comment: >
  
  Wouldn’t surprise me if she tries to run for President in 2024 as an Independent, positioning herself as  a “moderate”. In reality, acting as a spoiler to tilt the race to Republicans.
  She definitely has the ego and taste for cash to do it.
context: “Infighting”…discussion of ideas, representation of varied interests, providing the best outcomes for citizens, regions and industries.
  Vs blindly worshiping one guy whose bigoted rantings can only be opposed at risk of excommunication.
  I’ll take the infighting.
  Fucking media. >
  
  Fox News says something stupid: fuck Fox News. 
  NPR says something stupid: fuck the media. 
  NPR is subject to bias just like any news outlet. It’s disappointing when they fall prey to right wing tropes like this. >
  
  NPR is a neoliberal mouthpiece and any veneer it has of being “left” is purely marketing. >
  
  I keep seeing people misuse this word, neoliberal doesn’t mean what you seem to think it means.
  It’s an economic/ international development term coined ~70 years ago. From the wiki:
  
  Neoliberalism is a term used to signify the late 20th century political reappearance of 19th-century ideas associated with free-market capitalism after it fell into decline following the Second World War.[2]: 7 [3] A prominent factor in the rise of conservative and libertarian organizations, political parties, and think tanks, and predominantly advocated by them,[4][5] it is generally associated with policies of economic liberalization, including privatization, deregulation, globalization, free trade, monetarism, austerity, and reductions in government spending in order to increase the role of the private sector in the economy and society.
  
  (or you’re muddying the waters on purpose, I’m assuming you just didn’t know) >
  
  Neo-conservative is my go to for those using the guise of progressive policy to enforce conservative structures. I'm not sure if that's still the appropriate term here. >
  
  Right, and socio/politically we don’t need made up gradations of “good” liberals and “bad” liberals, the Democratic Party is inherently a coalition. We agree on ~99%, that’s what matters
  TL;DR - ‘neoliberal’ is economics, not politics. Beware anyone confidently calling democrat ‘X’ a neoliberal, they’re either a narc or a fool >
  
  I think one of the real issues we have is just this kind of thing. Most conservatives probably think of the denotative definition being reserved, not understanding that it's political meaning is more along the lines of "autocratic" or "fiefdom". >
  
  This post is not making sense to me. 
  
  Most conservatives probably think of the denotative definition being reserved
  
  Come again? >
  
  The word conservative is usually self referencial and used to denote "responsible" or "slow". As is the English meaning. But politically, the word conservative comes from the French aristocracy trying to use the new free markets to create a new kind of feudalism. The current conservative parties of UK/US/AUS are all direct philosophical descendants of the French aristocracy. This creates a common kind of difficulty when speaking where someone who is a self proclaimed conservative might not know the actual intentions of their political representation. 
  This obviously also impacts anyone discussing it. 
  TLDR words are hard. >
  
  I mean okay gotcha, just confused bc it’s not terribly germaine to bring up such an allegory
  anyway for the people in the back, yah neoliberalism refers to reforms in economic markets that are typically associated with Reagan era consevatives who believed in laissez faire capitalism and ‘free markets’ aka unregulated capitalism . 
  The ‘liberalism’ in question is Keynesian liberalism. 
  So ‘Liberalized’ states/economies like in the US enmesh and manage both the public sector (the state) and the private sector (I.e. the Fed setting interest rates for private lending). It’s both socialism and capitalism, enmeshed, to varying degrees. In Europe they hew more toward the public sector, in America the private sector. This all happens because we live in a society/culture of pluralism
  
  Pluralism as a political philosophy is the recognition and affirmation of diversity within a political body, which is seen to permit the peaceful coexistence of different interests, convictions, and lifestyles.[1] While not all political pluralists advocate for a pluralist democracy, this is most common as democracy is often viewed as the most fair and effective way to moderate between the discrete values.[2] As put by arch-pluralist Isaiah Berlin, "let us have the courage of our admitted ignorance, of our doubts and uncertainties. At least we can try to discover what others ... require, by ... making it possible for ourselves to know men as they truly are, by listening to them carefully and sympathetically, and understanding them and their lives and their needs... ."[3] Pluralism thus tries to encourage members of society to accommodate their differences by avoiding extremism (adhering solely to one value, or at the very least refusing to recognize others as legitimate) and engaging in good faith dialogue. Pluralists also seek the construction or reform of social institutions in order to reflect and balance competing principles.
  
