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- cross-posted to:
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The House voted on Wednesday to block the U.S. from funding the reconstruction of Gaza, whose destruction was financed by the U.S. to a large degree.
Other Republicans filed amendments combating the movement to boycott, divest, or sanction Israel for its illegal occupation of Palestine.
The provision was introduced by Reps. Brian Mast, R-Fla.; Claudia Tenney, R-N.Y.; and Eli Crane, R-Ariz., as an amendment to the 2025 National Defense Authorization Act, the annual defense budget. While Democrats opposed the amendment, which passed by a simple voice vote, they did not request a recorded vote.
Among the amendments with Democratic sponsors are ones expressing support for joint military ventures between the U.S. and Israel.
Rep. Jared Moskowitz, D-Fla., for his part, filed an amendment to require an assessment of the accuracy of the Gaza Ministry of Health’s death toll accounting. Over the last eight months, supporters of Israel have pointed to the fact that Hamas — as Gaza’s governing entity — controls the health ministry as a way to undermine its death count. Nonetheless, the Ministry of Health’s figures have in the past been corroborated by the United Nations, Doctors Without Borders, and even the Israeli government itself.
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If you don’t like how Congress represents you, vote in congressional elections. Democratic congressional election turnout is consistently less than 50%.
Make note of your state election dates and vote for change.
If you don’t like how Congress represents you, stop voting Democrat or Republican.
So stop doing the most influential thing citizens can do to affect the government?
What’s step two? Accept the Republican takeover or fail to violently overthrow the government resulting in massive losses?
You and givesomegucks should stop encouraging voter disengagement.
We’re only here from repeated failure to vote and fruitless attempts to elect third-party candidates.
You and givesomegucks should stop encouraging voter disengagement.
That’s like asking leopards to become vegan or fish to breath oxygen
I agree with the sentiment, but I think you mean air. Fish breathe oxygen from the water through their gills. That’s one of the many problems with climate change deoxygenating the ocean.
Haha yeah, I literally paused for a moment to decide which was most correct – I chose wrongly I suppose.
It’s all good. Your point is correct.
One thing I quite like about Lemmy is that it’s very easy to recognize individual users and the type of comments they usually leave.
“If voting made a difference, they would make it illegal”
"One party is trying "
Minor nitpick: while participating in voting is an important component of politics, I don’t think it’s accurate to say it’s the most influential thing you can do. It’s not even the most influential thing you can do if you’re strictly operating in the framework of electoralism.
How would you influence this vote? Writing your Representative would help if they weren’t block voting Republicans.
Volunteering in a campaign, running for office, designing and/or distributing pamphlets. All of these are potentially more effective than voting because you could get more than one vote for your preferred candidate that way.
And that’s just the obvious conventional stuff. If we get into theoretical strategies shit gets wild.
That’s fair.
Okay, I’ll bite:
How does not voting either Democrat or Republican help us right now?
It doesn’t. They know that. They’ll say either throw away your vote/don’t vote. They know either helps Trump win.
Also, tag the account and help keep calling them out.
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You can see both parties support Genocide in the article.
Voting Democrat does not appear to change this.
Conveniently side stepping the question
Standard voter disengagement advocate response. No suggestions for improvement, just don’t vote. This is how Republicans have been winning for decades. Good on you for calling it out when you see it.
So who do I vote for that will change it? Because my sample ballot only has genocide supporters on it. Am I writing in a name and just hoping the majority of the country writes the same name or what?
Moreover, while a lesser evil is still an evil, we are in a situation where these are the choices we have. By choosing Biden we have a chance to shift the lesser evil towards a greater good. Though four years isn’t a long time I sincerely feel we can make those changes if we just. stop. bickering. Cause fuck me if the Right won’t come together just to nail someone to a cross. Most the rest of us will have heated arguments over whether day old spaghetti is better than fresh.
Don’t you dare. I see you starting to make spaghetti claims, dammit.
