BlitzoTheOisSilent

Shocker.

Ok, but think about those policies, and think about how much they actually affect the average American. Not the white collar worker making clost to six figures working from home with solid benefits, retirement, etc.

Green energy

He's done a fair amount, but Harris blew this when she reversed her stance on fracking. We're using more renewable energy, but we're still heavily dependent on fossil fuels.

EVs

Biden did EVs? Idk what that means, but, ok, first, most Americans still can't afford an electric vehicle, and the charging infrastructure is incredibly lackluster outside of major metro area. Even with any rebates or tax incentives, I don't know anyone in my social circle who can afford a new EV, and we're definitely all average American.

So the average American wasn't affected by this, at least not in a way that they can directly observe, which is important.

IRA

40% of Americans can't afford an emergency car repair, and over 30% have a negative net worth. Doesn't sound to me like a good number of Americans can afford to contribute to an IRA, but even then, I haven't heard about this or at least don't remember, and I actually pay attention to politics. So it likely wasn't on the minds of most Americans.

Student debt relief

This one I thought would carry him more, but I don't remember the Dems pounding this home the last few weeks. Regardless, yes, Biden has done student debt relief, but not to the extent he promised, and regardless of the reasons, that's what voters remember.

Could also throw in there that there was a lot of animosity around student debt relief when no relief has been offered (or even really discussed) for credit card debt incurred during the Pandemic. That's something Biden could have addressed and didn't, and neither did Harris.

non-compete clauses being banned via FDA

This was a win, I'll give Biden that, but this doesn't affect the majority of average Americans. I've never worked a job where I signed a non-compete, and the only people I do work in tech or engineering.

Again, a win for Biden, but not a flashy one, and one that people clearly quickly forgot about.

Pact Act

My only criticism of this one is the fact it was passed, and then disappeared from public discourse. It's been at least a couple years since it was passed, so it likely just fell from people's memories, which is unfortunate.

supporting Ukraine

There was congressional fuckery around this though, and the support hasn't always been as much as the American people want to provide.

Though, I think alongside Israel, aid to Ukraine was actually a detriment. Why can we send Israel whatever with no strings attached or Congressional approval, but we can't send a bolt to Ukraine without a majority across the government?

I understand the intricacies of those two aid situations, but does the average American? Probably not.

The left is done. No one is going to run a left platform for fucking decades. Because the left never shows up, or doesn’t exist.

I find this funny, that it's always the left's fault for not supporting centrist, status quo candidates. I'm genuinely asking, has the DNC ever, ever, run a true, progressive candidate for the presidency? I mean, seriously, have they ever done it?

Because in my memory, they haven't, they just keep trying these centrist candidates, and they keep losing, but then keep blaming the left for not supporting them while they move slightly more right.

Why am I such a radical on this platform for thinking, or even suggesting, that maybe the Democrats need to move left for once. Maybe try a progressive candidate and see if you motivate people to vote for someone, instead of expecting them to come out and vote against someone.

Oh it's an absolute joke. The most recent is a guy speaking to me like I'm a misguided child who was fooled into spending my fun money on a rock.

No, dude, the Democratic Party isn't progressive, and I'm tired of them demanding my vote while giving me the finger and making no progress. I still voted Harris, begrudgingly, but I've been "had" and "need to go rest and come back when I feel better."

She ran a shit campaign and lost, and her policies offered little to the average American beyond "not fascism," I'm not misguided, her and the Democrats fucked up. Like they always do.

You were had.

It's people like you that just prove my point.

I voted for Harris. I wasn't "had."

We needed to delay fascism four more years to get a progressive or socialist candidate in the next Democratic primary.

Yeah, I'm fucking tired of hearing this. Y'know what could've delayed fascism and turned out the vote? Any measurable progress for the average American over the last four years.

You're so oblivious to it, and you act like you're the only one who actually gets it. You think Biden's mental acuity dropped overnight in July?

