The other huge mistake is the embrace of the whole log of claims from the transgender activists, while the UK, Denmark and Sweden are pumping the brakes on the more lunatic proposals, even closing down the Tavistock Clinic in the UK for their irresponsible “affirmation” policies.
Trans ideology lost me with the "assigned at birth" thing. That's where I was like "Okay, this isn't just about treating trans people decently anymore, this is outright denying reality.
Too little too late. The child, family and small business destruction caused by administrative authoritarian power abuse during the pandemic combined with the explosion in crime and hyper inflation, media and big tech attacks on free speech and lastly the absurd gender and sex politics of the postmodern neoracist woke... these things are all justifiably attributed to Democrats... and the voters are sick of the Donkeypox.
Seems like you are very hypersensitive to criticism of your political party. I suggest maybe you consider that as your challenge and not mine.
Eric below is writing in support of your dear Democrat party... that is why you like it.
I too would write in support of your dear Democrat party if that party was demonstrating anything worthy of being supported on. But alas, it is all bad stuff.
You should also read Liebovitz "This Town" and then get back to me.
I am not a GOP apologist with respect to their history. But you are talking about the same swampy establishment that Trumpists want to dismantle along with the swampy Democrats... who today outnumber the swampy Republicans 5 to 1.
Will, Kristol, Brooks, Frum, Noonan, Bush, Cheney, etc... they are all those swampy establishment war-mongering stuffed-shirt ruling class elites that suck almost as much as do Biden Democrats.
You should read Bret Stephen's recent op-ed related to Trump before you put him on the list.
Stake out truly extreme positions, then label anything less than that moderation and compromise. A common negotiating tactic implicitly endorsed by this author. The asserted compromise is not bipartisan, being only within the Democratic caucus.
Firstly, you are wrong to say the "compromise is not bipartisan". With the exception of the IRA and the American Rescue Plan, passed through budget reconciliation, all of the legislation passed requires the participation of at least 10 Republicans in the Senate. This goes for the infrastructure bill, the CHIPS bill, and the reform of the Electoral Count Act currently being negotiated.
Secondly, as for your remarks about compromise, all you're doing is recapitulating how compromise works. Nonetheless, it would be wrong to suggest that Democrats "staked out" any extreme positions in the first place. While the BBB was large and comprehensive, it contained numerous provisions that have long enjoyed popular support in America. Too much at once perhaps, but this has as much to do with years of Republican obstruction as it does with Democrats pandering to their base. Truly "extreme" proposals pushed by the Progressive Caucus, like the Green New Deal, have been opposed by the Party right out of the gate.
And cultural issues like "Defund the Police" were never supported by more than a handful of Democratic leftists. Criticize Biden if you want for appointing some overly woke individuals to key sub-cabinet level positions, but for the most part, that which gets offered as evidence of the Democrats "extremism" consists of things Republican politicians and right-wing media furiously labor to hang around their necks, despite not actually enjoying popular support in the Party.
Compare this to the Republican Party, who now feel free to let their "freak flag" fly as they have been *thoroughly* overtaken by extremists. From election deniers like Doug Mastriano and Kari Lake to people who can barely compose an intelligent sentence like Herschel Walker, deranged loons have been winning Republican primaries left and right. You can criticize Democrats for choosing to fund those candidates in some cases, but ultimately they're getting elected because they're what the Republican electorate wants.
Now if the Progressive Democrats would stop talking about being "on the right side of history" and the "arc of history", we will all be in a better place. There is no "right side of history" as history is without morals or ethics. We cannot just let history happen and assume that things will be better. Making history is hard work done preferably - not necessarily - by people with morals and ethics.
A heartening commentary. I hope you're right, Mr. Moskowitz. Those of us of a certain age have seen this movie before. Democrats tried to buck their "liberal" label in the late 80s and 90s, due to failed and wildly unpopular liberal policies and positions of the 60s and 70s. They learned their lesson until relentless leftist dogmatizing gripped the party again. This time, though, I fear the media environment we live in (including social media) will not allow the extremists to be re-incorporated within a big tent. At least not in presidential elections.
Well said. This is precisely why I tell people that no matter how much you take issue with the far left, the Democratic Party is far preferable to the Republican Party. While Democrats are responding to the electorate's demand for moderation, the Republicans are continuing to double down on everything that has made them so toxic to most Americans.
And for those who would argue that this is only because the political fundamentals are so bad for Democrats, I will point to 2018, when the exact opposite was true. Democrats were the party out of power, with all of the political headwinds in their direction. Yet instead of putting a bunch of frothing mad Bernie Bros into office on the basis of Trump hatred, the Democrats flipped Republican seats using moderate candidates appealing to kitchen table issues like healthcare. Despite a few high profile victories by more leftist candidates in solidly blue districts, they failed to win primaries in every single competitive purple district, leading to a wave election for Democrats.
Compare them to today's Republicans, who have been so arrogantly confident in the Democrats' ultimate implosion that they have not even deigned to propose a platform. Coming off a Presidential election in which they infamously eschewed a comprehensive set of policy proposals for a declaration of loyalty to their king with a few glancing references to what they believed he stood for, they chastised Rick Scott for daring to attempt to explain to voters what Republicans intended to do with the power they so confidently anticipated being awarded.
The irony of this is that it simply confirmed what the party's critics have long claimed it stood for: maintaining power for its own sake. As a result, the party power brokers have been blindsided by the sudden germination of seeds they cynically planted for years - most notably on abortion and the overtaking of the party by deranged, radical conspiracy theorists. Come November, we will see if America rewards or punishes their smug complacency.
Thank you for your kind remarks; as I'm sure you've figured, your efforts with Mr. Lee are likely for naught. He and I have a history of butting heads and it never goes anywhere.
