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TokenBoomer

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Why does this keep happening? (lemmy.world)

submitted 2 weeks ago by TokenBoomer to c/progressivepolitics

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Kamala is fine. There's something wrong with the Democratic party's campaign engine. I think they must just be so out of touch, or maybe controlled by too many special interests... I don't get it. But Biden's campaign was a shit show, and Kamala's team squandered every lead they had; and she didn't make any mistakes the Republicans could effectively use (a-la Hillary's multiple faux pas). These candidates provide leadership and tone, but they have advisors who (I hope) they're listening to. Only, the Democrat advisors seem to be utterly incompetent.

I am curious just how much AIPAC played into this election. Trump was obviously their favorite, but they had Kamala on a short leash, too, and I believe that her best option was to keep that support. But if she hadn't? Would the loss of the pro-Israel lobby, funding, and voting block have been made up for by the Palestinian-sympathetic voters? I still don't think so, but I'm also completely dumbfounded at this outcome.

I'm interested to see what the popular vote gap is this time.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Kamala is absolutely not fine. She ate absolute shit in the 2020 primaries because ahe is the quintessential policy wonk that is completly divorced from working class struggles. Her big sales pitch in 2020 was student debt relief for anyone who ran a business for 6 years in a low income neighborhood. This was the inevitable outcome when Biden chose her as a running mate back in 2020.

As much as the Democrats want to pretend they are pro-wprking people, they aren't. They will continue to eat shit in elections until they start offering actual policies that benefit actual working people, not business owners and the management classes.

[–] gAlienLifeform 5 points 2 weeks ago

When we're talking about whether "Kamala" is fine, I think we need to be specific as to what we're talking about. Like, I think running a non-white woman who occasionally laughs on camera is fine, but running someone who's flip flopped on Medicare for All isn't.

[–] Hobbes_Dent 14 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

I think sexism sums it up better.

I mean, if we're just throwing stuff out there.

[–] gAlienLifeform 4 points 2 weeks ago

Except Tammy Baldwin and Rashida Tlaib and like half a dozen pro reproductive healthcare ballot measures won last night

Also, I don't know how exactly we make America less sexist, but drawing a better contrast with the Republican party seems like a tangible and actionable thing

[–] surph_ninja 0 points 2 weeks ago

Yes and no.

The voters open to change of having a female president don’t just want her running on the policies of the status quo. And then the voters who want to stick with the status quo are less open to a female president.

[–] PP_BOY_ 8 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Whoever told Kamala that it was a good idea to go on stage with Liz fucking Cheney and get her endorsement in the final days of the campaign bad to be the biggest idiot/secret Trump supporter in history.

[–] gAlienLifeform 5 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

The moment on the View where she said she couldn't think of anything she'd do different from Biden (which made lots of undecideds say "four more years of inflation and border chaos!"), and then said she'd put a Republican on her cabinet (which made lots of progressives say "both sides are the same!") really epitomized her problem.

Among other things, she should have just thrown Biden right under the bus and gone with a campaign message of "anything you didn't like about the last four years was his fault and I'm gonna fix it ("how?" "It's complicated, here's a fifty page policy brief you'll never read." "I like how prepared you seem!"), anything you did like about the last four years was me pushing Biden to do good." Like, I personally would have been more enthusiastic about my vote for her if she was more progressive, but I actually don't know if she needed to be, she just needed to get on board with the premise that most people wanted something "better" (different) than Biden and then define "better" to be whatever she was proposing.

[–] PP_BOY_ 4 points 2 weeks ago

Said 10x better than I could have. She should've distanced herself from the Biden admin rather than defended it.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

I don't think it's strictly about the person/candidate.

[–] surph_ninja 2 points 2 weeks ago

It’s not rocket science. If a candidate is so weak that they need to rig the primary to get the nomination, then they’re too weak to win the general.

[–] Shatpoz1288 2 points 2 weeks ago

I think one of Kamala’s biggest mistakes was not going to Joe Rogan.