Is Yang a "grifter"?

 So, given Yang's recent announcement, and my disappointment with it, a lot of leftists would likely respond to me by saying "SEE? I TOLD YOU SO, I TOLD YOU HE WAS A GRIFTER!", so I wanted to address this question directly. 

When people say the word grifter, they generally talk of someone who has no real convictions or ideology, who is in the politics business to make money. Many people who are republicans or democrats are grifters. Some independents can also become grifters if they tend to shift their content away from being about legitimate political opinions and being about playing to an audience to get views. Examples often cited are people llike Jimmy Dore or Glenn Greenwald, who often cater their message to appeal to a certain base of people and tend to build their brand on being contrarian or in Jimmy Dore's case, angry. 

So...does Yang fit this definition for me? Largely, no. I believe Andrew Yang is mostly in for this for the right reasons. If he wanted to make money, he could have made money in the private sector. He used to have a lucrative job post college, then joined venture for america to create jobs for poor people in the midwest and stuff. But he realized that failed, which is why he jumped on board UBI. Much like me, he kind of looked at the structural issues of much of the economy, and decided all the job creation in the world isn't going to fix problems, we needed a new way forward. 

I've read Yang's books and feel like I have a good idea of his mindset here. I also listen to a good number of his podcasts. Yang's presidential campaign was risky. He basically put his professional career on hold to try to share the message of UBI and automation with people, coming up with new solutions that no one else did (at least in the mainstream, keep in mind, Yang is NOT the originator of the UBI movement, it existed long before he came into the picture). And he ran for president on him. He put tons of work in getting his campaign off the ground, and while he didn't win, I have to respect the hustle. He actually did a lot more than I did in trying to advance the idea. I mean, I have a blog. This guy was going all over states like Iowa and New Hampshire trying to sell his message. 

And after the campaign, he had a lot of options that could advance his career. He could have worked within the Biden administration. He could've been a commentator on CNN (and was for a while). But then he ran for mayor. By this point, he already had a plan to launch the forward party. Along the way, he understood the problems with the system are systemic, and it's not that no one is aware of the problems, but that people tend to not want to talk about the solutions. And understanding the system as it is, he wanted to make a third party.

His mayoral campaign in New York was about about bringing attention to ranked choice voting. He planned on leaving the party regardless of how it ended. He just wanted to elevate ranked choice voting as a concept. 

And let's be honest. What he did takes balls, and isn't typical grifter behavior. Grifters generally do not go against the grain. It is far easier to take a job within the system and shut up and be part of the dysfunction. He had the opportunities to do this, but he chose instead to do the forward party, because he felt it was necessary for his goals. So, let's take a moment and praise Yang for this. Because I respect that. 

I feel like despite my disagreements with Yang over this latest idea of merging with two other parties, he had good intentions. But, sometimes the path to hell is paved with good intentions. And this is where I start getting more critical. 

The thing is, Yang tends to make bad decisions sometimes. When healthcare was a contentious issue in the 2020 primary, he seemed to back off of single payer and moderate out of political pressure from his supporters. He tried to build a bridge between the bernie people who wanted single payer and more moderates who wanted ACA modifications. And it was tone deaf. He didn't read the room, and I remember, I was alienated by that too. I think Yang became convinced that while single payer was a worthwhile long term goal, we needed a more moderate approach to get there. And given his conciliatory nature, he just ended up dropping the ball. This was, by the way, the big thing that caused me to drop him in favor of Bernie in 2020. Given my "purity tests", single payer was more or less on par with UBI in priority at the time, and while UBI and M4A were my top issues that would be a no brainer for me, dropping M4A made him a weaker candidate than Bernie. ANd i just couldn't justify a Yang vote. 

But, by the time he launched forward, I had rerun M4A numbers and I became a bit more moderate on the issue. Much like Yang, I support single payer long term, but I have become more flexible on how to get there since 2020, and my evolution on this matter is similar to yang's, despite my logic being slightly different. And I also became alienated from the bernie bros who post 2020 became more extreme and toxic where I just couldn't fit in with them any more. 

