Nick Carraway Has Another Idea
Nick Caraway sends greetings —
There is no one more polarizing than Alexandria Ocasio Cortez (AOC) but give her this, she gets her money’s worth on the Twitter machine. This past weekend she turned her attention to John Kasich and his comments about progressives.
https://twitter.com/aoc/status/1325181753204461569
I think the biggest negative surprise from the race was the lack of effect of people like Kasich. I don’t know that anyone expected Ohio to turn because of him but he, other conservative defectors, and the Lincoln Project didn’t seem to have an electoral effect beyond a few points. So, what positive benefit did Joe Biden have by having people like Kasich on his side?
AOC got blasted for the timing of her tweet, but God love her, she only has one speed. She’s going to go full blast no matter what she does. The question is whether she’s right. The election returns in the House and Senate seem to say she is. Furthermore, polling on individual issues within the progressive platform seem to indicate she is.
It remains to be seen whether national Democratic leaders are shying away from the progressive platform because they don’t believe in it or whether they think appealing to the middle is still a winning formula. I’m not even sure there is much of a middle anymore.
Biden biographer on an Ezra Klein Show podcast says Biden doesn’t have an ideology other than his oft-stated decency and fairness doctrine, that any progressive position is negotiable to him, in his horsetrading worldview. I’m with AOC that it’d be nice if there was a progressive political party in America.
1I think American progressives are tired of old men, standing just this side of center, if at all, deciding to bold take the nation to right where it already is.
2Bring us a government of AOC and her like so we can actually move forward as a nation.
Don’t get me wrong, I am happy Biden won and understand why it had to be him. And I’m very glad he picked Harris as his VP. But there are too many people in the House and Senate (all the repugs and many of the dems) that have been there too long and are stagnating.
Agreed. In-depth questioning shows most Americans are actually center-left. Count me in as one old white lady who’s tired of having to vote for yet another old white guy “taking the nation to right where it already is” (great line, TrulyTexan#2).
Many of the Democratic votes we had locally were simply to get His Orangeness out of the People’s House, NOT because anybody thought Joe was more than a centrist, decent guy. Love him as a person, but we need action – on climate change, on racism & women’s rights, on universal health care.
3Senior Democrats still have PTSD from Reagan Democrats, and the unions supporting Republicans in the 1980s. It’s a different world today.
4It’s going to be people like AOC and Stacey Abrams who drag us away from being the dead armadillo party… though I personally don’t mind Biden and his contemporaries. They make me look like a younger white man.
5I’m another old white lady who 100% agrees with AOC. The DNC leadership should be fired for incompetence. When Biden, in his victory speech, over and over talked about “cooperation,” my eyes went back. I’m afraid he’s all too ready for capitulation and collaboration. That would be a losing strategy both for the country and for future elections.
6I love AOC, really I do (maybe Stacey Abrams a little bit more) but NYC isn’t GA, and she needs to tone it down until after the runoffs if that’s what GA asks her to do. These seats are too important to screw up with intra-party arguing. When there’s an empty seat in NYC, AOC gets to take the lead.
7Could a progressive get elected nation wide? I doubt it.
8Umair Hague has a piece in Eudaimaonia this month about the 80% of the USA that is white, the majority of which vote republican. It is still a numbers game
lazrgl:
9Great point.
Nick:
I’m not sure how to determine the effectiveness of the Lincoln Project and their I’lk. But they never said anything I ever heard about helping with anything but beating trump. We lost seats in the House. And so far the Senate hasn’t changed much. Who are they going to support in Georgia?
Because I foresee them getting back in their normal game.
I agree with Lazrgirl #6. When a politician garners a lot of attention, they need to continue to speak the truth, and watch how they say it. After the Floyd murder, someone started the Defund the Police slogan. No one I know wants that – they want a professional police department, yet that slogan has stuck like glue to Dems. Also socialism – Cuban refugees and their families are particularly attuned to that and his majesty was able to attach it to Dems in FL. Speak the truth, but measure your words.
10I agree with lzrgrl@6. Our next priority is the GA senate seats. I believe I saw a tweet from the Lincoln Project that they are going to work for the Dems on that. That being said, I love AOC. I think the center of our political dialogue has shifted so far to the right over the last few years, that what is considered a center moderate today is pretty conservative actually. And Grandma Ada@10, you are right about the Defund the Police slogan. It is just a bad slogan and it does not convey what is meant and can be (and was) distorted by the other side.
11Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez is correct. Milk toast and puppy biscuits lost seats in the House and did not achieve control of the Senate. While Biden/Harris won, it wasn’t the whupping it should have been given Donnie’s 4 years of being a tool of Russia and otherwise disaster.
Republicons will not vote Democratic in Georgia. Forget about their fragile fee fees and go all out to excite Democratic voters in Georgia. Stacie Abrams is there to register voters. Let Ossoff and Warnock rock the vote with the how and why of Democratic policies are the best.
wtf? Seriously? Shove Steny Hoyer in a resealable bag with all the other past their shelf date old white boys and quit appeasing conservatives who will never stop voting against their own interests. Unless you want 2022 to be a repeat of the 2010 disaster try doing something different.
