Originally published at: On Big Night for the Left, Voters Tapped An Institutionalist Normie to Take on Mike Lawler
Anti-establishment forces within the Democratic Party are undeniably ascendant, Tuesday being the latest election to see incumbents fall to political outsiders. Many of the banner races happened in deep blue New York City districts, where the Democratic candidate is virtually guaranteed the seat. Latitude is broad, from a party success viewpoint, for Democratic socialists and…
Steiner acknowledged that the USPS would comply with any court orders blocking the rule.
All of which will be stayed by The Six because it’s too close to the election. Or it has to work its way through the system. Or they don’t have standing.
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You think of a movement like MAGA — energizing and deeply motivating to its members, completely transformative of the party it came from — and how that far-right enthusiasm led to catastrophic fumbles of winnable seats (Blake Masters in Arizona, Herschel Walker in Georgia, Doug Mastriano in Pennsylvania).
But Tuesday gave observers one early data point suggesting Democrats’ greater discipline in competitive races.
The worst people, and the enemy within, are the Schumers and Pelosi’s and other tut tutters that come out with their fetid criticisms of fellow Dems because they are “too extreme”. Please, stfu. Change parties if you have a problem with winning on what these candidates are winning on, or again, at a minimum stfu.
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If the EO is blocked, then so is the ‘new rule’. Let’s hope he does comply and does not thumb his nose at the senators and the judges.
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Republicans will call every Democrat a drug-peddling, demon-worshipping, flag-burning gay transgender Sharia Marxist. Democrats who think they’ll save themselves by joining in the chorus or thumbing their noses at their own constituents are facilitating fascism.
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I wonder how this EO will play out for us in Colorado and other vote by mail states.
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Are we quick?o/
Agreed.
It is important for Democrats to actively support the Civil rights of everyone Trump targets. This means supporting trans rights. This means supporting the rights of people with extreme political views that you may disagree with. This means supporting the constitutional rights of immigrants, who are not excluded in the Bill of Rights from having the same core constitutional rights as all Americans.
Edit: but my main point is that the best way to not be criticized for protecting the rights of one group or another is to protect the rights of all groups, actively, loudly, and at all times.
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The Schumers and Pelosi’s and other tut tutters saw the results of the 2024 elections and are terrified that the mighty whirlitzer will spread the message of Commie Socialism across the Nation.
While this most likely won’t effect a solid D state like NY, the old guard is looking at races in swing states like Sherrod Brown in Ohio or James Talarico in Texas.
I personally think their fears are overblown. The Orange POS is doing an ecellent job of ensuring that it will be either a blue wave or maybe even a blue tsunami in the 2026 midterms.
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If you’d like to comment on the bullshit “proposal” “allowing” the USPS to screw mail-in voters, here’s how to do it.
Email comments, containing the NAME and ADDRESS of the commenter, may be sent to:
PCFederalRegister@usps.gov
Put “Ballot Mail” in the subject line.
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Yeah, there is no such thing as an “absentee ballot” in WA where I lived until this year. It’s just called voting, and it’s done with a mailed ballot to registered voters.
This proposed rule is so ridiculous that in normal times I would just ignore it and expect it to be shot down in the courts. It’s a clear violation of state rights in the Constitution. We’ll see, and I still think it’s a safe bet this won’t go anywhere.
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The last time the Supreme Court meddled in an election, they gave to seat to the Republcian who got less votes. So expect more of the same from this bunch.
Perfect! Corporate Dems playing the middle all these years has made it nearly impossible to move forward with real progress. Hopefully the “radical Left” finally gains real power. That’s the battle going forward as Trump freefalls.
I’m going to choose to read this overall as (hopefully) many Dem voters starting to realize that the path forward is not, and has never been, a fight for primacy between “centrists” and “leftists”. It is shifting the perspective to understanding that the Overton’s Window that matters is the one that lies between the “centrists” and the “leftists”…not the one that lies between “leftists” and the FUCKING FASCISTS.
Coalition or bust. That is the way. You don’t have to like it. You just have to accept it and work to make it happen. The rest will follow.
On the one hand, centrists MUST abandon the fight for constant control and their brain damaged dogma that “we’re in the middle of the alleged extremes, so that means we’re right and/or will capture the most voters.” Autonomic centrism is abject nonsense, a dangerous logical fallacy that has allowed them to be manipulated and positioned by an actually extremist right flank that recognized their mindless parochial adherence to that false tenet and promptly began radicalizing off the right end of the spectrum to drag Overton’s Window and the auto-centrists with them.
On the other hand, Team Unicorn is going to have to start recognizing and accepting that progress is going to be and will only EVER be incremental…that only the rarest of circumstances will produce giant, summary leaps towards the ideal. This is not to say that moral red lines like equal treatment of people should be abandoned or that targeted out-groups need to be thrown under the bus. It is to say that if you want to protect them and achieve the goal of pulling everything onto the correct side of that red line, you are almost never going to be able to do it all at once. That is not the way it has ever worked and it won’t work now, and in the few instances we’ve believed it has…well, look around you at the backlash. The tug-of war-will be long, neverending, and there will be moments of progress and moments of backsliding (the “pendulum” is a dumb analogy for its implied inevitability). What matters is the net movement. Progressives like myself should consider themselves the anchor position…perhaps even the “moral” anchor. You win the long game because you HOLD THE FUCKING ROPE. Tie yourself into it. You do NOT let go or walk away.
You do the work of convincing in between elections and during campaigns to shift more would-be “centrists” towards the progressive side, shift the Overton Window between them and us. It will be slow and you won’t get them all and the ones you get won’t move all the way. You will have to accept that sometimes the best candidate for progressive causes is going to be the centrist who is on offer because that’s all you’ve got. Maybe that means your preference lost the primary, so stop forming personality cults, learn to suck it up, and when it comes time to vote, HOLD THE FUCKING ROPE to get what you can. Never let go and walk away.
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I agree with you on the likely dispensation of the court, but it should be noted that an EO directing any aspect of the USPS is itself unconstitutional regardless of content. The Post Office is in Article 1 of the constitution and its existence is entirely controlled by Congress. The postmaster general making rules that evade the law and tamper with the mail is a felony. This isn’t an executive agency. It was birthed into existence as a Congressionally controlled monopoly long before the modern state existed.
Kavanaugh might be able to forget that with a few beers but KBJ could blatantly point out that this is a clear misreading of the constitution that any 8th grade US civics student could comprehend in the clear originalist textualist interpretation of the black letter of the constitution.
After the election of Mamdani, his unbroken win streak in New York and his rousing success at kicking out do-nothing “no we can’t” AIPC-corrupted corporate democrats, I really really really want the tired old democrats on here to tell us all one more time how Shillary and the DNC had to sideline Bernie because he would have lost to Fat Donnie the Child Rapist in 2016. Please, can one of you explain all that again? Because it’s so fucking funny that you still believe that.