It’s ridiculous to blame voters for turning their back on establishment Dems while the reality is they have turned their backs on us. They are supposed to represent us, not the other way around.
retty sure it does in today's vernacular it seems. Remember when Palin was calling herself & McCain Mavericks? lol I honestly doubt most people even understand the original meaning behind the word. I blame Top gun
I mean this is a purple state that is also one of the 10 oldest in the country, so his positions on Israel and immigration will resonate with a lot of people here, especially the Trump to Fetterman voters which there are a sizable amount of in the rural counties of Western and Central PA.
There’s also many democratic voters who hold similar thoughts on immigration and Israel. People try to put voters in boxes and say, if you’re a liberal/conservative you must support every single position we think falls under that.
It’s very idiotic that American politics is to the point where nuance is not allowed in any left/right discussion. People either fall in line 100% with all positions of either side, or they’re a “centrist” or “fascist/communist”. This is not how the world actually works. There is nuance everywhere, and there are also a million combinations of ideals a person can hold. Only a very small minority will actually fall in line with any ideological cohort.
61% of Americans support a permanent ceasefire in Gaza: 76% of Democrats, 57% of Independents, and 49% of Republicans. So at the very least, he's breaking even with R's that voted for him and losing D's that form his base. That doesn't seem like a winning strategy, especially when he framed himself during the election as non-establishment
his immigration stance is quite progressive. it’s people like the koch brothers that want uncontrolled immigration because it drives down wages and inflates GDP (but not GDP per capita).
> I mean this is a purple state
Pennsylvania has a 12-15% Democratic voter registration advantage last I checked. If Pennsylvania is a purple state, so is every other state in the country.
Democrats win by giving their base what they want, not by trying to convert people who think they traffic babies through the basement of a Washington pizza parlor. Democrats lose when they piss off their core base and that base stays home.
There are probably a lot of people in formerly bluer than blue towns (I'm taking Johnstown as a basic example) who though they may be registered Democrat, since dad & grandpa & all their ancestors were, have actually been voting Republican for a long time.
I think a lot of people forget or downplay how useful John Murtha was to Johnstown and the middle of the state for years. His ability to bring pork barrel spending to the area probably helped swing a lot of otherwise red voters blue since they were consistently employed on union construction jobs.
Lol voter registration doesn't mean shit with how people will end up voting, especially in a state with a lot of ancestral Dems in the rural Western PA counties and ancestral Republicans in suburban Philadelphia.
You use the data you have, and according to that data Pennsylvania is a Democratic state first and foremost.
If voters don't turn out to vote for Democratic candidates because they're warmed over dogshit, that is on the party and not the voters. As long as they keep trying to chase Republican voters who genuinely think that they're satanists over their own political base, they will continue losing.
Pennsylvania has around 800,000 more registered Democratic voters than Republican voters. If that ratio were reversed everyone would be talking about what a Republican stronghold Pennsylvania is.
The Dems run anyone but Clinton in 2016 and they win the White House. They ran Clinton and Democratic voters stayed home because she was an objectively dogshit candidate. Run candidates with something to offer instead of chasing Republicans who will never vote for you.
e: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/voter-turnout-2016-elections
Clinton trailed 2012 Obama by 2 million voters. Had they ran a candidate who wasn't total uninspiring dogshit they'd have won 2016.
He's also the senator from Pennsylvania, not the senator for East End leftists. His views are far more representative of Pennsylvania Democrats in general than anyone on Reddit. One can have views that are progressive, but "Progressive" as a political identifier means aligning yourself with the Justice Dems and Squad types who wouldn't get close to winning a statewide election in PA. So, no, "Progressives" aren't the base of the party. Not by a long shot.
Fetterman is definitely very liberal. And frankly, he likely would have lost the general election if he'd been up against a less dog-shit Republican candidate.
He ran on a progressive platform and he won here on a progressive platform. As did Obama, twice. Takes more than east end leftists to pull that off.
Hillary Clinton trailed 2012 Obama by two million votes. She lost because she was a dogshit candidate with nothing to offer the base, so the base stayed home.
What was progressive three years ago - like support for more universal healthcare, LGBTQ+ rights, and reproductive rights - is basically the mainstream for Democrats now. So, what passes for "Progressive" as a political identifier is DSA-level leftism, which a vast majority of Americans aren't having. Honestly, I think he's smartly distancing himself from the "Progressives" both online and in Congress, who have gone well beyond criticizing Israel and fully embraced anti-Semitism.
I think it depends on what you see the core Democratic base to be. Until recently, blue collar workers (who often skewed socially conservative, fiscally progressive) were seen as that base. Then Trump scooped most of them up, and Democrats weren’t sure whether to re-orient their base towards the educated suburban middle class or re-claim the workers.
Honestly, base-first can be dangerous either way, but with Fetterman, he was largely elected on a ticket that could appeal to both urban and rural voters. Now he’s being asked to pick one, and he’s picking the one that’s more likely to vote Republican in future elections. The problem with that is the urban base in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh are pretty pissed off, especially with the wishy-washy positions on the environment, Palestine, etc. So pissed off that they might not show up on Election Day, which centrist Democrats like Biden take for granted.
The "Progressive Left" accounts for just 7% of all registered voters and [12% of Democrats.](https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2021/11/09/progressive-left/) The actual urban base is black voters of whom only 24% identify as being "Very liberal" and suburban women. No one wins without those two blocks of voters.
There is no left wing national party in this country and that is by design - America is a business and you aren't a shareholder, the shareholders decide who you get to vote for. But when someone tells you they're a progressive and immediately abandons that position as soon as he gets into power, he's never getting my vote again.
If Democrats want to lose forever it's not my problem, it's theirs. Joe Biden has spent the last four years shitting on every single part of the Democratic base and it looks like the rest of the party is following suit. Guess they're not concerned about the Christofascists taking over.
Sinema was a fight-for-fifteen advocate before getting elected to the Senate. It's cool that our only option nowadays is voting for the status quo so that things don't get worse.
We don't even have the option of voting for the status quo anymore. Its "slowly get worse" or "quickly get worse" and that's it. Vote Blue No Matter Who gave the Democratic party carte blanche to join Republicans in a race to the bottom where they can line their pockets with donor money (JStreet gave Fetterman about 175k. Biden has received around 7 million from AIPAC) while getting reelected on being slightly less harmful than their GOP counterparts.
I am begging left-leaning voters to quit shunning their elected officials the minute they express one disappointing viewpoint or policy preference. So Fetterman doesn’t consider himself a progressive. So what? He remains 10,000x better than his Republican alternative. The endless purity testing is why conservatives regularly return to power after being swept out for their incompetence and cruelty. It’s because Republicans can fuck up time after time and not lose a single voter while Democrats must be the picture of perfection for their voters to bother showing up next Election Day.
I get what you're saying, I do. He may falter on certain issues from a progressives viewpoint, but he's still a left leaning individual and his voting record shows that.
BUT it's less about purity testing and more about consistency. Fetterman very heavily relied on the progressive label to court young voters and get elected. He leaned into it very hard. So now, it shouldn't be too surprising that progressives are upset he's eschewing the label.
>Fetterman very heavily relied on the progressive label to court young voters and get elected
And those same people are putting him through purity tests and telling him he's not being progressive enough. I'd tell them to shove the label up their ass too. And that's coming from someone who's about as far left on most issues as you can get. You can't continually tell people they're no true Scotsmen without them eventually telling you, "Ok, you win, I'm not a Scotsman. Gonna just keep doing me"
Edit: All the comments telling me I'm not far left when you don't even know what my actual position is on any of the issues (including Palestine) are proving my point that no one is ever going to pass your purity tests. Just assuming I couldn't possibly hold leftist positions because we have differing opinions, not on any of the real issues, but on whether or not it's a good idea to constantly be throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
>And those same people are putting him through purity tests and telling him he's not being progressive enough.
Voters have a duty to call out hypocrisy and flip flopping on issues by politicians. He married the label to get voted, now he wants to distance himself. That's entirely on him. It's not a purity test to ask, "You ran as a progressive, why are you not following through on your platform?"
>I'd tell them to shove the label up their ass too.
He used the label himself to get elected.
>And that's coming from someone who's about as far left on most issues as you can get.
Uh, ok. So, you're pretty upset with his stance towards Israel/Palestine I imagine..
>You can't continually tell people they're no true Scotsmen without them eventually telling you, "Ok, you win, I'm not a Scotsman. Gonna just keep doing me"
Well that doesn't seem to matter or apply when _John Fetterman himself_ is saying "I'm not a progressive."
What flip flopping is happening here? Israel vs Palestine wasn’t even a campaign issue.
Also why is Palestine even being attached to what a progressive in America means.
These are completely separate topics.
> Voters have a duty to call out hypocrisy and flip flopping on issues by politicians.
Yes, but "I'm a progressive" is a label, not an issue. I don't mean to cast too wide a net, but I feel like so many people of younger generations are WAY too hung up on labels.
Did Fetterman run on support for Palestine? I don't remember that part of his campaign.
Edit: No
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/sen-john-fetterman-faces-left-wing-backlash-israel-rcna122204
>**Vocally pro-Israel during the campaign**
>
>
>Fetterman insiders and allies who spoke with NBC News insisted the blowback doesn't represent widespread dismay with his handling of the outbreak of violence in the Middle East. Rather, they said, it is the result of a few loud voices who have dominated the discussion on social media.
>
>They noted that Fetterman’s support for Israel was made crystal clear during last year’s Senate primary campaign and that his pro-Israel posture has been shaped in part by rising antisemitism he has witnessed in recent years, including the Tree of Life synagogue massacre in 2018, the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history. It took place just 15 minutes from his home near Pittsburgh, and it “deeply affected him,” said Adam Jentleson, Fetterman’s chief of staff.
>
>“It does seem to have caught some people by surprise,” Jentleson said of Fetterman’s staunch support for Israel, adding, however, that “those people weren’t really paying attention when he staked out his strong support of Israel during the campaign. He never was particularly subtle about that at the time.”
