Well, yes, in so far as "their interests" involve actually getting things done rather than blaming everybody else for not doing.
Can I have a new left wing please? This one appears to be broken :(
The article provided many more things in support of its point, such as
* Surveys with startup founders on their politics.
* In-depth analysis of both PAC donations - which your criticism might apply to - and individual donations - which it does not.
* In-depth analysis of the changes that typically happen to a company like Amazon or Google that begins as an innovator and ends up being one of the biggest corporations, and threatened by things like antitrust, which naturally lead it to favor Republican positions on those issues.
I've been saying this since basically after Obama was elected.
I was a HUGE supporter of his, even in the democratic primaries. I donated to him, I was running local groups that were canvassing and phone banking to get him elected. I was ecstatic when he got elected (though I viewed it as a foregone conclusion, I didn't think McCain had a chance).
When it came to the governing, I was not really impressed. Basically from day 1, everything seemed stuck. He got a few things done (ACA though that's of dubious benefit, and was done in such a way that it became a political punching bag and can't get any reforms), but mostly in the first two years. After the 2010 midterms, this shit was just complete gridlock. You can blame whomever you want for the gridlock but a good leader builds compromise and ends gridlock.
I think there are two good examples of this. First, after sandy hook Obama promised that he would pass gun control legislation. Now, I do not agree with lots of things that he would like to do with such legislation, but, I do agree that there are some changes required. He has basically failed to pass any legislation around gun control and his response to that isn't to propose new legislation that can pass congress. His reaction was to go on national television and cry (literally) about his failure to pass gun control legislation.
I'm sorry, I don't want a damn leader who CRYS about their political failures. I know dead children is a sad subject, but, this is ultimately a political failure.
The 2nd one is Guantanamo. When he was campaigning one of his promises was to close Guantanamo, bring prisoners home and try them for their crimes. After 8 years, that has not happened and its become so politically untenable that he's basically letting these people out, without trying them at all. It is a mind-boggling
Withdrawing from Iraq/Afghanistan was another campaign promise that I was personally invested in too, but that is a far more complex one and though he doesn't get a pass from me on that as I have personal losses there, I acknowledge that its more complex.
I do not agree with lots of things that (old) republicans did (though I am hopeful about the new republican party of today), but they get shit done. They wanted to block (stupid) gun control legislation, they did. They wanted to block returning Guantanamo prisoners to the USA, they did.
Sometimes doing something, even if its not perfect, is more important than doing nothing, especially when you don't have a crystal ball and don't know what exact result specific actions/legislation will have. Move fast, break shit.
>I do not agree with lots of things that (old) republicans did... but they get shit done. They wanted to block (stupid) gun control legislation, they did. They wanted to block returning Guantanamo prisoners to the USA, they did.
Blocking legislation (esp legislation brought forth by the opposition party) is, always has been, and always will be 100x easier than putting forth any legislation. Blocking legislation isn't getting anything done. We already see a failure to get things done by the Republicans in their handling of Obamacare-- they have no collective idea as to how to replace it, despite their vigor in denouncing and repealing the bill. They have had 6 years.
On the other point, I lean Republican, and I'm more inclined to agree with 464192002d7fe1c. A lot of leftists love to blame the Republicans for being obstructionist during the Obama administration. But were you paying any attention to Obama's attitude? See [1]. He basically says "I won, deal with it, if you don't like it, then go win some elections". Well, they did, and they obstructed him in exactly the spirit that he invited. And in roughly the same spirit that the Democrats obstructed GWB during his term.
A good leader accepts the political situation and seeks to work within it. If your political opponents have control of Congress, you better learn how to compromise and work with them to get things done. This might actually involve not getting everything your way and sometimes doing something that the other side wants. Whining that you can't get the things that you want done is poor leadership.
I'll grant that there's a big divide between the two sides, and neither side is innocent in perpetuating it. But who can be the bigger person, lay off the name calling for a while, and make some compromises? Evidently not Obama. Maybe Trump will? I guess we'll see soon enough.
[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2013/10/17/pr...
Obama needed to be a better leader? Give me a goddamn break. Maybe he wasn't perfect, but in order for him to have done a better job unifying he would have had to bend over backwards to the GOP. There's a clear right and wrong in this situation.
Well no. They REDMAP'd it. That was impolite, so to speak: not technically illegal, but sufficiently unethical that in 2004 the Supreme Court basically said they'd ban it if only they had some consistent standard to apply.
This year they might have that consistent standard, and starting with North Carolina and Wisconsin, the permanent Republican Congressional majority might stop being so permanent.
In fact, every single politician who utters the phrase "permanent majority", with or without a party name in the middle, should be jailed. A democracy never has a permanent majority, or else it ceases to be a democracy.
