Fair enough. My impression of Hillary was that she was a pro-buisiness war hawk, and in retrospect was the wrong pick given how the election turned out. I don't see how you're not dispirited though. Is it worse to run on Hillarycare and then accomplish nothing? Or to run on a platform of doing nothing and be truthful? I'm not sure, but either way nothing's getting done. Given that the house only passed like 40 laws last year I wonder if we could switch to the people voting on bills directly. Everything good that's happened in Florida is because they allow this.
I was stuck in traffic behind a Chevy Astro with a Florida plate when NPR announced that the Supreme Court had handed the presidency to George Bush. That was fucking dispiriting. I volunteered for the Kerry Campaign, which was so thick on the ground in Seattle that "undecided voters" got sick of us hounding them. Exit polls showed Kerry wiping the floor with Bush and the voting machines were garbage. Kerry rolled over within hours. That was fucking dispiriting. THE OCTOBER SURPRISE WAS FUCKING REAL AND NOBODY CARES. That's fucking dispiriting. Trump? Trump did exactly what everyone predicted he would do and the country largely went "what the fuck?" he was every bit as incompetent as everyone predicted, he was every bit as vainglorious and ineffective as everyone predicted, he tried to overthrow the fucking government of the United States and what he got was 300-something lost lawsuits and a bunch of poop-throwing idiots in Nancy Pelosi's office. "You go to war with the army you have, not the army you want" - Donald Rumsfeld Fuck yeah, let's switch up the parliamentary procedure. Let's switch up fuckin' whatever we can. Is it worse to run on Hillarycare and then accomplish nothing? In 2007 I lost my job. State law compelled insurers to offer plans at the same rates as they were available to corporations, but as then-insurance-commissioner future-governer Chris Gregoire told me personally over the phone, "all we can do is sue and it didn't work last time." So THERE WAS NO FUCKING INSURANCE AVAILABLE TO ME UNTIL OBAMACARE. Now? now we all gripe about how much it costs but that's a very different thing than it being simply un-fucking-available. Joe Biden, objectively speaking, is the most liberal president since Franklin Delano Roosevelt. And yet the Online Left is at "well he hasn't been able to control the Israelis just like every president since the fucking SS Exodus therefore I'm staying home." Backintheday? Back when we knew the election had been stolen and an illegal war was busy killing hundreds of thousands and fucking up two cultures for generations? When ISIS didn't exist but you knew it was around the corner because how couldn't it be? Duncan Black coined the term "WATB" ("whiney-ass titty baby") to describe the right-wing pundits and public figures who got absolutely everything they wanted and yet still complained about how unfair everything was. It's always been more satisfying on the tongue than "snowflake." Pick your pejorative. Either way, insisting on exactly the right conditions for your delicate ass to flower is for orchids, not politics.
I feel like I'm missing your point. I totally agree with everthring you've said - and for the record I do plan on voting downballot, and if I lived anywhere where my vote counted would have no trouble voting for Biden. To his credit, he has made solid picks for the agencies and in general they're running OK. And even if Jesus Christ Himself was elected he'd be blocked by Congress for anything important so while its easy to blame the Democrats for that its not really Biden's fault specifically. What he can do though, is rule a lot more via Executive Fiat, something Trump and the Republicans have already promised to do. For some reason he doesn't seem interested in this. He's also like, the most Democratic Party guy imaginable. So for anyone who is frustrated by them, he's just awful to think about. He is Very Explicitly not anti billionaire and is Very Explicitly for small tidy improvements to the status quo, which would be fine if the status quo wasn't so dreadful. Again, not that he could do anything more anyways what with congress but its just aesthetically bad. And what's happening in Gaza is absolutely not "failing to control" Israel but very actively supporting it. This is the most personally damning thing. He declared unconditional support, bypassed congress to get them bombs, used UN vetos to avoid allowing food water or medicine in to Gaza, and is pushing Hard for an aid (bombs) package even to the point on allowing a border policy stricter than trump's wildest dreams. This is fully 100% on him and another president could have managed it differently. And with your list of ways the democrats have failed, I agree? But I don't see why you think things are different now. I really do desperately want something to hope for but it doesn't seem like anything is possible.
