Dem leadership is ass. Rep leadership is ass.
We’re cooked.
This enslaver state has been an ongoing disaster since its inception.
And once again Bernie Sanders is fucking correct
Yes he hasn’t signed on wanting Schumer to be replaced.
Either has AOC.
That’s it IMO. That’s the death of it all right there.
I really wish Bernie would enter the presidential as an independent. Not necessarily as the presidential pick but maybe as VP, given his age. Although if you see how the annoying orange has been doing recently I think Bernie could take over even in 4 years from now and be better.
I fear that by doing that it would split the left vote. Resulting in more easy Republican victories.
Calling democrats “the left” is a bit funny…
For the American Overton window. Of course they’re more right wing when viewed in the light of European or even Canadian political sphere.
Or Asian sphere. Or South American sphere. Pretty much we’re the crazies.
Perhaps. Or he could rally a whole bunch of the republican voters to vote for him as well. At this point you’re basically choosing between 2 evils every election, the borderline nazi evil and the complacent evil. Either one is not getting things done the way they should and maybe a solid 3rd candidate could change that.
Dude we’ve been down this fucking road. Stop trying to pry away the fucking Republican voter. They will vote in line, even if it means voting for an orange child rapist.
We need to move the Democratic party left the way the tea party did the fascist push to the Republican party.
Our two party system sucks, but it’s not getting fixed anytime soon, so use the tools we have.
Primary every fucking Democrat with a true liberal and get rid of the old guard.
Personally, I’m putting my political energy into arenas where actual change is possible. I’m done simping for capitalists.
Go ahead and try but I think moving the dems back to their position during Obama’s presidency will take a mammoth effort by itself, let alone moving them to Mamdani levels of leftism. I would love to see it happen but the rot runs deep, especially at the top. There are so many dems that are heavily entrenched in their positions and as you can see, it only takes a few dems (9 if you include Schumer who most likely came up with this “deal”) to ruin the party holding out in hope of better things.
As bad as the Democratic have been they are far less harmful and already have a sizable voter base.
Some voters will enthusiastically vote for the 3rd party, while other will prefer the 3rd party but vote Democratic because they don’t have faith that the 3rd party will get enough votes and they feel their vote will be “wasted” by voting for them.
I do think a 3rd party would have a better chance slowly taking over congress and the Senate by running candidates in select districts that are strongly left wing. This would also force both the dems and Republicans to make concessions to this 3rd party in order to get enough votes for laws and legislation.
If only there were a way to ask voters what they would do in hypothetical scenarios, ahead of time
Bernie should have started 3rd party when they cheated him out of the presidential nomination. He played it safe and achieved nothing.
Third party won’t work in a FPTP system.
We can pass RCV in local elections across the country, but progressive Dems need to work within the party lines to get shit done.
And he is a 3rd party: Democratic Socialist.
Having two parties also doesn’t work in any meaningful way. Democrats lost presidential elections to a convicted criminal and are unable to effectively use the tiny amount of power they still have. Yes, splitting Democratic vote would hand all the elections to Republicans but they ended up controlling everything anyway and people still don’t have any real alternative. Destroying and rebuilding the Democratic party from scratch would get you closer to a functioning system than trying to work withing party lines.
Bernie lost almost a decade ago. The political scene would look completely different by now (maybe some sort of joined primaries between Dems and Bernie’s party). He had a once in a lifetime chance to really change the system but chose not do do it.
but they ended up controlling everything anyway
Republicans have been completely aligned since Trump came into office. Democrats instead have had spoiler candidates that have almost completely ruined their plans in the Biden Admin.
We should be focused on primary-ing out the moderates and establishment candidates in the party. Yes the DNC always has the ability to shut shit down as they did in 2016 with Bernie, but if the movement is strong enough, I wager that won’t matter.
chose not do do it
Bernie got snubbed by the DNC in 2016??? Hello?
And Biden capitulated to Bernie in 2020 by adopting his policies, only later abandoning them like an asshole.
Bernie has rarely chosen at any point NOT to change the system.
I obviously meant that Bernie chose not to start a 3rd party, not that he chose not to be president.
That the Dems in general and Biden specifically had no intention of implementing any of Bernie’s policies was obvious to anyone who was paying attention. Democrats are simply a part of GOP with better PR. Their main function is to fight candidates like Bernie with “don’t split the vote” argument. It worked perfectly and now democracy in US is nearly dead.
3rd party crushes the other two in FPTP with enough votes. Also, I believe Bernie is technically an “independent”
How did the Greens work out?
I agree that FPTP is shit and we need something different. Most Americans are too loyal, stupid, or apathetic to care about a random 3rd party on the ballot.
