Which is what needs to be done.
It is 100% feasible. When you have a connection to a group to a party. One that’s local and accountable to you. They can try to spread whatever lies they want about it. The people who deal with them will know the truth. Propaganda really only works, and works best about groups you have no real contact with or understanding of. It’s how and why Communists and Jews were targeted in 1930s Germany. They were harmless minorities. But most people didn’t have any stake in defending them or knowing them. So they were easy targets. It’s why the fascist today are targeting trans people and immigrants. A lot of people don’t knowingly have contact of any note with these groups. So they don’t know that the fascists are lying and misrepresenting things. Granted with basic critical thinking skills they should know. But critical thinking skills are not something we value in America unfortunately. Not that we are alone.
I think I’ve overestimated the cohesion between local, state and federal level organisations. I was kind of assuming people like DeSantis and Scott were doing their things to further the party line. And maybe they are the odd ones to do that in contrast to the other state politicians.
I hope you’re right, and it could actually yield a peaceful end to the degrading spiral. It’s gonna be a long road though, here’s wishing you luck and stubbornness!
There’s not going to be a public revolt or at least I wouldn’t hold my breath. And besides public revolts may feel cathartic but historically they don’t have the kind of outcome we’d hope for. Not to mention the civil war that’d likely ensue.
There’s no overnight solution to this problem. And you can’t start from the top if you’re not already a billionaire with a private social media network. But you can get people on your side or rather show that you’re on their side.
The real enemy is the same for both of us: the 0.01%. Trump supporters have just been brainwashed into thinking Trump is the man to solve that problem. And to be fair a lot of the left has been brainwashed into thinking the establishment Democrats are the only way forward.
But in the end it’s the extreme right that profits from us screaming insults at each other.
When has there been a revolution without a revolt in all of history?
When has there been a 180° change without a revolution in all of history?
In much of the world, Unions were forged in blood of many revolts.
Nation separation and independence was almost exclusively revolution.
Even the civil rights (which most people have been whitewashed into thinking was peaceful) had the black panthers. They have been completely villified, but the civil rights movement would not have succeeded without their willingness to use violence.
History has shown time and time again that violence works and peaceful movements are stamped out 99% of the time.
Protest, absolutely. And possibly violent ones, could be. But until we get a good majority of people on our side we’re just going to be fighting our own while the oligarchs laugh. You want to start a fist fight with a conservative over pronouns? It sounds fun but it won’t accomplish anything.
I’m not saying we can get to where we need to be 100% nonviolently but it has to start there. You have to build a base before you can overthrow anything. You’re talking about skipping to the last step without taking all the necessary steps in between. The revolution part is always romanticized but all the hard work that goes into it is ignored. That’s how Occupy failed so miserably.
Politicians decide things, but to actually make stuff happen, the government needs to collect taxes to pay for services that are then provided to the public. I think the idea here is to take out the middleman. You won’t solve the problem country wide, but you’ll help some people, and that’s still worth it. Work together without like-minded people locally, be an inspiration, and show that it works. I’ve only been very briefly part of an activist group (specialized in food saving), so probably best to look elsewhere for good advice on how to do this well.