For those who won't compromise in the GE--here's my problem

[jpgray]

(No candidate mentions, please--don't get my thread locked. :))

We're not going to be able to wholesale change the direction of this country in *one election*, or in four. The demand isn't there for radical change, so it is NOT going to happen.

Why isn't the demand there? Partly because the people aren't *yet* in grave danger--they aren't fighting for survival.

There is poverty here. It can be crushing. But the majority of Americans have their color TV, their love handles, their crappy job and their credit card debt, and will vote as lazily as they scan the headlines. We're no smarter than they are, but they sure are complacent, and they are not suffering on the scale that would bring real change--they are not fighting for survival.

If you want to look at a relatively rapid, and long overdue, shift of wealth in the country, it's easy to look at the New Deal. But as my avatar would tell you, the amount of suffering necessary to BRING this country to that point (the point of real socialist values becoming accepted in the capitalist's paradise) was extreme. Can you imagine whole swaths of a state's population loading up the family and possessions in a car and clogging the interstate to CA due to financial pressure these days? Our suffering isn't that acute yet, and because it isn't, *rapid* change will be difficult if not impossible to effect. The level of suffering needs to trump the innate vulnerability people have to being controlled, by the media or other means. That isn't happening yet.

We CAN do a more gradual change. This isn't as sexy as the rapid change, because the gradual change will piss you off and fail your values 80% of the time and you'll want to walk away from it. But the difference in my mind between those who expect a slog and those who expect rapid change in this situation is as follows: the former is willing to work very hard and thanklessly for any number of years towards the cause, without hope of seeing any results from his labor. The latter is more liable to talk loudly and make visible, dramatic gestures, asking for fulfillment of most of their values and nothing less, and taking their support elsewhere if that fulfillment isn't there.

People honestly seem to beleive that a real reformer, outsider or third party challenge to corporatist politics could survive in our system. I find this belief tremendously naive. The system won't accept a true far left progressive in high office. Everyone knows this--they say the media is against them, that the insider politicians on all sides play dirty tricks to obfuscate the true issues, etc.

No kidding!

So the system won't allow a good outsider candidate to succeed, yet some will only support such a candidate. Think about that for a moment. Do they expect the system to magically be fixed by some benevolent and fantastical fairness gnomes? If people want major leftist change in the country, and the system won't allow it, shouldn't the chief priority be FIXING that system? You can't do that by supporting a candidate, you do that by putting people in power to gradually swing the system back to where it ought to be. You certainly DON'T get the system fixed when power hungry right wingers have control of every flippin' branch of government.

Who can be placed in power? With the FUCKED up system we have, Democrats or Republicans. Who will at least fix SOME of what is wrong with the system? A few good Democrats. You know who is the best on these issues, and who is less good. But even those who are less good will maintain the level of unfairness the system already has. The Republicans will seek ever to increase it--witness Green Party persecution, media consolidation, Diebold, corporate pandering, etc.

So if anyone wants to one-liner me, go ahead, but this I think is at the root of my disagreement with those who refuse to support anyone to the right of Kucinich. You can vote however you want, and ideals are great, but I'm not satisfied with backing a candidate who holds my ideals, I want my ideals to have a chance of becoming national policy. That's why I will vote and work for Democrats I don't match very well with. As you can see, any of our guys is a step in the proper direction, backing away from authoritarianism and shifting to left.

[burrowowl]

1. I'm surprised

that Bu$hie is higher up on authoritarian and further to the right.
Only 2 real lefties, sad.
But we will vote Dem anyway.

[berry]

2. Good points

I have come to the same conclusions--but hadn't articulated them. So thanks. And a kick. :kick:

The chart is also interesting. I'd love to see the question-by-question answers that got some of them into the places they occupy.
My only quibble is that *Bush's place on the chart may be according to what he SAYS. If he were charted according to what he's done and is doing, he would be almost off the charts. IMO.

[SaddenedDem]

3. Sorry, can't do it

The Democratic party has asked us to vote for the lesser of 2 evils for too many election cycles. There will always be a republican "boogie man" and I've promised myself I will never compromise again.

I'll not hold my nose and vote for a candidate who does not support my beliefs.