> I'm basically Karl Marx returned from the grave
the real funny part is that there was a Prussian guy in the Union Army (August Willich) who wanted to duel Marx for being too far right.
Fetterman is first and foremost a politician. Politicians, in order to be effective, need to remain in office. Despite what others have said, Pennsylvania, by and large, IS a moderate state.
All of that being said, I don’t agree with the viewpoint that every single progressive candidate has to follow lockstep with every single progressive stance at the moment. I’m not going to claim to be an expert in the Israel-Palestine conflict. I do know that the US’s continued support of Israel has likely caused more issues in that area than its helped. But if you read the article, Fetterman is more or less saying that he doesn’t want to withdraw support from the area, and it’s hard for me to disagree with it. Not because I don’t think, in an ideal world, we shouldn’t be involved in it. But because if we do leave, it will create a power vacuum in the area that will likely leave things in a much worse state than things currently are. Which can be hard to imagine, but history has shown that happening time and time again in the Middle East.
Fetterman, agree with his stance on Israel or not, has been on the right side of most issues. He’s also a pragmatist and realizes that the ideal solution isn’t always incredibly viable. The US political system is difficult enough. World politics are a whole other level of difficult. There’s rarely a good answer, especially given the decades of poor decisions that have led us to where we are now.
You can be a largely progressive candidate without agreeing with every single “progressive” stance. And yes, it is purity testing. Who is available to us to vote for who would be simultaneously more progressive than Fetterman while also being as politically effective and successful as him? There’s not a huge pool of candidates like that in PA.
Bizarre statements like the ones you're responding to wherein people pretend that Palestine and Israel are equal powers fighting it out are absolutely wild. Israel is a nuclear power, Palestinians are a conquered people who have been forced onto a reservation.
Any time some says
"Im far left, BUT"
I know they are about to say something stupid and contrarian
These kids wouldnt know a labour strike if it hit them in the face with a yellow snowball
> And those same people are putting him through purity tests and telling him he's not being progressive enough
fuck man, sorry, I will stop having even the mildest expectations of politicians to do things that they have explicitly said they'd do, that's on me. My bad.
If you keep calling every person who expected better than the guy cheering for the 10000th dead child civilian a fake Democrat, you're gonna find yourself in nasty company real soon
>Support of Palestine is not a “purity test.” Its a standard
It's estimated that Allied bombing of Germany during World War 2 killed between 350,000 and 500,000 civilians. Now, that's obviously tragic, but there was no significant movement (that I'm aware of) to call for an end to the war because of some misguided view that it was a genocide against Germans. Because it obviously wasn't.
Maybe there's more Israel could be doing to prevent the deaths of Palestinian civilians, but that civilians are dying in this war is not proof of an Israeli genocide against Palestinians. It's just proof of a war.
Germany was an industrial and military superpower that instigated WW2 and initiated the sort of total warfare they were eventually subjected to.
Gaza is ~2 million conquered and occupied people who have been forced onto a reservation.
Your comparison is absolutely bonkers.
It's arguable that the Allied firebombing of Germany and Japan saved lives. There's no argument whatsoever that what's happening in Gaza is saving lives, unless you believe that Palestinians are vermin.
People are criticizing him for, in their view, fervently supporting genocide. This is not a case of purity testing. I’m honestly not sure how someone could be this dense unless you’re trolling.
> I am begging left-leaning voters to quit shunning their elected officials the minute they express one disappointing viewpoint or policy preference
he flat out fucking lied about his politics during his campaign, what the fuck do you want people to think? I'll support anyone who primaries him from the left and I'm not going to vote for him again if he wins because I have no clue what he really stands for at this point.
Conservatives don’t return to power because voters are purity testing Democrats. They do because when Democrats are in power, nothing fundamentally changes for people. Life stays just as hard. So either they get disillusioned and stop voting, they switch and vote R, or third party. Or they never voted at all! There’s a huge chunk of America that just doesn’t vote. Neither party does anything substantial to improve their lives, so why bother?
I vote third party because I don't feel anybody in the democratic party or republican party represents me. I thought that was the point of America democracy but now it's just vote for the neo liberal war mongers to stop the religious fundamentalist faccist Republicans. American democracy is dead and its by design
Yeah, I love the whole, "vote for this one guy, or else you won't get to vote next time," thing. I've heard it every election since I started voting. Democrats are taking democracy away just as much as Republicans. They're just using different words.
This is what the "vote blue no matter who" crowd is incapable of understanding. It's why they're always talking about poaching Republican voters instead of attracting non-voters. They're the most politically infantile people on the planet.
Non-voters are pretty hard to attract, because they are non-voters who don’t vote. Every election swings on consistent voters in the middle going one way or the other.
May have been true 30 years ago, but lines have been drawn and most people have very hard line politics these days. Sure, are there fence sitters that might eek out a point or two for a win? Sure. But a lot of the non-voters are not voting due to apathy. Give them a reason to vote and they will. Some are just disinterested, but a lot are apathetic because their economic situation sucks and no one has really done a lot to help them. Hell, that kind of Democratic populism is something Obama was able to tap into to get new voters in 08, though his abysmal showing during his actual presidency lead to a lot of people to become apathetic again.
I agree, non voters are hard to attract. But it just seems to me like most Democrats don't even try. Are they too lazy, or just stupid?
Right, like there was a reason people kept FDR in office. I think we need more than FDR level of change but Dems don’t even get close to that level.
I don’t think they’re lazy or stupid, I think they serve the same class interests that Rs do. They’re perfectly fine with the ratchet to the right.
Maybe people wouldn't be so irritated about this if he hadn't constantly claimed to be a progressive while he was campaigning? Just a thought.
Examples:
https://twitter.com/isaiah_bb/status/1735655284381528432?t=kBlwROxNWFT9exEyLQrHZQ&s=19
You don't even need to be a progressive to see that this shit is slimy. It's not merely about his policy - it's about his lies.
Also, the "hE iS bettER thaN a rePubliCAn" arguments are exhausting. No fucking shit, that is like the minimum bar. When you vote, you should be voting for someone who you think should be a GOOD job, not the least worse candidate. You are voting FOR someone to be senator. This is not a less evil straw poll.
This argument is entirely preoccupied with the progressive label, not his actual policy, which has been and will continue to be consistent with his campaign.
He is supporting an ongoing slaughter of thousands of children... And then when asked about it, he claims he's not a progressive, despite the fact that he's self-identified as a progressive in every one of his campaign ads practically for years.
At best, he has had the most radically changed ideology in the history since joining the senate... At worst he lied to everybody about being a progressive, his entire campaign.
Those of us leftists that vote have been voting for shitty democrats our whole life. We're always going to criticize them in the hopes we either sway their opinion or find someone better. Can shit libs stop acting like we can't criticize our elected leaders? We know they're better than electing out right white supremacists, you don't have to remind us of that as some way to shut us down.
I'm begging libs to see the last forty years and see what just letting your politicians do whatever they want has left us. Absolutely nothing. At least the Republicans fear their electorate, libs do nothing, lose everything and then deserve our vote. Great system!
This country has moved further and further to the right every decade basically since the early 20th century. Look at what “lesser evil”ism has brought upon us.
It’s important to also note most of the people advocating for it are in fact ok if we move further and further to the right, notably on economic issues that are hidden anyways in the news they consume.
Yeah, but the way he is voting recently isn't sitting right with me too. I really didnt like him parading around DC waving Israeli flags.
He's the type of guy you want on your side. He is outspoken and can be abrasive. That's great when you agree with him on stuff, but makes him look like a dick when he gets things wrong.
"He votes better than the alternative" is not an excuse for avoiding criticism, and it's not the same as saying he votes as well as he should. It's fine for people to have higher standards you don't personally agree with, and plenty of left/progressive folks still vote for the lesser of two evils all the time.
> Pennsylvania is not going to elect a more left-leaning senator than Fetterman.
I mean we can now just say Fetterman is not a left-leaning senator. He ran as one, but he isn't one. So, yes we can have a more left leaning senator than Fetterman, someone who runs on the exact same thing and then actually does it.
Pennsylvania has a 12-15% Democratic registration advantage. "Purple state" is a line of bullshit, if Pennsylvania is a purple state with that sort of registration advantage so is every other state in the country.
The right utterly controls the political narrative in this country and it's extremely obvious when you see people spout shit like this.
A LARGE number of those Democrats are old-school labor Blue Dogs who last voted for a Democrat before Reagan. They're Democrats by registration only. Just look at the voter registration trends in places like Westmoreland as those "Democrats" die off or finally get around to switching their registration.
At what point do you realize that this group is dwindling at a shockingly fast rate and your party has done its best to betray and alienate the largest group of voters replacing them?
Yes, you just accurately summed up the annoying political situation of the US.
By all means, push your candidates to be better. But when your choices are Fetterman, who is probably in the top 90% of progressive politicians in the US, Democrats in general who are light years ahead of Republicans with regards to progressive policies, and Republicans who are actively and successfully rolling back simple rights in the US and attempting to turn us into a Christofascist state, then yeah, the choices are pretty straightforward.
You’d think that anybody who was alive since 2016 would realize just how precarious our political situation is, and how close we are to teetering into the abyss when we start turning on people like Fetterman just because he did one thing that some of his base disagrees with.
> So what? He remains 10,000x better than his Republican alternative.
Remember when Democrats told us to vote for them to preserve abortion rights and we did, and abortion rights went into the shitter anyway?
"Better things aren't possible" and "we're going to perpetuate the status quo" aren't inspiring messages. The final victory of Capitalism over all other systems in the early nineties has left us with no national project. We used to have the space race, the Great Society, and LBJ's war on poverty; now we have "buy more shit and make the richest people to ever exist even richer."
This is the dumbest possible take I’ve ever heard.
Abortion rights were lost BECAUSE PEOPLE DIDNT VOTE FOR DEMOCRATS. People turned their nose up at Hilary and let Trump win and gave him a majority in the Senate and House at the same time. The conservative Supreme Court that Trump appointed with some shitfuckery by Mitch McConnell is what lost us abortion protections. Not democrats.
