r/WorkReform • u/zzill6 đ¤ Join A Union • 9h ago
đĄ Venting This is what Centrism has got us...
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u/drthsideous 9h ago
To be fair, Al Gore won once all was said and done. He just conceded before the dust settled in Florida in the name of "unity".
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u/Moozipan 9h ago
To be fair, Bush stole the election through voter disenfranchisement especially of black citizens, and organized propaganda efforts via Fox News to manipulate stupid white men.
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u/EddieVanzetti 8h ago
Republicans and stealing elections, name a more iconic couple.
(Raygun's first term, Bush's first term, both of Trump's terms).
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u/danbey44 7h ago
What does an Australian breakdancer have to do with this?
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u/justmovingtheground 7h ago
Ronald Reagan + Star Wars = Ronnie Raygun
For those that donât know
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u/BrooklynLodger 1h ago
Democrats and willingly ceding power to republicans for the sake of "unity"?
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u/justmovingtheground 7h ago
People forget about the first Republican insurrection of the 21st Century.
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u/Saedran 6h ago
This doesn't get enough coverage. The Brooks Brother's riot was ran by the same gang as J6, including rhe notably Nixon-tatted Roger stone
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u/radicalelation 3h ago edited 2h ago
The Heritage people keep successfully running the same plays.
I mean, just this OP is falling into their psyop. Hillary's platform was further left than what Obama ran on. Gore was fairly left for the time as well, moreso than Bill, especially when it came to climate and social issues, even attempting to position himself as an LGBTQ activist.
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u/GiraffesAndGin âď¸ Prison For Union Busters 6h ago
IMO, a doc that provides one of the better looks into the Republican political mechanism is Get Me Roger Stone.
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7h ago
Stolen specifically by groundwork in Florida by Roger Stone, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney-Barrett. Those last two names sound pretty familiar now, don't they?
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u/R-Dragon_Thunderzord 9h ago
So you could say what caused his defeat was... the centrism...
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u/eliteharvest15 6h ago
the election was literally stolen. thereâs a bunch of cases about this. one was that butterfly ballot incident, another was the company that intimidated thousands of its employees into voting for bush.
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u/lordlanyard7 9h ago
What do you mean?
I thought the Supreme Court ruled against him.
Also his election came down to a state his opponent controlled through his brother. I don't see how he could expect to win, when elections are state run, and the state leadership he would need to side with him was so obviously against him.
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u/EddieVanzetti 8h ago
Correct, SCOTUS ruled in favor of Bush after his brother and Roger Stone's ratfucking campaign, and then said "hey this ruling isnt actually precedent hehehe we totally are a democracy and not a right wing dictatorship with extra steps", directly leading to Trump.
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u/lordlanyard7 7h ago
Yeah I went to law school and I still don't believe I understand the case.
It seemed to me that powers not expressly granted to the federal government reside with the states, such as elections. We don't even have a direct democracy, so however Flordia wants to go about choosing its electors is its own perview, provided it doesn't infringe on the 14th ammendment which should be pretty clear cut.
But like a lot of cases, the parties and the judges are so fixed on winning or making their desired ruling that the whole thing gets muddied.
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u/BIG_HEAD_M0DE 6h ago
Listen to the 5-4 podcast episode on it. It was so bad it was their very first episode.
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u/Mr_Saturn1 6h ago
Every one of the people listed in the post won the popular vote. We have a fundamentally flawed system that favors the right. Itâs not centrism.
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u/cashchops 7h ago
Would be very interested to see a simulation in which Al Gore was elected President in 2000. 9/11 response differences, no Iraq war, but Obama significantly less likely to be elected 8 years later. The timeline swing could be huge.
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u/gratefulkittiesilove 8h ago
Stupid. So stupid. Unity is standing by correct voter tabulation not obeying the republican screams.
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u/Zombieneekers 7h ago edited 7h ago
Which is another problem with Democrats. They relentlessly seek "unity" and compromise with Republicans, where if the positions were swapped, they would never even get a second glance.
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u/Good_Reflection_1217 9h ago
they would never let a true economical leftist get far. capitalists run the country.
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u/Vegeta-the-vegetable 9h ago
Perfect example is Bernie Sanders....
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u/TheFillth 9h ago
Bernie proved that Dems can actually unify behind a cause. They were more worried about him running the country than Trump.
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u/BeatNo4548 8h ago
Bernie is my dude. In the mid 90s, my dad worked on the same floor as his office, in the same building. This one time, he had some big bill he wanted passed, and he had all his people working on it. I saw what happened when it didn't work out. He handled it very well, he didn't scream at them or make a scene, he just went over what happened, and moved on. Bernie is a real one. Â
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u/want_to_join 8h ago
Also, Bernie would (and did) tell everyone to vote for Gore and for Kerry and for Obama and for Hillary. Let's not fall for this thinly veiled propaganda that urges us not to vote left.