Third parties rarely run for Congress. This is actually how you can tell that the US has no serious third parties. None of them make Congress even a remote priority. If they somehow won the presidency, they wouldn’t be able to do anything because they have no Congressional support.
You’ve inadvertently highlighted why your only options are to vote Democrat or Republican. No other party is serious about trying to win. If they were, they’d be building up a local presence in all 50 states and winning local elections. Then they’d look at state legislatures and governors. Then Congress for the House and Senate, and then the presidency.
That’s a lot of work though, so they’d rather run presidential candidates and grift for donations. The argument typically goes that they’re trying to bring awareness to their party through the presidential election – but how exactly is that going for them? It’s readily apparent that strategy doesn’t work, and they’d be better off putting in the hard work to become actual political contenders.
If you don’t like how Congress represents you, support your desired representatives and senators in primaries, and then vote for the person you dislike least in the general election. Or, encourage a third party candidate to run who has statewide recognition and plenty of political experience.
Democrats and Republicans are the only options because all the other choices are batshit insane or just want to steal your donations.
Absolutely. Anyone who would waste a lot of money on an election they stand zero chance of winning and spends nothing on elections they actually could win. Is not a serious group. Until you know basically all third parties in America are simply presidential spoilers. Outside of the likes of the DSA Etc who have run candidates in a few state and local races as well.
Yeah they’re pretty much the only group that seems to understand this. They have other struggles though with having greater appeal – mainly from what I can tell, there’s a lot of discord between different chapters.
That said, there actually is one socialist who did win a state legislature election, in Virginia. And they were able to get an insulin cap bill passed because they worked cooperatively with democrats.
This is the model that people need to follow if they want to move beyond Democrats and Republicans. This single socialist legislator in one state has done more than the entire green party combined.
Unless you’re capable of reasoning in which case you’d see that there are only 3 possible outcomes:
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vote democrat to reduce the amount of harm done
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vote third party and convince literally millions of other people to do so also (very very very unlikely to the point of basically impossibility)
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take literally any other action which at worst fully enables Trump and at best remains complicit in him amping up support for slaughtering Palestinians.
Options two and three are the same option in reality. But I know that Extra-Militant-Joffrey is in denial of these facts.
Voting for Democrat doesn’t reduce harm it increases harm
Stop repeating the same thing and tell us who we should vote for then. You’re worse than a politician.
Why should I blanket tell people who to vote for?
Because you’re blanket telling people not to vote and offering zero solutions while your high horse beggs your fat ass for reprieve.
Hey take that back. Extra-Militant-Joffrey has the best horses!
False. On balance Democrats improve conditions, which is especially obvious when compared with Republicans.
Are you a liar or a moron?
Yes.
But in all seriousness, Linkerbaan is an obvious bad faith actor. They’re actually campaigning for Trump by trying to get people to not vote for Biden.
Maybe I should go into right-wing spaces and start encouraging people to vote Libertarian.
It might not even be that hard. Look how easily they’re manipulated by Trump.
Great idea
Let’s just say for a moment you’re right and Democrats increase harm. Sure, they take Korporate Kampaign Kash (the other KKK), and are always about the donor class, and we can sure hit them on this. They’re feckless, always finding reasons we couldn’t POSSIBLY do Left-Wing priorities, and yeah, I’m pissed about how many times Manchin Lucy-Yanked the football on us this last term. They’d rather please the donor class than us, because, well, frankly, I can’t pay for an all-expenses paid junket to exotic places with exotic food and exotic people quite the same way as Mr. Gates and Mr. Dimon and Mr. Bezos and Mr. Musk can. It pisses me off that I have to sit so far back on the table while all the big names get to wine and dine President Biden and the Democratic Party, while I get a few scraps from the table.
