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On January 02 2026 19:16 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On January 02 2026 14:57 GreenHorizons wrote:On January 02 2026 13:28 dyhb wrote:On January 02 2026 09:20 JimmyJRaynor wrote:
Great, Mamdani is now Mayor and he is supposed to be some kind of big time socialist. Super cool. He talks a big game, but we'll see if he's more true believer than pragmatist under a DSA banner. All of the above? He's a true believer in (the right-wing of) DSA which is fundamentally "pragmatist" in many of the ways revolutionary socialists distrust, social democrats crave, and liberals ostensibly support while undermining with a rotating cast of "purple pragmatists" that stop all of us short of the progress we desperately need. Can't even work for 2 days before the purity tests are once again in full force. The biggest obstacle for the left in the US is the left itself.
You're using "purity test" reflexively/compulsively while also being laughably hyperbolic adding "full force".
Obviously the biggest obstacle to "the left" isn't "the left", it's "the right". It's unconscionable inequities. It's the capitalists/billionaires that waste/hoard unimaginable resources, the entrenched systems, institutions, algos, and beliefs dominated by those capitalists/billionaires/lackeys that enable it, and so on.
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For being socialist, many of them sure seem to lack the pragmatic framework needed to carry their own identifier.
Socialism for those who are all ideologically aligned, otherwise, burn bridges. Politics is about grabbing as much as you can without causing (too much) a ruckus. If you just sideline 70+% of the populatio or the political apparatus, it'll never happen. They'll just sideline you.
We have this fun thing in Belgium called the Cordon sanitaire, where all the political parties vowed to never make a coalition (and so a government with) the extreme parties, on both sides of the spectrum. This is still being practised, despite ~20 ish% (iirc) of the population having voted for them.
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On January 02 2026 19:16 Gorsameth wrote:
Can't even work for 2 days before the purity tests are once again in full force.
The biggest obstacle for the left in the US is the left itself.
GH was hyping Mamdani a few hundred pages back. They only like controversial Democrats if they can use them to encourage people not to vote for other Democrats. Doubtless they would've turned on Bernie Sanders too if he got more votes than Hilary Clinton or Joe Biden in the 2016 or 2020 primary.
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On January 02 2026 20:25 GreenHorizons wrote: the entrenched systems, institutions, algos, and beliefs dominated by those capitalists/billionaires/lackeys that enable it, and so on.
the entrenched systems are not capitalism though...which begs the question: "What Is Capitalism?" The opponents of capitalism do not know what it is they are opposing.
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-e- I take it back. No sense following a stupid line.
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On January 02 2026 23:27 LightSpectra wrote:Show nested quote +On January 02 2026 20:25 GreenHorizons wrote:On January 02 2026 19:16 Gorsameth wrote:On January 02 2026 14:57 GreenHorizons wrote:On January 02 2026 13:28 dyhb wrote:On January 02 2026 09:20 JimmyJRaynor wrote:
Great, Mamdani is now Mayor and he is supposed to be some kind of big time socialist. Super cool. He talks a big game, but we'll see if he's more true believer than pragmatist under a DSA banner. All of the above? He's a true believer in (the right-wing of) DSA which is fundamentally "pragmatist" in many of the ways revolutionary socialists distrust, social democrats crave, and liberals ostensibly support while undermining with a rotating cast of "purple pragmatists" that stop all of us short of the progress we desperately need. Can't even work for 2 days before the purity tests are once again in full force. The biggest obstacle for the left in the US is the left itself. You're using "purity test" reflexively/compulsively while also being laughably hyperbolic adding "full force". Obviously the biggest obstacle to "the left" isn't "the left", it's "the right". It's unconscionable inequities. It's the capitalists/billionaires that waste/hoard unimaginable resources, the entrenched systems, institutions, algos, and beliefs dominated by those capitalists/billionaires/lackeys that enable it, and so on. GH was hyping Mamdani a few hundred pages back. They only like controversial Democrats if they can use them to encourage people not to vote for other Democrats. Doubtless they would've turned on Bernie Sanders too if he got more votes than Hilary Clinton or Joe Biden in the 2016 or 2020 primary.