[jpgray]

6. You echo the historical argument perfectly

Ernst Thalmann wrote in December 1931: 'By raising the specter of Hitler's fascism, Social Democracy is attempting to sidetrack the masses from the vigorous action against the dictatorship of finance capital.... There are some people who fail to see the Social Democratic forest for the National Socialist trees'. He confused the murderous Social-Democratic reactionary practices with fascism, and did not realize at the time that Hitler would move to crush all independent political movements in Germany once he solidified his power. Indeed he believed the Nazi success in the election of 1930 would be Hitler's "best day", and that he would have "worse days" from that time forward. Thalmann later died in Buchenwald.

[SaddenedDem]

9. And this kind of rubbish is EXACTLY what is wrong with the party

If you think this trash is going to convince me to change my mind, you are sadly mistaken.

In fact, it makes me dig my heels in further. Keep calling me names, associating me with evil. I'll stop walking away from the party and RUN LIKE HELL.

[jpgray]

10. What trash? Where do I call you names? (nt)

[Point_n_click]

20. Next time don't duck ...

You let the point of the post go over your head.

By sitting things out if you don't get everything handed to you in one fell sweep you become complicit in the speeding of things in the wrong direction.

You either have to help put the brakes on the machine and help begin to turn it toward the better road or just shut up and don't complain when the nation goes screeming off the tracks and burns.

Remember, you're going to burn along with the rest of us so please try to help us stop or at least slow things down instead of taking your hands off the wheel completely and throwing a tantrum because the rest of us didn't have time to stop at the convenience store for your coffee.

Yeah, I don't like some of the candidate choices out there (including the most likely one to get the nomination at present), but I'll be darned if in a fit of selfish pique I'll let go of the rope and let the rest of my tug of war team end up in the mud. Especially since I'm going to get covered in it from the resulting splash if the other team wins again anyway.

Point_n_Click

PS - late night caffeine rush not a good thing for writing. The correct point is there, but reading back over it I used some bizarre images to get it across. :)

[SaddenedDem]

22. Someone else's turn.....

Because, you see, I've been at the front of the rope line for almost 16 years now.

I didn't agree with Clinton and NAFTA and Don't Ask/Don't Tell and many other issues. But I kept tugging for 2 elections and 8 years....

And then Al Gore and all the things I held my nose over with him....

And, now, you want me to stand there at the front of the line and wait for the Democratic party to splash mud in my face as they peel out on their way to the White House and screwing the people some more.

No thanks, it's your turn to take the front of the rope. I'm tired of tugging.

[Salviati]

4. There are some people out there

Who insist that it has to get worse before it gets better. Call me an optimist, call me naive, but I believe that it can get better before it gets better...

[DuctapeFatwa]

5. I think things have gotten to the point that - look what you're asking

people to compromise on:

imperialist colonialization, slaughter of innocents, seizing peoples' wives and kids for "interrogation," concentration camps, just about everything that's listed as a crime against humanity, the US is either doing it, or paying to have it done, or both.

If there are any people left in this country who don't see that kind of thing as negotiable, then may God bless them and may they live long and well, and when someone orders them to kick in YOUR door, may they hold fast to those principles that are so sneered at here on this progressive message board.

And we haven't even gotten to using the constitution for toilet paper, or these sweet little posts telling people that they better suck up being second-class citizens or they will be persecuted MORE.

A political solution is no longer a realistic possibility, so in a way, I guess it doesn't matter much whether people compromise or not, but when the day comes, for those of you who will be needing a basement to hide in, I strongly suggest you ask someone who will not compromise, and I even more strongly suggest that you do not let anyone who will compromise know you are still in the country.

[jpgray]

7. These things have happened throughout this country's history

Either you are working against it, working for it, or just talking about it.

edit: I don't mean to imply that people should just forget about their values and stupidly vote "D" because they like the letter's shape. I am saying we have to recognize that our system is in the gutter, and barring some disaster or other (which we are close to), the people aren't going to be keen on radical change. So if anyone has a way to effect serious change without ever voting for someone whose values are at odds with my own, I'm all ears.

Heck, even Dennis and I disagree on the flag amendment, and on abortion and gay rights as recently as 1996.