We’ll ignore the fact that the scraps I have gotten have finally made it so I can quit schooling and realistically pay my Student Loans now that it’s capped to 5% of your disposable income, and that I only have to pay that for 10 years rather than 25 or more because of PSLF. We’ll ignore the fact that I got quick and free access to a vaccine that ended COVID as a threat to me, and that I am able to work from home because my (Democratic) governor said ‘we’re out of the business of commercial real-estate. Everyone, your home is your office now.’ Between the vaccine and the not having to crowd on public transit with people who are frankly nasty, I haven’t gotten sick more often than once a year. But hey, the Dems increase harm according to you, so let’s go with that. Why trust my lying eyes eh?
OK. The Democrats are the equivalent of slow-driving a car towards a cliff. The Republicans? They have a plan for what they want to do. What does it include?
- Fire Federal employees who refuse to implement Trump’s conservative manifesto for the USA.
- End FBI attempts to police misinformation (oh, sorry, “Speech”).
- Ban abortion pills federally.
- Enforce Comstock Act to ban the mailing of abortion pills.
- Exclude abortion coverage from Medicade
- Ban unfriendly news media from the White House press pool.
- Enforce unitary executive theory practices.
- Schedule F - Replace tens of thousands of career bureaucrats with hand-picked conservative plants, which will require a similar overreach by the next Democrat, assuming we are allowed to pick one as POTUS, to undo.
- Reverse liberal policies.
- Removing references to abortions.
- Defunding clinics that provide abortion services
- Defund Dept of Justice and FBI
- Target Political foes and unfriendly media orgs.
- Restrict LGBTQ+ rights.
- Rollback of climate policies.
- Force Conservative policies on us
- “Family Values”
- “Christian Values”
- “Traditional Gender Roles”
So, when I say the Democrats are slow-driving the car towards the cliff, if you let the Republicans behind the wheel, they’re gonna stomp on the gas as hard as they can, and they’re gonna rocket that sucker off the edge.
It may suck to you having to make this choice, but it’s what America offers. There are no other options in the USA thanks to our antiquated system of electing representatives. Pick the slow choice, or the fast choice will rocket you and everyone else off right…fucking…now.
PS: in case it’s not clear, I disagree with the heart of your argument, but for the sake of pointing out that even under your own assumptions, it’s better to vote D than R, I entertained it long enough to explain why you’re a fucking moron for pushing not to vote for Dems.
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Until and unless we get ranked voting, we’re stuck using the shit two-party system if we want to actually have a chance for our votes matter.
No you’re not.
I’m Canadian. We have first past the post. Largely its a toss up between 1 of 2 parties federally but our far left party has won provincial elections and was within spitting distance of winning federally in recent memory.
It isnt fptp that’s prevenring you from electing a third party. Its your share delusion that it can’t happen.
Your election system allowed Doug Ford to win the Premiership of Ontario with 2.3 million votes, despite the NDP winning 1.9 million votes and the Liberal party winning 1.1 million votes. In fact, Ford won Ontario with a net margin of victory of -991,722 votes. That is to say, he lost the popular vote by almost a million votes, and still win the majority of seats. Here’s a few highlights
8 ridings went for the Progressive Conservatives in a margin narrower than 1000. These are:
- Ottawa West - Nepean (175 MoV, 16.4k NDP, 14.8k Lib)
- Brantford - Brant (635 MoV, 23.8k NDP, 5.6k Lib)
- Brampton West (490 MoV, 14.5k NDP, 7.0k Lib)
- Sault Ste. Marie (414 MoV, 13.1k NDP, 3.2k Lib)
- Kitchener-Conestoga (686 MoV, 16.3 NDP, 6.0k Lib)
- Kitchener South - Hespeler (770 MoV, 15.7k NDP, 6.3k Lib)
- Eglinton-Lawrence (957 MoV, 9.0k NDP, 19.0k Lib)
- Scarborough-Rouge Park (963 MoV, 15.3k NDP, 8.8k Lib)
Had less than 1000 people in each of these ridings from the smaller left wing party given their votes to the larger left-wing party, 8 seats would have been taken from the Progressive Conservatives (leaving them with 68 seats), and the NDP would have gained 7 seats (47) and the Libs would have gained 1 (going up to 8).
