Fire from the Left
A friend reminds me of an important addendum to my previous post. I think it will matter quite a lot whether the leftists decide that they prefer Trump or the Democratic nominee.
I am exaggerating slightly, but I think it's fair to say that a lot of prominent leftists were ambivalent at best about the 2016 election. Many of them spent the election season vigorously attacking Clinton and making sure that everyone was aware that the Democratic Party in general and Clinton in particular are elitist, game-rigging corporate shills who despise working-class people. Clinton delivered her nomination acceptance speech to loud boos and jeers from Sanders delegates. I think it's hard to overstate how much better off Obama was as a result of a united Democratic Party.
I am not presently arguing for the nomination of a leftist candidate (I'm not sure who that would even be—Sanders, I suppose, though I suspect that a lot of loyalty to him would evaporate the moment he started saying nice things about the Democratic Party). I'm just observing that this fissure has been a real problem in the past, and the Glenn Greenwalds of the world will almost certainly do whatever they can to get Trump reelected. It's a dynamic that will be tricky to navigate.
I am exaggerating slightly, but I think it's fair to say that a lot of prominent leftists were ambivalent at best about the 2016 election. Many of them spent the election season vigorously attacking Clinton and making sure that everyone was aware that the Democratic Party in general and Clinton in particular are elitist, game-rigging corporate shills who despise working-class people. Clinton delivered her nomination acceptance speech to loud boos and jeers from Sanders delegates. I think it's hard to overstate how much better off Obama was as a result of a united Democratic Party.
I am not presently arguing for the nomination of a leftist candidate (I'm not sure who that would even be—Sanders, I suppose, though I suspect that a lot of loyalty to him would evaporate the moment he started saying nice things about the Democratic Party). I'm just observing that this fissure has been a real problem in the past, and the Glenn Greenwalds of the world will almost certainly do whatever they can to get Trump reelected. It's a dynamic that will be tricky to navigate.
posted by James | 1:07 PM
2 Comments:
1. I think Greenwald et al. will be trying to get Trump reelected no matter what.
2. Warren has been tone-deaf on a lot of minority issues for a very long time, for example she's made dumb remarks about how things were better in the fifties. So this Pocahontas thing probably has some legs on the left.
3. The left-wing objection that DNA tests are a way of subverting tribal sovereignty and the right-wing claim that she benefited from affirmative action are incompatible but the power of these amorphous "scandals" is that they can easily encompass both. People who are not very tuned in will just file under "something is up with Warren pretending to be native Am." and will fill it in with whatever their prejudices are.
Of people who voted for Sanders but were not enthusiastic Hillary supporters the first major base of support was people who didn't want to vote for women. That's why they constantly criticized Hillary; that’s why the whole “Bernie bros” thing, and that’s why a surprising number of his supporters voted for tRump. His second major constituency were poseurs who wanted to benefit from the “coolness” associated with liberalism but didn’t actually care about real world consequences like if immigrants were mistreated or people had medical care.
The first group can be had easily if we want to cave to them, but we probably shouldn’t. The second group can be had only by making internal sniping aggressively uncool. Shame anyone who isn’t on board. Treat anyone who isn’t rallying as a social leper, uninvited them from parties, look embarrassed and politely excuse yourself if someone expresses negative view on the front runner. People who don’t care about the real world and only care about social impression can only be influenced by shaming, not be reason.
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