The Real Reason the Democrats are Attacking Jill Stein "is because they don't want voters to know that there can be a worker-centered party to the left of the Democrats"

xcancel.com /anthonyzenkus/status/1849994711311786190

Democrats aren't attacking Jill Stein because they think she is taking votes from Kamala Harris. No one I know who's voting Green would consider a vote for Harris at this point. They're attacking Jill Stein because they don't want voters to know that there can be a worker-centered party to the left of the Democrats that supports popular policies like Medicare for All, a $25 wage and federally guaranteed housing.
There are 80+ million eligible voters who don't vote at all because they don't see the point. Democrats are okay with this, in fact, they don't want any candidate to their left to appeal to those voters with popular policies.
The fact that the Green Party exists shows that the Democrats aren't pushing the most progressive policies. Jill Stein's candidacy shows that it's possible to support reproductive justice AND be against funding and arming a genocide. That we can end homelessness if we stopped funding endless wars around the globe.
Democrats don't want anyone to the left of them to exist because it's the only way they can convince Americans that Dem policies are "the best that we can do". To Dems, anything else is just "asking for a pony".
Don't fall for it. Despite Dem's desire to have you think otherwise, things don't have to be this way.
Another world is possible.

118 comments

- I implore you, if you at all believe in a free Palestine, you will take action to vote for Harris.
  Voting for a candidate who has vowed to continue a genocide will not, in fact, stop the genocide.
  You have to work with the tools we have.
  Bourgeois democracy will never willingly hand you the tools to dismantle itself. Nothing other than revolution will ever dismantle this system of genocide and working class oppression.
  
  I really don't understand how people keep forgetting that DONALDFUCKINGTRUP is the other option. He would literally nuke the area given the chance and has said as much.
- if you at all believe in a free Palestine, you will take action to vote for Harris
  How? Harris isn't even allowing Palestinian Americans to speak. She isn't even trying to appeal to them or acknowledge them.
  I was idealistic when I was young too
  Thanks for the compliment but my bad back calls bullshit on me being young.
  
  How?
  Because Trump is firmly aligned with Netanyahu and opposed to the existence of Palestine.
- It's absolutely incredible that people think this is an actual sound argument.
- Actually by not voting for Trump I am supporting Harris
- I'm voting for neither Republicans or Democrats so that means I'm voting for both
- It must be exhausting always rooting for the antihero.
  
  As opposed to, what?, rooting for accelerationism? Trying to actually make things incrementally better isn't good enough, so burn the whole fucking thing down (but of course in your fantasy you survive...)?
  Things were undeniably better under Biden than they were under Trump. Obama was better than Bush. we keep trying to improve shit, and y'all are insisting that breaking it all is better than continual improvement.
  
