I’m not sure this is true. Again, the left doesn’t have a cohesive media apparatus, and Democrats don’t rely nearly as much on propaganda and wedge issues to maintain their coalition. This is because Democrats support policies with broad popular support and so can run on policy. There are institutional reasons why it would be difficult for a “left Tea Party” to gain traction. And even if they did, what crazy policies might they support? Universal single-payer health care? Drastic action to address climate change? More progressive taxation? Quelle horreur!
Policy goals are not policy.
What crazy policies they might support would be poorly thought out policies, which while pursuing noble ends, don’t actually achieve them.
Thank you, you summed it up more succinctly than I was going to.
The crux of my argument was everything before “And even if they did,” The Tea Party didn’t really have any policy goals except maybe Obamacare repeal, but only because Obama did it. They had loads of grievance, institutional support from GOP donors and the GOP media apparatus, and a canny sense of where they could apply pressure to achieve maximum damage. (Again, they didn’t really have any policy goals, just a general sense that they should blow shit up because they’re mad.) The Tea Party was remarkably successful for being a minority caucus within the GOP. They shifted the whole GOP to the right by primarying moderates and/or threatening to primary moderates. They successfully used threats of defaults and shutdowns to extract draconian budget cuts from President Obama. They successfully turned up the rage and grievance and anti-PC fervor of white America enough to elect Donald Trump.
There is no one in the freshman class of Democrats who wants to blow government up–they want government to do stuff. The new leftists do not have a media apparatus that they can use to gain popular support for unpopular policy goals. And they do have specific, concrete policy goals which broad popularity. The parties aren’t symmetric. You can’t analogize from the Tea Party to the new left. Both Sides don’t do it.
Yeah, the reason the Republicans demonize her so much is because she’s effective. The fact that their somewhat misogynist base eats it up is just gravy.
It’s not a good idea for the Democrats to let the Republicans lead their decision makers. Even star rookies have coaches.
That’s great, but why are her Majority Leader and Majority Whip candidates also old fossils? If the point is to train her replacement, why don’t we put someone young into those slots? Or if those guys are great mentors and steady hands at the tiller, why not put someone young in front of the cameras? I don’t think AOC is the right person yet, but there have to be others. What about Tulsi Gabbard? Why has her buzz died down so much recently?
The bigger problem is that everyone with star power in an early stage of their career is trying to figure out how to become President, and the speakership / minority leadership is usually a long term role. It doesn’t have to be, though - Paul Ryan got it on the resume and could easily end up being the GOP nominee in 2024.
The reason the Tea Party hasn’t been doing anything productive isn’t because they have been an ineffective caucus. It’s because their goals are horrible, counterproductive ones.
I get it that having people in office who can actually achieve something is worthwhile, but one of the biggest achievements of the Tea Party is a massive shift in the Overton window to the point where raising taxes is completely insane and impossible now and advocating for 100% renewable energy is seen as some extreme policy (it is far from extreme - extreme would be advocating for everyone to stop eating meat and driving cars, and for the renewables to include nothing but wind, solar, and hydro power).
The question about someone’s policy should be “Would this be a good thing if it was passed?” Not “will the people currently in Congress agree to pass it?” A policy that is too extreme is one whose nominal goals are bad things (like basically everything the Tea Party stands for) or whose consequences are so costly they would be worse than not achieving the goal or whose goal assumes some unreasonable things about how people will act.
Still, though, AOC and the activist crowd she draws support from are to the Tea Party as Antifa is to the actual fucking Nazis in the GOP. Stop using the barest surface resemblance to dismiss all activism as Tea Partyism and all populism as Trumpism.
Interesting.
Let the “Beto for Speaker!” groundswell begin!
(Little-known fact: you don’t need to be in congress to be Speaker.)
You think? Christ, what a fucking empty suit.
I mean, anything would be better than Trump, but… Christ.
So, the woman who’s actually good at her job is probably out, but the white guy who’s not gets in by acclamation.
True… ish.
Traditionally the “Leader of the Party” is the highest-ranking elected official in the government from that party. So Trump is the “leader of the Republican party” and Pelosi will be the “leader of the Democratic party” in January.
That is distinct from being the head of the DNC or the head of the DSCC or whatever, and the “leader” doesn’t have any special powers that I’m aware of… but it would be folly to assume that Perez isn’t calling up Pelosi and appraising her of what’s going or, or asking for her blessing on his decisions.
Yes, Pelosi has been the target of incessant misogyny by the rest of the Democratic establishment, so this makes total sense.
Luckily, my fainting couch stands ready.
According to Monmouth, Trumps re-elect numbers are 6 points lower than his already abysmal approval numbers. That makes me happy.
Indeed. May he sink lower and lower.
Wait - Schumer is bad at his job? That’s not the impression I got.
Only one Speaker in US history has advanced to the White House. Ryan won’t be the second. It’s a terrible launch pad for higher office, because you can’t ever wash off the sausage bits.
It salves the wound a bit, but don’t think for a second that most Republicans won’t vote for him. They might not like it, but they absolutely will.
People still identifying as Republicans are like the zombies. There’s really nothing you can do about them: they’re mindless, their bodies are falling apart, and want to devour everyone they see. Just climb into your snowplow and drive through them.
It’s the people not yet infected that we should concern ourselves with. Right now, the infection hasn’t spread enough to topple society as a whole but I don’t think it’s unreasonable to stock up on Twinkies and boxes of 12-gauge shells.
How many have tried? There weren’t any reality star presidents before either. Ryan will burnish his image for a bit, write a book, make some appearances, and then relaunch himself as the substantive conservative everyone was giddy over back in 2012. Romney and Ryan ready to ride again in 2024!