Dems reportedly angry that progressives are pushing them to act like an opposition party
Dems reportedly angry that progressives are pushing them to act like an opposition party
"Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer are architects of the crisis that allowed Trump's fascism to arise and succeed," argued one progressive organizer. "They have zero credibility to be leading the fights we face today."
Summary
House Democrats are frustrated with progressive groups like MoveOn and Indivisible, which are pressuring them to oppose the Trump administration more aggressively.
In a closed-door meeting, lawmakers complained about grassroots activists driving constituent calls demanding obstructionist tactics.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer defended the party’s strategy, saying, “We are picking the most important fights and lying down on the train tracks on those fights.”
However, a CBS News/YouGov poll shows 65% of Democratic voters want all-out opposition to Trump’s agenda.
"We are picking the most important fights and lying down on the train tracks on those fights," Schumer told The New York Times earlier this month.
Bro is ineffectual in even his own metaphors.
Yeah dipshit we're not asking you to lie down on the tracks and die, we're asking you to do what russian anarchists do and rip out the the tracks entirely
Democrats have way more leverage than they're willing to use. The GOP is as fractured as ever and they have the house with a razor thin margin. Now is exactly the time to play hardball. The GOP will likely need their votes to do anything.
But instead I foresee Democrats making weak ass concessions at every turn because "we can't risk having the government shutdown!?!?"
Hilariously fucking accurate take
Seriously. His idea is to lay down on train tracks with an train coming.
It's hard to understand how dismissive they're being when their own constituents are reaching out to them. Is this article leaving it out or have they given some sort of rationale for choosing their battles instead of going all out?
This is a repost from earlier today.
The top people in the Democrats party are career politicias. They don't accept that people are angry nothing is being done while they continue to make money for themselves.You can find more discussion about it in the post from earlier today.
Thanks for the heads up. Was it in this same community? (I'll check here for now.)
Maybe I’m too cynical, but perhaps they’re being paid not to go all out.
I'm sure we all have suspicions about them but I want to know what their excuse is, especially considering the dangerous (for them) possibility their jobs could come to an end if Trump solidifies the level of power he obviously wants to have.
More like they aren't being paid to care. Silicon valley used to be their donors. They will happily loose votes if they can get those valley bucks back.
progressive groups like MoveOn and Indivisible
I've seen a lot of people asking how they can get involved and make a difference. Well, there's your answer. If those are the guys the Dems are mad at then they're the ones making the most impact.
I've been commenting this on every single YouTube video I watch. "America is in peril. If you're American and you're reading this we need to fight. Join or create a chapter of Indivisible in your area and get your community in on it. Doesn't matter if you're Republican or Democrat, fascism is good for neither. I love you all and we'll get through this. "
That's not all I'm doing either.
What a well-chosen photo at the top of this article. Two utterly uninspiring men with no ability or will to relate to ordinary people and their problems.
"We are picking the most important fights and lying down on the train tracks on those fights," Schumer toldThe New York Times earlier this month.
That's a more accurate metaphor than he intended. The fascist train will not even slow down as it runs over him.
Jon Stewart had an hour-long interview with Hakeem Jeffries the other day, and it's just painful to watch. Jeffries resolutely refuses to offer even a single hint of anything the Democrats intend to do beyond expressing vague sympathetic feelings towards unhappy voters. It becomes quite clear the Democratic leadership has no intention of even trying to take part in the resistance the USA needs, and would rather drain the energy of any such movement into their morass of vapid messaging, meandering non-promises and wearying inaction.
The senior Democrats have no intention of fighting for the people. Any effective resistance will have to come from elsewhere.
At this point you have to wonder if they're actively complicit.
Wittingly or not, it's quite clear they are.
They 100% are.
Spineless corporate shills. They don’t want to do the hard work of governing either. They just want a fat corporate paycheck from lobbyists and insider information for stock trades.
Don't you see? They've earned it by being in Congress since the 80s and doing nothing but dismantling the government for kick backs. Now let them retire in office in peace, it's a lot to ask an 80 year old to put up a fight.
The Senate: the only tax payer funded nursing home that is suitably staffed.
Dear House Democrats,
Fascism is currently destroying the US system of government that you like to call democracy.
Given the influence on the world held by the US, this is a major threat not only to the people you were trusted to represent, but to practically everyone.
If it succeeds in taking over the United States, it will be in no small part your fault.Kindly do you fucking jobs.
Now.
