Do you have friends who voted third-party in 2024? Folks who self-righteously eschew both the Left and Right, seeing Democrats and Republicans as two sides of the same coin? They might be self-described “Independents” who have difficulty stating which news sources they trust, putting FOX News and The New York Times into the same bucket of skepticism. Perhaps they’re calling for candidates with a more middle-of-the-road approach, or they don’t see anyone who perfectly embodies their values and have given up entirely on voting. Head, meet sand.
While I share some of this cynicism in my darker moments, the false equivalence of Dems and the GOP is intellectually lazy. There are core differences between the two parties—they aren’t “the same” because leaders on both sides of the aisle make money from insider trading.
A Democratic president, despite his faults, would never terrorize Minnesota with a $28.7 billion, poorly trained, racist paramilitary force. He would never consider seizing Greenland and alienating our allies. He would not punish red states by freezing $10 billion in federal funding for needy children. He would not accept a luxury jet from Qatar or brazenly make $1.4 billion during his first year in office. He would not take a secondhand Nobel Peace Prize to assuage his ego. He would not try to stage a coup with fake electors because he didn’t like the results of a presidential election. And he would never issue a presidential pardon to hundreds of violent felons who attacked Capitol police officers.
These are the acts of a deranged, power-hungry Emperor Palpatine. Broadly speaking, MAGA Republicans are the Empire—united, unthinking, unquestioning, obedient to male authority, and obsessed with power. They are deploying violent masked stormtroopers in cities, who are killing civilians and trying to ignite a backlash to justify further oppression and control.
In their better moments, Dems make up the scrappy Rebel Alliance, which struggles to unite such a diverse coalition of interests. I’m disappointed that they are not meeting this moment as a party. They’re disorganized, unpopular, and weak. Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries, in particular, have failed to produce more than “strongly worded letters” and one government shutdown, taking a short stand for healthcare subsidies. We have an all-brains, no-balls problem. (MAGA suffers from the opposite affliction.)
There are pockets of effective resistance and courageous messaging coming from individuals, such as AOC, Jasmine Crockett, Bernie Sanders, Ron Wyden, Mayor Frey of Minneapolis, and Mayor Mamdani of NYC. Folks like these with strong progressive values and backbones should be leading the party. Democrats’ current leadership is simply too comfortable, compromising, and feckless to embrace any ideas outside of its old centrist establishment.
The United States has not had a truly progressive president in my lifetime. Unfortunately, in the spirit of compromise, Democratic presidents governed right-of-center or moderate at best. Bill Clinton got “tough on crime” and helped fuel our current mass incarceration crisis. Barack Obama passed a half-cooked universal healthcare bill and continued extrajudicial drone strikes. Joe Biden…what did he do again? At least these presidents didn’t embarrass Americans and upheld the dignity of the office. (Even Clinton’s sex scandals seem quaint when compared to Trump, Jeffrey Epstein’s former bestie, who has been convicted of sexual assault and is accused of raping a 13-year-old.)
Overall, Republicans are a minority party that plays the game better than Dems. They stick together and tolerate being led by a grotesque, convicted felon because he’s helped them consolidate power and punish their political enemies.
One conservative insider estimates that up to 40 percent of young GOP staffers in DC are “groypers”—chronically online white supremacists who despise women. A leaked Telegram chat from these Gen Z Republicans contained messages such as “I love Hitler” and referred to Black folks as “watermelon people.” Tell me who you hang out with, and I’ll tell you who you are.
Racism and misogyny have proven to be potent political forces during times of economic uncertainty. The problem is that this MAGA ideology eventually throws most groups under the bus. It is inherently unstable because you can’t win elections without women and people of color. To remain in power, MAGA needs to change the rules of the game (e.g., gerrymandering, postponing or canceling elections, disenfranchising women, etc). Alternatively, it can pivot hard back to the economic populist issues that made it attractive in the first place.
Underlying MAGA’s appeal is ignorance, fear, and poverty. Blaming immigrants, non-whites, and women is an old tactic to deflect blame from the actual cause of misery in the United States: a widening wealth gap and a lack of social mobility.
But no matter how many ways progressives and democratic socialists convey this, it does not seem to break through with most Americans. Tribalism and calls to white or masculine identity are more magnetic than economic arguments. Also, a quote often (mis)attributed to John Steinbeck gets to the crux of the issue: “Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat, but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.”
Right now, these “temporarily embarrassed millionaires” don’t understand how progressive policies will help the working and middle classes. This is a failure of Democratic messaging and needs to be remedied.
Most importantly, when the pendulum of power inevitably swings back our way, progressives should govern with audacity and without compromise—the same way MAGA Republicans have. The key difference, of course, is that our positions actually reflect what a majority of Americans support. Most people want Medicare for All, regulations on big business, a higher minimum wage, higher taxes for the wealthy, strong unions, access to abortion, investment in infrastructure, and a stronger social safety net (i.e., welfare).
Taking a clear, progressive stand on all of these matters will go a long way. We also must promise to prosecute every masked ICE vigilante who has assaulted our civilians in ICE detention centers, on the streets of Minneapolis, and everywhere. Make accountability matter again. And to sweeten the deal for young, disaffected non-voters, Dems shouldn’t be afraid to call out Israel’s Netanyahu and Iran’s Khamenei for genocide.
Above all, progressives—whether they run as Dems or not—must craft a platform that’s uplifting and aspirational. Reflexively blaming white men for everything may be satisfying in the short term, but alienating specific groups based on blanket assumptions is exactly what we’re fighting against.
I agree with you but until the American people actually do something and push their elected officials to do their job nothing is going to change and only get worse. I am so tired of hearing there is nothing I can do and Washington doesn’t affect my everyday life. We need to actually vote for people who will do something and aren’t looking to be a career politician! We need people other than lawyers and wealthy elite to run. We need to change what it takes to get elected instead of raising billions to run stupid adds how about using billions to affect change! Go around the system! Instead of ads I used x dollars and partnered with this organization to do x and I raised y dollars and worked with these mayors to do y… I want change!!! Less poor me and more action!
Well said, Rane!
Well said. One of my chief regrets of my time in small-time politics is that I fear I worked too hard to be collegial. I did get stuff done, but maybe I could have gotten more done if I would have been more of a pain in the ass.
It’s hard for me to imagine you being a pain in the ass! Political compromise is usually good, but since MAGA takes pleasure in abusing blue states, I say we become more militant when it comes to Medicare for All, tax increases for the wealthy, and other progressive policies.