• pjwestin@lemmy.world
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    4 days ago

    Watching David Brooks, of all people, develop more introspection and self-awareness than the entire Democratic party leadership has been a real trip.

    • WaxedWookie@lemmy.world
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      4 days ago

      I know nothing of his work, but my immediate assumption is that he’s just a contrarian asshole that has no actual principles.

      In media (as in politics), this kind of thing is almost always a product of cynical expediency rather than sincere introspection.

      • pjwestin@lemmy.world
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        3 days ago

        He’s an old-school Regan conservative who writes a column for the New York Times. He also does a weekly PBS news segment; it used to be with this even older liberal named David Brooks (Mark Shields, what a dumb typo), but he retired, and now it’s with a young liberal who’s so moderate they barely even disagree.

        Funny enough, I actually don’t think he’s being contrarian. He was on PBS Newshour for their election night coverage, and he seemed shook. The next day, he commented on Twitter something to the effect of, “maybe the answer is that the Democrats need to pick someone that makes people like me unconformable.” I think he’s watched his economic outlook completely win American politics over the last 40 years, only to find the prize at the end was fascism.

        • WaxedWookie@lemmy.world
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          3 days ago

          Thank you - that’s interesting - particularly the quote about making him uncomfortable.

          I’m surprised that the shifting Overton window, which has left the Democrats far closer to Reagan than MAGA, (who are busy speed-running fascism) hasn’t swept up more Reaganites, but that boils down to naivete on my part, I think.

          Whatever the case, I certainly agree that the Dems need to move from institutional neolib/neocon positions to populist left positions, but that’s the last place the party wants to go - even when failure to do so represents an existential threat to the party.

    • orcrist@lemm.ee
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      3 days ago

      Don’t assume that he actually developed any self-awareness. I’m sure he takes no responsibility for the horrible columns he’s written over the past few decades. To him, the facts on the ground changed, and certainly he never got anything wrong.

      • pjwestin@lemmy.world
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        3 days ago

        Well, I doubt he blames himself for anything that’s occurred, and I certainly don’t think he’s going to become a socialist or anything like that. He does seem aware that 40 years of free market capitalism without any pushback from a real progressive party on behalf of the working class has created the conditions necessary for Trump, and that’s more self-awareness than I’ve seen from Nancy Pelosi. That being said, I’m sure this newfound progressive streak will boil down to, “let’s raise the federal minimum wage so we can get back to capitalism as usual.”

    • SailorMoss@sh.itjust.works
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      3 days ago

      David Brooks (Now): No, not Volcano, not ever.

      David Brooks (2028 probably): I get why you guys wanted to throw me into the volcano. My Bad.

  • mlg@lemmy.world
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    3 days ago

    New York Times

    The same newspaper that said Clinton had a 91% chance of winning in 2016.

    Even if this guy individually changed his mind, it doesn’t change the fact NYT is a mouthpiece of the DNC and has every notoriously reported false information multiple times even up to this year over Gaza which they refused to pull from publication or change.

  • BlanketsWithSmallpox@lemmy.world
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    3 days ago

    So, how do we get people who fear socialism to vote for a socialist that inspires blue voters to vote or steals enough working class votes to get elected enough rather than slowly spiral into fascism?

    1. Keep fascism in check for the next two years and hopefully win mid terms so we get the House and Senate again.
    2. Starting prepping a 50 year old straight white man for presidency.
    3. Somehow convince people that the firehouse of falsehoods isn’t worth their time.
    4. Keep it up another two years after to get the presidency back.
    5. Kill the filibuster.
    6. Stack the supreme Court after all the Republican extremist ones die.
    7. Fund public education in a way that isn’t based on local property values.
    8. Bring back the fairness doctrine.
    9. Stave off NatCs for another 20 years and hopefully profit?
    • SkyezOpen@lemmy.world
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      3 days ago

      I think dems underestimated the feelings of the working class. I’ve mentioned offhand to a few people who voted for Trump that Bernie probably could’ve won and they actually agreed.

      • DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social
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        3 days ago

        Climate collapse is coming, the window to stop the worst case scenario was just lost. Forget fighting fascism, the liberals will just go full mask off when the resource wars start in earnest.

  • seaQueue@lemmy.world
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    4 days ago

    I like how he completely misses the point even now. We don’t need to end liberalism but we absolutely do need to tax and regulate.

    • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
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      4 days ago

      We don’t need to end liberalism but we absolutely do need to tax and regulate.

      Definitely need both. Neoliberalism is a center right to right wing ideology that inherently favors moneyed interests and the status quo over workers and progress.

      Having it as the leftmost ideology of only two political parties with real influence is lunacy.

    • Deceptichum@quokk.au
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      4 days ago

      Taxes and regulations are bandaid solution to capitalism.

      As we’ve all seen, those with wealth use it to hide it away from taxes and to bribe for relaxed regulations or regulations to stop competitors appearing.

      Liberalism and any other capitalist model need to go.

      • Billiam@lemmy.world
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        4 days ago

        Look, I’m not going to defend capitalism, but

        As we’ve all seen, those with wealth use it to hide it away from taxes and to bribe for relaxed regulations or regulations to stop competitors appearing.

        Is not a problem inherent to capitalism. All of that stems from human greed, which you’re going to have no matter what economic system you try to implement. The solution is to have actual enforcement of your regulatory guardrails.

        • seaQueue@lemmy.world
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          3 days ago

          We need to start encouraging policies like reward bounties for exposing corruption. Know someone who’s breaking the law to defraud the government? Expose them and get 5% of the money recovered after a successful conviction.

      • seaQueue@lemmy.world
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        4 days ago

        I don’t see capitalism ending in the US during our lifetimes so I’ll take any improvement I can get

    • inv3r510n@lemmy.world
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      3 days ago

      No. Miss me with this lib shit. Liberalism has GOT TO GO. Liberalism is just the lapdog of fascism and always has been.