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the-badger-mole · 4 months

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Reaching for Hope

These last few months have been filled with the most horrifying stories and images coming out of Palestine, DRC, Sudan, Yemen, and too many other places around the world. We, in the US, have seen our president- our political leaders- roll over and not only allow the atrocities to continue, but to actually financially support and arm the perpetrators, despite the majority of us screaming for them to stop. To me, there is little difference between the Democrats and the Republicans at this point. Both parties are bought and paid for by the same people. As a new presidential election is coming up, I can't in good conscious vote Democrat. Not after what I've seen. Not as long as they refuse to hear us when we tell them we don't want Genocide Joe Biden or any of his cabinet to run.

But what is the solution?

I hate the feeling of helplessness I feel. I hate watching the horrors being carried out with my tax dollars. I hate that our "leaders" are more concerned with keeping the money from groups like AIPAC than actually representing the people who voted for them. They have put my finger on the trigger and they won't let me let go.

I'm trying to figure out how to make my voice heard. I've reached out to my representatives. I've done what I can to amplify voices that need to be heard more than mine. I can't claim any special effort in following BDS boycotts because the truth is, these aren't brands I have a whole lot of intentional contact with in the first place. As for Starbucks and McDonald's, I don't like either place so, cutting them off took very little for my part. I do encourage you to avoid all of these businesses, though. I don't know what else to do.

I will not vote for Joe Biden if he runs again. I will do my best to find down ballot candidates who's values are more in line with mine, but I will not give my support to a man who sees the atrocities being committed in Palestine and gives billions and weapons to the people committing these crimes against humanity. If the DNC is smart, they will be actively looking for candidates who don't openly support genocide, but let's face it, we ALL know how smart the DNC is. So, barring some drastic change, barring the DNC running a candidate who isn't on the take from AIPAC, who will actually pull support from Israel as they try to wipe out an entire culture for the sake of oil, I will be voting third party. I'm considering voting for Claudia De la Cruz of the PSL party, but there's nearly a year left, so I'm open to shopping around.

I know there are those that will say that pulling votes away from Biden is essentially voting for Trump. I know that there are those that will say that if the Republicans take the office again, they'll gut our rights. To that, I say, a vote for Trump is a vote for Trump and a vote for Biden is a vote for Biden. If the DNC can't come up with a better candidate and a better reason to vote for them than the same fear mongering tactics they've been using for years, then Trump is the DNC's fault. What has the Democratic party done to ensure our rights? What protections for voting rights have they passed at a federal level? What protections for education? For bodily autonomy? How do we have FOURTEEN BILLION to spare for freakin ISRAEL, but nothing for public schools? Nothing for student loan relief? Nothing for public health? Police reform? What good is the Democratic party if their only real platform is "Vote Democrat because we're not that guy"? If your conscious tells you to vote for Biden in November, so be it. As for me, I can't look at the man without seeing the blood of innocent men, women and children dripping off of him.

#getting political again #free palestine #free drc #anti murdering people for oil and cobalt #anti colonialism #anti capitalism #anti democrat #anti republican #they are the same #one's just wearing a mister rogers sweater #vote third party #the two party system is dead

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unimatrix-420 · 2 years

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the republican way of using hatred and fear to keep a populace under control could only work in a society like ours that brainwashes its citizens to believe that every day is a competition in which you earn something before it can be taken from you by foreigners and minorities

#personal #politics #republicans #government #two party system #society #american culture #competitive culture #foreigners #minorities #conservatives #anarchy #anarchism #anarchist #socialism #communism #capitalism #anti capitalism

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nando161mando · 8 months

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dreaminginthedeepsouth · 7 months

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[mike luckovich]

* * * *

The demise of the GOP.

September 22, 2023

ROBERT B. HUBBELL

The media is in rapture over the resignation of Rupert Murdoch, but the most significant story of the day was Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s inability to bring a defense spending bill to the floor of the House on Thursday—the third such failure in two weeks. See Politico, House GOP erupts as McCarthy fails to move Pentagon bill.

