[alt text: a screenshot of a tweet by @delaney_nolan, which says, “Biden/Harris saw this polling and decided to keep unconditionally arming Israel”. Below the tweet is a screenshot from an article, which states: “In Pennsylvania, 34% of respondents said they would be more likely to vote for the Democratic nominee if the nominee vowed to withold weapons to Israel, compared to 7% who said they would be less likely. The rest said it would make no difference. In Arizona, 35% said they’d be more likely, while 5% would be less likely. And in Georgia, 39% said they’d be more likely, also compared to 5% who would be less likely.”]
And Trump will be better for Palestinians how exactly? Anyone who prefers inane grandstanding instead of picking the lesser evil (no matter the topic) is a moron. That’s how politics work. The ideal candidate doesn’t exist and will never exist. If you ever come across one who 100% mirrors every single one of your opinions, get your head examined.
Edit: Also, every single credible poll out there indicates that American voters - idiotically - picked Trump due to their dissatisfaction with the economy. Middle Eastern wars were not high on the list of priorities for most voters.
And taking people’s votes for granted worked how exactly?
Voter turn out was much lower than 2020 and 2016 just like this poll predicted.
you don’t have to convince me, friend. The fact is, winning a national election involves building a coalition with people that you don’t see eye-to-eye with 100%. The Dems don’t have a great coalition to begin with - if they win their highly-educated base and nobody else, they lose the election 100% of the time. They have to win over other people, mostly the very few groups of undecided voters. And in this election, it was clear that one of the few undecided groups available were Arab-Americans that cared a whole lot about what has been happening on the West Bank. And Harris did fuck-all to court those voters, so they decided to stay home.
Arab-Americans
0.639% of the US population. This is a tiny minority of no relevance to American politics. Trump has 51% of popular votes already, not that this matters, because the districts that carry Trump to victory have few voters with this kind of background. Arab Americans could not have changed the outcome of this election, even if 100% had voted for Harris.
2.1% of Michigan, and Harris could really use an extra 2.1% in Michigan right now.
Not really, without Pennsylvania Michigan doesn’t matter unless nearly every other swing state goes for her, and they don’t look like that’s even a possibility.
It was high enough on their list to cause her to lose.
This is absolute bullsh1t.
Trump has repeatedly said Netanyahu can do as he pleases, has repeatedly disparaged all Muslims, has repeatedly shown a political kinship with dictatorships.
Biden/Harris were protest targets in spite of it being the entirety of Congress that votes on/gives foreign aid because these protests were propaganda bent on disenfranchising Democrats and nothing else. The protests will wither to nothing now that pants-sh1tter rapist is going to be president.
You were duped. You fell for it. Gaza has zero chance now.
You have to convince people to vote for you, you can’t just rely on them voting against the other candidate. That’s why voter turnout was lower than previous elections.
How many more elections will Democrats have to lose before they’ll lean this lesson?
Not voting for KH & TW is saying that a fully-fascist America is A-OK with you. Full stop. There really isn’t any way you can justify voting otherwise.
I absolutely agree with you 100%. That still doesn’t address the fact that many people were less likely to vote for Harris if she continued to want to arm Israel. The stick of Trump was effective for getting yours and mine vote. Some other people needed the carrot of ending the Gaza Genocide. If they would have done the right thing, they had a chance of motivating those voters.
That still doesn’t address the fact that many people were less likely to vote for Harris if she continued to want to arm Israel.
There have always been holocausts going on, somewhere in the world. A lot of times, the US is involved.
For a certain audience, the narrative was that Biden caused inflation and Trump would rescue them and make their economic lives easy. And look at that, they bought it. Even though it was opposite-land bullshit.
For a certain audience, the narrative was that Biden caused the holocaust in Gaza. And look at that, they bought it. There was some validity. But the new thing was that it was hugely important, all over their social media, and Biden was responsible, and it defined his presidency in a way that 100 other things he did failed to do.
It only got presented and spread so widely and presented so singularly as a Democrats-only issue, without acknowledgement that Trump will be ten times worse, a hundred times worse, because that presentation would hurt the Democrats.
There were other narratives in the same way. Immigration, either that Biden was too kind or too mean. Oldness and feebleness. Policing. The truth or falsehood didn’t matter. They were expertly crafted.
And the result? Now, after people bought and acted on them, hook line and sinker?
Buddy just you fucking wait. Gaza will get much worse, of course, but it will barely even register as a major problem, by the time all of this is said and done.
Whoever made the narratives got their fucking money’s worth, and then some.