If you look beyond your imagination, to the actual posts I made, you'll find nothing inconsistent in what I've said about Mamdani.
Bernie was an electoralism compromise for me back in 2015 before I figured out I aligned most with revolutionary socialism. The 2016 election process was the end of electoralism for me. His support for the F-35 (among other issues since then) was/is problematic, hypocritical, dishonest, and basically undermines everything I like about the guy (and is pretty emblematic of the hopelessness of electoralism imo).
I have plenty of actual "controversial" political opinions you can disagree with/debate/defile. You don't have to project your imagined idea of people to your left onto me to attack instead.
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Yeah, this thread is a bit dead. Let's have a thousand pages about abolishing the police.
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Let's have a thousand pages about how people won't vote for a candidate more left-wing than Bernie/Mamdani but somehow if we condemn elections and have a true socialist revolution, the country will come together to support policies more left-wing than Bernie's platform, because the overwhelming majority of the country will suddenly support that for some reason.
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On January 03 2026 03:42 LightSpectra wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2026 03:05 GreenHorizons wrote:On January 02 2026 23:27 LightSpectra wrote:On January 02 2026 20:25 GreenHorizons wrote:On January 02 2026 19:16 Gorsameth wrote:On January 02 2026 14:57 GreenHorizons wrote:On January 02 2026 13:28 dyhb wrote:On January 02 2026 09:20 JimmyJRaynor wrote:
Great, Mamdani is now Mayor and he is supposed to be some kind of big time socialist. Super cool. He talks a big game, but we'll see if he's more true believer than pragmatist under a DSA banner. All of the above? He's a true believer in (the right-wing of) DSA which is fundamentally "pragmatist" in many of the ways revolutionary socialists distrust, social democrats crave, and liberals ostensibly support while undermining with a rotating cast of "purple pragmatists" that stop all of us short of the progress we desperately need. Can't even work for 2 days before the purity tests are once again in full force. The biggest obstacle for the left in the US is the left itself. You're using "purity test" reflexively/compulsively while also being laughably hyperbolic adding "full force". Obviously the biggest obstacle to "the left" isn't "the left", it's "the right". It's unconscionable inequities. It's the capitalists/billionaires that waste/hoard unimaginable resources, the entrenched systems, institutions, algos, and beliefs dominated by those capitalists/billionaires/lackeys that enable it, and so on. GH was hyping Mamdani a few hundred pages back. They only like controversial Democrats if they can use them to encourage people not to vote for other Democrats. Doubtless they would've turned on Bernie Sanders too if he got more votes than Hilary Clinton or Joe Biden in the 2016 or 2020 primary. If you look beyond your imagination, to the actual posts I made, you'll find nothing inconsistent in what I've said about Mamdani. Bernie was an electoralism compromise for me back in 2015 before I figured out I aligned most with revolutionary socialism. The 2016 election process was the end of electoralism for me. His support for the F-35 (among other issues since then) was/is problematic, hypocritical, dishonest, and basically undermines everything I like about the guy (and is pretty emblematic of the hopelessness of electoralism imo). I have plenty of actual "controversial" political opinions you can disagree with/debate/defile. You don't have to project your imagined idea of people to your left onto me to attack instead. Let's have a thousand pages about how people won't vote for a candidate more left-wing than Bernie/Mamdani but somehow if we condemn elections and have a true socialist revolution, the country will come together to support policies more left-wing than Bernie's platform, because the overwhelming majority of the country will suddenly support that for some reason.
This type of thoughtless shitposting isn't helpful to anyone.
The deprivation/lack of understanding of the US's actual political history is certainly up there for "biggest obstacles". People distracted by electoralism (which is distinct from "elections") fundamentally don't understand how things like the (near*) abolition of slavery, worker rights, desegregation, etc actually happened.
EDIT: From the National Park Service on abolitionists before the Civil War:
The Republicans, assembling a new party in the 1850s, opposed the spread of slavery more from a concern for the opportunities of white people than from a concern with the rights or freedom of black people. Americans brave enough to proclaim themselves abolitionists constituted less than 5 percent of the white population in the free states; many of those opponents of slavery were women and thus unable to vote. The Republicans repeatedly told the nation there was nothing they could do about slavery where it existed. The abolitionists viewed the Republicans with suspicion, even disdain, but Democrats nevertheless labeled all Republicans "black Republicans," antislavery zealots.
www.nps.gov
Sound familiar to anyone?
