Democrats say the key to stopping Trump’s conservative agenda is to vote Democratic in the midterm elections. But Democrats admit they have no plans to impeach Trump. With the Senate certain to remain in Republican hands, there isn’t much Democrats could do if they wanted. So what exactly is the point of voting Democratic?
This Cartoon Explains Why Voting Democratic Can’t Do Anything to Stop Trump
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“With the Senate certain to remain in Republican hands, there isn’t much Democrats could do if they wanted.”
Ted! I am shocked at you. Even when the Senate IS in Democratic control, there isn’t much Democrats can do.
The only purpose in voting Democratic in the midterms is that the presidential elections begin when the polls close on Tuesday. If the Democrats take the House (which is possible) and if they close the gap in the Senate (also possible), it’s a very useful step for the 2020 elections. Ideally, all the midterm voters will stick around for the 2020 contest. If Sanders announces, they may even vote.
The most important things to watch for after the midterm elections?
1. Were progressive candidates elected?
2. Are those candidates starting fires (metaphorically)?
And let’s remember, a progressive is different from a liberal. It’s like those Goofus and Gallant cartoons.
Goofus, a millionaire, wants to cap minimum wage at $12. Gallant wants minimum wage to be at least $15.
Goofus, who has the best healthcare available, things Universal Single-Payer is unrealistic. Gallant points out that such a health plan exists in dozens of countries, some of which have smaller economies than the U.S.
Goofus says different things to different people in order to get elected. Gallant sticks to the same core principles over and over.
Man, I hate to say this but the reason to vote D is to make a statement about the Rs. Specifically the Twitter-in-chief.
in 2016, I voted Green. Perhaps that helped usher in the Age of Trump but I do not regret my choice. I made the ‘statement’ I meant to make. Now it’s time to make a different statement. It may or may not stop him, it may not even impede him, but it is certainly time.
The good news is that many of the Ds running for office are lefter-than-usual. Naw, we won’t bring about a Socialist Workers’ Paradise … but maybe we could take a baby step that direction?
And maybe Santa will bring me a pony this year…
Agreed. Hold your nose and vote D. Come on, pony!
Early voting up 500% for young people in Texas and Georgia. Oh, yeah. While some of them are certainly “Young Republicans” – the young do tend to lean left.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/midterms-2018-election-early-voting-texas-georgia-beto-orourke-ted-cruz-trump-a8609916.html
Gore lost in 2000 in part because of (only one cause among many) Black voter disenfranchisement in Florida.
Hillary also had the same problem, and only Jill Stein challenged the small number of states’ results that had Black disenfranchisement problems, in these states which could have put Hillary over the top with an honest Black vote count.
And Democrats never got around to fixing Black disenfranchisement problems because they were too busy celebrating their Black president, and blaming Republicans for their racism, without having to dirty themselves up with the concerns of the non-wealthy (Detroit poison water drinkers, for example) Black voters.
Biden praised Obama for being a clean Black man.
“I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy,” Biden said. “I mean, that’s a storybook, man.”
http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/01/31/biden.obama/
Democrats want only racially pure, solid White electoral wins where Black votes are not needed to put them over the top of the Republican white majority vote counts.
Democrats want the votes of those they can convince that Republicans are racist (which they are) without actually fighting for Black enfranchisement themselves.
But Democrats don’t want to lose white racist votes by winning elections without a white vote count greater than the Republican White vote count, by needing Black votes to put them over the top.
What’s the alternative, Ted ? Note that I don’t intend this as a rhetorical question, i e, a statement to the effect that there is no alternative, as dear Margaret Hilda Thatcher used to say, but rather a real question : what alternatives exist for US voters ? Are there candidates in one’s district for whom one can vote without holding one’s nose, or is one faced, as per the usual, with the evil of two lessers ?…
For your sake – and for the sake of us all, everywhere in this world, given that we are all affected by US policy – I very much hope you can indeed find alternatives….
Henri
I’ve always looked at it as a soda-based response.
Imagine the head of Coksi and the head of Ceksi talking about sales. In the early 60s, both brands sold, say, 100 million bottles a quarter. Then Coksi started using seawater, rather than the more expensive alternative of filtered water. And every quarter, they added a little more seawater. Ceksi, on the other hand, started using slightly radioactive water. And every quarter, they added a little more. People started to get sick, but sales were still good. Down from historic heights, but profit still rolled in.
Now, a number of quarters later, a whole lot of people have simply stopped drinking soda from either brand because they find it gross or sickening. But Ceksi and Coksi have spent millions fitting their factories to handle salt water or radioactivity. So they can’t change direction now. It would be too expensive. All the upper-echeloners would lose their jobs for damaging the brand so stupidly.
