The scandal ridden establishment democrats have met their sad failure. After an election that was plagued with drama from both sides, drama, untrustworthiness, and the ultimate huge loss of the presidency and congress, it’s time to get it together. Democrats need to stop pretending to be champions for the working class and other marginalized groups. The jig is up.
As Viet Thanh Nguyen writes for the New York Times, all policies have been aimed at imperialism abroad, and not enough work done to keep all groups of people happy domestically.
“That sickness is imperialism. America is an imperial country, and its decay might now be showing. The power that has brought so much benefit to the country — for white people — is now faltering in its ability to provide those benefits to all white people. The empire’s best hope is to be more inclusive, demographically and economically, but that runs counter to the imperial impulse to hoard power and profit.”
Now not every democrat is a bad egg (and there sure are way more on the other side of the aisle) In fact, they are all good people but some of them just have bad habits. One of the biggest blemishes of the 2016 bid for the presidency was the chair of the DNC, Debbie Wasserman-Schultz. Her establishment politics pushed Bernie Sanders out of any chance of winning in the primaries, favoring Hillary in any and all cases. Not only were here emails revealed to prove her dislike of Sanders, but her bid for Hillary lost the dems this election.
We will never know if Bernie Sanders would have won if it were him instead of Hillary. But there is overwhelming evidence pointing to his win if that were to have been the case. Maybe an unfortunate truth is that Americans aren’t ready for female leadership. But more specifically, Hillary’s leadership. She has been tagged by conservative slandering for twenty years, her time in senate and as Secretary of State was rocky to say the least, and I think our eyes may all get stuck rolled back into our heads if we hear the word “emails” one more time. But aside from that, she really is a war hawk and she would continue to perpetuate policy that bolstered our imperialist tendencies.
“If Hillary Clinton had won, she would have run again in 2020, which could have meant four more years of Wall Street liberalism and fire-and-forget perpetual warfare, conducted by drones and Special Operations over the horizon.”
She is untrustworthy, let’s admit it. Even if you can sit down with her over coffee and see that she is a good person...as a politician she is a bit shady. Bernie Sanders has had decades of a clean track record. But more importantly, his message was powerful, while Hillary’s was dull. Sanders played to a similar if not the same populist movement as Trump did. He was looking to reexamine and possibly dismantle the status quo for the good of the people. While Hillary was gradually changing to more progressive (with nudges from Sanders and Warren), it was disingenuous and many people saw right through her.
There are many flaws in the Democratic party, namely their candidate Hillary. Yes, she is a dedicated public servant who has been defamed by the nasty right for decades. But she is also deeply, deeply establishment and so is her entourage. This nation, and this generation wants a change and wants something that stands up to the status quo. And unfortunately, we got the worst case scenario of that.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/projects/cp/opinion/election-night-2016/end-of-the-empire
"Democrats need to stop pretending to be champions for the working class and other marginalized groups. The jig is up."
ReplyDeleteI do agree, the jig is definitely up. However, I think that generalizing a whole party is something we cannot do. Hillary is untrustworthy, I agree, but this also comes from a fueled rage towards her societal status. Many working class citizens of America voted for Trump (also unworthy and also very rich). Perhaps the concept that a working class citizen, a humble and for-the-people spokesperson may be long gone. Perhaps societies bleeding into each other and crossing pay gaps is a much larger problem.. or not. There is also a paradoxical truth that the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. Despite the fact that Mr. Trump is a horrible human being, he did seem to reach out to the working class and "poor" citizens of America. Way more than Hillary ever did. However, we must also bring to the table that people are willing to crucify Hillary because of her untrustworthiness and nonchalantly put aside Trump's violent remarks against minorities, LGBTQ+, women, etc. And now, we must remake society as we know it. And amidst everything, I still feel hopeful for humanity's future. Perhaps that is what makes me human.
The fact that Trump could spurt out as many racist and sexist comments as we wanted to and that people still considered him more trustworthy for the presidency than Hillary says a lot. It was hard to lose against Trump, but she managed it, despite his efforts to alienate as many non-white males as possible. This just means that the Democratic Party screwed up big time, as they probably would have won with any other candidate. Bernie would have been ideal. It would have been interesting to see his run against Trump, and his inevitable victory. Well, hopefully Hillary never runs for anything again, because the odds would definitely be stacked against her.
ReplyDeleteWhen people tell me to identify my political beliefs I usually tell them I'm a liberal-leaning independent. In truth, I agree with the Democrats on most of their stances. I refuse to register as a Democrat, however, because there are certain aspects of the party I don't want to associate myself with. The biggest one is that for all the fingers that Dems point at the Republicans, I think Democrats can be pretty bad, too. They are just as susceptible to demonizing the other side of the aisle (though in many cases it's probably warranted) and of playing the old political game, as was seen when they favored Hillary over Bernie. Favoring Clinton because of her experience might have been a politically strategic move for the party, but what they failed to recognize was her inability to develop a genuine connection with white working class voters and to overcome their biases against her. After this election I'm honestly tired of Dems, too, but then again I think that if the party manages to get its ish together it might stand a chance of getting Congress come midterm elections. And for the sake of many communities that have been targeted by Trump's speeches, the Dems need to get their ish together.
ReplyDeleteThe democratic party is decadent and depraved.
ReplyDeleteDespite their rhetoric they have no interest in improving the lives of the middle and lower class. Instead of communicating with the downtrodden, the working class, the Democratic party has decided to be the party of capital. The only difference between the Democratic party and the Republican party is that the Dems put a veneer of "diversity" onto their 1% politics.
That's not to say that Donald Trump is equal to Hillary Clinton. Donald Trump is a very dangerous man. He's an authoritarian figure with the potential to destroy the world. Hillary Clinton, despite all her faults, would have been the much better choice for president.
Still, despite the fact that Trump and the current GOP represent an abominable movement, it does not mean the Democrats should continue on their current path. If the democrats wants to succeed and defeat Trumpism, they need to abandon Wall Street and become the party of the working class.
Amazing post.
"Bernie Sanders has had decades of a clean track record."
ReplyDeleteWhile I agree with some of your points in the piece, it is impossible to draw such a parallel between Sanders and Clinton. Yes, Sanders hasn't had any scandals. But he's a senator for New Hampshire, how many scandals could he really be involved in? Maybe I'm jaded but to me it seems like all career politicians are to a certain extent going to have shady things in their past. For example, Anthony Weiner was a great congress member, and was a real champion for the liberal agenda but his indiscretions completely ruined his career. I just think we have to be careful before judging Clinton so harshly.