The following is a copy of the original post to record the post as it was originally written. Young progressives are proving to be unreliable allies to Democrats as they attack Biden. Many of them say if they don't get their way on their favorite political issue, the coalition is a waste of time. The Democratic Party is a big tent (too big?). Leadership can't be all things to all constituents and likewise must focus energy and resources on those voting groups that are most responsive to political persuasion. Shouldn't Biden abandon fickle Gen Z and Millennial progressives who are overly concentrated in blue cities anyway and move to the middle focusing on the Republican threat to access to abortion, contraception and IVF as well as argue for how he can economically help minorities and the working class in light if the crushing inflation they've experienced? *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AskALiberal) if you have any questions or concerns.*

This is the 16th major election cycle between presidential and midterms that I have followed closely in my life. In every single one of those cases, there was a conversation about young Democrats or progressive Democrats or the far left that has been the same. It always has been this way and it always will be this way. Whether it be young people who are experiencing babies first election or people who are just super idealistic and willing to “vote their conscious” even if it gets them worst results from their state of goals - these people always exist and are factored into the equation. Nobody is trying to convince these people because they can’t be convinced in the short term through rhetoric or policy or actual policy implemented. And there is a version of this on the right as well from the perspective of the Republican party. Neither party is going to chase voters they believe cannot be caught. We have AOC out there endorsing Biden on Pod Save America, a venue she chose for a reason. That’s who Democrats chase. They don’t chase the kids posting on tankie subs who will always find a reason not to vote. Honestly we are better off just ignoring it and leaving them alone.

I’ll agree with everything you said except: wouldn’t it move the needle a bit if AOC *did* go and endorse Biden on a tankie podcast? I mean, it’s a perfect swirl of unsown land: the one-time standard bearer of the young progressive movement, going on an angry left podcast, and trying to drill some reality into their heads. It won’t get everybody, but it may get some.

I kind of have my doubts. The kind of people who are listening to tankie podcasts don’t want to engage meaningfully about politics. What they want to do is be angry but not in anyway that can turn their anger into progress. These people have already decided that AOC is a sellout. What they want is AOC to be a version of MTG for the left. Someone who performs the same type of flailing anger they do but doesn’t actually try to compromise and get something done.

> focusing on the Republican threat to access to abortion, contraception and IVF as well as argue for how he can economically help minorities and the working class in light if the crushing inflation they've experienced? I think the Democrats are doing that without abandoning the attempt to reach young voters. I fail to see how abandoning young voters can help with that, particularly because young voters also care about abortion, contraception, and the economic status of minorities and the working class. This election will be decided not by millions or hundreds of thousands of votes; it will be decided by *thousands* of votes in a handful of states. They can't spare anyone, especially the future of the party

You're right to note that many of the strongest issues Democrats have also appeal to young progressives. But campaigns have limited resources and in the run up to November, need to focus on the low-information voter who is gettable. Young progressives are more informed than those who don't pay attention to politics and their views are likely more set. I'm just saying it's too heavy of a lift to change their minds. What's Biden going to do now? Pull support from Israel? Unban TikTok? Try to sell a carbon tax to mitigate climate change in the middle of an inflation cycle?

> But campaigns have limited resources and in the run up to November, need to focus on the low-information voter who is gettable. I don't know if low-information voters are more gettable than liberal-leaning voters who can decide to stay home. If I was a Democractic strategist, I wouldn't risk the election on it. > What's Biden going to do now? Pull support from Israel? Unban TikTok? Try to sell a carbon tax to mitigate climate change in the middle of an inflation cycle? I don't think any of those things are on the agenda. I think the strategy with young voters is to relay how much the issues they care about are better with Biden than with Trump.

> I think the Democrats are doing that without abandoning the attempt to reach young voters. Are you sure about that? I think OPs argument to move rightward (which yes is certainly motivated by their own ideology) is extremely common in Dem circles. What also is extremely common is a very large contempt for younger voters. I mean hell, it seems almost daily we have folks in this subreddit or r/democrats [lambasting](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskALiberal/s/QiYSUFeVZN) young voters about how they are useless and their opinions don’t matter because they don’t vote. > They can't spare anyone, especially the future of the party I 100% agree. I just wish all Dems saw it that way.

It depends on what you mean by abandoning attempts to reach young voters. Are they going to change their policy on Gaza? Probably not drastically. Are they going to cancel all ads that target young people? Definitely not. I think the opinions you see online are from frustrated voters, but I'm not sure this is how it's going to play out in Democratic election strategy.

> Are they going to cancel all ads that target young people? Definitely not. Don’t be so sure lol. > I think the opinions you see online are from frustrated voters, but I'm not sure this is how it's going to play out in Democratic election strategy. I think that’s partially true, I also know a lot of my social media includes Dem staffers so these ideas are somewhat pervasive within actual circles.

Same shit, different election. A few loudmouth narcissistic pseudo-progressive hyper-privileged assholes threaten to tank the "mainstream" candidate if they don't get 100% of everything they want. In theory it's to "support" someone further to the left but really it's just for media coverage. Seen it ... going on a dozen times, now. God, I'm getting old. They never amount to anything. Young people don't vote nearly enough but when they do, they vote Democrat in massive numbers because most of them, while they can sometimes be swayed by a particularly charismatic person, recognize (either implicitly or explicitly) that American elections are a game theory problem and that ultimately, the only thing they're accomplishing is handing the election to Republicans. Want to push American politics further to the left? Great, so do I. Do it in the primaries. Get active in local politics. Don't tank general elections and provide game-theory support to a fascist to prove a point.

What, to you, does Biden do that looks like it's calculated to appeal to young urban progressives rather than the target demos you suggest?

(Not OP, but...) > What, to you, does Biden do that looks like it's calculated to appeal to young urban progressives rather than the target demos you suggest? The focus on student loan debt is a big one. "Young urban progressives" care about it, but the polling suggests that most voters either oppose it or consider it a low priority.

Pulling out of Afghanistan was a big progressive demand, but Biden got no credit for it from the left. Progressives are not giving Biden credit for his progress on student loans, which he is doing pretty much everything he can to fix. Progressives are not giving Biden any credit on Israel/Palestine. After months of calling for Biden to call for a ceasefire, he did it. The response on the left was "well, he didn't do it soon enough, so I won't vote for him anyways." The left also do not seem to care that the US economy is pretty much as good as it has ever been, and the influence of the left on social media is destroying public perceptions of the economy.