Edit: It should be said that I think “It’s not the voters’ fault. It’s Harris’s fault that she didn’t earn the votes.” is another of those narratives. You’ve probably seen it a few times today. Why they’re spending effort on pushing that new one, all of a sudden right after the election, I have no idea. It barely matters. But if you take a step back and think, it’s a pretty weird thing to decide is important to say, if you’re trying to do anything other than further depress support for anything left that’s in power, and soothe the consciences of people who might have been involved in this catastrophe from the voter side.
Buddy, I don’t disagree with you, I actually vehemently agree with most everything here BUT you still gotta beat the spread. You got to play the game better than the refs. All the nuance in the world doesn’t matter, you still gotta deliver and Harris didn’t.
I can’t believe how often I have to repeat this but: remember the electoral college? Your vote for President only matters if you live in one of a few states. Your full stop is premature.
Trump has repeatedly said Netanyahu can do as he please
So has Harris.
Biden/Harris were protest targets in spite of it being the entirety of Congress that votes on/gives foreign aid…
It is the Secretary of State who brokers deals. Congress follows the Executive branches lead for MOST funding. The Secretary of State answers to the President and Vice President.
You were duped. You fell for it. Gaza has zero chance now.
They never had a chance. You made sure of that. And, I’M SPEAKING HERE, all of the people in this echo chamber are to blame. We had a key opening when Biden was ousted to make change happen, to demand an open convention, to force the party left, to force a viable candidate, but instead, all of you latched on to Harris’ dick and went to war, not with Republicans (you guys apparently love Republicans, Love them Cheney endorsements, want em in the cabinet), you went to war with undecideds and pushed them third party.
This is your fault.
Trump has repeatedly said Netanyahu can do as he pleases, has repeatedly disparaged all Muslims, has repeatedly shown a political kinship with dictatorships.
Right, and Harris shouted down protesters and wouldn’t denounce genocide. So if you are voting on this one single issue, you probably decide not to vote for either candidate, because they both cross your red line. However, most voters aren’t single-issue voters, and Harris didn’t provide much else in the way of policy to excite voters. Just vibes-based messaging and the occasional neoliberal economic policy.
So I repeat: Trump’s win is Harris’s fault. She had all the cards, and she flubbed it because she didn’t want to piss off her billionaire donors.
Biden/Harris fucked up on more than just Gaza. Biden took action to address inflation, but Americans have continued to feel like their economic situation is worse off than it was 4 years ago. This is because grocery store and gas prices remain inflated, while the average American’s income has stagnated. In short: corporate greed. Biden has done little to address corporate greed, and Harris did little to assure Americans that she would combat corporate greed or make Americans feel better about their personal finances. All evidence suggested that she would be even cozier with the billionaires than Biden was. Not hard to see why people stayed home when they felt like their choices were a billionaire and a billionaire-sympathizer.
In short, STOP BLAMING YOUR ALLIES. Trump’s win is HARRIS’S FAULT.
Hard to see people as allies who are willing to let the world burn because the only other option wasn’t perfect. The campaign fucked up, for sure, but every voter that stayed home shares blame in this.
Same. I can’t see you as allies if you throw Trans people, immigrants, disabled people and migrants under the bus to protest a policy that will be even worse under the opposition.
A lot of people (probably the majority) that stayed home didn’t do so because of Gaza. They did so because they are too busy to keep up with the news, and nothing they heard about either candidate was compelling enough to get up off the couch on election night. It was Harris’s job to reach and then convince those people.
I didn’t say Gaza, and it doesnt matter why they couldn’t be bothered. Their share remains the same.
So so so many people keep pointing at Trump and saying “But he’s the worst/we’re all doomed/holy shit you need to vote blue no matter who” and comments about “perfect being the enemy of the good” so we should hold our nose and support Democrats.
I feel like I’m the only person who remembers how hyperbolic we all were about Mitt Romney or John McCain being existential threats to democracy. South Park literally made fun of everybody at the time pointing at how running such a divisive campaign let them distract the public from their real goal of stealing the Hope Diamond (obviously). How many of us would BEG for Romney at the top of the Republican ticket at this point?
So sure, Trump is the threat now. When are we supposed to stop rewarding mediocre neoliberalism then? If it wasn’t 2016 or 2020 or 2024 then when? Trump will eventually die and some new Republican will take his place as the leader of the party. EVERY Republican will be the next existential threat and we’ll be scolded and told to hold our nose yet again and vote for the Democrat. If someone can tell me the “end date” where I don’t have to choose between the lesser of two evils, I’d love to know when that is.
