When the Democrats regain power, their centrist leadership will claim, "We can't do anything because...". Don't be fooled. We need to get the corporate centrists out and real progressives in!
I'll be the first one to say that the current Democratic party needs replacing, but they're not wrong.
Or did everyone forget that you need a supermajority in the Senate to get past the Presidential veto?
Is anyone truly naive enough to think that Donald Trump would sign anything the Democrats put forward? The man who told Republicans to tank legislation with things they wanted in it to avoid giving Democrats a win?
Unless you're advocating for a revolution, you have to work within the system. And it's not the Democrats fault that is easier to break a thing than to fix it.
It's always easy to point out a problem. Solutions are what we need, and all this kind of post does is discourage left-leaning people from voting, which is what the Republicans want.
So unless you have something resembling an actual solution, this just seems like virtue signaling to me.
I will say that there's immense value in symbolism, performative values, and simply being caught trying by voters. Yes the President will veto anything good, but fucking make him do it. Go on social media and the talk shows to rip him a new one for all of the good things that he's actively preventing. Move the Overton Window. Change the terms of the public discourse.
Governing long ago moved beyond mere parliamentary procedure; it also needs to be a show that the people in the cheap seats (a.k.a. low-information voters) can watch.
"A bunch" is roughly three. Sinema, Fetterman, and, uh... I'm sure there's one more.
It's easier to stop things than to pass things. You'll notice Republicans aren't getting a lot done right now, exactly. At least not through Congress.
They're doing so many blatantly illegal things, largely with the blessing of the DoJ and the Supreme Court. But they can't get the SAVE Act through to stop us from voting.
“A bunch” is roughly three. Sinema, Fetterman, and, uh…
If you can't name more than two Senators... Jesus, dude. Maybe start with Henry Cuellar and Bob Menendez. Ritchie Torres. Elissa Slotkin. Eric Swalwell. Josh Gottheimer. Do I really need to make you the full list?
Whenever there is a democratic majority, just enough Democrats will turn to make any actual change impossible, like a public option with Obama. Or when the blue dog Democrats fucked healthcare reform under Clinton. It's happened every time and will continue to happen because the ratchet effect is a feature that always ends in facism and oligarchy, which is where you make your real money.
The ratchet effect is real, but it's because when the Dems have a majority they're relying on West Virginia. Republicans kiss the ring or they're kicked from politics, just look at Ted Cruz.
The neolibs are not responsible for the majority of our problems.
Their biggest crimes are Israel and not being aggressive enough on changes. They're not the ones preventing most of the legislation we've tried to pass, such as the public option with the ACA.
I like it when people focus on one thing and ignore all the actual accomplishments. Or maybe you aren't ignoring them. Maybe you're entirely ignorant of them.
Because they also have the office of the president.
Currently anyway.
If one party controls both houses of congress and the president and has a sympathetic Supreme Court majority they can do a lot more than if they only have one or 2 of those things.
So here’s some basics on how the American government works.
The house can pass a bill with a simple majority.
So can the senate. In the event of a tie, the vice president casts the tie breaking vote.
However, the senate rules are such that in order to get to a vote you need vote to close debate, which takes 60 votes.
There are exceptions to the 60 vote rule using what’s called budget reconciliation. Matters pertaining just to budgetary items can bypass the 60 vote threshold and be voted on by a simple majority. These items must be cleared with the senate parliamentarian.
Once a bill has passed both the senate and the house, the president can either sign it or just wait 10 days and do nothing, at which point that bill becomes a law. He can also veto the bills at which point it gets sent back to both the house and senate which can override his veto with a 2/3 vote in both the house and senate.
If you want to pass a bill over the objections of the president you need two thirds of both the senate and house to agree to do it. If you want to get a bill through the senate that goes beyond budget reconciliation you need 60 senate votes.
When people talk about a supermajority they may be referring to the 60 votes needed to pass unrestricted bills in the senate, which the democrats had in 2008-2010 when they got Obamacare passed. Or if they are talking about overriding a veto they may be talking about the 2/3 of the votes you’d need in the house AND senate.
I’m not interested in debating who said what about what when, it just seemed like some people were unaware of the actual rules of how the US federal government functions and hoped to clear that up. If you have any questions about how that stuff works I’m happy to address it with the best of my knowledge. But I have no interest in actually debating politics online.
All of this applies. It’s why republicans were able to pass tax cuts via reconciliation but not the SAVE act. They would have needed to change the filibuster rule and they couldn’t get the 50 votes needed to do it.
If you want to make long term changes to this country you need to control both houses of congress and the presidency. 2026 elections can change the former but not the latter. Which means dems will be able to stop the insanity but they’re not going to be able to make major changes until they can overcome the veto power. They need to have a democratic president.
Look, I’m sure you’re passionate about change and want to make a difference, but if you’re not going to get your facts straight and just dismiss everyone who disagrees with you with pithy comments then you’re never going to get enough people on your side to do that. Not enough people will take you seriously and you’ll just end up being spoiler votes that keep people like Trump in power.
Republicans historically do not fucking govern. They give tax cuts to the oligarchs and otherwise have a concept of a plan in two weeks. They lie and lie and lie. They are the ones pushing the "gummit is borken" lie - and making sure it appears to be true.
Republicans are willing to use blatantly illegal tactics and control enough courts to make a mess, you know the whole "it's easier to break things" part.
Democrats need a supermajority, then they need the courage to invoke 14A3 disqualification backdated to at least J6 and declare everything the admin did legally null and void. Make every Republican politician personally legally liable for everything, all the theft and destruction, as the immunity of the political positions gets fully erased.
That's the only fast way to fix things. Anything less will mean it's going to drag out for decades.
The evidence shows multiple plausible answers depending on how one defines “dominate.” Recent sources most commonly point to the Democrats’ control of both chambers during the 117th Congress (January 3, 2021–January 3, 2023) as the last time they held unified congressional control, while earlier notable periods include the 111th Congress (2009–2011) and historically larger majorities like the 89th Congress after 1964. The statement therefore requires clarification of terms—“dominate” can mean simple majority, large supermajority, or sustained multi-decade control—to be answered precisely
Contemporary records and syntheses within the provided analyses indicate the 117th Congress (Jan 3, 2021–Jan 3, 2023) as the latest period when Democrats held both chambers, with a House majority and a Senate majority realized through a 50–50 split and the Vice President’s tiebreaking vote. This configuration coincided with the Biden administration and enabled the Democratic leadership to pass key legislation during early 2021, illustrating functional control despite narrow margins. Reliable repositories of congressional composition and institutional histories corroborate this timing as the most recent instance of unified party control in Congress cited across multiple analyses, making the 117th the default answer when “dominate” is used to mean holding both chambers
—————————————————-
That was after the republicans facilitated a global pandemic. The time before that was after the republicans destroyed the global economy. The time before that was before most of you were born:
—————————————————————
3. Earlier high-water marks: 111th Congress and the 1964 landslide
If “dominate” implies a more comfortable majority or a legislative supermajority enabling broad agenda-setting, earlier periods fit better. The 111th Congress (2009–2011) provided Democrats with substantial House and Senate margins that facilitated major policy initiatives during the Obama administration, and analyses explicitly call this a recent example of decisive Democratic control [4]. Going further back, the 89th Congress following the 1964 electiondelivered the largest Democratic majorities since the New Deal era, enabling the passage of transformative legislation associated with President Lyndon Johnson’s agenda. Historical accounts position the 1964–1965 period as a classic instance of one-party dominance in Congress, distinct from the narrow 2021–2023 control
The thing is that many people are looking too short-sightedly for the internal (non-revolution-like) reform path. The goal for change is 2028, but change in 2028 can't get off the ground running, if a 2026 sweep doesn't. (I wish you had a Westminster system with no-confidence votes, but alas).
What Congress can do is to compel Trump administration officials to get their asses into the chamber. They can put articles and lawsuits with appropriate standing to:
Halt ballroom construction.
Halt reckless and unnecessary tariffs.
Halt the endless war spending on the unauthorized military adventure Iran.
Halt funding for Israel.
Abolish/stymie/revoke funding from ICE.
Have the DoJ release the Epstein files.
Assess Trump's mental state and capacity to lead.
Release funding that Congress allocated but the Trump admin is withholding or disbursing unevenly (e.g. FEMA)
Collect evidence to make the case to impeach the justices or reform the Supreme Court in 2028.
Congress under leadership of feckless Republicans and sometimes Democrats haven't asserted the power of the purse. For budgetary matters, votes can be held without permanently removing the cloture rule. And if Trump refuses to sign a bill voted on D-party lines to fund the government while implementing changes, the government will shut down once again and the bill will await him on the desk until he signs it. He will try to shift blame as he always does, but the government has shutdown led by Republicans or Democrats, the common thread is his incompetent ass in charge for most of the time since 2016.
I don't think that OP is expecting Democrats or Progressives to get things through the Trump administration without a supermajority that can override his veto. What we are hoping for/expecting is that Democrats and Progressives to say "Fuck you, we're passing this bill and sending it on."
Medicare for All? "Fuck you we're passing this bill, veto it motherfucker!". Taxing rich people? "Fuck you we're passing this bill, veto this PDF". Repealing the Medicare cuts? "Hey, asshole, we passed it, oh and go fuck yourselves". Repeal the procedural filibuster? "Fuck it, we'll do it live!". Impeachment? "Hey, it's Tuesday, this asshole just did something unbecoming of the office, guess it's time to have another impeachment hearing, oh and fuck you, that's why."
Just try instead of rolling over on day one, what we're asking for even if you know it's destined to fail and show that you're willing to do the work. Back your shit up with actions instead of just words of "Well it'll never pass so we'll never try". Say what you will about Republicans, when they get in power, they do not give a fuck and will introduce every bad idea in their head and dare the President to veto it and that's why their base votes for them consistently.
That's what OP I think is asking people to remember.
That rule can be changed at any time by simple majority vote. That cloture rule is a parliamentary rule and is not law.
Don't be duped. Please look at what they call "the nuclear option."
There are over 180 exceptions to the super majority so far (last time I checked a few years ago).
(fun fact: the "nuclear option" was first called that by Trent Lott, a Republican, in the 2000s. Both parties immediately adopted the term because it scares the shit out of voters. What was it called before that? "the constitutional option").
Don't be a sucker. If they want to pass something, viola! It's an exception (like our budgets). If they don't want to pass something, but they want the voters to think that they do, "oh no, we need a super majority, super sorry we tried so hard!"
The solution is very simple. No other nation requires super majority votes for a reason.
You are thinking of filibuster, which I agree is just like you're saying.
However, they were talking about overriding the presidential veto, which is specifically defined in Article 1, Section 7 of the Constitution as needing a 2/3 majority in both houses. Not a simple majority. You also cannot adopt a rule that supersedes the Constitution.
Every Bill which shall have passed the House of Representatives and the Senate, shall, before it become a Law, be presented to the President of the United States; If he approve he shall sign it, but if not he shall return it, with his Objections to that House in which it shall have originated, who shall enter the Objections at large on their Journal, and proceed to reconsider it. If after such Reconsideration two thirds of that House shall agree to pass the Bill, it shall be sent, together with the Objections, to the other House, by which it shall likewise be reconsidered, and if approved by two thirds of that House, it shall become a Law. But in all such Cases the Votes of both Houses shall be determined by yeas and Nays, and the Names of the Persons voting for and against the Bill shall be entered on the Journal of each House respectively. If any Bill shall not be returned by the President within ten Days (Sundays excepted) after it shall have been presented to him, the Same shall be a Law, in like Manner as if he had signed it, unless the Congress by their Adjournment prevent its Return, in which Case it shall not be a Law.
I remember how the current congress led us to a government shutdown only to fold like lawn chairs in return for a pinky promise that was later broken. There are options that don't require overriding the president because congress has the power of the purse and the power to investigate.
They can make the filibuster be an actual Mr-Smith-Goes-To-Washington event again and fucking FORCE those fucking assholes to stand up there and talk for 24 hours straight. The change in filibuster behavior, which Republicans enacted, to just table anything that the other side said would be filibustered, should end. And spineless Democrats should do it and take credit for doing it, and look like they give a damn again.
I don't recall where I said that was the only role for a political party.
It's really easy to point out a problem, like "the Democratic party has issues and hasn't delivered in the past"
But unless you're bringing solutions, too, then you're just playing into the opposition's plan: Get opposing voters to be apathetic so they don't vote.
Giving people hope is not a legislative project, it is a political one, one which the corporate-led Democratic Party has remarkably and consistently and repeatedly failed at.
Leftist policy and, just as important, rhetoric is the solution. The Left can't do world building without institutional support.
Unless you're advocating for a revolution, you have to work within the system.
I'd argue that even if you're advocating a revolution, it absolutely helps to work within the system to control the damage and try to secure the most favorable conditions possible while you build the necessary organization to actually follow through on the revolution. It's a lot harder to organize when everyone to the left of Fetterman is declared a terrorist and the gestapo arrests them for possessing leftist pamphlets.
One could propose actively letting things get worse to inspire a revolutionary spirit in the masses, but that involves the suffering of already marginalized people.
A little reading comprehension would indicate that the current discussion is clearly talking about cases where Democrats also control the presidency. Your whole comment is a non sequitur.
No, I'm judging people from their own actions I've observed myself. It's the same ones who wouldn't vote for Harris because of Gaza because getting Trump elected again has worked out so well for them. It's the people who, when starving to death and presented with a bowl of dried dog shit or some overboiled broccoli, will choose to starve because the broccoli is too soft.
When apparently you can just rename everything America and after yourself at whim as President, the never-ending excuses for getting nothing done during Democratic presidential administrations will not cut it for me this time.
Anything a president can do unilaterally can be undone by the next president. There's a reason why the Afordable Care Act hasn't been undone at the stroke a sharpie
Not the argument I was making, more the downs in strategy. The republicans going full send without consideration of the consequences and the Democrat taking taking time and being thorough
"Taking time and being thorough" looks a lot like "wasting time and doing nothing" when they're doing anything other than selling weapons for genocide.
What a funny thing to hang your hat on. I can't tell if this is supposed to be sarcastic or not.
Renaming stuff is probably the easiest thing in the world. It costs money down the road, but it's significantly less intrusive and costly than doing almost anything else this admin has already done.
I know everyone's got the attention span of a fucking gnat, but this dude has done whatever the fuck he wants with impunity while most Democratic administrations look like they're asking for permission to pee.
That's because the Republican judges invent reasons to block what Democrats do and pretend there's no standing to stop other Republicans. You guys need to get a large enough majority to enforce 14A3 and disqualify this lot for fucking treason and tear apart their ability to get in the way
They don't say "it's too expensive", they say "republicans won't let us do it".
But they let republicans do anything they want, including stupid petty distractions like renaming places. They are not on your side. Also they committed the majority of the genocide in Gaza. Democrats are not your friends, very few of them are decent humans.
You're refusing to look at how the killing accelerated under Trump and you fucking dare to accuse us of not caring?
Everybody who looked and thought for 2 seconds predicted it would be worse under Trump, tried to stop Trump, and you didn't care because you refused to believe it could be worse under Trump, and then you claim the moral high ground for rejecting evidence
There is more genocide and imperialism because Trump got another term
That's not to defend him or his plans of turning Gaza into a beachfront resort, but factually, the killing is no where near as bad as it was under Biden.