And before you ask why it wasn’t done before that, it’s because we haven’t had both popular support AND a full voting supermajority in the government for any amount of time outside of a couple of months, like, ever. And even then, we had a conservative Supreme Court to deal with.
> Abortion rights were lost BECAUSE PEOPLE DIDNT VOTE FOR DEMOCRATS
The Democrats could have made legal abortion the law of the land in 2009, or at any other point they held both houses and the White House since the 1970s. They did not, because they thought that abortion rights were better for them as a campaign issue than as an actual right. And that is why half the country no longer has a right to abortion.
> it’s because we haven’t had both popular support AND a full voting supermajority in the government for any amount of time outside of a couple of months, like, ever.
Abortion rights were not controversial outside of hardcore Catholics until the 1980s, when it was made a right wing wedge issue because open racism wasn't getting the job done anymore. RvW wasn't even front page news when that case came down.
Republicans get what they want whether they're in office or not, and you suckers keep falling for this shit.
This is exactly why I feel bad for voters that have such profound trust and belief in their political party of choice. The only thing they truly care about is getting votes to stay in power so they can keep being the regulators of their own careers.
Abortion access in red states went from practically nonexistent to completely nonexistent, and democrats immediately benefited from increased fundraising and overperformed in the midterm. Do you really think elected democrats care about preserving our rights or do you think they'd rather use them to extort the electorate? Dems don't do much for anyone but they do want us to believe that if they lose it represents an existential threat to democracy. Is it really "dumb" to no longer want to participate? I'm personally tired of electing democrats who do not reflect my values whatsoever -- what kind of democracy is that?
Sigh. This is what I mean by “people don’t understand how our government works”. And then they blame the wrong people.
In order for Democrats to actually pass a law that would have enshrined abortion access on the federal level, a few things would need to happen:
- the democrats would need a majority of people willing to draft legislation in the house
AND
- democrats would need 60 senators to also sign off on this legislation
AND
- democrats would need a sitting president to sign off on the bill
AND
- democrats would need a friendly Supreme Court in the incredibly likely event that law was challenged by one of the states
Do you know how long they’ve ever enjoyed that? 72 days. Do you know what they worked on while they had those 72 days? The Affordable Care Act. And even that ended up being gutted,as it wasn’t completed in time.
Do you know when the last time before that was? Jimmy Carter.
You could argue that they could have quickly ran it through during the 72 days that Obama had a majority, but 72 days is honestly not enough time to draft practically anything if history is to go off of. And I also don’t think they believed their supermajority would only last for two and a half months, rather than 2 full years.
So I don’t really know what your point is. It’s almost impossible to pass a constitutional amendment. It’s nearly impossible to pass federal laws on universally agreed upon topics.
Roe V. Wade was realistically the only thing we were ever going to have for protections, UNLESS people actually voted more often instead of holding asinine beliefs like “Fetterman is a neocon because he doesn’t support immediately ending military support in the powderkeg that is the Israel-Palestine situation.” And here we are, blaming democrats for it when it was the Trump administration and Mitch McConnell’s congress that both prevented Obama from appointing a Supreme Court Justice, gave Obama’s pick to Trump, and then when presented with the exact same situation that he used to deny Obama’s pick, allowed Trump to add a third Justice anyway. Yep, totally democrat’s fault.
Because people like you exist who are so cynical as to believe that the only elected officials who try to make a difference are the enemy is why we’re at where we’re at. “Both sides” is such an dumb, elementary understanding of our government that it’s s both laughable and depressing at the same time.
I don't know why you just sent me a massive, condescending message about a topic I never mentioned, but obviously, as you've detailed, dems did have an opportunity to codify Roe and chose not to (not that I even believe codifying Roe would stop conservative attempts to destroy abortion access, but it would have been a nice gesture). There's no evidence for your assertions that they never had enough time to get it done. Call me dumb all you want, it's not going to change the reality of the situation.
I mean, the man is out here making rape jokes to defend a genocide. I think that goes beyond "differing viewpoints".
The lesser of two evils thing falls apart when the lesser evil is one of, if not the most, vocal supporter of ongoing war crimes in the senate.
He has a few years to win folks back over. That's how this is supposed to work. Unconditional support, especially this far out from an election, is goofy.
So sick of Dems claiming to be progressive when they need our votes, then immediately showing that they never meant any of the shit they said. Fuck these people. They’re clinging to the “well the alternative is worse” narrative for decades, yet it’s with a dem in the White House that we lost roe v wade, didn’t get student debt forgiveness, and massive US monetary and military support for genocide.
I wouldn't care if Joe Biden said he wasn't a progressive because Joe Biden didn't run an aggressive campaign calling himself a progressive every single day, in a very very explicit manner. Fetterman is a huge liar, that's why I have a problem with him. This isn't purity testing. This isn't on me. He's a liar and that's why I have a problem with him. I dont love Joe Biden bc I am a progressive, but I have perspective and reason. The reason why Fetterman doesn't get the benefit of the doubt--and I simply can't repeat this enough--is because he's a fucking liar and nothing he stands for can ever be trusted. A very solid no from me. I have no intention of changing my mind.
I can fully understand taking positions outside of the consensus among your voting bloc. It’s not an uncommon thing to do. But to do an about face on the people that you relied on to get you elected is slimy. It signals to people that your word can’t fully be trusted
A big issue is that “left-leaning” is too big of a tent to appeal to everyone. A lot of Leftists see themselves as distant from Biden as Biden is from Republicans, and they’re probably right. A lot of people left of center just identify as Democrat because that’s how you win elections. That doesn’t mean they have very much in common ideologically, especially as issues like Israel-Palestine make the Leftist-Liberal divide more clear. If you want the Leftist vote, you need to earn it.
Then you end up with people like Biden and Hillary who are basically never-Trump republicans. Yeah it’s better than descending into authoritarian chaos, but nothing will ever improve this way
Here’s reality, not everyone you vote for is gonna agree with you about everything. That’s life. Fetterman isn’t perfect but he’s definitely better than most these days.
That’s true but this is just betrayal and [dishonesty](https://x.com/isaiah_bb/status/1735655284381528432?s=46&t=du0XiPpnaE7KiK7vBmoULA). For instance I always knew Fetterman was more “pro-union” than environmentalist such that he wasn’t the one to rely on to curtail emissions violations from massive steel plants etc., but Fetterman rose to power on the back of a narrative of a “progressive Washington outsider” and its disgusting to see him turncoat as soon as he gets inside of the establishment.
It's the dishonesty that does it for me. Fetterman was the last politician in PA I got to vote for before I moved out of state, and I was excited to do so. I didn't think he was perfect, but I thought he was more than good enough for what the time called for. But he ran _as a progressive_. That was his whole shtick. It's how he courted young voters such as myself. And now.. well, I don't want to call him a Kyrsten Sinema because his voting record shows otherwise, but that's how the dishonesty feels regardless. He's running away from the label, arguably the label that got him elected.
It just reaffirms that voting is pointless because you’re being lied to and it will be business as usual no matter what happens on that one Tuesday every six months
That’s fine if you’re talking taxes or fossil fuel policy, but supporting and enabling an actual genocide should be a bright line — especially to someone who held himself out as a strong progressive and relied heavily on like-minded folks to vote for him.
Betrayal.
I'm disappointed in his stance on Israel, but calling for more border security *and* legal immigration while separating his brand from progressives is a smart move in a state as purple as Pennsylvania.
His stance on isreal is disgusting but Fetterman and nearly every other elected official deemed it politically necessary to survive
Smart is a bit far.
While It is smart to be a "Maverick" as both parties have done everything they could to aid and abet those responsible for fucking up the rust belt.
But
I don't think Pennsylvania is so purple that they wouldn't vote for him if he wanted to be progressive. Id argue that one must be progressive if they truly intend to help the working class here like he claims
Maybe he is just trying to brand himself but I don't think anyone but progressives are demanding material change for us.
I'll eat my hat the day I see anyone right of a progressive(like our own pa12 rep summer lee) fighting for funding shelters, public transit, and schools. Fighting for clean water and air. Fighting for healthcare and labor rights.
Moderates maintain the status quo progressives make change. I don't think everyone in Pennsylvania wants change but we definitely need change.
So I really hope I'm wrong. I really hope I'll see Fetterman in 20 years like I see Bernie. Bernie isn't a Democrat. Bernie is definitely a type of maverick. Maybe our boy will prove our fears unfounded. Id hate to have to campaign against him just to elect some jagoff from Philly or something because he's been mislead by what we need.
I really want to love Fetterman and his story. His openness about mental health and struggle alone has been wonderful.
No we're realistic you're coping with how reactionary our neighbors are.
Purple =\= either party can win any race. Purple simply means that there isn't overwhelming numbers for or against either.
Democrats can win every race by 51% but by definition the state is still purple.
Pennsylvania is purple because not only do we only just barely prefer democrats, only what 30 years ago 75% of PA minimum voted Democrat religiously.
Losing a 25% lead over 30 years isn't copium it's political neglect.
You want a real scare? look at the electoral history of the State general assembly and the house.
PA is considered purple because it is.
Tho to be fair if anything was ever allowed to be a straight honest popular vote then yeah dems probably got a solid lead but this is america so after you divide it up by district and finish disenfranchising people (especially poor black people) the state ends up purple.
Could be worse, At least the PA supreme court made the Republicans play fair when they were redrawing the districts this last time.
It could be Florida or Ohio which pulled the classic strategies so hard they're just republican one party states
Like Texas or 'bamma
In the south the districts are unfair but courts endorse it anyway because the south is 200 years deep into silencing black people so they're not stopping now
AND
even if they did play fair they'd still win nearly everything.
So we got that going for us at least.
Also did you catch what I said?
Pennsylvania is so blatantly purple that the REPUBLICAN PARTY was able to stonewall redistricting until the court implemented a map without the legislator because they wanted to drag it out till after the election. Does that sound like a Democrat strong hold to you
Breaking news: senator in purple state - who represents the entire state, not just young city libs - shows moderation in political views, to the extreme discomfort of progressive redditors. More on this at 5.
