It is not just the genocide in Gaza, as abhorrent as it is, but the legacy dems decision sometime ago to govern only for the uber wealthy, while appearing to placate the progressive voters with social issues. We can do both, and the DSA is demonstrating that.
“DeGette would die in her seat like so many other members do; the seat having transformed into nothing more than familial sinecure one might find more in the ancien regime of France than modern America.”
What a perfect example of the kind of pointless self-directed shit talk that non-DSA Dems reflexively append to any discussion of their party, empowering DSA-style candidates before they wonder where all the “bad vibes” came from.
Do you actually know anything about DeGette? Or just how she fits into a half-assed narrative?
Role of the US in my view is to disarm both sides and create a UN Mandate that can oversee a transition to a democratic, demilitarized one state entity with equal rights for all.
Ok, tell us how do you propose for the US to disarm both sides, impose the Un mandate (?) ànd then a single state on Israel ànd Hamas.
Do you propose a naval blockade followed by amphibious landing of the troops on the beaches of Tel Aviv - or to march them from Turkey through Syria? The Israelis are unlikely to surrender their country. Would you be ok with say 50 000 Americans dying for your utopia?
I hope no one dies; I am just operating from precedent for how the US deals with other hostile powers. We cut them off from global finance, we cut them off diplomatically, we embargo and blockade their nation, and then, hope for conditions to change locally on the ground. Israeli voters will eventually choose prosperity and peace over poverty and isolation. The UN Mandate is my very worst case scenario, where Israel responds to its isolation by directly attacking the United States, thus forcing us into a post WW2 scenario with regards to the state of Israel. It doesn't have to be inevitable, but it's what I imagine the present Israeli leadership will choose. American policymakers should be ready to make that choice, if it is in the national interest to do so (and I think it is; otherwise we are hostage to a nuclear power, a far smaller, far weaker nuclear power, and thus have lost all sovereignty). As for Hamas: there are ways to disarm and demilitarize conflict zones and militia groups. That means allowing Palestinian sovereignty to actually flourish, to allow a separate entity to grow apart from any sectarian group. It means messy parliamentary politics, with coalitions, and speeches. It means the return of the Palestinian diaspora back to their homelands, with Israel not impeding but helping that return. The doctors, engineers, and lawyers of the diaspora will build the renewed Palestine. My hope is one of peace, that the renewed Palestine will be a land for all peoples, for Jews and Muslims and Christians alike, and all others who have no creed or others. If there is to be an Israel-Palestine border, let it be like border between the Carolinas or the Montanas--a paper distinction on a map, worthy of fun trivia but little more. I want a world without murder, I want a world without genocide.
the definition of "hostile power " isn't "someone girlbosswoman doesn't like", but let's skip that.
Out of these people thé US has cut off from global finances , embargoed and boycotted diplomatically etc - can you name one that had surrendered, agreed to dissolve their nations ànd be ruled by à UN mandate? Iran , Cuba, North Korea, Mao's China, Hamas?
I do thank you for explaining your vision, though. I think it is helpful for anyone who read you piece to know if the author has any realistic knowledge and expertise of the matter or not.
I believe the real answer on this, as with many domestic issues, is that if pressed by your line of questioning girlbosswoman would do exactly what establishment Democrats would do: end military aid and take a hands off position like a Nordic country. This would hurt US defense contractors more than Israel since most of it is by law spent on US manufactured weapons. The fantasy of some, but not girlbosswoman I suspect, is that Israel is only strong because of US military aid. In an average year US aid is $4B. Israel’s GDP is half a trillion. I suspect girlbosswoman would not commit American forces to make Israel behave anymore than to make Iran, Russia, or China behave. At some level, it’s all just new packaging of the same program. As she says, Obama with more oomph. We could have this same discussion about socialized medicine. So, is the government going to run all the hospitals and employ all the docs? No, that’s not what we mean. And by the time you are done with the line of questions it’s just “replace private claims admin with govt claims admin” and increase the amount govt pays so the coverage is more affordable. In other words, exactly what Obama (and Clinton) proposed and what establishment Dems favor.
