Slotkin is the new Sinema and can GFY, but there is a component to this that does deserve some discussion.
If you look back on the past 10 years of the Democrats climbing hills for issues, I think it’s out of sync with the majority of people. The staunch fight for identity politics is not what people seem to want or need right now, and they need to understand that. Maybe there was a time when this was what their constituents wanted, but no longer.
Now they need to be really fucking strong on fighting the billionaires, pushing back against the front to vast majority of the country that has no wealth, and finding ways to make that flip around so that the wealthy who are imposing the enshitification of the lower and middle class are held accountable for doing so.
Forget the current struggles we’re forced to dread living through, and give people a clear plan and the hope that you’ll actually be attacking these things when elected. Seems pretty simple.
The staunch fight for identity politics is not what people seem to want or need right now, and they need to understand that.
They’re paid a lot of money specifically so they don’t understand that…
The entire reason for the culture war is to distract people from the fact that the wealthiest are fighting a class war.
You think she can’t understand because she’s not able to. It’s a willful ignorance, and require lots of money for that cognitive dissonance
So abandon economic justice and civil rights.
Is there anything left?
The color blue, instead of red.
The democrats were never left.
shes in the wrong party
Unfortunately shes in the right party for this BS. This is what the Dems have been for decades. We need a new party, not a new democrat.
We need a Guillotine Party, to do for the Democratic party what the Tea Party did for the GOP: Take it over from the inside out.
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Yes, but it worked. It got lots of people who felt very small and very threatened and who were/are envious of successful, educated “libs” to rally around populist candidates who didn’t want to make everyone’s lives better, but instead just make everyone else as miserable as the Tea Party followers.
Exactly. The current GOP looks more like the Tea Party than it does the pre-tea-party GOP. They managed to effect change within the party.
Elissa Slotkin IS the oligarchy. She is the Hot Dog Princess. Her grandpa owned BallPark Franks—subsidiary of the Tyson Foods megacorp. Every time someone eats a hot dog, Elissa gets more passive income than most folks earn from a year’s labor.
She sucks, I voted for Harper in the primaries but the Dems are full of neo-libs like her. It’s hard to see that party go more liberal even with Sander’s and AOC’s help
They actively work against Sanders and AOC. Both are the enemy to the average corporate-whore Dem.
Maybe the democrats need to ditch pro-oligarchy anti-woke members 🤷♂️
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Its great that you’re into solid research. I admire that. Maybe you could take a moment to read Slotkins wikipedia then.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elissa_Slotkin
And google her caucus memberships. They tell you who she is, and its not great. And she’s another “Endorsed by Liz Cheney” Dem which is the coveted endorsement for liberals.
Let me help get you started from that wikipedia page:
Caucus memberships
New Democrat Coalition
Problem Solvers Caucus[
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Ah , see, that take is rationalizing. She’s a former CIA torturer who worked under Bush. Within Michigan she once moved into a lobbyists house to avoid getting primaried after redistricting. (The lobbyist’s house was in a safe democrat area that the Democrat party did not field a local candidate for.) Her ascension to state senator was equally questionable - all the other candidates dropped out after meeting with party officials.
It’s clear she’s the Democrats new Joe Manchin, put there to avoid progress and force concessions if they ever win a plurality. All the Michiganders I know vehemently hate her.
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First she was in the DA not DO at the CIA so she factually was not a torturer as analysts weren’t doing torture rather the spies were.
Your defense of her is that she chose to work for torturers? Why would anyone work for torturers?
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1- I’m not who made the claim
2- How is this distinction a material difference? If she worked for torturers then she is unsupportable
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No, she can fuck off.
The oligarchy is killing us, and spinning language won’t change that. Meanwhile, ‘woke’ just means ‘social empathy’, which is ironically the solution to many of the problems the oligarchy is causing (and they’re not shy about this – Musk recently said empathy is bad).
We need more ‘woke’, not less. And being butthurt that the fascists are using ‘woke’ as a slur against us is childish and easy to ignore if you’re not too simple to get it.
Fuck this. I’m woke and proud of it. We all should be.
Woke is not weakness!
It’s funny, because the “Wake up, Sheeple!” line used to be what conservatives screamed at liberals for failing to understand their latest Ayn Rand inspired diatribe.
Then liberals adopted the “Wake up!” phrasing to describe structural racism, the enormous socio-economic cost of the Military Industrial Complex, and the inherent class warfare of privatization schemes. That caused “Woke” to fall out of fashion with the right.
Now it’s totally lost any context. “Woke” just means being visually queer coded or insufficiently religious. Its barely more than a slur.
specifically it was used by AA people in the start, now it has been co-opted by the right wingers and perverted, much like they did with “punisher”
Woke means understanding we live in an oligarchy in my mind. MAGA calls people sheep while complaining about them being woke in the same breath. They don’t even understand the language they use.
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Fine. Then come up with a plan to educate conservatives. Because this thing where the state legislates new norms (e.g. bio men in bio women’s sports) is NOT making sense to them. They are freaking out because they don’t understand it. And we can’t just make laws to make them accept it.
