If the party establishment can just pick whoever they want, why was Bernie in the lead going into Super Tuesday? Why have any progressives gotten elected anywhere, and why are they now facing (and beating) centrist primary challengers?
You can't simultaneously believe Democrats are incompetent enough to lose 2016 and maybe 2020, too, but also believe they have complete and total control over their primaries.
He lost. Does every loss mean the game was 100% rigged right from the start? Of course not.
you can’t believe winning was more important to them than stopping Bernie
Democrats absolutely prioritize winning on their own terms (i.e., not with Bernie) over winning, period, but that doesn't mean they can just go god mode on a primary and pick whatever candidate they want. Again, there is ample evidence to the contrary in the form of progressives winning elections and then defeating well-funded centrist primary challengers.
Bernie did not have a shot. It was always a game of chicken to see how far they'd be willing to let the mask slip. He didn't get far enough to force their hand, but that's what would've happened.
And they do cheat. The question is what -- realistically -- they can do to stop a leftist candidate with even more support than Bernie. I don't think in that case they'll just cancel the primary and pick a different candidate, even if they technically can. The whole reason they're worried about the mask slipping is that if they don't even pretend to be responsive to their base they'll collapse. The hard fact here is that Bernie supporters aren't the base, or at least aren't enough of the base to get the establishment truly worried. The task is changing that to where the left can't be ignored.
If you think every time you lose the game was rigged against you, I don't know what to tell you. You're just detached from reality at that point.
These aren't Machiavellian super-geniuses we're up against. We're up against a party that has all sorts of policy and demographic advantages and still manages to piss down their leg often enough to run a minority of the country. And you honestly think they're impossible to beat?
bitch, there's a pandemic killing hundreds of thousands, 40% of the country is being evicted, and climate change looms like an existential threat - and you want to sit here and talk about the 2024 blue primary? who the fuck cares? odds are there won't be a coherent entity called the United States by then and you're worried about your fucking soap opera. get a grip
over the next two months, a staggering number of people will face evictions. a staggering number of people will go hungry. a staggering number of people will be devastated by the on-going economic collapse. through it all, the state is not merely choosing not to act - it cannot. the ruling class is divided, practically at a breaking point between the two major factions as is, and very busy looting what remains of the petit-bourgeoisie, fighting over consolidation of market monopolies, etc.. economic subsidies to the (lumpen)proles or petit-bourgeoisie would interrupt this profit machine at a time when virtually no other profit is being extracted. so they're stuck doing what they're doing. that leaves the state at a deadlock, one that has been growing more and more intense for a full decade. the election cannot resolve the crisis because neither candidate fundamentally wants to change anything. the next election is for control of Congress in 2022 and it will remain gridlocked because any populist wave will run into an unsympathetic white house, however this election turns out. the election after that is almost five years after the start of the crisis. so elections will not provide relief. states will have to do their own thing - indeed there's already a brewing power struggle between the federal government and the states their authority to solve these problems themselves. it's likely the courts will uphold the power of the federal government over the states on this.
that means that in the next two months, a staggering number of people will get directly fucked by a system that has tied its own hands behind its back. it's only tool? repression. when people take the streets demanding bread and the government meets it with repression, the sheer scope of the number of people it's attempting to repress will force its immediate collapse. it will happen so fast that we might blink and miss it. one day people will be protesting, then there will be blood, and then there will be a wave of strikes and action directed against the state a la our May Days.
the election will proceed, whatever that means, with likely the military overseeing it and what happens going forward from there depends entirely on the quality of the response from the military and the immediate concessions made by the ruling class. we're looking at 2 decades of serious Instability.
Sure, anything's possible, but it's ridiculous to be "damn sure" of any of that. Odds are the most powerful country in the history of the planet will continue to exist in a recognizable form for at least another four years.
Guaranteeing anything four years in the future is silly, especially when your prediction involves a police state with nukes (and no history of popular, organized rebellion) collapsing. We're going to be stuck dealing with this shit until we change it.
If the party establishment can just pick whoever they want, why was Bernie in the lead going into Super Tuesday? Why have any progressives gotten elected anywhere, and why are they now facing (and beating) centrist primary challengers?
You can't simultaneously believe Democrats are incompetent enough to lose 2016 and maybe 2020, too, but also believe they have complete and total control over their primaries.
cool what happened after that?
you can't believe winning was more important to them than stopping Bernie
He lost. Does every loss mean the game was 100% rigged right from the start? Of course not.