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On January 03 2026 04:21 GreenHorizons wrote:EDIT: From the National Park Service on abolitionists before the Civil War: Show nested quote +The Republicans, assembling a new party in the 1850s, opposed the spread of slavery more from a concern for the opportunities of white people than from a concern with the rights or freedom of black people. Americans brave enough to proclaim themselves abolitionists constituted less than 5 percent of the white population in the free states; many of those opponents of slavery were women and thus unable to vote. The Republicans repeatedly told the nation there was nothing they could do about slavery where it existed. The abolitionists viewed the Republicans with suspicion, even disdain, but Democrats nevertheless labeled all Republicans "black Republicans," antislavery zealots. www.nps.govSound familiar to anyone?
If we transposed your ideology to the 1860s, you'd be going around telling people that voting for Abraham Lincoln is counter-productive to abolition and only mass protests would abolish legal slavery.
Though, judging by how you repeated Republican talking points about Kamala Harris "failing upwards", chances are you'd really be one of those folks decrying abolition because it would lead to colored folk being elected.
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When you call him a Republican supporter, is it because you think he’s a Republican troll, or because you’re using it as an insult? Sometimes it’s hard to tell.
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United States44353 Posts
The issue is that it would be very hard to tell the difference between a pro Republican attempting to encourage people who would never vote Republican not to vote Democrat either and GH.
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On January 03 2026 06:23 Sent. wrote:
When you call him a Republican supporter, is it because you think he’s a Republican troll, or because you’re using it as an insult? Sometimes it’s hard to tell.
I honestly don't know if they're a closet Republican or someone whose sole guiding principle in life is to always find some moral position that lets them feel superior to other people on the Internet even if it makes no sense with just a sprinkle of critical thought. It's hard to tell sometimes.
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On January 03 2026 05:44 LightSpectra wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2026 04:21 GreenHorizons wrote:On January 03 2026 03:42 LightSpectra wrote:On January 03 2026 03:05 GreenHorizons wrote:On January 02 2026 23:27 LightSpectra wrote:On January 02 2026 20:25 GreenHorizons wrote:On January 02 2026 19:16 Gorsameth wrote:On January 02 2026 14:57 GreenHorizons wrote:On January 02 2026 13:28 dyhb wrote:On January 02 2026 09:20 JimmyJRaynor wrote:
Great, Mamdani is now Mayor and he is supposed to be some kind of big time socialist. Super cool. He talks a big game, but we'll see if he's more true believer than pragmatist under a DSA banner. All of the above? He's a true believer in (the right-wing of) DSA which is fundamentally "pragmatist" in many of the ways revolutionary socialists distrust, social democrats crave, and liberals ostensibly support while undermining with a rotating cast of "purple pragmatists" that stop all of us short of the progress we desperately need. Can't even work for 2 days before the purity tests are once again in full force. The biggest obstacle for the left in the US is the left itself. You're using "purity test" reflexively/compulsively while also being laughably hyperbolic adding "full force". Obviously the biggest obstacle to "the left" isn't "the left", it's "the right". It's unconscionable inequities. It's the capitalists/billionaires that waste/hoard unimaginable resources, the entrenched systems, institutions, algos, and beliefs dominated by those capitalists/billionaires/lackeys that enable it, and so on. GH was hyping Mamdani a few hundred pages back. They only like controversial Democrats if they can use them to encourage people not to vote for other Democrats. Doubtless they would've turned on Bernie Sanders too if he got more votes than Hilary Clinton or Joe Biden in the 2016 or 2020 primary. If you look beyond your imagination, to the actual posts I made, you'll find nothing inconsistent in what I've said about Mamdani. Bernie was an electoralism compromise for me back in 2015 before I figured out I aligned most with revolutionary socialism. The 2016 election process was the end of electoralism for me. His support for the F-35 (among other issues since then) was/is problematic, hypocritical, dishonest, and basically undermines everything I like about the guy (and is pretty emblematic of the hopelessness of electoralism imo). I have plenty of actual "controversial" political opinions you can disagree with/debate/defile. You don't have to project your imagined idea of people to your