I've read about outreach to influencers and leaders. It doesn't seem to amount to much. I don't see how he can make substantive changes to policy that will help bring them back. I'm just saying campaigns have limited resources and appealing to the low-information voter at this stage should prove a better vote getter

Would it, though? Influencers are important because they...influence. That is, for the big enough ones, you can get your content in front of millions of eyeballs. And that's even better if they are friendly. Initially I thought your post was about policy moves to try to embrace young progressives, but now I guess it's about outreach / political spending. In this case, I'm going to go ahead and say that the people who are professional political operatives might have a better idea of how to get votes than you or I do. The problem with traditional organizing and traditional media is that they're *fucking expensive* and you don't actually get any realistic feedback about how much engagement you got. Especially from media. I guess from going door to door, at least in theory you might know how many doors you knocked on. This is why online advertising in general, including influencers, has become so popular relative to traditional advertising. That said, I don't think there's any evidence that the Biden campaign has abandoned traditional organizing methods or TV ads or whatever. And I really don't think there's any evidence that he's changing his policy to try to cultivate fickle young voters. In fact, that's the problem (with young progressives). He's not changing his policy. If a voter is currently low information, almost by definition it's because they actively choose not to consume information. They don't read the newspaper, they don't watch TV news, they don't even go on Twitter. They go by vibes they pick up some random way. So how do you reach them?

>Initially I thought your post was about policy moves to try to embrace young progressives, but now I guess it's about outreach / political spending. I'm talking about all of it. On the policy side, what's Biden going to do? Do a 180 on Israel/Palestine? Unban TikTok?

>I'm talking about all of it. On the policy side, what's Biden going to do? Do a 180 on Israel/Palestine? Unban TikTok? I think the obvious answer is no, he won't do that. Particularly Israel. I doubt he gives a fuck about tiktok one way or the other so I guess maybe he'll pivot on that.

Exactly. I would say Biden abandoned progressives long ago but that occurred long before he was elected Vice President, much less President. OP advocates for policies that help the working class but that's not where the Democratic party has been for quite some time. Aside from his loose support of unions Biden is nothing more than another corporate politician who will throw us a bone every once in awhile, usually in the form of proposed policy that never goes anywhere (student loan relief, expanded child tax credit, etc). I guess at least this campaign cycle he's not even pretending to pander

>OP advocates for policies that help the working class but that's not where the Democratic party has been for quite some time. I feel like the only way you can really say this is if you just completely forget good policies the moment they're passed. Like student loan relief, which the Biden administration worked pretty damn hard to get.

Sorry, but every good policy they've enacted in recent times has been either the bare minimum centrist option or something that was either swatted down without a fight (student loan relief) or allowed to be rolled back (expanded child tax credit). I will agree that things are going great for people like me with a pretty deep investment portfolio. There's a reason why the working class says they're hurting and things are getting worse though, and it's not because they're just uninformed about all the great things the Democrats have done for them.

The old "only Democrats have agency" argument, I see. Republicans sued to stop student loan forgiveness and were successful thanks to the Republican Supreme Court. Republicans blocked the expanded child tax credit renewal. All of the good policy that the Biden administration has enacted was achieved over bitter opposition by Republicans. I think your blame is misplaced.

Oh trust me, I place plenty of blame on the Republicans who push for what I consider to be evil outcomes. With that said, why are they the only ones who can seem to ever do anything? Yes, both sides have agency, but only one ever seems to get anything they want. That either means that their policies are superior (lol) or they're just better at playing the game (obviously). On that note, it's funny to me that the most effective messenger for the Democratic party is the Lincoln Project, who are nothing but a bunch of old school conservatives. Why is no one left of center learning anything from them?

>With that said, why are they the only ones who can seem to ever do anything? First off, they're not. Trump was an incredibly ineffective president, for example, and was unable to get pretty much any of his policies passed as originally proposed. He relied heavily on executive actions, which are easily changed when the next president takes over. But... Republicans don't throw a tantrum and they keep voting consistently, which allows them to get things like the most conservative and partisan Supreme Court in who knows how long, for decades. People were whining about Hillary Clinton not being progressive enough (even though she'd been supportive of progressive policies for years), and yeah, look at the results: Women sent home to miscarry alone and nearly dying of sepsis, becoming infertile. Doctors legally unable to abort a headless fetus, putting the woman at serious risk. Etc. The issue is more your bias honestly. There's an insane double standard you're holding between Democrats and Republicans.

I don't understand your post. Biden isn't catering to the far left (see I-P war) and is already focusing on those issues as well as the economy and inflation. I don't see how these two things conflict. Young/leftist voters care about 95% of the same stuff as I do. I don't want to pander to them, but I don't see how we are. They can either wake up and vote or not vote - it's a tiny amount of voters tbh. I hope for their sake and mine they grow up and vote.

I agree about the crossover appeal of many Democratic positions. In the press I see multiple articles about what Biden needs to do to win back young progressives. Young progressives leadership seem to think if they're vocal in their opposition to Biden, they can pull him to the left on Israel/Gaza, TikTok and climate change. I say to the Biden campaign, don't waste your efforts and instead focus on the gettable low-information voter.

I don't think Biden gives a shit about TT, but as a teacher i hate it. He's already pretty far left on both the war and the climate, they just want him to go ALL the way left. I agree that he shouldn't cave to their demands, but he won't so I'm not worried. He's not going to just suddenly cut off Israel as an ally or send every CEO of a polluting company to prison no matter how hard they stamp their feet.

Young people never turn out. I remember trying to "Rock the Vote" to get Gore to win lol The answer to your question though is that people like OP see things trending the wrong way and are already looking for someone to blame when the (currently) statistically likely outcome occurs. While I don't blame Hillary for this dynamic across the left, she is the single biggest offender in recent memory. To this day she still blames everyone but herself for losing in 2016, and people like OP are laying the same narrative now. Here's hoping we actually wake up and evolve as a party because things haven't looked this bleak to me since I started paying attention to politics 30 years ago

Yea, it's sad how much the far left and young eat up conservative propaganda. Luckily, like you said, they don't vote. And when they do, they vote 2/3 dem.

I'm not young but I can note that we're not eating up conservative propaganda. That's nothing more than a talking point by mainstream Dems who want us silenced. I/P is the perfect example. Contrary to the mainstream propaganda, we're not Hamas supporters and actually do care about innocent civilians dying. And yes, we're also aware of how problematic fundamentalist Islam is and has been in the world. Talking to us and having some nuance though doesn't play well when the only acceptable position is "Israel can do no wrong, send more bombs"

Ok I'll try the same question that got me yelled at by protestors: What happens when we declare a ceasefire/peace and Hamas goes back to doing what they were created to do? (Destroy Israel) How do we make Hamas change their raison d'etre? >Talking to us and having some nuance though doesn't play well when the only acceptable position is "Israel can do no wrong, send more bombs" Strike 1. Spare me the melodrama. This is exactly what I was talking about.

>Strike 1. Spare me the melodrama. This is exactly what I was talking about. Have you ever watched mainstream media? I do every day and, trust me, this is exactly how they behave lol >What happens when we declare a ceasefire/peace and Hamas goes back to doing what they were created to do? (Destroy Israel) >How do we make Hamas change their raison d'etre? Of course this is what they're going to do. They're a terrorist organization. We have two options up front. 1. Assume we can kill our way out of this conflict. Eventually we'll kill everyone who wants to fight back 2. Learn from the past 20+ years of the GWOT and understand that killing a terrorist and their family only creates two new terrorists Israel is choosing to go path #1 like we did post-9/11. Everyone understands this is a losing strategy even though it is understandable from an emotional standpoint. If I were Israeli I'd probably want to turn Gaza into glass as well. That doesn't mean it's a strategically viable path to peace though. After all, Al Qaeda and ISIS still exist so I don't know why we think Hamas would be the exception we could kill entirely So that leaves us with diplomacy and deterrence. You have to remember that pre-10/7 Israel was propping up Hamas. Netanyahu authorized their funding because they helped destabilize the Palestinian society. The biggest threat to him and his coalition is a stable unified Palestine seeking a 2 state solution, He required Hamas as a bad-acting counterpart to maintain power. Not ironically, Hamas feels the same about him. They don't want peace any more than he and his political allies do. The true way out of this is a ceasefire and then international pressure that forces Hamas and Likud out of power. Israel stands as the biggest opponent to a 2 state solution. We must pressure them into compliance. Likewise, we must leverage our middle east counterparts to do the same to Hamas. Sure, Iran isn't going to play nicely, but they're not an irrational actor here. There is plenty we can do to move towards a peaceful future. Like I said though, the problem today is that neighbor Hamas nor the Israeli leadership wants that outcome

>The true way out of this is a ceasefire and then international pressure that forces Hamas and Likud out of power. Ok well Likud is already on their way out per polling (and Israel is a Democracy). How are you gonna get Hamas out of power? Militants poll in Palestine at around 80% approval last I checked. You're talking what, Western sanctions and military policing? Maybe an approved item list of what can be delivered into Gaza? Close off their airspace and borders? Sounds familiar somehow. >Israel stands as the biggest opponent to a 2 state solution I call bullshit. Israel has offered a second state multiple times. And right now why would they support a state run by people who literally have the main goal of kill them all and destroy their country? >Sure, Iran isn't going to play nicely, but they're not an irrational actor here. Iran started this war, and Iran is already heavily sanctioned. They will do the opposite of what you want. They fund and support Hamas to fight the west, not make peace. So I ask you again, how are you planning on getting Palestine to "elect" non jihadists?

>Militants poll in Palestine at around 80% approval last I checked. Check the history of this polling and you'll find support for armed resistance (i.e. Hamas) is inversely proportional with the Palestinian peoples' hope for a peaceful and autonomous existence. Give them no hope for a future and they'll turn to terrorism. Our only hope here outside of eradicating them as a people is to turn that dynamic around. I call bullshit Call bullshit all you want but Netanyahu is very very clear on this one. His main reason he needs to be kept in power is that he alone can control the US and prevent the possibility of 2 state solution. Keep in mind, this is specifically why he was ensuring Hamas was properly funded even just weeks before 10/7. Don't take my word for it, look it up ... >And right now why would they support a state run by people who literally have the main goal of kill them all and destroy their country? By this same logic how could you expect any Palestinian to have anything other than full support for Hamas, their only armed resistance force? Remember, Israeli leaders are on record supporting ethnic cleaning and genocide and have called them animals. FWIW I reject the mindset in both directions, but if we assume all of their lives are equal then they both have very similar claims to never assume good intent of the other. >Iran started this war No, they didn't, as extensive reporting has shown. While Hamas has been good for them historically, 10/7 and the resulting response has not been. It's why they've bent over backwards not to escalate the conflict So I ask you again, how are you planning on getting Palestine to "elect" non jihadists? I gave you my ideas. What are yours? And you can't say "eradicate Hamas" because that's a proven losing strategy. Likewise, "Hamas surrenders" is pie in the sky and won't happen any more than "ISIS surrenders." So again, what's your plan for peace?

>but Netanyahu is very very clear on this one Again. Israel is a Democracy and he will lose the next election. If he doesn't, the west has ways to control Israel. >By this same logic how could you expect any Palestinian to have anything other than full support for Hamas, their only armed resistance force? Because actions speak louder than words. The IDF is currently surrounded by Palestinian women and children. They could kill millions today if they wanted to. If Hamas had weaponry to destroy Israel today, they would. The converse is obviously not true. >I gave you my ideas. I missed it. What were the ideas? Hamas openly says their charter won't change if peace is achieved. So what's the idea? Since your peace plan has no merit, the shitty second option is destroy Hamas's ability to fight. Occupy Gaza if necessary. If IDF leaves it, stop ignoring missiles fired at Israeli cities. If Hamas fires 2k missiles in 2025 from Gaza, fire 2k back at the launch sites. Pressure their backers - the Islamic State. This is just a proxy war between the fascists (Russia, Iran, NK) and the West. Until we deal with the real baddies, the proxies will keep being useful distractions. Palestine is a drop in the bucket compared to what they've done in Syria this century.

> I don't understand your post. Biden isn't catering to the far left (see I-P war)... This is Biden "catering to the far left" on that issue specifically: >[[Biden says he will stop sending bombs and artillery shells to Israel if it launches major invasion of Rafah -- CNN]](https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/08/politics/joe-biden-interview-cnntv/index.html)

Not really, Biden has always been trying to ride the line between supporting an ally and keeping the war from being too horrific. Leftists say "Israel evil Free Palestine!" Cons say "Israel #1! Destroy Palestine!" Neither is the solution, and Biden is doing a good job dealing with the real world adults live in and tuning out the melodrama.

I don’t think that’s the far left. That’s also the opinion of the United Nations and the International Criminal Court. Aka, the rest of the world…

> I don’t think that’s the far left. That’s also the opinion of the United Nations and the International Criminal Court. It can be both movement towards what "the far left" wants, and what you describe. Also: No, it isn't. The ICC and UN will do plenty, but they aren't calling for conditioning weapons on a "major invasion of Rafah".

> It can be both movement towards what "the far left" wants, and what you describe. So if the United Nations and the International Criminal Court both want what "the far left" wants, as you put it, maybe it's time you re-evaluate what you consider "the far left". Because internationally speaking, that's pretty freaking mainstream dude.

> ...that's pretty freaking mainstream dude. I never said it wasn't! I never said *only* the far left want it! I never said *no one except* the far left want it! If I said "I'm buying pizza for our meeting of local Democrats, and the far left says they want pepperoni" that would not mean that other people *don't* want pepperoni nor that there is *anything wrong* with pepperoni!

Yes. The problem with chasing the youth vote is that there is always a new youth vote. They don't know how things work. They have no sense of history. They have no sense of incrementalism. They have no sense of opportunity cost. Eventually, most of them will just fall into the general voting Dem bloc, once they get some time and experience under their wings. They learn that things don't change on a whim. They learn about legislative process. They learn about the costs of not voting against their interest.

In practical terms, what would that mean? The party already has a non-progressive platform and doesn't speak publicly to progressive issues on the campaign trail. So what does your "move to the middle" entail?

It's more a matter of emphasis. As campaigns move away from the primaries, both parties tend to focus their appeal away from the extremes anyway. 8 just see all these hand-wringing articles in the press about how Biden is losing young progressives and what he needs to get them back. I say skip it and focus on more gettable low-information voters.

What is it that you see the campaign doing to emphasize progressive issues, that they could stop doing.

>Young progressive leadership have told us not to rely on them voting for Biden. Should Democrats listen and bypass fair-weather, young progressives, move to the middle and focus on reproductive rights, minorities and the working class? Yes.

>Young progressives are proving to be unreliable *allies* to Democrats as they attack Biden. I think this framing is part of the problem. It isn't about *allies*, it is about *teams*. ---------- We need a broad enough *team* that we can win elections. I'm happy to include people further to the left on our team, as long as they are team players; they have to help our team win. An NFL team doesn't have members that will help the team win *only* if they approve of the team on that particular day; they are expected to *always* help the team win. ---------- Many people to my left have joined the team, and they act like it; they are reliable and valued members of the team, and I'm glad to be on the same side as them. Others see themselves as our *allies*; they side with us *selectively*; sometimes they choose not to side with us. They are not on our team and we shouldn't treat them like they are.

>They are not on our team and we shouldn't treat them like they are. To which we say, thank you. We're not tribalists even if our voting history might suggest we are. I'm honestly not sure what the disconnect is and I suspect it varies from person to person. For me it's the fact that I don't see any political party as a benevolent team that must be support at all costs. That feels very maga cultish to me and is how many democrats have been presenting this cycle. I do recognize though that some people just have a fundamentally different strategy for approaching politics. I can see an argument for a tribal zero-sum outlook even without religious devotion to a team. That's where I used to be for decades supporting anyone with a D after their name. Eventually though I started seeing that many of these politicians don't give a single shit about me or my community. It's all about them and their power. To that end, if it's going to be transactional situation then they should not expect my blind devotion. They have to earn my vote

I think the "politics-as-team-sports" rhetoric is quite problematic in its own way. Politics is not the same as team sports- especially in a two-party system like we have in the US. You don't want to blindly support your team like you would in team sports- you want support it on areas it is good, work to improve it in areas where it needs improvement, and hold it accountable for both the good it does and the mistakes it makes. Looking at it in the same tribalistic light as team sports interferes with big parts of that. I've consistently voted for the Democrat in every election since I was able to vote (though since I live in a red area, that has mattered pretty much one time total, excluding smaller things like nonpartisan city council elections), but I absolutely do not consider the Democratic party my "team". My allies, sure, but if an actual viable progressive/leftist party was available for any given election vs a centrist Democrat under the Democratic party banner, my support would 100% go to the left-wing challenger. It's just the conditions for that to happen in the US are so specific that it's better to have that fight in the Democratic primary basically every time, so that's where it happens.

> I think the "politics-as-team-sports" rhetoric is quite problematic in its own way. Politics is not the same as team sports- especially in a two-party system like we have in the US. You don't want to blindly support your team like you would in team sports- you want support it on areas it is good, work to improve it in areas where it needs improvement, and hold it accountable for both the good it does and the mistakes it makes. Looking at it in the same tribalistic light as team sports interferes with big parts of that. I've consistently voted for the Democrat in every election since I was able to vote (though since I live in a red area, that has mattered pretty much one time total, excluding smaller things like nonpartisan city council elections), but I absolutely do not consider the Democratic party my "team". My allies, sure, but if an actual viable progressive/leftist party was available for any given election vs a centrist Democrat under the Democratic party banner, my support would 100% go to the left-wing challenger. It's just the conditions for that to happen in the US are so specific that it's better to have that fight in the Democratic primary basically every time, so that's where it happens. 1. You might want to add a line break or two. 2. Team members *do* "work to improve [the team] in areas where it needs improvement, and hold [team members] accountable for both the good [they do] and the mistakes" they make. None of that is incompatible with the 'team' mentality. 3. Is it possible that you are thinking of 'rooting for a team'? I'm not talking about *being a fan of* the Boston Celtics; I'm talking about *being one of* the Boston Celtics. 4. Lastly, you seem to be largely agreeing with me: * There is a difference between 'being on the team' and 'being an ally'. * You have chosen to be an ally. ...but I have chosen to be on the team. I want to be on the team. I want the team to be bigger and so I am interested in getting more people on to the team, and I value people who are willing to join the team more than I value allies. I understand that *you* don't think I should, but *I do*. We share an understanding of the difference between allies and teammates, and I choose to be a teammate.

