5401

I hope you’re right about that last thing, but you’ll be able to knock me over with a feather if it comes to pass.

5402

The last few months have been a shitshow of Dems screwing each over and not doing anything.
As far as AOC I know about her because I follow a Black Democrat and few people hate her wing of the party as much as Black Democrats.

If you start fixing roads and giving people clean water they’ll remember it.

If you do things that make their lives better it leaves a positive impression. Doing nothing because you couldn’t get your own party to vote for something leaves the impression that your party is a bunch of incompetent clowns. Normal people don’t give a crap about Manchin being an ass because they don’t even know who that is.

Factional infighting also comes off as “these people aren’t serious/are incompetent” and feeds into the “Dems in disarray!” narrative the media loves so much. Doing nothing in the name of perfection is bad and having members of your party out there saying it is never good.

AOC spent the last few days shitting on the infrastructure plan she voted against saying it’s terrible because it wasn’t perfect and now there is talk of killing BBB out of retribution from the Progressive wing. That’s dumb. It’s a matter of refusing to take a win because the win wasn’t big enough. Politics is rarely about big wins, it’s usually incremental improvement.

5403

I don’t see the progressives saying this shit in my feeds but I’ll admit again that I don’t follow AOC et al.

Honestly this sounds like a straw man and I’d love to see a reference for someone real and influential saying this.

5404

No, they won’t. They only notice stuff like that when it’s broken. They don’t think about why it’s working or who is responsible for that.

5405

Then literally nothing wins elections except culture wars so I guess we already lost.

5406

This but unironically.

The GOP has demonstrated that as long as you just make up things that the average person finds bad and attribute those things to the entire opposing side, you can win.

People weren’t voting for the GOP last week because of their big policy wins.

5407

I was just watching a news thing where a farmer had to go way out of his way to bring his produce to market. The bridge they usually used had been closed for several years. If the bridge is fixed, he will remember it. Difference between a 10 minute drive and an hour and a half.

5408

Feinstein too. She’s just as bad, and probably declining faster than Grassley.

We have to go on offense in the culture war, that’s how we win. Start moral panics against evangelicals, anti-vaxxers, racists, etc…

5409

5410

I agree that that would be an example a lot of people would remember if it happened locally, but earlier in this thread someone mentioned that almost none of that infrastructure money will be spent till late next year, so I don’t see how it’s going to bring out too many people to vote.

5411

Well there are two options:

  1. The Trumpian option: just lie and post photos of various infrastructure projects already underway and say that they’re because of the bill. The people pointing out the lie aren’t going to vote Dem anyway.
  2. The truth

Dems generally pick #2, to their credit, but it doesn’t win a lot of votes these days.

Let’s see how it works.

See this photo? It’s of California’s I-5 North Coast Corridor Project, and it’s underway today thanks to the bi-partisan infrastructure bill that Congress just passed. As an essential throughway to Mexico and Canada, and an important part of the country’s highway transportation system – for tourists, commuters, and trucking alike — the I-5 project will include the addition of high occupancy vehicle lanes, interchange improvements, truck-specific lanes, pavement replacement, and more to help improve safety and reduce congestion.* Thanks, Joe Biden!

image

*text shamelessly stolen from this web page.

5412

So the timing of helping people is bad?

5413

Maybe this movie clip should just be a campaign ad:

5414

But do they call him Eric the bridge builder?

5415

In electoral terms, yes, because unfortunately most people aren’t swayed by stuff that doesn’t affect them or someone they see regularly. They’re not that into politics.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s good that the infrastructure bill passed but for the mid-terms the BBB bill is more important.

5416

Do you have a source to back this up?

I mean, I hear this from fat left folks a lot these days, seemingly arguing that competent governance doesn’t actually matter electorally, but I don’t think that’s an idea backed up by anything.

5417

I think you are misstating the notion. What some people are saying is that sure infrastructure is great and all but that’s kind of the minimal level of competence expected. Sure, Trump and the GOP totally failed to have an infrastructure week and this is a big achievement but it’s not enough. It’s barely enough for our media to even notice. It’s maintenance (and yes that is a generalization and there’s a lot of great new stuff like electric vehicle infrastructure in the BIF and you and I know that but the average voter does not and unless there’s a sea change in the media this week nobody is going to spend much time trying to tell them). The most transformative stuff like health care, child care, real new programs to help families are in the BBB. Programs that poll with large favorability and thus might actually break through to people and have them notice and for once give credit unironically to democrats (thanks Obama).

5418

Look man I’m working on it, okay?

5419

I’m barely a member of the fat left. My BMI is only 25.7.

5420

Nobody is going to take you seriously without the proper heft to your arguments.