  It's exhausting having to explain commons sense to people.
- This is so naive I'm gonna have to assume you're a literal child.
  So actually the way voting works is if you vote for a candidate then they get your vote and if you vote for another candidate, then that candidate gets your vote and if you vote for a third candidate, then that candidate gets your vote and if you don't vote for any candidate then no candidate gets your vote.
  Oh boy politics sure are complicated, huh? The only way your idea of 'how voting works' would in any way approach rationality, would be if you assumed that the democrats were somehow owed our votes. That doesn't really make sense. The way it actually works is that a party - or a candidate - courts voters by appealing to their interests and presenting themselves as a reliable steward for advancing those interests. If a candidate or a party fails in this, then they lose. In other words: If you want people to vote for you, listen to what they want you to do and then do that. Kamala Harris' campaign is a great example of what happens when you don't do that.
  We don't count the amount of not-votes a candidate gets, only the votes. But if it makes you feel any better we can say I'm not voting for Trump 1 million times and I'll only be not voting for Harris 100.000 times. We can even say I'm not voting for him in swing states! Hope that clears your heart flutters just a little so you can cool your head and let go of those no-no words.
  Or Trump will eradicate Palestine.
  Okay sweetie, so there's actually a genocide going on right now. You probably don't follow the news, but palestinians are being put in concentration camps and mass graves. And Harris has said she will increase support! I don't even know how it can get worse over there, but she has promised she's gonna let it get worse.
  Do you know what a genocide is? Probably not, because if you did you wouldn't be running your mouth saying wacky stuff like your doing. The end point of genocide is extermination. The end result is Palestine being eradicated.
  I know this can all be terribly abstract, so I'll try to help you understand what is going on. Now sweetie this will be a bit scary and it does contain some no-no words and I'm sorry about that, but I do feel it's necessary to make you understand. Still I don't want to shock you or traumatize you, so I'm gonna put it behind ::: spoiler this little tag
  Booh! Scared you! Teehee. Sorry for the prank, but it's actually just a link to a discussion I had with a real meanie-poo :( But I thought it would be better to give you a two-stage launch so you can really prepare yourself for reading some super scary stuff. Don't want you to be too scared to go to sleep at bedtime, now do we?
  :::
  and when you feel comfortable and safe, then you can just click it and read it. Maybe have a juice brick next to you so you can have a sippy if you get scared.
  But from my perspective it's due to not using our voices
  Oh boy you sure are the first person to come with that analysis. You know liberal "democracies" are actually incredibly understudied, especially on the left. There's barely any text on the faults of electorialism, so I'm super glad to see your little theory you brewed up all on your own there. Proud of you buddy. If you wanna expand your horizons a bit, then here's a little bit of literature. Don't get scared by the fact there's no pictures! I know you can do it!
  The state and revolution
  Bourgeois And Proletarian Democracy
  Proletarian Dictatorship Vs Bourgeois “Democracy” (this one was even written by americans just like you! So it's not foreign or super scary even)
  What is to be done
  Now you can probably figure out since I linked you a few texts that I'm being a bit facetious. And you got me. Good on you again! Maybe you can use that big brain of yours and think yourself some humility, it would do you some good. Maybe assume that the bare-bones drivel (sorry buddy, but it's really not very good) you're serving us as some unique insight, isn't really novel or unknown to us. We all exist in this society, we all see the same takes on the frontpage of reddit, we just... You know, think a little about it. We're a little curious over here. A curious little group of people that likes to just look a teeny tiny bit deeper instead of just incorporating whatever the TV told us that morning. Maybe you should consider doing the same yourself.
  You have to compromise and move things slowly forwards.
  Aw buddy, did you discover incrementalism? I remember when I did too, it sounded real swell. Sadly it doesn't really work, we've been hearing that stuff since the 1970's. Really we heard it before that too. I'm sorry to be the one to tell you that, I know it sucks to learn you're not the brightest bulb in the room. Hopefully this can be a learning experience for you!
- Incredible I can just repost this comment more or less word for word you people truly are NPC's.
- Maybe you don't take issue with washing your hands in a trough of Palestinian blood; maybe you don't mind having your metadata in the list of collaborators that will be made-- but I take a whole lot of fucking issue with that. Death to you if you thought in your personal calculus that the genocide of Palestine as a state and as a sovereign people was a fair price for the security of your rights; but you chose wrong, peckerwood.
  Death to Amerika. Death to the collaborators.
- Agreed 100%. I reached voting age in 2008 and I was one of those "both sides suck" idealistic young voters who voted third party. I did again in 2012 and again in 2016 thinking "Hillary's already got this one, I can protest vote". Nope, we ended up with Trump. Ever since that I will only vote blue no matter who, at least as long as the Democrats are the only viable party with some sense of normalcy. Third parties are completely unviable in the US election system. We need ranked choice for a third party vote to not be a throwaway vote. Until that happens, we can't afford to pick "the best choice", we have to pick "the best choice that actually has a chance". Even if it's not really the best choice. Very happy to have gone out and voted early last week. We need the blue wave. Once the Republican party is thoroughly stomped into the ground and made completely unviable can we focus on a truly liberal third party, but honestly we probably have a better chance of slowly moving the Dems left than we do a third party taking over. It may not happen in my lifespan but I'd rather see progress than regression.
  
  Once the Republican party is thoroughly stomped into the ground and made completely unviable can we focus on a truly liberal third party
  The Democrats will never allow that to happen. Nancy Pelosi Says U.S. 'Needs a Strong Republican Party'
  but honestly we probably have a better chance of slowly moving the Dems left than we do a third party taking over
  Liberals said that shit in 2016 and again in 2020 and the Democrats have since only moved to the right. They've outflanked the GOP on the border and are actively supporting a genocide.
  
