Do I like seeing him fuck with Trump? Yes.
Is he a dirty neo liberal? Yes.
Would I support him in a primary for President in 2028? Probably not. I sure hope someone better shows up.
Would I support him if he won the Democratic primary? Yes. Assuming we get elections. Assuming the DNC hasn’t fully fractured and a third party candidate cannot reasonably win.
Would he fix our country? No. See item 2.
Thank you for coming to my TED talk. Its not hard, people.
Good take. Maybe the Kamala protest abstainers will have a fresh enough dose of Trumpism to remember that halfway-kind-of-decent-sometimes is better than literally-the-worst-possible-decision-at-all-times. I hope we still have elections. I hope we are not stuck with Newsom as the only choice. But if we are, he IS the only choice, and even though he’s not nearly a progressive, he is far closer to it than whatever the GOP rolls out with in 3 years (whether it is Trump again, Trump Jr., Vance, or a new piece of shit far right authoritarian). We need to make sure he wins, and that means getting your asses to the booth. All of us. Even you.
Goddam. You guys sure love hoping someone else learns lessons. You ever hope democrats learn a little something?
I very clearly said that I hope we are not stuck with him. Hoping that Dems get their shit together and act right or at least get out of the waybof those who do is a constant state for me.
I desperately wish it was this straightforward to the majority of people who shape our future in this country.
I am firmly convinced that most of our population doesn’t have internal language, no internal tools for abstracting ideas into mental words for comparison and evaluation, and just spout rhetoric by instinct. Literally, this is why everyone seems so stupid… they’ve changed the way their minds work by scrolling all day, every day, and not socializing and not changing habits.
Nuance is something that you can only arrive at if you have this mental narrative tool that lets you see multiple angles of an issue.
This means that our future of politics is going to be entirely grifters riding on this fact and creating over-the-top caricatures and WWE theater style politics. And people will eat it up because everyone just wants something to be all-in for or all-against so they can fight with the opposing fans. We’re so fucking cooked.
Yeah it can’t be that people are frustrated about living in a country where they’re in a permanent minority and will never be happy with their government.
Thank you for the non-sequitur response. I will return in kind with “Banana kneecap caterpillar establishment.”
Libs and dismissing any criticism from progressives. Can’t name a more iconic duo.
I am dismissing your complete lack of effort in engaging with a point, if it makes you feel better to think of someone who called that shit out as a “lib” then have it, meanwhile I will continue to rally people behind the point that a third of our population is too stupid with to continue to engage with using the same liberal political methods of inclusion and mediocrity and financial status-quo. I don’t know where that leaves you, but please do it over there on the other side of the curb.
You said people are stupid and lack a sense of nuance.
I pointed out that people are frustrated and don’t give a fuck about nuance anymore, and that’s why we’re fucked.
Sorry I didn’t spell that out for you.
Yes, you do have to make an effort to connect topics when communicating.
And sure, there is a problem with apathy, but that’s not THE problem. The last three presidential elections have seen the highest voter turnout in American history, it’s not a problem with people not caring as much as being too easily swayed to care about the wrong things, and this comes from a lack of education, lack of language skills, lack of cognitive ability broadly. When you say “People are too frustrated to care about nuance” yes, this IS stupidity. Stupidity isn’t some magic potion, it’s caused by things. In this case, it’s been designed by corporate interests using fascism to further this goal of a dumb, easily manipulated population.
This is the way.
So sick of the division amongst the left. He is far from perfect, but I’d much rather take a neoliberal over a fascist.
With all due respect, as I understand where this sentiment comes from, that is how Trump gained momentum and won.
I think the blue no matter who approach has failed more than worked considering Hillary failed, Biden did win but really it was more Trump lost, Kamala lost (she got a shit deal yeah but still neolib vs unchained Trump should have been a no contest) and going further back Gore and Kerry lost to Bush. Clinton basically was the centrist Republican neolib that got Dems a roadmap that they keep to this day.
The time for half measures is over and the DNC needs to adapt or they will end up like the Whig Party. If you dont believe me look at their approval right now, No one likes the Democrats
Newsom is an establishment figure and telling the next generation of voters this is going to be a candidate for change won’t yield the results you think.
Leftists: “Democratic politicians are feckless. They need to get on social media to call out Trump’s bullshit on daily basis! When is a leader going to step up?!”