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u/expeditionQ 6h ago
vote left EXCLUSIVELY. liberalism is a death cult and thats what you expect us to vote for every cycle. you know damn well that whoever follows the trump chapter is still going to be a corporate pig who isnt even going to pretend to address the looming ecological collapse or solve working peoples problems
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u/Zeikos 6h ago
I wouldn't focus on that, what's most important is to move the overtone window and reframe talking points in such a way that people are receptive to the concepts.
There has been a generational effort in creating a minefield of taboo words, that's very hard to mavigate.
Many americans shut down when they hear the word "socialism" even if in reality they agree with all the policies being proposed.
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u/Riaayo 6h ago
We can try to sell harm-reduction all we want but at the end of the day Dems run against the couch, and if "centrists" can't turn out their voters that is their fault, not the voters' fault.
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u/ABHOR_pod 8h ago
It is established fact that most Democratic politicians will fight harder to stop a progressive than they will to stop a fascist.
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u/Doza93 5h ago
Liberals need to understand this. A lot of them are still bitching about the results of the 2024 election being the voters' fault, rather calling out the Democrats for being a slightly more palatable flavor of the same corpo-fascist ideology. Americans have been desperate for real, substantive policy change for a long time and over the past 10 years, the Democrats have:
Undermined the Sanders campaign so they could run their establishment candidate in Hillary and ultimately lose
Ignored Biden's severe mental decline for 4 fucking years before waiting til the 11th hour to throw Kamala in the race, who as much as reddit might not want to accept it, was never a popular or well-liked candidate. She dropped out of the 2020 primary for a reason
Completely ignore the will of NYC voters so they could run their establishment candidate in Cuomo and ultimately lose to Mamdani.. you know... the guy who won the fucking primary
Voted with Republicans to give ICE the funding that has enabled this administration to weaponize the agency against the American people, largely at the expense of Democratic constituents and communities
Sided with Trump on Iran. Hakeem Jeffries literally said Trump just needed to make his case to the American people on his vision for this "military action" in Iran, then refused to block additional funding for the war. You can't make this shit up
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u/Omena123 2h ago
Dems are perfectly fine with losing every election if it keeps the progressives from winning
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u/Zepcleanerfan 8h ago
He couldnt break 35% in the Michigan primary. I would love to have voted Bernie for president but our backwards racist country is clearly not into it. They reelected trump FFS.
Also this tweet cuts off Obamas reelection and Biden winning in 2020 both very convincing victories. Just saying. Its not the dNC who are useless I agree, its just the country we live in.
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u/longlivenewsomflesh 8h ago
Remember this was the week after super tuesday where klobuchar and buttigieg coordinated their dropout literally the day before to endorse biden -- while warren stayed in to siphon the progressive vote despite having no path herself and dropping out only after an abysmal super tuesday performance, even fumbling her home state... I remember MSM being so desperate they refused to even show when bernie was leading and constantly combined every other candidate's numbers against him individually to downplay any momentum... the fix was in way before michigan
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u/interbeing 6h ago
Yeah that was crazy. I was literally at a Bernie campaign rally in Salt Lake City when that news was announced. I finally decided to get out there and support something real and then that same day the game is rigged again. I was happy and exited about the movement and then in the middle of Bernieâs speech this news drops. I just felt kind of disillusioned and disgusted. The kind of machinations behind the scenes to keep out a real leftist like Bernie had never been more clear to me.
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u/longlivenewsomflesh 6h ago
I remember where I was too and it fucking sucks that people have such short memories as if this isn't exhibit A that dems actively preferred risking another trump win over nominating a progressive... I mean biden by all measures barely scraped by despite a once in a lifetime global pandemic and stockmarket crash, yet dems were parading around like they'd never have to hear from trump again and finally the left doesn't matter because our votes aren't needed. How'd that work out? Well now they say kamala lost because the left didn't do enough... curiously the solution, win or lose, is always "pivot to the right and appeal to moderates," huh weird!
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u/ABHOR_pod 8h ago
Also this tweet cuts off Obamas reelection and Biden winning in 2020 both very convincing victories. Just saying. Its not the dNC who are useless I agree, its just the country we live in.
Obama was a once-in-a-generation charismatic politician. He was JFK levels of cool. If he'd had the charisma of any other Dem politician of the last 25 years he'd never have gotten his first term, never mind his second.
He made up for in personality and charm what he lacked in platform.
And as for Biden... I have a lot of personal theories about the vastly different outcomes of the 2016, 2020, and 2024 elections.
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u/Additional_Teacher45 6h ago
Reminder that Bernie WON every single county in West Virginia in 2016... and the DNC still told him 'nah, you only get 51% of the delegates, we think the rest of the delegates should vote for Clinton in the primary'.
It doesn't matter how the people vote. If the elites want it differently, they will make it happen.
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u/-Wayward_Son- 8h ago
Bernie had 49.68% of the vote and 17,000 more votes than Clinton
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u/want_to_join 7h ago edited 7h ago
They are talking about 2020, but they are still wrong. Bernie got just over 36%.