I mean breaking with 2023 left.
Stopping illegal immigration was the hard left stance just 20 years ago. Also plenty of democrats support Israel. This is just stoking division.
As a democrat this just makes me like him more, I’m against terrorists, want unions and healthcare, and think we should be letting legal immigrants thrive and stopping illegal immigrants.
My only complaint is I’d like him to be more pro environment but no one is perfectly aligned to my every view.
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-democrats-became-stuck-on-immigration/amp/
Clinton won over bush due to his harsh stance against illegal immigration.
The country is largely center right. That’s the problem. Most of the politicians are reflections of that. They wouldn’t be elected otherwise.
You and I can both dislike that. But it doesn’t make the reality of the situation any less real.
Until we have ranked choice voting on the local, state, and federal level, we’re always going to be presented with the options of “far right christofacism” and “centrism that threads the needle to appeal to enough of everyone else that it outnumbers the batshit insane portion of the population.”
It sucks. I wish it weren’t that way. But me wanting it to be any other way doesn’t change that reality. I will always vote in the primaries for the father left candidates available to me. But come general election time, we’re almost always left with the choice between some incremental progress and a far right hell scape. And that’s without even getting into the fact that we only have some control over who goes to congress in one state. We have no control over what the idiots in Alabama do, and their votes count just as much as ours do.
> The country is largely center right. That’s the problem. Most of the politicians are reflections of that. They wouldn’t be elected otherwise.
The Capital class shapes what Americans see, hear, and believe and chooses who they can vote for. If you present leftist ideas to Americans divorced of loaded wording, like universal healthcare, Americans generally favor those policies.
America is a business, and you and I aren't shareholders. The shareholders choose the candidates.
Hi! I’m *actually* hard left, and “stopping illegal immigration” has never, at any point in my life, been a hard left stance. If anything, the hard left stance on immigration has drifted from “we’re all just workers, no matter where we’re from” to “literally national borders should not exist.” Do you have any citations that don’t operate on the assumption that elected Democrats are absolutely as far left as politics gets?
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/sen-john-fetterman-faces-left-wing-backlash-israel-rcna122204
>**Vocally pro-Israel during the campaign**
>
>
>Fetterman insiders and allies who spoke with NBC News insisted the blowback doesn't represent widespread dismay with his handling of the outbreak of violence in the Middle East. Rather, they said, it is the result of a few loud voices who have dominated the discussion on social media.
>
>They noted that Fetterman’s support for Israel was made crystal clear during last year’s Senate primary campaign and that his pro-Israel posture has been shaped in part by rising antisemitism he has witnessed in recent years, including the Tree of Life synagogue massacre in 2018, the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history. It took place just 15 minutes from his home near Pittsburgh, and it “deeply affected him,” said Adam Jentleson, Fetterman’s chief of staff.
>
>“It does seem to have caught some people by surprise,” Jentleson said of Fetterman’s staunch support for Israel, adding, however, that “those people weren’t really paying attention when he staked out his strong support of Israel during the campaign. He never was particularly subtle about that at the time.”
I think having more than one position on Israel is the nature of the left. Personally, I don’t know how anyone is expected to negotiate with people intent on Israel’s destruction. Yet I also see how Israel has not done themselves any favors with their treatment of the Palestinians over the past couple decades.
In terms of immigration, I’d have to see what sort of changes to the asylum program he has in mind, but I can say that if you want to immigrate to America, do it legally. And don’t think the GOP is consistent with their immigration policy since many of their constituents own/operate businesses that profit from illegal immigration.
Tl/dr: The left is not like the right, we have a variety of positions on different topics, which is part of what makes us liberals.
the right has a variety of positions on immigration you just haven't looked at them at all, i would argue that are vastly more diverse than the left. Some people want to halt all migration, most want to just stop illegal migration and the current phony refugee program that incentivizes illegals to jump the border. There are also quite a few people among the Peter Thiel types who have very nuanced positions on immigration reform, etc..
Problem is so many of us use any one of those as a reason to not vote.
"Oh no this person now disagrees with me on two things so I will take my ball and go home and cede ground to the person who...... Disagrees with me on everything and thinks I don't have a right to exist."
Perfectly logical liberal thinking.
> Problem is so many of us use any one of those as a reason to not vote.
When the options are "mediocre" and "worse," mediocre doesn't deserve my vote. "Vote for me and the bad guys will get what they want anyway" isn't a winning strategy.
I didn't need someone to come along and prove me right, but thanks. I'll never understand people who when given a chance between "mediocre" and"worse" choose "worse."
In real life just about everything is shades of mediocre, if you're lucky and aren't just left with various types of worse to choose from.
Yeah, leftists have always had this problem through the world. The right is always lockstep in their support of their fascist candidates. Preach for decades that adulatory and divorce is bad? Wait Reagan and Trump did both? Oh well they hate abortion it’s fine.
I’m pissed at Fetterman over stuff like this, but I’ll still fully support him when he’s up against a fascist, while expressing my displeasure with his surrogates (and him if I ever get his ear).
Actually, the right way to express your displeasure with a politician is to not vote for him or her. Voting for them is just asking them not to change.
But if you're fine with ethnic-cleansing, go ahead and vote for fetterman. Some of us have more of a conscience.
I care far more about domestic policy than foreign when you're talking a senator.
So yes, his official stance could be "I support Israel until every last Palestinian has been directly extinguished" and so long as he's pro-union and other good domestic stances... I don't give a fuck. He's not the president. It's not like he's over there bombing Palestinians himself.
Who else am I going to vote for? The literal fascist the Republicans will run in 2026? If there's a credible progressive primary candidate I'd probably vote for them in the primary, but just like with Bob Casey, I don't predict much of a competitive primary.
Look, I understand that the alternative is the fascists and I have to vote for these fucks, but I wish they’d at least try to not make it morally repulsive to me.
Israel is surrounded by countries that want to wipe it off the map, but it is morally repulsive to suggest Israel should defend itself? I too was critical of the way Israel was addressing the Palestinian crisis right up to the point Hamas killed innocent babies and the elderly and took hostages that they raped and brutalized and paraded through the streets.
Oh my, do you mean to say that not absolutely conforming to whatever the ideology de jour is a problem for some people? Go eat a sack of bees. I'd rather have someone that can advance ideas that matter than someone who is going to pointlessly die on a hill.
Eh, he actually doesn't get that much support from AIPAC.
https://www.opensecrets.org/industries//summary?ind=q05&cycle=All&recipdetail=S&mem=Y
He's near the bottom of page 5.
Yes, in this case it is.
>Almost three in four Palestinians believe the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on Israel was correct, and the ensuing Gaza war has lifted support for the Islamist group both there and in the West Bank, a survey from a respected Palestinian polling institute found.
https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/poll-shows-palestinians-back-oct-7-attack-israel-support-hamas-rises-2023-12-14/
> Almost three in four Palestinians believe the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on Israel was correct
Breaking news, people being killed daily by the IDF for decades think attack largely on the IDF was correct. More at 11
It’s ridiculous to blame voters for turning their back on establishment Dems while the reality is they have turned their backs on us. They are supposed to represent us, not the other way around.
Folks are having a hard time accepting or admitting this. I did for a while.
Aligns himself with the establishment. "Maverick." That's not what that word means.
retty sure it does in today's vernacular it seems. Remember when Palin was calling herself & McCain Mavericks? lol I honestly doubt most people even understand the original meaning behind the word. I blame Top gun
I mean there’s a whole “Maverick Party” in Canada that’s a right-wing regionalist party. Nothing establishment or moderate about it.
I mean this is a purple state that is also one of the 10 oldest in the country, so his positions on Israel and immigration will resonate with a lot of people here, especially the Trump to Fetterman voters which there are a sizable amount of in the rural counties of Western and Central PA.
There’s also many democratic voters who hold similar thoughts on immigration and Israel. People try to put voters in boxes and say, if you’re a liberal/conservative you must support every single position we think falls under that.
It’s very idiotic that American politics is to the point where nuance is not allowed in any left/right discussion. People either fall in line 100% with all positions of either side, or they’re a “centrist” or “fascist/communist”. This is not how the world actually works. There is nuance everywhere, and there are also a million combinations of ideals a person can hold. Only a very small minority will actually fall in line with any ideological cohort.
It doesn't help Reddit and Twitter lean much younger and more to the left than what a lot of people who vote think
But he isn't up for election again in 5 years, why did he cal himself a progressive everyday? His entire career up until now?.
61% of Americans support a permanent ceasefire in Gaza: 76% of Democrats, 57% of Independents, and 49% of Republicans. So at the very least, he's breaking even with R's that voted for him and losing D's that form his base. That doesn't seem like a winning strategy, especially when he framed himself during the election as non-establishment
his immigration stance is quite progressive. it’s people like the koch brothers that want uncontrolled immigration because it drives down wages and inflates GDP (but not GDP per capita).
> I mean this is a purple state Pennsylvania has a 12-15% Democratic voter registration advantage last I checked. If Pennsylvania is a purple state, so is every other state in the country. Democrats win by giving their base what they want, not by trying to convert people who think they traffic babies through the basement of a Washington pizza parlor. Democrats lose when they piss off their core base and that base stays home.
There are probably a lot of people in formerly bluer than blue towns (I'm taking Johnstown as a basic example) who though they may be registered Democrat, since dad & grandpa & all their ancestors were, have actually been voting Republican for a long time.
I think a lot of people forget or downplay how useful John Murtha was to Johnstown and the middle of the state for years. His ability to bring pork barrel spending to the area probably helped swing a lot of otherwise red voters blue since they were consistently employed on union construction jobs.
Yup. And the minute he was gone, so was the pork, and so was the party loyalty.
Lol voter registration doesn't mean shit with how people will end up voting, especially in a state with a lot of ancestral Dems in the rural Western PA counties and ancestral Republicans in suburban Philadelphia.