12It’s time for new DNC leadership- probably at least 75% need to be replaced. Time is NOW to start on the senate for 2022. Not the same old folks who are “next in line” or their turn” candidates. There are enough Republican seats up that if half are flipped, Biden gets what he needs. The party has to start now in those states getting out its message- as soon as it figures out what the message is.
13Well, with all the opinions expressed here, it seems like it might be good to give Joe a chance first. A lot will depend on who he surrounds himself with.
14Want something different from the DNC? change the delegates from your states.
Want something different from DNC staff? Talk to the Biden campaign, as winners usually get a strong say in who should be at the DNC.
Want someone different for Senator or Representative … find someone willing to run and begin the competition.
If you want someone to stand up for liberal ideas and excite the nonvoters — go for it. It may work — I’ve not seen that happen in Colorado, but your candidate may be more successful in finding and activating those voters.
15Yet another old white lady who is ready for the younger activists to lead us toward progress. I like AOC – always have. I love the way she stands up to the nasty old white farts who try to intimidate her. I like the Green New Deal. Both my 30-something sons are Bernie Bros. Make no mistake, I really like Joe Biden. I cannot express my relief that he was elected and not the current criminal in chief. I think he can make good strides cleaning up the mess that is our current government. He has the skills to barter with the Senate Majority Monster. But the planet is heating up at a rate unforeseen by even the most prescient experts and the results are already in full display. Our health care system is appalling at best. In fact most of our most needed social programs are woefully inadequate. We need some youthful fire and energy and courage to kick our asses down the road to real reform.
16The ideals that Ocasio-Cortez espouses are “polarizing” because Koch, his billionaire buddies, the corporate boards, and their K Street mouthpieces pay enormous sums of money to sell the idea that living wages, health care, equality, and equal treatment under the law are a threat to the American way of life.
17@Wally 16, That’s really the crux of the matter, and it’s also the reality that progressives need to deal with. Centrist Democrats don’t excite anyone, but progressives are currently easy for the right-wing talk machine to demonize. I think that the new generation of progressives, AOC and others, are sharp enough to eventually defeat the right-wing think tank, talk radio echo chamber, but it’s going to take some time and 7-dimensional chess to do it.
18treehugger and wally, thanks for saying it all for me (also white-haired old lady in Texas)
19P.P. and Jo, here’s the first anti-Perdue Lincoln Project ad. I don’t think it will be their last.
https://lincolnproject.us/video/you-did/
20We’re starting the same debates we’ve had for years about progressive vs. centrist messaging to get the job done.
21IMHO it’s pretty much the same goals we’re after. Just a matter of which tactics get us there. I go back and forth on the issue depending on the individual situation. But this situation is unique. The Georgia runnoffs are the difference between governing or groveling. I read somewhere that Biden and McConnell have a great history of working with each other. How’d that work out for judicial nominees when Uncle Joe was VP? Mcturtle can hold up confirmations of every cabinet secretary. Anybody think he wouldn’t?
He’s proven that he’ll obstruct everything in his power to retain the ability to stay in power.
Like lazrgl pointed out. Georgia isn’t New York.
So right now ALL our resources need to be on two races.
Because they really are the difference between governing and groveling.
So I say whatever Stacy Abams says goes. She’s the the most powerful engine. We just need to give her the fuel.
If or when we take the Senate, we’ll start arguing about the message going forward overall.
djw @ 20:
22Thanks for the link. That’s encouraging.
“wtf? Seriously? Shove Steny Hoyer in a resealable bag with all the other past their shelf date old white boys and quit appeasing conservatives who will never stop voting against their own interests. Unless you want 2022 to be a repeat of the 2010 disaster try doing something different.”
Don’t get me wrong. I’m an AOC fan, but she is living rent free in the heads of conservative talking heads. The most hilarious “own” was when they came up with the video of her dancing in college. It was supposed to somehow cripple her politically. All it did was make guys like me in their forties think she’s more attractive.
So polarizing isn’t always bad. It’s just important movement wide to understand who she is to those outside of the movement.
23Nick @ 23 “polarizing” is the word you used to describe AOC, when perhaps you meant the situation. That’s a both sides technique and a strawman argument conservatives use. It’s a form of using our good manners against us. Fact remains that is not “who she is.” If your intent is to understand the perceptions of ‘those outside the movement,’ don’t concede to their messaging. Make those conservatives define their own policies. Better yet make them “own” their own policies. C’mon Nick, make those conservatives do their own dirty work. Let them come to us with any plausible reasons they might have for denying climate change, or better yet why clinging to failed economic policy like the voodoo economics of Trickle Down after more than 40 years. Force conservatives to admit what they are really saying is “let’s keep failing.”
Nick, your points about Kasich and The Lincoln Project. Indeed. Not only did those conservatives not help win the election, they’re a drag on the country, at their best. Wait for it … that moment when they turn their venom on us like the proverbial turtle who agrees to carry a scorpion across a river learned.
