@memeorandum@universeodon.comWhere is the Party?: time for Democratic leaders to 'fight with both hands' or 'step aside' (MSNBC)
https://www.msnbc.com/ali-velshi/watch/where-is-the-party-time-for-democratic-leaders-to-fight-with-both-hands-or-step-aside-246211141717
http://www.memeorandum.com/250830/p36#a250830p36
@UP8@mastodon.social🫱🏽🫲🏿 How Anti-Corruption Can Be a Winning Issue for Democrats
#politics
@hex@kolektiva.socialThe fracturing of the Dutch far-right, after Wilder's reminded everyone that bigots are bad at compromise, is definitely a relief. Dutch folks I've talked to definitely see D66 as progressive, <strike>so there's no question this is a hard turn to the left (even if it's not a total flip to the far-left)</strike> a lot of folks don't agree. I'm going to let the comments speak rather than editorialize myself..
While this is a useful example of how a democracy can be far more resilient to fascism than the US, that is, perhaps, not the most interesting thing about Dutch politics. The most interesting thing is something Dutch folks take for granted and never think of as such: there are two "governments."
The election was for the Tweede Kamer. This is a house of representatives. The Dutch use proportional representation, so people can (more or less) vote for the parties they actually want. Parties <strike>rarely</strike> never actually get a ruling majority, so they have to form coalition governments. This forces compromise, which is something Wilders was extremely bad at. He was actually responsible for collapsing the coalition his party put together, which triggered this election... and a massive loss of seats for his party.
Dutch folks do still vote strategically, since a larger party has an easier time building the governing coalition and the PM tends to come from the largest party. This will likely be D66, which is really good for the EU. D66 has a pretty radical plan to solve the housing crisis, and it will be really interesting to see if they can pull it off. But that's not the government I want to talk about right now.
In the Netherlands, failure to control water can destroy entire towns. A good chunk of the country is below sea level. Both floods and land reclamation have been critical parts of Dutch history. So in the 1200's or so, the Dutch realized that some things are too important to mix with normal politics.
You see, if there's an incompetent government that isn't able to actually *do* anything (see Dick Schoof and the PVV/VVD/NSC/BBB coalition) you don't want your dikes to collapse and poulders to flood. So the Dutch created a parallel "government" that exists only to manage water: waterschap or heemraadschap (roughly "Water Board" in English). These are regional bureaucracies that exist only to manage water. They exist completely outside the thing we usually talk about as a "government" but they have some of the same properties as a government. They can, for example, levy taxes. The central government contributes funds to them, but lacks authority over them. Water boards are democratically elected and can operate more-or-less independent of the central government.
Controlling water is a common problem, so water boards were created to fulfill the role of commons management. Meanwhile, so many other things in politics run into the very same "Tragedy of the Commons" problems. The right wing solution to commons management is to let corporations ruin everything. The left-state solution is to move everything into the government so it can be undermined and destroyed by the right. The Dutch solution to this specific problem has been to move commons management out of the domain of the central government into something else.
And when I say "government" here, I'm speaking more to the liberal definition of the term than to an anarchist definition. A democratically controlled authority that facilitates resource management lacks the capacity for coercive violence that anarchists define as "government." (Though I assume they might leverage police or something if folks refuse to pay their taxes, but I can't imagine anyone choosing not to.)
As the US federal government destroys the social fabric of the US, as Trump guts programs critical to people's survival, it might be worth thinking about this model. These authorities weren't created by any central authority, they evolved from the people. Nothing stops Americans from building similar institutions that are both democratic and outside of the authority of a government that could choose to defund and abolish them... nothing but the realization that yes, you actually can.
#USPol #NLPol
@cdarwin@c.imIn Saudi Arabia, Trump Jr. mocks ‘No Kings’ protests
Speaking alongside Omeed Malik of 1789 Capital,
Donald Trump Jr. criticized Democratic Party policies and protesters targeting his father.
Junior invests in 1789 and continues to work in the real estate arm of the family, the Trump Organization, which has expanded its Mideast offerings even as his father serves his second term in the White House.
In particular, Junior mocked the “No Kings” protests that drew milli…
@hikingdude@mastodon.social✅ Wrote to two of our ministers to vote against chat control.
More to come the next days.
