- cross-posted to:
- politics
- cross-posted to:
- politics
Hillary Clinton is warning about the legality of birth control in the wake of a decision by the Alabama Supreme Court that found frozen embryos created through fertility treatments are children under state law.
“They came for abortion first. Now it’s [in vitro fertilization], and next it’ll be birth control,” the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee and secretary of State said in a post on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.
“The extreme right won’t stop trying to exert government control over our most sacred personal decisions until we codify reproductive freedom as a human right,” Clinton added.
I mean, can you fault someone for thinking Trump was unelectable?
While Hillary/Democratic party are at fault how they treated democrats during that election cycle, I think the US at large was at fault for its overall outcome.
Why did so many establishment Democrats get this one wrong though? I’ll tell you exactly why. They were/are so in love with their technocratic elitist bullshit that they had no conception of how fed up most of this country is with them.
Hillary was the most establishment candidate possible running against a political outsider with attitude in a country full of people who have been routinely ignored for decades.
It sure wasn’t obvious to me that Trump couldn’t win. I remember every single clueless thing Hillary did in that campaign raising my concerns a little bit more. It became more and more obvious as the campaigns went on that Trump was a serious contender.
She and the rest of the establishment couldn’t see the threat because their egos got in the way, and I do blame them for that.
I think they truly underestimated just how many deplorables there are, and how racist/misogynistic/homophobic they really are.
The “deplorables” were mostly already reliable Republican voters though, so I don’t think that was much of a factor.
The states where the election was lost were in the rust belt. The swing came mostly from. Obama to Trump voters. The commonality between the two is that both disengenuously ran as reformers.
I think these kinds of statements just seek to dismiss the very necessary conversations we need to have about the ineptitude or outright corruption of establishment Democrats which results in unnecessary losses or unnecessarily close races. I also think people are very quick to revert back from this broad blame attitude as soon as leftists or progressives state they’ll be voting 3rd party or write in. Ultimately moderates are the largest voting bloc in the Democrat party. If we assume the primaries aren’t straight up rigged by the DNC then it’s the moderate voters who control the outcome of the primaries. The lions share of the responsibility falls to them and yet they’ve done nothing to change course.
I think you’re agreeing with them here. There’s a point to be made that the voters are the problem too.
No. When moderates become the focus of the blame they deflect with “Well we’re all responsible.” but when progressives and leftists say they’re voting 3rd party or write in they’re like “You’re the reason why Trump won in 2016.” There’s never any moment where the moderates take responsibility for the garbage candidates they vote for in the primaries or their complete refusal to compromise with leftists or progressives despite desperately needing their votes.
Let me ask a hypothetical – if Sanders had been the candidate, would you have expected him to move a bit to the right to compromise with moderates and get their votes?
The whole “earn my vote” model often doesn’t consider the opposite. If you won’t vote for a moderate candidate because they haven’t earned your vote, why should a moderate vote for a progressive candidate if they feel their vote hasn’t been earned? What if moderates aren’t voting for progressives in primaries because the progressives aren’t trying to earn their vote?
I’m saying this as a progressive by the way. I think it’s a worthwhile critique that if moderate candidates need to earn our votes, so do progressive candidates. And if moderates don’t feel like their votes have been earned by the progressive candidate, it’s worthwhile for us to talk with them and explore why. I’m not going to deign to think that I’m right about everything and morally superior compared to them.
I did though. I voted for Biden in 2020. I compromised and got nothing in return. I’m out. I’m not voting for Biden again. I’m voting 3rd party or writing in.
You’ve just demonstrated how backwards and ridiculous the thinking is. Moderates have gotten so used to winning elections on their own they don’t even realize when people are compromising for them. They take it for granted and then throw a hissy fit when expectations come their way. Even worse they have the audacity to call it “entitled”, “spoiled” and so forth. It’s a complete lack of self awareness.
Moderates would rather lose to fascists than compromise with progressives and leftists. It’s pathetic.
I mean I agree, that’s my point. I don’t like the “earn my vote” model of thinking
What is the benefit of democracy if candidates aren’t trying to earn your vote?
Candidates are trying to earn the majority vote, not your vote specifically. Democracy is largely about compromise. It’s not about convincing people that you’re right, but about serving the majority. Your issue here is with the majority of voters, not the people seeking their votes.
Yes, I can fault someone for thinking Trump was unelectable; any professional politician who thought that would have been incompetent. But more importantly, Hillary Clinton isn’t incompetent - she knew it was a risk, and she played Russian Roulette with the country. Beyond that, she has been part of the neoliberal establishment that has set policies that we know historically set the stage for fascism, for decades. It’s amazing to me that people can look at the most powerful, privileged, and entitled people in our country, and somehow think they are guiltless, but put all that weight on our fellow citizens.