You predicted it in 2 seconds, we lived through the live streamed genocide from day one, you're wrong, and it's disgusting how smug you are about it.
The majority of buildings destroyed is not the majority of lives lost. More people were killed faster under Trump. Somebody is lying to you if they're telling you Democrats were easier on Netanyahu than Trump is. They are lying to you because they want you to hurt yourself.
That's cumulative you moron. The slope clearly drops after Biden did the majority of the damage. You can't even comprehend the information you're using, or you'll do anything to twist reality to justify your support of genocide.
Under Biden, until 19th of January 2025, 47,724 killed. This number does not include the bodies never recovered or accounted for because they were vaporized, are still under rubble, or the entire family line was wiped off and noone was left to report them gone. The Lancet estimated 75 200 violent deaths between 7 October 2023, and 5 January, 2025 (https://www.thelancet.com/journals/langlo/article/PIIS2214-109X(25)00522-4/fulltext). But we'll stick to the official number that Biden over and over called untrustworthy. 47,724
By the time Biden was out of office, over 90 fucking percent of housing in Gaza was damaged or destroyed, you ghoul.
As of 10 September 2026, the official number is 74,784.
That's only 27,060 under Trump.
If you want the daily rate under both that's 101.3 killed ever day under Biden (again way under reported) and 44.95 per day under Trump.
The recent slowdown in Gaza is caused only by increased killing in Iran and Lebanon, which does not play in your favor
Are you suggesting Biden, who bypassed Congress twice to illegally send them bombs to destroy practically all of Gaza, almost all hospitals and clinics, and almost all farmlands while gaslighting us, lying about seeing beheaded babies, callously licking ice cream while stating there are "none" chances of a ceasefire, who's administration had members of the press dragged out in cuffs for asking about it, who framed the terrorist pager attack in Lebanon as heroic, or Kamala who went on national television and said she can't think of a single thing she'd do different, would have stopped Israel from carrying on their stated objectives of greater Israel from day one?
So your argument is that after killing increased for s while under Trump, the shift to killing in Lebanon and Iran instead of Palestine means putting Trump in power was a success?
At no point during the Trump presidency did the rate of killing go higher than the first 150 days of the genocide under Biden. And we're still not counting the excess unreported deaths that primarily occurred during the first 150 days, when Israel cut all power to the strip and rained bombs at night.
The data is right there, and you've been repeatedly informed how you're misunderstanding it, but now I think you're just counting on people just believing your lies.
We don't support Trump, you moron. You're defending democrats as a "lesser evil", and in this demonstrable case, they actually are the "bigger evil". They're only better domestically, and that's what bothers liberals (or straight up Zionists pretending to be progressive), that Trump affects your cushy life. Fuck you.
You can't just condemn the democrats for committing genocide, you have to gaslight everyone and pretend like you give a shit about Lebanon or Iran just to say "look, republicans are the only baddies."
In case it isn't clear to your two braincells, we don't support Trump, we didn't want him in power, and we didn't vote for him. But you not only voted for genocidal KH (presumably), but you're still defending them despite the data showing clearly what they did.
"For far too long, our party has seen its job as managing decline instead of delivering material change for working people,” Mamdani said at a rally headlined by Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. “It has seen its job as explaining why we cannot instead of showing how we can"
The Corpo-Establishment, MAGA Lite Dems are going to try to be losers again, but the new DemSocs aren't going to allow it, and more importantly, neither are we. They will do their jobs this time, or they will be treated as harshly as MAGAs.
If they try to sandbag the next Dem administration again, in another transparent attempt to hand it back to the MAGAs, then they will be treated the same as MAGAs, and end up in prison or at the end a rope.
We're nearly as fed up with Dems as we are with MAGAs, and it starts with Schmuck & Jeffries. They are the first to go, to make way for real Democratic Leadership, and not just Manchurian MAGAs.
We need to organize twelve million Americans under a common manifesto.
If the Democrats don't take power in 2029 (both houses of the legislature and the executive), if they fail to move quickly, overhauling SCOTUS and ironcladding elections to stop tampering and voter suppression cold, then the US public needs to occupy Washington by multiple millions with a list of demands.
Or general strike.
Or riot in multiple municipal areas hard enough to overwhelm responders.
Or go on a billionaire assassination spree.
If we cannot do that, then we're all going to be packed onto the cattle cars. Not necessarily all together, but the US will fall to one-party autocracy.
This tbh. I've got very little faith in politicians to do something at this point. I would have been happy if 2022 Democratic senators and Biden did nothing and refused to get involved with the rail strike. Yet in another display of solidarity with corporations and billionaires they moved quickly to pass a bipartisan bill to block the rail strike. Wild.
Yeah, busting the rail strike really tipped the hand of the establishment Democratic party to show they still are captured, and the blue-dog ranks are in office not to serve the public or to make specific changes but to get rich by peddling their political power. Given they're negotiating with MAGA more than they're coordinating with progressives and DSA, I'm really expecting some Democratic officials will flip so they can continue exploiting their positions for personal gain.
Heather Cox Richardson notes that this sort of thing has happened before, in which business interests dominated the government and enacted policies that wrecked the economy, but got magnates very rich, but the backlash was a revival of public serving interests. In the case of Roosevelt and the New Deal, there was the threat of communist revolution, as we were also watching what was going on in the Soviet Union, and even communism had to be better than living in homeless encampments and barely surviving on flour paste.
We already have a conspicuous number of homeless encampments, and while we're not yet living on cups of noodles, we can't afford food and fuel at the same time, we're skipping meds, and we're also suffering from food poisoning while watching corruption and money getting poured into an unpopular war where our soldiers and sailors are being unnecessarily treated like shit.
Hopefully things don't have to get much worse before the mischief begins. I suspect we're all hoping the midterms turn out well (and we survive to the new Congress) which might save us from getting our hands dirty. But when there's no hope at all, some of us may realize we really don't have anything else to lose.
I'm totally game. Someone well above my pay grade needs to organize a panel of legal and civic experts to hammer out a charter and make sure it's got ironclad protections against corruption.
Otherwise, we'll just be here again in a decade or two, and they'll have the experience of this time to guide them.
For one thing, Citizens United only scratches the surface of money in politics. How Money Works did a video about just how entrenched it is. (Here on YouTube). And presently, politicians at the state and federal level expect to be able to enrich themselves by using the power of their office.
This is why it's way beyond my pay grade. We need historians to remind us how systems failed in the past, so we assure we don't repeat the same mistakes. We need legal scholars to check how our terms could be misinterpreted by bad-faith judges given authority, while making sure the language is plain enough that high-school students can understand what it means.
Someone well above my pay grade needs to organize a panel of legal and civic experts to hammer out a charter and make sure it's got ironclad protections against corruption
There's the problem, it always comes down to someone else. So long as we keep waiting for someone above our pay grade to do the work, we'll keep waiting.
Find a group and get involved. Figure out what your pay grade is, and contribute on that level. This kind of organization doesn't just happen, it takes people doing things. It's why I joined the DSA. They aren't perfect, but they're a relatively large organization working on exactly these things.
Maybe you can help organize events or recruit those legal scholars. Maybe you can put up posters or try to recruit members. Maybe you can donate to help retain legal advice. Just do something, don't fall into the bystander effect.
then the US public needs to occupy Washington by multiple millions with a list of demands.
I wish. But honestly, look at us. We don't have it in us. We're currently being abused (Constitutional violations left and right) and we haven't dragged them into the street yet.
We're weak. We can't get on the same page. We can't mobilize.
Or general strike.
You can definitely forget about that. If we aren't occupying D.C. there's no way a general strike is happening. Generally speaking a general strike is just not something that would happen. You aren't going to convince a nation full of people living at the edge of poverty to stop going to work. Not happening.
I'm not trying to dissuade people from doing things, I'm just making realistic observations. And realistically we're either voting our way out of this or waiting until everyone is starving to fight our way out of it.
I, too, am pessimistic about our chances. But some folk who are more read up than me about it (e.g. Jamille Bouie, Helen Cox Richardson) express more optimism, citing trends and moments in history that rhyme.
Although, I am worried that our ultra-wealthy are exponentially richer than the robber barons ever have been at any other time in history. Once they're done financializing the US into a wasteland (of quarries, oilfields and data centers), they're going to move onto the rest of the developed world, and they are rich enough to buy all the elections and control all the governments.
So if we can make our stand here, and recognize our billionaire class as the existential threat that they actually are, (and as Paul Krugman suggests, tax them out of existence) we'll be sparing the entirety of human civilization a lot of devastation.
I got the notion of this a long time ago. I mean like Obama expanding the Patriot Act. Like thanks for doing what I voted for you not to do. The opposite of progress is Congress. And there's a whole lot of Cons.
He was literally on his way to sentencing but the American people voted him into office and the supreme court said he can do anything and it's legal. They'd have to make up some bs to get him in jail at this point but who cares. The Republicans will call foul play but they will do that even if you gave them everything so...
The real trick: Republicans know their best shot of winning elections is to energize their base with "Democrats are going to destroy the country so you must go vote" while at the same time promoting the narrative "Democrats won't do anything so you should bother voting" to de-energize the opposition.
It's a very very obvious strategy being deployed here.
But go on and pretend you're an edgy contrarian while spreading the exact narrative the fascists want you to spread.
Because most Americans can't name a single bill passed in the last 10 years or who is in the senate or literally anything about politics at all? Biden passed like 7 major bills while the senate was almost 50/50 split republican/democrat. To get 7 actually good bills passed in that climate is a miracle.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/117th_United_States_Congress
Increasing the cost of living and shortages in supplies like food, water, and fuel massively impact the little guy all across the country. They did get a wage increase and better health benefits / sick leave, and the strike did go on for months. It literally could have shut down many local businesses, caused hardships for millions, caused shortages for many industries, not just the billionaire owned ones either.
The alternative is, eat all that cost for millions of people, and eventually after who knows how long one side caves. This is a lose-lose situation, and you can say he chose the wrong option, but to frame this as "he just chose to block the rail strike to side with the corporations" is just not accurate.
This one is actually encouraging people to get involved and put in the work to fix the party. It isn't like all the other posts I've seen that seem designed to discourage people from voting.
Conservatives will always be organized by bigotry and greed, which coincidentally are the things you need to be rich.
Dems fight over party ideals and nitpick each other to death.
In the primaries, be nitpicky. In the election, vote the guy who wont endanger millions of your neighbors and friends. Vote the guy who wont stuff money in billionaire pockets. Even if theyre pandering, a blue conservative is better than a red one.
Why do you think they're unpopular? Is it possible that the party which controls how funds, advertising, and opportunities are allocated in the primaries it fully controls has a vested interest in keeping leftist politicians out of office?
Got a bunch of fools to throw their hands up with the Democrat party and then fascists waltzed in and are currently speed running destroying our futures.
You can have problems with the Dems and that's fine and dandy, but if you're posting about how they're not going to accomplish anything (fundamental lie if you pay attention at all) then you're just helping fascists continue to obliterate our futures.
It's almost like the system is designed to prevent the working class from gaining any headway while consistently capitulating to the whims of capital.
The intrinsic failure of arbitrarily hierarchical systems. When the working class demands change, it can't happen because [arbitrary barriers we blindly obey] while anytime the owning-class demands it, suddenly we must make compromises for the benefit of the "county's economy"
Never forget the state and the economy are intrinsically linked. The state is a tool of the ruling class to oppress the working class. It is fundamental to the system itself.
I'm not convinced they'll regain power. The fucking president just promised to pay $5,000 per vote. He is trying to gain power over mail-in votes. He prevents interviews with democrats from airing on TV. He has friends that admit to messing with voting machines.
Yeah - Biden tried that, and literally nothing impactful actually happened, and then they all just threw up their hands and said “well, we tried, that should be good enough”
It’s not even just the pardons really, it’s the fact that so much of government runs on vibes^tm^ and the belief that elected officials will always act in good faith. So the pardons need to be reformed but a lot more things do as well. Like the fact it’s literally impossible to do a constitutional amendment now.
Biden and his admin did some good things, for sure, but by and large he simply continued entrenching the status quo and didn’t meaningfully listen to the American populace - unless it was through the filter of the DNC/DCCC’s fuckwitted consultant class, who have been a cripplingly parasitic negative influence on the party for basically the entire span of time I’ve been politically aware.
Remember:
nothing will fundamentally change.
I believed him when he said it, and he sure as fuck followed through.
Not to mention, his whole full-throated, carte blanche support of Israel in their genocide of Gaza (and I do mean to include the decades-long lead up to Oct 7, as well as the IDF’s retaliatory / punitive / expansionist / ethnic-cleansing actions after that point). Schumer’s one of the few politicians off the top of my head who’s more of an Israeli sycophant than Biden.
the DNC/DCCC’s fuckwitted consultant class, who have been a cripplingly parasitic negative influence on the party for basically the entire span of time I’ve been politically aware.
I am 100% on board for. Their consultants suck and need to be set adrift as soon as possible. Hopefully republicans will pick them up and start losing constantly.
The internet loves to pretend Biden wasn't one of the most progressive presidents we've ever had. The internet loves to fall for Republican and foreign disinformation and believe Biden didn't net a ton of important wins for Americans.
It's a combination of disinformation and people being too lazy to pay attention to current events.
Was Biden the best president in U.S. history? Nah. Was he actually a good president? Yeah, he was.
The 2024 Democratic primaries happened. Joe Biden won. Then his own voters made such a fucking stink about his age (despite his accomplishments) that they forced him out at the last minute and it defaulted to his VP, who Democrat voters also voted for by association of voting for Joe Biden.
You think we should have held a primary 2 months before an election? Would have been chaos.
The party sued as many opponents off the ballots as it could, so that Biden's name was the only one on the ballot in all 50 states. His handlers hid that his brain was pudding until he bragged about finally beating Medicare at the debates.
And then they installed Harris and you're going to bat for them for it.
I think biden never should have run. For anything. Ever. He's a genocidal piece of shit.
It's like people think democrats become kings when they get into office. Literally half the country is sub 100 iq, is moderately/extremely racist, and keeps voting in room temperature iq Republicans into the senate. About 1/3rd of the country voted for Trump AFTER we knew he was a felon and tried to steal the election.
They have the majority in literally everything and they still have failed to pass so many bills because they are that incompetent.
The Republicans are doing the equivalent of giving themselves money in a monopoly game and saying "hey there's no rule that says I CAN'T do that, is there?" Like when they sat on their hands rather than voting on Obama's scotus pick for months. I don't know what you do about that other than matching the egregious actions, and it seems dems are still trying to play inside the rules which I agree is a losing strategy.
That's one thing I'm really aligned with the DSA on, democrats need to break the rules too or have extremely harsh punishments for it once they're in power, so Republicans know to cut it out or they're either out of office or in jail.
It’s like people think democrats become kings when they get into office.
This excuse stops working now that the republicans have made it clear that the party in order absolutely has the ability to make sweeping changes if they choose to.
Does that include ShitLibs who split the anti-Trump vote by voting for Kamala Harris, even though it was obvious she couldn't win and Gloria La Riva was right there?
The democrats don't have the balls to do anything even if they had all of congress and the presidency. The democrats have been shown what is permissible, and they don't have the spine to do what is necessary.