Imagine a world where some non-democratic party gets more and more votes. Parties who want to "clean" the country. Which tool would be more worthy than having access to private conversations.
please vote for our freedom
please vote agains chatcontrol
Just drop them an email! It's just an email! Not even 5 minutes of your time.
@hex@kolektiva.socialThe American Democratic Party, and the concept of "Democratic Socialism" within the US, comes largely from an authoritarian political tradition where the state offers services in exchange for the population allowing elites to continue parasitize the system. Then it is critical for Liberals to consume and destroy popular mutual aid, because real mutual aid undermines their carrot.
Democrats tend to imagine that anarchists want to destroy "all the good things" that governments do. The reality is that we want to build those good things ourselves so that we can reject the offer of those same good things, less well managed, with all the bad things attached.
Anarchists want to build pro-social systems (what if we didn't *need* snap, but just made sure everyone was fed?) while eliminating anti-social ones (do we really *need* to kidnap children, or could we just kind of stop doing that?).
@memeorandum@universeodon.comRepublicans work to make Zohran Mamdani the face of the Democratic Party (Scott Wong/NBC News)
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/republicans-work-make-zohran-mamdani-face-democratic-party-rcna240069
http://www.memeorandum.com/251027/p110#a251027p110
@ErikJonker@mastodon.social"In case you hadn’t noticed, the current Democratic Party is dysfunctional if not dead."
#mamdani
@Mediagazer@mstdn.socialSources: a secretive project offering influencers $250-$8,000 a month to boost Democrats kicked off in July; creators were told 90 influencers were taking part (Taylor Lorenz/Wired)
https://www.wired.com/story/dark-money-group-secret-funding-democrat-influe…
@karlauerbach@sfba.socialI am quite sick and tired of the D-party doing little more than useless posturing (such as writing letters to El Cheeto) or simply asking for money. (The purpose of that money is almost never sufficiently described, if the purpose is described at all.)
So it is good to hear that new candidates are arising who will challenge the fuddy-duddy-crats of the D-party. (My own Congress Critter included.)
Note to others: We need good, fresh faces filling elective posts at *all* levels -…
@cdarwin@c.imAn initiative aimed at boosting Democrats online offers influencers up to $8,000 a month to push the party line.
All they have to do is keep it secret
—and agree to restrictions on their content.
https://www.wired.com/story/dark-money-group-secre…
@davidaugust@mastodon.onlineI tried to reach the last owners of Versailles to see how having such an opulent palace while your people starve worked out… but they seem not to be able to reply.
https://apnews.com/article/east-wing-white-house-ballroom-demolition-b60f…
@UP8@mastodon.socialDemocratic candidates can win Rust Belt voters by … attacking the Democratic party
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/oct/09/democrats-rust-belt-economy
@markhburton@mstdn.socialI joined Labour 3 times.Never again.
"Questions arise for members of the Labour Party. Why would one join a party where being a member means only paying subs and having no voice? Why would one join a party which is itself host to the enemies not only of socialism but of mild social democratic reform? Why would anyone on the left join an organisation that required you to battle the party bureaucracy before you could battle the true political opposition?"
@memeorandum@universeodon.comWhat Made the Democratic Party Go Crazy? (Victor Davis Hanson/American Greatness)
https://amgreatness.com/2025/08/25/what-made-the-democratic-party-go-crazy/
http://www.memeorandum.com/250825/p97#a250825p97
@kurtsh@mastodon.social“The working class abandoned the Democratic Party, primarily because the Democratic Party abandoned the working class.”
✅ Control of the Senate Could Be Decided in Maine. This Oyster Farmer Is Vying to Unseat Susan Collins. – Mother Jones
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/20…
@cdarwin@c.imPolitical operative Stuart Stevens spoke about the erosion of support for Donald Trump from some of his most prominent backers.
Stevens traces the MAGA takeover of the Republican Party and shares how the Lincoln Project,
a Republican-led anti-Trump organization where he is a senior adviser,
is working to stop Trump’s anti-democratic agenda.
@ErikJonker@mastodon.socialMaybe a bit controversial statement, but has democracy not already died in the US? Congress has no effective oversight anymore, GOP only listens to Trump, democratic party is totally ineffective. Rule of law is severely damaged.