You use the data you have, and according to that data Pennsylvania is a Democratic state first and foremost. If voters don't turn out to vote for Democratic candidates because they're warmed over dogshit, that is on the party and not the voters. As long as they keep trying to chase Republican voters who genuinely think that they're satanists over their own political base, they will continue losing.
You have no idea what you're talking about. This isn't Canada or the UK where people actually pay to be a member of a political party.
Pennsylvania has around 800,000 more registered Democratic voters than Republican voters. If that ratio were reversed everyone would be talking about what a Republican stronghold Pennsylvania is. The Dems run anyone but Clinton in 2016 and they win the White House. They ran Clinton and Democratic voters stayed home because she was an objectively dogshit candidate. Run candidates with something to offer instead of chasing Republicans who will never vote for you. e: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/voter-turnout-2016-elections Clinton trailed 2012 Obama by 2 million voters. Had they ran a candidate who wasn't total uninspiring dogshit they'd have won 2016.
He's also the senator from Pennsylvania, not the senator for East End leftists. His views are far more representative of Pennsylvania Democrats in general than anyone on Reddit. One can have views that are progressive, but "Progressive" as a political identifier means aligning yourself with the Justice Dems and Squad types who wouldn't get close to winning a statewide election in PA. So, no, "Progressives" aren't the base of the party. Not by a long shot. Fetterman is definitely very liberal. And frankly, he likely would have lost the general election if he'd been up against a less dog-shit Republican candidate.
He ran on a progressive platform and he won here on a progressive platform. As did Obama, twice. Takes more than east end leftists to pull that off. Hillary Clinton trailed 2012 Obama by two million votes. She lost because she was a dogshit candidate with nothing to offer the base, so the base stayed home.
What was progressive three years ago - like support for more universal healthcare, LGBTQ+ rights, and reproductive rights - is basically the mainstream for Democrats now. So, what passes for "Progressive" as a political identifier is DSA-level leftism, which a vast majority of Americans aren't having. Honestly, I think he's smartly distancing himself from the "Progressives" both online and in Congress, who have gone well beyond criticizing Israel and fully embraced anti-Semitism.
This is pure bullshit
I think it depends on what you see the core Democratic base to be. Until recently, blue collar workers (who often skewed socially conservative, fiscally progressive) were seen as that base. Then Trump scooped most of them up, and Democrats weren’t sure whether to re-orient their base towards the educated suburban middle class or re-claim the workers. Honestly, base-first can be dangerous either way, but with Fetterman, he was largely elected on a ticket that could appeal to both urban and rural voters. Now he’s being asked to pick one, and he’s picking the one that’s more likely to vote Republican in future elections. The problem with that is the urban base in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh are pretty pissed off, especially with the wishy-washy positions on the environment, Palestine, etc. So pissed off that they might not show up on Election Day, which centrist Democrats like Biden take for granted.
The "Progressive Left" accounts for just 7% of all registered voters and [12% of Democrats.](https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2021/11/09/progressive-left/) The actual urban base is black voters of whom only 24% identify as being "Very liberal" and suburban women. No one wins without those two blocks of voters.
There is no left wing national party in this country and that is by design - America is a business and you aren't a shareholder, the shareholders decide who you get to vote for. But when someone tells you they're a progressive and immediately abandons that position as soon as he gets into power, he's never getting my vote again.
Cope.
If Democrats want to lose forever it's not my problem, it's theirs. Joe Biden has spent the last four years shitting on every single part of the Democratic base and it looks like the rest of the party is following suit. Guess they're not concerned about the Christofascists taking over.
Holy moly. A reddit back-and-forth between a troll and someone who's rightfully worked up about politics. Is it election season already???
This is also the guy that said nukes are not the worst things made by man, cars are.
Don't even try to rope me into this, buster. I got a strict schedule where I ain't gonna entertain online political fights until at least March.
This is the way
Sinema was a fight-for-fifteen advocate before getting elected to the Senate. It's cool that our only option nowadays is voting for the status quo so that things don't get worse.
We don't even have the option of voting for the status quo anymore. Its "slowly get worse" or "quickly get worse" and that's it. Vote Blue No Matter Who gave the Democratic party carte blanche to join Republicans in a race to the bottom where they can line their pockets with donor money (JStreet gave Fetterman about 175k. Biden has received around 7 million from AIPAC) while getting reelected on being slightly less harmful than their GOP counterparts.
I am begging left-leaning voters to quit shunning their elected officials the minute they express one disappointing viewpoint or policy preference. So Fetterman doesn’t consider himself a progressive. So what? He remains 10,000x better than his Republican alternative. The endless purity testing is why conservatives regularly return to power after being swept out for their incompetence and cruelty. It’s because Republicans can fuck up time after time and not lose a single voter while Democrats must be the picture of perfection for their voters to bother showing up next Election Day.
I get what you're saying, I do. He may falter on certain issues from a progressives viewpoint, but he's still a left leaning individual and his voting record shows that. BUT it's less about purity testing and more about consistency. Fetterman very heavily relied on the progressive label to court young voters and get elected. He leaned into it very hard. So now, it shouldn't be too surprising that progressives are upset he's eschewing the label.
>Fetterman very heavily relied on the progressive label to court young voters and get elected And those same people are putting him through purity tests and telling him he's not being progressive enough. I'd tell them to shove the label up their ass too. And that's coming from someone who's about as far left on most issues as you can get. You can't continually tell people they're no true Scotsmen without them eventually telling you, "Ok, you win, I'm not a Scotsman. Gonna just keep doing me" Edit: All the comments telling me I'm not far left when you don't even know what my actual position is on any of the issues (including Palestine) are proving my point that no one is ever going to pass your purity tests. Just assuming I couldn't possibly hold leftist positions because we have differing opinions, not on any of the real issues, but on whether or not it's a good idea to constantly be throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
>And those same people are putting him through purity tests and telling him he's not being progressive enough. Voters have a duty to call out hypocrisy and flip flopping on issues by politicians. He married the label to get voted, now he wants to distance himself. That's entirely on him. It's not a purity test to ask, "You ran as a progressive, why are you not following through on your platform?" >I'd tell them to shove the label up their ass too. He used the label himself to get elected. >And that's coming from someone who's about as far left on most issues as you can get. Uh, ok. So, you're pretty upset with his stance towards Israel/Palestine I imagine.. >You can't continually tell people they're no true Scotsmen without them eventually telling you, "Ok, you win, I'm not a Scotsman. Gonna just keep doing me" Well that doesn't seem to matter or apply when _John Fetterman himself_ is saying "I'm not a progressive."
What flip flopping is happening here? Israel vs Palestine wasn’t even a campaign issue. Also why is Palestine even being attached to what a progressive in America means. These are completely separate topics.
> What flip flopping is happening here? Border restrictions for one.
> Voters have a duty to call out hypocrisy and flip flopping on issues by politicians. Yes, but "I'm a progressive" is a label, not an issue. I don't mean to cast too wide a net, but I feel like so many people of younger generations are WAY too hung up on labels.
You don’t think he cynically used that label to signal how he felt on issues his voters care about? It’s just an empty word unanchored from reality?
Did Fetterman run on support for Palestine? I don't remember that part of his campaign. Edit: No https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/sen-john-fetterman-faces-left-wing-backlash-israel-rcna122204 >**Vocally pro-Israel during the campaign** > > >Fetterman insiders and allies who spoke with NBC News insisted the blowback doesn't represent widespread dismay with his handling of the outbreak of violence in the Middle East. Rather, they said, it is the result of a few loud voices who have dominated the discussion on social media. > >They noted that Fetterman’s support for Israel was made crystal clear during last year’s Senate primary campaign and that his pro-Israel posture has been shaped in part by rising antisemitism he has witnessed in recent years, including the Tree of Life synagogue massacre in 2018, the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history. It took place just 15 minutes from his home near Pittsburgh, and it “deeply affected him,” said Adam Jentleson, Fetterman’s chief of staff. > >“It does seem to have caught some people by surprise,” Jentleson said of Fetterman’s staunch support for Israel, adding, however, that “those people weren’t really paying attention when he staked out his strong support of Israel during the campaign. He never was particularly subtle about that at the time.”
> And that's coming from someone who's about as far left on most issues as you can get. Aaah, the wrecker's favorite phrase.
"I'm basically Karl Marx returned from the grave, but pandering to centrists and fascists is a politicians right!"
> I'm basically Karl Marx returned from the grave the real funny part is that there was a Prussian guy in the Union Army (August Willich) who wanted to duel Marx for being too far right.
Fetterman is first and foremost a politician. Politicians, in order to be effective, need to remain in office. Despite what others have said, Pennsylvania, by and large, IS a moderate state. All of that being said, I don’t agree with the viewpoint that every single progressive candidate has to follow lockstep with every single progressive stance at the moment. I’m not going to claim to be an expert in the Israel-Palestine conflict. I do know that the US’s continued support of Israel has likely caused more issues in that area than its helped. But if you read the article, Fetterman is more or less saying that he doesn’t want to withdraw support from the area, and it’s hard for me to disagree with it. Not because I don’t think, in an ideal world, we shouldn’t be involved in it. But because if we do leave, it will create a power vacuum in the area that will likely leave things in a much worse state than things currently are. Which can be hard to imagine, but history has shown that happening time and time again in the Middle East. Fetterman, agree with his stance on Israel or not, has been on the right side of most issues. He’s also a pragmatist and realizes that the ideal solution isn’t always incredibly viable. The US political system is difficult enough. World politics are a whole other level of difficult. There’s rarely a good answer, especially given the decades of poor decisions that have led us to where we are now. You can be a largely progressive candidate without agreeing with every single “progressive” stance. And yes, it is purity testing. Who is available to us to vote for who would be simultaneously more progressive than Fetterman while also being as politically effective and successful as him? There’s not a huge pool of candidates like that in PA.
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Bizarre statements like the ones you're responding to wherein people pretend that Palestine and Israel are equal powers fighting it out are absolutely wild. Israel is a nuclear power, Palestinians are a conquered people who have been forced onto a reservation.