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u/ob_servant1 7h ago
There were many republicans who were close to flipping to Democrat for Bernie. They were Bernie guys, now they are Trump guys. Mountains of voters are on the fence and just want to get behind someone they can believe in. No one wants centrists or establishment candidates. More people hate corporations than ever. If a progressive dem ever gets in the position of power you can bet your ass the voters will vote in mid terms to get shit done that people have been waiting decades for.
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u/Ut_Prosim 9h ago
And Henry Wallace 1944. Had the audacity to say Black folks and women deserved equal pay. DNC stole his VP spot and replaced him with centrist Truman who kick started the cold war.
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u/brazilliandanny 9h ago
Or AOC or Mamdani, curious how all the one who motivate the voters and get people excited for the party are NOT centrist
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u/PM_ME_WEIRD_PETS 9h ago
Mamdani could not be president due to being born in another country IIRC, but AOC is American by birth and absolutely could be president someday if the DNC doesn't stop her.
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u/ender89 8h ago
The DNC still acted like voting in Mamdani would be the end of NYC
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u/Profpiff990 8h ago
I agree AOC has what it takes to one day be president but my God can you imagine the right way reaction(not that it matters) smh. A Hillary 2.0 with an actual abuela.
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u/ButtEatingContest 7h ago
Mamdani could not be president due to being born in another country IIRC
That may no longer be as true as it once was.
The Supreme Court altered the rules to allow Trump to run, who was otherwise strictly barred from holding office as an insurrectionist. They could have over-ruled the lower courts' findings, but instead they made up some bullshit. (Technically this means the 2024 election was 100% stolen by the Supreme Court, regardless of even if Trump actually legitimately got a majority of votes but that's another topic.)
But that bullshit they made up sets a precedent that could be exploited in the future by other people strictly forbidden from holding the office of president.
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u/Shivy_Shankinz 7h ago
Let's please not forget Aoc and mamdani both endorsed Jeffries... We have to keep our politicians accountable. This is not a team sport anymore, this whole ride or die mentality is no different than a cult, and it's exactly what Maga does
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u/flying-weenus 8h ago
I was going to say Bernie Sanders got pretty far, then guess who slapped him down lol
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u/stevez_86 9h ago
Of course. What they call left wing isn't in the grand scheme of things.
The economy is going to shit because they are rigging the existing capitalist system to benefit specific people. And benefit is a relative term. It's actually bad in the long run, but the people see it as a benefit.
The economy is being rigged to give people that are retiring and already retired the most financially comfortable Golden Years as possible. I have a little bit of a 401(k) and it is improving right now, despite everything. That is what the retirees are looking at in terms of the economy. And the polling is unfortunately set up to measure their opinion more than other demographics.
They are boosting the retirement economy at the expense of the economy as a whole.
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u/jonathanrdt 8h ago
Citizens United put wealth in charge. Wealth corrupts every party. Our choice now is whether the rule of law matters: fascism or plutocracy.
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u/KaneAndShane 9h ago
Thatâs why everyone needs to vote in primaries!
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u/TheUnlikeliestChad 7h ago
That's why we need ranked choice voting. Centrist liberals don't seem to want it, they would rather lose to a conservative than to let progressives gain a voice in the democratic party.
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u/FuckwitAgitator 8h ago
Neoliberals have incredible class solidarity.
Oh and also giant, for-profit media networks.
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u/JKsoloman5000 8h ago
âThe United States is also a one-party state. But in typical American extravagance, they have two of themâ Julius Nyerere
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u/Half_Man1 9h ago
I saw an interesting vid once with AOC talking about the establishment dem strategy of reaching out to âswing votersâ.
She pointed out that there are comparatively few people who swing from voting for one party or another, but way more who swing from whether or not to vote at all. And further, that by watering down on policy in the hopes of seeking compromise from âswing votersâ, you not only lose out on political progress but you lose support from that way larger group of non voters.
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u/tallman11282 9h ago
The Dems keep trying to appeal to moderate Republicans hoping to get their vote despite how most moderate Republicans will never vote for anyone but a Republican while completely ignoring everyone slightly to the left of liberals when if they were to try and appeal to them they would get a lot more votes.
Progressive candidates are popular, just look at Mamdani in NYC, AOC, and Bernie but the Dems mostly ignore them because they don't attract the corporate donations that the more moderate candidates do and that's mostly what they care about.
We need to get corporate money out of politics completely (ideally we'd get all donations out and publicly fund campaigns but just eliminating corporate funding would help immensely), get rid of the electoral college (an outdated system that literally nobody uses for good reasons), and have ranked choice voting so third parties actually stand a chance.
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u/Rdubya44 âď¸ Tax The Billionaires 9h ago
And infringe on the corporations first amendment rights?? We canât be having that đ
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u/tallman11282 9h ago
The entire premise that corporations somehow have first amendment rights is ridiculous to me to begin with, let alone the idea that political donations are somehow protected speech. Citizens United was one of the worst Supreme Court rulings ever and like so many bad ideas in this country the name is completely misleading to make it sound better than it is. Citizens United, Right to Work, the Patriot Act, the list goes on.
