I want to start by pointing out something important: nowhere in my post did I suggest we should be trying to "shame" or "convince" MAGA voters. That's a mischaracterization of my position. My critique wasn't about appealing to the immovable, it was about refusing to pretend that the GOP's fascism is just the natural result of Democratic timidity. That framing is not only inaccurate; it conveniently erases the decades of systemic power-building the GOP has engaged in. We can't fix what we refuse to see clearly.
You're right that Democrats are the only party we have any leverage over. But Republicans aren't passive obstacles, they are active agents of harm. They sue to block relief, handpick judges to overturn policy, gerrymander to erase votes, and run on an openly authoritarian platform. Treating them like fixed environmental conditions is dangerous. It implies we don't need to confront or explain their role in creating the crisis, when in fact, doing so is essential to mobilizing against it.
I didn't say shaming/convincing MAGA voters was your position, but it is the position that follows the logic of certain people taking part in the broader discussion we're having in here. To address your specific post, refusing to pretend that GOP's fascism is just a natural result of Democratic timidity may be correct in the context of a History seminar, but it's often a harmful distraction in the context of political advocacy in our current moment because it can often be transformed into diffusion of action potential. Focusing on the decades of systemic power-building the GOP has engaged in is only useful if it creates conditions for positive change, but the people who are constantly diverting discussions of Democratic Party failures towards that point are (purposefully imo) neutering the potential for positive change. Seeing the situation clearly would show us that the GOP is immovable and intransigent (as you agree) and the Democratic Party is failing to mount an effective political movement to overcome that. Acknowledging the fixed nature of the GOP's harmful goals only creates indifference if there is no oppositional force that can cohere a movement against that, which the Democrats are currently failing to do.
I'm not advocating that the Democrats pretend the Republicans don't exist. Just the opposite, in fact. I'm saying they need to
actually villainize them instead of doing the useless performative kabuki of controlled opposition, but to do so requires intra-Democratic Party reform first. It's the people who keep demanding evasion of Democratic Party leadership accountability via shifting vital reform focus to Republicans that are creating dangerous pretext for disengagement because there's no actual prospect of practical change by yelling at the brick wall of Republican evil.
That's precisely why Democrats need to be pushed, not just to "be bold," but to direct that boldness where it actually matters: toward dismantling the structural advantages that let the GOP rule without majorities. Court expansion, filibuster reform, voting rights protections, and so on - these aren't pie-in-the-sky ideas. They're necessary preconditions for progress. Because if Democrats are bold without addressing the system itself, we'll be back here again asking the same questions after the SCOTUS rules those bold policies illegal.
Right, everything you're saying here is exactly what the people advocating for Democratic Party reform have been demanding of Democratic leadership, but getting derailed by the people saying we should be criticizing the Republicans instead. The Democrats cannot go to voters and say "Look at how bad the Republicans are on voting rights protection" when they couldn't pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Act with a legislative majority. They need to get their own house in order first, otherwise calling out Republicans for doing Republican things will fall on deaf ears. Any effective Democratic progressive message will have the Republican Party as a villain in its political narrative, but you can't credibly build that narrative unless you yourself are clean.
You make a sharp distinction between "descriptive" and "normative" arguments, but I don't think those can be so neatly separated. The path forward depends on a clear-eyed understanding of how we got here. You can't solve a problem by ignoring half of it, and right now, any path to defeating GOP authoritarianism has to contend with their structural entrenchment, not *just* Democratic failure (something that I am not ignoring).
Right, I think any path forward has to contend with GOP structural entrenchment, but contending with it means Democratic Party reform because that's the only vehicle that can beat it. No one is saying "ignore the Republican half of the problem", we're saying "first get strong enough to credibly take on the Republican problem." But that's being stymied by people having this instinctive reaction to protect the honor of Democratic Party leaders and diverting the conversation to Republicans. This is why the normative-descriptive dichotomy is relevant. Because if we're looking at things through the descriptive lens of a Historian, then giving equal (or more) focus on Republicans is correct. But if we're taking the normative lens of someone looking to change things for the better, then its a bad strategy and waste of resources to pull attention away from Democratic Party reform towards impotently chastising Republicans.
So yes, I *want* Democrats to stop deferring to outdated norms and hand-shake agreements. I want them to stop pre-compromising out of fear and a lack of will. But I also reject the notion that naming the full extent of the problem is somehow "defeatist." That implies that being honest about the terrain we're fighting on is a waste of time. It's not. It's the only way to actually build something that works.
I can't control what other people say, but some of us *are* serious about demanding much more from Democrats *and* refusing to absolve the GOP for building an anti-democratic machine. I don't think that's a deflection. I think it's the reality of the situation.
Great, we have the same goals and understanding of what the Democratic Party should be doing. What I'm criticizing isn't the naming of the full extent of the problem, it's the diversion of attention towards an impotent, masturbatory strategy of booing the opposing team instead of demanding your team do better.
I believe the GOP is a fascist death cult that should be completely stricken from any semblance of a healthy society and have the earth they are buried in be salted over. I don't think they should ever hold power in any office of power ever again, regardless of what superficial moderation they make. They are rotten to the core, and they were so before Trump showed up. I'm more anti-GOP than the people on the opposite side of this discussion. I just don't have a deep parasocial attachment to the Democratic Party that inhibits me from criticizing them when they fail in their charge to fight on behalf of us and our supposed shared values. I don't treat politics like stan wars or marvel movies. I have no problem shooting a dog that won't hunt because the stakes of this fight are life and death. And that's how we should be viewing these Democratic politicians and the party itself. They are simply tools to build the society we need. If the tool is dull, throw it out and pick up a sharper one.