We need name brand recognition with people, and you do that will the Democrats. What we also need is a coalition of progressives in the Dems that actively politick about working class issues like Bernie Sanders to counter the moderates.
My point is we’ve needed this for decades, and Dems consistently side with the donors against the working class.
We’re at a moment where both progressives and maga folk are interested in real populism. It could be enough to siphon the necessary voters for a plurality win, and I think we have a far better chance for progress with this strategy as opposed to trying to reform the corporate Dem establishment. They’re too addicted to the money, and will spend millions to crush any challenge from the left. They fight the left far harder than they fight Republican.
Why is it you think that the Dems can be successfully reformed from within , given their history?
Because there are currently Democrats that haven’t caved to donor pressure?
The Mike from PA take finally getting the respect it deserves.
Oh, yeah. Bernie Sanders achieved nothing. What a wonderfully well grounded take. Not delusional at all. 🙄
Achieved nothing? He inspired an entire generation, who were previously apathetic regarding politics, to begin engaging in the political system.
You forgot the “/s”.
You couldn’t be more wrong.
The rich assholes in Washington do not care about us. They are set for life with the best Healthcare in the world. Why should they care about us?
Fuck the democrats. Fuck the Republicans more, but these democrats need to fucking go as well. They all need to go.
Incredibly relevant discourse for the current US political environment
Apologies for reddit link, can’t upload video directly in a comment on lemmy. The information this individual covers is absolutely vital for understanding modern politics in the US, and needs to be common knowledge if the US is ever going to recover from the exploitation that has led us here.
Most on lemmy will already be aware of the basics covered here, but for anyone confused as to why dems always choose failure in the most frustrating ways, this will explain it for you. This is why we need to support actual progressives who refuse to be bought and paid for.
First we need actual progressives to run.
Can someone explain to me simply (and I’m assuming the answer to that is “no”), why they can’t force the insurance companies to compete with each other on price. That would seem to be the obvious “free market republican” thing to do, and a prerequisite for removing the fat subsidy to the insurance companies that they’re currently trying to remove.
Because as usual, it’s a crime against humanity to pay gamblers to rob us of our healthcare.
This is ancient news that will never accepted in the phony capitalist/hegemonic narrative of “insurance” and “markets”.
https://web.stanford.edu/~jay/health_class/Readings/Lecture01/arrow.pdf
Because insurance doesn’t work like a normal product or good.
What ends up happening is they charge as much as they possibly can. The book “an American sickness” explains all the problems if you’re interested.
The ACA was never going to be great. It was the best that could get passed.
It wasn’t the best that could get passed. The Dems had a super majority during Obama’s 1st two years and could have gotten us Medicare for all, but Rahm Emmanuel blocked it.
Joe Lieberman blocked it. Rahm Emanuel was just the president’s chief of staff who tried to talk him out of it. Joe Lieberman was the senator from Connecticut, where all the old money lives.
Wow the dems really try soooo hard but there’s always that one guy messing it up for everybody… Guess we just gotta vote harder next time. jfc.
Lieberman blocked the public option
Fuckin’ jowely Joe. Fucked us.
The Dems had a super majority during Obama’s 1st two years
Nope. Even for the ~60 days they technically had it, they still had to contend with Senator Byrd being out of session due to health issues.
The Republicans know the free market is a myth and the only way to win in a capitalist system is to start rich and cheat. This involves convincing the plebs to believe in a free market.
Mostly because:
A) Insurance companies collude with each other
B) are only half the problem (the other half being hospitals and pharmaceutical companies cranking prices up)
C) Most Americans get their insurance through their employer
and
D) Healthcare costs are complicated because they’re split between insurance premiums and out of pocket expenses and typically raising one lowers the other and vice versa
Insurance was always a terrible way to handle healthcare expenses because healthcare costs are generally non-discretionary and have far too many moving parts and payers.
Those are all caused by them not needing to compete. Throw a few execs in jail for collusion to defraud their clients (the employers), and the other issues all go away.
Only the first one can be fixed by competition, the rest aren’t impacted by that at all. There are too many moving parts for it all to magically go away by just saying “make them compete”. For instance what happens when insurance companies compete to offer the best deals on group rates to employers but then charge exorbitant premiums to employees? Or what if insurance premiums all magically came down but pharmaceutical prices kept skyrocketing?
Medical costs are an inelastic demand as well as a non-discretionary expense. That’s an absolutely terrible combination which means they’re almost entirely isolated from market forces.