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u/catlikesfoodyayaya 7h ago
Wow, sounds like you hate free speech. How are smol bean corporations like Raytheon, Lockheed-Martin and Palantir supposed to stay in business if they can't spend hundreds of millions bribing politicians to keep us engaged in forever wars, or living in an AI surveillance state.
I bet you are one of those radical commies who thinks we should be spending our tax dollars on education, healthcare, and housing instead of protecting our freedoms from dangerous Iranian schoolgirls.
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u/GardenRafters âď¸ Tax The Billionaires 9h ago
About 40% of the population doesn't vote. That is a way larger percentage than either the Dems or GOP control since they basically split the other 60% in half.
Win over that 40% and you win every vote every time.
Where does that 40% mostly lie? In the Progressive camp.
Run a truly Progressive campaign and polls will go through the roof.
We need the Progressives to start their own party and run with it.
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u/SincerelyIsTaken 8h ago
The Democratic Socialists of America are running several candidates. Most of them are running as Democrats to avoid splitting votes, but that means they have to beat the corporate establishment Dems.
Which means they need your help! If you want a progressive candidate, reach out to your local chapter to find out how to get involved. In my experience, quality varies by chapter but they can only get better with more help.
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7h ago
Why start their own party? Just do what the Republicans did and take over the Democratic party. It'll take a few election cycles, but we know it works.
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u/the-debate-settler 7h ago
Doing a little research, I see some postulations that a little more than half of non voters lean democratic, but nothing at all to suggest they are "mostly" progressive. Unless you are counting a left lean as "in the progressive camp" - which I would disagree with. Totally could be looking in the wrong places however.
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u/DarkwingDuckHunt 5h ago
The ones that lean GOP showed up and voted for Trump, it's why he won. He attracted non-voters who lean right.
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u/burns_a_lot 6h ago
Mostly in the progressive camp
That's funny because every non-voter I know is a racist piece of shit who thinks the country should be "run like a business."
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u/bergmoose 8h ago
The ruling Labour party in the UK is making this kinda mistake just now. They are worried about a hard right party, so to try and get votes from it are becoming farther and farther right. They recently lost a seat they'd held continuously for something like 80 years to... a left wing party. And they still finished behind the right wingers they're copying.
The most frustrating thing is watching them congratulate themselves on being such master politicians.
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u/Munkeyman18290 9h ago edited 9h ago
All it takes to get my vote is a genuine attack on wealthy capitalists. The rest of your platform is a distant second. Hell, you could even skip the rest of your platform, and you'd likely still get my vote.
Wealth hoarding is a cancer. Workers are what make America great, not capitalists. Capitalists drag the whole system down by bottlenecking everything that can or cannot be performed by those willing and able, based solely on perceived profitability for themselves.
Capitalists are why we have evil healthcare insurance companies. Capitalists are why we go to war when our infrastructure, schools, and public services are crumbling. They are why we are short on nurses, doctors, teachers, etc at a time when people cant find jobs. They are why so many fundamental, necessary jobs pay poverty wages. Capitalists are why young people cant buy even one home and procreate - something fucking wild animals in the forest can do seemingly easier than we can. Fuck capitalists with a sideways cactus. I'll vote for anyone willing to fight them.
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u/CaptainBayouBilly 8h ago
Capitalism is incompatible with human life.
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u/Shark7996 6h ago
Capitalism WILL end the human race if we don't get it under control/abolish it. To be honest we're lucky to have made it this far.
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u/DJayLeno 6h ago
The only thing needed to earn my vote is comprehensive anti corruption legislation. But that won't happen because it's synonymous with an attack on wealthy capitalists.
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u/high_throughput 5h ago
All it takes to get my vote is a genuine attack on wealthy capitalists.
Luigi 2028
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u/Responsible_Gap8104 âď¸ Tax The Billionaires 9h ago
Mamdani won as a progressive and is making good on campaign promises. He is a shining example of what this country could be if the right people step up
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u/bfhurricane 9h ago
Mamdani won in one of the most progressive cities in the country. In the same election cycle you had Spanberger and Sherrill running super moderate campaigns - a fact they were heavily criticized for from the left - and winning well.
The post here is committing the fallacy of equating correlation with causation. The truth is that since Reagan to Bush Sr., no party has won the presidency after two consecutive terms. Independents sway over time. Dems losing the legislative branch during Obamaâs term wasnât because heâs a centrist, every presidentâs party loses seats - and they conveniently leave out that he won reelection. And who beat Trump in 2020? The most milquetoast moderate Dem in the field.
Politics are irrational.
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u/DTSportsNow 8h ago
There were more potential progressive candidates we liked in Virginia, but literally none of them ran for some reason. It felt like the Dem party told them all not to run and the primary was just handed to Spanberger.
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u/TiaXhosa 5h ago
What people always seem to leave out too, Obama lost the legislature specifically because of fallout over the ACA. He lost because he was too progressive. The idea that americans vote for republicans because democrats are not left enough is just totally insane
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u/zoddie3 9h ago
I absolutely agree, but he also won in the most multi-cultural area in the country, and one that voted for Harris in 2024 by around 40 points.