left onto me to attack instead. Let's have a thousand pages about how people won't vote for a candidate more left-wing than Bernie/Mamdani but somehow if we condemn elections and have a true socialist revolution, the country will come together to support policies more left-wing than Bernie's platform, because the overwhelming majority of the country will suddenly support that for some reason. This type of thoughtless shitposting isn't helpful to anyone. The deprivation/lack of understanding of the US's actual political history is certainly up there for "biggest obstacles". People distracted by electoralism (which is distinct from "elections") fundamentally don't understand how things like the (near*) abolition of slavery, worker rights, desegregation, etc actually happened. EDIT: From the National Park Service on abolitionists before the Civil War: The Republicans, assembling a new party in the 1850s, opposed the spread of slavery more from a concern for the opportunities of white people than from a concern with the rights or freedom of black people. Americans brave enough to proclaim themselves abolitionists constituted less than 5 percent of the white population in the free states; many of those opponents of slavery were women and thus unable to vote. The Republicans repeatedly told the nation there was nothing they could do about slavery where it existed. The abolitionists viewed the Republicans with suspicion, even disdain, but Democrats nevertheless labeled all Republicans "black Republicans," antislavery zealots. www.nps.govSound familiar to anyone? If we transposed your ideology to the 1860s, you'd be going around telling people that voting for Abraham Lincoln is counter-productive to abolition and only mass protests would abolish legal slavery. Though, judging by how you repeated Republican talking points about Kamala Harris "failing upwards", chances are you'd really be one of those folks decrying abolition because it would lead to colored folk being elected.
I'm literally an abolitionist. We're also about 1-5% of the population. A bunch of us can't vote under the status quo. People like you get upset that Republicans equate your "eminently reasonable" compromise positions with our more radical positions (seemingly wilfully oblivious to the fact that Republican supporters know and laughingly abuse this).
You and many Democrat supporters are pretty quintessentially playing the role of MLK Jr.'s white moderate.
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United States44353 Posts
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On January 03 2026 09:24 GreenHorizons wrote:Show nested quote +On January 03 2026 05:44 LightSpectra wrote:On January 03 2026 04:21 GreenHorizons wrote:On January 03 2026 03:42 LightSpectra wrote:On January 03 2026 03:05 GreenHorizons wrote:On January 02 2026 23:27 LightSpectra wrote:On January 02 2026 20:25 GreenHorizons wrote:On January 02 2026 19:16 Gorsameth wrote:On January 02 2026 14:57 GreenHorizons wrote:On January 02 2026 13:28 dyhb wrote:
[quote]He talks a big game, but we'll see if he's more true believer than pragmatist under a DSA banner. All of the above? He's a true believer in (the right-wing of) DSA which is fundamentally "pragmatist" in many of the ways revolutionary socialists distrust, social democrats crave, and liberals ostensibly support while undermining with a rotating cast of "purple pragmatists" that stop all of us short of the progress we desperately need. Can't even work for 2 days before the purity tests are once again in full force. The biggest obstacle for the left in the US is the left itself. You're using "purity test" reflexively/compulsively while also being laughably hyperbolic adding "full force". Obviously the biggest obstacle to "the left" isn't "the left", it's "the right". It's unconscionable inequities. It's the capitalists/billionaires that waste/hoard unimaginable resources, the entrenched systems, institutions, algos, and beliefs dominated by those capitalists/billionaires/lackeys that enable it, and so on. GH was hyping Mamdani a few hundred pages back. They only like controversial Democrats if they can use them to encourage people not to vote for other Democrats. Doubtless they would've turned on Bernie Sanders too if he got more votes than Hilary Clinton or Joe Biden in the 2016 or 2020 primary. If you look beyond your imagination, to the actual posts I made, you'll find nothing inconsistent in what I've said about Mamdani. Bernie was an electoralism compromise for me back in 2015 before I figured out I aligned most with revolutionary socialism. The 2016 election process was the end of electoralism for me. His support for the F-35 (among other issues since then) was/is problematic, hypocritical, dishonest, and basically undermines everything I like about the guy (and is pretty emblematic of the hopelessness of electoralism imo). I have plenty of actual "controversial" political opinions you can disagree with/debate/defile. You