The DNC was well aware of his declining mental health well before that, well before the primaries. And they hid it, and actively chose to hide it from the country, all while acting like all was completely fine. Then they waited for the debate, saw it went disastrously, and then decided it'd be best to run another candidate. Except, le gasp, there is not enough time to run a full primary! Oh no! What do we do?!

Eh, we'll just run the VP, and we'll run her on a centrist platform to try and win over Republicans. Yeah, yeah... That'll do it.

Where was Bernie in that discussion? Or better yet, how did it go trying to get Bernie as the candidate in 2016? I distinctly remember the DNC acting completely above board the entire time, listening to their constituents, and running a progressive campaign tha-

Oh, wait, no, that's all a lie. Historically, factually, it was a lie. The DNC has made it clear they will not, ever, support a progressive candidate. They showed us that in 2016, they showed us in 2020, and even when faced with fucking fascism, they refused to run a progressive platform in 2024.

This time, please join them instead of arguing against them. Saying 'both sides' isn't helping.

Oh go fuck yourself. Playing the "Just four more years of centrism, we promise for realz this time, 100%" is not helping.

Speaking to people on here like they're some misguided child who spilled a glass of milk is "not helping."

Trying to distance the Democrats from the conservative party they are and continue to show themselves to be "isn't helping."

Fuck you.

It’s not much different than all of you saying

Wow... So the constituents of a political party wanting their concerns and issues addressed and taken seriously, otherwise they just won't vote for a party that doesn't represent them...

Is the same thing as the political party, who is supposed to represent the interests of their constituents, telling their constituents to tow the line or they'll become more fascist.

Constituents: We want our concerns addressed and progress made for the working people.

Democrats: Support us unconditionally or we'll just become more like the fascists to win their support, since our actions show winning is all that matters.

You: These are literally the same argument, but the constituents are the wronger ones.

All because of a single issue in a country we didn’t know existed a year ago!”

This right here is what I've been pointing out for the last week: Democrats lose because the party is condescending, dismissive, and insulting to anyone who dares voice criticism. So those 100,000 protest votes organized by Muslim and Arab Americans, the same amount that Harris is currently losing Michigan by, yeah, that's just a single issue voter who hasn't even heard of Palestine until a year ago.

How incredibly insulting to people you're supposedly trying to win over while completely dismissing their concerns. Would you like to join the Palestinian speakers at the DNC on stage so you can insult them to their faces? Just kidding, the DNC chose to parade a bunch of Republicans across the stage rather than let a Palestinian speak.

We don’t really give a shit

The DNC to every progressive voter every voting day.

about the hardships they’ll now face because you didn’t cave in and do shit we don’t even understand!”

What shit were Democrat voters asking for that they didn't understand? Seriously, I want you to explain that to me, because from my understanding:

• They wanted positive climate initiatives, and two weeks into the campaign Harris went pro-fracking despite initially being anti-fracking.
• They want the Palestinian genocide to stop, Biden has put no contingencies on weapons transfers to Israel, Harris signalled she only wanted to stop the war. Again, the DNC completely ignored the Arab/Muslim voices protesting this entire election
• They want progress that is actually meaningful and impactful, not these half-assed decades-late measures like the $15/hr minimum wage (should he $26/hr now with inflation), or only expanding Medicare for specific services rather than Medicare4All
• They want an economy that actually reflects their struggles instead of being fed the same metrics that only effect millionaires
• They wanted a candidate they could see positive change in, and Harris returned to the typical Status-Quo Democrat playbook that keeps costing them elections

Those don't seem like things Americans don't understand, maybe you and the Democratic leadership need to get off your high horses and maybe acknowledge that people want to see actionable change and not just election cycle after election cycle of excuses and empty promises.

And just a reminder, Democrats had decades to enshrine Roe into law, and didn't do so the few opportunities they had because it was more useful as a campaign device.