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u/_jump_yossarian 8h ago
And it was a very close race against Cuomo. Adams won by 40 points in 2021, Mamdani won by 9 points in 2025.
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u/wyrrk 8h ago
All politics have to start local. Mamdani ran a brilliant campaign for the people of new york to be the mayor of NYC. He didnt run it as "i want to be your democrat mayor." He ran it as "i want to be your mayor."Â
The real test for the next national democrat or independent who runs on a leftist message will be whether their history as a local politician supports their message.Â
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u/GardenRafters âď¸ Tax The Billionaires 9h ago
The Progressives need to start their own party.
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u/tallman11282 9h ago
Without ranked choice voting third parties don't stand a chance. First past the post voting systems like ours always inevitably lead to there being two parties. The electoral college for presidential elections makes it even more unlikely for a third party candidate to ever win.
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u/_jump_yossarian 8h ago
Brilliant idea to get more Cons elected. Progressives truly donât learn from history or basic maths.
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u/MuddlinThrough 9h ago
American centrism is pretty right wing anyway, any of our "centrists" here in Europe would be called Communists over there
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u/maddy_k_allday 9h ago
Yâall have way more democratic electoral systems vs. our federal elections
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u/MuddlinThrough 9h ago
Well I'm not too keen on the first past the post system in our Parliamentary structure here in the UK. It has a similar effect whereby it breaks the election down to ~650 local elections, the winner of each is the representative but by extension gives +1 vote to whoever will become prime minister as the leader of the majority party
It also results in a separation between the popular vote & who really gets power
Plus, ya know.. we still have a king too
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u/MattsScribblings 8h ago
You have more parliamentarians than we do and we have 5 times more people. Every problem you have with your parliament is magnified so much in America.
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u/maddy_k_allday 9h ago
Itâs really tough to balance the competing interests in electoral systems fwiw. Australia/ New Zealand have really strong systems from which more places could borrow. And Iâm a big proponent on ranked choice voting, not that itâs such a massive solution but it eliminates a lot of the tomfoolery in the first to pass the post dynamic. Definitely fuck the Royal b.s., but I donât think Iâm someone who really gets what thatâs all about
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u/cogman10 9h ago
The parliament isn't so bad. With enough seats you get pretty close to a representational democracy.
The bigger issue for the UK is the house of lords. That's just completely undemocratic and unrepresentative of the people.
The US is worse in pretty much all ways imaginable. We've not expanded congressional seats in 50 years, we should be closer to that 650 representatives. And we have the senate which gives a ton of power to unpopulated states.
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u/Altruistic-Fox-8011 9h ago
centrism: the art of losing elections since 2000
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u/MuddlinThrough 9h ago
Oh far far longer than that!! The Weimar Republic had lots of centrist parties, not only did people feel they didn't offer significant enough change but it really split what centrist vote remained in their proportionally representative system
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u/Clevererer 9h ago
Our "centrists" are very precisely centered. They're centered exactly in the middle of the Republican party and its ideology. Now and then they'll bend on social issues, but never in a million years will they bend on taking anything away from our corporatocracy.
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u/flaser_ 9h ago
Nah, their strategy is working as intended: they can keep hovering up donations and block any attempts at thwarting the Kleptocracy.
What we need to get rid of is the Democratic Party itself.
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u/nixhomunculus 9h ago
Or should it be taken over the way Republicans got with the MAGA movement?
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u/PermanentRoundFile 9h ago
I'd say it already has. They're all taking money from Aipac or Russia or both.
The CIA human resources exploitation manual says that one of the most useful acts of sabotage an average person can commit is being intentionally mediocre at their job. Be slow and ineffective to drain resources and gum up the works. And think about it; when was the last time that something horrible was being passed, and democrats are in opposition, but then strategically at the last minute seven or eight of them fold and pass the bill. EVERY TIME, WITHOUT QUESTION. This is a farce of opposition.
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u/UglyMcFugly 7h ago
I think this point right here is why so many dems are scared to go too far left. We might hate it, but it's actually stable to alternate between moderate Republicans and moderate democrats in the presidency. Look at how far right we swung after Obama... who wasn't even very progressive at all! If we actually get a progressive in the white house, then 4-8 years down the line the next republican populist that gets elected would be ultra mecha kaiju hitler on steroids.
At this point we still gotta do it though. We offered up stability in Clinton, Biden and Harris. They chose chaos. So lets go ahead and wildly swing back and forth between far right and far left.Â
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u/Maeglom 5h ago
but it's actually stable to alternate between moderate Republicans and moderate democrats in the presidency.
Is it though? This status quo began in 1992 when the New democrat coalition took over from the New Deal coalition, and a little over 30 years later we're facing an incipient fascist dictatorship largely because of ineffective centrist governance over the last 30 years, and an unwillingness to reform from the powers that be.