The precedent has now been set that you can torture the other side and target their states and communities with money withholding, police/military, and imprison subgroups, label them terrorists, and incite in-groups, and capture judges and literally ignore laws...They don't have what it takes, and the American public won't hold anyone accountable for any amount of time. Cooked.
They don’t have what it takes, and the American public won’t hold anyone accountable for any amount of time. Cooked.
you're a real beacon of fuckin hope
also, do you really clamor for someone who's vengefully coiled waiting to break the system entirely to visit misery on some rural voter schmuck or should they focus on restoring the national character (chisel all that shit off the walls and strip the gold spray paint off too), rebuild alliances, constitutionally establish trans rights as human rights, restore the economy, etc.,? bring back the deported, prosecute ICE architects and the fascist footsoldiers... roll back all of trump's signatory bullshit, put maxwell into the wost fuckin hole they can find, release the epstein files etc.,
and even then, it still wouldn't be enough - they deserve worse. but. priorities.
this is a real problem, they've fucked up more stuff than can conceivably be fixed in a single admin.
I have more thoughts on this but the dog must be walked NOW
they know if they set a precendents, they would actually have to do something for once, like actually act on thier "promises", most of them tend to be Dinos though.
I don't know what is considered a lib anymore but my answer is let's have more than 2 parties. Reform electoral law, get rid of first past the post. Raked choice voting.
Some non-banana republics have tried this wacky idea of starting a different party, completely independent of any other party.
Which is a really good idea if you're not satisfied with the 2 you stubbornly keep voting for and who have invariably done the same shitty things since the beginning.
Some of us wild countries even have more than 3 parties!
The US also has more than 3 parties, but the current system guarantees that only two can get enough votes. The entire electoral system is built to perpetuate this, including the media ecosystem. So sadly, it’s not as simple as just “have a third party.”
Personally, I think socialist revolution is the only thing that can bring positive change in this country, largely because it doesn’t try to change things within the system, it seeks to dismantle the system entirely.
The US also has more than 3 parties, but the current system guarantees that only two can get enough votes.
'strongly favors' yes, but not 'guaranteed'.
It all comes down to the voters and the self fulfilling prophecy of not voting 3rd party because nobody does.
And yes, socialist revolution is the far better option but then we're back to my first comments.
You certainly can't expect that from people who can't even manage the voting 3rd party part.
They have zero class consciousness and perpetually voting against their own interests.
Even if the progressive wing somehow replaces the rightist corpo Dems, the ruling class would never allow us to democratically make the changes we all want to see without a fight. They will respond with fascism, so our communities must be organized enough to pose a bigger threat than what they can buy/foment.
Just watch them do a full archeological expedition to excavate the word “bipartisan” and then watch them cherish it as the treasure most sacred to our failing democracy.
Suddenly they won’t do things because they’ll be worried about what the right thinks. They’ll throw their arms in the air when the but think of the possibility of not having getting the votes in congress. They’ll tell us they tried nothing to revert our wealth inequality madness and say they are all out of ideas. They’ll claim that the poor being absolutely miserable and their conditions worsening is the American way and the debt is too big to do anything about it. Suddenly a balanced budget will be back on the menu with a whif of austerity hanging in the air.
A traitor for noting that the Democrats are fascist pedophiles?
My fellow American, we were founded by fascist pedophiles. We were forged by fascist pedophiles. We fought a civil between factions of fascist pedophiles. We protected fascist pedophiles. We celebrated fascist pedophiles. We revered fascist pedophiles. We rehabilitated fascist pedophiles. We appointed fascist pedophiles. We empowered fascist pedophiles. We committed murder for fascist pedophiles.
If you think the other big party in the US isn't chock full of fascist pedophiles, you're delusional
FDR - built concentration camps for anyone vaguely "Asian" looking and stole their commercial private property. Also established racial red lining for lending.
Truman - Korean war, killed a million civilians under the theory that the US should be allowed to continue the fascist occupation of the Korean peninsula since they're taking over for Japan.
Truman - Operation Overcast and Operation Paperclip. Saved 10k Nazis from justice prior to Nuremberg, gave them new lives, jobs, money, political positions, state protection, PR rehabilitation.
Truman - Staffed NATO with Nazi officers, oversaw election in West Germany which allowed former Nazi politicians to change parties and run for office.
Truman - oversaw Operation Gladio, the clandestine NATO program led by the Nazi officers assigned to NATO to organize former Nazis and Nazi collaborators all over Europe, funnel them money and weapons, train them, and make them into terrorist proxies
Truman - saw the French losing their fascist colonial occupation of Vietnam and decided we should help the French massacre the indigenous there.
JFK - decided to ramp up the military support for massacres in Vietnam
LBJ - cranked up the violence in Vietnam so bad he obliterated Laos. He also sent the US military to Guatemala to "support" the fascist right wingers there, by which I mean massacre popular movements. He also sent the US military to prop up the puppet government in DR Congo and massacre the popular movements there.
Nixon - Not a Democrat. However, the Ds controlled both houses of Congress for his entire presidency. And they all passed the drug laws that Nixon and his cabinet designed to imprison and disenfranchise Black people and anti-war hippies. Literally. The Nixon administration officials are on record that this was their design intent, and the Democrats made it happen. Because that's what fascists do - they criminalize peace, they criminalize resistance, and they profit from it.
Carter - A perfect liberal, did nothing wrong. Ya know, except oversee the CIA program to arm and train the Mujahideen, develop a pernicious form of radical islam to keep them fighting, and then eventually unleashing 9/11 on the country. Thanks, Jimmy. Even though you're a sweet old man, your fascist bloodlust just could not be tamed.
Clinton - Crime bill (Crime Bill). But also Bill was governor of Arkansas, and he and Hillary lived in the Governor's Mansion. Ya know they have black house slaves there? It's a prison labor thing. The Clinton's were fine with it. Didn't think it was worth changing. I'm sure they tipped their house slaves every once in a while. Treated 'em nice. But also yeah the crime bill? So much mass surveillance and incarceration. Just total fascist shit.
Obama - drone strikes on US civilians without due process, maintaining the Bush doctrine of first strike and the Bush concept of "enemy combatant" which is just fascist speak for "we can do whatever we want to these people". Then of course hand in hand with Clinton the funding and support for a civil war in Libya and then bombing the country into rubble where they now sell slaves. Clinton on record saying she laughed while she watched the video of the 80-year-old leader of the country sodomized by a bayonet in a public square as he was tortured to death. Real fash shit.
Obama - oh yeah. He was the first one to appoint Homan as deportation czar. 3M deported under Obama. Human rights groups called him "deporter-in-chief". He expanded DHS and ICE massively. In fact the things Trump has done, like appointing Homan as his deportation czar all started under Obama. Obama relied heavily on private prisons to fill his quotas, privatizing state violence like a real fash.
And then of course there's Biden
Biden who oversaw continued and escalating genocide in Gaza. Who fought the good fight against Trump by... doing nothing, almost as if he didn't really care. Biden who undermined the unions while using union aesthetics (which mustachioed German man pioneered that, I wonder?).
And that's ignoring the 50 years of bipartisan support for starving entire populations through unilateral sanctions, killing an average of 800K annually; the bipartisan support for mass incarceration; the bipartisan support for warrantless mass surveillance; the "southern strategy" and Democrat "triangulation"; the Democrat collaboration with Republicans that survives to this day while we all see the fascism for what it is.
Yes. The Democrats are fascist by virtue of being the other dominant power of the perennially fascist USA, a state that has not had a single day where it was not actively fascist (but the white people it considers the master race don't notice).
We are where we are now because of where we were before. The US from it's inception was explicitly anti-democratic. The founders feared popular will would vote away their wealth, so they designed the structure of the government to minimize the influence of the people at large.
Fast forward to more recent history: Unions started losing their power over the later half of the 20th century, which stripped the working class of a lot of potential political power. After 9/11, things like the Patriot Act gave the government even more capabilities to spy on people than it had before. (and it had already been making use of the FBI to disrupt leftist groups.)
The greatly expanded military budget and general culture of the nebulous "war on terror" enabled the gov to militarize more of our society and made the framework for calling activists "terrorists." The fact that congress hasn't exercised it's war powers since WWII and all of our wars have been illegal actions by the executive obviously has granted the executive more unilateral power. Citizen's United opened the floodgates for even more corporate dark money in our elections. Slowly losing the Supreme Court has made the judicial branch a joke.
None of this could be happening now without that history. Trump didn't just fall from the sky and suddenly take power. He was enabled by decades and even centuries of politicians who at best could be said to have failed to create and maintain a healthy democracy and at worst could be said to have never had any interest in democratic principles.
The fuck are you talking about? Political party reform is totally possible and has happened multiple times throughout American history. Conservatives just did it in the worst way possible to the Republican party. Positive political party reform is how the wealthy used to be taxed out their assholes back when America's middle class was strong.
And then Clinton threw the doors wide open to corporate cash and allowed them to start writing tax code. He also broke down the walls against lobbying, and corporate banking.
Very true. Dems had a supermajority and sitting dem president in 2009 and chose to sit on their hands instead of fixing healthcare in a materially significant way or codifying abortion rights. They left abortion in the hands of a lady that had more cancers than a lab rat.
The ACA was far, far from perfect, but it still had one major provision that has saved thousands, possibly millions of lives in the years since. By barring insurance companies from refusing coverage to those with pre-existing conditions, or from charging them massively higher premiums, millions of people with chronic illnesses and millions more who have survived life-threatening diseases and injuries are still able to access health care today. Imagine what a clusterfuck post-COVID America would be if everyone who had a serious case was no longer insurable.
Pro-tip: The "real progressives" will turn out to be Fettermans (at best).
Watch and see. The DNC is not paid to present progressives.
They will allow a small amount to hold office for appearances, but the higher up the pyramid you go, the less progressive they are.
Any time you doubt me, please compare the USA to any other "progressive" nation on Earth.
Poland now has better worker benefits than the USA. POLAND.
Mexico now has universal healthcare. MEXICO.
I'd love to be wrong, I vote every election and you should too. But the faster Americans realize that the DNC is not on their side, the better. I don't think we can vote our way out of this.
I pass my loser Democratic Congressman's office often, and I think I'll start visiting. This traitor just signed that ridiculous anti-socialist pledge, one of only a handful of STUPID Dems who thought they should cooperate with MAGA Propaganda. My first visit will be to let them know that I expect him to vocally condemn ALL MAGA bullshit of any kind, and to vote against ALL MAGA legislation.
I liked the part where the democrats slow rolled every part of it, coming to the negotiating table over and over with concessions to get the republicans to support it, all for nothing.
For real, I don't get why more people don't talk about this. They literally dismantled their own plan to appease Republicans, the Republicand never supported it, and they pushed forward their gutted plan.
Like, if you are going to say fuck it and push the plan with Democrats alone at least use the original plan that wasn't gutted. That shit was purposeful.
well, the thing is. they actually won't have much power at all. sure, they'll (mostly) be able to control the flow of legislation through congress. but that's it. dipshit will still veto anything his handlers don't like, and democrats won't have the numbers in either chamber to override.
if you want to see democrats actually accomplish something worthwhile that benefits people and the planet, give them a super majority in both chambers of congress and control of ~ 40 state legislatures.
What the fuck is this nonsense? I've been saying for years that one of the reasons Democrats aren't doing more is because Republicans are able to shut them down.
That's only one reason, yes:
No supermajority means filibuster (which has been more like "the threat of a filibuster" or "someone whispers the word 'filibuster'") has real power and Republicans have used it effectively
Yes, establishment Dems are centrist and not progressive, but they have tried to do things that got shut down, q.v. above
Yes, plenty of Dems are also corrupted by oligarchs throwing money into the system
There are mulitple reasons we haven't seen more progress, but this is not a new thing anyone is saying. Or maybe some people are just waking up to it, but OP's image is full of bullshit if they think some of us haven't been yelling about this for quite some time - because people think "Elect Democrat president = solve all problem" and this is VERY NOT TRUE. Same with Democrat majority in Congress.
And this is yet another reason why I think we're beyond fucked.
We need to help Progressives take over the Dem Party, and replace the party leadership. We can't allow the next era of Dem power to be managed by Schmuck & Jeffries. They already had their chance, and literally EVERYTHING they've done has helped MAGA gain strength and regain power. They are at least 50% of the reason that MAGA took over again, and they've done less than nothing to earn the opportunity at a second chance.
It's long past time to make huge changes, from top to bottom. We can't allow another term like the Biden term. The next Democratic term has to show substantial progress on Democratic policies, and massive rollbacks on MAGA treason, as well as criminal punishment for MAGA treason, corruption, and pedophilia, or it will be the end of America.
See, this is where while I might nitpick on a couple of things, I'm in at least like 90% agreement, and certainly 100% agreement on the conclusion. It irks me when so many are like "I know what we need to do, but some of the progressives that could help solve this are supporting one thing I disagree with, so fuck it, I'm out".
Because you are right - we've got to have progressives in charge. And it's not because "my team win, I win", it's because they win for EVERYONE. Progressive policies work for everybody except fascists.
When the genocide wing keeps telling us that biden is the most progressive human to ever draw breath, you can imagine that progressives are wary about their movement being co-opted.
It's incredible how Republicans manage to do a lot of things, essentially damage, despite Democrats opposition. But Democrats can't do anything, because Republicans won't let them do.
The system is built so that it is much easier to prevent action than to take it. Republicans obstruct. And where they succeed, it is largely because it's things the oligarchs want, and yeah, centrist Dems serve the oligarchs as well.
It's the main reason I keep shouting that we need to solve the oligarch issue first, then deal with the political party once we cut off their corrupt funding.
If another Democrat president is allowed to happen they’ll argue that Trump-style dictat cannot be used to materially improve the life of citizens instead of to enrich one man and his friends, because it’s not fair or something,
Reminder that it makes a whole hell of a lot more sense to reform the Democrat party than to shit on your vote and throw it away with a non-viable 3rd party that isn't even trying to be viable.
If you vote 3rd party you will watch your country burn while you cross your fingers and hope for a miracle.
I agree. It's also important to remember that that is not the destination, but the first milepost on the way to course correcting the entire system, even when following the incrementalist way to change one piece at a time.
It would make sense if it were possible. It isn't. The entire structure of the party as an organization is designed to ensure that no grassroots movement can ever wrest power away from the powerful.
But I encourage you to try your best. 10 years of busting my ass and becoming a paid campaign staffer was what finally made me see the light. The Third Way Foundation controls access to every single meaningful lever of power. Elected Dems like AOC and Bernie are tolerated because they help keep leftists hopeful, which keeps them voting Blue, which keeps them from ever genuinely organizing to become a threat to the Neoliberal agenda the Dems exist to defend. Their policy proposals are punchlines to the people who actually control the legislative agenda. They will only ever be brought up for an vote occasionally when the deck is stacked solidly against them to "prove" how they're guaranteed losing moves, despite the fact that Medicare for All polls much better than any politician that opposed it.
Maybe if you werent such a fucking defeatist? I think this sort of post or comment should bw downvoted and ignored as russian/chinese/whoever propoganda, but just in case you're real:
Should they get voted in, call and write them, everyday, demand to know why they haven't fixed the problem. Don't be "nice", either, remember that repub congress critters are scared of their constituents, and they were (at first) doing what their voters wanted.