From their perspective they are losing their country. We can laugh and call them backwards, but that won’t help. There HAS to be a plan that is better than, f-you wake up.
Fuck conservatives. They don’t need to be educated, they need to be beaten. There are more people left of center than right, we just need to prove we’re actually going to fight for them. All of them. Not 80% and then we’ll start to strategize on how many “urban” voters we can lose to pick up white suburbanite conservatives.
Just to drive this point home for the quiet listeners at the back of the house, I’ve had very long conversations with conservatives (I’m in a red area) who actually get more distrustful the more you relate to them. I’ve been told to my face that nobody cared that much about other people, and I was clearly only pretending to in order to make them listen to me. That it was obvious, because nobody cares that much. That empathy can only be manipulative, and is never real.
It took me years to understand this isn’t a contradiction, but that since they can’t imagine caring that much, I must be fake.
My whole outlook changed once I realised that. It’s insane, but many people literally can’t envision caring, and they think you’re fake and just want recognition for doing so.
Several of these surveys take on a different meaning once you realise there are fundamentally different perspectives like this.
e: and this is one of the biggest divides with conservatives. Simple word choice will not bridge this gap.
We don’t need fucking conservatives to win anything in this country. I’m sick of cowards acting like they just won by 10%. They barely won this election, barely won control of the house, and the main issue in the election for independents wasn’t trans people or minorities, it was the economy.
The economy sucks for ordinary people because the ultra rich have been raiding it since COVID. And everyone, even conservatives, know that’s true. Americans hate these big corporations. Slotkin and her allies know that, and that’s why they’re trying to distract from it.
It’s disgusting how ready some of you are to throw your own neighbors under the bus so you can try to win over a couple fascist votes… Who will never vote for you. You will never win them over. They aren’t going to believe that you suddenly hate gay people and minorities. You will just look like a dishonest weakling to them, and they’ll be right.
We will win the next election by targeting independents with an economic message. If you want to lose then go ahead and make it about “woke” like a complete coward.
So many people will say “this is a gross oversimplification, they do lots of progressive things” while ignoring the world around them.
The fact we had to invent a political term for them is enough to tell me that we need to abandon this fascist supporting party.
Was looking for this. One of the many many many problems the US has is spineless cowards terrified of trying to fix the underlying problem because every single election they ever have is always “the most important election in history”, that if they can just keep the bad guy out this once they can fix the systemic problems in their democracy later. And yet, the Democrats won in 2008, 2012, and 2020, with a congressional majority accompanying four of those years, and y’all did nothing during that time to fix matters.
I feel like the headline conveys a different message than even what the article does:
“She said Democrats should stop using the term ‘oligarchy,’ a phrase she said doesn’t resonate beyond coastal institutions, and just say that the party opposes ‘kings,'”
argued that the Democratic Party needed to lose its “weak and woke” reputation and “fucking retake the flag,” adopting a “goddamn Alpha energy”
She’s literally saying the word oligarchy sounds pretentious and an opposition to kings resonates better, and that people think the party is weak and they need to present themselves more aggressively.
Click bait is click bait.
An Oligarch & a King are not the same fucking thing.
Sorry if people use big, scary words that mean things.
EDIT: What’s actually pretentious is talking down to people b/c you believe they are too stoopid to understand what an Oligarch is or learn if they don’t. She’s talking down to the Democratic Party for not talking down to their constituents. Pretty fucking pretentious if you ask me.
LMAO I’m well aware far-left lemmy will downvote me for saying this, but the fact that you’re copping an attitude with that person is funny because lefties are absolutely TERRIBLE at messaging. Democrats and lefties suck so badly at communicating with voters that a guy who rambled incoherently about immigrants eating pets was able to beat them.
Sadly, no, most Americans don’t know what the hell an ‘oligarch’ is because that’s what happens when you have decades of Republicans de-funding education. Pointing this out isn’t ‘pretentious’, because it’s sadly true.
Her name is: Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI)
Just so you don’t accidentally vote for her.
Ulg shes the one voting with repubs
Let’s get back to our controlled opposition roots.
Read the fucking article before you comment. It’s obvious most did not.
The article title is incredibly misleading. Even the first sentence of the article makes clear what she was actually saying:
Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) has urged her Democratic colleagues to stop attacking the “oligarchy” on Thursday, arguing that the word did not resonate with most Americans and should be replaced with “kings.”
She’s advocating for using a more relatable term, not for a change in party values. The “woke” comment irks me, but again is focused on terminology and not ideology.
When you need the dumb fucks’ votes, you gotta speak their language. Or at least water it down to be palatable to someone who was “educated” in our broken-ass system.
Yea but opposing ‘kings’ isn’t even close to the problem of ‘oligarchs’
One is very clearly a result of a capitalist system, the other is a looser critique of authority generally.
If it was really not ideologically tilted she’d suggest ‘billionaire’ instead of oligarch, but the dems are afraid of losing the support of the 'good billionaires
One is very clearly a result of a capitalist system, the other is a looser critique of authority generally.