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u/Totally-NotAMurderer 9h ago
Exactly, they arent "losing" because they arent even trying to win. As a party overall, they are complacent, controlled opposition at best
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u/Rdubya44 âď¸ Tax The Billionaires 9h ago
After trumps first win i said âalright they got four years to find the next great candidateâ and they went withâŚJoe Biden?! Even now, who are they building support behind for 28? There is zero unity, itâs no wonder why MAGA won so easily.
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u/weathercrow 8h ago
Exactly. And look at the way they vote. Conveniently, just enough democrats vote with MAGA to forward Trump's agenda every time (for a recent example, look at the war powers resolution).
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u/TheMaStif 9h ago
They can keep the Democratic Party
We also need a Labor Party, a People Party, and the Green Party to not be complete with sell-outs
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u/handsoapdispenser 7h ago
I'd say the bigger problem is the left blaming the left instead of the people responsible for 99% of our problems.Â
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u/ninetysevencents 9h ago
This is a rewriting of what happened with Obama.
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u/badger0511 8h ago
Facts. Obama spent all the political capital he had with the filibuster-proof Senate to just get the ACA passed. Joe Lieberman and Max Baucus were the Dems that took a Medicare for All or public option off the table, so the ACA is what we got.
Then the right wing billionaires started astroturfing TEA Party shit and that wave of propaganda resulted in the 2010 midterm slaughter. Which then allowed all the newly GOP state legislatures to REDMAP/gerrymander the hell out of all of the state and House districts, cementing a built-in advantage that theyâve had ever since.
Iâm not gonna be an apologist over Obamaâs use of drones, but the manâs domestic policy was kneecapped by centrists in his own party and then didnât have the votes to do anything super meaningful after his first two years.
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u/_jump_yossarian 8h ago edited 4h ago
Joe Lieberman and Max Baucus were the Dems that took a Medicare for All or public option off the table, so the ACA is what we got.
This is what drives me insane when "progressives" say that Democrats don't want a public option; out of 60 Dem/Ind Senators there were 55 or so that supported it but ZERO republicans and somehow it was all the Dems fault it couldn't get passed.
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u/fury420 7h ago edited 7h ago
Also Lieberman literally lost his Democratic senate primary, backstabbed the Democratic party by running against the progressive Democratic nominee in the general election, campaigned for McCain against Obama, etc... so including him as a Democrat seems misleading.
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u/AirJinx3 7h ago
Thatâs because this is a Republican propaganda sub. They realized in 2016 that itâs more effective to discourage voters by pretending to be angry leftists than it is to try to convince people to vote for the right wingers.
Once you see it, youâll never stop seeing it. No matter what bad thing Republicans do, some âleftistâ will show up to attack Democrats, and theyâll count on the reader not knowing actual history.
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u/blindsdog 9h ago
Itâs also ignoring the fact that progressives canât even win a primary but assumes they can win the general. Bernie would have lost too.
Progressives are bad at politics.
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u/ninetysevencents 9h ago
To be fair, I think the center and left have much harder cases to make than the right.
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u/asphodel67 9h ago
Gore didnât lose as a centrist, he refused to defend his democratic win as a centristâŚ
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u/zoddie3 9h ago edited 4h ago
There were candidates to the left of these people in every primary.
I voted for all of them. They all lost.
2000? Bill Bradley (lost 76%-20%)
2004? Howard Dean got 5.5% of the vote, Kerry got over 60%
2008? Obama and Hillary were pretty close, but Hillary was slightly more left-wing
2016? Bernie lost 55%-43%
2020? Bernie (26%) and Warren (7.7%) lost to Biden (52%)
It isn't the candidates -- it's the voters (mostly). Yes, the party can put their thumb on the scale a bit, but American VOTERS are overwhelmingly choosing the more centrist candidate. I voted for the more left-wing candidate in every single one of those elections and they didn't come *close* to winning any of them outside of 2016.
Also, Centrists have won the general election -- Bill Clinton, Obama, Biden. Democrats have won almost every popular vote in the last 35 years. Would I have preferred Bernie in 2016 and Warren in 2020? Absolutely, but I don't know how to convince other Americans that are not on Reddit to agree with me.
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u/S_TL2 5h ago
And itâs always âthe DNCâ, or âthe Democratsâ, or âtheyâ who forced us to only have these options to cote for.Â
If you want progressive candidates in the general, then you need to vote for them in the primaries, end of story.Â
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u/SutterCane 5h ago
And if progressives actually want sway with democrats, the democrats need to actually overwhelmingly win with the progressive vote so the threat to take that vote away means something instead of just being business as usual.
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u/rsta223 8h ago
Gore was more progressive than Obama.
Whoever wrote this clearly isn't old enough to have been around for all these elections.
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u/series-hybrid 9h ago
If somehow someone was able to get "medicare for all" entrenched, I don't believe it would ever leave. Therefore, it would be nice for the next president and congress to make that happen.
Obamacare was a noble idea, but the details were mis-handled.
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u/maddy_k_allday 9h ago
SCOTUS gutted the central component that made it a pathway to universal care. In an absurd decision, 2012.