#USA #democracy
@simon_brooke@mastodon.scot"The #Labour party arose from a long wave of protests by workers against capital, calling for workers’ rights and for sweeping democratic reforms. These protests and their organisers came to be known as the labour movement. Its early actions included the radical war in Scotland, the Merthyr and Newport risings... the Swing riots... and the General Strike of 1842. No such protests would have me…
@rberger@hachyderm.ioAll the more reason to support and send money to Graham Platner. The “Dem Establishment" needs to learn that they are no longer the leaders of the Democratic Party as they have sold out the party and the country to their Billionaire donors . https://fed.brid.gy/r/https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:gvda6fem6r7selm4gzjjww4a/post/3m365lfrsrs25
@lilmikesf@c.im
@fgraver@hcommons.socialPerformative Politics Is a Dead End https://jacobin.com/2025/09/ndp-leadership-race-social-democracy-identity-politics/
@markrsmith@smithtodon.org
@tiotasram@kolektiva.socialHow the US democracy is designed to avoid representation
Right now in the US, a system which proclaims to give each citizen representation, my interests are not represented very well by most of my so-called representatives at any level of government. This is true for a majority of Americans across the political spectrum, and it happens by design. The "founding fathers" were explicit about wanting a system of government that would appear Democratic but which would keep power in the hands of rich white landowners, and they successfully designed exactly that. But how does disenfranchisement work in this system?
First, a two-party system locked in by first-post-the-post winner-takes-all elections immediately destroys representation for everyone who didn't vote for the winner, including those who didn't vote or weren't eligible to vote. Single-day non-holiday elections and prisoner disenfranchisement go a long way towards ensuring working-class people get no say, but much larger is the winner-takes all system. In fact, even people who vote for the winning candidate don't get effective representation if they're really just voting against the opponent as the greater of two evils. In a 51/49 election with 50% turnout, you've immediately ensured that ~75% of eligible voters don't get represented, and with lesser-of-two-evils voting, you create an even wider gap to wedge corporate interests into. Politicians need money to saturate their lesser-of-two-evils message far more than they need to convince any individual voter to support their policies. It's even okay if they get caught lying, cheating, or worse (cough Epstein cough) as long as the other side is also doing those things and you can freeze out new parties.
Second, by design the Senate ensures uneven representation, allowing control of the least-populous half of states to control or at least shut down the legislative process. A rough count suggests 284.6 million live in the 25 most-populous states, while only 54.8 million live in the rest. Currently, counting states with divided representation as two half-states with half as much population, 157.8 million people are represented by 53 Republican sensors, while 180.5 million people get only 45 seats of Democratic representation. This isn't an anti-Democrat bias, it's a bias towards less-populous states, whose residents get more than their share it political power.
I haven't even talked about gerrymandering yet, or family/faith-based "party loyalty," etc. Overall, the effect is that the number of people whose elected representatives meaningfully represent their interests on any given issue is vanishingly small (like, 10% of people tops), unless you happen to be rich enough to purchase lobbying power or direct access.
If we look at polls, we can see how lack of representation lets congress & the president enact many policies that go against what a majority of the population wants. Things like abortion restrictions, the current ICE raids, and Medicare cuts are deeply unpopular, but they benefit the political class and those who can buy access. These are possible because the system ensures at every step of the way that ordinary people do NOT get the one thing the system promises them: representation in the halls of power.
Okay, but is this a feature of all democracies, inherent in the nature of a majority-decides system? Not exactly...
1/2
#uspol #democracy
@PaulWermer@sfba.socialStochastic urban planning for housing: Reduce regulations with no provision to provide housing supporting the mix of incomes in California.
After all, in our system, return on capital plays no role in determining what price developers demand for building./s
https://www.s…
@paulwermer@sfba.socialStochastic urban planning for housing: Reduce regulations with no provision to provide housing supporting the mix of incomes in California.
After all, in our system, return on capital plays no role in determining what price developers demand for building./s
https://www.s…
@Billybobbell@twit.social"The current order is built on a triad of capital, the nation and the state. Our aim should be to replace it with a different one: the social, the international and the democratic..."
Great interview with James Schneider in Sidecar about the potential for the new party being established by Jeremy Corbyn and Zara Sultana.