> In fact, every single politician who utters the phrase "permanent majority", with or without a party name in the middle, should be jailed. A democracy never has a permanent majority, or else it ceases to be a democracy.
The GOP has controlled the House for only six years running. Before that, the Democrats controlled it for four - before that, the GOP controlled it for six, and before that, the Democrats controlled it for 61 years, with the exception of one term (1947, under Truman). During the vast majority of that time, the Senate was also under Democratic control as well, although the Senate has leaned slightly more right than the House fairly consistently ever since the Seventeenth Amendment was passed.
I agree that a democratic system should not be controlled by a single party, but it's rather silly to say that the GOP has a "permanent Congressional majority" given how recent their majority is.
Greater judicial opposition to the REDMAP gerrymandering program that, starting in 2010, helped to guarantee Republicans the consistent seats in Congress and state-houses that they needed to obstruct Democratic measures.
The Republicans do have plenty of voters, probably "too many" if you're a Democrat, but there was no historical necessity for them to have a chokehold on Congress until 2020.
I would wager many on the left are rethinking their whole stance on guns and 2A with the Republicans in power now. Not saying we are getting ready for revolution, but at least folks might be more sympathetic to the view of people power balanced against government when the other side is in office.
As a further real life example of the self defeating gun politics of the left, I am confident far more innocent people will die as a result of Republican rule than any gun violence (consequence of dismantling Obamacare and environmental regulations, reduction of social safety nets).
Why not say that? If we're talking about people leftist enough to be Leftist rather than "liberal", yes, there are calls for revolution. Well-justified calls for revolution, IMHO, given that Congress and our state-and-local governments now feature a permanent, unbreakable one-party regime by the Republicans in most states, with a very few "state-and-local swing states" and a couple of one-party Democratic states.
A two-party system that degrades into a one-party system should be overthrown. One party systems are not democratic. Democracy demands a multiparty system with responsive government and extensive civil liberties.
We have a small, but distinct left wing here. You can find it in magazines like Jacobin or Current Affairs. You can find it in many backers of Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. Or in Occupy.
But Obama? The left in the United States has spent eight years yelling bloody murder about his spying, his favors to the banksters, and his corporate giveaways. Obama's era has feature apthe combination of "not fighting hard for the good stuff he says he wants" and "fighting very hard for the bad stuff he wants". Don't lump him in with us.
If you want a new left wing, make it happen. Join a local board. Run for local office. Take part in your community. Be a part of something. But don't expect reading news or commenting on forums to change anything. After all, the shift from active citizen to passive consumer is what got us in this mess in the first place.
Adam Curtis has several phenominal documentaries regarding this shift over time. Particularly, "Century of the Self", "The Trap", and most recently, "HyperNormalization."
Oh come on. We all know that's not true. The citizens didn't turn neoliberal or particularly apathetic; the politicians did under the advice of economists who pushed neoliberalism as the solution to the oil crisis.
>If you want a new left wing, make it happen. Join a local board. Run for local office. Take part in your community. Be a part of something. But don't expect reading news or commenting on forums to change anything.
This I can agree with! Not just that, but provide names of organizations pushing a more "Old Left", social-democratic agenda. I belong to the first two of these as a dues-paying member and a volunteer, and we've been gaining hundreds of new members since the election. It's honestly like waking up from a bad dream: all of a sudden, the bread-and-butter issues (wages, housing, health-care, civil liberties) matter again, and the culture wars are getting sidelined.
* Democratic Socialists of America
* Our Revolution (started by Bernie Sanders)
* Socialist Alternative (more "party-line", worse at returning people's calls)
* The Berniecrats Network
* /r/Berniecrats and facebook/Berniecrats
* Jacobin magazine and its associated reading groups
For those looking for a more decent right-wing as well, I recommend Reason magazine, the Washington Monthly (especially this one, it's a hidden gem of a magazine), the Libertarian Party, the works of Henry George, and GK Chesterton's "distributivism".
I also definitely have a bone to pick with the people claiming we're gonna totally obtain third-party electoral successes Real Soon Now. Yes, the Democratic Party has been rubbish to us. It has been the "graveyard of social movements". But we've also run a hell of a lot of social movements (like Occupy Wall Street, for instance) that had a whole ton of radical spirit, chic, and ideology, but had zero power analysis and zero affirmative program. Our Revolution and Bernie's rejuvenation of social democracy through taking over the Democratic Party, while it's lost its back-bench, from the bottom up, does actually promise a strategy for obtaining real power that's suited to our historical moment.
Just my thoughts. Don't mind me. I'm no longer sober.