This is the same for another 23 ridings, but with a larger margin of victory. These ridings were nevertheless won by fewer votes than were sent to the smaller left-wing party. If we subtract these 23 seats, the PCs would have been down to 45 seats, enough for the NDP to have more seats before we allocate these 23 seats between the Libs, NDP, and Greens.
I like a lot of things about Canada, but I don’t like this fact about your country, and I don’t want it imported into the United States. Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania went to Trump in 2016 not because more people voted for Trump’s policies than against them, but because enough people bought the bullshit that Clinton was corrupt and no better than Trump and voted third party or stayed home. Had the Stein voters used a bit of common sense and rethought their votes, we could have avoided 4 years of utter shitshow here. Canadian politics won’t help us here. All we need to do is look at your province of Ontario and see that clear as day.
An interesting thought exercise. What if Ontario used Proportional Representation. Ford would have gotten 76 seats, but he’d have seen an Ontario Parliament that was 187 or 188 seats. Of these:
- The NDP would have gotten another 22 seats, in addition to their 40 won seats, for 62 total seats.
- The Liberals would have gotten another 29 seats, in addition to their 7 won seats, for 36 total seats.
- The Greens would have gotten 7 additional seats, plus their 1 won seat, for a total of 8 seats.
- 5 seats would have to be allocated between the NDP, Liberals, and Greens since the Progressive Conservatives shouldn’t be entitled to more than 40.5% of the seats as they got 40.5% of the vote.
We’d have to amend the US constitution to make this happen here, but I think you guys could just do it with a law there. But this is what ifs and coulda-bens. The as-is shows clearly why we don’t want to import your political system here. Democrats would never win an election again if we split our votes like Ontarians split theirs…
strategic voting consolidates parties. values voting is the only way to elect someone with your own values.
It was a republican amendment
The Data presented does not support the conclusion. This suggests dishonesty on your part.
This was a Republican bill that Democrats opposed. Fuck your “both sides” bullshit
I’m 13 and I think you’re right. What are primaries btw?
A true big brain (rot) take. Keep trying genius
bOtH sIdEs, amirite? Clown
That’s not realistic in America with our duopoly and FPTP voting system. Voting for progressive candidates locally is our best bet and being represented, and supporting Ranked Voting systems in place of FPTP.
Obviously this is cruel and the republicans can go fuck themselves. But also it would be quite hilariously stupid for the US to pay to destroy Gaza and pay to rebuild it.
I would say help rebuild it, but perhaps they should have reconsidered the destroying part. But hey what do I know. Something something important ally in the region, just a little smidge of genocide and apartheid. All good nothing to see here
We did exactly that in Iraq and Afghanistan. To add insult to injury, VP Dick Cheney’s company, Haliburton Oil, got the rebuilding contracts.
Oh how Haliburton has fallen, they should have a $20 bil bid to rebuild their schools and infrastructure…
While Democrats opposed the amendment, which passed by a simple voice vote, they did not request a recorded vote.
Before you blame this on republicans, Dems didn’t even challenge it for a vote so they had to put their names on it.
They just fucking stood there.
Wonder why Hakeem Jefferies didn’t even try…
https://www.opensecrets.org/members-of-congress/hakeem-jeffries/summary?cid=N00033640
If you wonder why pro Israel Dems keep getting to the general where Dem voters have no option but voting for them:
That has made AIPAC the biggest source of Republican money flowing into competitive Democratic primaries this year, according to a POLITICO analysis of campaign finance data — and drawn outrage from the left over what it sees as GOP meddling in Democratic contests.
Nearly half of AIPAC donors to Democratic candidates this year have some recent history of giving to Republican campaigns or committees.