To be clear, I’m for all of it… But I am also old enough to remember prior “revolutions” of the American left. Some things have changed for the better: gender equality, civil rights of course, urban policy, and others. But in a lot of ways the past only looks different because its leaders either made compromises or got nothing done given the politics of their day. Do you think “don’t ask don’t tell” was Bill Clinton’s preferred stance on what we then called “gays in the military”? No, it wasn’t. His position was what eventually happened: gay people are just people.
Pick the faction or candidate you think will be best at delivering the change you want to see, knowing that the one standing next to them on the primary debate stage ultimately holds very similar positions. They are not the enemy.
There's no planet-ruler who is going to decide this fundamental question. Nor is it realistic that U.S. policy is going to become fully democratic or fully rational. What the anti-war movement can realistically hope for is to reduce Israel's financial, military, and diplomatic support to the point that a new security architecture for the region is required. It's going to be up to the regional actors whether they settle on that new architecture diplomatically or whether they fight it out. Obviously the anti-war movement should try to shade the odds toward the diplomatic route but, again, even under an optimistic outlook, the anti-war movement's power is limited. There is also risk that Arab and Persian regional actors would be irrational, and a greater risk that Israel would be irrational. Israel cannot resist Arab and Persian armies long-term without ample external support. Chas Freeman draws a parallel to the 11th and 12th century Crusader states after Europe became preoccupied with other problems and reduced their support: they fell.
There's no planet-ruler who is going to decide this fundamental question. The U.S. will withdraw financial and military support while encouraging a peaceful, diplomatic approach to developing a new security architecture for the region. Israel will probably reject this opportunity and ultimately fall to Arab and Persian soldiers.
I would actually disagree here. The first warning signs came in 2004. Kerry lost ground in traditional Dem labor strongholds. Harlan Kentucky, immortalized in song and documentaries, went hard Repub then and never came back. My rustbelt union grandparents were lifelong Dem voters, but they abandoned the party over Kerry. The areas we lost the most ground are the historical centers of labor & socialism in America--Wisconsin, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, Missouri, West Virginia, Michigan, etc. As a Hoosier from Eugene Debs country, we were never reliable Dem voters...but it was a heck of a lot more competitive when Dems = labor. We had a blue governor straight from 1989 to 2005, until the party brand turned to mud. That mattered.
Obama in 2008 was the second major warning sign. He campaigned against a deeply unpopular, dysfunctional Dem establishment that'd given us 8 years of Bush and widely-hated warmongering that the establishment was strangely comfortable with. After 8 years of Bush, party leadership was shoving yet another elderly coastal lawyer turned Washington insider dynasty candidate, a pro-Kissinger, pro-Iraq war hawk without any basic charisma. Like they were willfully refusing to learn any lessons and giving the middle finger to their base as aggressively as possible. Sound familiar? Keep in mind that both Bill Clinton and Obama were young, Washington outsiders running on generational change. Even if that's not how either of them governed, as you pointed out:
"The whole ideological precept of the Obama administration was this idea of progressive, incremental reform."
The "center" (they're not actually in the center politically, they're extreme war hawks and extreme corporatists) is a political experiment put into place in the 90s. It never actually worked--it was just carried by a singular charismatic candidate (Bill Clinton). And now the establishment is trying to gaslight us that it's the default model, when the wheels came off literally decades ago and they've been coasting by on delusion & political inertia, losing more and more ground over the years.
In hindsight I’d argue the first warning sign was under Clinton. The “republican revolution” where the democrats lost the house for the first time in 30 something years. This has been a long time coming.
Heck, I grew up in the urban rustbelt and it's just as bad. Indiana has the second most idle factories in the country now, second to Michigan. And those are all urban environments. My lifelong Dem old union grandparents finally abandoned the Dem party over Kerry, who they saw as validation that the Dem party was now run by coastal elites for coastal elites. With zero intent to address the harm done to labor.
You stopped making sense when you repeated the “genocide” lie. Repeating the same lie endlessly doesn’t make it true. Sure, make antisemitism the big tent of the Democratic Party as they’ve done so far, and let’s see how well that plays in 2028. https://thegoldenpill.substack.com/p/late-stage-activism
Winning candidates will exude the characteristics of Mamdani: self-assured, positive, and carefully speaking the leftist language without sliding into cringy hard-left sloganeering. For example he is able to clearly reject (now) the "defund the police" idiocy. He can clearly call Hamas a terrorist organization, which it is. In NYC, with these hard lines drawn, he can then make valid points criticizing Israel, and thoughtfully improve public safety. Add some housing wins and a smiling demeanor, and suddenly this guy is a political success. Well done Mamdani.
But I don't often see that combination in other DSA candidates. They're grouchy. They don't seem to be having fun. And they slip quickly into positions that are radioactive to large majorities: excusing Hamas terrorism, "defund the police", "no-borders," seizing the means of production, and so forth. Do I need to even say it?... majorities simply will not vote for this stuff. Anyone who cannot see this, is not really looking.
Well no, I mean "After, the deluge." moi = me, I am not saying After me, the Deluge. I am saying After <the present>, the deluge. And the deluge is always coming, no? Always another storm, another war, another election on the horizon? That's what this blog is about.
History says the Warsaw Pact dissolved in 1991. Putin apparently never got the memo. He’s reportedly launching Warsaw Pact 2.0, inviting Michigan, New York City, and Colorado to join Russia in rebuilding the Soviet Bloc.
This is the language of people intoxicated by political power. Whether the state is controlled by Democrats, the DSA, or Republicans is of little consequence. Every faction promises to plunder society for the benefit of the politically connected elite while calling it democracy.
What they are really seeking is the power to tax, regulate, inflate, confiscate, and command. But the state produces nothing. Every promise it makes must first be financed by wealth taken from peaceful people
A free society has no reason to celebrate the victory of one gang of tax collectors over another. The only victory for liberty is to deprive them all of the power to loot.
more and more the accusation of genocide is falling apart amongst “scholars.” There will inevitably be a trickledown effect that will happen a few years down the line. Advice about how to handle the “big genocide” will become stale, and those who were
planning on launching their careers on Israel fear mongering will prob have to find some other method. Even Russia didn’t have the entire planet running content about their supposed genocidey ways, and they invaded Ukraine without provocation. They also have some explicitly genocidal moves (like taking kids to make them Russian). All you can say about Israel is their prosecution of their war was at worst quite callous. No country would have taken 10/7 in the teeth. Not even switzerland. Anyway, this too will pass so your advice may be expiring this year with the midterms if that.
I know I should expand on this but the holes left by questions of police/family/military abolition etc can only be answered with a conception of proletarian dictatorship.
All of these demands require a fundamental shift in the mode of production. Which will require the DSA (abiding by a communist programme) to acquire a majority mandate to replace the state. This isn't a party-state as such (God willing), but the democratic structure of the party should be the basis for the new workers' democratic republic (aka, proletarian dictatorship). The party becomes the new state apparatus, and its caucuses/factions become the new parties.
Things like the family and the prison system as they exist in the particularity of capital would undergo a paradigm shift. The abolition of capital means that these institutions are defunct, and the institutions of a proletarian dictatorship will be necessarily distinct, with their own particular functions.
The standing army will be replaced by a citizens militia, but this citizens militia isn't something akin to dad's army. The militia of the proletarian militia WILL have nuclear weapons, it WILL have the highest grade weapons afforded to us.
It is not just the genocide in Gaza, as abhorrent as it is, but the legacy dems decision sometime ago to govern only for the uber wealthy, while appearing to placate the progressive voters with social issues. We can do both, and the DSA is demonstrating that.
“DeGette would die in her seat like so many other members do; the seat having transformed into nothing more than familial sinecure one might find more in the ancien regime of France than modern America.”
What a perfect example of the kind of pointless self-directed shit talk that non-DSA Dems reflexively append to any discussion of their party, empowering DSA-style candidates before they wonder where all the “bad vibes” came from.
Do you actually know anything about DeGette? Or just how she fits into a half-assed narrative?
Physician, heal thyself.
If we have to choose sides, and we have to abandon Israel, does that mean we have to choose Hamas? Or do we just leave them to sort it out themselves?
