Noah Berlatsky

so it's an uphill fight...but I think there has been some movement.

will there be enough? for some definition of enough? I don't know.

so there's resistance to hearing that the electorate has maybe shifted left, or to accepting that finding some reliable moderate centristy sort to vacillate isn't necessarily going to work.

Hakeem Jeffries really doesn't like the left. a lot of Ds really like cops. etc. etc.

2nd, party leadership is in many cases moderate ideologically, not pragmatically.

Schumer isn't a zionist because he thinks it will win elections. he's a zionist because he is an enthusiastic and disgusting zionist.

I'd just add that the reason that party leadership is extremely reluctant to accept the pretty obvious point that moderation is not some sort of electoral cheat code is twofold:

1st, they desperately want an electoral cheat code.

Democrats Think Impeachment Is An Electoral Loser Unfortunately, winning every election is not a good antifascist strategy

and that Ds need to focus on wielding power rather than on winning elections or we are all dead. www.everythingishorrible.net/p/democrats-...

I've been saying a lot of this without the detail and authority they bring to it.

but yeah; it's clear enough even to those of us with limited statistical oomph that moderates have not been overperforming. www.everythingishorrible.net/p/if-moderat...

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TRANSCRIPT OF CARTOON This cartoon has four panels. They all show the same scene - the lobby of a weight-loss store - but a few months pass between each panel. In every panel, a fat redheaded woman, a customer, talks to a thin blonde woman, a saleswoman. PANEL 1 Through the display window, we can see a green, leafy tree. A couple of bags of money lie under the counter. The customer is wearing a floral sundress and cardigan, and is opening a purse full of cash as she talks to the saleswoman. CUSTOMER: I'd really like to lose weight. SALESWOMAN: We can help! It's only $200 to start! PANEL 2 The tree has now lost all its leaves, and the customer is returning, carrying a sack of cash and wearing winter clothing. There's more money under the counter. CUSTOMER: I lost a bit of weight, but I'd like to lose more. SALESWOMAN: You got it! For a modest monthly subscription. PANEL 3 It's now spring, and there are little pink flowers on the tree. The customer, in stretchy pants and a loose fitting long-sleeved top, returns with a grocery cart filled with bags of money. The saleswoman is cheery, but the customer is downcast. There are now so many moneybags under the counter that some are spilling out the side. CUSTOMER: Now I've gained all the weight back... And a little more. SALESWOMAN: You need our super subscription plan. It comes with an app! PANEL 4 The tree is full and green again. The customer is back, with the shopping cart piled so high with money that she's mostly hidden behind it. The room is filled with money bags, and the saleswoman is lounging on the pile of money, smiling happily. CUSTOMER: Does it worry you that your weight loss plans keep on failing? SALESWOMAN: Oh, yes, definitely. So very concerned!

Weight Loss Inc

By me and @postcardsbybecky.bsky.social

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“One young girl who kept coming up to me, a little girl who was hugging my leg, asking us to help get her out of there.” - Rep. Joaquin Castro

This part of our response essay is where I'm at. Boiling down all of politics to electoralism has been absolutely terrible for resisting rising authoritarianism.

www.bostonreview.net/forum/how-no...

They're the absolute worst kind of fucking idiot -- the kind that thinks they're smarter than everyone else because they discovered an internet forum.

No offence intended to people who participate in the wellness community, but it is full of some of the dumbest, most gullible and unjustifiably self-righteous motherfuckers on the planet.

Correction: offence intended.

yep.

he was right!

children are in many, many respects a marginalized group who are systematically targeted for discrimination and abuse.

no, it's not just rich people. it's not just this one group of horrible people.

there's a far right cult of disciplining children which is absolutely horrific and almost never discussed.

parents kick their queer kids out of the house all the time and we shrug. Black kids are tossed into the carceral system and we shrug.

parents can prevent kids getting vaccines, putting them at risk of death. this is considered fine and good and reasonable.

it's legal to spank your kids in every state. there are many states where it's legal for teachers to spank kids.

there's tons of research showing that spanking is really traumatic; lifelong trauma in line with abuse.

there didn't need to be much of a conspiracy with epstein because as a culture we mostly don't care about the safety of children. 1

Nicki Minaj is hardly the first talented musician to be a horrible person, but her rush to let everyone know in this way has certainly been dramatic.

Ds suck in a lot of ways. but one party is sending a federal gestapo into cities and trying to end elections and the other is not doing that.

if you can't tell the difference, I'm not sure what to say.

there are issues where the two parties have significant overlap, mostly in bad ways —on zionism, on policing.

even there though, the Ds are generally significantly to the left of R policy, and look like they can be pushd even further.

the thing is that this...just isn't true anymore. segregationists/white supremacists have been sorting into the gop and out of the D party for like 70 years.

and he was right; at that point, both parties were pro segregationist, which was the most important issue in american politics. 2

I was reading James Baldwin and he was arguing (in the 50s I believe) that both parties were the same, pointing to the fact that senator eastland was a D and barry goldwater was an R and both were grotesque segregationists. 1

No, stop it. You don't really believe Democrats would defect on impeachment if 25 GOP flipped, & the way you know this is that every Senate Democrat voted <twice> to convict Trump in impeachment trials the last time around. You can be unhappy with Dems on policy issue X & still know 👇 is nonsense.

the state legislature keeps messing with the rules because there's a D governor and they were terrified that mcconnell would die and they'd have a D representative.

questions about more nuanced and/or less strongly held beliefs produce data that 20% of Americans support bombing Agrabah.