If they just flagrantly broke the law and kept doing it until the SCOTUS and others actually stopped them, the dems would be far more popular than just throwing their hands up and saying "better things aren't possible.

This is basically what FDR did with a lot of his social and work programs during his presidency. He'd establish an agency or authority or whatever, regardless of the legality, and by the time the court's or whoever made the decision to close it, they'd have 5 others going simultaneously, and/or they'd make another one. And the process would start all over again.

First of all, do not tell me that I've been "duped" or don't understand the situation, because I could say the exact same of you thinking the parties are not the same. And to be clear, I did not claim they're both the same side, in fact, if you go back and look at a lot of my comments from the last week (excluding today), I actually explicitly point out that I encourage everyone to vote for Harris.

But she is not a progressive candidate, and she never ran as a progressice candidate. Everyone here is always screaming about "When someone shows you who they are, believe them" about Trump and his ilk, but none of you will apply the same scrutiny to the Democrats and their party leadership.

As the campaign went on, Harris moved further to the right, and that is evident by her adopting some of Biden's policies (Biden, btw, is still detaining immigrants at the border and doing all of the things we criticize the Republicans for, in fact, his administration actually helped pass a more strict immigration policy for the border). She garnered as much former Republican support as she could (no Palestinians were allowed to speak at the DNC, but they had how many Republicans parade across the stage).

I am begging you. You have been fooled. Please believe me. Again, it is not possible for me to argue you out of this. You have to trust someone. If you can't trust me or any of the other people on lemmy saying the same thing, find someone irl you can trust. That's the only way you can get better.

This is the kind of shit I would expect to hear from a cult, not someone trying to have a rational discussion about the failings of a political party. She showed us she cared more about garnering the votes of Republicans than she did trying to win over progressive non-voters within her own party. Biden has shown us he's made progress, but not to the average American, and not in any meaningful way.

And y'all need to stop acting like Harris got on stage and by virtue of not being Trump was going to save this country. She's a career centrist Democrat who ran on a centrist platform, promising a centrist return to the status quo that centrist Joe Biden has been leading us through for four years.

Y'all keep trying to get your party on board with incremental change while they witness landfall change coming from the other party. Maybe the Democrats need to adopt more progressive policies and run candidates voters want to vote for for fucking once, instead of counting in someone to vote against.

Or they can keep screaming that our voices, concerns, and wants don't matter, and they can keep trying to pander votes from a demographic (Republicans) that will never fucking support them. And, just like in 2016, they care more about the support of people who would never support them.

They lost because of it, and that's on them. The Democrats need to win voters to their party, and this bullshit Republican-lite "we're not fascist and we totally promise this time we'll actually make progress for realsies" isn't working anymore. I hope they choose to go progressive, but looks more like the Democrats will just shift further right, alienating more progressive voters and giving fascism a stronger foothold next election (assuming we have one).

You're so edgy, oh my gawdddddddddddddd

Y'know what... I started writing a whole thing out, and you're not worth it.

Fucking "Democrat" versus "Democratic," for fuck's sake, no wonder we lost.

Every Republican family member except one that I've asked about Bernie has said more or less the following:

I like him, I like that he's not Dem/Repub, he's got the country's best interest at heart, etc.

Then it's usually followed by how he'd never get a chance, and then it revolves back to why Dems suck and repubs rule, or at best, "they're both the same."

You are 100% right: people want change, they want progress, and regardless of how shitty he is, Trump got things done that his base wanted.

Clinton, then Biden, and now Harris, promise marginal improvements to the status quo while dismissing large swaths of their electorate that don't fall in line.

If they ran progressive candidates with progressive policies, they'd pull voters from all over. But they wont, hence, fascism.

I voted Harris, and my state went to Harris. Voted Democrat down ballot.

Guess that makes me a Trump voter. 🤷‍♀️

But if you point this out on Lemmy, you're a MAGA Trumper with six Trump dildos shoved up your ass and a fetish for fascism.