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4 hours ago, Fru said:

My point is that since we are in some pretty unprecedented territory, I wish folks were more willing to overlook imperfections of others in the short term, so that we don't allow a President to do something like start

This sounds like my republican friends trying to convince me why we need to support Trump....because....you know.....Obama is a Muslim socialist sent here to destroy America. 

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1 hour ago, zoogs said:

I think it's fair to argue the campaign made numerous strategic errors, and made poor judgments in relying on their internal polling. 

 

But I think the larger culpability is with the union folks who failed to distinguish between the pro-labor side and an extremely, virulently anti-labor side, a core piece of whose fundamental mission is crushing union membership power. 

I think this is a slippery slope of blaming the voters instead of blaming the candidate. Hillary was an awful candidate regardless of how bad Trump is/was. And there's lots of blame for the Dems, not just Hillary and her campaign - why only have 6 primary debates (Repubs had 17)? The entire strategy to go get moderate Republican voters was a terrible idea - get your own base behind you first! Remember Schumer's words: "For every blue-collar Democrat we lose in western Pennsylvania, we will pick up two moderate Republicans in the suburbs in Philadelphia, and you can repeat that in Ohio and Illinois and Wisconsin."

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I don’t know, I find it a little pointless to talk about campaign strategy over policy. It’s not entirely meaningless, as you point out, but I take the view that we get the governments we deserve, generally speaking, and the solution to having people with really bad policies in office is us being able to better recognize why they are bad. Yeah maybe it’s too bad some savvier PR people aren’t running political organizations so that they can do a better job of convincing us the sky is blue, but if we depend on that to decide the sky is blue then we accept a world where we don’t always get it right.

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Dems need to appeal to more people to climb out of their electoral hole. Period. I don't know if it's productive to debate appealing to the middle or swinging to the left. Put out honest, good-natured candidates who want to make the country better, win enough elections to have any power & hammer out policy decisions later. I think a bigger tent should be the goal for now. Run candidates that appeal to the people in their districts. 

 

@ZRod I know and it's fairly depressing as someone who would like to see liberalism succeed in America. Their messaging (propaganda) has been more effective for some time now, I think because they opt for raw emotional appeals rather than logical ones. I think the undying allegiance bit has a lot to do with THIS type of marketing:

 

 

@zoogs I count myself as someone who finds myself disappointed with Democratic leadership more than I'd like, but decidedly NOT someone who wants to see them return to center or move rightward. Let's get that Overton Window shifted back to the left! It's been drifting aimlessly rightward for far too long. 

I'd love to debate the merits of centrist vs. leftist views on all type of issues if any of the resident centrism-inclined posters are interested.

 

I would disagree with you on blaming the union leaders/members themselves, though. That they were in such a bad place that many of them were gullible enough to trust Trump (or even view him as a GOOD alternative to Clinton) even when union leadership was telling them not to speaks volumes about the state of life for union members in our country. It's a vital part of the liberal coalition that Dems BADLY need to salvage, because it's being ripped apart by GOP business interests.

 

 

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Part of what troubles me too is what people allude to when they talk about messaging. Like, obviously the winning messaging strategy in 2016 was to feed off some fundamentally race-based resentment of the white working class but for a hell of a lot of us cashing in on such resentment was an absolute non-starter. I feel a pivot to this direction inevitably produces narrow, exclusionary policy, the kind meant to rectify the wrong of the erosion of white privilege at least in certain corners, by restoring it.

 

Diversity is everything to me, and is core to what I think of as the American national identity. That, and an aspiration for being a force for good, such as through social justice and welfare in our own communities and being a good neighbor globally. So our greatness emanates from our goodness, and we are stronger .... together. But that was a weak, garbage message? and what we really needed was something that could focus in on highly legitimate white anger, hard pass please.

 

Re: union members, I mean, I think it's pretty clear, if you are truly pro-union then you need to be not voting for the people who have been thirsting for union destruction for decades and good job on handing them the judiciary keys to do that. If racial resentment either took over or all the blatantly anti-Black, anti-immigrant, anti-women, anti-LGBT stuff on the Trump ticket wasn't enough to bother you, then that's also on you. That said, I would like to see a much stronger pro-labor push from the Democratic side. I do hope that this is something they'll embrace, as a matter of "worker's rights" and a more truly democratic society, and not "we need the white midwest front and center again."

Edited by zoogs
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13 hours ago, BigRedBuster said:

This sounds like my republican friends trying to convince me why we need to support Trump....because....you know.....Obama is a Muslim socialist sent here to destroy America. 

 

That's a horrible false equivalency. 

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17 hours ago, zoogs said:

Re: union members, I mean, I think it's pretty clear, if you are truly pro-union then you need to be not voting for the people who have been thirsting for union destruction for decades and good job on handing them the judiciary keys to do that. ... That said, I would like to see a much stronger pro-labor push from the Democratic side. I do hope that this is something they'll embrace, as a matter of "worker's rights" and a more truly democratic society, and not "we need the white midwest front and center again."