The power of the Speaker lies mainly in their ability to control the progress of legislation through the House. Absent that power, the Speaker’s office is ornamental—a fascinator on the head of Congress. Kevin McCarthy is all feather and no hat.

The collapse of the Republican Party in the House mirrors the collapse of the GOP as a national party, no longer capable of winning the popular vote in presidential elections. The GOP has not won the popular vote in a presidential election in two decades—and has won the popular vote only once in the last three decades (George Bush in 2004).

The GOP is a failed party at the national level, especially in the House. It is no longer a political party. It is a loose federation of fiefdoms, each run by a petty tyrant who maintains power by transactional graft, shifting alliances, and animal cunning.

None of this means that we can assume victory or relent in our efforts to defeat every Republican in every election henceforth. But it is worth a moment of reflection and introspection on our part. I hear from readers every day who are concerned about the supposed dysfunction and weak messaging of the Democratic Party. I believe that misperception is based on the asymmetry inherent in a two-party system in which one party is dedicated to the truth while the other views deceit as its business model. It is easier to create a soundbite if you are not constrained by the truth.

That asymmetry is inherent in a two-party system in which one party seeks to achieve consensus for the common good while the other inflames grievance to secure votes in gerrymandered districts.

That asymmetry is inherent in a two-party system in which one seeks to preserve the rule of law while the other views it as an impediment to power.

That asymmetry is inherent in a two-party system in which one party recognizes that lasting progress is the incremental product of thoughtful planning and careful execution while the other measures success in soundbites-per-minute on Fox News.

When McCarthy’s third attempt to bring the defense bill to the floor collapsed, he declared a recess and sent members of his party home for the weekend—five business days before the government would shut down in the absence of a budget. McCarthy appears to have surrendered to the chaos of his warring federation of tribes.

If there is a way out of the mess caused by the demise of the GOP as a governing political party, it will involve a bipartisan solution in which a handful of Republicans cross party lines to protect millions of Americans from the devastating effects of a government shutdown.

The demise of the GOP is no cause for joy; it calls us to create a stronger Democratic Party that can rise above the chaos of the failed Republican Party. That challenge—and much more—is on the ballot in 2024.

#Robert B. Hubbell #Robert B.Hubbell Newsletter #The GOP #corrupt GOP #anti-democracy GOP #two party system

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battleangel · 8 months

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And still I see no changes...

Late-stage capitalism depends on women producing the next generation of laborers whether they want to or not...

Corporate greed -- as evidenced by fast fashion like SHEIN, Fashion Nova, Romwe, Forever 21, the film industry with the continued strike aimed to replace all but the biggest stars and virtually all background and supporting actors despite the unions totally reasonable demands for a living wage & AI protections so that their image & likeness cant be scanned & used in perpetuity by studios with their forced consent in exchange for being cast in the production, fast food companies like McDonalds continuing with deforestation practices & the destruction of rainforests & ecosystems, all of the environmental waste produced by Amazon warehouses, chemical & environmental pollution by Fortune 500 companies in the constant pursuit of ever more profit, overextracting natural resources from the planet and raping the earth, the extinction of tens of thousands of unique species with the non-stop intent of further expansion, further development, further cutting down of trees, razing of forests, landfills at total capacity with overflow killing wildlife in the oceans with a majority of waste taking thousands of years to decompose, a finite resource -- Mother Earth -- endlessly pillaged & raped by big pharma, big agriculture, big chemical manufacturing companies, big box retail like Amazon & Walmart, fast fashion like SHEIN & Forever 21, admitted alien existence by former CIA director which also includes not yet admitted to government experimentation with alien technology & weaponry that led to a bomb cloud many reported seeing in NYC that happened the same exact day as the "Canadian wildfire smoke" filling the skies of the east coast, yet all the videos on social media were of the smoke, none were of the fires, and reports that claimed 100 wildfires started simultaneously in Canada made no sense -- the alien bomb testing led to record toxicity levels in the air and non-stop unprecedented extreme humidity that has not relented since the "wildfire smoke" aka the testing of the alien bomb in NYC -- yet the worlds elite in industry (Elons, Bezos, etc) & the actual power brokers in politics behind the scenes of the political figureheads that are all selected ahead of time, every election is fake & the outcome is predetermined, all US presidents share royal lineage dating back to British kings, they are all reptilians picked ahead of time by the kingmakers as charismatic frontmen that are then controlled behind the scenes & told what to do, all politicians get along with each other behind the scenes, the 2 party system is a complete sham, its heel vs face in wrestling -- its all a cheap gimmick to divide the audience and to keep the money flowing in via donations over "hot button" issues that are red meat to their respective partys bases but there are always predictable, planned & scripted mostly incremental changes that shift back and forth with very few actual "watershed" moments by design so that both parties can constantly fundraise over whatever the contrived forced issue is of the day with no true actual change, its why Obama deported more undocumented immigrants than Trump, there is no actual "red vs blue", nor actual material difference between the two main parties, its why theres never any true substantive change regardless of who is in power, and a true changemaker and revolutionary like Cornel West never even gets heard from.