Edit: Thanks for proving my point better than I ever could have. Cowards.
BlueMAGA can't even be bothered to pick a specific foreign country to scapegoat all their problems on anymore, now they're just blaming foreigners in general
LOL. What are you, 18? You think letter writing and call in campaigns do anything? Man, voting doesn't even do anything. These people don't work for you and they don't care what you think except as far as they can keep you working and not trying knock over their gravy train. They don't give a shit about angry phone calls or letter or email or petitions. They haven't cared for at least century.
Listen. Go research the civil rights movement. Go look at the black voter turnout and tell me that the reason civil rights passed is because of voting. It wasn't. It was because of riots. How do we know? Because both the Ds and the Rs were forced to capitulate in successive terms. Nixon had to do a ton for civil rights because people were in the streets threatening to shut the system down. And then you know what he did? He launched the drug war to further criminalize black people and the hippies that supported them. And you know who stepped right up to help? The Democrats. Because that's who both parties are. They are racist, misogynistic, genocidal PR firms providing spin to different audiences so that the population doesn't try to stop the empire.
Again, you have it completely and utterly wrong. Alternatives to rioting are pleasant fictions that give people excuses to not riot. Because they believe in voting, they think that that's enough. We have to show them reality to get them on the streets. Letting people live in the fantasy land where voting matters means fewer people on the streets.
Give up on voting. It's literally never worked in your life, your parents lives, nor your grandparents lives. It's a lie created by the ruling class to pacify you. Stop relying on the vote. Start getting angry and shutting the system down. If you can find time to vote between rioting, striking, and sabotage, go ahead, but there's probably something more important you could be doing to dismantle the system that has been oppressing you and your fellow humans for centuries.
During the 2025-2026 congressional sessions, several significant pieces of legislation were passed that showcased deep partisan divisions. The key issues included:
Budget Proposals
Healthcare Reforms
Voting Rights
The voting patterns on these issues were characterized by strong party-line divisions, with Democrats and Republicans largely voting in alignment with their party's stance. This trend reflects the ongoing polarization in Congress, where bipartisan support has become increasingly rare.
Summary of Votes
| Legislative Issue | Party Support | Key Points |\
| Budget Proposals | Mostly along party lines | Significant disagreements on funding allocations and priorities. |\
| Healthcare Reforms | Divided by party | Controversial changes to existing healthcare policies. |\
| Voting Rights | Strong partisan divide | Debates over access to voting and election integrity measures. |
If you think any of those explanations aren't valid excuses, then you don't actually know how the government functions. Sure everything is easier when a dictator like Trump does it because he doesn't follow the law.
I don't support genocide. I recognize the unfortunate reality that either Democrats or Republicans are going to be running the country right now. Maybe one day we can get better options, it is not an option here and now.
The way I see it, Democrats are convincible, Republicans aren't. Republicans hate nonwhites and Muslims, Democrats don't. That makes Democrats the better option.
Oh, you think carrying out the will of your voters is good? Well have you considered that goes against the design of a system made by slave-owning rapists to maintain their class's power?
It's more complicated than you are presenting it. There are hundreds of representatives each with their own motivation on every different vote.
Yeah, sometimes they vote against the will of the voters (Israel). Other times, they can't do the will of the voters because of the rules. For example budget reconciliation can be used to pass financial-only laws with a simple majority that would otherwise need a higher vote threshold to pass. The parliamentarian will say no if they try and squeeze something non-financial through that way.
Even Trump hasn't been willing to fire the parliamentarian and blow up that system. It has a purpose.
You want to throw out the whole Constitution and start over? Fine. How many dead are worth it to you? There Conservatives are sure as hell not going to give up power without a fight and they are willing to kill to keep it.
There are hundreds of representatives each with their own motivation on every different vote.
And there's a party whip and the power to take representatives off committees or remove their access to party infrastructure. The whole point of a party is that it can force its members to work together, without that ability you don't have a party.
Even Trump hasn’t been willing to fire the parliamentarian and blow up that system. It has a purpose.
It hasn't been useful for him because he appointed a parliamentarian who does what he wants. When Bush's parliamentarian wouldn't, he fired him and replaced him with one who would.
You want to throw out the whole Constitution and start over? Fine. How many dead are worth it to you? There Conservatives are sure as hell not going to give up power without a fight and they are willing to kill to keep it.
The literal only use any government institution is to enact the will of the entity that controls it. The conservatives understand this, the left understand this, only the liberals who don't understand why they keep losing at calvinball have yet to figure it out.
And there's a party whip and the power to take representatives off committees or remove their access to party infrastructure.
The whip can not take tepreststives off committees. The decision must go through the party's internal Steering Committee or be voted on and approved by a resolution of the full House chamber.
The Speaker of the House has the authority to appoint and remove members from temporary select or conference committees at any time.
The whip can only make threats and offer new committee positions.
It hasn't been useful for him because he appointed a parliamentarian who does what he wants.
Elizabeth McDonough has been parliamentarian since 2012
The literal only use any government institution is to enact the will of the entity that controls it.
Unless that will breaks already established laws. If the majority wants to reinstate slavery, they shouldn't be able to just ignore the 13th amendment and the essential civil rights of millions of people.
290 Comments
BluescreenOfDeath@lemmy.world · 59 pts · 4d
I'll be the first one to say that the current Democratic party needs replacing, but they're not wrong.
Or did everyone forget that you need a supermajority in the Senate to get past the Presidential veto?
Is anyone truly naive enough to think that Donald Trump would sign anything the Democrats put forward? The man who told Republicans to tank legislation with things they wanted in it to avoid giving Democrats a win?
Unless you're advocating for a revolution, you have to work within the system. And it's not the Democrats fault that is easier to break a thing than to fix it.
It's always easy to point out a problem. Solutions are what we need, and all this kind of post does is discourage left-leaning people from voting, which is what the Republicans want.
So unless you have something resembling an actual solution, this just seems like virtue signaling to me.
SwingingTheLamp@piefed.zip · 40 pts · 4d
I will say that there's immense value in symbolism, performative values, and simply being caught trying by voters. Yes the President will veto anything good, but fucking make him do it. Go on social media and the talk shows to rip him a new one for all of the good things that he's actively preventing. Move the Overton Window. Change the terms of the public discourse.
Governing long ago moved beyond mere parliamentary procedure; it also needs to be a show that the people in the cheap seats (a.k.a. low-information voters) can watch.
AppleTea@lemmy.zip · 23 pts · 3d
Careful, that almost sounds like something a competent opposition party would do.
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world · 39 pts · 4d
Why can Republicans govern with a slim majority while Democrats consistently need a supermajority?
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 23 pts · 4d
The democratic party accomplished all of its goals during the biden administration: they sold weapons for genocide.
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world · 15 pts · 4d
People hate when you say it, but the Democratic Party is Controlled Opposition.
A bunch of them are just paid to lose.
Serinus@lemmy.world · -4 pts · 3d
"A bunch" is roughly three. Sinema, Fetterman, and, uh... I'm sure there's one more.
It's easier to stop things than to pass things. You'll notice Republicans aren't getting a lot done right now, exactly. At least not through Congress.
They're doing so many blatantly illegal things, largely with the blessing of the DoJ and the Supreme Court. But they can't get the SAVE Act through to stop us from voting.
It turns out every bit matters.
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world · 12 pts · 3d
If you can't name more than two Senators... Jesus, dude. Maybe start with Henry Cuellar and Bob Menendez. Ritchie Torres. Elissa Slotkin. Eric Swalwell. Josh Gottheimer. Do I really need to make you the full list?
AWistfulNihilist@lemmy.world · 12 pts · 3d
Whenever there is a democratic majority, just enough Democrats will turn to make any actual change impossible, like a public option with Obama. Or when the blue dog Democrats fucked healthcare reform under Clinton. It's happened every time and will continue to happen because the ratchet effect is a feature that always ends in facism and oligarchy, which is where you make your real money.
Serinus@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 3d
The ratchet effect is real, but it's because when the Dems have a majority they're relying on West Virginia. Republicans kiss the ring or they're kicked from politics, just look at Ted Cruz.
Natanael@infosec.pub · -6 pts · 2d
Is that why Biden got more progressive change through than any prior president despite record breaking political resistance?
You need break the dependency on the idiots who talk about fake "bipartisanship", like Manchin
When get only get small majorities, these damn idiots gets a say, you need to make those dumbasses irrelevant
https://edition.cnn.com/2024/03/21/politics/joe-manchin-nominees-bipartisan-support
0tan0d@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 3d
Cory big pharma bitchboy Nooker
bitjunkie@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 3d
Jeffries, Schumer, Pelosi, Kaine, Booker… pretty much anyone not in the squad or otherwise on the AIPAC tiddy
Serinus@lemmy.world · -10 pts · 3d
The neolibs are not responsible for the majority of our problems.
Their biggest crimes are Israel and not being aggressive enough on changes. They're not the ones preventing most of the legislation we've tried to pass, such as the public option with the ACA.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 1d
As far as you're concerned, their biggest crime is not supporting genocide even harder.
DarkFuture@lemmy.world · -11 pts · 3d
I like it when people focus on one thing and ignore all the actual accomplishments. Or maybe you aren't ignoring them. Maybe you're entirely ignorant of them.
Doc_Crankenstein@slrpnk.net · 9 pts · 2d
Petty concessions do not obscure the overt imperialist oppression.
"I don't care about the fact we support genocide so long as I get better quality of life."
What a fucked mentality. Go find your solidarity with the oppressed.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 2d
He doesn't care about quality of life as long as he gets his genocide.
Natanael@infosec.pub · -8 pts · 2d
Why are you helping Republicans guarantee the genocide continues?
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 2d
You don't care who wins as long as anti-genocide candidates aren't on the ballot.
BrainInABox@lemmy.ml · 4 pts · 1d
Why are you still beating your wife?
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 2d
You like it when Palestinians die.
BrainInABox@lemmy.ml · 4 pts · 1d
"Hitler made the trains run on time though!"
BeefGyro@lemmy.zip · 16 pts · 4d
Because they also have the office of the president.
Currently anyway.
If one party controls both houses of congress and the president and has a sympathetic Supreme Court majority they can do a lot more than if they only have one or 2 of those things.
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world · 19 pts · 4d
"We need a supermajority" was a response Democrats gave in 2009 and 2021.
Did Republicans pass legislation they supported between 2011 and 201
75? Did they pass legislation they supported between 2023 and 2025?BeefGyro@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 3d
So here’s some basics on how the American government works.
The house can pass a bill with a simple majority.
So can the senate. In the event of a tie, the vice president casts the tie breaking vote.
However, the senate rules are such that in order to get to a vote you need vote to close debate, which takes 60 votes.
There are exceptions to the 60 vote rule using what’s called budget reconciliation. Matters pertaining just to budgetary items can bypass the 60 vote threshold and be voted on by a simple majority. These items must be cleared with the senate parliamentarian.
Once a bill has passed both the senate and the house, the president can either sign it or just wait 10 days and do nothing, at which point that bill becomes a law. He can also veto the bills at which point it gets sent back to both the house and senate which can override his veto with a 2/3 vote in both the house and senate.
If you want to pass a bill over the objections of the president you need two thirds of both the senate and house to agree to do it. If you want to get a bill through the senate that goes beyond budget reconciliation you need 60 senate votes.
When people talk about a supermajority they may be referring to the 60 votes needed to pass unrestricted bills in the senate, which the democrats had in 2008-2010 when they got Obamacare passed. Or if they are talking about overriding a veto they may be talking about the 2/3 of the votes you’d need in the house AND senate.
I’m not interested in debating who said what about what when, it just seemed like some people were unaware of the actual rules of how the US federal government functions and hoped to clear that up. If you have any questions about how that stuff works I’m happy to address it with the best of my knowledge. But I have no interest in actually debating politics online.
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world · 12 pts · 3d
None of this seems to apply when a Republican is in office
bitjunkie@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 3d
I know right, this is what lost me
Doc_Crankenstein@slrpnk.net · 2 pts · 2d
I mean, it does function. Just not for the benefit of the working class.
BeefGyro@lemmy.zip · 2 pts · 3d
All of this applies. It’s why republicans were able to pass tax cuts via reconciliation but not the SAVE act. They would have needed to change the filibuster rule and they couldn’t get the 50 votes needed to do it.
If you want to make long term changes to this country you need to control both houses of congress and the presidency. 2026 elections can change the former but not the latter. Which means dems will be able to stop the insanity but they’re not going to be able to make major changes until they can overcome the veto power. They need to have a democratic president.
Look, I’m sure you’re passionate about change and want to make a difference, but if you’re not going to get your facts straight and just dismiss everyone who disagrees with you with pithy comments then you’re never going to get enough people on your side to do that. Not enough people will take you seriously and you’ll just end up being spoiler votes that keep people like Trump in power.
This will be my last post in this thread.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1d
Or when netanyahu wants weapons.
Natanael@infosec.pub · -1 pts · 2d
Because the Republicans break laws and get sympathetic judges to cover it up
m532@lemmy.ml · 4 pts · 2d
And the controlled opposition can't break laws ofc, they might win otherwise.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1d
The Leahy law is a law.
Centrist democrats break laws whenever they want. It just so happens that they only want to break one.
daychilde@lemmy.world · 13 pts · 4d
Republicans historically do not fucking govern. They give tax cuts to the oligarchs and otherwise have a concept of a plan in two weeks. They lie and lie and lie. They are the ones pushing the "gummit is borken" lie - and making sure it appears to be true.
RampantParanoia2365@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 3d
Probably because the Rs are more loyal overall.
Natanael@infosec.pub · -2 pts · 2d
Republicans are willing to use blatantly illegal tactics and control enough courts to make a mess, you know the whole "it's easier to break things" part.
Democrats need a supermajority, then they need the courage to invoke 14A3 disqualification backdated to at least J6 and declare everything the admin did legally null and void. Make every Republican politician personally legally liable for everything, all the theft and destruction, as the immunity of the political positions gets fully erased.
That's the only fast way to fix things. Anything less will mean it's going to drag out for decades.
homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world · -9 pts · 4d
Executive Summary
The evidence shows multiple plausible answers depending on how one defines “dominate.” Recent sources most commonly point to the Democrats’ control of both chambers during the 117th Congress (January 3, 2021–January 3, 2023) as the last time they held unified congressional control, while earlier notable periods include the 111th Congress (2009–2011) and historically larger majorities like the 89th Congress after 1964. The statement therefore requires clarification of terms—“dominate” can mean simple majority, large supermajority, or sustained multi-decade control—to be answered precisely
https://factually.co/fact-checks/politics/when-did-democrats-last-dominate-congress-1833b0
Contemporary records and syntheses within the provided analyses indicate the 117th Congress (Jan 3, 2021–Jan 3, 2023) as the latest period when Democrats held both chambers, with a House majority and a Senate majority realized through a 50–50 split and the Vice President’s tiebreaking vote. This configuration coincided with the Biden administration and enabled the Democratic leadership to pass key legislation during early 2021, illustrating functional control despite narrow margins. Reliable repositories of congressional composition and institutional histories corroborate this timing as the most recent instance of unified party control in Congress cited across multiple analyses, making the 117th the default answer when “dominate” is used to mean holding both chambers —————————————————-
That was after the republicans facilitated a global pandemic. The time before that was after the republicans destroyed the global economy. The time before that was before most of you were born: —————————————————————
3. Earlier high-water marks: 111th Congress and the 1964 landslide
If “dominate” implies a more comfortable majority or a legislative supermajority enabling broad agenda-setting, earlier periods fit better. The 111th Congress (2009–2011) provided Democrats with substantial House and Senate margins that facilitated major policy initiatives during the Obama administration, and analyses explicitly call this a recent example of decisive Democratic control [4]. Going further back, the 89th Congress following the 1964 electiondelivered the largest Democratic majorities since the New Deal era, enabling the passage of transformative legislation associated with President Lyndon Johnson’s agenda. Historical accounts position the 1964–1965 period as a classic instance of one-party dominance in Congress, distinct from the narrow 2021–2023 control
Rentlar@lemmy.ca · 18 pts · 4d
The thing is that many people are looking too short-sightedly for the internal (non-revolution-like) reform path. The goal for change is 2028, but change in 2028 can't get off the ground running, if a 2026 sweep doesn't. (I wish you had a Westminster system with no-confidence votes, but alas).