So Ceksi and Coksi get marketing companies to sell their toxic brews because they simply have no other options, unless they want to admit their culpability and ignorance. Still, sales continue to drop. The excuses become more and more bizarre. The smaller companies, like Antfa and CR Cola, which are gaining sales (but are still dwarfed by Ceksi and Coksi), still have to fight like hell just to stay on the shelves (because Ceksi and Coksi both are trying to make it so that the other two can’t even get shelf space at the supermarket–or the supermarket debates), so most of the shoppers pushing their carts down the aisle wonder why anyone would bother trying to make Antfa in the first place. “I mean, Ceksi and Coksi are so popular. Sure, there’s a tendency to vomit after drinking them, and Antfa and CR Cola don’t give you that feeling, but, I mean, Antfa’s so unpopular. …”
Voting Democratic is like putting a band-aid on a festering wound; the ugliness will be removed from sight, but without a chance of reducing the infection before gangrene sets in.
The gross betrayal of hope by Obama and the touting of his successes (the successes of Obama’s betrayals?) by Hillary has fueled the ascension of Trump.
The forever movement of the Democratic Party to the right imagined the further movement of the Republican Party to the more extreme right, and into its decline into irrelevance by the Democratic Party’s capture of the Republican Party’s electoral and financial bases.
The “geniuses” of the Democratic Party could not foresee the eruption of the Republican boil on their body politic into Trumpism; Democrats somehow imagined that the most overtly violent party would surrender to their inevitable demise without resort to an apocalyptic death-defying blaze of glory (driven, in their humiliating defeat, perhaps by a discovery of their latent humanism?).
Stupid, stupid, stupid.
surrender(driven, in their humiliating defeat, perhaps by a discovery of their latent humanism?) to their inevitable demise without resort to an apocalyptic death-defying blaze of glory.
Ted, your nihilistic equivalence of Republicans and Democrats is starting to annoy me. If Democrats take only the House of Representatives, that will stop the insanity of a GOP controlled Presidency and Congress.
“If Democrats take only the House of Representatives, that will stop the insanity of a GOP controlled Presidency and Congress.”
How?
Because forcing a Republican President and Senate to compromise with a Democratic House would be better than what we have?
“The conservative legislative agenda will be dead. Instead of a friendly Congress working to pass Republican bills, Trump will have to spar with Democratic majorities. The result will likely be gridlock (though unusual bipartisan compromises are possible, depending on the issue).”
https://www.vox.com/2018/10/8/17923504/2018-elections-midterms-trump-races-polls
I would be very surprised if the Democrats would align themselves with the interests of the people’s left.
Once the Democrats win a few seats they won’t need anything more from the left and so will not really have any reason or ability to offer the left anything that might displease their financial backers.
The newcomers will soon be disciplined and disillusioned into toeing the line of the old guard.
Desperate people will take the bait over and over again; the Democrats and Republicans both count on it.
That’s why fake democracy works so well for the few.
@Kevin –
“The result will likely be gridlock”
… and that’s a good thing. 😀
Kevin,
I get what you’re saying but I will point out that the early voting is tremendous. I think that Trump, by bringing so much to the front, has actually achieved the beginning of a wake-up/mobilization to the left. If the Dems had controlled the House, we would not see such response from the left. My hope is that HRC will have one single moment of concern for the lower 97% and just sit at Chapaqua while Bernie beats Trump in 2020.
But this cartoon spelled out the clear differences between the two parties: the Democrats are able to follow a logical chain for 4 full steps without blinking. This may result in circular reasoning, depending on one’s definition of “is”.
In contrast, Republicans have cultivated the image that basic logic itself is likely satanic and anyway only employed by latte-drinkers in New York and San Francisco, the modern day incarnations of Sodom and Gomorrha.
What’s more, establishment Democrats mainly resist the Republican attack on the New Deal programs by counter-intuitively decimating those programs themselves – using Republican votes in the Senate if necessary in the case of Bill Clinton’s welfare “reform”, repeal of Glass-Steagall, etc.
But the two parties only seem equivalent in plain space-time, not from the lordly vantage point of 5 dimensional chess where working class voters are cast as sacrificial pawns. Also resistance to that kind of “resistance” was supposed to be futile since “what are they going to do, vote Republican?”.
But then Bernie came and spoiled everything…
Great comment, andreas5.
How can an appraisal such as yours be considered to be “nihilistic” when the Democrats have demonstrated time and time again that they literally believe in nothing?
@ Kevin
Reality is biased against the rhetoric of both Democrats and Republicans.
Denial of reality is nihilistic in the extreme. It’s funny that you should use the word “nihilistic” to support a party that believes in nothing.
The Democrats campaign by fear mongering Trump, and then nihilistically give him all the money he needs to end life on earth along with the power to wage undeclared war unconstitutionally.
“On Wednesday, the House passed the measure by a vote of 361-61, sending the bill to Trump. Last week, the Senate approved the legislation in a vote of 93 to 7, sending the bill to the House.”
https://www.military.com/daily-news/2018/09/28/trump-signs-defense-spending-bill-largest-troop-pay-raise-10-years.html
When will the Democrats begin their resistance?