Before it's too late.What REALLY pisses me off is that feeling that I’m being fucked. My ass has been pulled around to the front like a fucking contortionist and they fucked it right in my face.
Every email with the “stop fascism” this, and “stop fascism” that with the goddamn donate button like they’re actually doing anything to stop it OR that they actually believe it in the first place. You know what? They don’t. It’s politics as usual for these people.
Trump skipped Joe Biden’s inauguration.
These assholes are always pretending to be the good guys, he gave them a free pass to skip his inauguration when he went on and on about the election being stolen. Or, I don’t know, when he had them all running for their lives on January 6.
Seeing all of the former presidents sitting there at his inauguration (including Bush, who by the way has said out loud that the man is a threat to democracy) legitimized his position and everything looked like no big deal to all of the people who aren’t paying attention.
It lends legitimacy to the claim that people are experiencing some derangement syndrome when everybody comes to the big party and it appears to be business as usual.
And you know what? It mostly is. At least to them.
These are a rare breed of people who are nasty enough to seek power in the first place. They get it by being two faced. They get it by exaggerating their feelings. They get it by calling a fellow human being whatever nasty name they can think of and then turn right around and shake his hand with their fake smiles and their suits that cost more than my car.
I. Am. Done.
I’m done responding to them with donations. I’m done being bombarded with cries of threats that they don’t take seriously except to say what they need to say to raise funds.
I’m staying out of it. I’ll vote for the lesser of two narcissists/egos when it’s time to do that.
As others have said. It’s time for a progressive party.
This isn’t the time of magazines and newspapers telling folks who to vote for. If the internet can’t make a viable third party stand a chance I don’t know what can.
The Democrat party needs to end. We can't fight fascist activism by being nice to them. We also can't fight fascist billionaires with "nice guy" billionaires who ultimately benefit just as much, but just don't approve publicly of the methods.
The Democrat party needs to end.
How many Democratic members of Congress (and their donors) are going to be richer thanks to Trump tax cuts?
How many of them own stock in companies that are regulated by the institutions that musk is meddling in?
This is amazing.
We need a progressive party.
Hell just a real party that actually persues an democratically decided agenda would be a vast improvement. What we have instead is a coalition of career politicians.
Sounds like our democracy is dead, if true.
No democracy has survived contact with neo-liberalism. Clinton couldn't roll over for his corporate overlords fast enough.
It was dead on January 20th. We're just witnessing it's death throes.
“We are getting paid to lose elections.” Yeah, thanks for the update dickhead.
Schumer and his ilk should be run out of town on a rail.
They're too old, too milquetoast, and too entrenched in the status quo to be effective to today's needs.
Their time is up, hook'm off the stage.
This is why they lose.
Also because they haven't tried to win since 2008.
Obama was the last election in which Democrats wanted the top seat. After which, they realized they can make just as much money with far less effort.
"unnamed source" "unnamed Democrat"
Why don't these people grow a pair of tits and put their name to their quotes? They're complaining that the Dem leadership isn't being brave and fighting, yet they can't be brave and put their name to critiquing the leaders...? Figure it out.
Because they know if they do, they'll be blacklisted.
You can’t blacklist Spartacus.
Sometimes it's strategically necessary to not put a name to yourself if you want to actually be able to influence how things are happening within your organization.
These people are actually in the thick of it, you're not. Don't be so quick to assume you know better than them how things work.
do they like getting phone calls to act more oppositional? do they want more phone calls to act more oppositional?
because removed about it is how you get more phone calls to act more oppositional.
and now that the base knows they are getting through, any current elected who is not acting more oppositional is almost guaranteed to get a primary opponent who i assure you is most definitely going to act more oppositional. and primaries are won by the most ideological. being a creature of washington is not going to help those people if they don't get their act together.
this is also not to mention the countless numbers of elected democrats who after biden's debate performance completely fell for the media created narrative and treated joe biden's back not so much like a pincushion but a target fired at by a scattergun at 2 feet. i haven't forgotten and i won't forget.
Poor guys. If they didn't like it, they should quit.
Democrats "We're suppose to do something about this? Cause we weren't really planning on anything."
This is news? It wasn't exactly a recent development that made voting a choice between picking a conservative party backed by interests or picking a conservative party backed by self-interests.
The former is better than the latter, but it's not much of a consolation prize, considering neither of them give a rat's ass about the people they claim to represent.
That's fine. Elections have no relevance in America now that Republicans are in total control.
No one has explained to me why they would ever willingly relinquish power now that they have all of it on a federal level.