What Congress can do is to compel Trump administration officials to get their asses into the chamber. They can put articles and lawsuits with appropriate standing to:
Congress under leadership of feckless Republicans and sometimes Democrats haven't asserted the power of the purse. For budgetary matters, votes can be held without permanently removing the cloture rule. And if Trump refuses to sign a bill voted on D-party lines to fund the government while implementing changes, the government will shut down once again and the bill will await him on the desk until he signs it. He will try to shift blame as he always does, but the government has shutdown led by Republicans or Democrats, the common thread is his incompetent ass in charge for most of the time since 2016.
inclementimmigrant@lemmy.world · 15 pts · 4d
I don't think that OP is expecting Democrats or Progressives to get things through the Trump administration without a supermajority that can override his veto. What we are hoping for/expecting is that Democrats and Progressives to say "Fuck you, we're passing this bill and sending it on."
Medicare for All? "Fuck you we're passing this bill, veto it motherfucker!". Taxing rich people? "Fuck you we're passing this bill, veto this PDF". Repealing the Medicare cuts? "Hey, asshole, we passed it, oh and go fuck yourselves". Repeal the procedural filibuster? "Fuck it, we'll do it live!". Impeachment? "Hey, it's Tuesday, this asshole just did something unbecoming of the office, guess it's time to have another impeachment hearing, oh and fuck you, that's why."
Just try instead of rolling over on day one, what we're asking for even if you know it's destined to fail and show that you're willing to do the work. Back your shit up with actions instead of just words of "Well it'll never pass so we'll never try". Say what you will about Republicans, when they get in power, they do not give a fuck and will introduce every bad idea in their head and dare the President to veto it and that's why their base votes for them consistently.
That's what OP I think is asking people to remember.
Mulligrubs@lemmy.world · 13 pts · 4d
They never, ever need a super majority. EVER.
That rule can be changed at any time by simple majority vote. That cloture rule is a parliamentary rule and is not law.
Don't be duped. Please look at what they call "the nuclear option."
There are over 180 exceptions to the super majority so far (last time I checked a few years ago).
(fun fact: the "nuclear option" was first called that by Trent Lott, a Republican, in the 2000s. Both parties immediately adopted the term because it scares the shit out of voters. What was it called before that? "the constitutional option").
Don't be a sucker. If they want to pass something, viola! It's an exception (like our budgets). If they don't want to pass something, but they want the voters to think that they do, "oh no, we need a super majority, super sorry we tried so hard!"
The solution is very simple. No other nation requires super majority votes for a reason.
No laws need to be changed.
BillyClark@piefed.social · 25 pts · 4d
You are thinking of filibuster, which I agree is just like you're saying.
However, they were talking about overriding the presidential veto, which is specifically defined in Article 1, Section 7 of the Constitution as needing a 2/3 majority in both houses. Not a simple majority. You also cannot adopt a rule that supersedes the Constitution.
Here's the specific paragraph that I copied from Wikipedia
zbyte64@awful.systems · 19 pts · 4d
I remember how the current congress led us to a government shutdown only to fold like lawn chairs in return for a pinky promise that was later broken. There are options that don't require overriding the president because congress has the power of the purse and the power to investigate.
Natanael@infosec.pub · 0 pts · 2d
Without a large majority they can only be annoying, not get arbitrary change
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1d
There is no majority large enough. There are always just enough Manchins.
daychilde@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 4d
And the threat of filibuster, it's a double-whammy
granch_bibblyfibble@piefed.social · 14 pts · 4d
They can make the filibuster be an actual Mr-Smith-Goes-To-Washington event again and fucking FORCE those fucking assholes to stand up there and talk for 24 hours straight. The change in filibuster behavior, which Republicans enacted, to just table anything that the other side said would be filibustered, should end. And spineless Democrats should do it and take credit for doing it, and look like they give a damn again.
daychilde@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 3d
I'm Alexander Daychilde, and I support this ↑ message.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
schipelblorp@sh.itjust.works · 2 pts · 4d
If you think the only role of a political party is to pass laws, you are lost.
BluescreenOfDeath@lemmy.world · 14 pts · 4d
I don't recall where I said that was the only role for a political party.
It's really easy to point out a problem, like "the Democratic party has issues and hasn't delivered in the past"
But unless you're bringing solutions, too, then you're just playing into the opposition's plan: Get opposing voters to be apathetic so they don't vote.
schipelblorp@sh.itjust.works · 2 pts · 4d
Giving people hope is not a legislative project, it is a political one, one which the corporate-led Democratic Party has remarkably and consistently and repeatedly failed at.
Leftist policy and, just as important, rhetoric is the solution. The Left can't do world building without institutional support.
DagwoodIII@piefed.social · 4 pts · 4d
That's either a strawman argument, or you have no idea how the US Constitution works.
The House and Senate make the laws, and the President enforces them.
schipelblorp@sh.itjust.works · 4 pts · 3d
If you think the only role of a political party is to pass laws, you are lost.
DagwoodIII@piefed.social · -1 pts · 3d
Whatever, dude.
agamemnonymous@sh.itjust.works · 0 pts · 2d
I'd argue that even if you're advocating a revolution, it absolutely helps to work within the system to control the damage and try to secure the most favorable conditions possible while you build the necessary organization to actually follow through on the revolution. It's a lot harder to organize when everyone to the left of Fetterman is declared a terrorist and the gestapo arrests them for possessing leftist pamphlets.
One could propose actively letting things get worse to inspire a revolutionary spirit in the masses, but that involves the suffering of already marginalized people.
isleepinahammock@lemmy.blahaj.zone · -2 pts · 4d
A little reading comprehension would indicate that the current discussion is clearly talking about cases where Democrats also control the presidency. Your whole comment is a non sequitur.
JustPlainDave@lemmy.zip · -7 pts · 4d
You're expecting a lot from people who'd rather stay home and claim some moral high ground while the world burns around them.
isleepinahammock@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 6 pts · 4d
You're just judging people based on your imagined stereotypes.
JustPlainDave@lemmy.zip · -11 pts · 4d
No, I'm judging people from their own actions I've observed myself. It's the same ones who wouldn't vote for Harris because of Gaza because getting Trump elected again has worked out so well for them. It's the people who, when starving to death and presented with a bowl of dried dog shit or some overboiled broccoli, will choose to starve because the broccoli is too soft.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
Why are you griping? You got the only thing you ever wanted the instant there was no anti-genocide candidate.
JustPlainDave@lemmy.zip · 0 pts · 1d
The only thing I ever wanted was for you to pull your head out of your ass. Unfortunately, you lack the ability to do so.
samus12345@sh.itjust.works · 43 pts · 3d
aesthelete@lemmy.world · 42 pts · 3d
When apparently you can just rename everything America and after yourself at whim as President, the never-ending excuses for getting nothing done during Democratic presidential administrations will not cut it for me this time.
Geobloke@aussie.zone · 1 pts · 2d
Anything a president can do unilaterally can be undone by the next president. There's a reason why the Afordable Care Act hasn't been undone at the stroke a sharpie
Alcoholicorn@mander.xyz · 3 pts · 2d
Lets not do anything good because Trump might undo it.
Geobloke@aussie.zone · 1 pts · 1d
Not the argument I was making, more the downs in strategy. The republicans going full send without consideration of the consequences and the Democrat taking taking time and being thorough
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1d
"Taking time and being thorough" looks a lot like "wasting time and doing nothing" when they're doing anything other than selling weapons for genocide.
Alcoholicorn@mander.xyz · 1 pts · 19h
The consequences of doing the thing your voters want and disregarding your enemies telling you you're not being civil is that you get reelected.
The consequences of listening to the people who are opposed to your voters is that your voters see that you are useless and check out of politics.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
That reason is that it benefits the insurance industry and only helps patients as a lamentable side effect.
zoloftt@lemmy.world · -2 pts · 3d
What a funny thing to hang your hat on. I can't tell if this is supposed to be sarcastic or not.
Renaming stuff is probably the easiest thing in the world. It costs money down the road, but it's significantly less intrusive and costly than doing almost anything else this admin has already done.
aesthelete@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 2d
Dude it ain't just the renaming.
I know everyone's got the attention span of a fucking gnat, but this dude has done whatever the fuck he wants with impunity while most Democratic administrations look like they're asking for permission to pee.
zoloftt@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 2d
I know! That's why I thought renaming things was such a silly thing to break the camels back for someone.
The way your original comment reads, it reads like the recent renaming is what has really made you upset.
Natanael@infosec.pub · 0 pts · 2d
That's because the Republican judges invent reasons to block what Democrats do and pretend there's no standing to stop other Republicans. You guys need to get a large enough majority to enforce 14A3 and disqualify this lot for fucking treason and tear apart their ability to get in the way
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
Democrats invent excuses to break their own campaign promises.
3abas@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 3d
They don't say "it's too expensive", they say "republicans won't let us do it".
But they let republicans do anything they want, including stupid petty distractions like renaming places. They are not on your side. Also they committed the majority of the genocide in Gaza. Democrats are not your friends, very few of them are decent humans.
zoloftt@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 3d
I never said they are on our side, I just found your particular point about it silly.
Not even going to comment on the rest of your reply. You clearly live in a black and white world.
3abas@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 2d
You clearly live in a world where suffering of others is negotiable as long as it benefits you, and you call that a colorful world.
What a weird way to attempt to insult me, yes genocide and imperialism are bad and their supporters are bad, there's no room for gray in there.
Natanael@infosec.pub · -1 pts · 2d
You're refusing to look at how the killing accelerated under Trump and you fucking dare to accuse us of not caring?
Everybody who looked and thought for 2 seconds predicted it would be worse under Trump, tried to stop Trump, and you didn't care because you refused to believe it could be worse under Trump, and then you claim the moral high ground for rejecting evidence
There is more genocide and imperialism because Trump got another term
3abas@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 2d
The killing factually decelerated under Trump.
That's not to defend him or his plans of turning Gaza into a beachfront resort, but factually, the killing is no where near as bad as it was under Biden.
You predicted it in 2 seconds, we lived through the live streamed genocide from day one, you're wrong, and it's disgusting how smug you are about it.
Natanael@infosec.pub · -1 pts · 2d
LOOK AT THE CHARTS
You're just blatantly lying here, the charts fucking jolt up under Trump, YOU HAVEN'T EVEN LOOKED and insists on just believing your gut!
YOU'RE the smug fuck for refusing to look
Natanael@infosec.pub · -1 pts · 2d
Who lets them? The Republican courts you mean?
The majority of buildings destroyed is not the majority of lives lost. More people were killed faster under Trump. Somebody is lying to you if they're telling you Democrats were easier on Netanyahu than Trump is. They are lying to you because they want you to hurt yourself.
Observe the acceleration under Trump
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1616501/monthly-gaza-fatalities-injuries/
https://infosec.pub/comment/23470753 - here's a whole list of how Trump was worse in every way exactly as the warnings said
The recent slowdown in Gaza is caused only by increased killing in Iran and Lebanon, which does not play in your favor
3abas@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 1d
That's cumulative you moron. The slope clearly drops after Biden did the majority of the damage. You can't even comprehend the information you're using, or you'll do anything to twist reality to justify your support of genocide.
https://data.techforpalestine.org/
Under Biden, until 19th of January 2025, 47,724 killed. This number does not include the bodies never recovered or accounted for because they were vaporized, are still under rubble, or the entire family line was wiped off and noone was left to report them gone. The Lancet estimated 75 200 violent deaths between 7 October 2023, and 5 January, 2025 (https://www.thelancet.com/journals/langlo/article/PIIS2214-109X(25)00522-4/fulltext). But we'll stick to the official number that Biden over and over called untrustworthy. 47,724
By the time Biden was out of office, over 90 fucking percent of housing in Gaza was damaged or destroyed, you ghoul.
As of 10 September 2026, the official number is 74,784. That's only 27,060 under Trump.
If you want the daily rate under both that's 101.3 killed ever day under Biden (again way under reported) and 44.95 per day under Trump.
Are you suggesting Biden, who bypassed Congress twice to illegally send them bombs to destroy practically all of Gaza, almost all hospitals and clinics, and almost all farmlands while gaslighting us, lying about seeing beheaded babies, callously licking ice cream while stating there are "none" chances of a ceasefire, who's administration had members of the press dragged out in cuffs for asking about it, who framed the terrorist pager attack in Lebanon as heroic, or Kamala who went on national television and said she can't think of a single thing she'd do different, would have stopped Israel from carrying on their stated objectives of greater Israel from day one?
Fucking clown.
Natanael@infosec.pub · 0 pts · 1d
So your argument is that after killing increased for s while under Trump, the shift to killing in Lebanon and Iran instead of Palestine means putting Trump in power was a success?
3abas@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
You disgusting ripe banana brained piece of shit.
At no point during the Trump presidency did the rate of killing go higher than the first 150 days of the genocide under Biden. And we're still not counting the excess unreported deaths that primarily occurred during the first 150 days, when Israel cut all power to the strip and rained bombs at night.
The data is right there, and you've been repeatedly informed how you're misunderstanding it, but now I think you're just counting on people just believing your lies.
We don't support Trump, you moron. You're defending democrats as a "lesser evil", and in this demonstrable case, they actually are the "bigger evil". They're only better domestically, and that's what bothers liberals (or straight up Zionists pretending to be progressive), that Trump affects your cushy life. Fuck you.
You can't just condemn the democrats for committing genocide, you have to gaslight everyone and pretend like you give a shit about Lebanon or Iran just to say "look, republicans are the only baddies."
In case it isn't clear to your two braincells, we don't support Trump, we didn't want him in power, and we didn't vote for him. But you not only voted for genocidal KH (presumably), but you're still defending them despite the data showing clearly what they did.
BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today · 28 pts · 3d
My favorite Mamdani quote:
The Corpo-Establishment, MAGA Lite Dems are going to try to be losers again, but the new DemSocs aren't going to allow it, and more importantly, neither are we. They will do their jobs this time, or they will be treated as harshly as MAGAs.
If they try to sandbag the next Dem administration again, in another transparent attempt to hand it back to the MAGAs, then they will be treated the same as MAGAs, and end up in prison or at the end a rope.