If its a "democracy", why are Cornel West, Dr. Jill Stein, the Green Party, the Libertarian Party, the Communist Party of the USA, the Socialist Party -- why arent they allowed to be on the Presidential debate stage unless a totally fake & arbitrary threshold of votes is reached -- because they dont want the American public on a mainstream stage to actually hear cogent and cohesive and compelling and persuasive and intelligent arguments for the abolition of the police, Supreme Court, military, prison system, free college education, universal healthcare, workers uniting & pooling their incomes & distributing them evenly amongst themselves aka true socialism so they can stop being exploited by their corporate overlords slaving away at their salaried jobs many without overtime once they are in a "leadership" position working thousands of hours for free.

True reproductive justice & freedom with a realization that women are dehumanized & tyrannized by the "motherhood is martyrdom" societal mandate that demands that women sacrifice & sublimate their entire identities on the altar of being a "selfless mother" and giving women control over their bodily autonomy, reproductive choices, careers, sexual health, incomes, mental & physical health, physical appearance and control over their lives as anti-abortion legislation takes all of this agency away and demands that a pregnant woman become a mindless husk & soulless incubator ready to reproduce via forced birth endless bodies for the corporate capitalist machine & system, thats all "pro-life" is, its reducing women to their occupied uteruses and forcing them to birth more bodies in service of late stage capitalism.

Why dont we have funerals as a society for miscarried and aborted fetuses? because we intrinsically know as a society that an unborn fetus doesnt have a fully developed consciousness, personality, soul expression, thoughts, emotions, experiences, philosophies -- it is fetal tissue, it is not a sentient, thinking, emoting human being but the woman gestating it is -- so why is the woman reduced to nothing but a gestational carrier and why is the fetus elevated to mattering more than the woman carrying it, when thousands of toddlers are waiting to be adopted in the foster system, when children born to women who didnt want them who then express the trauma of enduring forced birth as neglect, abuse & physical abandonment -- how is any of that "pro-life"?

When states that have anti-abortion laws have significantly higher poverty & crime rates, how is that "pro-life"? Whats "pro-life" about punishing women who dont want to be mothers and forcing them to give birth?