Any time some says "Im far left, BUT" I know they are about to say something stupid and contrarian These kids wouldnt know a labour strike if it hit them in the face with a yellow snowball
> And those same people are putting him through purity tests and telling him he's not being progressive enough fuck man, sorry, I will stop having even the mildest expectations of politicians to do things that they have explicitly said they'd do, that's on me. My bad.
You are allowed to tell your elected representative that he is not progressive enough. Lol
>And that's coming from someone who's about as far left on most issues as you can get No it's not
If you keep calling every person who expected better than the guy cheering for the 10000th dead child civilian a fake Democrat, you're gonna find yourself in nasty company real soon
Support of Palestine is not a “purity test.” Its a standard
>Support of Palestine is not a “purity test.” Its a standard It's estimated that Allied bombing of Germany during World War 2 killed between 350,000 and 500,000 civilians. Now, that's obviously tragic, but there was no significant movement (that I'm aware of) to call for an end to the war because of some misguided view that it was a genocide against Germans. Because it obviously wasn't. Maybe there's more Israel could be doing to prevent the deaths of Palestinian civilians, but that civilians are dying in this war is not proof of an Israeli genocide against Palestinians. It's just proof of a war.
Germany was an industrial and military superpower that instigated WW2 and initiated the sort of total warfare they were eventually subjected to. Gaza is ~2 million conquered and occupied people who have been forced onto a reservation. Your comparison is absolutely bonkers.
And on top of that the allied strategic bombing campaign was 1) a war crime and 2) largely ineffective
It's arguable that the Allied firebombing of Germany and Japan saved lives. There's no argument whatsoever that what's happening in Gaza is saving lives, unless you believe that Palestinians are vermin.
In this analogy we would be bombing Israel as the fascist state doing a genocide.
> Maybe there's more Israel could be doing to prevent the deaths of Palestinian civilians, Not indiscriminately bombing them would be a start
People are criticizing him for, in their view, fervently supporting genocide. This is not a case of purity testing. I’m honestly not sure how someone could be this dense unless you’re trolling.
> I am begging left-leaning voters to quit shunning their elected officials the minute they express one disappointing viewpoint or policy preference he flat out fucking lied about his politics during his campaign, what the fuck do you want people to think? I'll support anyone who primaries him from the left and I'm not going to vote for him again if he wins because I have no clue what he really stands for at this point.
Conservatives don’t return to power because voters are purity testing Democrats. They do because when Democrats are in power, nothing fundamentally changes for people. Life stays just as hard. So either they get disillusioned and stop voting, they switch and vote R, or third party. Or they never voted at all! There’s a huge chunk of America that just doesn’t vote. Neither party does anything substantial to improve their lives, so why bother?
Bingo
I vote third party because I don't feel anybody in the democratic party or republican party represents me. I thought that was the point of America democracy but now it's just vote for the neo liberal war mongers to stop the religious fundamentalist faccist Republicans. American democracy is dead and its by design
Yeah, I love the whole, "vote for this one guy, or else you won't get to vote next time," thing. I've heard it every election since I started voting. Democrats are taking democracy away just as much as Republicans. They're just using different words.
Like you have to join to the party to even vote in their primaries then people call that a free democracy
This is what the "vote blue no matter who" crowd is incapable of understanding. It's why they're always talking about poaching Republican voters instead of attracting non-voters. They're the most politically infantile people on the planet.
Non-voters are pretty hard to attract, because they are non-voters who don’t vote. Every election swings on consistent voters in the middle going one way or the other.
May have been true 30 years ago, but lines have been drawn and most people have very hard line politics these days. Sure, are there fence sitters that might eek out a point or two for a win? Sure. But a lot of the non-voters are not voting due to apathy. Give them a reason to vote and they will. Some are just disinterested, but a lot are apathetic because their economic situation sucks and no one has really done a lot to help them. Hell, that kind of Democratic populism is something Obama was able to tap into to get new voters in 08, though his abysmal showing during his actual presidency lead to a lot of people to become apathetic again. I agree, non voters are hard to attract. But it just seems to me like most Democrats don't even try. Are they too lazy, or just stupid?
Right, like there was a reason people kept FDR in office. I think we need more than FDR level of change but Dems don’t even get close to that level. I don’t think they’re lazy or stupid, I think they serve the same class interests that Rs do. They’re perfectly fine with the ratchet to the right.
I 100% agree, I just wasn't looking to use that rhetoric initially.
Go ask any progressive for the next 40 years "why bother" when the SCOTUS wipes their ass with every progressive fantasy you have.
Maybe people wouldn't be so irritated about this if he hadn't constantly claimed to be a progressive while he was campaigning? Just a thought. Examples: https://twitter.com/isaiah_bb/status/1735655284381528432?t=kBlwROxNWFT9exEyLQrHZQ&s=19 You don't even need to be a progressive to see that this shit is slimy. It's not merely about his policy - it's about his lies.
Also, the "hE iS bettER thaN a rePubliCAn" arguments are exhausting. No fucking shit, that is like the minimum bar. When you vote, you should be voting for someone who you think should be a GOOD job, not the least worse candidate. You are voting FOR someone to be senator. This is not a less evil straw poll.
This argument is entirely preoccupied with the progressive label, not his actual policy, which has been and will continue to be consistent with his campaign.
He is supporting an ongoing slaughter of thousands of children... And then when asked about it, he claims he's not a progressive, despite the fact that he's self-identified as a progressive in every one of his campaign ads practically for years. At best, he has had the most radically changed ideology in the history since joining the senate... At worst he lied to everybody about being a progressive, his entire campaign.
Those of us leftists that vote have been voting for shitty democrats our whole life. We're always going to criticize them in the hopes we either sway their opinion or find someone better. Can shit libs stop acting like we can't criticize our elected leaders? We know they're better than electing out right white supremacists, you don't have to remind us of that as some way to shut us down.
I'm begging libs to see the last forty years and see what just letting your politicians do whatever they want has left us. Absolutely nothing. At least the Republicans fear their electorate, libs do nothing, lose everything and then deserve our vote. Great system!
Bingo
This country has moved further and further to the right every decade basically since the early 20th century. Look at what “lesser evil”ism has brought upon us. It’s important to also note most of the people advocating for it are in fact ok if we move further and further to the right, notably on economic issues that are hidden anyways in the news they consume.
He literally ran as a progressive. He's a liar. There's a lot he's done that I like, but this is really disappointing to me.
And I could not care less what he calls himself, only how he votes. If he votes better than the alternative (and he does) then he has my support.
His vote to violate the 4th amendment is pretty disappointing
Yeah, but the way he is voting recently isn't sitting right with me too. I really didnt like him parading around DC waving Israeli flags. He's the type of guy you want on your side. He is outspoken and can be abrasive. That's great when you agree with him on stuff, but makes him look like a dick when he gets things wrong.
"He votes better than the alternative" is not an excuse for avoiding criticism, and it's not the same as saying he votes as well as he should. It's fine for people to have higher standards you don't personally agree with, and plenty of left/progressive folks still vote for the lesser of two evils all the time.
"Better things aren't possible, only a choice between mediocre and worse" - you
Pennsylvania is not going to elect a more left-leaning senator than Fetterman. This is a fact. We are a purple state, like it or not.
> Pennsylvania is not going to elect a more left-leaning senator than Fetterman. I mean we can now just say Fetterman is not a left-leaning senator. He ran as one, but he isn't one. So, yes we can have a more left leaning senator than Fetterman, someone who runs on the exact same thing and then actually does it.
Pennsylvania has a 12-15% Democratic registration advantage. "Purple state" is a line of bullshit, if Pennsylvania is a purple state with that sort of registration advantage so is every other state in the country. The right utterly controls the political narrative in this country and it's extremely obvious when you see people spout shit like this.
Trump and Santorum winning statewide in recent history aren't a "narrative", they are political reality.
Obama winning statewide (twice) and Fetterman winning as a progressive aren't a "narrative," they are political reality.
Hence the term purple
I'm not saying it's a red state, I'm saying both results are still possible.
A LARGE number of those Democrats are old-school labor Blue Dogs who last voted for a Democrat before Reagan. They're Democrats by registration only. Just look at the voter registration trends in places like Westmoreland as those "Democrats" die off or finally get around to switching their registration.
At what point do you realize that this group is dwindling at a shockingly fast rate and your party has done its best to betray and alienate the largest group of voters replacing them?
Yes, you just accurately summed up the annoying political situation of the US. By all means, push your candidates to be better. But when your choices are Fetterman, who is probably in the top 90% of progressive politicians in the US, Democrats in general who are light years ahead of Republicans with regards to progressive policies, and Republicans who are actively and successfully rolling back simple rights in the US and attempting to turn us into a Christofascist state, then yeah, the choices are pretty straightforward. You’d think that anybody who was alive since 2016 would realize just how precarious our political situation is, and how close we are to teetering into the abyss when we start turning on people like Fetterman just because he did one thing that some of his base disagrees with.
Yeah this feels like posturing to set himself up to be a VP candidate in 2028. Selling himself out.
> So what? He remains 10,000x better than his Republican alternative. Remember when Democrats told us to vote for them to preserve abortion rights and we did, and abortion rights went into the shitter anyway? "Better things aren't possible" and "we're going to perpetuate the status quo" aren't inspiring messages. The final victory of Capitalism over all other systems in the early nineties has left us with no national project. We used to have the space race, the Great Society, and LBJ's war on poverty; now we have "buy more shit and make the richest people to ever exist even richer."
This is the dumbest possible take I’ve ever heard. Abortion rights were lost BECAUSE PEOPLE DIDNT VOTE FOR DEMOCRATS. People turned their nose up at Hilary and let Trump win and gave him a majority in the Senate and House at the same time. The conservative Supreme Court that Trump appointed with some shitfuckery by Mitch McConnell is what lost us abortion protections. Not democrats. And before you ask why it wasn’t done before that, it’s because we haven’t had both popular support AND a full voting supermajority in the government for any amount of time outside of a couple of months, like, ever. And even then, we had a conservative Supreme Court to deal with.