We're nearly as fed up with Dems as we are with MAGAs, and it starts with Schmuck & Jeffries. They are the first to go, to make way for real Democratic Leadership, and not just Manchurian MAGAs.
almost_genocide@lemmy.world · 10 pts · 3d
Exactly. Obama's
Resonated with a lot of people and then it turned out he and the Democratic senators of the 111th congress had no intention on following through.
uriel238@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 25 pts · 3d
We need to organize twelve million Americans under a common manifesto.
If the Democrats don't take power in 2029 (both houses of the legislature and the executive), if they fail to move quickly, overhauling SCOTUS and ironcladding elections to stop tampering and voter suppression cold, then the US public needs to occupy Washington by multiple millions with a list of demands.
Or general strike.
Or riot in multiple municipal areas hard enough to overwhelm responders.
Or go on a billionaire assassination spree.
If we cannot do that, then we're all going to be packed onto the cattle cars. Not necessarily all together, but the US will fall to one-party autocracy.
US Dictatorship by 2033 is on the BINGO card.
almost_genocide@lemmy.world · 12 pts · 3d
This tbh. I've got very little faith in politicians to do something at this point. I would have been happy if 2022 Democratic senators and Biden did nothing and refused to get involved with the rail strike. Yet in another display of solidarity with corporations and billionaires they moved quickly to pass a bipartisan bill to block the rail strike. Wild.
uriel238@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 7 pts · 2d
Yeah, busting the rail strike really tipped the hand of the establishment Democratic party to show they still are captured, and the blue-dog ranks are in office not to serve the public or to make specific changes but to get rich by peddling their political power. Given they're negotiating with MAGA more than they're coordinating with progressives and DSA, I'm really expecting some Democratic officials will flip so they can continue exploiting their positions for personal gain.
Heather Cox Richardson notes that this sort of thing has happened before, in which business interests dominated the government and enacted policies that wrecked the economy, but got magnates very rich, but the backlash was a revival of public serving interests. In the case of Roosevelt and the New Deal, there was the threat of communist revolution, as we were also watching what was going on in the Soviet Union, and even communism had to be better than living in homeless encampments and barely surviving on flour paste.
We already have a conspicuous number of homeless encampments, and while we're not yet living on cups of noodles, we can't afford food and fuel at the same time, we're skipping meds, and we're also suffering from food poisoning while watching corruption and money getting poured into an unpopular war where our soldiers and sailors are being unnecessarily treated like shit.
Hopefully things don't have to get much worse before the mischief begins. I suspect we're all hoping the midterms turn out well (and we survive to the new Congress) which might save us from getting our hands dirty. But when there's no hope at all, some of us may realize we really don't have anything else to lose.
Cheebus@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 2d
here’s a start:
Universal Healthcare
No Stock Trading
Term Limits
End citizens united
at most a 3 day work week
Severe punishment for oligarchs
Maximum capital of 10 million, anything after that is taxed 100%.
If the next elected officials don’t immediately start getting these things lined up they face treason charges.
uriel238@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 3 pts · 2d
I'm totally game. Someone well above my pay grade needs to organize a panel of legal and civic experts to hammer out a charter and make sure it's got ironclad protections against corruption.
Otherwise, we'll just be here again in a decade or two, and they'll have the experience of this time to guide them.
For one thing, Citizens United only scratches the surface of money in politics. How Money Works did a video about just how entrenched it is. (Here on YouTube). And presently, politicians at the state and federal level expect to be able to enrich themselves by using the power of their office.
This is why it's way beyond my pay grade. We need historians to remind us how systems failed in the past, so we assure we don't repeat the same mistakes. We need legal scholars to check how our terms could be misinterpreted by bad-faith judges given authority, while making sure the language is plain enough that high-school students can understand what it means.
agamemnonymous@sh.itjust.works · 5 pts · 2d
There's the problem, it always comes down to someone else. So long as we keep waiting for someone above our pay grade to do the work, we'll keep waiting.
Find a group and get involved. Figure out what your pay grade is, and contribute on that level. This kind of organization doesn't just happen, it takes people doing things. It's why I joined the DSA. They aren't perfect, but they're a relatively large organization working on exactly these things.
Maybe you can help organize events or recruit those legal scholars. Maybe you can put up posters or try to recruit members. Maybe you can donate to help retain legal advice. Just do something, don't fall into the bystander effect.
DarkFuture@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 3d
I wish. But honestly, look at us. We don't have it in us. We're currently being abused (Constitutional violations left and right) and we haven't dragged them into the street yet.
We're weak. We can't get on the same page. We can't mobilize.
You can definitely forget about that. If we aren't occupying D.C. there's no way a general strike is happening. Generally speaking a general strike is just not something that would happen. You aren't going to convince a nation full of people living at the edge of poverty to stop going to work. Not happening.
I'm not trying to dissuade people from doing things, I'm just making realistic observations. And realistically we're either voting our way out of this or waiting until everyone is starving to fight our way out of it.
uriel238@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 3 pts · 2d
I, too, am pessimistic about our chances. But some folk who are more read up than me about it (e.g. Jamille Bouie, Helen Cox Richardson) express more optimism, citing trends and moments in history that rhyme.
Although, I am worried that our ultra-wealthy are exponentially richer than the robber barons ever have been at any other time in history. Once they're done financializing the US into a wasteland (of quarries, oilfields and data centers), they're going to move onto the rest of the developed world, and they are rich enough to buy all the elections and control all the governments.
So if we can make our stand here, and recognize our billionaire class as the existential threat that they actually are, (and as Paul Krugman suggests, tax them out of existence) we'll be sparing the entirety of human civilization a lot of devastation.
Eheran@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 2d
Do you think people in the past did it from a Position of wealth...?
Avicenna@programming.dev · 20 pts · 3d
I wonder if even after Trump they will run with the "Change takes time you have to be patient" bullshit again. That is if they ever get relected.
Squirrelknight@lemmy.world · 19 pts · 3d
They'll do the "We look forward, we don't look back" bullshit that Obama pulled post Bush.
Nobody important in the Trump administration will be prosecuted or punished in any meaningful way. Just you watch, we've been here before.
mlg@lemmy.world · 17 pts · 3d
Lol I already said a year ago that even if they gain a supermajority, they'll still somehow fail to successfully impeach Trump.
For the third time.
myyass@lemmy.world · 13 pts · 3d
I got the notion of this a long time ago. I mean like Obama expanding the Patriot Act. Like thanks for doing what I voted for you not to do. The opposite of progress is Congress. And there's a whole lot of Cons.
almost_genocide@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 3d
Trump has already been convicted for some serious crimes they need to actually sentence him.
Capone didn't end up prison for a lot of the heinous shit he did. But he did end up in prison.
starelfsc2@sh.itjust.works · 5 pts · 3d
He was literally on his way to sentencing but the American people voted him into office and the supreme court said he can do anything and it's legal. They'd have to make up some bs to get him in jail at this point but who cares. The Republicans will call foul play but they will do that even if you gave them everything so...
SpaceCowboy@lemmy.ca · 17 pts · 3d
The real trick: Republicans know their best shot of winning elections is to energize their base with "Democrats are going to destroy the country so you must go vote" while at the same time promoting the narrative "Democrats won't do anything so you should bother voting" to de-energize the opposition.
It's a very very obvious strategy being deployed here.
But go on and pretend you're an edgy contrarian while spreading the exact narrative the fascists want you to spread.
almost_genocide@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 3d
Why do you suppose this is effective?
starelfsc2@sh.itjust.works · 5 pts · 3d
Because most Americans can't name a single bill passed in the last 10 years or who is in the senate or literally anything about politics at all? Biden passed like 7 major bills while the senate was almost 50/50 split republican/democrat. To get 7 actually good bills passed in that climate is a miracle. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/117th_United_States_Congress
almost_genocide@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 2d
Yeah one was blocking the rail strike. Really fighting for the American people that guy. /s
starelfsc2@sh.itjust.works · 2 pts · 2d
Increasing the cost of living and shortages in supplies like food, water, and fuel massively impact the little guy all across the country. They did get a wage increase and better health benefits / sick leave, and the strike did go on for months. It literally could have shut down many local businesses, caused hardships for millions, caused shortages for many industries, not just the billionaire owned ones either.
The alternative is, eat all that cost for millions of people, and eventually after who knows how long one side caves. This is a lose-lose situation, and you can say he chose the wrong option, but to frame this as "he just chose to block the rail strike to side with the corporations" is just not accurate.
almost_genocide@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 17h
Imagine being so drunk on corporate propaganda you think blocking a strike is in service to the American people.
Biden did it for the billionaires and the corporations dumbass. He doesn't give a fuck about the American people.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
He also blocked the rail strike out of hatred for workers.
Genocidal shit gets no benefit of the doubt.
TheFinn@discuss.tchncs.de · 7 pts · 3d
This one is actually encouraging people to get involved and put in the work to fix the party. It isn't like all the other posts I've seen that seem designed to discourage people from voting.
urthoughtsrbad@lemmy.zip · 2 pts · 3d
None of it discourages people from voting. Y’all are wilin out.
Vote for the lesser of two evils, but don’t tell me to stop calling them evil. They are. It’s disingenuous.
I’m starting to think you folk are the ones getting paid to squash talk of reforming the party. You on payroll for a corporate dem?
Or maybe calling everyone who disagrees with me a paid shill is idiotic. But hey, you all started it.
almost_genocide@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 3d
They're definitely on some kind of payroll. People can't be so bored that they fight this hard for do nothing geriatrics.
Funkt4st1c@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 3d
Conservatives will always be organized by bigotry and greed, which coincidentally are the things you need to be rich.
Dems fight over party ideals and nitpick each other to death.
In the primaries, be nitpicky. In the election, vote the guy who wont endanger millions of your neighbors and friends. Vote the guy who wont stuff money in billionaire pockets. Even if theyre pandering, a blue conservative is better than a red one.
almost_genocide@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 3d
This is just more of the centerist bullshit that's led us to where we are in the past 25 years.
Stop defending obstructionists who vote for trash candidates in the Democratic primaries.
starelfsc2@sh.itjust.works · -1 pts · 3d
Then get them in during the primaries? It's not my fault they are extremely unpopular with the voters.
pachrist@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 2d
Why do you think they're unpopular? Is it possible that the party which controls how funds, advertising, and opportunities are allocated in the primaries it fully controls has a vested interest in keeping leftist politicians out of office?
almost_genocide@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 2d
I voted for them. Did you?
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1d
Stop acting like the primaries are honest.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
Stop acting like the primaries are honest.
DarkFuture@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 3d
Yup.
Literally what happened last election.
Got a bunch of fools to throw their hands up with the Democrat party and then fascists waltzed in and are currently speed running destroying our futures.
You can have problems with the Dems and that's fine and dandy, but if you're posting about how they're not going to accomplish anything (fundamental lie if you pay attention at all) then you're just helping fascists continue to obliterate our futures.
Bottom Line: The Democrats MUST win.
Doc_Crankenstein@slrpnk.net · 15 pts · 2d
It's almost like the system is designed to prevent the working class from gaining any headway while consistently capitulating to the whims of capital.
The intrinsic failure of arbitrarily hierarchical systems. When the working class demands change, it can't happen because [arbitrary barriers we blindly obey] while anytime the owning-class demands it, suddenly we must make compromises for the benefit of the "county's economy"
Never forget the state and the economy are intrinsically linked. The state is a tool of the ruling class to oppress the working class. It is fundamental to the system itself.
chunes@lemmy.world · 14 pts · 2d
I'm not convinced they'll regain power. The fucking president just promised to pay $5,000 per vote. He is trying to gain power over mail-in votes. He prevents interviews with democrats from airing on TV. He has friends that admit to messing with voting machines.
THIS IS NOT DEMOCRACY.
gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works · 14 pts · 4d
Yeah - Biden tried that, and literally nothing impactful actually happened, and then they all just threw up their hands and said “well, we tried, that should be good enough”
schipelblorp@sh.itjust.works · 9 pts · 4d
The United States has a huge problem with presidential pardon power. Anyone serious about accountability needs to advocate for getting rid of it.
Keilik@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 4d
It’s not even just the pardons really, it’s the fact that so much of government runs on vibes^tm^ and the belief that elected officials will always act in good faith. So the pardons need to be reformed but a lot more things do as well. Like the fact it’s literally impossible to do a constitutional amendment now.
homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 4d
Biden delivered big wins that should be propelling us now except that trump destroyed all of it in six months.
gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works · 13 pts · 4d
Biden and his admin did some good things, for sure, but by and large he simply continued entrenching the status quo and didn’t meaningfully listen to the American populace - unless it was through the filter of the DNC/DCCC’s fuckwitted consultant class, who have been a cripplingly parasitic negative influence on the party for basically the entire span of time I’ve been politically aware.
Remember:
I believed him when he said it, and he sure as fuck followed through.
Not to mention, his whole full-throated, carte blanche support of Israel in their genocide of Gaza (and I do mean to include the decades-long lead up to Oct 7, as well as the IDF’s retaliatory / punitive / expansionist / ethnic-cleansing actions after that point). Schumer’s one of the few politicians off the top of my head who’s more of an Israeli sycophant than Biden.
homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world · 13 pts · 4d
I disagree with parts of the analysis, but this:
I am 100% on board for. Their consultants suck and need to be set adrift as soon as possible. Hopefully republicans will pick them up and start losing constantly.
crusa187@lemmy.ml · 5 pts · 4d
Agreed. Don’t be fooled - Pete Buttigieg made his career as a McKinsey consultant.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
Yeah, they're not genocidal enough for you. No one is.
DarkFuture@lemmy.world · -2 pts · 3d
Let's try not to rewrite history here.
He publicly voiced disapproval. He threatened arms shipment cancellations. He worked to negotiate a peace deal.
While those things ultimately didn't work, they don't fall under the "full throated carte blanche" category.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 2d
He lied, yes.
And didn't follow through.
BeHiNd ThE ScEnEs
BrainInABox@lemmy.ml · 3 pts · 1d
Proceeds to rewrite history
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 4d
Biden delivered weapons for genocide, and there is no other reason you support him.
dreamy@lemmy.ml · 4 pts · 3d
Biden didn't just deliver, he gifted them. Never forget his 40 beheaded babies statement, and never forget that Reagan had more balls against Israel than Genocide Joe.
DarkFuture@lemmy.world · -3 pts · 3d
The internet loves to pretend Biden wasn't one of the most progressive presidents we've ever had. The internet loves to fall for Republican and foreign disinformation and believe Biden didn't net a ton of important wins for Americans.
It's a combination of disinformation and people being too lazy to pay attention to current events.
Was Biden the best president in U.S. history? Nah. Was he actually a good president? Yeah, he was.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 2d
Centrists love to lie and call a genocidal turd progressive.
BrainInABox@lemmy.ml · 3 pts · 1d
"Hitler wasn't perfect, but he made the trains run on time!"
homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world · -4 pts · 3d
Yep. Well said.
knobbysideup@sh.itjust.works · 14 pts · 4d
Primaries are the time to do this. It's the reason I moved from independent to democrat as PA only lets you vote in primaries with party affiliation.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 4d
Those things we didn't get in 2024?
i_need_your_bones@piefed.social · 10 pts · 4d
Democrat primaries, famous for listening to the voters and propping up who they vote for. Never any fuckery in a democratic primary
DarkFuture@lemmy.world · -5 pts · 3d
The 2024 Democratic primaries happened. Joe Biden won. Then his own voters made such a fucking stink about his age (despite his accomplishments) that they forced him out at the last minute and it defaulted to his VP, who Democrat voters also voted for by association of voting for Joe Biden.