Condoms break, people forget to take birth control, guys refuse to wear condoms because they want to "feel everything" or they "dont like them", women are socialized to be docile & polite and are socially conditioned to struggle to say "no" to men especially in intimate encounters, women are groomed & socially engineered to be pleasing and agreeable towards men even in sexual situations when they shouldnt be -- smile, look pretty, be attractive, be quiet, be sexy and hope he likes you and wants to be with you, that is the social messaging in pop culture movies, media, music, books -- the man leads, the woman coquettishly follows -- where is the confident, emphatic, full-chested "no" in that when women are trained above all else to be liked? This leads to a lot of unwanted sex, regrettable sex, unenjoyable sex, forced sex, "I would rather go home but I dont want to be rude" sex, "He said he didnt want a blow job, I guess I have to fuck him" sex, spousal rape, date rape, acquaintance rape, "He said its too late to change my mind now" rape, drunken rape, high rape, "I just wanted him to like me" rape "I wanted to do stuff but not sex" rape -- why should women be forced to give birth in any of these situations?

Why should women be forced to give birth at all?

If men gave birth, not women -- do you really think there would be anti-abortion legislation?

Prescription medication making birth control ineffective happens, not taking Plan B in time for it to work happens, people drink & use psychedlics, hormone rushes happen, abuse happens, coercion happens, pressure happens, rape happens, assault happens, molestation happens, incest happens, depression happens, suicidal ideation happens, mentors, coaches, teachers, professors & youth leaders abusing & exploiting their authority via sexual force & assaults happens, autoimmune disease diagnoses happen, layoffs happen, reduction in force happens, firing happens, unemployment happens, houseleness happens, evictions happens, car & furniture reposessions happen, infidelities happen, breakups happen, STIs happen, heartbreak happens, malignant narcissists and dark empaths as toxic & abusive partners happen.

The feminization of poverty already ensures that women are overrepresented in low wage jobs & service industries while being underpaid vs men in white collar corporate jobs while also taking years off from their careers to raise their children and care for aging parents while men do not typically take more than a week or two off when children are born so women work less years in their careers than men for less pay and are overrepresented in low wage jobs yet this society wants to layer forced births on top of all of this already existing gender inequality.

Giving a newborn baby up for adoption after carrying it for 9+ months and birthing it is often traumatic -- it is up to the woman if she wants to endure that experience, it should never be forced on her, paid maternity leave and universal childcare are unavailable so a woman who gives birth is forced to take 60% pay on either a short or long term disability leave (losing almost half of her income), use up her PTO vacation and sick days for the year or, since women are so overrepresented in low wage jobs, if they are in the retail & food service industries or if they are temporary employees in corporate positions they have no benefits and no paid time off so she is forced to take an unpaid leave which she cannot afford with how minimal her salary already is and then once the forced birth happens, daycare is $1k+ a month, more than rent in many places, not all states have daycares that are operated out of individuals homes for cheaper rates and everyone does not have parents that can watch their newborns but now if she goes back to work, daycare may be more than her rent and not leave her with any money to survive -- who thinks about these women?

There are untold circumstances and reasons why a woman can experience an unplanned & unwanted pregnancy and want to terminate, some women may be antinatalist like me and believe that it is an immoral and philosophical wrong to reproduce and to continue the immeasurable & irrevocable damage and harm humanity has done to Earth, its ecosystems, natural resources, rainforests, oceans, wildlife, ozone layer, climate and believe it is wrong to contribute to our current & continuing overpopulation -- no sentient, thinking, feeling human being should be forced to birth a non-sentient fetus for any reason -- we already have global overpopulation, why would we as a society add to our overpopulation human beings that are not wanted by their expectant mothers by force?

How can any good come out of coercion, control, forced birth and trauma?

What kind of social, emotional, mental and psychological harm do we do as a society to these women who, for a plethora of reasons, want to terminate their pregnancies and then certain states say no, youre not allowed to, you have to birth this unborn fetus.

The planet is not a resource that is infinitely renewable. We as humans, due to endless corporate greed, pursuit of profits and endless expansion, a blind unthinking need for more more more, are already trying to colonize Mars via Elon Musk -- isnt the destruction of one planet enough?

We are literally the Borg.

Go look up how many tens of thousands of species are already permanently extinct, how many elephants have been killed for the ivory trade, how many Amazon rainforests have been razed so McDonalds can raise and slaughter more cows for their Big Macs, how many landfills are filled with Amazon waste -- why do we need delivery in an hour?