Role of the US in my view is to disarm both sides and create a UN Mandate that can oversee a transition to a democratic, demilitarized one state entity with equal rights for all.
Ok, tell us how do you propose for the US to disarm both sides, impose the Un mandate (?) ànd then a single state on Israel ànd Hamas.
Do you propose a naval blockade followed by amphibious landing of the troops on the beaches of Tel Aviv - or to march them from Turkey through Syria? The Israelis are unlikely to surrender their country. Would you be ok with say 50 000 Americans dying for your utopia?
I hope no one dies; I am just operating from precedent for how the US deals with other hostile powers. We cut them off from global finance, we cut them off diplomatically, we embargo and blockade their nation, and then, hope for conditions to change locally on the ground. Israeli voters will eventually choose prosperity and peace over poverty and isolation. The UN Mandate is my very worst case scenario, where Israel responds to its isolation by directly attacking the United States, thus forcing us into a post WW2 scenario with regards to the state of Israel. It doesn't have to be inevitable, but it's what I imagine the present Israeli leadership will choose. American policymakers should be ready to make that choice, if it is in the national interest to do so (and I think it is; otherwise we are hostage to a nuclear power, a far smaller, far weaker nuclear power, and thus have lost all sovereignty). As for Hamas: there are ways to disarm and demilitarize conflict zones and militia groups. That means allowing Palestinian sovereignty to actually flourish, to allow a separate entity to grow apart from any sectarian group. It means messy parliamentary politics, with coalitions, and speeches. It means the return of the Palestinian diaspora back to their homelands, with Israel not impeding but helping that return. The doctors, engineers, and lawyers of the diaspora will build the renewed Palestine. My hope is one of peace, that the renewed Palestine will be a land for all peoples, for Jews and Muslims and Christians alike, and all others who have no creed or others. If there is to be an Israel-Palestine border, let it be like border between the Carolinas or the Montanas--a paper distinction on a map, worthy of fun trivia but little more. I want a world without murder, I want a world without genocide.
the definition of "hostile power " isn't "someone girlbosswoman doesn't like", but let's skip that.
Out of these people thé US has cut off from global finances , embargoed and boycotted diplomatically etc - can you name one that had surrendered, agreed to dissolve their nations ànd be ruled by à UN mandate? Iran , Cuba, North Korea, Mao's China, Hamas?
I do thank you for explaining your vision, though. I think it is helpful for anyone who read you piece to know if the author has any realistic knowledge and expertise of the matter or not.
I believe the real answer on this, as with many domestic issues, is that if pressed by your line of questioning girlbosswoman would do exactly what establishment Democrats would do: end military aid and take a hands off position like a Nordic country. This would hurt US defense contractors more than Israel since most of it is by law spent on US manufactured weapons. The fantasy of some, but not girlbosswoman I suspect, is that Israel is only strong because of US military aid. In an average year US aid is $4B. Israel’s GDP is half a trillion. I suspect girlbosswoman would not commit American forces to make Israel behave anymore than to make Iran, Russia, or China behave. At some level, it’s all just new packaging of the same program. As she says, Obama with more oomph. We could have this same discussion about socialized medicine. So, is the government going to run all the hospitals and employ all the docs? No, that’s not what we mean. And by the time you are done with the line of questions it’s just “replace private claims admin with govt claims admin” and increase the amount govt pays so the coverage is more affordable. In other words, exactly what Obama (and Clinton) proposed and what establishment Dems favor.
To be clear, I’m for all of it… But I am also old enough to remember prior “revolutions” of the American left. Some things have changed for the better: gender equality, civil rights of course, urban policy, and others. But in a lot of ways the past only looks different because its leaders either made compromises or got nothing done given the politics of their day. Do you think “don’t ask don’t tell” was Bill Clinton’s preferred stance on what we then called “gays in the military”? No, it wasn’t. His position was what eventually happened: gay people are just people.
Pick the faction or candidate you think will be best at delivering the change you want to see, knowing that the one standing next to them on the primary debate stage ultimately holds very similar positions. They are not the enemy.
My God this is incredibly naive and dumb.
wow - let’s just do 1947 all over again. what an asinine … i’m going to stop before i get banned.
Equal rights for all is incompatible with a Muslim state.