You think we should have held a primary 2 months before an election? Would have been chaos.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 2d
The party sued as many opponents off the ballots as it could, so that Biden's name was the only one on the ballot in all 50 states. His handlers hid that his brain was pudding until he bragged about finally beating Medicare at the debates.
And then they installed Harris and you're going to bat for them for it.
I think biden never should have run. For anything. Ever. He's a genocidal piece of shit.
dream_weasel@sh.itjust.works · 9 pts · 3d
Let's get to that point and at the same time run candidates to prevent it happening again.
"Oh my God he's bleeding out! We have to stop the bleeding"
"Yeah I've seen this before, he's just going to start bleeding again. Do you want Arby's?"
Let's fix problems, take incremental wins where available, and not be morons about it.
starelfsc2@sh.itjust.works · 5 pts · 3d
It's like people think democrats become kings when they get into office. Literally half the country is sub 100 iq, is moderately/extremely racist, and keeps voting in room temperature iq Republicans into the senate. About 1/3rd of the country voted for Trump AFTER we knew he was a felon and tried to steal the election.
Alcoholicorn@mander.xyz · 6 pts · 2d
Weird how the republicans never seem to let the parliamentarian or 1 vote or the SCOTUS or whatever stop them.
starelfsc2@sh.itjust.works · 4 pts · 2d
They have the majority in literally everything and they still have failed to pass so many bills because they are that incompetent.
The Republicans are doing the equivalent of giving themselves money in a monopoly game and saying "hey there's no rule that says I CAN'T do that, is there?" Like when they sat on their hands rather than voting on Obama's scotus pick for months. I don't know what you do about that other than matching the egregious actions, and it seems dems are still trying to play inside the rules which I agree is a losing strategy.
That's one thing I'm really aligned with the DSA on, democrats need to break the rules too or have extremely harsh punishments for it once they're in power, so Republicans know to cut it out or they're either out of office or in jail.
BrainInABox@lemmy.ml · 3 pts · 1d
This excuse stops working now that the republicans have made it clear that the party in order absolutely has the ability to make sweeping changes if they choose to.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
They do everything they want to do when they get elected. They sell weapons for genocide.
cyclonedusk@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 9 pts · 2d
if we were smart, we'd prosecute the centrists as accomplices. because they are.
Tollana1234567@lemmy.today · 4 pts · 2d
the ones that keep siding with israel, or taking thier money and the ones getting money from people like koch, thiel and others.
Bloomcole@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 2d
that's a constant in both sides of your uniparty.
americans are dumb AF
Wataba@sh.itjust.works · -2 pts · 2d
Id prosecute the people who stood by and did nothing when the fascists raved about what they were going to do.
That includes non-voters.
DudleyMason@lemmy.ml · 5 pts · 2d
Does that include ShitLibs who split the anti-Trump vote by voting for Kamala Harris, even though it was obvious she couldn't win and Gloria La Riva was right there?
BrainInABox@lemmy.ml · 3 pts · 1d
"I'd prosecute anyone who wouldn't vote for my genocidal fascist of choice"
SoloCritical@lemmy.world · 9 pts · 3d
El-Sayed for President!
DarkFuture@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 3d
Welcome to America, where that ain't happening.
SoloCritical@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 3d
Maybe. Maybe not. But at least I can still say it, for now.
Tollana1234567@lemmy.today · 8 pts · 3d
also a supermajority dem had problems, they had too many DINOs in the party.
almost_genocide@lemmy.world · 9 pts · 3d
Hence the title:
Lemming6969@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 2d
The democrats don't have the balls to do anything even if they had all of congress and the presidency. The democrats have been shown what is permissible, and they don't have the spine to do what is necessary.
mojofrododojo@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 2d
former dem presidents haven't broken the norms because they were afraid of setting a precedent.
I think that's all gone now, or at least better be, because the obstruction future admins face even if they get voted for is going to be enormous.
Lemming6969@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 1d
The precedent has now been set that you can torture the other side and target their states and communities with money withholding, police/military, and imprison subgroups, label them terrorists, and incite in-groups, and capture judges and literally ignore laws...They don't have what it takes, and the American public won't hold anyone accountable for any amount of time. Cooked.
mojofrododojo@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 1d
you're a real beacon of fuckin hope
also, do you really clamor for someone who's vengefully coiled waiting to break the system entirely to visit misery on some rural voter schmuck or should they focus on restoring the national character (chisel all that shit off the walls and strip the gold spray paint off too), rebuild alliances, constitutionally establish trans rights as human rights, restore the economy, etc.,? bring back the deported, prosecute ICE architects and the fascist footsoldiers... roll back all of trump's signatory bullshit, put maxwell into the wost fuckin hole they can find, release the epstein files etc.,
and even then, it still wouldn't be enough - they deserve worse. but. priorities.
this is a real problem, they've fucked up more stuff than can conceivably be fixed in a single admin.
I have more thoughts on this but the dog must be walked NOW
Lemming6969@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1d
I agree there is more to be done than can be done in 1 admin already, but I'm not convinced what they should do as step 1 will be done at all.
mojofrododojo@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 1d
I have a family, so... hope springs eternal.
two things really standing out: diesel is surpassing $6 a gallon. everything we buy and eat are moved by trucks eating diesel.
russia has seen enormous segments of it's industrial sector and especially it's resource extraction hammered.
hope it's not a cold winter, because ooof.... might just lead to an overthrow of putin.
Tollana1234567@lemmy.today · 2 pts · 2d
they know if they set a precendents, they would actually have to do something for once, like actually act on thier "promises", most of them tend to be Dinos though.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
That was just an excuse and they'll find others.
HalfSalesman@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 3d
"When" lots of optimism in that word.
speaksintv@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 2d
Jeffries already been bought off after his private meeting with Kushner the other day.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 1d
He was bought off long before that. He was just meeting with his boss to get his marching orders.
Bloomcole@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 2d
lib answer: let's laughably try and fix this party
mig@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 2d
I don't know what is considered a lib anymore but my answer is let's have more than 2 parties. Reform electoral law, get rid of first past the post. Raked choice voting.
FlyingCircus@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 2d
Ok, now how do you get that enacted within our current framework?
Bloomcole@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 2d
Some non-banana republics have tried this wacky idea of starting a different party, completely independent of any other party.
Which is a really good idea if you're not satisfied with the 2 you stubbornly keep voting for and who have invariably done the same shitty things since the beginning. Some of us wild countries even have more than 3 parties!
FlyingCircus@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 1d
The US also has more than 3 parties, but the current system guarantees that only two can get enough votes. The entire electoral system is built to perpetuate this, including the media ecosystem. So sadly, it’s not as simple as just “have a third party.”
Personally, I think socialist revolution is the only thing that can bring positive change in this country, largely because it doesn’t try to change things within the system, it seeks to dismantle the system entirely.
Bloomcole@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1d
'strongly favors' yes, but not 'guaranteed'.
It all comes down to the voters and the self fulfilling prophecy of not voting 3rd party because nobody does.
And yes, socialist revolution is the far better option but then we're back to my first comments.
You certainly can't expect that from people who can't even manage the voting 3rd party part.
They have zero class consciousness and perpetually voting against their own interests.
FlyingCircus@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 2d
Even if the progressive wing somehow replaces the rightist corpo Dems, the ruling class would never allow us to democratically make the changes we all want to see without a fight. They will respond with fascism, so our communities must be organized enough to pose a bigger threat than what they can buy/foment.
nullify3112@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 3d
Just watch them do a full archeological expedition to excavate the word “bipartisan” and then watch them cherish it as the treasure most sacred to our failing democracy.
Suddenly they won’t do things because they’ll be worried about what the right thinks. They’ll throw their arms in the air when the but think of the possibility of not having getting the votes in congress. They’ll tell us they tried nothing to revert our wealth inequality madness and say they are all out of ideas. They’ll claim that the poor being absolutely miserable and their conditions worsening is the American way and the debt is too big to do anything about it. Suddenly a balanced budget will be back on the menu with a whif of austerity hanging in the air.
We’ve been there before.
nilloc@discuss.tchncs.de · 6 pts · 3d
We also need to keep protesting for them to do the things we need them to do.
Getting complacent when a D is elected won’t fix these problems.
psycho_driver@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 3d
Yeah but we need to vote for anyone in the end other than the fascist fuck pedo party.
BrainInABox@lemmy.ml · 1 pts · 1d
The Red one or the Blue one?
frisbird@lemmy.ml · 0 pts · 3d
I hate to break it to you but there's a ton of Ds in the Epstein Files.
fyzzlefry@retrolemmy.com · -4 pts · 3d
This traitor is all over this thread.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
This traitor to pedo solidarity.
frisbird@lemmy.ml · 1 pts · 3d
Me? 2 posts? All over the thread.
A traitor for noting that the Democrats are fascist pedophiles?
My fellow American, we were founded by fascist pedophiles. We were forged by fascist pedophiles. We fought a civil between factions of fascist pedophiles. We protected fascist pedophiles. We celebrated fascist pedophiles. We revered fascist pedophiles. We rehabilitated fascist pedophiles. We appointed fascist pedophiles. We empowered fascist pedophiles. We committed murder for fascist pedophiles.
If you think the other big party in the US isn't chock full of fascist pedophiles, you're delusional
DarkFuture@lemmy.world · -5 pts · 3d
I'll take "Things Stupid People Say" for $500, Alex.
frisbird@lemmy.ml · 5 pts · 3d
Let's see.
FDR - built concentration camps for anyone vaguely "Asian" looking and stole their commercial private property. Also established racial red lining for lending.
Truman - Korean war, killed a million civilians under the theory that the US should be allowed to continue the fascist occupation of the Korean peninsula since they're taking over for Japan.
Truman - Operation Overcast and Operation Paperclip. Saved 10k Nazis from justice prior to Nuremberg, gave them new lives, jobs, money, political positions, state protection, PR rehabilitation.
Truman - Staffed NATO with Nazi officers, oversaw election in West Germany which allowed former Nazi politicians to change parties and run for office.
Truman - oversaw Operation Gladio, the clandestine NATO program led by the Nazi officers assigned to NATO to organize former Nazis and Nazi collaborators all over Europe, funnel them money and weapons, train them, and make them into terrorist proxies
Truman - saw the French losing their fascist colonial occupation of Vietnam and decided we should help the French massacre the indigenous there.
JFK - decided to ramp up the military support for massacres in Vietnam
LBJ - cranked up the violence in Vietnam so bad he obliterated Laos. He also sent the US military to Guatemala to "support" the fascist right wingers there, by which I mean massacre popular movements. He also sent the US military to prop up the puppet government in DR Congo and massacre the popular movements there.
Nixon - Not a Democrat. However, the Ds controlled both houses of Congress for his entire presidency. And they all passed the drug laws that Nixon and his cabinet designed to imprison and disenfranchise Black people and anti-war hippies. Literally. The Nixon administration officials are on record that this was their design intent, and the Democrats made it happen. Because that's what fascists do - they criminalize peace, they criminalize resistance, and they profit from it.
Carter - A perfect liberal, did nothing wrong. Ya know, except oversee the CIA program to arm and train the Mujahideen, develop a pernicious form of radical islam to keep them fighting, and then eventually unleashing 9/11 on the country. Thanks, Jimmy. Even though you're a sweet old man, your fascist bloodlust just could not be tamed.
Clinton - Crime bill (Crime Bill). But also Bill was governor of Arkansas, and he and Hillary lived in the Governor's Mansion. Ya know they have black house slaves there? It's a prison labor thing. The Clinton's were fine with it. Didn't think it was worth changing. I'm sure they tipped their house slaves every once in a while. Treated 'em nice. But also yeah the crime bill? So much mass surveillance and incarceration. Just total fascist shit.
Obama - drone strikes on US civilians without due process, maintaining the Bush doctrine of first strike and the Bush concept of "enemy combatant" which is just fascist speak for "we can do whatever we want to these people". Then of course hand in hand with Clinton the funding and support for a civil war in Libya and then bombing the country into rubble where they now sell slaves. Clinton on record saying she laughed while she watched the video of the 80-year-old leader of the country sodomized by a bayonet in a public square as he was tortured to death. Real fash shit.
Obama - oh yeah. He was the first one to appoint Homan as deportation czar. 3M deported under Obama. Human rights groups called him "deporter-in-chief". He expanded DHS and ICE massively. In fact the things Trump has done, like appointing Homan as his deportation czar all started under Obama. Obama relied heavily on private prisons to fill his quotas, privatizing state violence like a real fash.
And then of course there's Biden
Biden who oversaw continued and escalating genocide in Gaza. Who fought the good fight against Trump by... doing nothing, almost as if he didn't really care. Biden who undermined the unions while using union aesthetics (which mustachioed German man pioneered that, I wonder?).
And that's ignoring the 50 years of bipartisan support for starving entire populations through unilateral sanctions, killing an average of 800K annually; the bipartisan support for mass incarceration; the bipartisan support for warrantless mass surveillance; the "southern strategy" and Democrat "triangulation"; the Democrat collaboration with Republicans that survives to this day while we all see the fascism for what it is.
Yes. The Democrats are fascist by virtue of being the other dominant power of the perennially fascist USA, a state that has not had a single day where it was not actively fascist (but the white people it considers the master race don't notice).
Malica@lemmy.zip · 5 pts · 4d
If they don't both get removed from power, the rot remains
minorkeys@sh.itjust.works · 5 pts · 4d
You need to defend the existence of your democracy first.
mrdown@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 4d
You never had democracy
minorkeys@sh.itjust.works · 0 pts · 3d
Are you going to argue 20 years ago was the same as right now, too?
darthelmet@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 3d
We are where we are now because of where we were before. The US from it's inception was explicitly anti-democratic. The founders feared popular will would vote away their wealth, so they designed the structure of the government to minimize the influence of the people at large.
Fast forward to more recent history: Unions started losing their power over the later half of the 20th century, which stripped the working class of a lot of potential political power. After 9/11, things like the Patriot Act gave the government even more capabilities to spy on people than it had before. (and it had already been making use of the FBI to disrupt leftist groups.) The greatly expanded military budget and general culture of the nebulous "war on terror" enabled the gov to militarize more of our society and made the framework for calling activists "terrorists." The fact that congress hasn't exercised it's war powers since WWII and all of our wars have been illegal actions by the executive obviously has granted the executive more unilateral power. Citizen's United opened the floodgates for even more corporate dark money in our elections. Slowly losing the Supreme Court has made the judicial branch a joke.
None of this could be happening now without that history. Trump didn't just fall from the sky and suddenly take power. He was enabled by decades and even centuries of politicians who at best could be said to have failed to create and maintain a healthy democracy and at worst could be said to have never had any interest in democratic principles.
mrdown@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 3d
No, I am saying that you never had a democracy , you always had an oligarchy
minorkeys@sh.itjust.works · 0 pts · 3d
Did anyone have a democracy, by your measure? Or are you contrarian out of habit?
mrdown@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 3d
I am not a contrarian and you are an conformist
minorkeys@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 3d
Sure, bud. You keep doing you.