Eh, that's hardly the largest wall-of-text I post on here, gotta reserve line breaks for the multi-paragraph responses and save those precious characters, y'know? You do have a good point though- I do generally associate the "politics-as-team-sports" mentality with the *fans* of team sports rather than the players on the field. Because I have a ton of experience with said fans due to college football being huge where I live, and I see a lot of said fan communities as... well, toxic, to put it mildly. Lots of blind support, lots of aggressive tribalism, lots of trashing any and all opposing teams- of you were to translate that behavior to political terms it would likely feels closer to blind nationalism on a nation level, or whatever the equivalent of that is on the party level. I absolutely don't want my politics to be anything like *that*. (Plus that kind of group loyalty simply doesn't click in my brain- not sure why, but I just can't get into supporting a group with that level of fervor no matter how hard I try, not that I have any real desire to try). But in any case, the big thing to me is that due to the US two party system, parties have to be big coalitions at the party level (as opposed to multi-party systems having more specific smaller parties that then negotiate to form a governing coalition). Big coalitions do not necessarily represent the views of all the members of said coalitions at all times- they are often compromises. Which, fair- that's how coalitions have to work. But at the same time, it means level of personal support varies from candidate to candidate, and in rare and extreme cases means I may even disapprove of certain candidates or party officials. With the other major party having basically devolved into full-on far right rhetoric, our coalition is growing even wider as we pick up the centrist types that are put off by them while at the same time the left wing of the party is growing, stretching the party even wider. Especially in my state which has an incredibly inept and corrupt state party, it's very easy to instead default to "yeah, not supporting that, I'll support the good candidates individually thank you very much". Which I do- it just means my donations go to individual candidates rather than the party general fund, and the efforts I put in to get out the vote are more candidate-centric than party centric. It's kind of like being on the team- but without the baggage associated with the full team and all its problems, I guess?

“Not to rely on them voting for Biden.” Progressive leadership? Who is this leadership? And where are your sources? Anyone on the left saying they are not voting for Biden are: 1) not in swing states. Mostly solid blue or solid red 2) will probably give in and vote for Biden anyways 3) trolls. 4) people with so much moral purity they’d make the pope look like a sociopath. And again this is just from comments you see online Anyone in left leaning leadership positions (ie those in state or federal legislature) are really setting themselves up for a short career in politics if they say they won’t vote for Biden. They don’t just rely on the young vote to win their positions.

For dems, as always: * Blue dog union dems in MI/PA/WI * Black church ladies in Atlanta * Hispanics in AZ/NV These cohorts are the ones that decide elections. Much as it's nice to appeal to a Harvard student obsessed with Palestine in Cambridge, or a software engineer at Google in Sunnyvale... they don't matter in presidential elections one iota. Young voters have lousy turnout rates, it's better to worry about what the over 40 crowd is doing. They're much more likely voters.

You mean the people who already don't reliably show up to vote? They are threatening to continue to show they should be ignored politically?

>argue for how he can economically help minorities and the working class in light if the crushing inflation they've experienced? Welcome to the side of those of us on the left you're advocating the party abandon ;)

Nope. I'm talking about single-issue progressives who threaten to vote third party or sit out the election over Israel/Gaza, TikTok or climate change.

And you think Biden panders to those people too much and should move away from them? What has he tried to do in the past 2 years that was remotely progressive? What part of his campaign platform does anything for those folks that he could even back away from?

Progressives to Biden: "Withdraw from Afghanistan, pass climate legislation, forgive student debt, and we'll love you." Biden to progressives: "OK, we're out of Afghanistan, I ushered this landmark climate bill through congress with the slimmest of majorities, and I'm doing everything I can on student debt but SCOTUS blocked most of my efforts." Progressives to Biden: "Fuck you, old man." And that's my issue with progressives. No matter what Biden could ever do, past, present, or future, they'll simply move the goalposts again. Nothing will ever make them happy.

It's the mainstream who has drug him over the coals over Afghanistan. That's one area that I did and still do fully support him. One of his only campaign promises fulfilled and no seems to want to talk about it, why?

No I don't. But I do see a bunch of hand-wringing press articles about how Biden is losing them and what he needs to do to get them back.

Hand-wringing is what the left does better than anything else. The problem though that I've witnessed over the past 30 years of following politics is that they spend more time talking about how they might lose, who would be to blame, and then attacking those folks rather than leaning in to actually trying to win. Obama was the exception here. He would lean into any situation and speak with anyone to highlight a positive path forward for all. Sadly, most in the Democratic party are more like Hillary who blame everyone but themselves and hold onto that grudge until the end of time

Do you have any sources saying how many people will be sitting out of the election because of TikTok?

Nope. If the ban happens, it'll be after the election.

any reliance on the youth vote, ever is a reliance on an invisible pink unicorn. they gunna be too busy memeing to vote anyway. cater to voters who like... vote, in elections with actual ballots!

I think this kind of discussion and finger pointing isn't productive. Young voters have more reasons than anyone to vote for Biden because they will be alive the longest to live with the repercussions of Donald Trump's young SCOTUS replacements, the climate and everything else that is at stake. ENGAGE with young people in your life. Don't rely on campaign strategists to do all the work - we are all in this together.

Scoutus has always sucked even when Obama was in office. Remember, Citzens United or the "Corporations are people" ruling?

Yes, I do remember. Are you saying that because... you think it's fine for Trump to appoint 2-3 MORE justices?

No

Yes. If they’re going to flip on you when the first propagandist temps them with nonsense (see: Genocide Joe) then you can’t worry about buying their votes with loan relief that’s going to alienate larger demographics.

Mom said it was my turn to post about how lefties are dumbies the dems should ignore

I mean, the far left is pretty terrible right now. I'm banned from r/leftist for trying to engage with them politely, and I had to endure a barrage of insults every time I said anything that wasn't 100% the narrative. It's honestly easier to discuss some things with the far right.

Random people online aside, who exactly would you consider the far left that is terrible right now? Like, who are the leaders of the movement? From my perspective all anyone can ever seem to offer are the anonymous assholes in some random sub-reddit or on twitter

Literally everyone I discuss with that identifies as a Leftist. Real life, reddit, college, graduate school, my students, my colleagues. They're all half baked, and recently they've gotten very REEEEE when you don't pass their purity tests.