My point is that you, among other liberals your age, have lofty goals for a system that has never once delivered the way you demand it must. Further, that rather than examine the failings of the system and the impediments to progress in order to better plot a path forward, the dreary majority of young liberals prefer to piss and moan about how "not good enough" is actually "worse." Kind of like how you insist that Biden should do more by "executive fiat" in one sentence while one sentence previously you observed that congress would block "Jesus Christ himself." Kind of like how you agree that Biden is the most liberal president since FDR but also "just awful to think about" because he's "the most Democratic Party guy imaginable." What are the alternatives? the "Give Ukraine to Putin" DSA? The Greens? If you hate the Democrats, and you hate the Republicans, what's left? Everything sucks, sure. What's your alternative? What's better? What gets the world closer to your goals? You're at "small tidy improvements to the status quo" about a guy who passed more social programs, funded more infrastructure and appointed more judges than anyone since the New Deal while insisting he's "Very Explicitly not anti billionaire" about a guy who's funding half his budget by giving the IRS teeth. Israel? Israel is a clusterfuck. Israel has always been a clusterfuck. Here's all you need to know about Israel: 1) Congress passed a law in 1976 allowing them to cut off all foreign aid to any nation seen to be developing weapons of mass destruction, specifically targeting Israel and South Africa. 2) Israel and South Africa tested a nuke in 1979. 3) The Carter administration covered it up so no one would have to pick a fight with Israel and South Africa. Okay, here's a little more about Israel: Israel would be much less of a clusterfuck if Benjamin Netanyahu hadn't used stochastic terrorism to assassinate Yitzak Rabin. The end effect of this, of course, was to make Netanyahu the longest-serving leader in Israeli history. His whole platform? Fuck Gaza. Here's a whole book, by the way, about the ways the US has failed to rein in Israel in no small part because they are, in the words of Bamford, "the most embedded foreign espionage power within the United States." The goal is to prevent a third world war in the Middle East, despite the best efforts of Russia and Iran. This goal is not enhanced by making Netanyahu more popular by giving him something to rail against. Every time Netanyahu has been in danger of getting ousted? he's railed against America and gotten right back into the catbird seat. I don't know much about Israel? I mean, from a "setting foreign policy" standpoint I don't know much about Israel. I'm maybe 30 books into Israel which is enough to know how much I don't know. However much I don't know? I know I know more than you, and I know it's a clusterfuck. Would I do things differently? Probably. But then I'm not in the position of knowing intimate details about Israel's nuclear arsenal, for example, or what heinous shit it's been wargaming in case we cut off its money. Did you know we had battle plans against the UK between the world wars? What sorts of contingency plans do you think we have around Israel? So if anything, my point is "it's complicated" and "it could be worse" and what I've found is that the most strident leftists I know have absolutely no patience for complexity or optimism. You don't "desperately want something to hope for" so desperately that you'll actually look. That's my point.
Ok, if I understand correctly, your point is that Biden is the best president we could have possibly hoped for. Which maybe is true, you know the system & history way better than me. I don't feel comfortable arguing that. I still don't agree with the conclusion that this is not incredibly sad, but I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on that. If it's just how things be that the US is a vassal state of Israel and always has been and will be, and that the only thing we can do for climate change is a trillion dollars in handouts to billionares, and that only losing Some rights in Some states is a huge policy win, and that the most that can possibly be done against the ever increasing financialization and gutting of our economy is 2% more lawsuits from the IRS. Idk, can't I at least be upset? Why do I have to like the guy that utterly embodies business as usual? "If you hate the Democrats, and you hate the Republicans, what's left?" Nothing! That's why living in this country feels so awful and bleak. I don't think things are getting better under Biden. They're getting worse slower, for sure, but I'm not even convinced we're on an upswing. And you're right, I don't have any alternatives, and progress seems complicated, so much as to be impossible. "You don't "desperately want something to hope for" so desperately that you'll actually look." This is fair. I'll have to reflect on it more. It'd probably be good for my sanity to take the little wins when they come.