#corbyn
@villavelius@mastodon.onlineFarage (short for Fascist Anti-democratic Rage?) may well win the next general election. One way to stand a chance to avoid that is to change the system from a first-past-the-post to a proportional one. But there is no incentive for the party in power to do so. An easier possibility, keeping the constituencies as they are, may be a 2-stage election, with the two largest parties coming out of the first to face off in the second round. Constituencies will at least have MPs with 50 % majoritie…
@memeorandum@universeodon.comGallego Gets Candid About His Party's Immigration Failures (Adrian Carrasquillo/The Bulwark)
https://www.thebulwark.com/p/senator-ruben-gallego-arizona-interview-immigration-iowa-democratic-party
http://www.memeorandum.com/250815/p51#a250815p51
@curiouscat@fosstodon.orgI donated again to the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law School https://www.brennancenter.org/ Due to the dire threats to the USA from the current administration and the Republican party I am double up on my donations to protect us from those threats to our way of life.
@cdarwin@c.imOne of the Republican talking points during this shutdown is that Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer has been pulled left by the far left of his party,
but that is bullshit.
The force that is moving Democrats to fight is coming from the party itself,
and this is a reality that Republicans are loath to admit.
Democrats who are committed to fighting for healthcare in Congress
Include the centerists and moderates that Republicans have traditionally counted on …
@cdarwin@c.im“How do we move forward in a way that everybody feels like they’re being engaged, they’re being heard and they’re understanding that elections have consequences?” she asks rhetorically.
“You have to come out and vote. You lose your voice if you don’t come out to vote.
One of the problems that’s happening right now is people are fearful and that’s how dictatorship begins. That’s how authoritarian regimes start.
They create this chaos and then this fear and we cannot be fe…
@memeorandum@universeodon.comYoung progressives look to Zohran Mamdani, AOC as future of the Democratic Party - under one condition (Deirdre Heavey/Fox News)
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/young-progressives-look-zohran-mamdani-aoc-future-democratic-party-one-key-caveat
http://www.memeorandum.com/250803/p27#a250803p27
@markhburton@mstdn.social"It has long been understood that the capitalist class has numerous means of functioning as a ruling class via the state, even in the case of a liberal democratic order. On the one hand, this takes the form of fairly direct investiture in the political apparatus through various mechanisms, such as economic and political control of political party machines and the direct occupation by capitalists and their representatives of key posts in the political command structure."
@arXiv_csHC_bot@mastoxiv.pageCorrecting Misperceptions at a Glance: Using Data Visualizations to Reduce Political Sectarianism
Douglas Markant, Subham Sah, Alireza Karduni, Milad Rogha, My Thai, Wenwen Dou
https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.00233
@tiotasram@kolektiva.socialUspol
"We're not redrawing the districts to discriminate based on race, we're drawing them to favor our own party," is such an interesting thing to say out loud. On the one hand, pretense of democratic norms is completely gone; says a lot about where the country is headed. On the other hand, the need to maintain a pretense of non-racism persists? That's probably better than them feeling comfortable to go full mask-off about white supremacy. They're already flaunting breaking a lot of laws, so I wonder whether the legal or social-norms aspects of coming out as explicitly racist matter more to them here.
#USPol
@cdarwin@c.im @karlauerbach@sfba.socialWhy should the D-party agree to anything, and I mean *anything* that FFOTUS wants?
https://apnews.com/article/senate-confirmations-nominations-trump-schumer-thune-905a63d0046319eeb7c266d5e24e70b6
@cdarwin@c.imHouse Speaker Mike Johnson on Sunday doubled down on his criticisms of millions of protesters who joined Saturday’s “No Kings” rallies across the nation,
decrying the peaceful demonstrations as evidence of
“a rise of Marxism in the Democratic Party.”
https://www.politico.co…
@memeorandum@universeodon.comWith a Democratic Party leadership vacuum, Obama steps up his criticism of Trump (NBC News)
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/trump-administration/democratic-leadership-vacuum-obama-trump-criticism-rcna233711
http://www.memeorandum.com/251004/p50#a251004p50
@UP8@mastodon.socialHow elites destroyed the Democratic Party in the US and fuelled populism
... great and concise analysis of the confluence of right wing and left wing populism
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoD6ccdmlfI
@Billybobbell@twit.social"The current order is built on a triad of capital, the nation and the state. Our aim should be to replace it with a different one: the social, the international and the democratic..."