  Once the Republican party is thoroughly stomped into the ground
  Okay, so we agree. You should not vote Democrats if you don't like the Republican party, on account of them thinking a strong Republican party is necessary, them inviting Republicans to join their campaign, and promising a Republican in their cabinet.
  
  This what all you crackers look like to me at this point. How long is it going to take you crackers to cosign my people getting put back in trees, I wonder? I already have to hear you crackers making excuses for the carceral slavery system your Department of Corrections maintains. I've been hearing excuses for the concentration camps at the southern border for four fucking years now. How long? How long before I'm going to have to hear about you crackers escorting unvarnished and blatant Jim Crow back into the halls of our legislature?
  You tell me that, peckerwood. 'Cause best believe: if you'd do this to Palestinians? We already know we're on that list, probably right after the gays, anybody that looks Chinese('cause Amerikans can't tell Asia's manifold cultures apart) and the Mexicans.
  
  Oh boy Here I go having to repeat the same points once again like seriously I could set my watch to you guys
  Why don't you just go talk to the 50% of people who don't vote instead of being mad at third party voters (who you yourselves always say are so few, they don't matter
  
  LLM bot?
This is an interesting perspective that I haven't thought of or considered.
- Really now
Fearmongering is the imaginary fence which keeps all Democrats locked where they are.
Once the dam breaks and the Green party has a winning chance voters will flock to Greens in droves.
They are definitely trying to censor Jill to keep the Greens from reaching the critical mass needed to have a chance at winning.
A socialist party would be nice in u.s politics.
- There's a few running, that the democrats tried and failed to kick off the ballot in many states. Party for Socialism and Liberation is one.
  The US greens are also an eco-socialist party. Ajamu Baraka is a great anti-imperialist / communist writer, and he was the green party's VP pick last time.
  
  I heard of greens, but as a party I hadn't actually seen them or any of the others covered much. Usually you just hear about Republicans and democrats. Might just be censorship and lack of exposure in the u.s.
- If they would actually do the work at the local level to get candidates elected in towns, counties, and states, then they might even be viable at a national level at some point. But if they won't put in the effort locally, then all they're doing is fucking over the rest of the country when they run nationally.
  
  Congrats you described the green party with nearly 200 elected officials across the US.
I feel like the real reason Democrats would be attacking her would be due to her happily accepting donations from Republican led sponsors, aiming to actively sway Democratic voters instead of specifically both, and the distance that she has from actual election given that she's not on the ballot in a number of states and is posing herself as the anti-war candidate despite saying that Russia invaded Ukraine because they needed to defend themselves from nukes. Odd how it's okay to be apologetic to Russia but not Israel. You must understand - as a third party they can claim to have a plan for world peace, but what members in Congress will sponsor those bills? Even if Jill Stein did become President, who is approving her policies?
All that aside -- she does very little in between election years. The Green Party as a whole has accomplished less of its supposed goals while having far more funding than the SRA. I would also expect that the leader of the Green Party practice what she preaches, as her and her husband have stock in just as many oil companies as the Democrats do. So quite honestly, it's hard to see her as anyone but a faux candidate who shows up to take money from Green Party voters, preventing actual change from happening with that money because it's going into a candidacy that will go nowhere.
If she cared, she would campaign for her donations to be given to something that would actually have meaningful effects, and she would push for more local candidates to run. The sad fact of the matter is that the Green Party has candidates who start out Green then move to a different party and are completely happy taking donations from Big Oil just like Kyrsten Sinema.
To call the Democrats a joke party when the tactics of the Green Party have been laughable is just one reason why they aren't taken seriously. Another would be this quote:
there are more open socialists in just the New York state legislature right now (8, all caucusing together, will be 9 next year) than have been elected total above the local level for the Green Party (5). even accounting for party switching, this expands to just 9 people in history.
We can also just look at the Public Office Holders for the Socialists and the Green Party.
In short -- The Green Party is the vote of choice because there is a Presidential candidate, but they offer nothing else through the four years. People are asking where the Democrats have been for them, what about the Green Party? Why are they all too happy to take money from you but do nothing in between for local activism? People are saying that the Democrats only provide lip service when they say things like supporting a two state solution, but lip service from the Green Party is totally fine? The Socialists or the DSA seem to at least aim for actionable goals, but is there no support for them because there's no Presidential candidate? We've also seen that they (Socialists) actually have a chance of being elected if they run on a democratic platform and push bills that we can be proud of, something that historically cannot be said for members of the Green Party.
I hope this provides some insight on why people, not just Democrats, don't feel like the Green Party is a worthwhile option.
- Good points. If anybody should be annoyed by the Greens campaigning only for the national election and going dormant the rest of the year it should be PSL.
They're attacking Jill Stein because she's running a campaign that will have absolutely no impact on the world except for enticing some number of would-be Harris voters to instead throw their votes away. If the Green Party were serious about change, they'd focus on races where they could actually win instead of actively causing harm to the party that is much more likely to actually do the things they say they want. Instead, they've basically outright stated that all they care about is hurting the Democrats. It's a terrible electoral system that needs to be fixed, but until it is, third parties are always going to present a false option that effectively does the opposite of what their voters actually want.
- Not only did the Democrats not deliver on the Green New Deal they promised, but they expanded the private prisons at the border https://www.aclu.org/news/immigrants-rights/unchecked-growth-private-prison-corporations-and-immigration-detention-three-years-into-the-biden-administration
  