I don’t blame other citizens for voting how they do. Everyone has to decide for themselves their red lines for support and in the privacy of the voting booth who they want to support. I do blame Democratic leadership for not learning a single lesson from 2016 about hand picking candidates and browbeating everyone into thinking that’s OK.
You’re exactly right, and this is my point. I’d bet damn near everyone commenting in this thread voted for Harris. It doesn’t matter, we aren’t the swing voters. And the swing voters are the ones that decided this election. There is nothing we can really do to convince swing voters, unless they are already our friends or family. It was Harris’s job to come out with bold policy proposals and messages that would convince those swing voters. Instead, she peddled the same milquetoast neolib shit that has been losing Dems elections since the 90s.
When are we supposed to stop rewarding mediocre neoliberalism then?
When neoliberalism is consistently beating fascism.
OK, how do we know we’re “beating fascism” and can back off? What stops Democratic leadership from arguing that the most boring ass middle of the road fiscal conservative Republican on the planet is “Trump 2.0” and must be stopped?
I don’t disagree on what you said at all, but so much of this is a war of messaging and marketing. If an amorphous “leadership” just keeps arguing the Republicans are all fascists regardless of what their actions/deeds/etc…actually suggest, how then do we push back on that narrative without being called a Russian plant or Republican sympathizer? In an age of clickbait, outrage manufacturing and people isolating in their own news spheres, it’s super easy for those with power to just lie and stay in power.
“Don’t blame your allies.”
Proceeds to blame his allies, picking out the one wedge issue which the opponents used to greatest effect to split the left in this election.
Nothing in particular that would help anyone pick up the pieces, or figure out what happens now or what to do.
Fair point. It’s the day after the election. Anger is a valid emotion. Today, I’m choosing to direct my anger at the Harris campaign for doing fuck-all to court undecided voters. Not the people in this thread; I suspect almost every American here went to the ballot box and voted for Harris/Walz, regardless of their opinions about Israel.
When I say “undecided voters”, I mean the single mothers in Pennsylvania that are so completely underwater because they have two jobs and everything is so expensive now and they probably have medical debt and other bills weighing them down. The people that don’t have time to watch every Harris interview and decide whether or not they are “coconut-pilled”. Those people saw what Harris was selling, and the message they received was “more of Biden, who did fuck all for me”. In the face of that, and when you have to move heaven and earth just to get the time to go vote, why would you bother?
I’ve spent enough of my arguing about politics energy for today, especially now that the horse has left the barn.
https://ponder.cat/comment/839212
https://ponder.cat/comment/837488
https://ponder.cat/comment/835981
That’s my response. There’s some good stuff in there. I do not require any kind of response on any of it.
But they got the Cheneys!
I steadfastly refuse to accept an apology on behalf of single-issue voters. Those abstentions and/or third party protest votes got us here. Anyone who refused to coalesce around (or at least hold their nose and vote for) the biggest “not Trump” candidate was failing to see or even acknowledge the bigger picture and larger threat. And now we all have to pay for that.
The electoral votes in a state go to the single candidate with the most votes. “Not Trump” was not a candidate. Furthermore, a third party candidate was never going to win. So, I will absolutely blame these so-called “allies” as I find them to be worse than the people who voted for Trump (at least they were honest about what they were doing).
I sincerely hope there is a future election where they have learned something from this. In the mean time, good luck everyone.
I sincerely hope there is a future election where they have learned something from this. In the mean time, good luck everyone.
Given you’re expecting an apology instead of giving one, nothing was learned apparently.
this is where i’m at. Maybe instead of loudly shouting for months that people should just get over the genocide and hold their nose and vote for Harris, Harris and the Dems should have been working to convince Americans that she would actually work on the issues that people care about? Americans are feeling like things keep getting more expensive and while their wages stay the same - what was Harris doing to address that? What was she suggesting that didn’t feel like a band-aid on the problems with our top-heavy economy? Some stayed home because of the genocide, but more than that, Americans just weren’t convinced that Harris would do anything to improve their economic situation.
I apologize for nothing. I didn’t vote for genocide, the stripping of trans rights, the building of cop cities, the placement of Republicans in the candidate, increased hostilities on the border. I have nothing to apologize for.
You, on the other hand, voted for all of those things and STILL lost. Why? Because those are right wing policies, and Republicans are right wing. If the policies are right wing, the Republicans win. That’s how its always been. Not that hard to wrap your brain around.
We painstakingly spelled it out for you in slow motion for a year, and you kept your head lodged firmly up your master’s ass.
So quite the opposite, I wouldn’t accept the apology you lack the self awareness to extend me.
