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I’m way overdue for this question, but can someone explain to me what “GOP” is? I’m not interested in US politics too much (I don’t live anywhere close) but of course lots of US politics news reaches me regardless. I know the two parties, but “GOP” is mentioned from time to time and I have no clue what it is, other than that it has something to do with the Republican party.
Abbreviation for “Grand Old Party,” it started as a nickname for the Republican Party in the late 1800s
I knew the term, but not the origins, so thanks for giving me an excuse to look it up
Gaslight.
Obstruct.
Project.The three main tenants of conservatism the world over.
Grand Old Party
I think it’s comes down to the fact that there are far fewer wealthy Dems than Republicans. The Dem “base” doesn’t have any power or influence outside of our voices, which is to say, none.
What actually is the Dem base?
That’s just it, there isn’t one.
The right has a few different branches of the same kind of base: groups with actual political capital, the most basic, orcish kind, but it works and progressives broadly have not found a way to unify with any kind of alternative group identity.
Seriously, I am not sure what the left/progressives really think is going to happen here doing the same things over and over, expecting different results. They are still tone-policing, lecturing, and purity-testing as a fucking culture, meanwhile the right is forming war-bands of people who embrace the American flag, carry weapons and will march in lock-step with their leaders.
Groups like that are the power that has formed nations and held up empires. Why is it so hard to imagine having the same kind of force and political capital but without the hate and xenophobia and anti-science rhetoric?
Meanwhile I will spend hours arguing with people on Lemmy trying to convince other people who loved Duck Tales that the show is problematic. Everyone has their own little branch-off faction where they argue with other progressives about the pettiest, performative lines-in-the-sand to virtue signal how incredibly progressive they are while letting the country erode to dust.
The only other alternative just barely left of center is fucking liberals and I don’t even want to start on them.
Anyone who isn’t the GOP base
thats because they are both GOP parties, one is just gop lite, the gop lite is designed to stop the GOP from getting to far, they have no interest in progress. thats why they dont repeal gop policies in the next presidencies for the most part. the “DEMS” are designed to stop any actual party thats left than center right from appearing, and the gop does what it always does, and often are sometimes kept in check by gop lite party. its just pratically RUSSIA-LITE. putin has control, but he allows a “faux captured opposition” now and then with no real power.
Do you think we should solve the problem by voting for the dems and making them do their jobs anyway, by primarying them with socialists like Zohran, by voting for third party candidates like Jill and Andy, or by abstaining?
All four options come with building a socialist revolutionary army and practicing mutual aid, obviously.
If you are not organized, your only options are voting for the most progressive of the top two candidates in elections/primaries, or apathy. (voting third party is apathy)
Join your local DSA chapter and help them make more Zohrans.
You know nothing about what Russia is like, and it seems you also have no idea how US works.
putin has control
Only over Trump. The people who write the laws have control. They are the ones who fund elections.
We need to change that perception, and make the politicians fear US, far worse.
Democratic politicians are way too polite. If they won’t do it, then it’s time for us to fuck shit up.
I would say that actually we have no party representing the left. The Democrats are a kind of center right party on many major issues. But of course this all depends on your definitions.
they actually DONT WANT An actual left, it undermines the dems and gops power.
Neoliberals are hard-right, IMHO.
Think about it: the whole point of privatisation, reducing regulation, small government and so on is to reduce the power of the one entity - the State - which is (supposedly) controlled voters via votes which are (supposedly) of equal weight for all, and make it be below the power of Money which is controlled by a “voting” system were some have literally trillions of times the weight in chosing what happens than others.
In other words, Neoliberals are against Democracy, same as Fascists.
No one mentioned the left.
Oh, I know. Terrifying 🙄
If I had to fight a grizzly in my skivvies with only a spear or be in a room with that woman I’m fighting the bear. Also the man to her left looks like he just realized what face she is making.
They don’t respect the people that keep voting for them, they know you think you have no other option and are exploiting it over and over. Whats the definition of insanity?
Not eating the rich
A lot of leftists don’t vote. The party doesn’t try to get the votes because historically the turn out is super low for leftists.
A lot of leftists don’t vote because:
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They can’t get time off work on voting day, or would be fired or get into serious financial precarity if they did,
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They got purged from voter rolls and don’t find this out untill they show up at the polls,
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They do not have stable housing, perhaps literally no permanent address (homeless), perhaps they have to keep moving regularly and can’t keep their current address correct in every single account or system that requires that,
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They have no reliable method of transportation to voting places,
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They don’t have a drivers liscense because they don’t own or drive a car,
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They have medical conditions / disabilities that prevent them from being able to get to voting places,
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They do not have or cannot reliably use some kind of mail in voting system, often for some combination of some of the above reasons.