Here's another angle. It's not that I'm optimistic? It's that I've been so disillusioned for so long that the little things that feel so unsatisfactory for everyone who could have voted for the first time in 2016 but didn't are fucking monumental to me. Yeah. Biden used the word "anti-trust" in a State of the Union. Big whoop. It's not like he suddenly said "medicare for all." but no president has said "anti trust" in a SotU IN MY LIFETIME and I'm damn near fifty fucking years old! I'll level with you. I've been screaming about how the Republicans have been coming for Roe V. Wade since nineteen fucking eighty eight. They said they'd have vengeance for Bork and fuckin' A, that's one thing they've been clear-eyed about. So last year when everyone suddenly woke up and said "ZOMFG they took Roe!" my natural reaction is "fucking of course they did, you simps, it's been the one thing they've been un-fucking-wavering on since before you were born, where the fuck were you when we could have goddamn done something about it?" Look. I'ma show you a picture. No, first, I'ma set the scene. 1983? Reagan calls the USSR "the evil empire." 6 months later? we start some shit.. The next august? "We begin bombing in 5 minutes.". Now, are you ready for that picture? "Ooops, no, not that picture," he said disingenuously for effect. "I meant this picture." You want fucking hopeless? try living in a world on the razor's edge of armageddon with FIFTY NINE PERCENT of your countrymen cheering it on. Forty percent of Americans voted against Reagan, reflected as two. point. five. percent of the electoral vote. Do you taste it yet? Do you taste the bleakness? The utter, overwhelming despair? You're ten, by the way. And the TV wants you to know that eleven is doubtful. But hey, you make it to eleven and we're selling Stinger missiles on the down-low to the Iranians to buy weapons for the Contras and somehow the CIA is selling cocaine in Los Angeles and Ronnie is absolutely, positively, undeniably senile and they're already talking about putting his mug on Mt. Rushmore. Here's the difference between you and me. I'm grading on a curve because I've seen some shit. You demand purity because - to be frank - you haven't. You still could. But this isn't what it looks like. You wanna know why Biden is treating Israel with kid gloves? cuz nobody likes dead marines. And for the record, Palestinians were: - the direct and proximate cause of the Jordanian Civil War - the direct and proximate cause of The Lebanese Civil War - a complication and exacerbation of the invasion of Kuwait And, for the record, Palestinians support October 7 by a 4:1 margin. Shit's complicated. Shit's bleak. Shit's been complicated and bleak forever, though and it's hella less complicated and bleak than it has been and fuckin' hell, bubba, I legit didn't think I'd make it to 18 and instead I saw a piece of the Berlin Wall above the bar of a Bennigan's I was too young to drink at but got to anyway so quit fucking whining.
Yeah, that does sound pretty bad. I remember my mom telling stories of it, saying she was glad to live in DC because when the bombs fell she wouldn't even notice. GenZ has it's own crises though. The big one being climate change ofc. Which unlike the cold war isn't solved by Not doing something extremely reckless. Business as usual WILL WITH CERTAINTY cause catastrophe. It's staring into the barrel of a gun and the 40% of the country who's vote counts is cheering and the 60% who's vote doesn't is trying to find a clever compromise between your head and the exploded brain lobbyists. Its driving towards the edge of a cliff while the country argues whether to go at 20 miles per hour or 60. If you weren't born with a blind love of corporations, there's not much in the country left to care about anyways. Our culture has been 15 years of Ant-Man: Quantumania going on 20. Any company anyone ever liked has been bought up and gutted. Just yesterday saw they're trying to sell D&D to tencent for god's sake. The circuses suck and the price of bread just went up 20%. I guess that's my point, that shit still sucks, and with a different sort of vibe. I can't say which one is worse but you're jaded now and weren't then, I assume. And regardless, in this case it's not needed because i will certainly vote (and did in 2016 too, c'man now). But "vote for my guy because your problems don't matter and aren't going to be solved anyways" isn't a very inspiring argument even if it is true.
I'm dealing with global warming also. It's not like this is happening to GenZ alone. We're all in it. I'm dealing with the corporate hollowing-out of America also. It's not like this is happening to GenZ alone. We're all in it. Yes. Shit still sucks. And with a different sort of vibe. But I don't know how I can say this any clearer: Pessimism should never be an excuse for inaction. "your problems don't matter and aren't going to be solved anyways?" c'mon, man. I deserve better than that. Nowhere did I say that. Nowhere did I say anything CLOSE to that. What I said is "I've seen shit a whole lot more hopeless than it is now." I've said it a half-dozen ways. I've elaborated, I've elucidated, I've enumerated and you keep coming back with "but but but." You know what fucking sucked? TSR being bought by Wizards of the Coast. Fuck you. Magic: The Gathering is Bridge for dipshits and always has been. Pokemon is a fucking blight on the minds of children worldwide and the fact that the thriving community that so threatened the 'boomers that they held fucking congressional hearings about it is now owned by Hasbro means I don't now and never do need to give the first fuck about anyone buying dungeons and dragons ever again. We've gotten to the point where D&D nerds wonder why The Olds care about turning everything into Stephen Universe to which I say "let it all rot." You can't say which one is worse. I can. I can say it with no hesitation. And I say it with this level of stridency because every.single.mutherfucker.up.in.this.bitch is offended by my optimism and truly - y'all are a bunch of WATBs.