archomrade [he/him] @ archomrade @midwest.social

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2 yr. ago

I do consider that “game theory” voting (a) results in a definite single rational course of action for this election for anyone who favors democracy or left-leaning policies. But I also, it (b) is not be the endgame and just a mitigation until we prioritize ranked choice voting and other structural reform.

This is fine if there was any indication that the underlying problem of fascism in the US is going to be addressed by the incoming administration, or if you believe it is addressed by voting against it. The problem is that many of us don't believe either to be the case, especially when the current campaign strategy has been to grant concessions to those nationalist solutions while turning away from socialist ones.

When neither of the most likely outcomes address the continued growth of fascism inside the US, the 'game theory' of electoral politics suddenly seems like a naieve indulgence more than any kind of solution, even a temporary one.

I think the miscommunication is that you're looking for a game-theory explanation for the best way to vote given a desired outcome, and TDD (forgive the shorthand) is doing a higher-level analysis on large-scale electoral trends and demographics that explain a shortcoming in the democratic campaign strategy. Even working within the 2-party electoral system, democrats have been leaving a lot of voters on the table, and the only outreach they've been doing for those voters (who are getting more and more frustrated) has been to scare them/shame them into falling in line and swallowing their scruples.

The reason why it's dumb to paint Greens or other third-parties as 'spoilers' is because of this implicit assumption that those votes will trickle-down into one of the two major parties if they weren't there. TDD is pointing out that Greens (and RFK before he stepped out, and PSL, ect) are filling political voids that the democrats and republicans have left open by not addressing the concerns of those voters. Assuming those voters would simply make a different choice ignores the fact that there was something about whatever third-party candidate that was motivating them that isn't present in the 2-party candidate. That voter is about as likely to decide not to vote at all as they are to decide to give up their scruples and vote for the party that they were actively avoiding in the first place, especially when that candidate has refused to give those voters/those interests representation.

All of this analysis is on top of a foundational understanding/materialist lens that suggests that the US is heading toward economic/capitalistic collapse independent of whatever electoral showmanship is happening every 4 years. This game-theory bullshit is completely indifferent to the environment that is actively pushing voters away from the center and into more and more extreme populism.

Yup. This is what frustrates me here and especially the last year: everyone pretends as if Trump is the singular threat that - once defeated- we may move on to other more important things.

But Trump is a manifestation of a national disillusionment with electoral politics and a broader economic failure. We keep dismissing the progressive populism of the left, while the fascistic populism on the right grows to a fever pitch.

If tonight trump keels over from a stress induced aneurism, by tomorrow lunch an opportunistic upstart will take his place because conservatives are frothing at the mouth for retribution. If Republicans return to classical wasp conservatism now, they'll lose the next decade of elections because half their voting base simply isn't interested in stale fiscal policy anymore.

The longer democrats ignore the conditions creating that current of populism beyond the orbit of Big Orange, the shorter lived any victories they might squeeze out now will be. We'll see what happens Tuesday, but i think the odds are leaning away for Harris. We might have to confront that failure sooner than we think.

Yes.

My take? That a third of the american population has taken a liking to fascism.

Fascism isn't borne out of stupidity, it's borne out of greed and desperation. Sure, some of those people are probably as dumb as a bag of rocks (any slice of the american population is liable to have a few), but most are likely just your average-intelligence american who has taken their feelings of fear or envy and rationalized them into fascism.

People like Josef Mangele don't become famous because they're dumb - they become famous because they end up wielding their intelligence against humanity. If we were to assume that everyone with those beliefs is dumb, we'd misunderstand what motivates them and we'd waste our time trying to educate them out of bigotry.

Trump is actively attempting to court these dissatisfied voters. In September, he received the endorsement of Democrat Amer Ghalib, the Muslim mayor of Hamtramck, Michigan.m

Woah, you mean they can do that?!

