I miss beltway garage

Trump odds up to 60%

  • the_post_of_tom_joad [any, any]@hexbear.net
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    23 days ago

    Does thread think the Dems (and even Republicans, why not) target’ is to only be ever ~51% popularity, as in deliberately keeping parity between wings in order to maintain plausibility of legitimate govt inaction?

    Or is it just a consequence of their extremely similar platforms?

    Do you get what I’m trying to say? Is it a feature or a “happy” outcome they simply exploit?

    • REgon [they/them]@hexbear.net
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      23 days ago

      I think a large group of Dems actually buy into the triangulator bs that you see in most "left"wing parties (quotations because they’re not, but you know what I mean.) I don’t know if the leaders buy into it, I know there’s some insidious psy-op at the root of it, meant to kneecap any leftist political party, but I think a very large group actually believes the “aw shucks we really do want to do universal healthcare, but we gotta be more rightwing to get into government.”
      These people never interrogate the validity of the claim, let alone the belief that a politicians task is to get elected.
      You’ll see this tendency whenever you ask about doing any actual popular policy. “It’s more nuanced than that…” “We gotta be bi-partisan…” “We want to be able to get elected…” “We don’t want to scare away voters…” “We gotta be realistic…”
      Like with the decline of US intelligence agencies I think we are now seeing a generation of people who actually believe the propaganda.

      • ShimmeringKoi [comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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        22 days ago

        Yeah the US managed to maintain the separation of propagandized workers and rational imperialist intelligence state mandarins for like…a generation or two, and now everyone just has the same internet brain damage.

    • D61 [any]@hexbear.net
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      23 days ago

      The people with money, the folks politicians actually work for, are likely to be more politically similar than different. Both parties are playing towards their true base.

      The primaries are over so neither candidate needs to spend too much time paying lip service to the unwashed masses.

      So, why not both “feature” AND “happy outcome”?

    • CarbonScored [any]@hexbear.net
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      23 days ago

      It’s effectively a feature, but the amount of intentionality is grey, I think bourgeois democracy initially fell into this happy outcome, and it’s a natural balance that occurs from them acting in self-interest, but it is also maintained actively with laws, culture wars, etc.

      Which party people vote for seems to entirely depend on “the other guy is worse”, so if both parties do terribly for people when they get in government (and they will because they serve the bourgeois class) then people will always vote for the “only other choice” and voteshame third partyers.

      Rinse and repeat and the balance will stay forever around the 50% point while conditions worsen and people remain under the illusion they have a choice.

    • ihaveibs [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      23 days ago

      I feel like Biden dropping out almost immediately after Trump almost got domed displays a certain degree of intentionality. Trump was going to run away with it at that point and I dont think they want either party having too much political power. Somebody might try to do something with it if that were the case