Somewhere, a finger curls on a monkey’s paw.
Calling him out on social media is absolutely not what I want and is definitely feckless.
Neoliberals Don’t oppose fascists.
He will work with the fascist to come up with a compromise that the fascists can live with. That probably means sacrificing vulnerable groups and rallying around right wing talking points.
He is right wing. Gavin newsom is just right wing. the fact that there’s a uneven deeper more belligerent right wing out there doesn’t mean that he is somehow an alternative to it.
He threw trans people under the bus, and there’s no way in hell I’m voting for that.
You Americans don’t learn, constantly punching left, nobody is good enough to be an ally. While the right is unified and eating your lunch
This is true to an extent, but when you look at the history of the moral majority (new right movement) and what actually unified the right, it should give you some context about how the Dems aren’t really doing themselves any favors by distancing themselves from progressive values. The right were always willing to offer some concessions to what were once considered fringe voters (and now is essentially the base of the Republican party) in exchange for their vote.
I say this as someone who is almost always willing to vote blue no matter who, continuously catering to the wealthy and failing to follow through on promises is going to be the nail in the coffin for Democrats (and possibly American democracy in general). Midterms will probably be their last chance to get it right (if we’re even allowed to vote) and they are definitely not off to a good start by giving the cold shoulder to Mamdani.
It’s very hard to battle voter apathy and “both sides” disinformation when Democrats will not even acknowledge that much of what progressives are asking for is pretty reasonable. Establishment Dems seem to believe once they’re accused of cultural marxism (which btw is a term that was popularized by the same people that created the moral majority/new right) they will lose centrists voters that might help them gain an edge over the competition. Meanwhile they seem to be oblivious to all the support on the left that they’re absolutely hemorrhaging.
Some of that support is going to the right (and those are the people Gavin Newsome seemed really be worried about reaching with his podcast that “reached across the aisle” to some absolutely vile people), but a big chunk is being lost to people who just no longer see a point in bothering to vote for an establishment that seems to intentionally exclude and dismiss them.
I believe what I believe, and whoever shares my values, will get my support. Compromising on my values to get some kind of “strategic alliances” is something I don’t do. If you look across the world and across history, that generally doesn’t end well in the long term.
Bruh what do you think political parties are?
Unions, national alliances, society… It’s all people compromising on their individual values.
Good for you for letting perfect be the enemy of good, bet you feel so vindicated as the world burns down around you.
And where did partisan politics bring us to? The world is burning down around us even without my help. I think this validates my point.
As long as you vote for someone I don’t care whether you choose the candidate that I would vote for. There’s no wasted votes, I’ve voted 3rd party when the major candidates aren’t someone I can vote for in good conscience.
If you abstain on “principle” because there isn’t a politician that perfectly aligns with your values then yeah, you’re just dumb and you’re part of the problem.
About 60% of the country votes in the general election, much less in the primaries, and much, much less in local elections. People that don’t vote because they can’t be assed suck, but the ones that sit on a high horse and scoff at the system that they play a huge hand in perpetuating through some misguided moral high ground are literally the worst.
I dunno, I’d say the left tried it your way in 2016 and 2024 and how’s that working out?
Nope he’s not. But he’s not as bad as trump.
He might not be a progressive but he’s not a Russian cum rag, so speaking as a member of a (for the moment) allied country, he is lightyears ahead of your current guy.
Don’t split. I don’t like the guy much if I have better options, but anytime he’s punching right I’m for him.
No fascism is better than fascism. Hopefully if he runs and wins he actually fixes the problems that led to fascism. He needs to tax the wealthy at 98%.
OH boy I sure do love purity checks. It’s worked out so great for us in the past.
Why is this shit always all or nothing, goddamn. It works for maga because they have no nuance and it’s all groupthink, but the rest of the nation is far more complex and won’t just go for a hard left progressive in the same way. It needs to happen but it won’t happen in a single election.
I am in no way endorsing newsome, but at least he’s doing LITERALLY ANYTHING.
Exactly, people tried that shit with Carney up here and we all knew we were not getting a progressive PM but we sure as hell didn’t get a right wing mini trump.
Could we have gotten better? For sure but desperate times man, desperate times…
…you expect the dems to run a progressive?
