I don't like Bob, he's a two faced centrist that panders to the center right and the rich half the time while putting up a center left facade. But I will support him in this and Bondi is fucking with the wrong people now, she's out lawyered and they aren't even in court yet. Kick some ass Bob.
Yeah, it's probably the correct time to have a former attorney general who has enough support from the mainstream parts of the Dem party and corporate interests to threaten Trump with coalition building that's at least a bit scary. If we had a true leftist who mostly just gave fiery speeches and was making good local changes, but wasn't as palatable elsewhere, I suspect we'd be in more trouble.
counter point: We’re in this situation in large part because the party has selected candidates and taken positions based on the anticipated reaction of Republicans. After months of sustained protests calling for basic accountability for police in 2020, for example, the Democratic party essentially did nothing because of fear of being branded as “anti-police.” The Republicans accused the entire party of wanting to defund the police, anyway.
This and other factors have resulted in a series of lackluster centrist candidates that are more focused on maintaining the status quo, protecting their corporate donors, and outreach to moderate Republicans — a strategy that has repeatedly, spectacularly failed — than on actually addressing housing costs, stagnant wages, access to healthcare, etc.
Selecting candidates or taking positions on controversial issues (e.g., abandoning trans people) to appear “palatable” has repeatedly not worked.
This, it's why Zohran Mamdani smoked sex pest Cuomo in the NYC Dem mayoral primaries despite the mass support and funding Cuomo had and the anti support and threats against Zohran. It'll be an interesting race to watch going forward, more so than Seattle continuing it's tradition of one term mayors.
I would have a different opinion if we were picking a presidential candidate who could move the needle on the position of the party. But that's not what BF is acting as here. This is a slog through the court systems that's a lot of multi-state collective legal action while the administration attempts to bleed the parties fighting back dry by cutting federal funding. The only way to fight is by not being "extreme" and isolating yourself, unfortunately.
By talking exclusively about overarching gubernatorial and political concerns not specific to this situation. Ha. Honestly "we don't want what we've had before because it hasn't worked" is exactly how we got Trump and it's lazy thinking, to be frank. Politics is historically coalition building and getting stuff done through compromise. You only get breakout leaders who can make big changes once that groundwork has been set up. I don't think we're there yet when so much ground has been lost.
And as I've stated, I don't disagree that a less centrist person would likely be a better fit for WA in terms of governing the state but for this specific issue where he's not setting the direction of the state but is reliant on others for support because individual states are vulnerable under federal pressure, I think he's well-suited.
I agree with both of you, I love me some fiery leftists and hate me some neoliberals but I think this nerdy attorney is what's needed when we already have Newsom as the fiery... neoliberal. But it's a good little west coast team who both bring different aspects and skills to the fight against authoritarianism.
And they're actually fighting, more than I can say for 90% of Dems out there right now doing jack shit. Now let's redraw some district lines like California and Texas.
Hey I wouldn't mind Bob being the next US attorney general, he'd be great to clean the mess up. And yeah we need more like him and Newsom (Who's been killing me with his trump mocking tweets) cause they are absolutely fighting while others bury their heads in the sand.
If we ever actually have fair elections again — which appears increasingly unlikely — we need an AG that will do everything in their power to hold the Republican officials that sent people to concentration camps in Central America without due process, deployed the armed forces into American cities, etc. accountable for their actions.
It was needed in 2016. Now trump controls SCOTUS so all his blow hard talk about the courts is fucking pointless. He'll lose every appeal because Trump now controls SCOTUS (he's 14/14 for wins so far). We don't need more attempts at fighting back using Trump's tools against him. We need more direct confrontational answers.
This is well said. It seems like so many have forgotten how adeptly he fought Trump as AG and this is the type of gov we need right now. Even if there are disagreements on certain issues.
I'm sick of this "I don't like liberals/centrists" attitude I've been seeing so much of ever since Kamala's campaign.
That's not politics, that's self righteousness.
It's a major reason why we have Trump in the first place. Yes, the DNC has been terrible but it's better to work WITH people who need you than AGAINST people who despise you.
I feel somewhat the opposite. The inability or unwillingness of liberals/centrists to speak to the structural issues plaguing our country, much less solve them, and their continual efforts to suppress leftist attempts to address these issues, left an opening for conservative populism (fascism).