  In short, our world is largely a ”Liberal Pluralist“ society 
  Words are indeed hard. Thanks for coming to my TED Talk >
  
  Shit headline and narrative by NPR...more like..."Despite Republicans blocking every piece of legislation designed to help out most Americans, Democrats made some progress" >
  
  NPR is still trying to maintain a veneer of non-partisanship, and it’s less divisive and more interesting to talk about how Democrats struggled but succeeded in getting out of their own way than to talk about what everyone knows already: Republicans want to sabotage government to prove it can’t work. >
  
  Nprs donation list from charities includes a bunch of corporate sponsorship (AmazonSmile) pretending to be charities. It's gross. Npr is a corpo shill now. This is coming from a listener of years and years, hours and hours. I wouldn't be surprised if corporate underwriting was involved in every single one of their pieces. >
  
  I stopped listening to my local NPR back during the mass teacher strikes a few years ago. 
  I tuned in to hear their coverage while on a long drive and it consisted entirely of a few local Republican reps spewing every cliche anti union talking point available then the segment just..... ended. No teacher or union rep there to rebut, no critical questions, nothing. 
  NPR's famed neutrality on display. >
  
  There's no such thing as local NPR, it's a national service - that would be your local public radio station and their coverage (actually hell in Massachusetts you have two!)... >
  
  Even when Democrats are doing well, they will get the "Dems in disarray" trope from even good media sources. >
  
  The GOP is tearing themselves apart between MAGAs and the old guard to the point that the vote for Speaker is shaping up to be a fight - something that hasn’t happened in a hot minute. 
  But no, it’s the Dems that are “in fighting.” >
  
  I mean there definitely has been in fighting with the Dems the past two years with Manchin and especially Sinema (cause no one knows what the fuck she wants). I feel like they’re going to pale in comparison to the GOP controlled house though. >
  
  It’s not nearly as bad, though, as under Obama’s first term or anything like the constant relitigating 2016 >
  
  lmao they really killed it on obamacare, total Democrat success there, it helped dozens of people probably and was funded by a $700 fee to our countries poorest >
  
  Being a vibrant party that has a variety of ideas, and engages in discussion on how to implement them isn’t “infighting”. It’s normal democracy.
  It’s much healthier than a blind adherence to an incoherent set of talking points forged through alliances of those who have strong, but unpopular opinions (the wealthy, Christian nationalists, the NRA). >
  
  How about what you call "infighting" we call "negotiating" and leave it at that?  Perhaps... just maybe... Democrats got so much accomplished because they worked hard at it, compromised...and moved on to the next big thing?  And Republicans?  Sat with their arms crossed and refused to participate.  Let's talk about that... shall we?  Just imagine what we could have actually accomplished with an opposition party that actually wanted to work at the hard stuff? >
  
  The Manchin thing really was a surprise turnaround. I guess a check bounced somewhere. >
  
  He got guaranteed future oil leases in Alaska/offshore in an otherwise anti fossil fuel bill, is what happened. >
  
  Democrats default to governing
  Republicans default to identify politics, class warfare, and harming the working class. >
  
  You mean like how biden forced railway workers to keep working and not go on strike? >
  
  Yup, democrats wanted to meet be their demand and included sick leave. Guess who forced that out of the final result.  Gop 
  I know you're trying to both sides it... but it's not both sides.  Just the gop causing problems. >
  
  Biden produced an unforced error by making a strike illegal.  Unless you think workers should be forced to work. >
  
  I'm not a huge fan of that move, but I also get why he did it.  It would have been bad for everyone if the rails shut down over Christmas because of a strike... >
  
  "Democrats got a shitload of really good stuff done. Here's why we still hate their guts for daring to try to help people and will continue spreading propaganda that they're failures, even in success." >
  
  40%+ of the population doesn't want to do better, they want to do better than those they hate >
  
  
  40%+ of the population doesn't want to do better, they want ~~to do better than~~ those they hate to do worse than them.
  
  There's a difference >
  
  He’s hurting the wrong people! >
  
  *"He's not hurting the people he needs to be hurting" >
  
  Surprisingly productive?  You mean Democrats actually passed helpful legislation, like functional governments are supposed to do, after 4 years of GOP tax cuts, science denial, deregulation, culture wars, and money laundering? >
  
  And get ready for Sinema and Manchin try to take credit for all of it during their next re-election campaigns without an ounce of shame. >
  
  Sinema is done.  Machin needs all the help he can get in bright red w virgina. >
  
  
  Sinema is done
  
  I don’t think there’s any other way to see it.  Self-important narcissist that she is, I’m guessing she’ll be Faux News’s next celebrity ‘Left Wing’ pundit.  She’ll try to pretend she has nothing to be ashamed of.