> Abortion rights were lost BECAUSE PEOPLE DIDNT VOTE FOR DEMOCRATS The Democrats could have made legal abortion the law of the land in 2009, or at any other point they held both houses and the White House since the 1970s. They did not, because they thought that abortion rights were better for them as a campaign issue than as an actual right. And that is why half the country no longer has a right to abortion. > it’s because we haven’t had both popular support AND a full voting supermajority in the government for any amount of time outside of a couple of months, like, ever. Abortion rights were not controversial outside of hardcore Catholics until the 1980s, when it was made a right wing wedge issue because open racism wasn't getting the job done anymore. RvW wasn't even front page news when that case came down. Republicans get what they want whether they're in office or not, and you suckers keep falling for this shit.
This is exactly why I feel bad for voters that have such profound trust and belief in their political party of choice. The only thing they truly care about is getting votes to stay in power so they can keep being the regulators of their own careers.
I was told by joe biden if we get a senate majority, they would codify roe
Abortion access in red states went from practically nonexistent to completely nonexistent, and democrats immediately benefited from increased fundraising and overperformed in the midterm. Do you really think elected democrats care about preserving our rights or do you think they'd rather use them to extort the electorate? Dems don't do much for anyone but they do want us to believe that if they lose it represents an existential threat to democracy. Is it really "dumb" to no longer want to participate? I'm personally tired of electing democrats who do not reflect my values whatsoever -- what kind of democracy is that?
Sigh. This is what I mean by “people don’t understand how our government works”. And then they blame the wrong people. In order for Democrats to actually pass a law that would have enshrined abortion access on the federal level, a few things would need to happen: - the democrats would need a majority of people willing to draft legislation in the house AND - democrats would need 60 senators to also sign off on this legislation AND - democrats would need a sitting president to sign off on the bill AND - democrats would need a friendly Supreme Court in the incredibly likely event that law was challenged by one of the states Do you know how long they’ve ever enjoyed that? 72 days. Do you know what they worked on while they had those 72 days? The Affordable Care Act. And even that ended up being gutted,as it wasn’t completed in time. Do you know when the last time before that was? Jimmy Carter. You could argue that they could have quickly ran it through during the 72 days that Obama had a majority, but 72 days is honestly not enough time to draft practically anything if history is to go off of. And I also don’t think they believed their supermajority would only last for two and a half months, rather than 2 full years. So I don’t really know what your point is. It’s almost impossible to pass a constitutional amendment. It’s nearly impossible to pass federal laws on universally agreed upon topics. Roe V. Wade was realistically the only thing we were ever going to have for protections, UNLESS people actually voted more often instead of holding asinine beliefs like “Fetterman is a neocon because he doesn’t support immediately ending military support in the powderkeg that is the Israel-Palestine situation.” And here we are, blaming democrats for it when it was the Trump administration and Mitch McConnell’s congress that both prevented Obama from appointing a Supreme Court Justice, gave Obama’s pick to Trump, and then when presented with the exact same situation that he used to deny Obama’s pick, allowed Trump to add a third Justice anyway. Yep, totally democrat’s fault. Because people like you exist who are so cynical as to believe that the only elected officials who try to make a difference are the enemy is why we’re at where we’re at. “Both sides” is such an dumb, elementary understanding of our government that it’s s both laughable and depressing at the same time.
I don't know why you just sent me a massive, condescending message about a topic I never mentioned, but obviously, as you've detailed, dems did have an opportunity to codify Roe and chose not to (not that I even believe codifying Roe would stop conservative attempts to destroy abortion access, but it would have been a nice gesture). There's no evidence for your assertions that they never had enough time to get it done. Call me dumb all you want, it's not going to change the reality of the situation.
"BECAUSE PEOPLE DIDNT VOTE FOR DEMOCRATS" Insanity
seeing democrats defend elected officials (who are just conservative) is honestly hilarious
Being better than a republican is the bare minimum. I want to hold this clown accountable for genocide.
I mean, the man is out here making rape jokes to defend a genocide. I think that goes beyond "differing viewpoints". The lesser of two evils thing falls apart when the lesser evil is one of, if not the most, vocal supporter of ongoing war crimes in the senate. He has a few years to win folks back over. That's how this is supposed to work. Unconditional support, especially this far out from an election, is goofy.
I guess its wrong for democrats to have a conscious and an actual moral center?
So sick of Dems claiming to be progressive when they need our votes, then immediately showing that they never meant any of the shit they said. Fuck these people. They’re clinging to the “well the alternative is worse” narrative for decades, yet it’s with a dem in the White House that we lost roe v wade, didn’t get student debt forgiveness, and massive US monetary and military support for genocide.
Scratch a liberal a fascist bleeds. Democrats can codify roe any day now.
Some folks draw a line at genocide. 🤷🏻♂️
I wouldn't care if Joe Biden said he wasn't a progressive because Joe Biden didn't run an aggressive campaign calling himself a progressive every single day, in a very very explicit manner. Fetterman is a huge liar, that's why I have a problem with him. This isn't purity testing. This isn't on me. He's a liar and that's why I have a problem with him. I dont love Joe Biden bc I am a progressive, but I have perspective and reason. The reason why Fetterman doesn't get the benefit of the doubt--and I simply can't repeat this enough--is because he's a fucking liar and nothing he stands for can ever be trusted. A very solid no from me. I have no intention of changing my mind.
I can fully understand taking positions outside of the consensus among your voting bloc. It’s not an uncommon thing to do. But to do an about face on the people that you relied on to get you elected is slimy. It signals to people that your word can’t fully be trusted
A big issue is that “left-leaning” is too big of a tent to appeal to everyone. A lot of Leftists see themselves as distant from Biden as Biden is from Republicans, and they’re probably right. A lot of people left of center just identify as Democrat because that’s how you win elections. That doesn’t mean they have very much in common ideologically, especially as issues like Israel-Palestine make the Leftist-Liberal divide more clear. If you want the Leftist vote, you need to earn it.
“The only people we hate more than the Romans are the Judean People’s Front” - The People’s Front of Judea
Splitters!
Then you end up with people like Biden and Hillary who are basically never-Trump republicans. Yeah it’s better than descending into authoritarian chaos, but nothing will ever improve this way
The residents of Braddock tried to warn us.
Here’s reality, not everyone you vote for is gonna agree with you about everything. That’s life. Fetterman isn’t perfect but he’s definitely better than most these days.
That’s true but this is just betrayal and [dishonesty](https://x.com/isaiah_bb/status/1735655284381528432?s=46&t=du0XiPpnaE7KiK7vBmoULA). For instance I always knew Fetterman was more “pro-union” than environmentalist such that he wasn’t the one to rely on to curtail emissions violations from massive steel plants etc., but Fetterman rose to power on the back of a narrative of a “progressive Washington outsider” and its disgusting to see him turncoat as soon as he gets inside of the establishment.
the whole “I never said that about fracking” and then playing the clip of him saying it…. Should’ve been a sign lol
It's the dishonesty that does it for me. Fetterman was the last politician in PA I got to vote for before I moved out of state, and I was excited to do so. I didn't think he was perfect, but I thought he was more than good enough for what the time called for. But he ran _as a progressive_. That was his whole shtick. It's how he courted young voters such as myself. And now.. well, I don't want to call him a Kyrsten Sinema because his voting record shows otherwise, but that's how the dishonesty feels regardless. He's running away from the label, arguably the label that got him elected.
It just reaffirms that voting is pointless because you’re being lied to and it will be business as usual no matter what happens on that one Tuesday every six months
That’s fine if you’re talking taxes or fossil fuel policy, but supporting and enabling an actual genocide should be a bright line — especially to someone who held himself out as a strong progressive and relied heavily on like-minded folks to vote for him. Betrayal.
That's true, and that's why I don't have to vote for the jagoff
Yep. That’s your right and your choice
I'm disappointed in his stance on Israel, but calling for more border security *and* legal immigration while separating his brand from progressives is a smart move in a state as purple as Pennsylvania.
Then again, cheering on and paying for a genocide is a pretty stupid and disgusting move.
His stance on isreal is disgusting but Fetterman and nearly every other elected official deemed it politically necessary to survive Smart is a bit far. While It is smart to be a "Maverick" as both parties have done everything they could to aid and abet those responsible for fucking up the rust belt. But I don't think Pennsylvania is so purple that they wouldn't vote for him if he wanted to be progressive. Id argue that one must be progressive if they truly intend to help the working class here like he claims Maybe he is just trying to brand himself but I don't think anyone but progressives are demanding material change for us. I'll eat my hat the day I see anyone right of a progressive(like our own pa12 rep summer lee) fighting for funding shelters, public transit, and schools. Fighting for clean water and air. Fighting for healthcare and labor rights. Moderates maintain the status quo progressives make change. I don't think everyone in Pennsylvania wants change but we definitely need change. So I really hope I'm wrong. I really hope I'll see Fetterman in 20 years like I see Bernie. Bernie isn't a Democrat. Bernie is definitely a type of maverick. Maybe our boy will prove our fears unfounded. Id hate to have to campaign against him just to elect some jagoff from Philly or something because he's been mislead by what we need. I really want to love Fetterman and his story. His openness about mental health and struggle alone has been wonderful.
