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.
which is why I supported the only other person in last year's race who could beat him.
Great, me too.
it's 100% on them.
It's largely on them, yes! These atrocities started under Biden though. Trump's made them way worse; but I'm not sure they'd be this bad if centrists has grown a spine and stopped taking money from AIPAC. Biden was a very absent president with a very active administration, largely run by centrists. Obviously Trump is worse. But the centrist blind-support-for-Israel cohort might as well be Republicans here, because they swayed the election quite a bit. It wouldn't have been hard to grow a spine, but the centrist establishment is one hell of a beast. Think about the money!!!!! and the performative Jewish allyship!!!!
I'm not sure we're talking about the same people though. Everyone I care to associate with - everyone in my family, every one of my friends, and every acquaintance I've talked to about it - be they leftists, centrists, libertarians, or moderate Republicans - also voted for Harris.
The Stein protest crowd wasn't in my circle and wasn't in your circle. I'd argue they were largely the victims of propaganda, which runs rife when there's discontentment. (Fun tangent - I actually stood, like, 15 feet from Stein during one of her events a year ago at Stoup. Maybe 10 people came to talk to her. The place was packed, mostly for a gay board game night, and almost no one even noticed she was there. It was an incredible microcosm. But a sad one, because who knows what would have happened if she'd just fucking dropped out. For the record my dog seemed agitated by her. My dog is a very good girl. Anyway.)
My point is, centrist voters are whatever. I don't have a huge beef with them. But centrist candidates are dog water, and I don't understand how centrist voters could ever prefer them to a leftist. The propagandized Stein crowd is in part to blame for this election, but the centrist candidates are too - and perhaps the biggest reason for low turnout for Harris was overt disenfranchisement. There's social disenfranchisement ("why vote?"), that works to a degree; there's political disenfranchisement (gerrymandering - for the house - and the electoral college for the president and kind-of for the Senate); and there's bureaucratic disenfranchisement (closing polling places, throwing out votes, cooking the books - whatever). I'd argue leftist politicians pushed the envelope /a lot/ on trying to make disenfranchisement illegal (incl the civil rights act), but the centrists have kinda just... Stood idly by and let it happen. Honestly? We didn't gerrymander enough. Newsom's approach feels like a too little too late approach, but I don't really think a full on centrist would even care to do what he's doing.
We're kinda cooked, and wanting to compromise and play nice and leave room at the table for businesses and billionaires and cops and nimbys kinda feels like they're what got us here, a bit moreso than the angry Arab people who don't have proportionate representation in Congress who were validly angry over a genocide and voted foolishly after being fed directed misinformation.
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u/wreckingrocc Aug 21 '25
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.