[DuctapeFatwa]

12. Have you ever had a credit card?

Maybe when you were younger, not so wise, or maybe you know someone who has had a credit card, and charged things on it, month after month, year after year.

From time to time, someone may say, hey you better take it easy on that credit card, and the shopper says, oh man, I have been using this credit card for years now.

One day, your friend gets her credit card bill and discovers that not only isn't there any more room left on it, but the finance charges alone are almost as much as the minimum payment, and the minimum payment is now so high that he can't afford to pay it and eat too.

Add a couple of late charges, and your friend is in trouble! Even if he cuts out ALL extras and goes on the all Ramen noodle diet and buys no new clothes or toothpaste or batteries for the next 60 years, he is still going to just be paying the finance charges on that credit card.

Now if your friend had been even stupider, he wouldn't have even gotten a credit card, he would have gone to some of those easy credit low low payment places that charge you $10 a month for so many months, then the entire balance is due. That's called a balloon payment.

The US has a walletful of maxxed out credit cards, and there's not a balloon payment place on the planet where they don't have a big ol' balance waaaay past due.

[jpgray]

14. I don't dispute your points.

I just don't want the swing to the left (it will come eventually) to be the result of a disaster, economic or otherwise. Some people think we should just let the Republicans take the wheel and crash us so we can get about fixing things. I hold the view that we should hold things together as long as possible and work like crazy for some small change. There isn't a single Democratic or third party candidate who matches my values exactly, but I will still vote in November.

[DuctapeFatwa]

17. I wish I could tell you that anything you or I do would avert a disaster

but I can't, because it wouldn't.

The reality is, it is not likely that who you vote for will matter one way or the other, since the machines will do what the company is paid to do, so your vote is a comfort gesture, and anyone who will feel more comfortable voting their conscience should not hesitate to do so.

[jpgray]

23. I won't argue that either. (nt)

[KC21304]

13. And good luck to you and all your noncompromising friends.

Say someone has $0 and says they need $10. Someone comes along and offers them $6, with the possibility of getting more, but the person with $0 says no, if I cannot have $10 now I don't want any.

I would say some went for the $0 dollars in 2000. I guess we should take a poll and see how they think that worked out for them.

[jpgray]

16. It's a serious issue, and DuctapeFatwa makes some valid points. (nt)

[DuctapeFatwa]

19. Try it with your mortgage payment or rent

And remember my advice about hiding in basements.

One good thing about compromising, you won't have to worry about people asking if they can hide in yours.

[For PaisAn]

8. Once agaion

you are correct. Logical and realistic. My emotions are too raw right now too make any decisions, maybe tomorrow.

[For PaisAn]

11. On second thought

maybe we need to stop compromising. We've been doing it for a long time and it hasn't worked out too well, has it? Maybe we have to vote our principles and let things get worse so that people are suffering on the scale that would bring real change. Maybe people will be motivated only when they are fighting for survival. I'm not heartless and don't want this to be the case but it may be true. I don't know.

[jpgray]

15. You might be right--I of course have no idea (nt)

[camero]

18. I'm all about electing a democrat

After that is done I will probably put the screws to whoever is elected to make sure it goes farther towards the left. Just because you can't elect your ideals doesn't mean you let go of your ideals.

How to fix the sysytem is to get off of all this hero worship and start electing regular people at the local level instead of the same old lawyers, developers, doctors, and others of the hobnob society.

Then let them rise.

[neebob]

21. I think there's more difference

between the Bush dot and that other cluster of dots than that graph leads one to believe. I just want a president who isn't a warmongering right-wing nut and tells the truth at least occasionally. A president my mother doesn't like. One who doesn't give me nightmares and make me worry about waking up in an unimaginable apocalyptic world or losing my son in some bullshit war or merely posting comments on a message board in cyberspace. With one exception, I would feel a hundred times safer with any of those dots than the one on the top right. That one belongs behind bars.

[Moderator]

24. Locking

Rules to start discussion threads in the General Discussion forum.

...

7. Discussion topics that mention any or all of the Democratic presidential primary candidates are not permitted in the General Discussion forum, and instead must be posted in the General Discussion: 2004 Primary forum.

Thank you for your understanding and cooperation,
DU moderator

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"... anyone to the right of Kucinich." and the graphic names all the candidates. :eyes: