Just Tell The Truth About How Insidious Democrats Are & Maybe You’ll Win

Nina Turners campaign admits they chose to avoid confronting party leadership to win votes but some are saying she didn’t do enough to pander to conservatives

The lefts hostile takeover of the Democratic Party has been an abject failure. As I wrote in a previous article, since 2016 the working class movement has dumped over $270 million into attempts to elected progressive politicians to reshape the party. Still, the leadership and the policy direction of the party is as corporatist as ever. As an added bonus, every single ally we sent to bust up the establishment has turned into status quo defending incrementalists who put the interests of their party and careers above that of the public that got them elected. For everyone doing the math at home compared to where we were in 2015 this movement is down $270 million and even in a pandemic not a single politician is advancing single payer.

Anyone with the sense of urgency to call for a political revolution 6 years ago analyzing the situation objectively has to realize this current strategy is not going to produce any real results for the people living in crisis today. Which is why I and many others have made the calculation that the only way we get the policies to survive this state of crisis is through militant public pressure campaigns and the only way to keep members of our communities who’ve been left for dead afloat in the mean time is through mutual aid. 

I believe this is where all our resources should be going in this moment. Where I disagree with some factions on the left is over their insistence that we continue to shovel unlimited money and resources into this electoral politics dumpster fire to the detriment of the project of fully committing to direct action. 

This is why I called on everyone to exercise caution and discernment about how invested we should be in getting Nina Turner, another politician, elected. Now that the race is over it seems the left spent $6 million dollars and countless volunteer hours to win this election. Since Nina Turner lost it’s undeniable that those resources would have been better spent on mutual aid and direct actions. If there’s one lesson I hope everyone takes away from this race, it’s that. Even if she won I’d still make the argument resources would have been used elsewhere for reasons previously stated

As much as I reject electoral politics as the solution to our current state of crisis, I do concede at some point a functioning system requires us to have politicians that actually do their jobs. It’s untenable to expect mass mobilization every time we need politicians to do the bare minimum of their job description. This is why I find utility in an autopsy of this failed campaign. 

I’ve been clear about why I believe Nina Turner lost this race. In part, it was the failure to organize an effective ground game but that’s because Turner decided to abandon any attempt at bringing out new voters. Only 16% of voters came out in an open primary because NT failed excite the other 84% of eligibility voters enough to come out. She used the buzzwords like m4a but there was no urgency behind it and no clear articulation of the strategy she’d use to make those policies a reality in a reasonable timeframe for voters in the district. In fact the ethos of the campaign did the exact opposite. NT campaign advisor Jeff Weaver told Axios:

‘they don't want to give Turner's opponents any easy ways to argue that her ties to Sanders would pit her against Biden or make her unwilling to work with more moderate Democrats.’

In a pandemic and economic crisis that democrats are handling miserably instead of leaning in to the frustration that people have at the inaction of our government in an emergency Turner tried to sell herself as a loyal partisan democrat in the poorest big city in the country where voters have been left for dead by the very same party. Had she been more adversarial to the corruption in the party she would have controlled the media narrative and tapped into the biggest voting block in this country, people who are fed up with the duopoly. 

At the time people like Jordan chariton were praising this as the only serious strategy to win in a district that historically votes for corporate democrats. Now that strategy clearly didn’t work, and instead of entertaining the idea of being openly hostile to the duopoly, Jordan is saying she didn’t pander to conservative Biden voters enough. So this begs the question, why can’t we ever just tell the truth about how insidious the Democratic Party is and trust voters to prioritize their material well being over allegiance to a party that’s actively working against them?

I stated before that the focus of any left campaign should be to tap into the largest voting block in the country, people who see the system as corrupt and don’t align with either party. But I’ll also acknowledge that the pro-duopoly propaganda has brainwashed a lot of people into thinking the democrats are actually fighting for them which is why millions will loyally show up every election and give their vote for nothing in return. If you believe that the partisan loyalty voters have to democrats is an obstacle to progress created by institutions who manufacturer consent for the duopoly you can’t also say we have to avoid deconstructing that mythology. You can’t have it both ways.

If you don’t directly disprove this fictitious persona then voters will never learn that democrats are working against their interests thus perpetuating the endless cycle of voting for politicians serving corporate interests.

