2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumPoliticusUsa: "Democrats Beware: Ideological Purity is Un-Democratic"
Ideological purity the idea that following only a prescribed set of political doctrines bestows legitimacy is inherently un-democratic, and Democrats must avoid the trap Republicans fell into when they allowed their own moderates and centrists to go the way of the buffalo.
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Perhaps they havent thought of the millions of people who will lose their health insurance if any of the Republican candidates win the White House. They say Hillary Clinton is a corporate shill or has only Wall Streets best interest at heart, but Hillary Clinton will not kill Obamacare. Democrats must not let hate get in the way of their common sense.
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We Democrats are all Democrats. There has always been a spectrum from moderate to extreme and some are socially liberal and some are socially conservative while supporting Democratic economic policies. A political party is a mixed bag and that is how it has always been. We dont all agree on every point, but thats why we vote.
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And that is a problem. A big problem. Either/or arguments, called the false dilemma fallacy by philosophers, are fallacious for a reason: there is almost always a third, or even a fourth or fifth choice. Our choices are almost never limited to either/or, black/white, or good/evil.
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You wont find those moderate Republicans campaigning for office. Today, these folks are called RINOs Republicans in Name Only. Democrats want to be cautious about applying similar labels to their fellow Democrats.
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The problem is not the wildly variant views we hold, but those who insist that they, and only they, are the real Democrats, the champions of ideological purity in the party where it can never be allowed to exist.
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Its not an easy job, being democratic, but because one party as already given up on the dream of America does not mean we should do the same.
http://www.politicususa.com/2016/04/19/democrats-beware-ideological-purity-un-democratic.html
Cha
(297,285 posts)Thank you, Surya~
Surya Gayatri
(15,445 posts)We are doomed to be forever labelled as heretics under the Sanders Inquisition.
Cha
(297,285 posts)Well, maybe some. lol
vintx
(1,748 posts)that the DLC started and the Turd Way dems are continuing.
All those "but hillary is the most liberal" claims don't mean CRAP when she is in favor of regime change, fracking, "clean coal", etc etc etc ad nauseam.
Surya Gayatri
(15,445 posts)baldguy
(36,649 posts)Kittycat
(10,493 posts)Look at North Carolina! Prime example. Heck, we even have some in my own state of IL doing stupid shit to either benefit themselves or republican efforts. And look at Payday Debbie. Not only has she supported her Republican over promoting Democrats, she's trying to push Payday Loans for goodness sakes!
So yes, be very, very aware of anyone trying to usurp the label of Democrat by staking claim under the Democratic party's big tent, while enjoying the same protections siding with republicans class values.
Response to Surya Gayatri (Original post)
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Marrah_G
(28,581 posts)Surya Gayatri
(15,445 posts)Doctrinaire ideologues do not bring much to the conversation except pronouncements and condemnations.
Calling people "Democratic wh_res" does not tend to foster exchange, much less positive action.
Bluenorthwest
(45,319 posts)All of this from the folks whose candidate claims Ron and Nancy Reagan were the heroes of the AIDS crisis......
CobaltBlue
(1,122 posts)The truth is painful, Surya!
intheflow
(28,476 posts)I hear a lot of Clinton supporters talking about how Sanders supporters aren't "real" Democrats. Sounds like a party purity standard to me.
Surya Gayatri
(15,445 posts)farleftlib
(2,125 posts)I wish I had a nickel for every time I read on this site how Sanders isn't a real Democrat, even though he caucused with them his entire career. They have no room to talk at Camp Weathervane.
CobaltBlue
(1,122 posts)I hear a lot of Clinton supporters talking about how Sanders supporters aren't "real" Democrats. Sounds like a party purity standard to me.
It's a head game.
Think of the two parties like being in an abusive household.
Daddy takes care of the physical.
Mommy takes care of the psychological.
Daddy is the Republican Party.
Mommy is the Democratic Party.
People have to decide for themselves.
I'm an independent who feels no requirement to have to choose between the two. And 2016 has been a great year with exposing the corruption of how this Democratic Party operates. It was long overdue. And so, too, all those Hillary voters who claimed, during the 2000s, that they were angry over the war in Iraq.
KittyWampus
(55,894 posts)you might not fully agree with regarding strategies/goals.
It means patience.
It means hard work.
It means embracing other people, listening to their voices validating their concerns.
Surya Gayatri
(15,445 posts)all american girl
(1,788 posts)Baitball Blogger
(46,732 posts)policy to changes in a corrupt process?
How do you think neo-liberals get things done? All the decisions are made at the leadership position where individuals are induced, and the people they represent get screwed over and over again.
The big tent concept no longer exists.
Surya Gayatri
(15,445 posts)Declaring your "Independence" from that organization, and then standing outside the halls of power screaming that you have no voice, is truly self-defeating.
Baitball Blogger
(46,732 posts)And when someone dismisses your p.o.v. because you don't fit into their square pegs, you get disenfranchised.
What you are saying is that there are only two parties, and if you don't work within their system, you don't exist. But what happens if the local party leaders are corrupt? And the national level leader encourages the way they induce each other to separate their interests from the interests of the people they are supposed to represent? All this for the appearance of facilitating decisions to make it look like they are getting things done?
Here's a question for you. What happens when there are more independents in this country than there are Republicans and Democrats combined? At what point do you begin to realize that we are very stuck in a primary process that co-opts the will of the people and is no longer representing the interests of the majority?
Surya Gayatri
(15,445 posts)and do some mano à mano arm wrestling to wrench power away from them. Populism begins at the local level.
Baitball Blogger
(46,732 posts)Can you seriously not see what you're saying? Bernie is the example of populism. If he can't succeed with some mano a mano wrestling to wrench power away from the established DNC, what chance does one person have to fight the same gamed system at the local level? If you don't have your own cash flow, you can't attract people who are very much afraid to disrupt a system that can get them blackballed and harm their financial well-being.