How much food do we waste, do we throw away unused from our refrigerators, do we throw away uneaten in restaurants while children are food insecure and hungry and millions starve to death?

How much waste, how much misplaced hate, how much injustice, how many wars, how much corporate greed, how much control, how many genocides, how many natural disasters, how many more degrees can global temperatures rise, how much air pollution, how many synthetic chemicals and drugs and artificial preservatives, how many medications to make us sick and kill us, how many fake political movements, how many Proud Boys, how many Dont Tread on Mes, how many Make America Great Agains -- America was never great, how many victors rewriting history, how much propaganda, how much fake news, how much exploitation, how many overcrowded prisons with inhumane conditions without heat in the winter, AC in the summer & insect infestations yet you want to sit there and tweet about Trumps mugshot...

How many unarmed black men have to die at the hands of white cops, how many Amadou Diallous, how many Rodney Kings, how many Trayveon Martins, how many black while eating a bag of skittles, how many George Floyds, how many Ahmad Arberys, how many Philando Castilles, how many January 6th insurrections, how many overnight deaths in prisons, how many Sandra Blands because they stopped at a red light, how many Breonna Taylors for the crime of being asleep in their own beds, how many hands up dont shoot, how many I dont want to die, how many I dont have a gun Im just removing my license Officer, how many I thought it was a gun not a wallet, how many put your hands on the steering wheel before I blow your fucking head off, how many unreported crimes, how many unsolved murders, how many botched cases, how many its just another dead black man who gives a fuck, how many unredacted body wearing camera footage -- I thought the body wearing camera was supposed to bring transparency, why are you blurring the footage out, how many racist pigs, how many hooded klansmen hiding behind a badge a shield and a gun, to protect defend serve and kill as many innocent black people as possible, no need for an autopsy no need for an investigation its just another dead black man.

The only good nigger is a dead nigger so dont make me pull my cop trigger

Rat-tat tat tat tat, thats the way it is

And still I see no changes, all I see is racist faces, misplaced hate makes disgrace to races

We under, I wonder what it takes to make this one better place, lets erase the wasted

It aint a secret, dont conceal the fact, the penitentiarys packed and its filled with blacks

And still I see no changes, can't a brother get a little peace?

There's war in the streets and war in the Middle East

Instead of war on poverty, they got a war on drugs so the police can bother me

Don't let 'em jack you up, back you up

Crack you up and pimps smack you up

You gotta learn to hold ya own

They get jealous when they see ya with ya mobile phone

But tell the cops, they can't touch this

I don't trust this, when they try to rush, I bust this

🧿how many, how much until we say, enough is enough? 🧿

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allthebrazilianpolitics · 2 years

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Lula’s campaign missteps stir the question: Has he lost his touch?

For months, the candidate known simply as Lula barely had to say a thing. He didn’t need to. As President Jair Bolsonaro failed to control the coronavirus, soaring inflation or out-of-control gas prices, every election poll showed his challenger leading by a wide margin.

But now, with his bid to unseat his bitter rival in the October contest beginning in earnest, former Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is again before crowds and finally speaking up.

It hasn’t necessarily been a good thing.

Rather than show off what has always been his greatest political talent — dazzling oration — Lula, 76, has made uncharacteristic gaffes. A politician who has always found a way to talk himself out of trouble is now increasingly talking himself into it.

In recent weeks, he has insulted the police, called Brazil’s elites “slavers,” accused Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky of wanting the war that has devastated his country, and potentially most damaging in an election that could be decided by Brazil’s large evangelical vote, said abortion should be legalized and treated as a public-health issue.

Lula’s comments have come at an inopportune time. Recent polls show he still commands a large lead. But Bolsonaro, 67, whose supporters say Lula’s comments show he represents a “culture of death,” has gained ground. As the pandemic eases and unemployment falls, the race could become still more competitive.

