saying "well no one *I* know votes based on rising prices!!" is also kind of silly because most of us on this site are overly engaged politics nerds with decently-paying jobs who disproportionately know other overly-engaged politics nerds with decently-paying jobs
With this war specifically it makes total sense to tie it to economic impacts bc the brand Trump built was (in part) getting away from democrat do-goodiness and neocon interventionism to focus on American interests, and now Condi Rice is at the White House while Trump shrugs rising gas prices
Also, tying to kitchen table issues doesn't reduce severity. Studies showed that AOC's statement that "Trump is cutting your healthcare to pay for ICE killing moms" was the most effective with voters in the wake of Renee Good. That data is real, even though ICE killing moms should be bad enough
Yes, people SHOULD care about this beyond their paychecks. They also should have cared about what putting a criminal who did Jan. 6th back in the White House would do to democracy, which was a huge theme of Harris' campaign
People who are struggling in the every day have a shorter scope of concern
The Biden admin basically did what you think they should have - pointed at charts saying Economy Good, Voters Wrong - and it notably did not work! I myself tried to push the narrative, while watching attendance at my church's soup kitchen rapidly rise and trying to fight the growing unease
Will, I have a lot of respect for you for your work in Minneapolis, but it is frustrating to see you still banging a drum that ppl did not feel real economic impacts in recent years (even if the media exaggerates it) and apparently expanding that into claiming economic impacts don't matter at all?
conservatism during the 2010s was all about how millenial adults were infantilized and acted like children with safe spaces and adult coloring books, and now they're like "but i miss playgrounds ):"
If Obama had worn a ball cap for one of these he would have been lynched
I went to March for Families in 2018 and and the DC ICE Out for Good rally in 2026. March for Families was about the abuse of immigrants by ICE. ICE Out For Good was about progressive political organizing with a loose immigration theming.
and yes, if you've ever been in an online space for bisexuals, you've encountered the polyamory evangelists. Saw one once literally tell a girl that "polyamory has the answers you seek!"
"polyamory used by manipulative men as a way to dispose of their wife for a younger, hotter model without having to deal with the hassle of divorce" happens a lot more than I think some of the online polyamory evangelists like to admit
who was it who said "if you want to fight the establishment, you can't act shocked when the establishment fights back!"
I know the candidate that can unite Maine. A local artist and teacher from a humble town with a long history of successfully combating crime!
So your one weird trick is "use the senate filibuster," something Dems are already doing and requires being...in the senate
legitimately how is it 2026 and there are still so many people who think that a One Weird Trick To Stop The Republicans is hidden in the Constitution like the map on the Declaration of Independence and Dems could find it if they only had the courage and imagination
If you want Pete to call us to arms and march a citizens revolution into Washington, say that. But you better be prepared to JOIN that revolt, which I doubt you are
there is no weird trick that Dems could be using to circumvent the fact that Rs control all 3 branches if they only had 🌈imagination🌈
I got bad news for you bro. There is no "get out of Republican majority free" card. There is no "oops these people suck can we reverse our last vote" button. This is the government the American people chose. The only way to get out of it is to vote for different people and keep Dems in power locally
Which is ultimately the cusp of a lot of this - Platner's supporters act like we want him ostracized from society, when actually it is a question of SHOULD THIS GUY GET TO BE A US SENATOR
That is something I also think about. I don't think PTSD is disqualifying for office - Gallego clearly had it too and while I don't like him he is functional - but if you are too disabled to work so you need money, how can you run a business AND be a senator??
Ryan Grim of all people outing himself as someone who thinks working class is when manual labor
DC ain't that big, and staffers don't live on capitol hill, which is very expensive
What exactly do you suggest he do that is better than helping Dems in swing districts get elected? What exactly can a private citizen do to fill a vacuum of leadership that he is not already doing?
I want specifics, no "well that's his job!"
Yeah people keep being like "oh so you think he's literally a Nazi???" no I think he's an idiot, which I also consider disqualifying for the FUCKING SENATE
my point initially was about how absurd it was for people in the 2010s to downplay and romanticize the Jefferson/Hemings situation, which you illustrated beautifully
I guess I just don't understand splitting hairs over "well maybe it wasn't *exactly* rape when she was 34 and he was 63 and she could not even *be* legally emancipated w/o being forced to leave Virginia permanently" instead of simply conceding that the situation was fucked beyond belief regardless
Again, I suggest you visit Monticello if you have the opportunity. They do not say for certain it was rape, but they do not dismiss the idea, and they certainly make it clear that it was not a situation to be romanticized. The more one learns about this situation the less flattering it is for him.
I never said he threw her to the ground while she screamed. Rape does not always look like that.
According to their children, he never acted as a father to them because they were just "children of a slave." These quotes come from Monticello, which now has an entire wing about this subject.
In fact you are correct that he had very particular ideas about marital sex and his own entitlement to it, which arguably killed his wife because she was constantly in risky, physically arduous pregnancies for a decade. Martha Jefferson's life sucked even for a very privileged woman of the day
Again, I suggest you read Hemingses of Monticello. It is written by one of the most decorated historians on slavery in the country. Gordon-Reed, a Black woman herself, actually does not think their "relationship" necessarily equated to rape, but still does not paint Jefferson in a flattering light
When Martha Jefferson died of childbirth at age 32, Sally Hemings (again, her half sister) was at her bedside. She was 9.
The fact that Jefferson made his wife go through ten years of physically damaging pregnancies that eventually killed her because he felt entitled to sex does not absolve him