24The Dems need everyone who will vote for them. They need most those who will vote Dem up and down the ballot and back across it as well. They need firebrands. They need steady Eddies. They need those who flash out from the first instant a new thing happens, and they need those who think slower and deeper, who play the long game. I admire AOC. I admire Hillary Clinton. I admired (O Lord how I admired) Barbara Jordan…each of those women for their unique personalities, their unique talents, their unique insights. We need all that. But most of all we need a Democratic Party that is not focused on unicorns.
Can we please quit dissecting the party and trying to turn it into several smaller ones that can’t win third-assistant-dogcatcher? Have we learned nothing from the non-success of third, fourth, fifth parties over the centuries? Changing a nation’s attitudes, when the opposition is as big as it is, takes time. Takes the steady Eddies to keep the pull going when the firebrands have gone cold. Takes the people who are more invested in *this* issue than *that*…don’t kick ’em to the curb and diss them, use them for what they’re good for. And yes, it *does* take cooperation and compromise *and has since humans first hung out in groups and tried to do anything together.*
I recommend an essay in a book called Making Conversation by Theresa Nielsen Hayden, published by the New England Science Fiction Association (NESFA) press in 2016. Hayden was a senior editor at Tor Books for many years, and attended a bazillion SF conventions; with her husband Patrick they ran long-standing blogsites. This put her in contact with an extremely diverse and vocal group, from one edge of the political spectrum to another, all of them thinking themselves smarter than average. Theresa was, by a country mile, smarter than the average smart-alec young white male SF fan. She was never MY editor (my current publisher outbid Tor for a book, and thus my fate was cast elsewhere) but I did meet her around that time. The essay I recommend for this discussion is the one titled “Chaos Is Not Your Friend,” written in answer to someone else’s answer to one of her husband Patrick’s blogs.
Don’t be hasty enough to think this is an argument in favor of stagnation, inertia, doing nothing. Think longer. At best, we cannot achieve what I see as “good enough” in what’s left of my lifetime. At worst, we’ll end up in a civil war (and if you think that’s “just a few years of chaos” notice that the first one we had *still is not over*. We need to think LONGER. We need to think HARDER. We–young and old, male, female, and other, all of us–need to settle into the collar, back our ears, and settle in for the long haul it will take to turn a ship of state this big, this massive, out of this course to another. I want AOC in Congress, you betcha. She’s a firebrand, a change-starter. But I also want a bunch of less fiery, just as stubborn, members of Congress who will keep going, and going, and going. Maybe instead of Steady Eddies, I should be calling them Bunnies.
25I’ve been in the writing game too. I’d love to pick your brain, but that would require an off site conversation as identities would be blown…
I see your point Jane. I suppose a part of my POV is that I seem to have more conservative friends that progressive ones. They are the ones constantly complaining about AOC. You can always tell who they are worried about based on who they constantly complain about.
I think Elizabeth’s point is well taken. We need a big tent. That’s also one of the reasons why my writing seems to sometimes contains religious undertones. I think you try to talk to everyone possible and sometimes you have to speak the language. There is a fine line between reaching across the aisle and retreating back into your own. I think Obama often tried too hard to reach across the aisle. He had the majority in the first two years and could have rammed more things through. Joe won’t have that advantage even if we win both seats in Georgia. That’s why he probably is the best guy for this particular time and place.
26Nick, Democrats have a huge tent and all are welcome. But where the rubber hits the road is leadership and to cite an instance, if cheating in FL didn’t cost Al Gore the election, then Joe Lieberman did because the actual vote count didn’t have to be that close nor dependent on FL.
Let’s talk Congresswoman Maxine Waters. Is she polarizing? No, she’s fiery and speaks her mind. Women are not polarizing, shrill or any other dodge applied to them by old white conservatives. LOL When they apply that standard to either Kimberly Guilfoyle or Leningrad Lindsey their words my begin to have meaning. Again, I’d drop Ian Paisley’s name in any conversation with them that veered that far into their biases vs sanity.
FWIW Played golf with an old duffer that had named his dog Wall Street. Yeah. that conservative. And no even when we discussed Bernie Sanders, I did not bury him in a sand trap. He moved for retirement reasons.
27I guess I define polarizing differently and don’t see gender as a part of it. I’d say Bernie can also be polarizing. I’d say Mitch is polarizing on the other end. I think of it in sports terms. I used to hate Charles Barkley until he became a Rocket and then he was loved. Rusself Westbrook is the same.
There are guys/gals on the other side who we might begrudgingly respect and then there are those that make our skin crawl. I’d say Teddy is pretty polarizing,. Simply put, if the mention of their inspires a visceral reaction one way or another then they are polarizing. Should AOC or Maxine Waters be polarizing? That’s a whole different question. I’d say no as they really haven’t DONE anything worthy of that honor.
You bring up golf. I have a yearly weekend I go to that was canceled this year. Some of the folks there are huge conservatives. I kind of gauge who is polarizing by who they complain most about. I can do it on our side with the conservatives we complain most about.
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