Democratic (Party) Direction

How the @Ocasio2018 cohort of leftists, including @KanielaIng, are transforming our understanding of the left. pic.twitter.com/B2mxvQBKhk

— corey robin (@CoreyRobin) July 25, 2018

what i love about this is that it follows closely on bernie's apparently recent first encounter with the fact of the cash bail system, which itself led to a lotta yelling about how it was wild he'd never heard of it and proof he's just another privileged old white man--his team learns and moves forward.

xp

the common thread robin's pulling out here is that these people were organizers before they were politicians: learning to be ever better at weaving your personal biography into your work for your hobbyhorse issues is a core practice of organizing work. in a class i took marshall ganz (UFW organizer & legendary movement scholar who Obama himself surely studied) broke down obama's 2004 dnc speech schematically, how he narratively moved from his personal story to the story of american progressive forces to the story of the country as a whole and wove them into a single powerful thing.

yeah everything I've seen from Ing suggests he is a whiz at that

really appreciating your perspective here HOOS.

HOOSpective

ditto

this is the video CR references, presumably

A Hawaii for the many is possible, but we have to take it, together.

On August 11, this movement can make history, but I need your help.

Please Retweet this video, Donate, and sign up to knock on doors, send texts + https://t.co/dELbZgUFNP#Ing2018 pic.twitter.com/aGXwSj4m5f

— Kaniela Ing (@KanielaIng) July 25, 2018

for any interested folks here are a couple (prolly hueg sorry) graphics i made coming out of that ganz course that speak to that movement between narrative structures:

https://i.imgur.com/EGH1Ecc.png

https://scontent-iad3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/15027629_10102943919643485_6109731694427890042_n.jpg?_nc_cat=0&oh=5e454c297835bfe754d310f4d82c994b&oe=5BD501A2

I know one of the other candidates for that district. Beth Fukumoto who was the one that switched parties from Republican to Dem last year after her party left her hanging after she spoke out against Trump.

AOC and Ing's videos had the same filmmakers. I could be wrong since I have lived in very few places in the US (oddly enough, most recently AOC's district and Oahu) and it seems like this type of narrative is easier in these locations which have a more vibrant identity, still retains a sense of community. Like, when I think of places out in 'coal miner' america, I think of families sitting in their homes miles apart or separated by privacy fences from their nearest neighbor. Privacy, and minding your own business, completely rules over community. I could be wrong.

you forget church!

I don't even want to get into that shitshow. My brother (in Virginia) became a late in life Christian. Whenever he used to talk about it waiting for me to say something mean, I would just say "well, people need to feel a sense of community somehow. Good for you if you found friends." hee.

There's a sheer geographic issue that goes beyond "vibrant identity" (which I don't really think explains AOC's victory), and that's density. It's easier to organize and canvass when people live close together.

Yeah, I didn't do a good job of implying that in both people have to live on top of each other and actually interact on a daily basis.

also think "vibrant" is really tricky --- it's a real thing but also in some hands it codes as exotic/other, one of these weird "white people don't have a color" kind of tropes. not saying that's where you're at obviously!

Yeah I wasn't trying to "call out" Yerac, but there is a media myth that AOC won because the majority of her district is people of color, and a competing myth that she won because white liberal gentrifiers, and actually both are partly true and even both together don't fully explain it and don't give her and the people organizing for enough credit for their ingenuity and hard work.

Oh it's fine. I didn't take very much care in my word choice because you know, it's a messageboard and most of this thread sucks. Please, someone talk more about Hillary.

I don't know what it is. AOC ran a really good campaign, is utterly charismatic and inspiring, her posters were amazing and she speaks to issues that are important. I showed her and Kaniela's video to some chileans last night and they were surprised that they were considered far left. I live (at least part time) in her district (the Queens part) and one of my good friends lives in the Bronx part. Selzer knows more about the demographics. Where I live at least, it's pretty european white, although there is one street where all the egyptian, middle eastern restaurants, hookah lounges are. There is a gay community that has been growing too. To buy a one bedroom apt is pretty much in the >500k range right now. I really have no clue how much people (white or non-white) make in these neighborhoods. But when I lived in Oahu, I was actually stunned how low the wages were when food and housing were on par with NYC prices. I would constantly have this discussion with Hawaiians that I worked with. Some lived in subsidized housing but most had to rely on their families owning property already. It felt completely unsustainable for most native people to live there.

Maybe the real divide is whether a place has people who walk their dogs outside multiple times a day or whether they just let them outside in the backyard.

because you know, it's a messageboard and most of this thread sucks

borad description

Mainstream Dems are going to continue to dismiss AOC as a New York outlier for awhile. "Don't you see the rest of the country looks upon New York like we're left-wing, communist, Jewish, homosexual pornographers? I think of us that way sometimes and I live here."