If people on the left don’t do the work of combating this mass delusion then who will? Certainly not mainstream media or the education system. They are the ones manufacturing consent for the corporate duopoly. How can you ever expect to get enough people in the streets if the people most politically engaged believe voting for corporate democrats is an actual solution to their problems when in reality they are exacerbating existing problems?  If your position is we can’t even engage in this necessary project because voters are too dumb to understand that they’re being taken for a ride then you’re just admitting defeat and that you can’t actually convince people. 

This idea that the bond voters have to Democratic Party is as strong as a blood oath isn’t true. Most of the left who is openly hostile to the DNC used to be loyal democrats, until some point when they were provided information on the heinous policy positions of the DNC and how they go against our own self interests. I don’t care how many dems you’ve voted for, if you were bombarded with the message that the only reason you doesn’t have healthcare is that Joe Biden refuses to sign an executive order because he’s more concerned with protecting the profits of his corporate donors than you dying or going bankrupt, it’s going change the way you see the democrats. I don’t know why just telling the truth and trusting people to come to the conclusion that best serves isn’t even an option on the table. 

I believe if done correctly and tied to the material concerns of voters you can awaken a segment of partisan democrats even in the timeframe of one election but even if it does take longer than an election cycle to break the spell it’s a task worth doing in the long run. Had there been a more concerted effort from people considered leaders in the working class movement to tell the truth about how vile the institution of the Democratic Party is over the last 6 years instead of running from the task, maybe people would be less complacent with the unacceptable governance we’re experiencing while democrats have complete control of government. Maybe more people would be in the streets. Maybe more people would focus on building power outside the duopoly. Who knows but what I can guarantee is perpetuating the myth that the party is doing anything other than serving oligarchy doesn’t help advance either of those projects. 

“You can not continue to exert your revolutionary thinking and yearning to burn down the system to older voters and suburban voters” Jordan Chariton

This is one of many straw men chooses to engage with rather than the more substantive counter arguments to his approach. No one is suggesting to go into nursing homes and ask if they want to start a revolution. I’m merely suggesting we tell them the truth about who’s actually an obstacle to policies that will improve their lives. Yes. Every district has issues specific to their voters and you can tailor your approach to focus on healthcare, wages, climate, social security or what ever genre of policy will most connect with them. What I don’t agree with is that because voters in a district voted for corrupt conservative politicians in the past it is now a law of nature that you can’t win that district unless you emulate the corrupt partisan politicians that came before you. That logic undermines the entire theory behind the strategy of a political revolution through electoral politics. By definition most district in the country elect corporate politicians who oppose single payer so does that mean a politician running on single payer can never win in such districts? If you truly believe that why engage in project like running a challenger like AOC to unseat one of the most powerful democrats in the country who’s one his district for nearly 20 years?

Furthermore I’m at a loss for words to explain why anyone would encourage left politicians to be more subservient to the Democratic Party. There’s already a crisis of credibility among these alleged lefty politicians for that very same reason.  They all use revolutionary rhetoric when it’s convenient but all reliably maintain the status quo once in office. Let’s not entice them to conform to the party even more and even earlier especially since that’s the main reason they currently get no results and we still haven’t figured out how get them back on the course they originally set out on. 

Democrats have complete control of government. The pandemic is still being mishandled. No politicians is even entertaining single payer to deal with the healthcare crisis. We are witnessing undeniable proof that we’re mid climate apocalypse and instead of aggressively combating the crisis democrats are exacerbating it by approving record amounts of permits for fossil fuel extraction. There are more kids in concentration camps than ever before. The endless wars and genocide for profit continue unabated. We’re in the beginning of the worst homelessness crisis in US history and democrats are allowing it at the behest of their donors in the real estate industry. 

At every turn the democrats show us they serve oligarchy at the expense of our lives. This party is just as hostile to our existence and well being as republicans. They’ve waged class war on the poor and working class on behalf of the establishment. They have made themselves the enemy of the people. If the left is serious about advancing our policy agenda then that starts by being clear who the obstacles of these life saving policies are: the party that controls the house, senate and White House. 

For everyone who’s so convinced that we can never tell voter the truth about the democrats: name one time someone has actually fully committed to this strategy and failed. Because the list of examples of progressives trying to loyal team players and producing no results is endless.