  What does this have to do with anything? Yes, the Democratic Party is flawed. That doesn't change the fact that voting Green will make my political desires slightly less likely, and will make my political fears slightly more likely, compared to voting for a Democrat.
Bernie Sanders was that candidate. He supports the election of Harris because he recognizes that it is necessary.
- Bernie sanders was a compromise and a terrible one at that lol. Unlike blue MAGA we don't engage in cults of personality, but are actually capable of critiquing our political leaders. Bernie supports genocide and sucks shit, why would I care what he thinks?
  It's the same shit every time with you people
  
  Who's "we?"
- You don't have the moral high ground you think you have. You can't scare me with Russia when the US and many Western countries are guilty of enabling a genocide.
  Here's what the Financial Times wrote a year ago:
  “We have definitely lost the battle in the Global South,” said one senior G7 diplomat. “All the work we have done with the Global South [over Ukraine] has been lost . . . Forget about rules, forget about world order. They won’t ever listen to us again.”
  “What we said about Ukraine has to apply to Gaza. Otherwise we lose all our credibility,” the senior G7 diplomat added. “The Brazilians, the South Africans, the Indonesians: why should they ever believe what we say about human rights?”
  Just four weeks before the Hamas assault on Israel, leaders from the US, EU and western allies attended the G20 summit in New Delhi and asked developing nations to condemn Russia’s attacks on Ukrainian civilians in order to uphold respect for the UN charter and international law. Many of those officials told the Financial Times they have had the same argument read back at them in demands for condemnation of Israel’s retaliatory assault on Gaza, and of its decision to restrict water, electricity and gas supplies there.
  source: https://www.ft.com/content/e0b43918-7eaf-4a11-baaf-d6d7fb61a8a5
  archive: https://archive.is/TxkRb
- Am I reading the article right? My understanding of what I just read is that in 2016 some social media accounts with ties to Russia put out some pro-Stein statements and then a year or two later Stein was photographed sitting at the same table as Putin.
  Neither of those two facts suggest to me that she is, as you put it, "another Russian tool". Especially since the article itself says that there's no evidence she knew about the Russian social media accounts boosting her and there wasn't an interpreter sitting at the table with her and Putin.
  Can you please tell me what I've missed? Is there more evidence that she's a "Russian tool"? Because the evidence in the article you linked seems extremely weak.
- The only tool here is you bud.
- I like that you specifically posted a right wing source that liberals spent years demonizing during Trump's and Biden's terms. It's weird how right wing you people are just openly being.
- Everyone the establishment doesn’t like is a Russian troll these days. Coincidence, or propaganda?
Democrats aren’t attacking Jill Stein because they think she is taking votes from Kamala Harris.
This is an incredibly dumb take.
This election is about triage. If you want elections to not be triage, you need to fix the conditions that make it triage before the elections ever happen.
What triage means:
Lets say you see a massive car accident at an intersection that's known to be dangerous, and you have a medical kit in your car. (You have a medical kit in your car, right?) You have some basic trauma first aid experience. You have two tourniquets, two chest seals, a few packs of QuikClot z-fold gauze, and a combat bandage, along with EMS shears and a rescue hook. There are four people that have serious injuries. The first is conscious, has had both legs severed above the knees, and is blood is spurting from the severed limbs. The second is also conscious, and has a massive laceration on their left arm; a fractured bone is protruding from the laceration, and they are bleeding profusely. The third is not conscious; they have lost an arm and blood is spurting from the severed limb, have a penetrating chest wound, have a massive and profusely bleeding laceration on a leg, and significant head trauma. They are breathing in short, erratic breaths. The fourth person is conscious, and has a clearly broken lower leg with a laceration; they're holding on to the laceration, and blood is seeping out between their fingers.