DarkFuture@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 3d
Weird how I can vote for a candidate and if they get more votes they become my representative.
I guess that's an oligarchy to people who don't understand what a democracy is.
mrdown@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 3d
You think ability vote make you a democracy lol. You don't understand what democracy is
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
And you're happy with any result that doesn't curtail genocide.
K1nsey6@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 4d
This is more reform bullshit, which history has shown us countless times does not work
DarkFuture@lemmy.world · -4 pts · 3d
The fuck are you talking about? Political party reform is totally possible and has happened multiple times throughout American history. Conservatives just did it in the worst way possible to the Republican party. Positive political party reform is how the wealthy used to be taxed out their assholes back when America's middle class was strong.
K1nsey6@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 3d
And then Clinton threw the doors wide open to corporate cash and allowed them to start writing tax code. He also broke down the walls against lobbying, and corporate banking.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1d
Yes, he got the reform he wanted.
Unsealed9041@lemmy.ca · 4 pts · 3d
Very true. Dems had a supermajority and sitting dem president in 2009 and chose to sit on their hands instead of fixing healthcare in a materially significant way or codifying abortion rights. They left abortion in the hands of a lady that had more cancers than a lab rat.
DarkFuture@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 3d
The 2009 supermajority was very short lived. And abortion had been settled by the SC for decades. Not exactly a priority.
Unsealed9041@lemmy.ca · 2 pts · 2d
It doesn't seem so settled in the year 2026.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
The bailouts were a priority. They sailed right through.
ThisUsernameKillsFascists@piefed.social · -2 pts · 2d
The ACA was far, far from perfect, but it still had one major provision that has saved thousands, possibly millions of lives in the years since. By barring insurance companies from refusing coverage to those with pre-existing conditions, or from charging them massively higher premiums, millions of people with chronic illnesses and millions more who have survived life-threatening diseases and injuries are still able to access health care today. Imagine what a clusterfuck post-COVID America would be if everyone who had a serious case was no longer insurable.
0x4f1@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 2d
Last time I looked AIPAC owned the Democrats as well. We can't start putting things back together until American sovereignty is restored.
Mulligrubs@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 4d
Pro-tip: The "real progressives" will turn out to be Fettermans (at best).
Watch and see. The DNC is not paid to present progressives.
They will allow a small amount to hold office for appearances, but the higher up the pyramid you go, the less progressive they are.
Any time you doubt me, please compare the USA to any other "progressive" nation on Earth.
Poland now has better worker benefits than the USA. POLAND.
Mexico now has universal healthcare. MEXICO.
I'd love to be wrong, I vote every election and you should too. But the faster Americans realize that the DNC is not on their side, the better. I don't think we can vote our way out of this.
look at this, Americans, and weep
https://www.dudkowiak.com/employment-law-in-poland/employee-benefits-in-poland
nosuchanon@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 2d
The olde bait and switch
dylanmorgan@slrpnk.net · 2 pts · 4d
They need a parade of constituents at their local and DC offices reiterating demands.
BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today · 5 pts · 3d
I pass my loser Democratic Congressman's office often, and I think I'll start visiting. This traitor just signed that ridiculous anti-socialist pledge, one of only a handful of STUPID Dems who thought they should cooperate with MAGA Propaganda. My first visit will be to let them know that I expect him to vocally condemn ALL MAGA bullshit of any kind, and to vote against ALL MAGA legislation.
dylanmorgan@slrpnk.net · 2 pts · 3d
Definitely someone who needs frequent reminders of who their employers are and what is important to them.
Hikermick@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 2d
Did this person miss the Obamacare fight?
ghen@sh.itjust.works · 16 pts · 2d
You mean the one where a Democrat argued for a republican created policy to perpetuate our healthcare misery for another few decades?
immutable@lemmy.zip · 11 pts · 2d
I liked the part where the democrats slow rolled every part of it, coming to the negotiating table over and over with concessions to get the republicans to support it, all for nothing.
Alkali@lemmy.ml · 8 pts · 2d
For real, I don't get why more people don't talk about this. They literally dismantled their own plan to appease Republicans, the Republicand never supported it, and they pushed forward their gutted plan.
Like, if you are going to say fuck it and push the plan with Democrats alone at least use the original plan that wasn't gutted. That shit was purposeful.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
15 years and centrists are still coasting on a Heritage Foundation policy that they altered because it wasn't far enough to the right for them.
adarza@lemmy.ca · 1 pts · 4d
well, the thing is. they actually won't have much power at all. sure, they'll (mostly) be able to control the flow of legislation through congress. but that's it. dipshit will still veto anything his handlers don't like, and democrats won't have the numbers in either chamber to override.
if you want to see democrats actually accomplish something worthwhile that benefits people and the planet, give them a super majority in both chambers of congress and control of ~ 40 state legislatures.
daychilde@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 4d
What the fuck is this nonsense? I've been saying for years that one of the reasons Democrats aren't doing more is because Republicans are able to shut them down.
That's only one reason, yes:
There are mulitple reasons we haven't seen more progress, but this is not a new thing anyone is saying. Or maybe some people are just waking up to it, but OP's image is full of bullshit if they think some of us haven't been yelling about this for quite some time - because people think "Elect Democrat president = solve all problem" and this is VERY NOT TRUE. Same with Democrat majority in Congress.
And this is yet another reason why I think we're beyond fucked.
BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today · 8 pts · 3d
We need to help Progressives take over the Dem Party, and replace the party leadership. We can't allow the next era of Dem power to be managed by Schmuck & Jeffries. They already had their chance, and literally EVERYTHING they've done has helped MAGA gain strength and regain power. They are at least 50% of the reason that MAGA took over again, and they've done less than nothing to earn the opportunity at a second chance.
It's long past time to make huge changes, from top to bottom. We can't allow another term like the Biden term. The next Democratic term has to show substantial progress on Democratic policies, and massive rollbacks on MAGA treason, as well as criminal punishment for MAGA treason, corruption, and pedophilia, or it will be the end of America.
daychilde@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 3d
See, this is where while I might nitpick on a couple of things, I'm in at least like 90% agreement, and certainly 100% agreement on the conclusion. It irks me when so many are like "I know what we need to do, but some of the progressives that could help solve this are supporting one thing I disagree with, so fuck it, I'm out".
Because you are right - we've got to have progressives in charge. And it's not because "my team win, I win", it's because they win for EVERYONE. Progressive policies work for everybody except fascists.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1d
When the genocide wing keeps telling us that biden is the most progressive human to ever draw breath, you can imagine that progressives are wary about their movement being co-opted.
matlag@sh.itjust.works · 7 pts · 3d
It's incredible how Republicans manage to do a lot of things, essentially damage, despite Democrats opposition. But Democrats can't do anything, because Republicans won't let them do.
Can't you find COMPETENT Democrats?
daychilde@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 3d
The system is built so that it is much easier to prevent action than to take it. Republicans obstruct. And where they succeed, it is largely because it's things the oligarchs want, and yeah, centrist Dems serve the oligarchs as well.
It's the main reason I keep shouting that we need to solve the oligarch issue first, then deal with the political party once we cut off their corrupt funding.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
FluidBeef@quokk.au · 0 pts · 3d
If another Democrat president is allowed to happen they’ll argue that Trump-style dictat cannot be used to materially improve the life of citizens instead of to enrich one man and his friends, because it’s not fair or something,
crashfrog@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 2d
These are all basically the same thing and, yes, you can’t pass a bill in the Senate if you can’t get 60 votes
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
And you never need the senate to sell weapons for genocide.
crashfrog@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 7h
Yes that’s correct, you don’t need the Senate’s permission to sell things
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 7h
In this case, selling "things", specifically weapons that were actively being used for genocide, is against the Leahy law.
Funny how any excuse will stop centrist democrats from helping workers, but actual law won't stop them from their only goal in life.
crashfrog@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 6h
Good thing that it’s not a genocide, according to the UN definition and the ICJ, or some people might really be in trouble
DarkFuture@lemmy.world · -2 pts · 3d
Reminder that it makes a whole hell of a lot more sense to reform the Democrat party than to shit on your vote and throw it away with a non-viable 3rd party that isn't even trying to be viable.
If you vote 3rd party you will watch your country burn while you cross your fingers and hope for a miracle.
w3ird_sloth@lemmy.world · 12 pts · 3d
Well said, Hakeem.
Rentlar@lemmy.ca · 4 pts · 3d
I agree. It's also important to remember that that is not the destination, but the first milepost on the way to course correcting the entire system, even when following the incrementalist way to change one piece at a time.
DudleyMason@lemmy.ml · -2 pts · 2d
It would make sense if it were possible. It isn't. The entire structure of the party as an organization is designed to ensure that no grassroots movement can ever wrest power away from the powerful.
But I encourage you to try your best. 10 years of busting my ass and becoming a paid campaign staffer was what finally made me see the light. The Third Way Foundation controls access to every single meaningful lever of power. Elected Dems like AOC and Bernie are tolerated because they help keep leftists hopeful, which keeps them voting Blue, which keeps them from ever genuinely organizing to become a threat to the Neoliberal agenda the Dems exist to defend. Their policy proposals are punchlines to the people who actually control the legislative agenda. They will only ever be brought up for an vote occasionally when the deck is stacked solidly against them to "prove" how they're guaranteed losing moves, despite the fact that Medicare for All polls much better than any politician that opposed it.
Grilipper54@sh.itjust.works · 0 pts · 2d
It's possible at a state level. Jessie Ventura is the only example I can think of though.
CADmonkey@lemmy.world · -4 pts · 3d
Maybe if you werent such a fucking defeatist? I think this sort of post or comment should bw downvoted and ignored as russian/chinese/whoever propoganda, but just in case you're real:
Should they get voted in, call and write them, everyday, demand to know why they haven't fixed the problem. Don't be "nice", either, remember that repub congress critters are scared of their constituents, and they were (at first) doing what their voters wanted.
Edit: Thanks for proving my point better than I ever could have. Cowards.
BrainInABox@lemmy.ml · 3 pts · 3d
BlueMAGA can't even be bothered to pick a specific foreign country to scapegoat all their problems on anymore, now they're just blaming foreigners in general
frisbird@lemmy.ml · 1 pts · 3d
LOL. What are you, 18? You think letter writing and call in campaigns do anything? Man, voting doesn't even do anything. These people don't work for you and they don't care what you think except as far as they can keep you working and not trying knock over their gravy train. They don't give a shit about angry phone calls or letter or email or petitions. They haven't cared for at least century.
Listen. Go research the civil rights movement. Go look at the black voter turnout and tell me that the reason civil rights passed is because of voting. It wasn't. It was because of riots. How do we know? Because both the Ds and the Rs were forced to capitulate in successive terms. Nixon had to do a ton for civil rights because people were in the streets threatening to shut the system down. And then you know what he did? He launched the drug war to further criminalize black people and the hippies that supported them. And you know who stepped right up to help? The Democrats. Because that's who both parties are. They are racist, misogynistic, genocidal PR firms providing spin to different audiences so that the population doesn't try to stop the empire.
CADmonkey@lemmy.world · -5 pts · 3d
How are we going to riot if people keep posting about how they are giving up before they even vote?
frisbird@lemmy.ml · 3 pts · 3d
Again, you have it completely and utterly wrong. Alternatives to rioting are pleasant fictions that give people excuses to not riot. Because they believe in voting, they think that that's enough. We have to show them reality to get them on the streets. Letting people live in the fantasy land where voting matters means fewer people on the streets.
CADmonkey@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 3d
You realize that the same person can vote and riot, right?
This is nonsensical.
Stop telling peolle to give up.
frisbird@lemmy.ml · 4 pts · 3d
Give up on voting. It's literally never worked in your life, your parents lives, nor your grandparents lives. It's a lie created by the ruling class to pacify you. Stop relying on the vote. Start getting angry and shutting the system down. If you can find time to vote between rioting, striking, and sabotage, go ahead, but there's probably something more important you could be doing to dismantle the system that has been oppressing you and your fellow humans for centuries.
homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world · -5 pts · 4d
Dig this big crux
ayyy@sh.itjust.works · 3 pts · 4d
Your table didn’t quite work there. Maybe it’s not possible to do that inside a block quote?
homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world · -2 pts · 4d
Yeah I futzed with it to little avail. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
ChonkyOwlbear@lemmy.world · -7 pts · 2d
If you think any of those explanations aren't valid excuses, then you don't actually know how the government functions. Sure everything is easier when a dictator like Trump does it because he doesn't follow the law.
PokerChips@programming.dev · 7 pts · 2d
Your proving op's point
ChonkyOwlbear@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 2d
No, not really.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
Anyone who disagrees with your unthinking support for genocide and no other policy ever doesn't know how anything works.
ChonkyOwlbear@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
I don't support genocide. I recognize the unfortunate reality that either Democrats or Republicans are going to be running the country right now. Maybe one day we can get better options, it is not an option here and now.
The way I see it, Democrats are convincible, Republicans aren't. Republicans hate nonwhites and Muslims, Democrats don't. That makes Democrats the better option.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
Democrats can only be convinced to move to the right. I think you know this.
ChonkyOwlbear@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1d
No. All the protest against Israel is working. More Dems are pulling back on their support.
Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 1d
More dems are being supplanted by better dems.
Alcoholicorn@mander.xyz · 7 pts · 2d
Oh, you think carrying out the will of your voters is good? Well have you considered that goes against the design of a system made by slave-owning rapists to maintain their class's power?
-ChonkyOwlBear, probably.
ChonkyOwlbear@lemmy.world · -2 pts · 2d
It's more complicated than you are presenting it. There are hundreds of representatives each with their own motivation on every different vote.
Yeah, sometimes they vote against the will of the voters (Israel). Other times, they can't do the will of the voters because of the rules. For example budget reconciliation can be used to pass financial-only laws with a simple majority that would otherwise need a higher vote threshold to pass. The parliamentarian will say no if they try and squeeze something non-financial through that way.
Even Trump hasn't been willing to fire the parliamentarian and blow up that system. It has a purpose.
You want to throw out the whole Constitution and start over? Fine. How many dead are worth it to you? There Conservatives are sure as hell not going to give up power without a fight and they are willing to kill to keep it.
Alcoholicorn@mander.xyz · 5 pts · 2d
And there's a party whip and the power to take representatives off committees or remove their access to party infrastructure. The whole point of a party is that it can force its members to work together, without that ability you don't have a party.
It hasn't been useful for him because he appointed a parliamentarian who does what he wants. When Bush's parliamentarian wouldn't, he fired him and replaced him with one who would.
The literal only use any government institution is to enact the will of the entity that controls it. The conservatives understand this, the left understand this, only the liberals who don't understand why they keep losing at calvinball have yet to figure it out.
ChonkyOwlbear@lemmy.world · -2 pts · 2d
The whip can not take tepreststives off committees. The decision must go through the party's internal Steering Committee or be voted on and approved by a resolution of the full House chamber.
The Speaker of the House has the authority to appoint and remove members from temporary select or conference committees at any time.
The whip can only make threats and offer new committee positions.
Elizabeth McDonough has been parliamentarian since 2012
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_MacDonough
Unless that will breaks already established laws. If the majority wants to reinstate slavery, they shouldn't be able to just ignore the 13th amendment and the essential civil rights of millions of people.