OTMFM

Like, when I think of places out in 'coal miner' america, I think of families sitting in their homes miles apart or separated by privacy fences from their nearest neighbor

'coal miner' america is really only isolated to a few states i think, up and down the Appalachian mountains. that's why you have Tennessee and Philadelphia w mines. i mean Tennessee as a state has some cool liberal parts and only a small area is coal mining towns. why spend so much time and energy concerning yourself with a small area of people? you live in Hawaii? i imagine it is very different. i live in Atlanta and it is very liberal here. however most people i know that have kids and bought houses did so in the suburbs or out in the country. housing is cheaper & larger, schools are nicer, etc. especially for young hippie parents it seems to be the thing to do, move to Asheville or whatever. i know lots of people that have moved to Asheville or Ellijay. my dad moved to Ellijay, which is at the foothills of the Appalachians, and it is a cool place. there are less than 2,000 people living there and there is a 30% Hispanic population.

http://www.city-data.com/city/Ellijay-Georgia.html

my brother lives an hour and a half outside of Atlanta. he is married to a French woman and he is very close to her family, all super cool people who are first generation French immigrants. they live in Auburn, GA. raising a baby girl w 2 dogs right next to some trailer parks. my parents are a different story (they both have accused me of being a liberal. not a problem i ever have on ILX.)

'coal miner' america is really only isolated to a few states i think, up and down the Appalachian mountains.

By far the largest producer of coal in the US is Wyoming.

But I get the 'coal miner' emphasis.

xpost I am using 'coal miner' here to stand in for all of the forgotten white people that the NYT/WaPo/Trump admin love so dearly. I thought this was obvious??? Ugh. Anyway. I am technically a nyc resident.

how can anyone say we're forgetting those people at this point, reporters are constantly visiting them to find out how miserable and racist they are

I just want to put this here to remind everyone what poor Americans get with “none of them are worth my vote” purity tests and third party challenges “from the left”

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/24/health/maine-medicaid-expansion-lepage.html

I could put some other great examples of Democratic machine bullshit here, because RI, NY, and DC all have plenty of assholes that come to mind, but then there’s Maine. And LePage is just a little Trump actually happening because the checks and balances at the state level are almost nonexistent.

*sigh*

Yes we know how you feel

yeah, too bad all those berniebros wrote in jill stein for governor, otherwise everyone making less than 135% of the federal poverty limit would have subsidized health care, while everyone lucky enough to be making more than $16,500 A YEAR could buy one of those incredible Obamacare plans with a deductible that ensures you won't be seeing a doctor. Truly a neolib utopia.

I think he's referring to the fact that the Maine governor race had a third party spoiler that got 8% of the vote, which was more than the margin btw the dem and the republican candidates.

we've been over this ground before tbh and i'm not sure we're really going to bridge the gap between the "third parties are spoilers" paradigm and the "major parties not getting people to vote for them are spoiling themselves" paradigm. the theories of what voting means and the ethical obligations upon voters are pretty different.

A little old, but worthwhile. (Resistancehole, so relax, it's satire)
Calling All Resistance Members! Roe V. Wade Is In DANGER! We Need YOU To Yell At JILL STEIN About The 2016 Election!

Maine has a history of a strong independent party, hard to say that a third party vote in that state is a "waste." Angus King governed the state as an Independent for 8 years, and obv beat a democrat and a republican in 2012 for a senate seat.

if Dems had been willing to bow out in 2010 there wouldn't have been a governor Lepage

the independent candidate lost by 10,000 votes

we've been over this ground before tbh

Oh shit, did I bring up a tired-ass topic that ILX can’t find consensus on? And on a thread about the Democratic Party? Started by gabbneb?

I guess we found consensus about him, though.

haha wasn't really trying to shush you so much as save us from a 100 post digression that everyone involved will feel weary of even as they're posting

remember when third parties were for libertarians or fascists? good times.

Maine's got ranked-choice voting now, right? Or did LePage manage to throw up more roadblocks

An excruciating story to read. Oh, will someone think of those moderates!

And Stacey Adams is "brainy"!

reassuring to see the US centrists are just as nauseating as their UK counterparts!

Gary Lineker feels their pain tho...

lol, see, they're both extremists, she thinks the confederacy were bad guys!

Hey there was violence on both sides

love how it throws in republican talking points tangential to the actual topic - "The unemployment rate has declined by more than 6 percentage points since the current governor, Nathan Deal, took office in 2011." hmmmmm, wonder what was going on with employment in the years before 2011 and how this number has compared to that in other states, or nationally. ehhh whatever clearly this radical speaking of expanded access to health care should have all sensible georgians - you know, Jeb! voters - quaking in their boots.

so so many thoughts on this but i think it's better for me just to listen

Unified. Vote D for Democracy. pic.twitter.com/0S5oww1kR5

— Operation Wolverines 🇺🇸 (@OpWolverines) July 28, 2018

no real idea who this crowd is or where this came from

wolverines...idk sounds kinda ruskie

Opposite, right? Like from Red Dawn?

canadian