Nevoic @ Nevoic @lemm.ee

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2 yr. ago

Reducing net profit doesn't have any impact on pricing in capitalist markets. It's not like capitalists have some specific profit percentage they are allowed to hit (unless they're in a very regulated industry like grid or water supply). They want infinite returns, and they'll increase prices as much as the market allows to generate more profits.

Capitalists don't look at a net profit of 4.4% and say "yup that's enough", but if it were 2.8% they'd say "damn guess we have to increase prices for customers, I really wish we didn't have to do this".

They might increase prices as a retaliatory measure. The same way businesses slashed hours as a result of Obamacare. They didn't have to, but it benefited them to, and they didn't see a downside.

They might be able to increase prices, blame it on this law, and have people who are aligned politically with them put up with it and maybe even support their business more to "stick it to the libs". They already do this with things like inflation, blaming it on Biden and then increasing prices far more than necessary.

Democrats won't respond to a bunch of uncommitted voters beyond just lip service. The genocide will continue, fiscal conservative austerity politics will continue. The best we'll get is a return to the world of 2015. That's the absolute best case with another Biden term, and even that is unlikely.

I know the genocide isn't a big deal for you or other moderate libs, and you're more concerned with getting America back to its status quo than doing anything that might actually help Palestinians in the future.

The Democratic party caters to mainstream voters

The Democratic party caters to power. They want to stay in power. If enough people vote green who previously voted Democrat, they know there's something that moved them that way, and they'll know that some of those voters can be recaptured. You have an incredibly naive and rosey view of bourgoise democracy.

It's not easier to pull a Trump cultist who has been voting Republican for 40 years, over a person who voted Democrat in 2020 and Green in 2024. It's quite easy to reason out, and even if you don't understand this simple fact, Democrats in 2028 will at least, because it's essentially their full time job to maintain power.

we have to take Trump at his word

No we don't, I've never done this and I'm not going to start now. He's already tried and failed to seize power as a sitting president. He's proven he's too incompetent to become a fascist dictator.

I won't go as far to say as it's literally impossible, but the fact that so many liberals now believe in Trump's ability to overthrow the government just as much as his own supporters is baffling. He's not a reliable source of information. He's not intelligent, and he's not capable. He's an old, pathetic moron that is on the verge of dying due to age, not some capable fascist mastermind.

Exactly like you said, it's not about an idealist movement towards progressivism, that's exactly why the feedback loop isn't an issue. When certain material goals are met, progressives are satisfied. It's not an endless pit of progressive ideals, it's about actual changes we want to see in Democrat policy. Once those changes are made, we vote Democrat to reinforce good behavior.

If the Democrats have any self-interest in holding power, they'll actually try strategies to regain power. If they lose in 2024 by a percentage that is covered by the green party, they could conclude it's easier to go left and get Green members rather than pull people from the Trump cult. I'd agree with these future Democrats, I think you'd have very, very little success pulling people from the Trump cult.

Especially if the people who voted green in 2024 have previously voted Democrat, it showcases that these people are willing to go Democrat if certain material concessions are made.

The feedback loop spoiler idea only works if there are literally no material goals, only an idealist goal to move towards progressivism. This isn't how reality works.

Not supporting genocide is a large material goal, and the Israel/Palestine conflict wasn't at the worst it's ever been in 2020, but it is in 2024. The material goals changed. In 2020 the biggest issue I was aware of was stopping fascism in America. Now that doesn't even come close to stopping the ramped up genocide, that happened as a direct result of the endorsement of Israel by the Biden administration.

I would vote for a Democratic candidate that wants to end the genocide. Sure, they can still be a corporate boot-licking liberal. Biden was in 2020 and I still voted for him because the material outcome I wanted was satisfied.

It is not satisfied in 2024. The Palestinian genocide is far more important now, as it's happening literally faster than any time in history. You claim that leftists have some idealist goal to just move Democrats to the left, so a refusal to engage with these leftists is the only option Democrats have, but this ignores a massive difference between socialists and fascists, socialists are materialists and fascists are idealists.

It's a disingenuous portrayal of how leftists actually think. I suspect you're conflating socialist thought with fascist thought either because you're a liberal or because you're unfamiliar with socialist theory. Either way, it's worth getting more educated, the extreme left does not function the same way the extreme right does, and you seem to think it does.

To continue on this, the spoiler effect is a shorterm strategic problem, not necessarily a long term one.