Leftists, actual leftists, not liberals who think they are leftists, tend to be broke, broken, and literally disenfranchised.
Yeah, a good number of them also just don’t vote because they know the districts they are in are gerrymandered to hell, or they are ideologically opposed to it, or something like that.
But, a whole lot would like their voices to be heard… only to find that no one is willing to give them an opportunity to speak.
That opportunity to electorally speak requires and assumes a basic societal baseline that everyone is at, yet society does not actually guarantee this baseline… so, the many people who fall through the cracks, they are unpeople, they don’t count, they are definitionally disenfranchised.
(As you can see, all of what I have outlined often forms at least part of an ideological basis for why electoralism is bullshit.)
(Personally, while I do think electoralism is indeed bullshit in many ways, I still very much think that all who can vote should vote, because I know that if we don’t try, the system will just pretend more and more of us do not even exist, more and more privileged people will hear the media report bullshit numbers telling them that we do not exist… and things will get worse, faster.)
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The turnout is low for any group that is dismissed by the parties. Why would you vote for people who ignore you?
Give them a reason, they’ll vote.
Bernie didn’t get the primary in 2016 or 2020. Primaries typically have 5-10% voter turnout. I felt like the only person voting for Bernie both times. If leftist voter turnout was higher, then he would have won the primary.
also because the OLD guard DNC doesnt market them in anyway, the gop got it down to a tee on some gen z, PROPAGANDA through social media, which is the best way to reach the younger generation. the dnc just doesnt do that, they stick to cable/national television where everything is curated.
not to mention there isnt much of a leftist/democratic network as well. CNN AND pbs got astroturfed then taken over.
The Conservative Propaganda Machine is a real thing, conceived and constructed by Dick Cheney and Roger Ailes following the Watergate scandal, which they blamed on the “liberal” media for reporting their CRIMES. It has evolved over the years, and become an astonishingly effective tool.
While they were doing that, the Dems were doing absolutely nothing to counter or match it, and here we are.
Not voting for the dems lead to our current situation. Masked federal agents grabbing people off the streets, the longest shutdown in US history, the dismantling of federal agencies, and the list continues.
Things would have been far from good, but sometimes people need to recognize that you gotta vote for self preservation. It shouldn’t be that way but here we are.
Avoiding the formation of a fascist state seems like a good reason to vote to me
I agree with you, but I get why ignored, criticized, and betrayed groups wouldn’t see any reason to vote for either party. The chaos that we’ve been seeing over the last few years? Some people have been feeling that for decades. They gave up on America long ago, for good reason. They think they’ll be better off if both parties destroy each other, and we have a fresh start.
I can appreciate their position, even if I don’t agree with it.
I’d say leftist turnout perfectly matches leftist representation on the ballot.
Then how do you explain 2016 and 2020 when barely anyone voted for Bernie? He was on the ballot. Primaries typically have 5-10% turn out.
Strangely enough; not considering the leftists leads to more leftists.
thats another problem, plus all that apathy. games, youtube, influencers are all distraction to that politics.
And by GOP base, we mean capitalists and landlords.
Megadonors are the only base politicians care about.
Sociopathic Oligarchs
If, by GOP base, you mean working class white Americans, I don’t think they’re actually afraid.
Otherwise, they wouldn’t constantly be taking away all the structural supports keeping them somewhat healthy or giving them opportunities to improve their lives.
If, by GOP base, you mean corporations and the billionaire class.
Then… yea, you’re right.
Don’t listen to their words: look at their actions. Also, follow the money will always be relevant.
Well, people who are slavishly obedient to “handlers” no matter what, shouldn’t be surprised to be seen and treated like dogs by said “handlers”.
IMHO, one should never deliver blind trust and/or obedience to people you don’t personally know well for a long time, especially not to salesmen types (which is what politicians are), no matter how famous and how many other people you see delivering blind trust and obedience to them.
yeah well at least everyone agrees the GOP base is scary, so that’s something I guess lol. There is still a cinder of objective reality we can all gather around, which is that the hardest right people in a country with 500 million guns are --shockingly-- a scary as fuck bunch.
I’m not scared of them because they have guns. I’m scared of them for the same reason I’m scared of a toddler with a grenade. They will blow up society because they thought it would make a cool splash in the pond.
Only one base will knock on your door, claim to be a police officer, and shoot you in the face.
Removed by mod
Then, when you think about it long enough, you realize that the GOP base is scary because of guns; not because of intelligence.
GOP base has guns. Dem base is opposed to violence on moral grounds. Sheep to the slaughter.