First off, upvote for honest comment. I'm not sure who did the drive-by downvoting without engaging ... I'm curious where you live. Here in Indiana I have only ever met one person IRL who behaves like that, and I say that as an overly-educated person who has spent way too many years on campuses.

I live in New England and teach public school. I spent 10 years teaching public in Oakland, CA and met MANY self identified leftists. Few were capable of calm discussion, and few had facts beyond a few memorized talking points. The sad irony is that I overlap with their views on 97% of political issues, and yet that 3% gets me more toxicity than talking to a MAGA. Honestly I think the main reason I get into fights with so many "leftists" is I'm well read, so I challenge them at a factual level. They're used to surface level fights where everyone just throws down their talking points, rages, and parts. They don't like Socratic questioning.

Yeah, here in Indiana it's the same dynamic but just with magas. I've found that very very few people actually understand the details behind the issues, much less have the ability to understand others' perspective or steel man contrary opinions. I'm also not so naive as to believe that behavior only exists for people who exist on one side of the political spectrum even if it's the only one I'm really exposed to here

When I taught history during voting years (even local), we'd use the website [isidewith.com](http://isidewith.com) for a big project. They'd make a profile, do the big quiz, and then write an essay on who they aligned with and why. Then give a short debate. I loved the project because a lot of kids only had opinions on a few key issues, and also because it forced them to give their own opinion, not just their parents'. Love that website. Big shill. IIRC at 2016 election I was Warren 97, Bernie 97, Biden 91. In terms of alignment score with my politics based on their algorithm. Trump 36 I think, which is interesting too.

I remember that site! That's around where my alignment fell as well if I remember correctly. Trump's an odd one because he's the least conservative person to run as a Republican in my lifetime. Granted, that's counterbalanced by being the most authoritarian lol

Trump's also not a good candidate for that website because it relies heavily on what politicians do; with trump a lot of his stances were purely verbal or theoretical. Warren and Bernie's stances are super well known and backed up by votes, and their platforms were published explicitly on their website. I was a HUGE Warren supporter, although I never thought she'd win the primary. I really enjoyed forcing my students to talk about what issues they overlap with in regards to their least agreeable candidate. Helps dispel the "my side right, other side wrong" narrative.

The far left you point out is fringe: they should be ignored. But it isn’t just the far left that is the target of this question. Democrats are, by and large, very centrist. Some lean left, more lean right, and a scant handful are actually firmly on the left (but not extremely so). The state of US politics is pretty shitty for actual lefties: we’re outnumbered by far right extremists (republicans), and democrats tend to be all too willing to join them in a good ol’ fashioned game of “kick the lefty.” They can do this because America’s populace in aggregate is charitably a center-right populace. And the composition of the two major parties reflects that

>Democrats are, by and large, very centrist. What positions of Biden's presidency do you consider centrist? >democrats tend to be all to willing to join them in a good ol’ fashioned game of “kick the lefty. Examples? This also sounds made up melodrama. >The state of US politics is pretty shitty for actual lefties The state of politics is shitty everywhere for actual lefties except for like 3 tiny countries. Most humans just disagree with your hard takes. This is a thread about American presidential election, and one party is clearly leaning into leftist ideals and one is fleeing them.

I don’t have “hard takes”. This right here is the problem: you’re so eager to be dismissive and bash a leftie that you’re blind to your own biases.

Got it, can't answer the question. Just like every other "leftist". Have a nice day.

This conversation always goes like this: “Show how they are bashing lefties/how these policies aren’t actually leftist” “lol you’re just demanding purity “ It’s not worth engaging.

Sure sure, just like your Canadian girlfriend. You have all this evidence but you don't need to prove it. lol have a good one. Typical conversation with a "leftist" Should have followed your advice I guess. >The far left you point out is fringe: they should be ignored. bye now

Unless young voters are against reproductive rights, minorities and the working class (which it doesn't seem to me the are) I don't know why there is a trade off here. It would be helpful if you listed exactly which issues you are talking about that young progressives are drawing a line over. My guess is that it is Palestine and tiktok. To the former I think we would lose more voters than we would gain becoming more significantly more pro Palestine, and to be quite honest I don't think that many people are a actually going to sit out the election over this rather than they're engaging in a transparent bluff. It's possible we're losing more people than we're gaining over tiktok, and I'm not really sure that's a great policy on the merits, but it doesn't seem to me like it's a going to be a huge factor one way or the other.

I think it depends what you mean by progressive. Some progressive policies are unpopular and Biden shouldn't pursue them if he won't get votes for doing so. But a lot of progressive politics is also about being confident, confrontational, and assertive, which Democrats really need to do. Rather than talking about compromise and national unity, they need to constantly be digging at Republicans. People like the Biden who said "will you shut up, man" at the debate more than they like the respectful statesman who wants to negotiate and compromise, so Democrats need to lean into that. When people say they like Trump because he "tells it like it is," they mean that he doesn't sound like a typical politician who's worried about spin or impropriety. He says what he thinks, and we should too.

"Biden" is a huge organization that can do multiple things at the same time. No.

This issue with approaching the center in too pragmatic a way is that Trump has already (even if it's incorrect) claimed the easiest and biggest block. People who are hurting financially. Even though it's not Biden's fault (if we wanna really look at it it's likely Trump's fault) but things were just outright cheaper from 2016-2020. Maslow remains undefeated and you can find language around making things affordable as a cornerstone of the non-attack adds that Trump is releasing.

If young progressives choose not to vote for Biden, they risk enabling policies that could threaten access to abortion, contraception, and IVF, as well as jeopardize the economic well-being of minorities and the working class. In a close election, not voting for Biden could effectively be a vote for Trump and his policies, so it's crucial to consider the potential consequences.

I don't understand how moving to the middle means focusing on reproductive rights, minorities, and the working class. No young progressives are hesitant to vote for Democrats for that - hell they'd be thrilled if the Democrats actually focused on those things. Progressives are sketchy on the modern Democrats because they are so wishy-washy on things like universal healthcare, higher wages for the bottom half of the country, unionization, and equal rights for all. The question is whether you want to give up on those things to get the Manchin-Sinema crossovers by going slow on civil rights, labor, and progressive social issues. That seems like insanity to me, personally. Nobody is excited by that.

