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I love AOC, but she will lose.
The American people have shown that they would rather have a convicted felon, rapist, fascist pedophile than a highly qualified woman.
It's stupid, but it's reality.
A woman candidate is a non starter.
If you see bigotry but refuse to fight against it, you a coward and no different than the bigots.
Unlike Kamala and Clinton she actually believes in something, and not just the Dems' very rich corporate donors.
look at Zohran Mamdani in New York. He's a Muslim, foreign born, socialist. Plenty of things that by the same logic would make him loose. But he won the primary and odds are he'll Winn the mayor position.
NYC does not extrapolate out to the US, or things would look very different these days.
The issue is we've never actually tried to run a populist left candidate. So everyone saying, "it'll never work!" have no real bases for that statement. (the closest we've ever been was Sanders, and the DNC ensured that he was not going to be on the ballot.)
A TRUE LEFT POPULIST WILL WIN! in my opinion
We actually did, his name was Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Sure if we hold him up to today's standards not a progressive by any means, but he campaigned on working class issues and helped steer the country out of the depression. He created virtually all our modern safety nets or their predecessors.
He was so popular a president that Congress amended the constitution to ensure no other president could have more than 2 terms. He was so popular congress was afraid it threatened the power of their branch of government.
Running on and actually accomplishing worker centric policy works.
And to fend of the inevitable yes he was not that progressive by today's measures and had a mountain of flaws. But his accomplishments were revolutionary for the country in his time.
I didnt say 'it'll never work!!', I said NYC <> the US. You can't compare the two and say "See, it works" when he isn't even elected yet, and its in a city that is absolutely further left than democrats on the national scale.
I would love to see it work. One mayoral hopeful in a friendly city is not a reasonable comparison though.
Edit: feel free to show me a single example somewhere red. I'd love it.
When that happens, yeah, that'd be a good example.
To bolster your point, a true progressive ran in 2018 in west Virginia- Paula Swearengin. She challenged Joe Manchin in the primary and lost 70-30.
She then won the Democratic primary in 2020 for Senate and went on to lose in the general 70/27 (other votes to the libertarian.)
People really need to understand that while Zohran and AOC are great there isn't some kind of silver bullet with progressivism across the country.
How do we know that? In super deep red areas it's a uphill battle. But the most left wing president we've ran since FDR was Carter and I'd say he's more neoliberal/pure centrist than progressive/left. Once again, when you only run center and more right candidates; the more center candidates losing isn't really a sign America wants only right politics. It just means the more left wing voter stays home on elections.
I don't know? Results?
I want more progressive policies. Run em. But just don't be surprised if they get slaughtered.
I think more than progressive policies people want younger people.
But to Anyone down voting, great. I simply presented raw facts.
Don't get surprised when you try the same thing over and over again expecting a different results.
It's not just policy, it's energy.
Becoming a recognized name that sticks in people's heads is the biggest battle — this is usually the incumbent advantage: this was Manchin's advantage over Paula Jean Swearengin; but it was also Cuomo's advantage over Zohran Mamdani... and Cuomo lost. So there's another way to make yourself known: being disruptive.
I loathe MAGA. They are assholes, but that's how they took over. That's what gets them covered in the news, they do constant theater saying asshole things. Literally everyone knows who Marjorie Taylor Greene is, whether they're into politics or not. Many MAGA politicians nowadays you know first from the podcast circuit. Yes they have an ecosystem but that doesn't mean we can't do guerrilla campaigning. After all, Mamdani still won, right?
Now I'm not saying we need progressives to be assholes. But they should be more performative — loudmouths even: get up in people's faces, speak confidently and provocatively into the camera, tell people your values without them asking. Do things that aren't necessarily stunts, but that get labeled as stunts.
Mamdani has done a bunch of this stuff, from telling Cuomo how to spell his name, to his full day walking through Manhattan and interacting with people, to how easily he answers even the hardest questions — I mean, you probably already know how good he is at this stuff and how easy he makes it look, so it might be tempting to think you can't replicate his success because of how uniquely talented he is, but let me give you another example:
Kat Abughazaleh (YouTuber and investigative journalist for Mother Jones and Media Matters, currently running for Congress) has done arguably even more with her campaign: she's using campaign money for mutual aid (anyone can walk into their office and get free stuff except for ICE), feeding the homeless, Pride and Drag Queen Story Hour; she gave bigots the finger on camera and doubled down; she did a campaign event in a comedy club and turned it into a TED-style stand-up presentation about "General" Michael Flynn wanting to sell your blood. Her campaign slogan as a Democrat is "What if we didn't suck"! She started in single digits and now she's single digits away from first place. Watch her explain it though, to get a sense of the energy. (All the other stuff is on her channel too, I highly recommend the Flynn one btw!)
You have to get creative and work the outrage media space, it's the only way. Get eyes on you and stand up for your values, loudly!