#brazil #brazilian politics #politics #luiz inacio lula da silva #brazilian elections #brazilian elections 2022 #mod nise da silveira #image description in alt #i don't think i agree with all of this opinion piece but it features so.e worthy info & insight from political analysts #i definitely disagree with lula on ukraine #i definitely agree with him on abortion #and while i sort of see what he was trying to say about the police & elites he probably could've worded it better #this is sort of different from how i feel about the democrats in the usa #who feel to me like wimps with the spines of a jello #too afraid to speak out in ways that appeal to what seems to me like an increasingly left-wing electorate #(few exceptions apply)#in order to try to appease to a pretty much non-existent 'non-trumpist GOP voter'#as if the entirety of the GOP isn't an authoritarian and anti-democratic party #and a big difference is that dems literally control two of the three branches of the usamerican gvmnt #meanwhile brazil is still a multi-party system with a non-radicalized* electorate #*no pejorative sense to be implied; here i just mean ideologically committed to left-leaning agendas; spealing like this even i am radical #so the dems can afford to and SHOULD stop trying to be 'moderate' whereas lula still has the 'gathering' work to do #ok i wrote almost an entire op-ed here and am running out of tags sorry for rambling pls carry on with ur day

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foreheadkissesforzewu-jun · 2 years

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I hate it when people use the term 'Western culture'. Like fuck, don't throw Europe and Canada on the same heap with that ultra-capitalist, mentally unstable gun-wielding misogynist shit-show across the Atlantic. I'm a European. We have our own 99 problems, but being part of the USA thankfully ain't one of them...

#fuck capitalism #Fuck anti abortian laws #Fuck guns #Fuck the undemocratic two party system #I am looking at you too UK #The USA is legislatively a third world country

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gacorley · 3 months

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There’s some common threads I see in the anti-voting posts going around, and I feel like I need to discuss some of them. Let’s start with the biggest one:

Voting to punish evil. I see lots of variations of this. Biden is supporting Israel, therefore we can’t vote for him. Is there any viable candidate who would stop the genocide? I don’t think the anti voting crowd actually cares. They are appealing to moral feelings rather than political strategy, because strategically, you have to realize that voting is not going to change foreign policy, and that change has to be pushed by other means. It’ll probably be something in the long haul.

Democrats should run someone else. First of all, this is a shit strategy. You don’t primary your president in the second term unless your party is falling apart. This may come from people from countries where replacing the head of government is easier, but the POTUS is the de facto party head. Also, going to the lack of thought to the goal — do you know someone willing to primary Biden and able to win who would do the things you want?

Biden hasn’t done anything anyway. This is just a way to bat away pro arguments. There’s plenty of lists of progress on lots of things. Student loans, insulin price caps, regulations, anti-trust.

Putting the entire Palestinian genocide on Biden. I’m not saying there’s not culpability there, but understand that the entire US government is in support of Israel, on both sides. It was a miracle we got a handful of Senators to call for investigations. We should cut off aid, absolutely. Who’s running to do that? And keep in mind that Israel chose to engage. US officials would have liked a more limited response, not out of care for Palestinians, but because they know from experience that it will come back to bite Israel in the form of newly radicalized Hamas recruits.

Liberals just have no hope for change. This is a new one. Just some idea that people are stuck in a rut and that’s the reason the two party system exists. The two party system is a mathematical consequence of the way we vote. There is reason to hope for change. The change, though, whatever means you choose, will take decades. Keep working at it. The hope is not that this election will fundamentally change things. The hope is that many small political actions over the years will push things forward.

Funnily enough, I haven’t seen a whole lot of third party promotion, just lots of this rhetoric aiming to punish. When voting, ask yourself:

Is this problem I have with this candidate something that the other candidate would be better on?

Are there other political actions I can take that will help?

What things can change with a different President or Congress, and what needs to be pursued by other means?

