Is the Left trying to appear more unified than they actually are?

Jeanne d'Arc

Jeanne d'Arc

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I was sent this reddit post about the Washington Post presenting exaggerated support for Joe Biden as the Democratic candidate in 2020 not too long ago: https://redd.it/bie187

(Do bear in mind, the poll does technically have "No Preference" as the winner, which I think makes sense. Why would most people back any candidate when you haven't seen a single debate/campaigning has just started?)

It's made me think a fair bit as to why the Left is trying to push the narrative that they are unified under one candidate (one that has been involved in scandals recently, nonetheless) this early in the election cycle. Nearly every channel on TV and most Left-leaning websites are rallying behind Biden and designating Kamala Harris as almost a "second-string" candidate.

There were so fucking many Republican candidates seeking the nomination in 2016- debates looked like fucking roundtables- and Trump still kicked the shit out of Hillary. What does unity under one candidate matter this early? Why is the Left so focused on cutting the fat immediately? No one is a front-runner yet, not this early- so why so much push and shove as to who's the face of the party?

Not to mention, the Left seems to welcome every under the sun into their party in the name of boosting numbers- why be so flexible in the name of unity? If the people you welcome into your party see through all the welcome gifts and Twitter woke-ness, it just looks bad. You can say you support "LGBTQ+ rights" all you want, but when people with half a brain get over their TDS (if they ever do- many people will just vote [D] because orange man bad) and realize there is no real platform besides "NOT TRUMP" and their values will not be clearly represented within your party, what do you do?

I guess what I'm trying to say is- why can't the Left try to unify under policy and common values as opposed to a party leader? It didn't work for them in 2016, it won't work now. The focus of the Democratic party should be consistent platform, not infighting and trying to choose a "leader" a la Clinton. I'm genuinely curious as to what everyone thinks. Are the Left just dumb and can't see the errors of their ways in trying this again? Or is there something more sinister going on in picking a candidate this early? Is there something I'm missing?
 
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The left is completely fragmented & continues to shoot itself in the face. They can frame it however they want to but their party has less cohesion than hangover shits.
It's largely because the far-left extremist contingent cannot take a hint and is going to take the entire ship down to prove a point.
 
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Recon said:
The left is completely fragmented & continues to shoot itself in the face. [...]
It's largely because the far-left extremist contingent cannot take a hint and is going to take the entire ship down to prove a point.
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pas d’ennemis à gauche, pas d’amis à droit. the only point of the left is to push leftward. the speed doesn't matter.
 
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It's about fundraising. The large media outlets would like to democrat to be president and they think Biden has the best chance of making that happen.
Understand donors are only going to donate so much. Campaigns are expensive and if you dump 100 bucks on Kamala or Beto only for them to fall out during the primaries then that's 100 bucks you can't send to Biden or Butteryjeg, thus their motivation to astroturf for whoever they think has the best shot.
 
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BigRuler said:
this is vastly overstated imo. on most issues the left is pretty unified.
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A lot of it is the Kiwi audience getting high on its own supply. Its fine to hope for a win, but be realistic, everyone. I still get the occasional dumb or autism rating for a series of posts I made a year ago saying that the blue wave seemed likely and was going to wipe a load of Republicans out. The ratings keep coming, even after the wave happened in the way I described.

Anyway, Democrats are obviously more unified right now than the Republicans. These "tone arguments" about electability and the feasibility of green spending are nothing compared to the Republican fight last election about foreign policy and trade- and its not like the losers of that fight went away or anything, they are still there with their twenty percent of the national vote.

I think the real issue will be how much of Donald Trump's coalition stays with him, and a big part of that is of course who Democrats nominate. If they pick an "old white guy" aka someone who cares about labor issues, then Trump will be at risk of losing parts of the blue collar vote in areas like the rust belt. But if they pick a Wall Street-aligned business Democrat then Republicans will lose portions of that same suburban vote that was iffy about him in 2016 and voted Democratic representatives in in 2018. Trump has of course alienated some people so much that they'd vote for any Democrat over him, and regained some of the people who thought he was a liberal in conservative clothing last time and sat that election out.
 