Consider for instance a situation I find myself in. I need a certain medication for a permanent medical condition. Fortunately there are multiple medications available (often due to patents there’s only a single option). Unfortunately I’m allergic to all but one of them. That means it doesn’t matter if the pharmaceutical company is charging $5 or $5000 I’m paying for it. I literally have no choice. Whether my insurance pays for 100% of that or 0% doesn’t change what the pharmaceutical company is charging. Further for insurance I was offered a choice of about 5 different plans through my employer (which is a lot by most standards, often employers only offer one or two plans). My insurance is by all metrics terrible, I pay thousands of dollars every year in deductibles, but once I hit those deductibles it covers everything at 90% which with my medical expenses save me tens of thousands of dollars a year. There are cheaper plans of course, but then the tradeoff is that I’m restricted to a tiny handful of doctors who are all terrible and every single medical decision has to be pre-approved by the insurance company or they don’t cover it and I’d rather pay the extra thousand dollars a year to keep those decisions between me and my doctors.
The US medical system is a hydra and fixing any one part doesn’t actually solve anything. The entire system needs to be overhauled top to bottom. Switching to a single payer system is just the first step in that process but it’s a necessary one because otherwise the problem is intractable. It’s likely the patent system is going to need to be overhauled at least with regards to medications before it’s fixed as well.
Cause then those companies would have less to kickback to their government cronies
This was my first guess also. “Legalized Lobbying”
What if all American’s cancel their insurance. Why are we paying these people for a service that they don’t provide!? If I’m going to be sick and broke because my insurance is too expensive to actually use, why not be sick and broke while not giving them our money.
well because 3 times the premium cost is still far below the cost of surgery. i am currently recovering from the removal of a cyst in my jaw that ate half my jaw leaving bone barely 3 playing cards thick in some areas. there was nothing i could have done to avoid it. the surgery too make the marsupilisation to drain the area alone was $3500, with only pain numbing. still awaiting the final surgery cost, but the anastegeologist is $1500 that i have to pay. and the stitches from my mandolin accident costs me an additional $1500.
this is ALL what i have to pay, while i have silver level coverage
marsupilisation
anastegeologist
mandolin accident
Hmm
two separate incidences, one involving acyst in my jaw, one slicing my hand in a food processor, and a constant fight with the auto correct, and bad spelling
Just send the bill to your congress person. It’s on them to solve this problem. That’s kinda why we put them in office.
There’s been a weird trend of negative/mentally defeated comments lately in these political posts on Lemmy for a EU, Canada and US. Anyone else catching this? I get it that it sucks right now but this isn’t healthy for anyone and it’s a bad position for them and everyone else. I hope there isn’t spam/bots happening here.
Just smile and soak up the genocide, y’all!!! \s
It’s hard to be upbeat when Dems were leveraging the single piece of power left to them, saw fantastic special election results I would bet in part to that, and then flush it down the toilet for nothing.
I hope there isn’t spam/bots happening here.
The Trump administration declaring a war on judges followed by spam attacking all the useless judges for doing nothing to stop Trump? Sweeping victories for Democrats in local U.S. elections, followed by a sudden surge in doomerism mainstream media, and spam pushing a divisive and defeatist gatekeeping narrative for the “left”? (btw did you know you can’t really be left if you show any support for Democrats?)
Nah, more likely everyone has just accepted we’re all hopeless victims, and a vote for any progress is a vote for capitalism and genocide. We should all just give up and curl into a ball because we will never win against the unstoppable strongmen. Have you not noticed how strong they are? /s
Asked if Schumer should be replaced, Sanders replied: “By whom? That’s the point.”
But he offered a less-than-ringing endorsement of the top Senate Democrat, who Sanders said belongs to the party’s “corporate wing.” Sanders also said “it goes deeper than Schumer.”
A politician is just a politician at the end of the day, but common sense should tell you that there are still degrees trustworthiness even among politicians. Comparing the immediate responses yesterday to the news that the Dems had caved, should make everyone really think about Sander’s response to this question, and what he’s really saying here.
When I compare the immediate response of the Dem I trust the most to the response of the Dem I trust the least, both seemed upset by this news. However, only one seemed genuinely perplexed, and immediately expressed his frustration on behalf of the Americans who would be harmed by the decision to cave. The other immediately began to push a strategy narrative calling for new leadership in the party.
Both gave subsequent interviews. One used every news outlet that would have him to continue spreading the narrative calling for new leadership. The other, again focused on the harm this would do to Americans. 24 hours later, guess which talking point has received the most attention?
When asked how he felt about calls for new leadership, for some reason the Dem that I trust the most didn’t immediately hop on the band wagon that everyone else has been hyper focused on for the past 24 hours, but it’s definitely not because he thinks the current leader of the party is the strongest and the most effective.
Replaced by whom? That’s the point.