There absolutely is a strategic difference between

• 52% Republican
• 48% Democrat

and

• 47% Republican
• 43% Democrat
• 10% Green

The former tells Democrats their only option is to move right to resecure some Republican voters. The latter tells Democrats that they have the ability to also resecure votes from the left by making concessions that to Green Party politics.

People who say these two situations are literally identical are being disingenuous or ignorant. Even if the same number of Democrats/Republicans voted in both, and the only difference is people who didn't vote instead voted green, this results in actual differences in signals and potential future policies.

tldr: voting third party is not identical to not voting, even strategically.

The difference between someone who doesn't vote and someone who voted Democrat in 2020 and Green in 2024 is you know two facts about the latter person that you don't know about the former:

• they are willing to vote Democrat in some circumstances
• they prefer far left policies

You can play dumb all you want and pretend these facts aren't true, but that doesn't change the reality of the situation, no matter how many words you write to overcomplicate the issue.

If people who voted Democrat in 2020 decide to vote for a candidate that is further left than the current fiscal conservative, pro-genocide Democrat, they will conclude that they have to become more progressive to win back the votes of the people who have literally demonstrated that they're willing to vote Democrat.

It's absolutely easier to get a person who voted Democrat to vote Democrat again than to get someone from the Trump cult who has been voting Republican for 40 years to defect.

the additional message that the Democratic party hears is, we will never be able to win these people's votes

The message Democrats hear from someone who voted Democrat in 2020 and Green in 2024 is that that person will never vote Democrat?

Your position is becoming incoherent and exhausting. Stop arguing in bad faith. Your entire fucking comment is just endless shit like this, so I'm going to take it even slower and walk you through all this shit. Address the above paragraph, then we'll move on to the next point, and hopefully after we're through 3 or 4 of your nonsense points you'll reconsider your position without me handholding you through it.

If you want to help me, just say "yes I understand I was wrong on that point", then I can easily jump into the next point without addressing some new incoherent shit you throw at me.

Exit polling does not signal the same thing, again you're just repeating your incredibly naive point. As you admit, money is in politics, and you hand wave away that fact even though it's a massive point.

With corporate interests in play, constituent preferences have had literally 0 impact on policy in Gaza. I'm not questioning the ability to gather the data, but you're conflating the ability to gather data with the want to listen to preferences. Again, naive. This isn't how the world works. Democrats don't just listen to their constituents, they actually rarely do.

I'm going to keep this comment short because you keep hand waving or ignoring 80% of my point with non sequiturs, so I'm going to take this way slower so you can hopefully keep up.

exit polling data can break down ideological differences

You have an extremely naive view of the world, thinking that exit polling signals the same thing that voting far left does. Constituents aren't the only interest group politicians listen to, we actually have hard data that for the purposes of at least law making they entirely ignore us, and we have very little influence even beyond that.

The miniscule amount of influence we do have is the ability to remove one party from power. Exit polls come absolutely no where near this in terms of influence. When other interest groups want to continue the Palestinian genocide, and you have exit polls signaling that Democrats are against this (as exit polls have suggested for the last 50 years) then Democrats happily ignore this, as they have been.

We're in a unique situation where the genocide is ramping up, and for some reason the American left has latched onto this issue (rightfully so, but still surprising). If we actually funnel this clearly into a signal that we will essentially sacrifice our wellbeing (e.g put Trump in power) just to draw the line that genocide support is unacceptable, we might actually see an anti-genocide Democrat for once.

Exit polls are entirely different. They're fine in a world where there is no institutionalized interest in perpetuating some harm, and the Democratic party is split on some issue, they can look to constituent preferences. But as Joe Biden said best, if Israel did not exist in the middle east, the U.S would have to invent an Israel to protect American interests abroad. Preferences will be ignored without consequences for those in power, and if you think otherwise, again, you're being naive.

I've responded to this exact sentiment in at least 4 comments and it's getting exhausting. Either find my response to this or don't engage, I don't really give a fuck. It can't possibly be my responsibility to educate every genocide-agnostic moderate-lib on the material reality of elections.

there were nothing but solid replies to your comments

A comment I received with 9 upvotes: "You may actually have brain damage".

Most of the other comments were honestly less coherent than this, but this is concise enough and not even relevant to the conversation, so I am really excited to hear how this is a "solid reply" in your book.