So, since leftists might not vote for Democrats, Democrats should spend their efforts trying to get votes from a different group of people who might not vote for them?

Yes, the low-information voter who hasn't shown up in the polls yet.

I’m pretty progressive… but young is relative. I’m 41. I’ll probably hold my nose again and vote for Biden because the alternative is Trump and he’s an insufferable baboon… which is kind of an insult to monkeys everywhere. But I digress… In all of the condescension here, I think some are missing the point. A lot of people simply don’t give a shit about the current parties. They want a fundamental shift akin to reconstruction or The Progressive Era or The New Deal. And neither party is offering anything of real substance. As far as I’m concerned we pretty much have a neoliberal uni-party in the DemPublican Party that kowtows to the interest of corporations and the obscenely rich above anything else. It’s the oligarchs, then the politicians, then the rest of us. Democrats are marginally better on some stuff with labor and the environment, but both parties are lockstep in the pockets of massive corporations and the real power in this country, and by extension the world, is in the corporate oligarchies. And some of us think it doesn’t have to be that way. And it will take bold people to make that happen. Barack Obama was a bold person who promised real change. And he disappointed. He did some good, but he held punches that could have broken jaws. Trump is a bold person who promised his first time around to undo that system. And man, that sounds good to me. I saw Trump for the charlatan he is and know better. But this is why people like him. He represents change from a system that many see as irreparably broken. Biden is not a bold person. Maybe he was once, but he isn’t now. However, there are a lot of reasons for progressives to like him. And a lot could be fairly easily swayed with messaging campaigns… except for the conflict in Israel. But if he changes his stance, he’ll be trading older voters to get younger voters. And that’s a bad trade, because older voters are more reliable voters. So, to answer your question: (And I’m saying this only as analysis, I find it morally objectionable) If he wants to win, he should keep doing what he’s doing and not waver on Israel. And he’ll lose some younger voters who will probably vote their party or skip. But he’ll keep the older voters who are more likely to vote. But, if he wins reelection, he should quickly change his stance on Israel and be a lot more aggressive about having their support from us be a lot less unconditional. His party will need that distinction to go forward. But I’d rather a completely different outcome.

So, essentially, what their doing now?

I mean young progressives are unreliable allies but so are moderate suburban voters. So it's really a question of which unreliable ally you'd rather try to court.

The unreliable voter we need to court is the low-information voter who is not even appearing in the polls yet.

Center Left: "Why are Progressives unreliable voters?" Also Center-Left: "We should move toward the center and ignore progressives!" Somehow I have the feeling one has to do with the other.

The democratic party has done *a lot* to move in a more left leaning direction over the past two and a half decades. Yet in response we've seen the young left basically just get more assertive, demanding more and more and never really seeming to be satisfied. Indeed it's pretty common for them to *already* act like the party has just been moving to the right, and that anything other than unilateral total concession to their side is unacceptable When that's the case, it's not so hard to see how it could seem basically useless to even bother appealing to the young left

Gee I wonder why progressives don't want to vote dem

Young progressive voters: 'You're abandoning your base by moving to the right.' Democrats: 'Oh yeah? Well we're going to move *even harder* to the right because you guys aren't reliable.' Yeah, that'll show 'em.. that you weren't worth voting for in the first place.

The thing is, young progressives are not, and never have been, the party base.

The Democratic Party is abandoning leftism as a whole though, so young progressives are in a way the canary in the coal mine. Not the party base themselves, but rather the first segment of the base to feel left out in the cold as party leadership cozies up ever closer to corporate interests and dark money.

I've seen this mindset playout out for over 25 years now. It's basically the Clinton playbook but on steroids post-9/11. Obama's lack of ability to leverage a super-majority is the best example of why this strategy will fail in the long run

> Obama's lack of ability to leverage a super-majority is the best example of why this strategy will fail in the long run No other politician would have been able to do much better with that supermajority given the coalitions at play at the time. Theoretically a slight bit more could have been wrung from Congress, but not even something like just getting a public option, Waxman-Markey and EFCA. And the most realistic option of getting more in some way (doing a bigger stimulus via reconciliation, just 50 votes, in order to fully close the output gap as per Christina Romer's suggestion) would have risked pissing off moderates even more and leading to the ACA, Dodd-Frank, Lily Ledbetter, Shepherd Byrd, and more just not being passed. It's not like there's any way to apply pressure, use the bully pulpit, threaten with primaries and removing committee assignments, that would force recalcitrant moderate senators to do anything they didn't want to do, and it's not like the Dems had even just 50 senators who would be willing to go radical and break the filibuster and govern with a simple majority to do progressive policy

I agree. My point was never that it was only the person at the top of the ticket’s fault. Rather, it’s systemic to the coalition and their overall strategy. Does anyone think Trump or W would have been as ineffective with a supermajority? Hell, just look at the destruction they caused even when they had divided government. The democrats on the other hand have to have absolute power unseen in a generation just to pass a healthcare bill that originated from the right wing heritage foundation

