Midway through this summer, a high-quality poll found that Democrats in California were overwhelmingly in favor of the upcoming ballot measure for a one-time 5% tax on billionaire wealth.
The ratio was more than 4 to 1. But the state’s most powerful Democrats – including the governor Gavin Newsom, his near-certain successor Xavier Becerra and the Los Angeles mayor Karen Bass – have lined up with Silicon Valley billionaires who’ve raised upward of $340m to defeat the initiative.
The terrible thing with this is that it’s these Neolib Clinton Dems that piss off the voters, and inspire the “both sides are the same” accusations. That’s where a lot of folks stop.
But if you want to change a party to be on the side of the people, willing to reinvigorate progressive tax laws, you need to vote Dem, and force the Dems to the left. You’re not going to force the GOP to the left, at all. They are absolutely the political arm of the richest. They do not exist as a party without the top 1%.
The Dems used to be more Left, and like to pretend they’re still the same New Deal folks they’ve always been. They’re not, but voters can force them to be again. Let your elected reps know what you expect of them, and threaten to primary them from the left all the time. The party can be moved. It’s definitely in need of fixing, but it can be done. Just like the Tea Party and then MAGA transformed the GOP, so too can the Dems be transformed by passionate progressives. You just have to realize that opting out, and hating the Dems for not already being what they should be, is just saying you want to lose, and to always lose.
Sack the lot of them and implement a direct democracy. We don’t need “representatives” - at least not ones that we’re periodically stuck with even when they repeatedly vote on our behalf against our interests.
Love the enthusiasm, but you lose points on feasibility.
I think the “feasibility” of our representative democracy has lost the point. Why do we need representatives to travel to DC, or whatever central place of government, to have their say on our behalf - especially when they all too often don’t represent their voters? Why can’t we exploit modern communication technology to have our say directly on anything they vote on?
Or if we are to have representatives, to make voting easier, why can’t we align our votes to a party or other group, ad hoc, for them to vote on our behalf? Where we could re-assign our representative based on big issues (with an advanced deadline) or choose to make our own vote directly on matters we find important? Why do we have to lock in a “representative” for 4+ years?
This is a Uk perpctive. The new prime minister has pledged to end decades of neoliberalism (the great concept espoused by Rand, Friedmann, Hayek then Reagan and Thatcher). It is both rare and refreshing to hear any UK PM say any thing like this. I am fearful about the extreme ignorance, simple mindedness, and gullibility of some of the electorate. They are completely blind to the effects of neoliberalism, which is the main guiding force behind the bumptious and odious Farage, and fascist/racist Reform party who believe that competition is the defining characteristic of human relations. It redefines citizens as consumers, whose democratic choices are best exercised by buying and selling, a process that rewards merit and punishes inefficiency. It maintains that “the market” delivers benefits that could never be achieved by planning. Attempts to limit competition are treated as inimical to liberty. Tax and regulation should be minimised; public services should be privatised. The organisation of labour and collective bargaining by trade unions are portrayed as market distortions that impede the formation of a natural hierarchy of winners and losers. Inequality is recast as virtuous: a reward for utility and a generator of wealth, which trickles down to enrich everyone. Efforts to create a more equal society are both counterproductive and morally corrosive. The market ensures that everyone gets what they deserve. We internalise and reproduce its creeds. The rich persuade themselves that they acquired their wealth through merit, ignoring the advantages, such as education, inheritance, and class – that may have helped to secure it. The poor begin to blame themselves for their failures, even when they can do little to change their circumstances. As written in today’s Observer, "People don’t want much. They want someone to love, somewhere to live, somewhere to work and something to hope for.” And Tim Forcer added "That would be a welcome change from much of UK politics, where many promote views that assume we mostly want someone to hate, someone to envy and someone to despise.”
The new Prime Minister who has not run an election as leader of the party and was only chosen to lead the party by a handful of senior MP’s who nominated him - because he stood unopposed the party membership were not given any opportunity to vote on him.
He was voted MP by a Manchester constituency who knew him as the mayor, and then he was voted PM by a handful of MP’s - not by the general electorate nor even the party members.
Liberals need to make the case that some things are not amenable to free market solutions. Healthcare is one: everyone puts an infinite value on their existential health, meaning there is no reason for healthcare providers to not maximize fees, all out of proportion to their own costs. Healthcare, utilities, these need to be regulated by the state, strongly.
“Guys if we keep voting for them when they screw us over they’ll definitely stop!”
“I want to keep losing, so that I can feel pure!”
That’s you.
“I can fix them.”
Them: the graveyard of social movements.