All the takes are correct and yet they also miss the point.
Yes, it was insane for the Democrats to think they could win by running a soulless candidate, without a shred of progressive policy vision, pursuing endorsements from neocon war-hawks everybody hates, while arming and funding a genocide, and belittling and crushing those who have enough morality to protest it. It is enraging that the Democrats are so smug and blind to this.
But these are all just symptoms. The deeper reality is that liberalism has failed, liberalism is dead, and people urgently need to wake up to this fact and respond accordingly. It is a defunct ideology that cannot offer any meaningful solutions to our social and ecological crises and it must be abandoned.
Democrats have proven over and over again that they cannot accept even *basic* steps like public healthcare, affordable housing, and a public job guarantee - things that would dramatically improve the material, social and political conditions of the working classes. And they cannot accept a public finance strategy that would steer production away from fossil fuels and toward green transition to give us a shot at a liveable future.
Why? Because these things run against the objectives of capital accumulation. And for liberals capital is sacrosanct. They will do whatever it takes to ensure elite accumulation, it is their only consistent commitment. At home, they suppress and demonize progressive and socialist tendencies. Abroad, they engage in endless wars and violence to suppress input prices in the global South and prevent any possibility of sovereign economic development.
The Democrats have done all this purposefully and knowingly, for my whole life, not as some kind of "mistake" but in full consciousness that it is in the interests of capital.
And because liberalism cannot address our crises, and because it crushes socialist alternatives, it inevitably paves the way for right-wing populism. They know this pattern, and yet they risk it every time - this election being only the most recent example. They did it in 2016, when they actively crushed the Sanders campaign and sent Trump to the White House. They do it because ultimately they (and I mean the liberal ruling class here) don't really mind if fascists take power, so long as the latter too ensure the conditions for capital accumulation. They 100% prefer this to the possibility of a socialist alternative.
So, progressives have to face reality. The dream of "converting" the Democratic party is dead. This is now a fact and it must be accepted. The only option is to build a mass-based movement that can reclaim the working classes and mobilize a political vehicle that can integrate disparate progressive struggles into a unified and formidable political force and achieve substantive transformation. This will take real work, actual organizing, but it must be done and that process must begin now.
4 years on, Who Owns Norfolk has mapped 70% of West Norfolk and is concluding its landownership research. In this old fashioned part of England, just 0.2% of the population (including several Italian counts) owns 50% of the land. Read on for more: https://t.co/F99oWrsygW
‘Dartmoor wild camping campaigners rally round ahead of Supreme Court ruling’
Amazing work by @EveryonesStars @Right_2Roam today with reports of hundreds turning out on Dartmoor. Next up: rally outside the Supreme Court, this Tues 11am https://t.co/UrtGQRoojm
How can we best spend £22 billion to get the biggest climate bang for our buck and really kickstart our 'green revolution'?
I know, let's invest it in one of the 'climate solutions' with lowest potential and highest costs
This is absolute madness. Carbon capture and storage has failed time and again. Labour has slashed reliable green programmes, to pour vast sums of our money into a complete crock. The only possible explanation is lobbying by fossil fuel companies.🧵 https://t.co/GCyad2C3N4
Jesus that carbon capture investment policy is weak. Such a gut punch for anyone hoping Labour knew what they were doing on the environment. The technology has been debunked for years!
The Labour leadership's resistance to proportional representation is undemocratic and out of tune with the demands of its own members. It has a huge majority on a small mandate. It knows that is not right or fair. It must also know it could easily tip the other way.
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I'm so angry about how Labour has treated @faizashaheen.
People like her with direct relationships to the communities around them are integral for making sure progressive politics is grounded in working class experience.
Let's all donate to her campaign!
https://t.co/IbSgEUBFLJ
I am standing as an independent candidate for Chingford & Woodford Green at the General Election on 4 July.
For more info: https://t.co/JNQ62RjmrX
Sign up to volunteer: https://t.co/2t6uTsMJLh
Let's do this!
Nothing from Labour on the massacre in Rafah today. It’s taken me too long, but I can’t stand it any more. I’ve resigned my membership. I want to back @TheGreenParty and independents backed by @_we_deserve_ in #GE2024.
Oil corporation sues EU in a corporate court for daring to levy a windfall tax on its twelvefold increase in profits following the invasion of Ukraine. Exit ECT and dismantle the whole ISDS system, which protects profiteering billionaires. A monstrous attack on democracy.
Our X/Twitter account , which had 20,000+ followers, was deleted by the Elon Musk-owned platform earlier this month.
We used our account to amplify the voices of low-paid and migrant workers and to mobilise support for their struggle for dignity, equality and respect. ✊🏾
Suspect we’ll see big Lab win in 2024. Then, because they’ve no story for 21st C Britain, no policies & no politics around class (who wins & loses from status quo) this stuff will make political weather thereafter
Expect centre & centre left to make same mistakes all over again.
Rising corporate profits were the largest contributor to Europe’s inflation over the past two years as companies increased prices by more than the spiking costs of imported energy. https://t.co/iEf6Emu0Rp
We are horrified by the recent Israeli bombing of Ahli Arab Hospital in #Gaza City, which was treating patients and hosting displaced Gazans. Hundreds of people have reportedly been killed. This is a massacre. It is absolutely unacceptable...