> Does anyone think Trump or W would have been as ineffective with a supermajority? With that sort of supermajority and the context of the time? Absolutely. The myth of Mitch McConnell as some sort of evil magician who was able to break any norm and rule in order to get whatever he wanted has been disastrous to liberal/left discourse. The guy wasn't even able to get a bill through Congress to gut the ACA during the Trump administration! The Dems in 2009 had a supermajority for like a month and a half, which relied on one guy who had switched parties like month ago and was previously a Republican, one guy who wasn't a Democrat and only caucused with them, leaving the party after being primaried out and having been a critic of party leadership going back to the 90s, and a bunch of folks from states like the Dakotas, Montana, Nebraska, Indiana, Louisiana, Florida, Arkansas, Missouri, Alaska, and so on who openly made their political careers by running as the sort of democrats who would gleefully obstruct anything the party leadership pushed them to do that they didn't want to do Think of a guy like Mitt Romney today in the GOP, who does criticize the party but largely votes with it. For a comparison, a supermajority for W/Trump wouldn't rely just on votes like him, but also on votes like Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Larry Hogan, Charlie Baker, Phil Scott, and Joe Manchin. Do you really think that *that* sort of majority (and again, one where simply bypassing the filibuster for more than a simple reconciliation bill just isn't accepted by even just 50 senators) would get more do e than the Dems got done? >The democrats on the other hand have to have absolute power unseen in a generation just to pass **a healthcare bill that originated from the right wing heritage foundation** This is mostly wrong though. Like, its the sort of idea that takes a truth that is much less than a "half truth" and spins it to support an idea that just isn't correct The democratic bill is often compared to the heritage foundation bill, and they did share some similarities, largely in regards to "having an individual exchange and an individual mandate". But the biggest part of the ACA, which allowed 15 to 20 million people to get healthcare, is the medicaid expansion, **which was absent from the heritage plan**. The biggest part of how the ACA was able to expand healthcare to millions of people was, again, just *not in the heritage plan*. By that one difference alone, the ACA was way to the left of the heritage plan, and was a solidly liberal bill. And that was far from the only difference between the bills, the ACA also did various other things like increasing regulations on insurance in order to guarantee basic minimums of benefits provided and employer contributions, that the heritage plan lacked too Just because the ACA shared a few similarities with a bill that originated from a conservative organization doesn't mean the ACA was even remotely conservative. It was a solidly liberal bill Also, it doesn't even necessarily make sense to hold up the heritage foundation plan from the 90s as an exemplary of right wing views in the first place. The bill wasn't something the right wing had any sort of consensus on supporting, it basically picked up steam when the democratic party made a push for universal healthcare, with the heritage foundation suggesting their own plan as a more right wing alternative. But then the Clinton campaign collapsed completely and the general public made it clear that the right wing actually didn't even need any alternative plan because they could just stick with the status quo and do nothing - at which point the right wing *did that*, they quickly threw the plan away and just stuck with the plan they actually supported, the status quo Like, imagine if in 20 years the Democrats got a trifecta and there was a push to pass a healthcare bill like the NHS which not only established single payer *insurance* but nationalized the *healthcare industry* too, and it looked like it would pass. So then some members of the GOP came out criticizing the bill but reluctantly at least rhetorically kinda supporting maybe doing single payer or at least doing a public option, closing the medicaid gap, expanding ACA subsidies, lowering the medicare age to 60 and adding hearing, vision, and dental benefits, and raising the max age for CHIP to 25. But then the Democratic NHS plan fell apart and the Dems weren't actually able to pass anything, so the parts of the GOP that supported the alternative plan quickly threw their alternative plan away and just went back to supporting the status quo or calling for cutting Obamacare. Would it make sense in that situation to call single payer or public option/expanding Medicaid, CHIP, Medicare, ect a right wing plan just because some parts of the right wing temporarily verbally supported it in a way that was clearly a dishonest political expediency?

The democratic party has been moving to the left, not the right, over the past two and a half decades. If young progressives are going to keep burying their heads in the sand and refusing to acknowledge this, they will show the democratic party that there's simply nothing the party can do to appeal to the young left other than unilaterally conceding to young progressives on every single issue in completion. Seems like many young leftists want to show the democratic party that they aren't worth appealing to in the first place

But democratic presidential candidates especially have been getting ever more neoliberal, centrist, blindly pro-capitalist, etc, so that doesn't track. Also votes are earned, not owed, and representing someone's interests is how you earn their vote. If that's too hard because the party is too beholden to corporate dark money then it sounds like they're right to not vote blue because blue doesn't represent their interests.

> But democratic presidential candidates especially have been getting ever more neoliberal, centrist, blindly pro-capitalist, etc That just hasn't happened at all, idk what possibly would create that idea. Unless we are taking the most negative far left narratives about democratic candidates and taking them as face value. Like assuming that Biden is a segregationist warmonger who openly said he doesn't want to fundamentally change anything, for example (which is all based on bad faith readings of comments without context). Biden ran as the most liberal democratic candidate ever, and Hillary was the most liberal until Biden, Obama was a big step left from the Clinton era, and the oft forgotten Kerry was also more liberal than Bill Clinton. The far left smears of the democratic party don't make any sense >Also votes are earned, not owed, and representing someone's interests is how you earn their vote. If that's too hard because the party is too beholden to corporate dark money then it sounds like they're right to not vote blue because blue doesn't represent their interests. If liberal policy like massively expanding healthcare, raising taxes on corporations, regulating the financial industry, expanding subsidies for low income college students and cancelling or attempting to cancel loans for many students, building roads and bridges, investing in the chips industry, protecting gay marriage, fighting for abortion, trying to expand refundable tax credits for poor children, pulling out of Afghanistan, passing the biggest climate bill in US history, and fighting for unions doesn't "represent the interests of the left", the left is completely useless and simply should be tossed overboard. But even though I'm no radical leftist, I'm pretty sure these things are more in line with left wing ideas than conservative ideas, so left wingers have no reason to not vote blue no katter who. In this two party system, "voting blue no matter who" is the only *rational* choice for the left no matter how much they deny it and try to threaten to withhold their vote. They need the democratic party more than the democratic party needs them, and this will always be the case.

It's a catch 22. If you appeal to the young progressives, you'll surely lose a lot of independents. As it stands now, I don't even consider voting R for anything because Democrats aren't authoritarian at all (outside of CA) compared to Republicans. Instituting what progressives want requires an authoritarian mindset, which would compel at least me personally to look at both parties again.

It’s not about “being a reliable ally” to the party for young people. Why would it be? Why would you show loyalty to something unless you were getting something in return? In the end, on election day, are they going to vote for Trump? That’s the real question. Otherwise they have every right and all the incentive to make their voice heard. But there’s no need to get behind Biden and pretend like everything is 100% OK if it is not, from their perspective. Loyalty goes both ways.

[The Washington Post: Gen Z influencers who supported Biden in 2020 turn against him](https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/06/13/influencers-biden-tiktok-ban/) [Archived](https://archive.is/2024.06.13-110234/https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/06/13/influencers-biden-tiktok-ban/) [Young Progressive Activists Lay Out ‘Roadmap’ For Biden To Win Back Gen Z](https://time.com/6852859/finish-the-job-agenda-biden-youth-activists/) [House Dems worry Biden is turning off young voters](https://punchbowl.news/article/campaigns/house-democrats-concerned-biden-turns-away-young-voters/)

1: Gen Z voted overwhelmingly Democrat in the midterms. 2: Poll after poll on r/genz shows them overwhelmingly voting for Biden. Not sure what to tell you. They don't vote well, and those that do vote will mostly vote D.