That's a big part of the problem: the Dems have been going pro-corporation and anti-union for decades. Voting for Obama didn't help the unions - at all. It's hard to convince those people to vote for you based on helping them when you have been doing the opposite for decades. For example, Reagan and Bush 1 couldn't pass NAFTA - it took Bill Clinton to get it through a Dem controlled Congress. When you do those sorts of things, then the union members don't trust you anymore, and then you get what happened to Hillary Clinton.

 

In my view at least, the Dems real issue is that the American people don't like the direction of the country right now (particularly economically) and are pressing for change, but the Dem party is pushing for the status quo with a few tweaks around the edges.

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Maybe I’m really ignorant, but the 1990s passing of NAFTA does not seem like the “anti union” thing it’s made out to be. Whereas appointing labor hostile folks to the NLRB, causing disruption to already fragile but nascent labor movements in the country, and empowering right to work people who were going to appoint obviously labor hostile SCOTUS judges to swing the vote on Janus seems like an actual “anti union” thing,

 

If we the people failed to grasp the ENORMOUS difference between a party that isn’t as socialist enough as a small but growing subsection of us leftists would prefer, and a party that was going to burn labor to the ground as they have been dreaming to do for decades, then congratulations on a Trump pulling out of the TPP, I guess? Yay, organized labor? 

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16 minutes ago, zoogs said:

Maybe I’m really ignorant, but the 1990s passing of NAFTA does not seem like the “anti union” thing it’s made out to be. Whereas appointing labor hostile folks to the NLRB, causing disruption to already fragile but nascent labor movements in the country, and empowering right to work people who were going to appoint obviously labor hostile SCOTUS judges to swing the vote on Janus seems like an actual “anti union” thing,

 

If we the people failed to grasp the ENORMOUS difference between a party that isn’t as socialist enough as a small but growing subsection of us leftists would prefer, and a party that was going to burn labor to the ground as they have been dreaming to do for decades, then congratulations on a Trump pulling out of the TPP, I guess? Yay, organized labor? 

Well, considering the unions were against NAFTA, especially since they didn't even get any input on the creation of the bill, I'd call that anti-union. Other things being even more anti-union doesn't really change anything.

 

But the difference isn't that enormous when the Dems don't even attempt to undo whatever the Repubs have just done. Not actively destroying unions is not the same as supporting unions. You keep harping on how bad the Repubs are, but you fail to present why the Dems are good, just that they aren't as bad. That's what I'm getting at with the Democrats - they paint themselves as Not-Republicans and not much else.

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Which unions want NAFTA dismantled? The teachers' unions (see: OK, WV)? Grad student unions? Public workers' unions?

 

Labor rights and collective bargaining is not the same thing as implementing international trade policy according to the protectionist interests of certain sectors which also have unions.

 

It's inaccurate to say the difference is not enormous. You can make the same argument about healthcare, for example. Plenty of Dems aren't on the public option boat (a really key point being this is turning around), and, on the other hand, Republicans want to increase the uninsured rate. There is a profound difference here; to elide it is to render the concerns of those affected immaterial. You could call this position "protectionist" and "Democrats aren't paying attention to their anti-trade steel worker constituency", but it would not be altogether fair I think to frame this as a pro-labor position. If a lot of this is just playing defense, well, that's the task before us when labor rights are fundamentally under assault in this GOP-dominated political landscape. And this is also a real erasure of pro-labor things Obama for example has done. The common refrain is "what have they actually done", and the answer to this is nothing, to those who were never interested in looking to begin with.

 

For example: https://www.politico.com/story/2015/09/unions-barack-obama-labor-board-victories-213204

 

 

 

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I'd just add as another one of the other leftists on the board that I agree with both of you on things and appreciate the dialogue. Personally, I would very much like to get to "better" vis-à-vis labor and other policy matters. I would very much like it if we had a stronger left flank in Congress. That would mean being more explicitly pro-labor... that was the whole reason I commented on unions in the first place.

 

But I also think zoogs has a good, important message. Doing nothing (meaning Congress is literally the status quo of Republicans) is unacceptable. Clinton had his own reasons for being a centrist, pro-business Dem. I personally feel the 90s were a very different time with their own challenges & that he was merely being pragmatic with what he could get done with the Congress he was given.

 

Obama could've been better for labor, but who could have been far worse as well.

 

On the other hand, it's accurate to say Republicans are trying to crush labor as it is today with right-to-work laws & other anti-union legislation. 

 

Dems may not tack leftward overnight, but it looks like they are shifting that way. On the other hand, leaving in place the current status quo instead of opting for a much more sympathetic Dem governing group could prove to be a very costly mistake for labor.

