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Comment by sillyfluke | Hacker News Reader

Yeah, but this only strengthens the parents point that "It works in europe" is not a good rallying cry in the states. It's also too easy for opponents to counter and point to random europeans who complain about their own system and win cheap debate points on that front. It might be better to just lean into the exceptionalism and say, "We're America, we're richer, we can make a better system." Or something along those lines.

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Counterpoint: The country really needs to learn how to have a grown up conversation and not allow the dumbest people in the room with the least generous interpretation of everything possible who were never going to vote for you anyways to constantly set the agenda.

Sensible voices are a rare thing in this climate and it’s incredibly easy to stand out as one if you stop playing by a set of rules that were intentionally designed to make you fail in the first place.

Honestly I think the American exceptionalism shit is a cancer on the society and I find it incredibly hard to distinguish from the "Deutschland über alles" nonsense that the Germans went through. It’s just a fundamentally flawed way of looking at the world. It’s like a story a small child might believe but it really doesn’t stand up to even the most gentle of scrutiny.

>Honestly I think the American exceptionalism shit is a cancer on the society and I find it incredibly hard to distinguish from the "Deutschland über alles" nonsense that the Germans went through.

I think it would be wise for us to remember that it is/was not only Americans that believed in American exceptionalism, but immigrants that were actually trying to come to the States among other possible options who believed in it-- prior to this administration that is. You would have to admit it would be a ridiculous thing for them to do if they couldn't distinguish it from "Deutschland über alles".

>>You can go to live in France, but you cannot become a Frenchman. You can go to live in Germany or Turkey or Japan, but you cannot become a German, a Turk, or a Japanese. But anyone, from any corner of the Earth, can come to live in America and become an American.

This was the Republican president Ronald Reagan speaking. The world has caught up obviously since then in this regard as well, but prior to this administration it would not be a stretch to say this was true of America more than any other nation.

The problem is your whole line of thinking is EXACTLY why Democrats lose elections. This is exactly the wrong way to win over voters.

The louder you get with this type of message, the more you will push people farther away.

FWIW I lived in 3 continents including Europe and the densest cities in the world. The best QOL I've had is in deep red voting rural areas.

Just to be clear we are currently in a thread talking about someone who won against all odds and stupid amounts of money by not sticking to the supposed “centrist script”.

Also we aren’t talking about your personal preferences here in terms of quality of life but about hard data. The numbers aren’t even close. The one you listed as your personal favorite comes last in those categories.

I’m not trying to be rude but it sure seems like you’ve taken your preference of living in a rural area vs living in a city and then tried to build an argument around that.

Just to be clearer, Mamdani's whole platflorm was alluding to "making the best city in the world more affordable". If that's not appealing to New Yorkers's feeling of exceptionalism I don't know what is. Stop conflating positivity with hollow centerism, you're buttering Maga's bread.

what are you suggesting? left politicians need to do more to explain to voters how stupid they are? it's a bold strategy cotton...

More about accepting that they are never going to vote for you to begin with and that you’re very literally wasting both your time and killing the support you do have in trying to reach them. They are entirely unrecruitable.

How many genuinely ex-MAGA people do you know? I think for most people that number is at absolute best a very low single digit number.

There are a whole bunch of people out there who are entirely disenfranchised who just can’t be bothered to vote however who could be inspired to do so and this thread is very literally about someone who went with that strategy and won.

I’m simply making the argument that you should spend your time there instead and keep your integrity in the process. People actually want something to believe in and a concept of fairness, affordability, justice and anti-corruption is an incredibly wide tent already. Stick with that.

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