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  • According to the Democratic Party, the election they just lost in a humiliating landslide was the most important election in anyone’s lifetime, a last-ditch effort to protect democracy itself from Trump’s incipient authoritarianism. Out of the entire population, they could only choose one person to be their champion, to go head-to-head against Donald Trump and stop his new fascist cacocracy from becoming reality. The lives and welfare of millions—billions!—depended on their making the right choice. And who did they pick? One of the least popular politicians in the country, the goofy cackling woman who says things like ‘It is time to do what we have been doing, and that time is every day,’ who seems mildly but permanently xanned, who moves through the world like a pat of half-melted butter. For the Democrats to lose one election to Donald Trump by nominating an obviously terrible candidate is an honest mistake. Two, and something’s up. The question isn’t why Harris lost to Trump—why was she ever in a position to lose to him in the first place?
    ...
    The reason Kamala Harris lost is the same as the reason she was the candidate to begin with: the Democratic Party is allergic to democracy. It’s the instrument of a particular form of class power; its role is basically disciplinary. When it comes to an actual crisis, all it knows how to do is coil in on itself, breathe in its own fumes, suck itself off until completion. The party knew that Joe Biden’s brains kept running out of his nose and into his morning coffee, but they kept pretending until it was far too late that he was running laps around the White House lawn and solving new problems in theoretical physics in his spare time. They really seemed to think that people wouldn’t notice what was right in front of them, or maybe they simply didn’t care. And when people did notice, when Biden stretched his arm too wide at the first debate and all the stuffing came out, the party made sure his overthrow and replacement went as smoothly and as seamlessly as possible. No messy primaries, no ideological bickering, just a slick, stage-managed show. They’re very good at politics too.

    https://samkriss.substack.com/p/i-told-you-so

  • After every election, a lot of people use the result to justify all their theories about pretty much everything, usually without doing the legwork to provide some evidence of how much it contributed to the result, or was relevant at all. Just a lot of shouty venting. "I told you so" is what they're all saying, but this person making it the title of their post really doesn't endear them to me.

    I can read through that and be thinking "Maybe. Seems true. Probably relevant." and then I get to

    They really seemed to think that people wouldn’t notice what was right in front of them, or maybe they simply didn’t care.

    And all I could say to the author would be "Grow the fuck up, you ranty child." I mean, I'm pretty sure Biden's people didn't think that and did care, but it would be a waste of time trying to say that to them.

    I could make a list of the specious arguments, but

    But ‘democracy is on the ballot’ is an incredibly antidemocratic slogan.

    Is a fucking corker of nonsense, and I don't have the energy to reread the rest.

  • the Democratic Party is allergic to democracy.

    I thought it was quite a good analysis. This bit particularly rings true, and ties in with what I've heard first hand from people who have been involved in politics in the US.

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