I’m sure the average, middle-of-the-road voter with mundane concerns thinks that. So relatable.
“King” isn’t even related to capitalism.
People really like first not admitting they didn’t read, then doubling down on absolute nonsense around here.
“People shouldn’t be able to have that much money when everyone else is struggling”
You’re right, that is completely unrelatable, who would ever think like that
People really like first not admitting they didn’t read, then doubling down on absolute nonsense around here.
You speaking for yourself there?
I think we’re both talking past each other: oligarchy doesn’t imply capitalism, either.
The order you wrote the 2 sentences—kings…oligarchs then one…the other—isn’t parallel. Oligarchs have lesser, shared authority than a king, and neither implies capitalism, so semantic cues weren’t clear enough to reject suggested parallelism.
Someone who knows the cognitive meaning of oligarch would be confused the way you wrote that.
Anyhow, anti-capitalist sentiment isn’t really that relatable to many Americans: too many Americans dream about gaining obscene wealth, socialism is still a dirty word among too many, they think those business elites somehow “earned it more” than others. There is some reason to think criticizing power (elites stacking the deck in their favor like unelected rulers) is more likely to broadly appeal to those folk. Meeting them where they at with a more familiar word isn’t irrational, either.
While I’m fine with explicit language to oppose business oligarchs, I also see an argument for a different tact & same results in rustier, less urban states.
The… cognitive meaning? Wtf is a ‘cognitive’ meaning?
There is some reason to think criticizing power (elites stacking the deck in their favor like unelected rulers) is more likely to broadly appeal to those folk
And how do you think those elites are stacking the deck?? I think you’re intentionally dismissing something that most americans understand extremely well - that the ‘elite’ are able to stack the deck in their favor because they have obscene wealth. Elon bought his way into trump’s circle and fucked with Wisconsin’s election using his immense fortune and influence. That isn’t a mystery, not even to diehard conservatives.
The other issue with ‘kings’ is that in a MONarchy, there is only one monarch, one King. Even the people you’re claiming to speak for know that the problem extends well beyond Trump, and thinking of Elon and Bezos and Zuck and Gates all as Kings of their own kingdom unnecessarily complicates what is otherwise a clear quid-pro-quo relationship between them and a government they are supposed to be subservient to. Oligarchs may be ‘officially’ less than the governing structure they’re a part of, but they are the defining feature of a government by the name of oligarchy.
I also see an argument for a different tact & same results in rustier, less urban states.
I have family in those states, and even though we have differing voting habits, they have always shared my resentment against those with ill-begotten obscene wealth and influence. It is often one of the few things we have in common politically, and I think democrats just don’t want it to be true.
Wtf is a ‘cognitive’ meaning?
Cognitive meaning is when words are used to convey information and emotive meaning is when words are used to convey your own beliefs (your emotions).
And how do you think those elites are stacking the deck??
It’s not about me. It’s about how others think, and they don’t necessarily think wealth is a problem. They may think more about power & corruption.
I think you’re intentionally dismissing something that most americans understand extremely well
I think you overestimate Americans & don’t know how many think unlike you.
they have always shared my resentment against those with ill-begotten obscene wealth and influence
That’s cool for your family.
It’s a mixed bag: plenty of people in those states also vote the way they do because they think they someday could be rich. There’s an anti-intellectual strain that dislikes people who say words like oligarch.
Merely complaining that someone is rich is oblique & takes some steps & assumptions to arrive to the part that bothers people. Complaining that they exercise undue power over you & cheat you out of a fair shot makes the point directly.
Many had little problem with the wealthy itself until they saw the Musks, Bezos, & Zuckerbergs line up with the president for favors, ie, corruption.
First part of article title is a bit misleading I think. She thinks “Kings” is a better term than oligarchy because it’s more relatable. She has a plan to fight kings. She does seem to think wokeness is weak though.
Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) has urged her Democratic colleagues to stop attacking the “oligarchy” on Thursday, arguing that the word did not resonate with most Americans and should be replaced with “kings.”
Detailing her plan, Slotkin – a former analyst for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) – argued that the Democratic Party needed to lose its “weak and woke” reputation and “fucking retake the flag,” adopting a “goddamn Alpha energy” inspired by Detroit Lions coach Dan Campbell.
“She said Democrats should stop using the term ‘oligarchy,’ a phrase she said doesn’t resonate beyond coastal institutions, and just say that the party opposes ‘kings,'” wrote Wren, who reported that Slotkin was planning to deliver a series of speeches in the coming months about her plan.
Elissa Slotkin can fuck off.
Detailing her plan, Slotkin – a former analyst for the Central Intelligence Agency…
Oh, she can really fuck off.
Edit:
“I can’t do what she does because we live in a purple state, and I’m a pragmatist,” she concluded.
This is code for not rocking the boat.
She’s sorta right. ‘Oligarchy’ is a big college word that Joe Bumblefuck doesn’t understand.
Aristocrats is a good word, but again: “duh?”
Therefore Dems just need to start harping about “rich fucking parasites”