Great interview with James Schneider in Sidecar about the potential for the new party being established by Jeremy Corbyn and Zara Sultana.
#corbyn
@memeorandum@universeodon.comThe Democratic Party is in fits over Mamdani's bid for NYC mayor. Republicans are loving it (Associated Press)
https://apnews.com/article/zohran-mamdani-democrats-republicans-bernie-schumer-48a536b75dc213ef5b996bcb9ee2d2ae
http://www.memeorandum.com/250915/p158#a250915p158
@cdarwin@c.imIt's Isaiah Martin, and the countdown is at 82 days until my special election.
Two huge updates for you.
#1: It's official, we kicked the hive, so MAGA has put in a handpicked Trumpster to run against me.
💥But getting arrested didn't scare me, so their lackey doesn't either.
They won't steal this seat in Congress from the people.
#2 Last night we hosted a town hall with over 11,000 people in attendance.
💥Momentum is building, and we c…
@cdarwin@c.imThe House passed its $892.6 billion defense policy bill Wednesday,
despite vocal criticism from Democrats
after the Republican majority denied votes to limit the Trump administration’s use of the military domestically.
The bill advanced by a vote of 231 to 196, largely along party lines.
The House now will wait on the Senate to pass its version of the annual legislation before beginning the “conference” process,
in which negotiators from both chambers reconcile …
@cdarwin@c.imHere's Fox's picks for the newest young Democratic "radicals" 💪🏽
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/squad-2-0-meet-americas-next-wave-radical-democrats-shaping-partys-future
@cdarwin@c.imTrump, emboldened by a Republican party that appears willing to let their leader do whatever he wants,
is now threatening to send troops to Democratic-run cities including Chicago, Baltimore, San Francisco and New York City,
prompting outcry and accusations of abuse of power.
“He’s really planning a military, repressive force, to go out into the streets of the places that are most likely to resist his dictatorship and to just put down the whole thing by force.”
@cdarwin@c.imThe prescription is simple.
Cut ties with firms and any vendors that they do business with that treat donors as marks.
Establish and enforce efficiency standards.
Demand that fundraising operations deliver actual value to campaigns,
not just commissions to consultants.
Most crucially:
Recognize that Democratic donors deserve the same honesty the party demands from everyone else.
The party faces a choice.
Continue feeding the vortex, or shut…
@memeorandum@universeodon.comNadler, Pillar of Democratic Party's Old Guard, Will Retire Next Year (Nicholas Fandos/New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/01/nyregion/jerrold-nadler-congress-retires.html?unlocked_article_code=1.ik8.f48a.0mjVi6N1dqz2&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare
http://www.memeorandum.com/250901/p73#a250901p73
@cdarwin@c.imWORKSHOP
Yes, you can(vass)!
Virtual Training · Hosted by California Democratic Party
Tuesdays
7 – 8pm PDT
Join from anywhere
Hosted in Santa Barbara, CA 93103
https://www.mobilize.us/mobilize/event/842992/
@cdarwin@c.imDays after attorney general Pam Bondi tried to put an end to the Justice Department’s revelations about Jeffrey Epstein, captains of the legal resistance gathered by Zoom.
Norm Eisen, a former attorney for Barack Obama’s White House, had convened lawyers, Democratic communications strategists, a neoconservative Trump critic, and a former chair of the Michigan Democratic Party.
This one was big, Eisen said from his parked car in Baltimore, where he had traveled for a lawsuit to ov…
@cdarwin@c.imI never thought I'd be proud to have been arrested.
But I also never thought that I'd be in a situation where the President of the United States is trying to make questionably legal power grabs.
He knows if he loses Congress, it's over.
It's Isaiah Martin,
and my election isn't in a year,
it's in 89 days,
which means vote by mail ballots are coming sooner than later.
First and foremost, thank you for your support.
I…
@cdarwin@c.imOne week ago MAGA threw me in jail
for speaking out against their gerrymandering plan
to hand Trump more control.
Gov. Gavin Newsome, Joy-Ann Reid, and even People.com told the world to pay attention.
The time for strongly worded letters is over.
We must meet this moment,
and that means electing leaders who are willing to get arrested to stop Trump's tyranny.
I'd do it again for the people of Texas.
I'm running for congress in a…