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/06/09/aipac-republican-donors-democratic-primaries-00162404
Anyone want to guess what US politician has taken more money than anyone else from pro-Israel lobbyists?
And yes, I’m aware AIPAC isn’t required to register as an agent of a foreign government, they get an exception.
The only reason it exists is because the prior group did have to register as a foreign agent in 1962. So they rebranded and donated to the people in charge of deciding who goes on that list, so AIPAC has never had to go on that list.
This has been an issue for over 60 years and there’s no rational excuse to keep ignoring it.
Edit:
I should have presented the way for Dems to stop this:
In the United States House of Representatives, the filibuster (the right to unlimited debate) was used until 1842, when a permanent rule limiting the duration of debate was created.[70] The disappearing quorum was a tactic used by the minority until Speaker Thomas Brackett Reed eliminated it in 1890.[71] As the membership of the House grew much larger than the Senate, the House had acted earlier to control floor debate and the delay and blocking of floor votes. The magic minute allows party leaders to speak for as long as they wish, which Kevin McCarthy used in 2021 to set a record for the longest speech on the House floor (8 hours and 33 minutes) in opposition to the Build Back Better Act.[72][73]
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filibuster
Republicans did it for 8.5 hours just a few years ago…
Jefferies agrees with Republicans on this though.
Which is one of the big complaints about current Dem leadership. They only fight if they’re 100% sure they’ll win. Voters want politicians willing to fight even if it’s hard and losing is possible.
We can’t fight facism like this, because they fight every battle even if they don’t have a chance of winning.
I’m sorry, “before you blame this on republicans”? Republicans vote for Horrible Policy, pass it, but we should blame it on democrats for not …calling for a recorded vote? Yeesh.
Democrats didn’t have the votes. You don’t like this result, vote out republicans.
givesomefucks covertly attacks Democrats in every comment. It’s often a baseless argument, beginning with some truth. They start making a good point, then twist it into a veiled criticism of Biden or Democrats, even when it’s the fault of Republicans or entirely apolitical.
In this case you’re correct. The Republican majority in the House makes a vote pointless.
Ironically, the same message givesomefucks is spreading will disengage people who may otherwise increase Democratic representation in government, leading to actual positive change.
They may just want to ensure they have something to complain about next year.
TLDR: OP honestly pointed out an awful thing that the Dems did. This kind of honesty is bad because it may make you not want to vote for Dems. Republicans are bad because they are dishonest and do awful things.
Incorrect. They didn’t challenge it because they don’t have House majority. If it were put to a vote, they’d lose regardless. It’s a moot point, and givesomefucks is leveraging it as a wedge issue.
It’s a baseless argument designed to point fingers at Democratic Representatives, when the actual problem is low Democratic voter turnout in congressional elections. If we had majority in the House, this vote would actually have a chance.
Dissuading people from voting Democrat will worsen this issue, not improve it. Notice they never have a solution? It’s always “don’t vote Democrat” without any suggestions for change? It’s completely contradictory advice from a passionate disengagement advocate.
Democrats didn’t have the votes.
Why is it Dems need a super majority to do anything then?
The fillibuster, right?
Like, you know the reason you call for a vote is so a fillibuster can happen, right?
If there’s no vote, there’s no chance to filibuster.
So the reason no one had a chance to fillinuster, is Hakeem Jefferies let it happen without a vote.
The fillibuster has nearly no relation to what the house does. I don’t know why you’re hung up on it. I mean read your own damn quote. Do you think anyone cares if a party leader decides to speak for 8 hours in the house before a vote? For a day? They don’t need a supermajority to stop them, they just let them run out of steam. The Senate it matters, but it’s just theater in the house .
Do you think anyone cares if a party leader decides to speak for 8 hours in the house before a vote? For a day?
Yes…
In the run up to a very important election it’s important for dem leadership to show potential voters that Dems will fight for what voters want.
