Democratic (Party) Direction

yr welcome Alfred

Ah, there's what I was thinking of

This notion that the donor class has absolutely no effect on policy is ludicrous to me.

I didn't say this. I said there is rarely a direct quid-pro-quo - which is what a lot of these criticisms of candidates usually amount to (ie, "They received a donation, therefore they are going to pass whatever legislation their donors want!") - primarily because legislation is so complex and there are multiple centers of powers/interests involved.

This notion that the donor class has absolutely no effect on policy is ludicrous to me. banks and major corporations throw their money at people out of the goodness of their hearts, or out of some vague notion of "stability" or something? legislation that is not proposed, wording that is not used, is just as important as legislation that is. Didn't a leaked memo note that donors were uneasy w/ Warren's rhetoric?

If you ask the extreme libertarians, they'll tell you that the "donor class" isn't buying legislative preferences, they're paying protection money/being shaken down by the government. Yes, it's as stupid as it sounds.

(Obama made well-covered remarks that his thinking DID IN FACT change when exposed to/dependent on the donor class)

"They're like the police dept for wise guys."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDbgkIkTVUk

Whether or not you believe there's a direct quid pro quo relationship, why should voters rally behind anyone who isn't fiercely advocating for anything short of the complete removal of corporate influence over the political sphere? How will you restore public trust otherwise (barring, again, an Obama-level rhetorical talent)? The popular perception, accurate or not, is that establishment Dems are bought and sold.

why should voters rally behind anyone who isn't fiercely advocating for anything short of the complete removal of corporate influence over the political sphere

because there are bigger problems

like, I agree, that's one problem and excluding corporate money from campaigns and policy decisions is a good goal. It's secondary to a lot of other shit going on imo.

I find hat difficult to believe when, f'rinstance, 100 companies account for 71% of emissions.

and yet Exxon supports cap-and-trade and the Paris accords. go figure.

that's reductive as all hell, Shakey

oh and Simon's statistic isn't?

Aren't the Paris benchmarks considered too tame by most scientists? PR wins are important for exceptionally toxic companies.

they represent a groundbreaking international agreement and a framework for future project, even if the goals themselves are not as aggressive as they should be

they also - not entirely coincidentally! - present a path for companies like Exxon to make a shit-ton of money. sometimes interests overlap.

the main opposition to dealing with climate change is not coming from huge corporations - coal companies just aren't that powerful anymore - it's coming from a small cadre of completely ideologically driven idiots in the Republican party. And they are not - at least not primarily - cynically motivated by being beholden to corporate interests! They are just very, very stupid people like James Inhofe.

so it's frustrating when I see people try to draw these simplified conclusions like "X corporation's $$$ = Y policy decision" because the reality is usually more tangled and complex

Deval Patrick might be a saint and have meant well at every stop, but convincing the social democratic left that he was the good guy at Coke while they were abetting murdering union organizers, the good guy at Ameriquest while they were heavily contributing to the Great Recession, the good guy at a private equity firm that exists primarily as a corporate raider... I don't see it happening. Call the social democratic left stupid and myopic if you want but do so at the risk of Trump 2020.

Call it guilt by association, but who you choose to associate with matters.

they represent a groundbreaking international agreement and a framework for future project

sorry meant to say "future progress" here

xp

Deval Patrick might be a saint and have meant well at every stop, but convincing the social democratic left that he was the good guy at Coke while they were abetting murdering union organizers, the good guy at Ameriquest while they were heavily contributing to the Great Recession, the good guy at a private equity firm that exists primarily as a corporate raider... I don't see it happening. Call the social democratic left stupid and myopic if you want but do so at the risk of Trump 2020.

Call it guilt by association, but who you choose to associate with matters.

― El Tuomasbot (milo z), 3. august 2017 22:49 (thirty-one minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

But on the other hand, good luck at trying to convince the democratic base in the south that a civil rights veteran is unacceptable as a nominee because the companies he worked at did something bad once. And therefore the social democratic left won't lift a finger to vote out trump and sessions. I mean...

he was the good guy at Coke while they were abetting murdering union organizers

this was in Columbia in the 90s right...? Coke is a huge corporation, was he really involved with this?

I remember it as an issue in the early 2000s but it might have been new reporting on something older.

why should voters rally behind anyone who isn't fiercely advocating for anything short of the complete removal of corporate influence over the political sphere

because there are bigger problems

climate change is one of the biggest problems we have and we have been giving corporations a free ride on taking our natural resources and polluting not just the planet but our environment. look at Flint. Clinton didn't even visit. corporations have a lot to answer for irt pollution. i read two books on medieval history and the original corporations were also started to plunder fossil fuels and gold and precious metals, and the water was so polluted that it was unsafe to drink. there are places in the USA that are living like medieval times. this is unacceptable.

and I mean, I'm not saying he was involved in anything specifically awful with any of them, it's just a chain of awful companies that he's happened to be involved with as a very high-level executive

why do we need corporate drones to be POTUS?