Withholding your vote as a punishment isn’t really going to help. Biden doesn’t know who you are or why you are not voting for him, and there is no one with a chance of winning that will do everything you want. But you have other means. Protest, organize, donate, build up alternatives, advocate for a different system.

Vote to give yourself space and get a little bit. Do other things to keep things moving.

#poliitcs #us politics

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msprayforever · 11 months

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The Military Industrial Complex.

#anti establishment #end stage capitalism #end citizens united #peace #end two party system #herd mentality #spectator sport

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jewish-sideblog · 6 months

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Clearly, y'all don't care about Jews, and the fact that Hamas is violently antisemitic doesn't seem matter to any of you. So let me go with a new approach, of equal truth and value. Hamas is violently anti-Palestinian.

This past week, Hamas attacked evacuation routes and prevented Gazan citizens from fleeing an active warzone. [1]

They did that because they routinely use Gazan civilians as human shields. Hamas intentionally builds military targets close to schools, hospitals, and mosques, putting soft targets in the way of both incoming and outgoing fire. Hamas encourages Gazan civilians and children to stand on the roofs of buildings they know the IDF is targeting. [2]

Hamas has refused to allow elections in Gaza since 2006. Not just Palestinian National Authority elections, mind you. No open elections for any office have been held in seventeen years. Palestinian rights to free elections and self-determination have been denied by Hamas. [3] (And good luck to anyone who tries to blame that on Israel, because elections were held by the PNA in the West Bank in 2012, 2017, 2021 and 2022. It's Hamas's intention alone to purge democracy.)

Hamas's track record on human rights is appalling. Palestinian prisoners in Gaza face unfair trials and death sentences after being tortured by police. Palestinian women are prevented from accessing the legal systems to escape domestic abuse situations. Political dissidents in Hamas, even ones who merely support the other half of the Palestinian government, have been summarily executed. [4] [5]

Peaceful organizers in Palestine protested Hamas's massive tax hikes in 2019. Hamas security forces responded by assaulting demonstrators, tracking them down, raiding their homes, and detaining them. And, as previously mentioned, prisoners in Gaza are not treated well by Hamas. [6]

Edit Nov.5, 10:30 PM: I forgot to add arguably the most important thing-- Hamas manipulates the humanitarian aid they receive away from helping Gazans and toward killing Jews. 5% of Hamas's budget actually gets used for humanitarian aid, while 55% goes to military use. Construction equipment intended to rebuild Gaza's crumbling infrastructure is used to build a complex series of underground tunnels. Those tunnels in turn are used to smuggle Iranian military equipment into the country. They were also used for human trafficking in the October 7th attacks. [7]

If you actually want Palestinians to be free, you can't just replace Israel with Hamas. But it's not like they're the only option for supporting Palestinian liberation. While Fatah doesn't have an immaculate historical track record, it now operates as a leftist, democratic socialist, secular Palestinian government that fights for a two-state solution. Similarly, Arab-Israeli political parties like the Hadash-Ta'al coalition support leftist, anti-Zionist, and two-state solutions from within the Israeli parliament.

You can and should support Palestinian liberation movements that abuse neither Jewish nor Arab human rights and dignities. Plenty of them exist out there. But if y'all continue to throw your weight behind an antisemitic and anti-democratic terrorist regime, Palestinians and Jews will both take note of exactly where you stand.

#israel #palestine #antisemitism

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mostlysignssomeportents · 30 days

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Working class Dems who campaign on economics beat Trumpists in elections

I'm on tour with my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me FRIDAY NIGHT (Mar 22) in TORONTO, then SUNDAY (Mar 24) with LAURA POITRAS in NYC, then Anaheim, and more!