 

I get the concept that pols need to prove their chops & show that they're actually good for something instead of merely marginally better than the other side of the coin, but I feel we can be both walk and chew gum at the same time.  We can both change the fervently anti-union composition of our political class as it is now AND push Democrats to be better. After all, if we can get to a place where Dems are routinely very explicitly pro-labor, it will make Republicans seem more unreasonable in their anti-union zealotry. 

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4 hours ago, zoogs said:

Which unions want NAFTA dismantled? The teachers' unions (see: OK, WV)? Grad student unions? Public workers' unions?

 

Labor rights and collective bargaining is not the same thing as implementing international trade policy according to the protectionist interests of certain sectors which also have unions.

 

It's inaccurate to say the difference is not enormous. You can make the same argument about healthcare, for example. Plenty of Dems aren't on the public option boat (a really key point being this is turning around), and, on the other hand, Republicans want to increase the uninsured rate. There is a profound difference here; to elide it is to render the concerns of those affected immaterial. You could call this position "protectionist" and "Democrats aren't paying attention to their anti-trade steel worker constituency", but it would not be altogether fair I think to frame this as a pro-labor position. If a lot of this is just playing defense, well, that's the task before us when labor rights are fundamentally under assault in this GOP-dominated political landscape. And this is also a real erasure of pro-labor things Obama for example has done. The common refrain is "what have they actually done", and the answer to this is nothing, to those who were never interested in looking to begin with.

 

For example: https://www.politico.com/story/2015/09/unions-barack-obama-labor-board-victories-213204

It's hard to find specifics on the NAFTA political debate from 25 years ago, but here's a snippet from a Guardian article:

Quote

Just over two decades after lobbying unsuccessfully against the North American Free Trade Agreement, US labor unions are again voicing strong reservations to a proposed major trade-liberalization deal.

And here's a Cornell paper from 1994 (emphasis mine):

Quote

U.S. workers, trade unions and their allies in the United States mounted a strong campaign of opposition to NAFTA.20 There was a subtle division among labor progressives and other anti-NAFTA forces. Some opposed any continental trade agreement; whatever form it took. Others argued that a NAFTA with a strong Social Charter might be acceptable. Since a strong Social Charter never appeared, this incipient division never became a problem.


Labor advocates were unanimous in opposition to the NAFTA. With no enforceable labor standards, they argued, Mexico's low wages, government-dominated unions and lack of environmental protection would accelerate the movement of jobs from the United States. The NAFTA held out no prospect of "upward harmonization" of labor standards. "Say no to this NAFTA" became the slogan of labor and its allies. 

Sounds like unions were against NAFTA to me.

 

It's perfectly accurate to say the differences aren't enormous, as this is a matter of subjective opinion. I see the debate as the Repubs actively attacking workers' rights, and the Dems standing around pretending it's not happening.

 

"Playing defense" to the GOP position is part of why the Dems policy/messaging sucks and can't inspire people. The Dems need to go on the offensive. If they came out with some sort of plan of action to help workers that would be something, but they mostly avoid talking about workers' rights except as an abstract thing that they approve of.

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3 hours ago, dudeguyy said:

I'd just add as another one of the other leftists on the board that I agree with both of you on things and appreciate the dialogue. Personally, I would very much like to get to "better" vis-à-vis labor and other policy matters. I would very much like it if we had a stronger left flank in Congress. That would mean being more explicitly pro-labor... that was the whole reason I commented on unions in the first place.

 

But I also think zoogs has a good, important message. Doing nothing (meaning Congress is literally the status quo of Republicans) is unacceptable. Clinton had his own reasons for being a centrist, pro-business Dem. I personally feel the 90s were a very different time with their own challenges & that he was merely being pragmatic with what he could get done with the Congress he was given.

 

Obama could've been better for labor, but who could have been far worse as well.

 

On the other hand, it's accurate to say Republicans are trying to crush labor as it is today with right-to-work laws & other anti-union legislation. 

 

Dems may not tack leftward overnight, but it looks like they are shifting that way. On the other hand, leaving in place the current status quo instead of opting for a much more sympathetic Dem governing group could prove to be a very costly mistake for labor.

 

I get the concept that pols need to prove their chops & show that they're actually good for something instead of merely marginally better than the other side of the coin, but I feel we can be both walk and chew gum at the same time.  We can both change the fervently anti-union composition of our political class as it is now AND push Democrats to be better. After all, if we can get to a place where Dems are routinely very explicitly pro-labor, it will make Republicans seem more unreasonable in their anti-union zealotry. 

I agree. The point I'm trying to make is that the Dems can't just be Not-Republicans and it's up to us to make them change their positions (or vote them out - go register and vote in the primaries!). Your last paragraph sums up what I'm trying to say better than I've been able to so far.

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