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u/R-Dragon_Thunderzord 9h ago
Updated to include Kamala, who ran as an ultra-centrist, and lost to someone criminally unqualified.
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u/Omatzus 9h ago
By this theory, Obama should have lost in 2012. Biden also won as a centrist in 2020, and Harris lost as a progressive in 2024
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u/Japanese-Bonus-Track 9h ago edited 9h ago
Also, Obama didn't run as a progressive in 2008. From the start, his whole campaign was explicitly premised on the idea that the country needs to overcome partisan/ideological divisions and work together. He actually shifted left in office on a wide range of issues from LGBT rights to health care. In the primaries, Clinton mostly ran to his left and the main candidate of the progressive wing was John Edwards.
Also, arch-centrist and all-round creep Bill Clinton steamrolled through the 90's and would've easily won 2000 if he'd been allowed to run.
With that said, do the Democrats have a serious problem with a lack of ideological consistency and a tendency to let pollsters dictate their every move? Absolutely, but I'd say that has mostly enabled Trump with low-info voters by making Democrats come across as inauthentic and condescendingly technocratic.
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u/Omatzus 8h ago
Agreed. I will say that the ideological inconsistency is because the Democratic coalition is a larger and more diverse umbrella. So they have a harder time with simple messaging that resonates for everyone. This leads to focuse-grouped-to-hell messaging.
The message SHOULD be simple. Billionaires are ruining our lives and Republicans can't govern.
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u/rekniht01 8h ago
Also, the midterms shifted during Obamaâs first term because he was black as much as any other reason. It was racism, period.
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u/PreZEviL 9h ago
As a non american person. I always laugh at republicans when they call dems crazy leftist , dems is a center right party, like every freaking liberal party on earth...
Republicans are more aligned with authoritarians, while dems are more aligned with libertarians and both of those are right wing view...
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u/tallman11282 9h ago
As an American who understands how far to the right the Overton Window is shifted here compared to the rest of the world I agree. Our furthest left politicians, like AOC and Bernie, are called "radical leftists" and "communists" and things when compared to the rest of the world they are barely center left and only calling for things most nations take for granted while Obama, Biden, the Clintons, etc. center right at best. Republicans aren't just more aligned with authoritarians, they are blatantly authoritarian these days. They have been shifting the nation rightward into fascism for years (and Democrats have only served to slow that shift, not stop it, let alone take us back leftwards at all) and Trump has drastically sped up that slide and is acting full out fascist.
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u/newstarburst 9h ago
The democratic party would rather pander to the 10% of republican "centrists" voters than the 100% of progressives
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u/McButtsButtbag 9h ago
The democratic party would rather pander to the 10% of republican "centrists" voters who 90% won't vote for them than the 100% of progressive voters who 90% will vote for them
Edited that a little.
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u/chiaboy 9h ago
Obama postured as a centerist. His entire campaign was about getting white people (in both parties) to take a deep breath and chill.
Every moment of his campaign was centerist in nature.
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u/n3bbs 9h ago
I ask this in the most sincere way possible as I'd like to know why people feel a certain way: Why is the notion of getting white people in both parties to chill out a centrist view, and therefore based on sentiment I'm seeing around the idea, a bad thing? I know that's just an example but I'd like to understand what the grievances people have with those that hold centrist views are.
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u/Nekron-akaMrSkeletal 9h ago edited 8h ago
Fundamentally change is impossible under your (*their) belief system. And an important one to me is that centrists seem to think they don't have a specific ideology when they do. Neo-liberalism is centrist because both parties have embraced the concept while never mentioning it directly. And that ideology must protect the upper class, the power of the US Empire, and a million other concepts that are either no longer useful or actively dangerous to the future of humanity.
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u/n3bbs 9h ago
Appreciate the response! To be clear I don't really consider myself a centrist and definitely lean more progressive, but I asked this question because I've been noticing certain topics that seem very reasonable at the surface fall under the centrist umbrella, or rather "they say or do X so they must be a centrist" and wanted to better understand the reasoning behind it.
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u/chiaboy 9h ago
White supremacy is bad and poisons America is ways great and small. There's an argument to be made (which I find reductive) that capitulating to the white supremacist frame(s) of 1) "whiteness" is real 2) and it's a benign default, is a grotesque and counter productive capitalization.
I personally agree with the idea that white supremacy in America is ubiquitous and toxic, but I also understand the need to safely navigate it to accomplish higher goals. (the tough trick is navigating it without propping it up)
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u/Captain_Jellico 7h ago
Also Biden was a centrist and Kamala was progressive. This post is conveniently positioning things to make a false point.Â
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u/microbular 8h ago edited 7h ago
Al Gore won but had it stolen by the republican supreme court.
John Kerry lost because Bush rode post-911 incumbency "let him finish the job" sentiment.
Obama won 2 terms comfortably ? wtf does that even mean?
Hillary won the popular vote by 3 million votes but lost due to archaic electoral bullshit.
This post is clown level reasoning.