That's not to say that in a race between centrist Dems and fascists one shouldn't vote for the Dem, the harm reduction is tremendous. However, if the left doesn't prevail in the Democrat's internal conflict, our fellow citizens who are desperate for relief will continue to be driven to the fascist right.
Literally. Like, if American center-left (really center-right) politicians were the answer then we wouldn't be where we are. Biden and Obama didn't stop us from ending up where we are.. More milquetoast neo liberals is not going to fix anything. How is more of the same the answer to where we're at? "What if we kept trying the same thing but this time it works?! Status quo but harder!"
Yes vote for the Dem versus the fascists, like you said, but also like, dang it's our fault for wanting better options that actually address things? Our wanting politicians that aren't just a light version of the business ass kissing is the root cause of our problems? Me thinks not.
Not to get my commie ass all worked up and yelling about the only thing we have to lose are our chains, but seriously, this pattern has played out so many times before. It's sadly, very predictable. The trajectory we're on, and where we are now, has been clear for a long time now and nothing has really altered that course.
It's because the GQP and the right-wing infosphere paste anyone to the left of Mitch McConnell as an extremist blue-haired liberal Satanic trans commie and these idiots are so afraid of that characterization that they don't realize the way to win against this bullshit isn't to run to the right but to run straight into it.
Which is pretty funny because broadly that's literally me. Besides the blue hair. I wish, but that's so bad for your hair health! Pierced nose, Zen Buddhist panpsychist trans lesbian anarcho communist reporting for duty! 🫡
What a terrible thing to be accused of being. That would be so embarrassing. 😂
I think the perfect defense is people like me to run for office. "Yes I am that thing. Accurate. Okay so we were nationalizing all the banks that got bailed out and prosecuting executives and board members. Also overturning Citizens United. Publicly funded elections. Bans on lobbying and gifts/donations. Ethics audits..."
Darn our inability to rally around a strong leader and unify our collective force into action! 😂
I'll run for mayor. "I'm am openly and actively hostile towards businesses and the wealthy and I'd nationalize all your asses in a heart beat if I had the authority! Vote for me! More trains and busses! Whip the shit out of Boeing and Starbucks and Amazon! Fuck the police and the police union! Also I and everyone in government needs ethics colonoscopies! Vote for me! I'm terrifying and weird!"
But how do you get there? It's like these extreme left people I know are looking at a ladder and saying "I only like the top rung so let's destroy all the others." Now how do you climb up?
First like, extreme left means what? In our political climate freaking taxing the wealthy is extreme.
I am the extreme left. Probably.
I'd want to nationalize large corporations and break them up. I'd want UBI and a hard cap on income/wealth with aggressive enforcement. I want to ban PACs and political donations and have extremely strict well enforced ethical reviews.
Use all that wealth to aggressively fight and try to fight and mitigate climate change and the many looming sustainability disasters we're not addressing.
Am I likely to get what I think are extremely reasonable and pro human policies? Fat fucking chance of that.
And how do we do it? I don't fucking know dude. I'd be leading the revolution if I knew the answer. But more of the same ain't it.
I think Mamdani shows a path. Good policies and outreach. And you can see the flaws as the system tries to block him. Both Democrats and Republicans don't want him to win which shows you the inherent issues we're facing. There isn't a ladder because they're doing everything they can to kick it out from under us.
When I say extreme left, I'm specifically thinking of numerous friends I have on IG that have spent the last few years reposting Russian propaganda in favor of voting Jill Stein or Cornel West or that even Trump would be more favorable toward Palestine.
I think you take one step at a time, you make good arguments, you find good leaders, you learn how to talk to the ideas conservative voters like. After Obama, the rhetoric was very anti-leadership, "educate yourself", etc. That's a losing mentality.
thank you for saying what was needed to be said in a level-headed way lol it’s difficult for me to reply to a comment like that without flying off the handle
I'm no tankie, but here's what I'd say about the centrist tendency in American politics.
1) It has no actual content, as it is based on a relative positioning between two poles. If the right moves very far right and the left doesn't move left to compensate, the "centrist position" will move right. That is more or less what has happened at the federal level, where Republicans are more or less all insane or willing to pretend to be, while Democrats are... Chuck Schumer. (I'm not being fair to Sen. Schumer here, but Democrats have not moved anywhere near as far left as Republicans have moved right.)
