Fascism is what happens when empires in decline can no longer extract from the periphery and turns its attention to the home front to make up for lost profits. Democrats have been party to Republicans in setting this up. Prop 50 ads in CA say "Trump's gone too far." That says it all.

How's marginalizing it been working out for keeping it in check so far? The way to beat the radical right is the way that Zohran Mamdani seems poised to beat it, by appealing to people's bottom lines, not gifting corporate welfare to residential builders.

Yeah. And the govt would need to cover the gap between 30% of income for lower income people out of the general fund but that would pay down the bonds, buying permanently affordable housing. Google AI says rates are 4.10% to 4.25.

SF’s Aaron Peskin pitches financing bill for “missing middle” housing Ordinance would allow the city government to issue tax-exempt bonds to finance workforce homebuilding.

Affordable housing can be financed with tax exempt mortgage revenue bonds that are not subject to such political controls as general obligation bonds. therealdeal.com/san-francisc...

S.F. upzoning would cut rents just $75 to $125 a month, city economist says Citywide zoning changes would have modest effects on housing construction and affordability, but big boost to GDP

Regale us with YIMBY tales of how rents and housing prices must increase in order to build housing that will, cough cough, lower housing prices? missionlocal.org/2025/10/sf-u...

One building is a drop in the bucket relative to the scale of the problem. Where were you in rustling up the funding for a full affordable build out of Potrero Yard, public land? AWOL.

WSJ opinion has been like this for decades.

They are not debating. YIMBY, Charlie Kirk and trans zealots all use the same techniques to avoid engaging on substance. YIMBY, for instance, are shock troops to deflect from real estate lobbyists busy changing the law with electeds they’ve purchased.

The Hegelian underpinnings of Marxism are its weakest points.

Real estate is showing its appreciation for you gifting it expanded access to some of California’s most lucrative real estate market. No matter how much you raise, you’ve shat the bed in your house and will probably lose.

This is what we, including people near death’s doorstep, did in ACTUP—march into harm’s way.

It is always a good sign when the US military is in turmoil.

As if market rate housing has a chance of scaling when financing shuts down during 3/4 of the business cycle when rents/prices are not rising. As if housing that costs more to build per square foot than is affordable by supermajorities will ever push prices down to affordability.

Scott Wiener is owned by big money--real estate.

a man in a suit is eating popcorn from a box ALT: a man in a suit is eating popcorn from a box

LOL. Tryna slither off to DC before the shit hits the fan on your upzonings and while your iron is still hot with your real estate funders, having gifted them significant envelope in the hottest markets in the state. This should be fun.

One Prop 50 TV spot says that the Trump has "gone too far," as if Democrats want to go in the same direction, but more kindly and prudently, so as to not trigger resistance.

They don’t really lose when the Republicans win. Their leadership remains in place, loss after loss. That doesn’t happen in parties in real democracies. Dems are not a party rather a cartel of interests with claims on federal revenues and deregulation.

These protests are efforts by the Dems to channel outrage they've fomented into a safe harbor where it threatens neither Democrat elites nor Trump. Were Democrats serious, they'd cobble together a version of the "Contract With America" to lay out their political plans to win the next election.

One would think that a socialist would use the dialectic method to consider the historical efforts of our side and of the other side and the process of how they reconciled into the reality we now must confront. But that would pose uncomfortable questions for those still getting paid to lead us here.

The problem with this piece is that it ignores considering the progressive political collapse in the lead up to Lurie that opened the door to oligarch and crypto swindler rule. Hint: SF's progs did the opposite of what Mamdani's doing in NYC, telling most all voters that they were too privileged.

¡Axolotl!

Why does your party funnel outrage into pointless protests, Trump can't be shamed, and come up with a contemporary equivalent of "Contract With America" to articulate an affirmative vision around which to rally. That approach is working for Zohran Mamdani: center class, and then identity also.

Zohran Mamdani, the Power Breaker Why the Democratic Party, the New York Times, and the donor class got Zohran Mamdani so wrong.

Another good one:

"For all the rewriting of political norms in this era, one maxim is still inviolate: You can’t fight something with nothing"

nymag.com/intelligence...

Mamdani is centering changing public policy to bend the arc to economically benefit the most working New Yorkers, not centering funding nonprofits to provide charity to the most vulnerable. This, and his gifts for communication, is why Mamdani is winning while SF progs are losing. Adapt or perish.

How about the Federal Reserve just conjure up fiat currency to keep seniors in a dignified retirement like the Federal Reserve does for Wall Street and the Pentagon?

Social Security needs to max out at $80K and be made exempt from federal, state and local income taxes.

Doesn't the order of operations require that majorities of working voters be assembled on economic issues like medicare for all before power can be raised to abolice iCE? ICE sucks, but ICE pales in comparison to the US' record in the global south, a record that passes unnoticed by so many.

Yes the max payment of ~$60K is a princely sum that should subsidize beneficiaries who are entitled to lower payments.

What's different about trans is that it is such a self declared and self referential thing that it becomes all about the trans person and the individual's needs. Trans operates like a movement of hosltile malignant narcissists. That is why trans are losing popular support--TQ treat others like shit.

People of color, lesbians and gays and females would all like our full civil and legal rights. We've been working for them long before gender theory was a thing. Yet we have reconciled ourselves to putting the long haul interests of the movement before ours.