don't have to project your imagined idea of people to your left onto me to attack instead. Let's have a thousand pages about how people won't vote for a candidate more left-wing than Bernie/Mamdani but somehow if we condemn elections and have a true socialist revolution, the country will come together to support policies more left-wing than Bernie's platform, because the overwhelming majority of the country will suddenly support that for some reason. This type of thoughtless shitposting isn't helpful to anyone. The deprivation/lack of understanding of the US's actual political history is certainly up there for "biggest obstacles". People distracted by electoralism (which is distinct from "elections") fundamentally don't understand how things like the (near*) abolition of slavery, worker rights, desegregation, etc actually happened. EDIT: From the National Park Service on abolitionists before the Civil War: The Republicans, assembling a new party in the 1850s, opposed the spread of slavery more from a concern for the opportunities of white people than from a concern with the rights or freedom of black people. Americans brave enough to proclaim themselves abolitionists constituted less than 5 percent of the white population in the free states; many of those opponents of slavery were women and thus unable to vote. The Republicans repeatedly told the nation there was nothing they could do about slavery where it existed. The abolitionists viewed the Republicans with suspicion, even disdain, but Democrats nevertheless labeled all Republicans "black Republicans," antislavery zealots. www.nps.govSound familiar to anyone? If we transposed your ideology to the 1860s, you'd be going around telling people that voting for Abraham Lincoln is counter-productive to abolition and only mass protests would abolish legal slavery. Though, judging by how you repeated Republican talking points about Kamala Harris "failing upwards", chances are you'd really be one of those folks decrying abolition because it would lead to colored folk being elected. You and many Democrat supporters are pretty quintessentially playing the role of MLK Jr.'s white moderate.
You should try reading the letter you linked to. He decries voter suppression, not electoralism. The white moderate he criticizes are people against nonviolent direct action, like you did when you spread FUD about the No Kings protests. The alternate universe MLK Jr. you believe in that thought a black liberal would've been worse than a literal white supremacist fascist is really funny though.
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On January 03 2026 05:44 LightSpectra wrote:
Though, judging by how you repeated Republican talking points about Kamala Harris "failing upwards". Honestly, this sounds like a left wing talking point on Kamala Harris’s deficiencies. I have heard so much biting criticism of Kamala (which you can feel is unfair) attributed to right-wing talking points that I’m having to search for explanations.
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it is fascinating how little has changed and yet corpo media outlets from FOX to CNN are are constantly telling us were in a state of crisis.
https://www.pewresearch.org/race-and-ethnicity/2024/05/31/the-state-of-the-american-middle-class/
The % of Americans in middle class and upper middle class is almost identical as it was 50 years ago. Its gone from 72% to 70% in 50 years. Yawn.
Upper middle class people are experts at spending money on total bullshit. Downhill skiing is not a sport.. its a bullshit money spending spree. Hockey has turned into a sport for the upper middle class. The body armour hockey equipment now costs $1000s. I drive a Corolla and yet in the driveways near me are $130,000 cars. What a waste of money. My neighbours make fun of my Toyota. I think Toyota engineering is pure genius. I'm a proud Corolla owner. If the Tercel were still being made I'd be driving a Tercel. IMO, the Tercel is the best engineered car since 1980.
In this age of hedonistic consumerism I am so proud to be super-cheap, spending almost no money at all times. Why introduce unneeded stress? If we are on the verge of total collapse ... people certainly are not acting like it. Its like they like talking about the impending apocalypse but it does not impact their consumption-based lives. I'm behaving more like the world is coming to an end than my neighbours are.
In 2025, U.S. consumer spending driven by credit reached historic levels, with total credit card transaction value forecasted at
$3.841 trillion, a 3.3% increase year-over-year. By the end of the third quarter of 2025, outstanding credit card balances hit a record $1.233 trillion, rising $24 billion from the previous quarter
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United States44353 Posts
"If you really believe things are bad then why do you live like there is no tomorrow?"
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EPT
