aalvare2

Sure, it could be to pressure the GOP to care about unions, or it could be to pressure democrats to commit to more protections.

If that’s the goal, simply withholding endorsement for the democratic nominee would achieve that goal. Speaking at the RNC, without any serious commitment to unions made by the GOP, goes far beyond that goal, and is again, naive.

A really good way to prove that democrats are more union friendly than republicans would be to commit to more union protections. That's a simple narrative to fix, if they were interested.

A really really good way to prove democrats are more union friendly would be to have a president in office with an exceptional pro-union record, and to have earned the endorsement of at least 6 other major unions.

Not to a fucking union, there isn't.

Yes, but the statement you’re replying to was a general statement on leftism. That’s why I follow that up with “Even in this context …”

Literally their only job is collective bargaining, and threatening to withhold support to gain concessions is famouslytheir most useful tool.

That made me chuckle, you have a fair point. But again, withholding support is one thing, and speaking at the RNC with republicans who don’t play ball with workers’ rights is another.

I mean, what’s the play exactly? “Give us even more union protections or I’m gonna help the other guys who definitely don’t give a damn?” What protections specifically? The kinds of protections given to workers by the PRO Act? The thing Republicans try to shoot down over and over again?

I don’t simply understand ‘left’ to mean ‘democrat’, I’m aware that there are people left of democrats.

Being “Left” encompasses more than just solidarity with the working class, but even specifically in this context, being the first acting teamster president to speak at the conference of a party that is historically anti-worker is…at best, naive. It could be seen as a way to pressure the GOP to care about unions, but they don’t care about unions, and speaking at their conference as a union president just gives a stronger surface-level impression to voters that they might.

He was the first acting teamster president to ever speak at the RNC, that’s a huge deal regardless of whether he was also expecting to speak at the DNC. Especially given how anti-union the republican party generally is.

Either it was an appeal to conservative teamsters, or he himself is quietly moderate or conservative.

But if your argument is that he went to the RNC as an appeal to teamsters who support Trump (aka not lefties), and that he is also choosing not to endorse either candidate on behalf of those teamsters, then that isn’t an appeal to further-left-than-democrats politics, it’s an appeal to centrism.

My point then being

Now she’s the one always punching left

Doesn’t really make sense in this context

Punching left at the guy who attended the RNC?

Yes, though it’s not a magic bullet.

Here’s a video that compares Plurality/FPTP (our current system), Ranked choice, and approval voting, and is up-front about the limitations of each method.

Here’s a link with a lot more information on different voting methods. STAR voting is the method highlighted here as the best, but Score voting and Approval are also pretty good. IRV/Ranked Choice doesn’t perform quite as well, but is at least still better than FPTP.

A new voting system that’s any better than our current system brings us closer to a political landscape where viable candidates who choose not to drop out early aren’t working against their interests, and voters are less incentivized to vote strategically. And even if IRV is only marginally better than FPTP, its popularity gives exposure to the idea that alternative voting systems are worth looking into.

I appreciate the sleuthing! Was an interesting listen

Interesting, I’ll look more into that, thanks

Ohhh you just mean “there’ve only been 2 times in history where the popular vote disagreed with the electoral vote.”

When you said “only 2 times the popular vote was greater than the electoral vote” it sounded like you were comparing the size of the popular vote to the size of the electoral vote. Which would be silly, b/c the popular vote is always larger than the electoral vote lol

Margin of error on this poll is 4.4%. Don’t even bother clicking this. Vote.

There has only been two presidential elections where the popular vote was greater than the electoral vote.

What exactly do you mean by this? When you say “the electoral vote”, you’re not referring to the number of electors in the electoral college, are you?

Because if you are then that sounds silly lol, I’m probably misunderstanding you

He literally sidestepped around congress twice

I appreciate the source, I was not aware of this.

That said, has Biden sidestepped Congress since these sales to send additional weapons to Israel? These sales happened just 2 months after the assault on Israel, and just a few weeks apart from one another. It’d be nice to know if any other sidestepping occurred in the following 9 months, the bulk of the conflict.

Edit: added quote