I don't believe Trump's campaign promises are unwavering truisms that come to fruition 100% of the time. I'm glad you have so much faith in the promises he makes though, so much so that you'd literally call them a certainty and disregard any other possible reality just simply on the basis that Trump said it.

I've met a good number of Trump supporters that don't even have this kind of faith, only his most devout followers take his promises as premonitions of the future.

The information gained would be we're refusing to vote for genocide supporters. Some people, like yourself will vote for someone in support of genocide as long as they're on the ticket as a Democrat.

If everyone behaves that way, the democratic party doesn't have to change. They can keep pushing moderate fiscal conservatives like Biden, over and over again, and Democrats will permanently retain power.

If they lose the general election by less than the third party vote, they know there are voters to the left that are voting that they could focus on capturing instead of catering to cultish fascists. Your entire original point was predicated on the idea that the Democrats would have to move right, but in a world where:

• Republican: 46%
• Democrat: 45%
• Green: 8%
• Other: 1%

There's a very clear strategy for future Democrats to move left to win the election. It's either purposeful ignorance or genuine stupidity to say the above is EXACTLY THE SAME as:

• Republican: 55%
• Democrat: 45%

This is why the idea of a "spoiler vote" is insanely dumb, especially when you're advocating for voting for an actual genocide supporter.

He already tried to seize the capital through force. He has failed, he was the president for 4 fucking years and couldn't figure out how to dismantle the government. He's incredibly incompetent, I don't know why every liberal in the world is clutching their pearls like he's some kind of mastermind who grew and learned how to overthrow the country.

I didn't say withhold your vote, go vote for Jill Stein.

It's sad that you have to resort to a strawman to make a coherent argument against me. This is the only response to me that's coherent, I just wish it was a coherent point against an actual position of mine, instead of a made-up position you fabricated.

If 8% of the vote goes to someone who has been openly anti-Israel and pro-Palestine, while crowds are chanting against genocide Joe, it'll send a pretty clear signal to Democrats what they need to do.

Hoping you'll apologize for the unnecessary strawman honestly, it's needlessly exhausting to have to deal with all the inane shit everyone is throwing my way, only to then have to deal with a coherent comment put together against a point I didn't even make.

You're speaking in certainties when you cannot. The genocide has been perpetuated, on and off, for 75 years. This is the most killing we've seen in the region in a short span of time, but we have seen figures close to this in the past 75 years.

Of course there's a world where Trump is elected, and successfully aids Israel in the extermination of the Palestinians. But you have to admit that that world isn't a certainty, even if Trump is elected.

There's also a world where Biden is reelected, his campaign keeps greenlighting the genocide with periodic rhetorical criticism, and then some other fascist Republican or moderate fiscal conservative Democrat comes in in 2028 and finishes the job (the Democrats now emboldened to further ignore the genocide because it costs them nothing).

It's easier online to speak in certainty about the future, I understand that, but please if you're going to bother engaging please don't do it in bad-faith and actually admit where your knowledge ends. You're not clairvoyant.

If 2024 was the last election ever, then your logic makes complete sense, and I get to liberals every election is the last election ever, despite us seeing Trump's desperate and flawed attempts at seizing power. He didn't get more intelligent in the last 4 years or learn from his mistakes.

Imagine a crazy, crazy world, where Trump wins in 2024 and there's a 2028 election. I know this is hard for some moderate libs to fathom, but you should recognize it as a real possibility.

If it's incredibly clear that Biden lost because he's Genocide Joe, then the next Democratic candidate might be someone younger who is ready to end the genocide (which the U.S is perfectly capable of single-handedly doing).

I've met people online that absolutely refuse to even acknowledge this is a possible world. They think Genocide Joe is the absolute best, pro-Gaza leader the Democratic party could ever put forth, and that losing elections due to issues like supporting genocide could never change the rhetoric and actions of future candidates in the party.

It's fucking mind-numbing how little thought people put into this. Like I'm happy to agree that in a world where Trump wins, the years 2024-2028 are going to be worse in about every conceivable way, but then as we get into 2028 and beyond, there are scenarios that play out better for leftists in that world (e.g we get an anti-genocide, socialist leftist instead of some moderate Republican who is a reincarnation of Biden except on some social issues). The fact that moderate libs REFUSE to acknowledge this possibility is fucking exhausting.

And I'm not saying that it's guaranteed to be better 2028 and beyond, it's absolutely not, nobody can make guarantees about the future, but there is undeniable potential value in having Biden lose this election when you look beyond the next 4 years.