VulgarPoet
(2,872 posts)If that's somehow "ideological purity", wow, y'all people mangle a lot more of the dictionary than I expected.
Surya Gayatri
(15,445 posts)adversaries, and yes, even break bread with them on occasion, you will never be able to advance your agenda one jot.
Ideological purity does not get you what you want.
VulgarPoet
(2,872 posts)And you sound a lot like another one of those types who would send us to die, without any skin in the game yourself, frankly.
Surya Gayatri
(15,445 posts)Fresh_Start
(11,330 posts)I'm unwilling to condemn other people who have different points of view.
My father in law is very much a lifelong liberal.
Nonetheless he supported the war in Iraq.
I supported neither Afghanistan nor Iraq.
Both wars inflicted great harm on many many innocent people most of which were women and children.
He isn't a demon because his opinion was to support that war.
He is just a human being who made an emotional decision...as indeed my decision was also emotional.
We are not robots...even the most logical of us are prone to emotional decision making.
We are all human and imperfect.
Maru Kitteh
(28,340 posts)Your post was quite beautifully simple and true.
Orsino
(37,428 posts)Arkana
(24,347 posts)Her husband compared Bernie supporters to Tea Partiers and suggested we want to shoot people on Wall Street.
Gee, I can't imagine why Bernie's supporters might feel ostracized, can you? Seems like Clinton's campaign has no reason for existing. She seems to be for winning and against someone else winning. That's the only bedrock principle I can detect.
Dem2
(8,168 posts)The problem is not the wildly variant views we hold, but those who insist that only they are the real Democrats
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Surya Gayatri
(15,445 posts)It looks awesome on my phone, a wall of Amen's
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)as an individual stand on the political spectrum. If you disagree with the party line on too many issues, you don't belong in that party. I think that a lot of people who are on the left doesn't feel like the Democratic Party represents them anymore. Same on the right of the spectrum to an extent, but moreso on the left IMO. Because a right leaning Dem has a further right party option in the Republican party, but a left leaning Dem has no other option.
So what do you do in that case? Hence the rise of the independent self-identification. But those left leaning independents who disagree with too many of the positions of current day Democrats will find another option eventually. Whether it's the Greens or a workers' party, it will happen.
CajunBlazer
(5,648 posts)Options:
I guess that you could sit on your hands and not vote in coming general election.
The Green Party is certainly not going to win and offers a totally unqualified candidate who has run nothing bigger than her medical practice and knows nothing about how to be president except what she has learned as one of 22 Town Meeting Representatives in her town of 34K.
The Republican Party will likely offer erratic and totally unpredictable Donald Trump who has promised to abolish Obamacare and deport 11 million people and heavens knows what else or Ted Cruz who would be by far the most conservative person ever to be POTUS. Both have promised to ensure that the Supreme Court is ruled by ultra conservatives for the next 20 years.
The Democratic Party will in all likelihood nominate Hillary Clinton who is who certainly doesn't appear to be a good fit for you, but is much more aligned to your politics than the likely Republican candidates. She would also probably ensure that the Supreme Court became much more progressive for the next 20 years. She would likely take only incremental progressive steps towards a more progress system, but that might be better than moving drastically backward.
Those four options appear to be your choices. Only you an determine which course is best for you you take.
I know that there is much concern about remaining true to progressive values, but isn't the most important progressive value that of ensuring that the less fortunate among us who are least able to defend themselves share in the prosperity of our country? How does one remain true to this most important progressive value doing nothing and making it more likely that Republicans will take over all three branches of our government.
Tierra_y_Libertad
(50,414 posts)The irony is delicious.
Baitball Blogger
(46,732 posts)Agnosticsherbet
(11,619 posts)That is the greased, slippery slope to fascism.
(it should not be necessary, but...)
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)That's a consequence of NOT being "ideologically pure" or at least standing ground on principles and of having to "compromise on legislation". The "lesser of two evils" argument has left a growing number of citizens without representation and brought us a probable choice in November between a neo-conservative, social moderate in Clinton and a proto-fascist opportunist in Trump. And the government in the country lurches further to the right, while the people are moving left. What's next in 2020? A socially moderate fascist and a classic fascist? That's the trend line of the "lesser of two evils"
Agnosticsherbet
(11,619 posts)It is ideological purity, as is most often practiced by Republicans, that have brought us close to a failed state.
DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)CajunBlazer
(5,648 posts)Surya Gayatri
(15,445 posts)CobaltBlue
(1,122 posts)The author writes,
We Democrats are all Democrats. There has always been a spectrum from moderate to extreme and some are socially liberal and some are socially conservative while supporting Democratic economic policies. A political party is a mixed bag and that is how it has always been. We dont all agree on every point, but thats why we vote.
I'm not a "Democrat."
I'm an independent.
That author writes in cult-speak.
It's sick.
Response to Surya Gayatri (Original post)
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randome
(34,845 posts)[hr][font color="blue"][center]There is nothing you can't do if you put your mind to it.
Nothing.[/center][/font][hr]
TransitJohn
(6,932 posts)Surya Gayatri
(15,445 posts)TransitJohn
(6,932 posts)Surya Gayatri
(15,445 posts)they go off and wreak havoc in the shadows.
They may be RW nuts, but they're OUR RW nuts, and you totally ignore them at your risk and peril.
TransitJohn
(6,932 posts)our families with you.
Surya Gayatri
(15,445 posts)you can enjoy decades more of deadlock and paralysis.
That's worked SO well thus far.
Response to Surya Gayatri (Original post)
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Surya Gayatri
(15,445 posts)silvershadow
(10,336 posts)vote for one side, under any circumstances, even triangulation.