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The Left doesn't have real ideas. They only screech and whine about inane bullshit. Spouting that they know how to fix all the people's problems while at the same time having no idea how to even begin doing it. they're pushing Biden because everyone is fucking re-tarded. Warren, Cortez, all of their other high profile people are worse than a known pedophile. They are as unified as a hydra. Each head snapping at the others, fighting over food. just waiting to cannibalize each other.

The new Republicans only exist because of Trump, and while the wage slave supporting, warmongers of the old Republican guard are still around, they're literally dying. They are an endangered species. Same goes for the old Left. Difference is the new left are fucking insane, dumbass sjws with no concept of how the real world works. While the New Right is unified under basic principles outlined by Trump, while non-trump right wingers are just riding the trend.

This election will be extremely entertaining, and I stand by what I've said before. I believe that Trump will win, hold or strengthen his hold in the Senate, and get his House back. With more of the old guard fading into obscurity. If I'm right and he wins, the Democrats will be crushed, and they may actually have to adapt, or they'll never recover.
 
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Annie said:
Or is there something more sinister going on in picking a candidate this early?
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Picking a candidate as quickly as possible has major strategic advantages (although this is far from an exhaustive list):
  1. Any money not being spent on a contentious primary race is money that can be used in the general.
  2. You avoid donor fatigue.
  3. Your candidate doesn't end up too dirtied by the nastiness of a close primary, and the dirt takes longer to come out.
  4. You have more time to deal with the skeletons in a candidate's closet, and you can get ahead of any negative stories, be that in the form of addressing the skeletons in your closet, or selectively leaking negative information about yourself early so it's old news by the election.
  5. It's much easier to build a strong campaign/personal narrative for a candidate if they don't have to worry about subversion early on from primary opponents.
  6. It's easier to build a ground game, and you don't have to worry about people not being willing to volunteer because they had their heart set on another candidate that was beaten by the nominee.
  7. I really can't understate the importance of not having to spend money in a competitive primary, because that's a huge boon.
 
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Depends on what you mean by "The Left". Is the Left referring to "actual" leftists (socialist, communist) or to the Democratic voting base, which is decidedly neither of those things?

I think where the greatest division is is identity politics. On the one hand you have both Hillary Clinton-loving (I'm With Her!) liberals and idpol-intoxicated Antifa/Queer activists, and on the other you have class-first Berniebros and socialists of the Jacobin/Cumtown variety. And yes, Bernie has to capitulate to identity politics but he doesn't do so near as much as say, Kamala Harris does. He doesn't support reparations and the Twitter woketards hate him for it.
 
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Annie said:
It's made me think a fair bit as to why the Left is trying to push the narrative that they are unified under one candidate
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Both the left and right do this despite being divided.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whip_(politics)

Creating unity is a job title.

Historically the left has been more divided than the right and this is because the left has tended to have less leadership than the right. The left has Unions but that is an institutional force rather than a community force like a Church or business group.

thermocline said:
Depends on what you mean by "The Left". Is the Left referring to "actual" leftists (socialist, communist) or to the Democratic voting base, which is decidedly neither of those things?

I think where the greatest division is is identity politics. On the one hand you have both Hillary Clinton-loving (I'm With Her!) liberals and idpol-intoxicated Antifa/Queer activists, and on the other you have class-first Berniebros and socialists of the Jacobin/Cumtown variety. And yes, Bernie has to capitulate to identity politics but he doesn't do so near as much as say, Kamala Harris does. He doesn't support reparations and the Twitter woketards hate him for it.
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That's the point of intersectionalism. To create a unified front against whitey by eradicating or ignoring internal prejudices. Black people on the LGBTQP flag, etc.
 
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