The other huge mistake is the embrace of the whole log of claims from the transgender activists, while the UK, Denmark and Sweden are pumping the brakes on the more lunatic proposals, even closing down the Tavistock Clinic in the UK for their irresponsible “affirmation” policies.
Trans ideology lost me with the "assigned at birth" thing. That's where I was like "Okay, this isn't just about treating trans people decently anymore, this is outright denying reality.
Too little too late. The child, family and small business destruction caused by administrative authoritarian power abuse during the pandemic combined with the explosion in crime and hyper inflation, media and big tech attacks on free speech and lastly the absurd gender and sex politics of the postmodern neoracist woke... these things are all justifiably attributed to Democrats... and the voters are sick of the Donkeypox.
Seems like you are very hypersensitive to criticism of your political party. I suggest maybe you consider that as your challenge and not mine.
Eric below is writing in support of your dear Democrat party... that is why you like it.
I too would write in support of your dear Democrat party if that party was demonstrating anything worthy of being supported on. But alas, it is all bad stuff.
You should also read Liebovitz "This Town" and then get back to me.
I am not a GOP apologist with respect to their history. But you are talking about the same swampy establishment that Trumpists want to dismantle along with the swampy Democrats... who today outnumber the swampy Republicans 5 to 1.
Will, Kristol, Brooks, Frum, Noonan, Bush, Cheney, etc... they are all those swampy establishment war-mongering stuffed-shirt ruling class elites that suck almost as much as do Biden Democrats.
You should read Bret Stephen's recent op-ed related to Trump before you put him on the list.
Stake out truly extreme positions, then label anything less than that moderation and compromise. A common negotiating tactic implicitly endorsed by this author. The asserted compromise is not bipartisan, being only within the Democratic caucus.
Firstly, you are wrong to say the "compromise is not bipartisan". With the exception of the IRA and the American Rescue Plan, passed through budget reconciliation, all of the legislation passed requires the participation of at least 10 Republicans in the Senate. This goes for the infrastructure bill, the CHIPS bill, and the reform of the Electoral Count Act currently being negotiated.
Secondly, as for your remarks about compromise, all you're doing is recapitulating how compromise works. Nonetheless, it would be wrong to suggest that Democrats "staked out" any extreme positions in the first place. While the BBB was large and comprehensive, it contained numerous provisions that have long enjoyed popular support in America. Too much at once perhaps, but this has as much to do with years of Republican obstruction as it does with Democrats pandering to their base. Truly "extreme" proposals pushed by the Progressive Caucus, like the Green New Deal, have been opposed by the Party right out of the gate.
And cultural issues like "Defund the Police" were never supported by more than a handful of Democratic leftists. Criticize Biden if you want for appointing some overly woke individuals to key sub-cabinet level positions, but for the most part, that which gets offered as evidence of the Democrats "extremism" consists of things Republican politicians and right-wing media furiously labor to hang around their necks, despite not actually enjoying popular support in the Party.
Compare this to the Republican Party, who now feel free to let their "freak flag" fly as they have been *thoroughly* overtaken by extremists. From election deniers like Doug Mastriano and Kari Lake to people who can barely compose an intelligent sentence like Herschel Walker, deranged loons have been winning Republican primaries left and right. You can criticize Democrats for choosing to fund those candidates in some cases, but ultimately they're getting elected because they're what the Republican electorate wants.
Now if the Progressive Democrats would stop talking about being "on the right side of history" and the "arc of history", we will all be in a better place. There is no "right side of history" as history is without morals or ethics. We cannot just let history happen and assume that things will be better. Making history is hard work done preferably - not necessarily - by people with morals and ethics.
A heartening commentary. I hope you're right, Mr. Moskowitz. Those of us of a certain age have seen this movie before. Democrats tried to buck their "liberal" label in the late 80s and 90s, due to failed and wildly unpopular liberal policies and positions of the 60s and 70s. They learned their lesson until relentless leftist dogmatizing gripped the party again. This time, though, I fear the media environment we live in (including social media) will not allow the extremists to be re-incorporated within a big tent. At least not in presidential elections.
Well said. This is precisely why I tell people that no matter how much you take issue with the far left, the Democratic Party is far preferable to the Republican Party. While Democrats are responding to the electorate's demand for moderation, the Republicans are continuing to double down on everything that has made them so toxic to most Americans.
And for those who would argue that this is only because the political fundamentals are so bad for Democrats, I will point to 2018, when the exact opposite was true. Democrats were the party out of power, with all of the political headwinds in their direction. Yet instead of putting a bunch of frothing mad Bernie Bros into office on the basis of Trump hatred, the Democrats flipped Republican seats using moderate candidates appealing to kitchen table issues like healthcare. Despite a few high profile victories by more leftist candidates in solidly blue districts, they failed to win primaries in every single competitive purple district, leading to a wave election for Democrats.
Compare them to today's Republicans, who have been so arrogantly confident in the Democrats' ultimate implosion that they have not even deigned to propose a platform. Coming off a Presidential election in which they infamously eschewed a comprehensive set of policy proposals for a declaration of loyalty to their king with a few glancing references to what they believed he stood for, they chastised Rick Scott for daring to attempt to explain to voters what Republicans intended to do with the power they so confidently anticipated being awarded.
The irony of this is that it simply confirmed what the party's critics have long claimed it stood for: maintaining power for its own sake. As a result, the party power brokers have been blindsided by the sudden germination of seeds they cynically planted for years - most notably on abortion and the overtaking of the party by deranged, radical conspiracy theorists. Come November, we will see if America rewards or punishes their smug complacency.
Thank you for your kind remarks; as I'm sure you've figured, your efforts with Mr. Lee are likely for naught. He and I have a history of butting heads and it never goes anywhere.