Wild

This almost sounds like 'fascism is capitalism in decay', but strangely isn't.

edit: i'm confused, are people upset that they aren't being given permission to blame the voters they're abusing into voting against their conscious?

what I am saying is very similar to what leaders of the “Uncommitted” initiative have themselves said, by publicly refusing to “endorse Harris” but declaring that their movement “opposes a Donald Trump presidency, and urging supporters “to vote against him and avoid third-party candidates that can inadvertently boost his changes.”

What a strange world we live in that we're acknowledging the legitimacy of voters' concern over genocide, but pleading with them to privately support a candidate anyway

I hope that, given this acknowledgment, we don't still end up blaming those voters for a loss or interpreting a win as a popular mandate since we're now at a point where public opposition cannot be assumed to be aligned with how one votes.

If Harris loses, it will now be in spite of undecided voters being made to swallow their moral principles - and if she wins, it will be in spite of her support of Israel's genocide.

The critique of the trolly problem isn't that you don't still make the choice, it's that the outcome was predetermined before you even got there.

Leftists who are making a point of abstaining are doing so to point out that voters have no control over the trolly to begin with - that the choice is artificial because the outcomes were pre-selected by someone/something else to ensure a particular outcome, and that participating in that choice only ends up legitimizing that process.

Of course she is.

That's the point though, those clips just make it seem like we're exaggerating all of his behavior.

We don't experience the same media onslaught as they do. We might hear their perspective from talking to them, but we don't understand the extent of the warped reality they experience, and we don't understand how the same news events get communicated to them very differently.

Just looking through the reporting shared here, you get the distinct feeling that Trump is on the decline and he's in big trouble. But any other media environment paints an extremely different picture - and any alarm or skepticism raised here in the comments is not very well received. The polls that show trump extending leads in swing states are suddenly not at all unbelievable once you anonymize your internet browsing and see what's being presented to the median american.

I'm just commenting on what I see. The vibe here feels very similar to 2016, and I'm bracing myself for the media collapse that happens the day after.

People might not have been enthused about Biden in 2020, but there was at least some hope for him after the extremely progressive primary campaign.

There's none of that hope or excitement for this year - there was no primary to push Harris to run on progressive issues. If there's any election that bears a resemblance to this year, it's 2016, not 2020

Calling them weird is effective because it makes them seem weak and gross to people who are compelled by him appearing dominant. Accusing him of sexual assault (while gross to everyone else) reinforces that image of male dominance that his base fuckin' loves.

Those two messages are working against each other.

The more you amplify ordinary behavior as somehow exceptional, the less people will actually listen to the exceptional behavior.

There's an endless stream of videos hyper-analyzing footage of Harris or Biden doing ordinary things, making them seem like egregious examples of derangement or ill-health. It's what the conservative base is exceedingly good at.

It's far more effective to make fun of them as obsessive weirdos than engage in the same petty psychoanalytic rhetoric as they do. The latter isn't going to move any voters and is only going to excite the weirdos on the other side.

Setting aside the seriousness of SA and the repeated examples of Trump committing it -

are we working off of the 2016 playbook or something? Between this and the rumored SA video, i'm getting strong 'grab her by the pussy' vibes. That didn't move any voters back then, why do we expect it to now? Hell, Tucker Carlson was just giving a speech where trump was "daddy", and he's "coming home to spank his children". They're aroused by trump manhandling women and children.....

All these stories do is get his core base excited; anyone who's disgusted by Trump's misogyny is already not voting for him.

Go back to calling him weird, that was so much more effective.

Of course not, but people don't think of tired sleepy old men as dangerous fascists.

The optics are mutually exclusive, even if the qualities themselves aren't.

What else is a debate?

well certainly not where you 'disallow' someone of their view, whatever the fuck that even means.

Lmao are you trying to debate me about whether you were debating people?

wtf does 'disallow them their view' even mean lol? Do you have that power? Woah that's crazy

You asked "is capitalism the problem" and everyone unambiguously said "yes".

And even now, you're saying, "nobody answered the question because they haven't agreed with my assessment 😣"

lmao, get over yourself bud. Few here -if any- are on that 'capitalism would work if that was what we had' libertarian bent.