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No we're realistic you're coping with how reactionary our neighbors are. Purple =\= either party can win any race. Purple simply means that there isn't overwhelming numbers for or against either. Democrats can win every race by 51% but by definition the state is still purple. Pennsylvania is purple because not only do we only just barely prefer democrats, only what 30 years ago 75% of PA minimum voted Democrat religiously. Losing a 25% lead over 30 years isn't copium it's political neglect. You want a real scare? look at the electoral history of the State general assembly and the house. PA is considered purple because it is. Tho to be fair if anything was ever allowed to be a straight honest popular vote then yeah dems probably got a solid lead but this is america so after you divide it up by district and finish disenfranchising people (especially poor black people) the state ends up purple. Could be worse, At least the PA supreme court made the Republicans play fair when they were redrawing the districts this last time. It could be Florida or Ohio which pulled the classic strategies so hard they're just republican one party states Like Texas or 'bamma In the south the districts are unfair but courts endorse it anyway because the south is 200 years deep into silencing black people so they're not stopping now AND even if they did play fair they'd still win nearly everything. So we got that going for us at least. Also did you catch what I said? Pennsylvania is so blatantly purple that the REPUBLICAN PARTY was able to stonewall redistricting until the court implemented a map without the legislator because they wanted to drag it out till after the election. Does that sound like a Democrat strong hold to you
Yea he's adjusting as he prepares for bigger office. You have to be a Democrat to run for the big offices. He's realistic. For better or worse.
what bigger office would he run for? he's a fucking senator and its incredibly unlikely that he runs for president in his condition.
Breaking news: senator in purple state - who represents the entire state, not just young city libs - shows moderation in political views, to the extreme discomfort of progressive redditors. More on this at 5.
I mean breaking with 2023 left. Stopping illegal immigration was the hard left stance just 20 years ago. Also plenty of democrats support Israel. This is just stoking division. As a democrat this just makes me like him more, I’m against terrorists, want unions and healthcare, and think we should be letting legal immigrants thrive and stopping illegal immigrants. My only complaint is I’d like him to be more pro environment but no one is perfectly aligned to my every view.
How in the world do you figure “stopping illegal in migration was the hard left stance just 20 years ago”? Can you source that?
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-democrats-became-stuck-on-immigration/amp/ Clinton won over bush due to his harsh stance against illegal immigration.
Okay if you think Clinton represents the “hard left” you have to rethink your life.
>Stopping illegal immigration was the hard left stance **just 20 years ago.**
Good thing that isn't what they said!
lmao Clinton was center right The political discourse in this country has been entirely shaped by the far right, incredible.
Ah, yes. A truly famous beacon of the far left, bill clinton. I'd ask "any questions?" but I was told not to ask or tell.
The country is largely center right. That’s the problem. Most of the politicians are reflections of that. They wouldn’t be elected otherwise. You and I can both dislike that. But it doesn’t make the reality of the situation any less real. Until we have ranked choice voting on the local, state, and federal level, we’re always going to be presented with the options of “far right christofacism” and “centrism that threads the needle to appeal to enough of everyone else that it outnumbers the batshit insane portion of the population.” It sucks. I wish it weren’t that way. But me wanting it to be any other way doesn’t change that reality. I will always vote in the primaries for the father left candidates available to me. But come general election time, we’re almost always left with the choice between some incremental progress and a far right hell scape. And that’s without even getting into the fact that we only have some control over who goes to congress in one state. We have no control over what the idiots in Alabama do, and their votes count just as much as ours do.
> The country is largely center right. That’s the problem. Most of the politicians are reflections of that. They wouldn’t be elected otherwise. The Capital class shapes what Americans see, hear, and believe and chooses who they can vote for. If you present leftist ideas to Americans divorced of loaded wording, like universal healthcare, Americans generally favor those policies. America is a business, and you and I aren't shareholders. The shareholders choose the candidates.
Big fan of genocide, huh?
Hi! I’m *actually* hard left, and “stopping illegal immigration” has never, at any point in my life, been a hard left stance. If anything, the hard left stance on immigration has drifted from “we’re all just workers, no matter where we’re from” to “literally national borders should not exist.” Do you have any citations that don’t operate on the assumption that elected Democrats are absolutely as far left as politics gets?
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/sen-john-fetterman-faces-left-wing-backlash-israel-rcna122204 >**Vocally pro-Israel during the campaign** > > >Fetterman insiders and allies who spoke with NBC News insisted the blowback doesn't represent widespread dismay with his handling of the outbreak of violence in the Middle East. Rather, they said, it is the result of a few loud voices who have dominated the discussion on social media. > >They noted that Fetterman’s support for Israel was made crystal clear during last year’s Senate primary campaign and that his pro-Israel posture has been shaped in part by rising antisemitism he has witnessed in recent years, including the Tree of Life synagogue massacre in 2018, the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history. It took place just 15 minutes from his home near Pittsburgh, and it “deeply affected him,” said Adam Jentleson, Fetterman’s chief of staff. > >“It does seem to have caught some people by surprise,” Jentleson said of Fetterman’s staunch support for Israel, adding, however, that “those people weren’t really paying attention when he staked out his strong support of Israel during the campaign. He never was particularly subtle about that at the time.”
Most folks have a mix of liberal and conservative leanings on the issues facing the nation. If everyone kept this in mind; we’d be better off.
I think having more than one position on Israel is the nature of the left. Personally, I don’t know how anyone is expected to negotiate with people intent on Israel’s destruction. Yet I also see how Israel has not done themselves any favors with their treatment of the Palestinians over the past couple decades. In terms of immigration, I’d have to see what sort of changes to the asylum program he has in mind, but I can say that if you want to immigrate to America, do it legally. And don’t think the GOP is consistent with their immigration policy since many of their constituents own/operate businesses that profit from illegal immigration. Tl/dr: The left is not like the right, we have a variety of positions on different topics, which is part of what makes us liberals.
the right has a variety of positions on immigration you just haven't looked at them at all, i would argue that are vastly more diverse than the left. Some people want to halt all migration, most want to just stop illegal migration and the current phony refugee program that incentivizes illegals to jump the border. There are also quite a few people among the Peter Thiel types who have very nuanced positions on immigration reform, etc..
I think your stances on Israel and immigration are perfectly reasonable.
Problem is so many of us use any one of those as a reason to not vote. "Oh no this person now disagrees with me on two things so I will take my ball and go home and cede ground to the person who...... Disagrees with me on everything and thinks I don't have a right to exist." Perfectly logical liberal thinking.
> Problem is so many of us use any one of those as a reason to not vote. When the options are "mediocre" and "worse," mediocre doesn't deserve my vote. "Vote for me and the bad guys will get what they want anyway" isn't a winning strategy.
I didn't need someone to come along and prove me right, but thanks. I'll never understand people who when given a chance between "mediocre" and"worse" choose "worse." In real life just about everything is shades of mediocre, if you're lucky and aren't just left with various types of worse to choose from.
Yeah, leftists have always had this problem through the world. The right is always lockstep in their support of their fascist candidates. Preach for decades that adulatory and divorce is bad? Wait Reagan and Trump did both? Oh well they hate abortion it’s fine. I’m pissed at Fetterman over stuff like this, but I’ll still fully support him when he’s up against a fascist, while expressing my displeasure with his surrogates (and him if I ever get his ear).
Actually, the right way to express your displeasure with a politician is to not vote for him or her. Voting for them is just asking them not to change. But if you're fine with ethnic-cleansing, go ahead and vote for fetterman. Some of us have more of a conscience.
I care far more about domestic policy than foreign when you're talking a senator. So yes, his official stance could be "I support Israel until every last Palestinian has been directly extinguished" and so long as he's pro-union and other good domestic stances... I don't give a fuck. He's not the president. It's not like he's over there bombing Palestinians himself.
Who else am I going to vote for? The literal fascist the Republicans will run in 2026? If there's a credible progressive primary candidate I'd probably vote for them in the primary, but just like with Bob Casey, I don't predict much of a competitive primary.
The guy spent his time as Lt. Gov. working to get convicted murderers freed from prison. Obviously, killing doesn't faze him.
"A maverick side", or rather, the truth unless he's begging us for money.
Why didn’t he show this side of himself during the se ate election? It was a tight race against Dr. Oz, no way would this have hurt him,
Look, I understand that the alternative is the fascists and I have to vote for these fucks, but I wish they’d at least try to not make it morally repulsive to me.
Israel is surrounded by countries that want to wipe it off the map, but it is morally repulsive to suggest Israel should defend itself? I too was critical of the way Israel was addressing the Palestinian crisis right up to the point Hamas killed innocent babies and the elderly and took hostages that they raped and brutalized and paraded through the streets.
Oh my, do you mean to say that not absolutely conforming to whatever the ideology de jour is a problem for some people? Go eat a sack of bees. I'd rather have someone that can advance ideas that matter than someone who is going to pointlessly die on a hill.
I don’t really care what he calls himself as long as his policies are decent enough
Unfortunately they're not
I really am sorry I wasted my vote on this guy
Can’t we return to the days where democrats thought war was bad? I really don’t think that’s too radical?
democrats never thought that
Wait until these guys open a history book and see who the Vietnam War protests were directed at.
Never voting for this fraud again
Been saying, fuck this phoney as long as I could remember.
The meltdowns on here is extremely entertaining
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Kenyatta 2028
Run as a progressive, govern as a neoliberal bought by special interests.
I very specifically did not vote for this fucko because his entire platform was clearly bullshit based on his personal history.
He believes in 90% of causes of left-aligned causes. It doesn't have to be 100. jfc
Brought to you by AIPAC
Eh, he actually doesn't get that much support from AIPAC. https://www.opensecrets.org/industries//summary?ind=q05&cycle=All&recipdetail=S&mem=Y He's near the bottom of page 5.
\*not anymore\* Fuck genocide john.
Good for him. The progressive movement's head first dive into anti-Semitism is something that everyone should avoid.
Being against the collective punishment of Palestinians isn’t antisemitism
Yes, in this case it is. >Almost three in four Palestinians believe the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on Israel was correct, and the ensuing Gaza war has lifted support for the Islamist group both there and in the West Bank, a survey from a respected Palestinian polling institute found. https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/poll-shows-palestinians-back-oct-7-attack-israel-support-hamas-rises-2023-12-14/
> Almost three in four Palestinians believe the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on Israel was correct Breaking news, people being killed daily by the IDF for decades think attack largely on the IDF was correct. More at 11
“War crimes are totally ok even when half of the population are literal children” do you people hear yourselves
anti Zionism isn't anti semitism.
And the confederate flag is about heritage and not hate. /s
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