What do you do? Who do you help, in what order?
The person with the severed legs gets the tourniquets; they will bleed to death in less than two minutes without them. The person with the compound fracture gets the z-fold gauze and the combat bandage; unless the brachial artery is severed, they don't need a tourniquet. You ignore the person with the head injury; you can't treat the head injury, and the erratic breathing is likely agonal breathing from the head trauma. Using a tourniquet on them means that you won't be able to use a tourniquet on the first person, which--in turn--means the first person dies from blood loss. Regardless of anything you do or don't do, the third person will likely die. The fourth person does not need immediate care; their blood loss is not significant enough to kill them before paramedics arrive.
Triage is recognizing that you can't help the third person--even though they will very likely die before paramedics arrive--and that the fourth person can wait until you've helped the first and second people.
The best you can do is help two people while a third dies. If you walk away, three people die. If you treat the person with the head wound, three people die. If you worry about the broken leg first, then three people die while you're trying to help the one person that didn't need emergency trauma care. Maybe you've been advocating for years to fix the intersection, while the city council has ignored you; that does nothing to address the immediate needs of the people in front of you.
This is where we are. There is no vote you can cast that is going to save everyone. No matter who you vote for, the genocide in Gaza isn't going to stop. Stein won't win, so she can't stop it. Trump will accelerate it. Harris appears to mostly take the side of Israel. But by focusing on that, you fail to act in a way that can prevent other harms.
Most people don't like how we've gotten to where we are now. But this is where we are, and railing against the system now doesn't do anything to help the people that need help.
- Meanwhile, you hand a couple more rounds to the sniper that caused the accident in the first place, who is actively and intentionally causing more accidents.
  
  Lets say you see a massive car accident at an intersection that’s known to be dangerous,
  The cause was already contained within the exercise.
  You can either do what you can to help people now--knowing that there's nothing you can say or do at this moment that will help the people of Gaza--or you can insist that you can help them and, in so doing, fail to save anyone at all. It's your choice.
  That is what triage is.
  I'm going to be okay either way. I'm white, male, middle-aged, cis-, het-, and can pass as Christian and conservative if necessary. I own a home outright, have no significant debts other than student loans, and have sufficient savings and investments that I can survive the next four years regardless of who wins the election. Your choice to fuck everyone else over in this election won't directly hurt me. It will hurt a lot of my friends, and I'm certain that at least a percentage of the LGBTQ+ people I know will die or be killed, I have no doubt that some of the undocumented people I know will be deported to countries they haven't lived in for 30+ years, and I'm sure that my non-white friends will see a sharp uptick in violence directed at them. Meanwhile, the people in Gaza will still be murdered by Israel, because Trump and Netanyahu are both fascists.
  You will accomplish nothing except causing more harm.
  Tell your non-white friends, your LGBTQ+ friends, you female friends, that you didn't care enough about their rights and their safety to help them. Say it to their faces. Tell them that it was more important for you to send a message than it was to prevent them from being harmed.
  Good luck. You'll need it. Hopefully we still get to vote in two years, and in four years.

118 comments