Maybe the real answer is people that consider themselves "too left" to vote for a centrist need to stop being mentally children, suck it up and turn out every election to achieve incremental change for the better. Instead of throwing a little temper tantrum every time it looks like a single election didn't achieve socialist utopia.
The American political problem so easy to solve, vote D in every election tune out of the news cycle and live your life. If you want to make things move more left vote in the primary for the candidate that best suits your desires.
Or you know, keep doing what you're doing and end up with an ever more right wing loony filled government.
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u/2Peenis2Weenis 7h ago
"Progressives" would rather have debilitating regression for decades rather than incremental change from Democrats. They would literally be where they wanted to be if we had 20 years of Democrats instead of constant back and forth regression.
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u/amisslife 4h ago
John Kerry lost because Bush rode post-911 incumbency "let him finish the job" sentiment.
As well, what most don't seem to know/remember, is that a video was released of Osama bin Laden claiming responsibility for orchestrating 9/11. This was released to the public by Al Jazeera four days before the presidential election.
On top of the jingoism rampant at the time, this led to an increase in support for Bush (supposedly a few percentage points), whereupon Bush won by about 2.5%.
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u/RickSanchez3x 9h ago
Why would they abandon the thing that gets them exactly what they want? The thing that gets them elected and gives them power. Not the power to help you but to help themselves.
If you think electoralism will save us and want the Democratic party to change then stop voting for them just because they're the lesser of two evils. The lesser of two evils bullshit is exactly what brought us here.
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u/RijnKantje 9h ago
Obama did not posture as a progressive... Progressives just forgave him because he was black and having a black POTUS was progressive enough.
Politically he was as centrist as they come. Biden had to semi-force him on stuff like LGBT rights all the time.
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u/kilawolf 9h ago
Trump won in 2016 as a fcking lunatic, Trump won again in 2024 as a even more crazy fcking lunatic. Maybe the American voters need to have a tiny bit of accountability.
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u/MyNameEndsWithZ 8h ago
Iâm about 73% convinced twitter, fb, instagram, whatever whatever posts are inorganic and only serve the purpose of dividing the âleftâ of the us.
Is the democratic party flawless or perfect? Of course they fucking arenât. Still miles ahead of what the conservative party is offering up but you idiots are just as easily swayed by propaganda as trump cultists
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u/MilkiestMaestro 8h ago
Again blaming the Democrats for not trying hard enough. As if it wasn't your neighbors being idiots and voting for the brick through the window option.
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u/2Peenis2Weenis 7h ago
Democrats held to the highest standards ever. Republicans get to eat poopy and make things worse.
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u/stayintheshadows 7h ago
More people voted for Al Gore, Obama, and Hilary then their competitor. The electoral college is the problem.
Plus they could be less corporatist and more worker obviously.
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u/ChronoPilgrim 9h ago edited 9h ago
Fucking hilarious seeing the Democratic wins being excused like this.
Obama ran as a centrist and on a bipartisan platform. Keep rewriting history. No mention of Biden at all, of course.
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u/Pika_Fox 9h ago
Obama didnt lose shit by being exposed as anything....
Dems tried to push healthcare reform, got the best they realistically could with the numbers they had, and everyone straight up abandoned them over them drastically improving healthcare greatly. Most because they were racist af and told it was the second coming of communism, but dropping dem support because it didnt go far enough is some trump level 4D chess play.
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u/searing7 9h ago
They are going to lean into being right wing even harder. Like they have each election
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u/McButtsButtbag 9h ago edited 8h ago
Biden barely won in 2024 2020 against one of the worst human beings to run for president in my lifetime. He ran as a centrist.
This is why they are so adamant on their anyone but Trump campaigns. They have nothing else to offer.
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u/RobleViejo đ 2025 Nobel Peace Prize Winner 9h ago
Im Argentine and the fact Usains seem oblivious to the fact they have a Far Right Party (Reps) and a Right Party (Dems) and keep on saying stuff like "Centrist" or "Left Wingers" is insane to me.
USA doesnt have a Left Party. Never did and never will.
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u/FlyLikeATachyon 8h ago
Gore won the popular vote? Clinton won the popular vote? Was Obama not exposed as a centrist by 2012? Did Biden not beat Bernie in the primary and win the general against an incumbent?
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u/incredirocks 6h ago
It's all according to plan. The Democratic establishment would rather a centrist lose than a populist leftist win.
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u/HairyContactbeware 9h ago
Al gore and clinton were not centrist by any metric..and if all these centrist are losing votes to extremeist and ending up were we are today then maybe trying a centrist isnt the worst idea
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u/tdbeaner1 9h ago
Truth has no place in the Reddit echo chamber. These posts look for affirmation that their polarized views are actually mainstream, and the only reason their party lost in a general election was because the policies were not extreme enough instead of acknowledging that the candidates had serious flaws.
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u/jarena009 âď¸ Prison For Union Busters 9h ago
Plus no matter how much you're a centrist, Republicans are going to call you socialist, communist, for open borders, soft on crime etc.