The Democratic Party Pizzaburger Theory of Electioneering is: half the electorate wants a pizza, the other half wants a burger, so we'll give them all a pizzaburger and make them all equally dissatisfied, thus winning the election:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/06/16/that-boy-aint-right/#dinos-rinos-and-dunnos

But no one wants a pizzaburger. The Biden administration's approach of letting the Warren/Sanders wing pick the antitrust enforcers while keeping judicial appointments in the Manchin-Synematic universe is a catastrophe in which progressive Dem regulators (who serve one term) are thwarted by corporatist Dem judges (who serve for life):

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/14/making-good-trouble/#the-peoples-champion

The Democrats – like all parties in two-party systems – are a coalition; in this case, a "progressive" liberal-left coalition with liberals serving as senior partners, steering the party and setting its policies. These corporate dems like to color themselves as "neutral" technocrats with "realistic, apolitical" policies that represent what's best for the country:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/05/not-that-naomi/#if-the-naomi-be-klein-youre-doing-just-fine

This sets up the left wing of the party as the starry-eyed, unrealistic radicals whose policies are unpopular and will lose elections. But for a decade, grassroots-funded primary challenges have made it possible to test this theory, by putting leftist politicians on the ballot in front of voters, especially in tight races with far-right Republicans (that is, exactly the kinds of races that the corporate wing of the party says we can't afford to take chances on).

The 2022 midterms included enough races to start testing these theories – and, unlike traditional midterms, these races enjoyed high voter turnout, thanks to the unpopularity of GOP positions like abortion bans, book bans and anti-trans laws. Jacobin teamed up with the Center for Working-Class Politics, Yougov and the Center for Work and Democracy at ASU and analyzed those races:

https://images.jacobinmag.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/11134429/CWCP-Report-2024.pdf

Their conclusion: candidates from working-class backgrounds who campaigned on economic policies like high-quality jobs, higher minimum wages, a jobs guarantee, ending offshoring and outsourcing, building infrastructure and bringing manufacturing back to the US won with a 50% share of the vote in rural and working-class districts. Dems who didn't lost with a 35% share of the vote:

https://prospect.org/politics/2024-03-18-how-actually-existing-democrats-run-for-office/

In other words, in the kinds of districts where Trumpist politicians are beating Democrats, running on "left populist" policies beats Trumpist politicians.

That's the good news: if Dems recruit leftist, working class politicians and put them up for office on policies that address the material reality of voters' lives, they can beat fascist GOP candidates.

Now for the bad news: the Democratic establishment has no interest in getting these candidates onto the ballot. Working-class candidates, by definition, lack the networks of deep-pocketed cronies who can fund their primary campaigns. Only 2.3% of Dem candidates come from blue-collar backgrounds (if you include "pink-collar" professions like nursing and teaching, the number goes up to 5.9%):

https://jacobin.com/2024/03/left-populists-working-class-voters

All of this confirms the findings of Trump's Kryoptonite, an earlier Jacobin/CWCP research project that polled working-class voters on preferences for hypothetical candidates, finding that working-class candidates with economically progressive policies handily beat out Republicans, including MAGA Republicans:

https://images.jacobinmag.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/08125102/TrumpsKryptonite_Final_June2023.pdf

Since the Clinton-Blair years, "progressives" have abandoned economic populism ("It's not a burning ambition for me to make sure that David Beckham earns less money" -T. Blair) and pursued a "third way" that seeks to replace half the world's of supply white, male oligarchs with diverse oligarchs from a variety of backgrounds and genders. We were told that this was done in the name of winning elections with "modern" policies that replaced old-fashioned ideas about decent pay, decent jobs, and worker power.

These policies have delivered a genocide-riven world on the brink of several kinds of existential catastrophe. They're a failure. The pizzaburger party didn't deliver safety, nor prosperity – and it also can't deliver elections.

Name your price for 18 of my DRM-free ebooks and support the Electronic Frontier Foundation with the Humble Cory Doctorow Bundle.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/03/20/actual-material-conditions/#bread-and-butter

#pluralistic #elections #political science #democrats #democrats in disarray #class #class war #us politics #pizzaburger

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