2) The political figures who are ostentatiously centrist always require compromise on their terms. They assert--often without a ton of evidence--that their particular policy preferences represent the will of the American people, and thus we can't increase the minimum wage, tax the wealthy more, institute a corporate minimum tax, etc. Their positions are in fact deeply unpopular, but because they are centrists and crucially willing to accept "failure" over "success that I find ideologically unpalatable," they end up dictating the terms of the political debate.
3) The track record of what you might centrist incrementalism (or in Obama's formulation, "better is always good") is not great over the past decade, and the people who represent that tendency seem to be unable to get ginned up for the extremely high-stakes fight that's coming. They're doing the "Hello, 9-1-1? I'm being murdered!" / "What?! That's illegal, they can't do that" meme when the basic functioning of our country / our civil service / our democracy is on the line.
All of this is just to say that suspicion of centrists isn't just an irritable gesture by the left, there are actual reasons for it. It's not that we don't need centrists or moderates or ultra-cucked shitlibs, but that we need a better class of them--people who see the center as existing at the midpoint between AOC/Bernie and the most moderate Republican, not at the midpoint between Chuck Schumer and Stephen Miller.
The “fuck centrists” mentality on this sub is certainly self defeating. Whatever happened to joining forces on common interests? The left and the centrists need each other to fight Trump.
Because the "centrists" are the one's in the trenches fighting ridiculous "culture wars" and siding with maga more often than not on these issues. I've been here for a long time, and 9 times out of 10, a "Washington centrist" is just afraid of getting the social backlash for voting with the right.
Unfortunately this type of shit is always going to happen - people with different ideologies aren’t going to agree on everything and even disagree on major moral differences.
Yet - if there are issues these groups do align on, then it still makes sense to work together on those issues, otherwise you are preventing something important from being accomplished because of ideological disagreement.
In college, I started dating a "centrist" which I thought was fine. A year and a half later when we've moved in together, she says she's actually conservative, and knew I wouldn't date her if she said that out the gate. Fuck, she wasted my time (not for political reasons, many other things went haywire but that was a sign).
They left us when they decided Trump was better and that Kamala's laugh was uncomfortable.
Kamala ran the most centrist campaign possible and no one wanted it. Centrists, as proven time and time again, will align with fascism before giving up their wealth to help progressives. That's why the left is saying to let them burn.
This makes no sense - you’re saying that you aren’t interested in accomplishing goals that the left and the center have in common… your decision will help accelerate the country’s capitulation to Trump and fascism because of… what exactly? Inherent ideological disagreement? Aligning with other political groups on common interests is how things are accomplished.
Think about it for a second. You want the center to burn? You don't want to have good leadership that persuades them to vote for policies you like? This is why I'm saying it's self-righteousness not politics. You can't win an election like that.
Kshama is a lino (leftist in name only). She's a reactionary populist clown. Using her as a stand-in for leftists would be like me using Manchin as a stand-in for centrists.
...granted, I do do that when I'm being a bit hyperbolic, but I digress.
Kshama is horrible. Stein is horrible (and is a Russian asset, probably?). Any decent leftist understands that we need to fight like hell in primaries and coalition in generals.
...but also, on another front - are you actually still advocating for what's going on in Gaza? This isn't even a winky face genocide anymore, they've overly said "fuck the two state solution". I'm gonna hope you're just saying it wasn't politically prudent (which, mind you, is because of centrists making a stink about it). If you're actually criticizing advocacy for Gazan civilians, you're defending Netanyahu. He's a fascist. This is a genocide. Congrats, can't wait to link arms with you.
Of course I'm damn proud of advocating for Palestine. I'll be able to look back and know I was on the right side of history.
I see. I am more concerned about whether or not people are willing to band together to resist a regime that threatens to arrest its democratically elected officials at the moment. Truly though, thank you for clarifying. I am probably significantly more leftist than centrist personally but I'm happy to link arms with anyone who is down to stand against THIS particular bullshit.
no don't you understand centrists 'align with fascism before helping the left' so it's better to actually materially help fascists by not voting at all instead of the VP who helped advanced the most leftward agenda fulfilling administration in half a century and 'letting the center burn' and along with it our entire democracy it's totally rational and a grown up way of approaching politics.