In 2001, Patrick left Texaco to become the Executive Vice-President, General Counsel and Secretary at The Coca-Cola Company. Patrick pushed for a thorough review of allegations that some workers at bottlers of Coke products in Colombia had been abused or even killed by paramilitary groups as a result of union organizing activity. Patrick concluded the allegations to be unsubstantiated and untrue, but counseled that the company allow an independent inquiry to lay all questions to rest. After initially supporting Patrick's view, then-CEO Douglas Daft changed his mind, precipitating Patrick's decision to leave Coke.[21]

we don't. calling Harris a corporate drone is a stretch. She is not Mitt Romney.

I know v little about Patrick.

xp

Deval Patrick worked at a bunch of corporations effectively as a fixer, with the slant that most of the time the things he was working on were meant to improve conditions for workers. The Coke review is an example of where this didn't work out and he left the company over it.

that's too complicated. way easier to just conclude "worked for corporation = EVIL"

the way to bet

here's a good example of conflicting interests undermining a donor/client relationship: http://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/03/epa-federal-ethanol-mandate-trump-241290?lo=ap_d1

and another from an awful corporate stooge

Nissan workers deserve the right to organize and bargain collectively. I applaud the continuous efforts of @UAW. #UnionYes https://t.co/HZYOB0hFvB

— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) August 3, 2017

Can we just pause for a moment and remember that time when Dr Morbius told another poster they were being "reductive as all hell"

Kind of worried that I, the least reflective and most stubbornly kneejerky of ilx midrange posters - and completely isolated from US politics and or race relations as these things go- seem to have been in the minority in googling the (relatively short) Wikipedia of deval patrick after a poster with the heft of djp suggested it.

I don't feel any better or brighter or less kneejerky than I was several years ago. Did youse all just get worse or what?

Your nerves are not so frayed and uninsulated as those who have been following US politics on Twitter. Your "knee jerk" is at the speed of a sonar echo through cold molasses compared with people who saw the grand jury announcement form one character at a time through a neutrino dectector array

and another from an awful corporate stooge

It's great that Harris (and Perez) are standing up for labor.

However, the lesson from 2016 should in part be that people don't necessarily believe what someone is saying right now to be their honest belief if it contradicts their past (or their past associations). Which is a problem for anyone tied to the Clinton and Obama eras. Corbyn/Bernie's appeal is in large part tied to their consistency.

Harris doesn't have that much of a track record on these issues, which could be to her benefit.

However, the lesson from 2016 should in part be that people don't necessarily believe what someone is saying right now to be their honest belief if it contradicts their past (or their past associations).

Isn't the lesson from 2016 that people will believe any old shit someone says if it flatters their prejudices, no matter whether the record of that person's entire life in the public eye screams the opposite?

white evangelicals stopped voting for Democrats in the 70s

When they began taking corporate money, iirc

I'm happy to see Harris and Perez supporting Nissan workers, hoping it's a sign of things to come (and hopefully actions to match words)

Xp - They both started taking more corp money in 80s/90s, to whom you refer there?

to return to the subject of corporations as global citizens, I'm ashamed that I only learned about this via a fucking Adam Ruins Everything segment, but soda companies sick of shelling out for glass bottles (among other companies) moved to plastic to cut costs, then created "litterbug" messaging to shift blame away from themselves and onto consumers when they didn't recycle. when the bottom line aligns with doing the right thing, that tends to be the exception (or a a PR sop that constitutes a minimal fraction of their income), not the rule.

also if there's one thing that can unite this thread, I hope that it's mocking The Zuck's (likely) political ambitions

Mark Zuckerberg says he's no longer an atheist, believes 'running for president very important' pic.twitter.com/C2mg8VO6ei

— Bill Dixon (@BillDixonish) August 3, 2017

more like mark-ass busterberg

It's so fucking stupid that presidential candidates are expected to come fully stocked with a pure unadulterated political history that lines up exactly with the political trends of the moment

I wonder why people might be extra demanding all of a sudden

Wait, when did Presidential candidates not "line up with the political trends of the moment"?

climate change is one of the biggest problems we have and we have been giving corporations a free ride on taking our natural resources and polluting not just the planet but our environment. look at Flint. Clinton didn't even visit.

― AdamVania (Adam Bruneau), Thursday, August 3, 2017 9:32 PM (yesterday)

wtf @ this. clinton visited flint twice and spent more time talking about the issue than any of the other candidates:

http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/hillary-tour-the-devastated-city-flint

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2016/03/06/democratic-debate-clinton-sanders-flint-michigan/81418928/