Like. Why would you think that isnt important to voters?
But…
It’s disappointing that you don’t remember when Republicans did it in 2021.
Republican voters did, and it contributed to their gains in 2022. Because their voters believed Republicans would fight even if they knew they couldn’t win.
And that’s what voters want out of their representatives.
Because the reason many leftists are dissatisfied with Dems is that they’re largely performative, and you’re arguing for more performative nonsense that achieves nothing.
No.
I’m arguing that bare minimum they should be doing “performative nonsense that achieves nothing.”…
Why do you think that “literally nothing” is better?
Edit:
I think the difference is you want actually stuff accomplished. I do too.
But that’s not going to happen, so I at least want “performative nonsense” because that will keep Trump out of office.
And like Biden supporters keep saying, that is the most important thing about the upcoming election.
I just want party leaders to start acting like it instead of just saying it as an excuse for their actions or lack of actions.
If there was going to be a fillibuster, then they would have requested a vote count. You don’t avoid a vote count to prevent fillibuster, if you intend to fillibuster, then you ask for a vote count.
That said, I mostly agree with you this time otherwise. The dems do not want to take a stand on this issue because they are trying not to alienate the moderate pro-Israeli faction. It’d be cool though, if you could stop conveniently forgetting that the dems are not a hard progressive party that always wants to do progressive things but is being held back by its leadership. It’s just not factual. There is a reason Bernie is not registered as a dem.
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You don’t understand how the US government works. This comment makes that incredibly obvious.
The filibuster is in the Senate. Not the House. That should be obvious to anyone who pays attention to politics.
He literally gave an example of a filibuster on the House floor in his comment. Idk how effective it would be, but he did source an example of someone fighting with a filibuster.
It’s only for party leaders. And they’d have to actually speak the entire time. The GOP would just wait and then pass it when he was done. It’s not like the Senate filibuster which can effectively kill legislation.
I kinda see their point, though. Even that kind of performative gesture would get headlines and demonstrate to the public that they’re trying actively to fight for the cause. It’s like when Trump would try to do something and get shut down, like with the Muslim ban or something. He would look like he was doing something and getting obstructed by courts or the “deep state”, but it made people feel like they had an advocate on their site, even though he just didn’t care that much and was mostly out to enrich himself.
I agree, it’s not totally unreasonable to do it, but it’s also not totally unreasonable to not do it, and to save the media attention for something more meaningful. And less divisive for Democrats. Like, say, a law banning abortion federally.
Wow, not a word about the Republicans that introduced the measure to block funding and who hold a majority in the House.
It’s clear which party and which presidential candidate is a better choice for people who care about Gaza and want to resist right-wing regimes (such as Netanyahu) worldwide. The Democratic one.
The Democrats gladly participated. If their actions are the same what does the wording matter?
Their actions are not the same. Republicans blocked the funding by introducing a measure to eliminate it, not Democrats.
BoTh SiDeS… bla, bla bla… There must be some mistake here, Trump causes all the bad stuff, we just have to keep Trump out of office so then everything will be great! Trump is a literal fascist! He’s going to do awful things, Biden and his dems are doing so good, basically the human form of the word “perfection”!
I’m sorry, I can’t really follow what you’re saying here.
But it might help if you read my reply to the other person about why without a vote there couldn’t be a filibuster allowing this to happen with a Republican majority rather than a supermajority
Now, enough Dems might have voted with Republicans on this, but I want to know their fucking names at least
Not for them to hide behind republicans skirt and count on people blaming them.
Exactly. I’m just pointing out how stupid people are who always say that it’s the Republicans that do awful shit and not Dems. This is yet another case of them both being awful, and yet whenever things like this get pointed out, people jump up and yell about how both sides are not the same. I just beat the fools to it so that when they do it, it looks especially dumb. They will probably just silently downvote since they really have no other way to respond.