Democrats absolutely prioritize winning on their own terms (i.e., not with Bernie) over winning, period, but that doesn't mean they can just go god mode on a primary and pick whatever candidate they want. Again, there is ample evidence to the contrary in the form of progressives winning elections and then defeating well-funded centrist primary challengers.
Yes, they literally can.
Like, do you just not know this? They've done it before.
Primaries are not legally binding. And they don't even have to run them fairly. They could literally cheat and it would be legal.
They have argued this successfully in court .
Bernie did not have a shot. It was always a game of chicken to see how far they'd be willing to let the mask slip. He didn't get far enough to force their hand, but that's what would've happened.
And they do cheat. The question is what -- realistically -- they can do to stop a leftist candidate with even more support than Bernie. I don't think in that case they'll just cancel the primary and pick a different candidate, even if they technically can. The whole reason they're worried about the mask slipping is that if they don't even pretend to be responsive to their base they'll collapse. The hard fact here is that Bernie supporters aren't the base, or at least aren't enough of the base to get the establishment truly worried. The task is changing that to where the left can't be ignored.
absolutely fucking smoothbrained. pathetic.
If you think every time you lose the game was rigged against you, I don't know what to tell you. You're just detached from reality at that point.
These aren't Machiavellian super-geniuses we're up against. We're up against a party that has all sorts of policy and demographic advantages and still manages to piss down their leg often enough to run a minority of the country. And you honestly think they're impossible to beat?
I've been paying attention to primaries for decades, you didn't even pay attention to the last one
I'm sure you were studying the blade real good.
bitch, there's a pandemic killing hundreds of thousands, 40% of the country is being evicted, and climate change looms like an existential threat - and you want to sit here and talk about the 2024 blue primary? who the fuck cares? odds are there won't be a coherent entity called the United States by then and you're worried about your fucking soap opera. get a grip
Do you really think the United States is just going to... fade away by 2024?
no, but I'm damn sure it will be (pick your favorite):
By what process do you expect the US to collapse into any of those in the next 4 years? I don't really see it happening that fast.
over the next two months, a staggering number of people will face evictions. a staggering number of people will go hungry. a staggering number of people will be devastated by the on-going economic collapse. through it all, the state is not merely choosing not to act - it cannot. the ruling class is divided, practically at a breaking point between the two major factions as is, and very busy looting what remains of the petit-bourgeoisie, fighting over consolidation of market monopolies, etc.. economic subsidies to the (lumpen)proles or petit-bourgeoisie would interrupt this profit machine at a time when virtually no other profit is being extracted. so they're stuck doing what they're doing. that leaves the state at a deadlock, one that has been growing more and more intense for a full decade. the election cannot resolve the crisis because neither candidate fundamentally wants to change anything. the next election is for control of Congress in 2022 and it will remain gridlocked because any populist wave will run into an unsympathetic white house, however this election turns out. the election after that is almost five years after the start of the crisis. so elections will not provide relief. states will have to do their own thing - indeed there's already a brewing power struggle between the federal government and the states their authority to solve these problems themselves. it's likely the courts will uphold the power of the federal government over the states on this.
that means that in the next two months, a staggering number of people will get directly fucked by a system that has tied its own hands behind its back. it's only tool? repression. when people take the streets demanding bread and the government meets it with repression, the sheer scope of the number of people it's attempting to repress will force its immediate collapse. it will happen so fast that we might blink and miss it. one day people will be protesting, then there will be blood, and then there will be a wave of strikes and action directed against the state a la our May Days.
the election will proceed, whatever that means, with likely the military overseeing it and what happens going forward from there depends entirely on the quality of the response from the military and the immediate concessions made by the ruling class. we're looking at 2 decades of serious Instability.
Interesting read. Given what's happened so far, it's certainly possible.
Sure, anything's possible, but it's ridiculous to be "damn sure" of any of that. Odds are the most powerful country in the history of the planet will continue to exist in a recognizable form for at least another four years.
When you definitely have a grip on the history of capitalist states in times of capitalist crisis.
Guaranteeing anything four years in the future is silly, especially when your prediction involves a police state with nukes (and no history of popular, organized rebellion) collapsing. We're going to be stuck dealing with this shit until we change it.
I'm sure this time you'll win your table scraps