We’re sorry you’re having trouble; please try again.
Why should Palestinians disarm?
Perhaps the “israelis” should piss off back to their frozen eastern european shitholes if they can’t stop being genocidal terrorist supremacists?
Hamas is just resistance to zionist aggression. Israelis have been killing Palestinians for decades. Grow up.
israel is a cartoonishly evil terrorist nation that has no fundamental right to exist anywhere, much less in Palestine.
Your love for israel and zionist savagery is clear.
Lmao, “abandon israel”
Zionist confirmed. No wonder you hate Palestinian and Lebanese resistance to depraved zionist terror and genocidal mass murder so much.
There's no planet-ruler who is going to decide this fundamental question. Nor is it realistic that U.S. policy is going to become fully democratic or fully rational. What the anti-war movement can realistically hope for is to reduce Israel's financial, military, and diplomatic support to the point that a new security architecture for the region is required. It's going to be up to the regional actors whether they settle on that new architecture diplomatically or whether they fight it out. Obviously the anti-war movement should try to shade the odds toward the diplomatic route but, again, even under an optimistic outlook, the anti-war movement's power is limited. There is also risk that Arab and Persian regional actors would be irrational, and a greater risk that Israel would be irrational. Israel cannot resist Arab and Persian armies long-term without ample external support. Chas Freeman draws a parallel to the 11th and 12th century Crusader states after Europe became preoccupied with other problems and reduced their support: they fell.
There's no planet-ruler who is going to decide this fundamental question. The U.S. will withdraw financial and military support while encouraging a peaceful, diplomatic approach to developing a new security architecture for the region. Israel will probably reject this opportunity and ultimately fall to Arab and Persian soldiers.
"The first warning sign came in 2024".
I would actually disagree here. The first warning signs came in 2004. Kerry lost ground in traditional Dem labor strongholds. Harlan Kentucky, immortalized in song and documentaries, went hard Repub then and never came back. My rustbelt union grandparents were lifelong Dem voters, but they abandoned the party over Kerry. The areas we lost the most ground are the historical centers of labor & socialism in America--Wisconsin, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, Missouri, West Virginia, Michigan, etc. As a Hoosier from Eugene Debs country, we were never reliable Dem voters...but it was a heck of a lot more competitive when Dems = labor. We had a blue governor straight from 1989 to 2005, until the party brand turned to mud. That mattered.
Obama in 2008 was the second major warning sign. He campaigned against a deeply unpopular, dysfunctional Dem establishment that'd given us 8 years of Bush and widely-hated warmongering that the establishment was strangely comfortable with. After 8 years of Bush, party leadership was shoving yet another elderly coastal lawyer turned Washington insider dynasty candidate, a pro-Kissinger, pro-Iraq war hawk without any basic charisma. Like they were willfully refusing to learn any lessons and giving the middle finger to their base as aggressively as possible. Sound familiar? Keep in mind that both Bill Clinton and Obama were young, Washington outsiders running on generational change. Even if that's not how either of them governed, as you pointed out:
"The whole ideological precept of the Obama administration was this idea of progressive, incremental reform."
The "center" (they're not actually in the center politically, they're extreme war hawks and extreme corporatists) is a political experiment put into place in the 90s. It never actually worked--it was just carried by a singular charismatic candidate (Bill Clinton). And now the establishment is trying to gaslight us that it's the default model, when the wheels came off literally decades ago and they've been coasting by on delusion & political inertia, losing more and more ground over the years.
In hindsight I’d argue the first warning sign was under Clinton. The “republican revolution” where the democrats lost the house for the first time in 30 something years. This has been a long time coming.
Growing up in rural areas, NAFTA under Clinton decimated towns and they never forgot, they still talk about it today.
Heck, I grew up in the urban rustbelt and it's just as bad. Indiana has the second most idle factories in the country now, second to Michigan. And those are all urban environments. My lifelong Dem old union grandparents finally abandoned the Dem party over Kerry, who they saw as validation that the Dem party was now run by coastal elites for coastal elites. With zero intent to address the harm done to labor.
There is no genocide in Gaza, only the attempted genocide of all Israelis by Hamas.