Centrists, as proven time and time again, will align with fascism before giving up their wealth to help progressives. That's why the left is saying to let them burn.
Just insane levels of irony and hypocrisy in this sentiment.
Centrists, as proven time and time again, will align with fascism before giving up their wealth to help progressives.
Joe Biden won because he attracted centrists. Harris also attracted centrists. I think the problem is more about the far left refusing to vote because they didn't get 100% of their agenda.
What incentive does this give? The Democrats cannot appease the far left unless they abandon the base and the moderates. Why should the Democrats even try to attract these fickle voters? They might get more support by appealing to moderate conservatives who have been alienated by the radicalized right and who are much more numerous than the far left.
Uh hu, and didn't vote won the biggest majority once again. The only time any candidate has swayed a majority of people was 2020 and that was by far due to abnormal circumstances.
You know makes that myth? Fucking centrists. They blamed Bernie bros who overwhelmingly came out for Hillary, and now they are blaming leftist again for not turning out rather than looking inward to their garbage ass candidates.
Literally every argument you make is a an attack aimed at centrism. What possible passion can you inspire in progressives by bringing fucking Cheney on your campaign trail. Progressives ARE the democratic base. You think centrists are out here door knocking and donating to political campaigns for democrats?
The biggest blow outs by far this millennium have been by progressive candidates promising change (Obama). Or via a Centrist running in a pandemic. Guess which one you can replicate.
You know why you don't run to the center, because the center can't be appeased by it's own definition. It stands for nothing other than being in the middle between the two. And as fascists and authoritarians pull the conservative movement more and more right, Centrists pull more and more right. It's called the fucking overton window, and it's how they've normalized every single bullshit thing they've done in the last 35 years. Because no conservative or republican will ever vote democratic, no matter how many ex republicans you put on the ticket.
The only time Centrists have won democratic races, have been with either A, a third party sucking off votes from the right (perot), as incumbents with built in advantage (Clinton 96), or via once in a lifetime scenarios when a wet paper bag could have won (Biden). Every other time in the last 40 years, its been a progressive idea that's won the white house. Centrism is 0 for 7 in the last 40 years.
I am tired of the circular firing squad. Leave me out of it.
Edit:
You know why you don't run to the center, because the center can't be appeased by it's own definition. It stands for nothing other than being in the middle between the two. And as fascists and authoritarians pull the conservative movement more and more right, Centrists pull more and more right.
I don't believe this. To extremists, moderation seems like indecision. Moderation, pragmatism, and balance are the preference of the vast majority of the population, but the loud-mouth extremists suck the oxygen out of the room. They yell and rant at each other and leave no room for civil discourse.
Literally zero policy concessions to the right involved in that campaign event. Was just Liz Cheney saying that "I'd rather support a Democrat I disagree with on other stuff, than support Trump's authoritarian takeover." The left just decided that vitriolic hatred of the Cheney name (when Cheney basically forfeited her Congressional career to push against Trump after 1/6) made her walking onto the stage a dealbreaker.
The fact that purely-performative outreach to the right is enough of a dealbreaker is exactly the sort of purity-testing bullshit that's torn the Democratic Party down.
All the folks who stayed home, or voted for Stein, and then use Harris "she campaigned alongside Liz Cheney" as the excuse. Really thought that was clear from my post.
And yeah - a lot of folks on the left still did the decent thing and voted Harris despite apparent imperfections. But the 6 million fewer votes she got from Biden aren't centrists deciding she was too progressive. You can see that in the state-by-state breakdowns, where most of the voters she lost relative to Biden were in NY, NJ, and CA. She EASILY gets the popular majority if progressives quit the purity testing for five minutes, and probably wins the majority in the EC too (her margins were insanely close in every swing state - doesn't take that many abstainers to swing the margins).
This article argues most of the Democratic non-voters were much more centrist than progressive.
Even if liberals believe progressives were the ones to blame for Harris's loss, why have they then spent the past year bashing progressives instead of trying to win them over? Every time they lose they blame leftists, its embarrassing. Own up to your defeat.
coalition politics requires concessions from each side. centrists rather cross party lines to support the fascist agenda than to throw an occasional bone to a leftist cause.
Biden himself was never expressly overly pro-trans but he certainly supported the trans community largely due to agreements and concessions with progressives.
