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Cake day: August 22nd, 2023

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  • They can maybe singlehandedly win some House races. $14M is a lot of money there. You’ll notice however that Ilhan Omar is still in Congress despite their opposition and Bernie Sanders, who’s much more influential, has nothing at all to worry about. They accomplish a lot more by targeting a couple of already weakened reps and others getting scared than they ever could if they actually had to directly confront them. Their money isn’t endless and is kind of an irrelevant amount when talking about the scale of a presidential race.



  • I’m not nearly as confident about that as you are. Hillary had the money advantage. Elections are won in swing states, by voter turnout, and while money can encourage or discourage voting, it does so by highlighting (or lying about) policy. You’re not coming out ahead if you just save them the effort of lying by sticking with a policy that turns away voters (or more realistically, is already being further enhancement by political spending).


  • You can talk about money equals votes all you want, but right now there’s very direct evidence that her position is losing votes. No speculation on the power of ad campaigns or which wedge might be effective. There’s an issue that’s already losing votes and already being targeted by conservative money. And this whole premise of “do nothing, they’ll come home” is based on everyone being able to recognize she’s better for Palestinians except the Zionists. Because if they’re not the lone idiots in this whole game, they already have reason to want her to lose. And the only reason they wouldn’t already be putting all those resources against her is if THEY don’t believe their money can win the election for Trump.

    And even past all that, arguing “Democrats gotta do what the lobbyists want even if the party doesn’t agree” is a position that itself is going to lose even more votes. It’s feckless neoliberalism and “don’t bother, the system is beyond the voters” all tied together with a nice little bow, presented as if that was supposed to motivate voters to knuckle-down and engage with a system you’re claiming doesn’t care about them and is incapable of acting in their interest. Because there’s still going to be a weapons lobby and a Zionist lobby post election, and under this philosophy she’s going to be beholden to them indefinitely because there’s always going to be a next election for her or the party.



  • That she’s not president right now is the benefit. She can say whatever she wants and skeptical people have no way of testing her sincerity. The problem with your examples are that they’re entirely content free wishes for a better world. Those statements don’t imply she might do something to try to enact this ideal world where the heartbreaking thing doesn’t happen or that she would even consider doing anything to incentivize Netanyahu to make a deal.

    The key to my proposed ambiguity is that there is an explicit acknowledgement that Netanyahu’s far right government might be not only an obstacle to peace, but an obstacle that she might confront. Current statements are just the same things Biden is already saying.


  • The most fundamentally disappointing aspect of Harris is that she’s had all the room in the world for ambiguity and platitudes to sweep the problem under the rug. She doesn’t need to even promise anything, just indicate she’s concerned about the motivations of the far right Israeli government and will look at all options to promote a just and peaceful Middle East. Expressing the vague potential to confront a far-right Israeli government isn’t going to lose her any Democratic votes, at least not in places as important as Michigan where not doing it is a potentially campaign defining choice.

    It’s like the centrist establishment has some inherent desire to force that “you have to vote for us” choice on disgruntled Democratic factions even though they could just solve the disagreement. If they start acknowledging the left side of the party as being worth listening to, even if doing so is trivially easy, then it sets a bad precedent.