His path to victory is very hard. Expect hundreds of millions to be spent on ads against him. My boss’ PAC has estimated Cuomo would have $100 million available if he chooses to run as an independent.
That's New York. You won't win swing states with those candidates. And I love Zohran. If he ran in California, I'd vote for him.
And specifically NYC, not even the state.
And specifically only 15% of registered DNC voters who participated in the primaries.
And that is why she will fail.
Welcome to reality. Welcome to America.
We chose a felon rapist traitor over highly qualified women...twice. And those women were more qualified than AOC and more moderate. The further left AOC goes, the more voters she loses.
She won't win.
So what? Run her anyway. There's this thing called the window of discourse.
He won with 48% of the 15% most involved DNC voters who took time to participate in primaries, in New York City, and he still has to win the generals next.
It does not matter enough. Too many bigots in the conservative dem voter base.
They will vote black, Muslim, Asian, so long as it's not a woman.
Sad state of the American psyche.
In all likelihood, yes, she will lose.
But she should still run for the same reasons Bernie ran. Change the discourse and prevent unfettered ratcheting of the Overton window; force Democrats to respond to her challenge.
If she doesn't run, we all lose. Winning isn't quite everything.
If the dems lose in 2028, assuming there is an election, the fascists will consolidate power and the U.S. will be a dictatorship for 40 years.
And your solution is to vote for the people who are doing nothing to stop the fascists, instead.
Bold strategy.
False dichotomy.
The U.S. has proven a woman can't win because the U.S. is a bigoted shithole with a flawed constitutional system.
The alternative is to vote for someone who can win and can beat the fascists.
Assuming there are free and fair elections in 2028. A big if.
To be fair, Clinton and Harris and the platform were not particularly exciting, and they played by the old rules.
Misogyny may have been a contributing factor, but not being bold, exciting, or authentic sure as hell didn’t help.
maybe let the people who actually vote for the party decide who they prefer as candidates, rather than having the gerontocracy alone dictate that choice
Those people said "Clinton" and then "Biden". Both over Bernie, who was far more charismatic than both and with a fucking spotless record, unlike both.
Not sure that the primary voters'll be delivering a progressive savior unless the demographics of who votes in Dem primaries changes radically.
Harris and Clinton both had major structural issues that went beyond their gender. I'm not ignoring the reality that women face a greater uphill battle--they need to be downright perfect in order to even get fair consideration--but I don't think that the fact that they are women was the only factor. I'm not even positive that it would be a deciding factor against someone who isn't Trump. His particular brand of politics really only works for him, somehow.
This is the type of thinking that will keep the status quo the status quo.
"Things can't change oh well!"
Prepare yourself for the “Status Quo-mo”
The fact that Harris got as close as she did with so little time proves that she didn't lose because she's a woman. She lost because her policies sucked. Run someone who is honest and trying to help the people and I'd bet they do well, man, woman, or otherwise (OK, maybe a trans candidate actually couldn't win for now).
The people saying those two lost because they're women are ignorant. They lost because they were shitty candidates. More men have lost than women, and no one says it's because they were men. It's just an easy excuse to ignore that people don't like corporate ass kissers who fuck over the average person to help the rich.
Another factor which IMHO led to her lose was that she didn't primary. So all the anger against Biden mostly transferred onto her. His blinding support to genocide, his greediness for the presidency, his support for big businesses, him breaking the railway workers strike just eroded any goodwill he did have.
He did good things but optics of these didn't let good deeds to shine. They did cast a shadow over Kamala's campaign too.
Losing the nomination would not be the end for AOC. But as a champion for the "Democratic Socialist" wind of the Democrats there's really not a better candidate to speak at the primaries and ensure that even in a primary loss the eventual winner adds parts their goals to the administrations goals.
This is why the "Christian Conservatives" always run a few candidates in the Republican party, and why they've always got a spot in the Republican party platform.
Based on what's happening in New York, I think they'd sabotage her.
Walz/Cortez 2028 take my vote all day long.
You could say also they’d rather select that than a qualified “person”. Should no opposition ever run again? Or is it clear that she was not chosen because of her gender? Maybe so, but that feels to me like it completely overlooks that there could be anything about her personality or positions responsible.
I’m not comfortable saying AOC or any other woman is a non-starter because other women have failed. A lot of people have failed before and at some point perhaps one will be selected. I think she would be a good choice, and more appealing to many than Kamala, I suspect.
They've shown they don't want to vote for hope-extinguishing establishment dweebs.
A woman candidate who's actually good would do great.
In our cast system she is way low in the hierarchy. Not even Hispanics would vote in the majority for her.
Yup, it's ridiculous, but reality is reality.
You are correct.
Anyone downvoting you is just ignoring reality.
There's a reason Trump has run 3 times and only lost once and it was to a man. A significant portion of this country in the right geographical areas will never vote for a woman to be president. And that includes a ton of women. And half of the country wants to burn AOC at the stake for being too liberal.
She can't win the Electoral College.
You want to get Bernied again? Vote for AOC.