If everyone who voted for Harris voted for 3rd Party instead, the Electoral College shows Trump still would have won.
most of the people you have probably argued with online about Harris and genocide probably did in fact hold their nose and vote for Harris. The people that stayed home were young people and Arab-Americans that have become disillusioned with the Dems, and the genocide was just the last straw. Many people who voted for Biden 4 years ago have found that their economic situation is worse than it was 4 years ago. Harris did little to convince people that her policy would be substantially different from Biden’s. Most of her campaign’s messaging was vibes-based shit like “coconut-pilled” and “we all need to heal” and “Madam President”. In the rare instance that she talked economic policy, it was clear that she would be like Biden, except with more neoliberal cozying up to corporations.
The people I know who are plugged into politics simply sucked it up and voted for Harris, because they are realistic about things. If you are following the news like that, it is obvious that Trump is worse in every way conceivable. Most Americans are busy, poorly-educated, and not that plugged into politics. They get their news from Facebook or TikTok. For those people, it is the candidate’s job to bring them on-side. Harris failed at that, plain and simple.
How about instead of blaming the people that Harris failed to convince, we talk about how we can invite those people back into our coalition? Personally, I’m ready to throw the Democratic party in the bin and start something new.
The same thing is looking like it’s going to happen in Canada
Current Liberal government is going to hold out all support for a genocidal country doing genocidal things for no apparent obvious reason and any moderate voter out there will avoid them for them it.
It doesn’t matter what your politics are … if your political party openly and wholeheartedly wants to support something that does no benefit to your country, ruins the lives of others and supports a maniacal regime, and does it at the cost of millions and billions of dollars -> why would you want to vote for them?
I don’t get it … sure Israel is pretty important but why would political leaders obviously tank their entire prospects just to save the support of a country that has very little to do with their own other than to cost everyone money.
No, it can be more than one person’s fault. It’s Harris’s fault, and it’s also the fault of the people who decided fascism was an acceptable alternative to capitalist liberalism.
I’m sure the trans people whose lives are now in danger will sleep much better tonight knowing that the blood of those Palestinian children who are going to continue dying because Donald Trump has promised not to even try for a ceasefire isn’t on your hands, because you didn’t vote for Kamala Harris.
I hope you’re fucking happy.
I’ll remember how this was all Kamala’s fault when Trump starts rounding people up. I’m sure it will bring me great comfort. I’m also sure it will bring great comfort to the people of Palesine because Trump DEFINITELY isn’t going to keep arming Israel, and we know he’s way more susceptible to public pressure than Harris would have been.
Got a link to the quoted article, by chance?
I don’t use Xitter so all I can see is the single tweet and it’s just an image, no attribution.
Found an article but it doesn’t link to the source either.
https://zeteo.com/p/poll-harris-democrats-gaza-ceasefire-arms-embargo
There’s this for methodology, at the end of the article:
Fuck that, I’m blaming every single person that didn’t vote for Harris
No number of additional blue votes in Massachusetts or Hawaii was ever going to matter.
I mean, if you’re referring to the people that voted for Trump, I’m right there with you. It’s absolutely mind-boggling that a rapist and convicted felon won the popular vote.
They made their decisions and you made yours. If you decided that we’d be better off with Trump, that’s on you. Own it.
Putting Trump in office makes Gaza worse. He’s promised us as much. Maybe you proved a point to the Democrats, and maybe you didn’t. Maybe now they’ll lean even harder to the center. Who knows. That’s a gamble you took, and you made steep sacrifices to make that gamble.
Gambling with someone’s life to make a political point does not make you their ally.
I’m sorry, did you personally count my ballot? Or are you just making assumptions about me?
I mean, I feel like it is quite fair to blame the people who voted for Trump for Harris’s loss tbh. I don’t really buy the "the dems would win if they didn’t just refuse to try to win over conservatives and instead promised to go all-in on progressive policy that I’ve seen lately. I wish we got more progressive policy too, but it’s not like they don’t have any idea what people want, they have whole teams of people whose job it is to figure out that kind of thing. If promising some more progressive policy was a clear winner, why wouldn’t they do it? The answer I generally see implied or stated is that the dem establishment doesn’t want that policy, but that isn’t really an adequate explanation, because politicians are perfectly familiar with dishonesty. If supporting some progressive policy they didn’t like would win them power, they’d just promise it and then just not do that thing upon getting elected. It’s happened for state and congressional races before, so it’s not like that’s never been thought of.
I don’t think Harris’s loss is down to refusing to say the right words to inspire her base or anything like that, it’s down to the fact that, somehow, Trump is very good at inspiring his. She gave it a decent shot, but it’s very hard to win an election against a massive cult of personality. He, and the people that support him, are the problem here.