You're retarded
Your mom’s retarded!
Your mom is a whore
lol glad we had this exchange 😂
You stopped making sense when you repeated the “genocide” lie. Repeating the same lie endlessly doesn’t make it true. Sure, make antisemitism the big tent of the Democratic Party as they’ve done so far, and let’s see how well that plays in 2028. https://thegoldenpill.substack.com/p/late-stage-activism
The zionist entity of israel is committing genocide in Palestine
LOL. You go chatbot.
Aww did I offend you? Fucking loser
You amuse me. You’re a chatbot set to low effort.
You're simple to amuse. Braindead jew
Winning candidates will exude the characteristics of Mamdani: self-assured, positive, and carefully speaking the leftist language without sliding into cringy hard-left sloganeering. For example he is able to clearly reject (now) the "defund the police" idiocy. He can clearly call Hamas a terrorist organization, which it is. In NYC, with these hard lines drawn, he can then make valid points criticizing Israel, and thoughtfully improve public safety. Add some housing wins and a smiling demeanor, and suddenly this guy is a political success. Well done Mamdani.
But I don't often see that combination in other DSA candidates. They're grouchy. They don't seem to be having fun. And they slip quickly into positions that are radioactive to large majorities: excusing Hamas terrorism, "defund the police", "no-borders," seizing the means of production, and so forth. Do I need to even say it?... majorities simply will not vote for this stuff. Anyone who cannot see this, is not really looking.
I like what you wrote but girlbosswoman, it’ « Après moi, le déluge ». Sorry, I’m French Canadian so I had to write this lol.
Well no, I mean "After, the deluge." moi = me, I am not saying After me, the Deluge. I am saying After <the present>, the deluge. And the deluge is always coming, no? Always another storm, another war, another election on the horizon? That's what this blog is about.
Ah ok, I understand.
History says the Warsaw Pact dissolved in 1991. Putin apparently never got the memo. He’s reportedly launching Warsaw Pact 2.0, inviting Michigan, New York City, and Colorado to join Russia in rebuilding the Soviet Bloc.
This is the language of people intoxicated by political power. Whether the state is controlled by Democrats, the DSA, or Republicans is of little consequence. Every faction promises to plunder society for the benefit of the politically connected elite while calling it democracy.
What they are really seeking is the power to tax, regulate, inflate, confiscate, and command. But the state produces nothing. Every promise it makes must first be financed by wealth taken from peaceful people
A free society has no reason to celebrate the victory of one gang of tax collectors over another. The only victory for liberty is to deprive them all of the power to loot.
more and more the accusation of genocide is falling apart amongst “scholars.” There will inevitably be a trickledown effect that will happen a few years down the line. Advice about how to handle the “big genocide” will become stale, and those who were
planning on launching their careers on Israel fear mongering will prob have to find some other method. Even Russia didn’t have the entire planet running content about their supposed genocidey ways, and they invaded Ukraine without provocation. They also have some explicitly genocidal moves (like taking kids to make them Russian). All you can say about Israel is their prosecution of their war was at worst quite callous. No country would have taken 10/7 in the teeth. Not even switzerland. Anyway, this too will pass so your advice may be expiring this year with the midterms if that.
I know I should expand on this but the holes left by questions of police/family/military abolition etc can only be answered with a conception of proletarian dictatorship.
All of these demands require a fundamental shift in the mode of production. Which will require the DSA (abiding by a communist programme) to acquire a majority mandate to replace the state. This isn't a party-state as such (God willing), but the democratic structure of the party should be the basis for the new workers' democratic republic (aka, proletarian dictatorship). The party becomes the new state apparatus, and its caucuses/factions become the new parties.
Things like the family and the prison system as they exist in the particularity of capital would undergo a paradigm shift. The abolition of capital means that these institutions are defunct, and the institutions of a proletarian dictatorship will be necessarily distinct, with their own particular functions.
The standing army will be replaced by a citizens militia, but this citizens militia isn't something akin to dad's army. The militia of the proletarian militia WILL have nuclear weapons, it WILL have the highest grade weapons afforded to us.
Say free Palestine
Why are you an ex-DSA member?