I fully expect to see a repeat of 2020. The party establishment will be split between Elderly Nepo-Ghoul With Fanatical Partisan Following and Young Pretty Boy Who Says Progressive Things To A Room Of Millennial Age Investment Bankers.
On the edge of the debate, you’ll see a few genuinely progressive leftist voices saying things like “We should be against genocide” and “Homelessness is easily solveable if we put forward even the least amount of political capital” and “Granting DC statehood is the most obviously smart and moral Act any future Congress can pass”. Maybe even a few “Medicare 4 All is still a good idea” die-hards shouting from the extremely cheap seats.
And then one (or both) of the insider candidates will pick up a few of the more popular slogans as their own. This, while denouncing any of the fringe voices as Anti-White Racists, Politically Toxic Far-Left Anti-Capitalists, Eco-Terrorists, and Fat Ugly Unfuckable Losers.
Come primary day, said fringe leftists will do shockingly well in some of the early states. At this point, the centrist candidates will panic, drop the kabuki of intra-party squabbling, align behind whomever the current Party Elder tells them to select, scream that a vote for Fringe Candidate is a vote for Fascism, blanket the airwaves with a deafening smear campaign, disavow every nice thing they said up until this point, and maybe squeak in to the convention by a few points on a technicality about who gets to be Superdelegates.
The Convention will be a coronation of a rotten corporate homunculus. Any leftist disgusted by the process or the annointed candidate will be denounced as a Far-Right Foreign Plant designed to undermine the fundamental principles of democracy itself. Said rotten homunculus will pick a Token Minority/Progressive as their running mate, then immediately dump that person to the sidelines and campaign exclusively with the reanimated corpse of Rush Limbaugh.
Trump wins by a ten point margin in 2028. Leftists are blamed for the loss. Democrats vow to purge their party of anything resembling progressive values or human decency even harder. By 2032, they’re running a Bitcoin Billionaire in an uncontested primary, because it’s unreasonable to trust an election process that’s been infiltrated by Hamas.
He only looks good compared to the opposition.
Don’t care. Way better than fascism and besides, the tweets are hilarious.
Perhaps. But I’d rather have this guy than a pedophile rapist.
CLOSE ENOUGH. for fuck’s sake if you wait for perfect you’ll get stuck with shit like trump again.
Why is wanting things to get better instead of stagnating or getting worse somehow impossible to understand?
When the Duopoly exists to ratchet us twoards fascism then the only way out is to abandon the Duopoly.
Voting / politics is a chess game. Sometimes you have to plan ahead and work from behind and sacrifice some positions. Refusing to play the pieces you have (even from a losing position) is just letting the opponent win.
If there’s a better primary challenger than Newsom, a Progressive candidate, I’m all for them. I want them. I don’t want Newsom, but if it comes down to him or another trump clone, Newsom is good enough to at least keep us from societal collapse.
Refusing to vote for him because he’s not a perfect fit is just giving the enemy a win. See: all those who refused to vote for Harris and now we have trump.
There’s no viable 3rd party candidate. Probably never will be.
Lmao i saw this same comment in 2016
Just save this post and you can use it every 8 years until we are killing each other for clean water
Ok. So how do we “abandon the duopoly?” Honest question. If you have a viable suggestion, I am all for it. Because refusing to vote is what trump wants you to do.
Hold on there partner, it can get so much worse.
There is a hot car with an infant inside and parent no where in site. Should you break the window and save the child? Breaking a window is bad so we shouldn’t do it. They just shouldn’t have locked the baby in the car. I’m not going to vote for vandalism.
-protest non-voter
Listen, I know we are the tiny bubble, so posting this here has no negative effect — but 2028 has to be about people on the right and left joining together to repudiate fascism and totalitarianism. Who cares about the past under these circumstances. I hope that Newsom’s lack of prog cred gives him cred with the pugs who hate Trump. Or are lukewarm on Trump.
The Harris thinking Cheney would sway voters pipeline again? Oof.
2028 has to be about people on the right and left joining together to repudiate fascism and totalitarianism
not pictured are all the ignorant morons that believe billionaire news media that sanewashes the people those pictured in hoods follow.
reality has nuance, removing it hurts us all.
The right does not think this is fascism. So, there goes that fantasy.
There has to be economic pain so bad that they can’t refute it anymore. That’s our only hope.
That or Trump dying before the end of his term.
