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> WTF? The Democrats are the ones with concrete offers to ease people's suffering. Literally. Stuff like Medicare for all. No. Democrats have concrete offers.
by hnbad 2y ago
> WTF? The Democrats are the ones with concrete offers to ease people's suffering. Literally. Stuff like Medicare for all.
No. Democrats have concrete offers. The Democrats don't. The Democrats had several opportunities to pass far-reaching reforms like Medicare For All but didn't.
There's a massive difference between the ideals of a few activist politicians running for office and the actual policy decisions of a government led by that party.
Also, I already acknowledged that the US handled the recession remarkably well. But that still doesn't change that generally things are pretty rough and "doing largely the same for 4 more years" isn't a very attractive position to the masses when the other guy is appealing to the base instincts of "strong man will fix problem" - especially in a cultural environment where "hard problems require hard solutions" (i.e. that morally repugnant actions are often necessary to help people in the long run) is often accepted without questions.
- bryanlarsen 2y ago> generally things are pretty rough But better than everywhere else in the world. Virtually every other country did worse over the last 4 years than the US did. > The Democrats had several opportunities to pass far-reaching reforms like Medicare For All but didn't. They had 2 opportunities to bypass the Senate filibuster and pass far-reaching reforms. They chose to use those two opportunities to fight inflation and stabilize the economy.
- hnbad 2y agoYou'd have a point if the Democratic party ever acknowledged any of that. Instead the party line has been "things are actually fine the way they are and we're on the right track". Alas, being the adults in the room doesn't get you elected because this isn't The West Wing and Republicans don't simply disagree "but share the same goals". It literally doesn't matter how much the Democrats have prevented things from being worse in the past because their messaging is what ultimately allowed Trump to win. Twice. This isn't the 1990s anymore. People don't want stable. People are sick of stable because what has been stabilized had already not been working for them before. There's been a massive, crippling redistribution of wealth and political power in all Western economies (and the former Eastern bloc but they were less subtle about it) from the people to the billionaire class. You can no longer pretend that's not happening. At least the Republicans had the good sense to actively lie and misdirect and continue to do so while said billionaires are desparately trying to dismantle the system before it can be turned against them.