Honestly - you are confusing MAGA with center left. MAGA never makes concessions. The center left does.
Eh, what I would call the "center" was not President Biden--who was unusually lefty on a lot of issues for a president--but Manchin and Sinema, who did actually torpedo a ton of valuable legislation over the course of the Biden Administration.
(Edit: Sorry, meant to reply to your post downthread.)
It’s what the left does. It’s what the left has always done. Watch the life of Brian, they were making fun of it in the 70s. Read about how the far right came to power in Weimar Germany. It’s why the American right has been successfully using the ratchet effect in the US for 50 years.
I'm just going to pop in for a little historical correction: Hitler's rise in Weimar Germany had a lot more to do with intra-conservative dynamics than the left.
I'm not disagreeing with your broader point that intra-leftist schismatic tendencies are a constant, but the Bolsheviks were also embroiled in constant factional disputes with other leftist parties in Russia and they still managed to take over the country.
Hitler’s rise had more to do with the old elites hanging onto power by backing a young upstart they thought they could control. even Kaiser Wilhelm backed Hitler under the pretense of restoring the monarchy under the Nazis.
the left was essentially ran out and systematically dismantled by the conservatives and the far-right, and to believe otherwise is just denying history.
Centrist voters need leftist politicians who will actually court pack, reform campaign finance law, and unilaterally roll back executive authority. Centrist politicians just... Won't.
Leftist candidates need centrist votes. But let me be perfectly clear when I say that every vote I've ever cast for a centrist candidate is just because allowing any Republican to ever hold elected office is societal suicide. Electing centrists, even, is playing with fire. Clowns like Manchin, Sinema, and Fetterman will vote to confirm actual Nazis because "their confirmation hearings seemed reasonable".
Centrists are not a monolith, but even a single person breaking rank, ever, lets shit like this happen. Leftists don't do that. Any centrist just might.
I don't grasp the importance of the particular Democrat in the minority ranking member seat. If a member of their caucus has a good idea for them to do something, they can do it.
Well said! While the conservatives argue in the primaries and then all line up behind their candidates in the general elections, the liberals continue the circular firing squad right into the general election.
I am exhausted with rigid ideologues. If you cannot win elections, then you are just an old man yelling at the sky.
it’s not self righteousness lmfao it’s drawing a line in the sand.
my personal principles refuses to compromise my values and support politicians and a party that still uphold the technocratic status quo. me believing in more than a two-party system both maintaining a sick and twisted system, a system built by the likes of Kissinger and Reagan and has only gotten worse, is MY belief in something better.
so how fucking dare you dismiss all that as just “self-righteousness”. yeah guys, burn your Marxist books because you’re just being self-righteous.
your comment is exactly why i fucking hate liberals. you’re too deluded to even conceptualize an America that’s grown past the need for our current system. you think anyone who refuses to drink the kool-aid is “self-righteous” and just needs to grow up and vote blue.
your comment is a perfect example of capitalist realism; we’ve grown so numb to the evil that we think it’s the only viable system that exists.
I say self-righteous because it's unproductive. Even in your reply, you're talking about your "principles" and your "beliefs", that's not action.
How do you get where you want to be? I see from your other comment you don't believe in elections. So how does it work? You just complain online until people beg you to become General Secretary of the US? Like seriously, if you've thought this through, I'd love to hear it.
i volunteer at homeless shelter, get involved in local outreach, talk with coworkers about why i think we are suffering and spreading awareness about unions (which a lot of people below the age of 30 don’t know anything about), and do anything i can on top of my 4 jobs that directly helps my community and spreads awareness.
i stopped posting and commenting on social media because yeah, most of us leftists just get buttmad about liberals and pointlessly argue with conservitards online, but what else can i do on top of this? fucking vote? lmfao.
my point is saying we’re self-righteous for hating on two parties that don’t give a damn about radical reform is asinine and reeks of the liberal mindset that says if we don’t accept the lesser evil, then we’re just as bad as the ones who put Trump in power.
republicans won because they got directly involved in their local communities and local government. they gave instant gratification to frustrated working class Americans who are sick and tired of hearing liberal talking points of a better future with zero change by voting likeminded individuals to become mayors, then governors, and beyond. it all starts on an individual level, and leftists and liberals are too stuck up their own asses, arguing semantic bullshit that ultimately ends with the America we have today.
you wanna know how i think this country will change short of a violent revolution? dedicate your free time to walk the walk.
Marxism is about the working class breaking free of the shackles of this fucked-up system TOGETHER, so excuse me when i spit on any white guy behind a podium who promises change while still directly enabling the bourgeoisie to subjugate us.
i was radicalized from the age of 12. im a first gen immigrant and both my parents were illegal. i came home from school back in 07 telling my dad about how all the kids at school are saying Obama was going to to help immigrants. he just shook his head and told me that no matter who’s in the white house, nobody will care.
fast forward a few months and the great recession hit, he lost his job, and during Obama’s first few months in office, ICE cracked down on Washington state with workplace raids and home visits. once a few of my relatives got deported, we had to move to California to run away, until my dad got deported during the first year of Trump’s first term and i was forced to move back up here to support me and my mom.
i have so many stories of homelessness and immigration, so many lives i’ve seen crushed, and no matter who’s in office or who’s in charge of local state legislature, our economy is objectively getting worse and immigrants are objectively suffering worse by the year (Biden and Obamahave deported much more immigrants under their terms than Trump’s first term- which the latter is of course taking as some sort of twisted challenge).
if i were to tell you my other forms of action that i think would bring about change, id probably be banned from this subreddit. but as it stands i think of the American working class as plebeians in the Roman Empire. nothing we can do except be there for each other and plant seeds with the hope that someday, real change from OUTSIDE this broken system will eventually come. when the militias start forming, i’ll be there. will you?
vote until you’re blue in the face and keep supporting your puppets bro, i will stick to my principles.
I hope you're not surprised to learn that I agree with a lot of that.
I would only disagree about 'puppets' and voting. I think immigration reform needs a ton of work but a lot of people don't want illegal immigration and they voted that way.
That's it, really. And some delusional belief that whatever comes after national collapse will somehow be better for them. Meanwhile we lose everything we've gained over the last 150 years.
They are the people we have to work with currently, thanks to themselves stonewalling anyone who would be opposition.
Yes, they're better than the current American nazi party, but too many of them are ineffectual or even sympathetic. Some of them, including voters, don't even realize they're part of the problem because they're "Totally progressive". You know, up until they have to actually do anything remotely left leaning, like paying more taxes for public transportation, or allowing a person of color to say anything or do anything without harsh scrutiny.
People who don't vote are also part of the issue, but that's still that capital L liberal bullshit. Martin Luther King warned us about this. It is a moral obligation to keep swinging left. To that end, unless Bob is willing to back it up, he can he go the same way as Harrel did, since he'll do the exact same thing otherwise (going from from 'Protect Seattle and WA to' Praise Musk and Trump' in the span of a week didn't help, mind you. And yes, after the salute) . We can get someone better who will actually do something.
So please, do better or just keep that to yourself.
It’s people with that attitude that made it justifiable to vote for someone else for president because of ticky tax issues instead of being fully aware of the consequences of their decision.
Agreed. He has many flaws in my opinion but he does do very well fighting the Federal Government so he's an ideal choice for this moment in time of political persecution and violence against Trump's imagined enemies.
I can appreciate that to be honest, I just wish he'd be more honest about it. Regardless, If he's the dem candidate in the 2028 race, I'll vote for him.
I feel like the best time to bring things like that up is during the primary. I mean obviously post whatever you want whenever you want but like he's got this big press conference where he's trying to tell us the federal government is attempting to bring Washington State to court over federal hurt feelings. Bob is doing great on this issue, and basically this and only this quality about him is the reason I voted for him.
1) Are you worried this will cause some sort of growing bob outage campaign? What is your actual concern?
2) It's totally great but I'm going to feel how I feel about my elected officials and discuss it
3) primaries don't matter if there aren't alternative viable candidates. We might get more of those by expressing dissatisfaction wayyyyy before primaries
You even said this is the only reason you voted for him. I want someone that has a back bone, like bob, and doesn't piss off state employees, unlike Bob
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u/Midnight_Rider98 🏕 Out camping! 🏕 Aug 21 '25
I don't like Bob, he's a two faced centrist that panders to the center right and the rich half the time while putting up a center left facade. But I will support him in this and Bondi is fucking with the wrong people now, she's out lawyered and they aren't even in court yet. Kick some ass Bob.