And reading Forward, I felt like Yang still supported the priorities, he just didn't want to emphasize some of them because he was afraid of relitigating the contentious 2020 primary. So he dropped the issue. I got the impression he still supported M4A, he just didn't prioritize it. 

I was willing to overlook this given he did support UBI, and human centered capitalism, and ranked choice voting, but I have to admit this is a flaw with Yang.

Another problem Yang mentioned in Forward, and even he had to admit it, is that politics is complicated. And sometimes your ideals tend to push you in one direction, but your relationships with others pushes you in another. Like, once he mentioned there was a contentious primary in which he wanted to endorse one candidate, and his supporters endorsed that candidate, but he ended up endorsing the other person, because he felt like he had a social obligation to. Yang was conflicted about it. It's why he wrote about it in Forward. he talked about how the environment of people you work with can change you. 

And that's where I think we can get back into my concerns with this merger. Yang's retreat from UBI reminds me a lot of his retreat from M4A. He wants to grow his party, but understands the more requirements he puts on people to join his party, the less potential for growth there is. He doesn't want to purity test so hard he barely attracts anyone. And I see the point. I'm going to be honest. This is an issue I've had with, for example, the greens. I was on board with them for the economic vision, but I do know when I tried to join a discord related to the green party once, I only lasted a day before I left. Because it was overrun by insufferable SJWs who I conflicted with on a basic personality level. I ended up saying something politically correct that offended their delicate sensibilities, and not being the kind of person who gets along with those sorts of people, I just made it easy and left. I still ended up voting green, but I'm not a cultura; fit for that party due to being a bit more "moderate" (read: less post modernist) on social issues. Yang wants to make an inclusive environment for everyone, but honestly, as I said before, there's a balance to be had in purity testing. If you dont purity test AT ALL, then you run the extreme of not standing for anything. And Yang decided RCV is so important it was worth throwing away everyone else to get people on board with it, even if it sentences the party to never being anything other than a milquetoast centrist organization doomed to make the same mistakes as the democrats.

And as far as the long term potential goes, I think that his relationships WILL compromise him. He just MERGED with two other movements. This isn't an organization he is fully in control of any more. He is at best a copartner here. And push comes to shove, given the political ideologies of the people he now has relationships with, that's going to compromise his UBI advocacy. After RCV is done, what will he do next? His forward platform will basically be compromised. Because his partners are moderates and right wingers who don't like UBI. This organization won't go back to UBI. Because he will need to work with these professional relationships of his. He will, at best, have a moment of dirty conscience and leave the movement behind, and start a new one based on his original platform, but who knows if he compromises it, again.

This is the problem with Yang. No, he is NOT a grifter. But...he allows his diplomatic and personable side get in the way of his ideals. He would rather compromise to try to make everyone happy (which makes no one happy) than risk pissing someone off. It's just a personality flaw of his. And maybe that's not a terrible flaw to have in business. But in politics I see it as fatal. I'm the opposite kind of guy by the way. I have my views, and if people don't like what i stand for, that's their problem. I value Bernie like consistency on virtues and values. And if someone does not represent my views, I will make the difference known and even break ranks with them.

And that's who I am. I left the GOP because of my conscience in 2012. I left the democrats in 2016 after they tried to bully me. I dont do the "team player" crap. And since then I've had grievances with the greens over various things. ANd the bernie bros. And the yang gang.

The reason I supported forward was because it supported my ideals. Given it no longer does, I'm done. Now, given forward IS a movement of running candidates within existing parties, could I support forward endorsed candidates? Of course. And when i make my metric for 2024, RCV will likely give any candidate a nice bonus. But ultimately, RCV alone isn't enough to draw me. UBI and M4A are still my #1 and #2 respectively. And anyone who doesn't support those is going to be at a massive disadvantage no matter what else they support. So, we'll see 2024 where I end up going. I don't even know any more at this point. I don't think anyone does. The dems are in a bad state, the GOP is insane. And other movements have pros and cons. 

But yeah. To conclude in the topic at hand, no Yang isn't a grifter. He just has some serious personality flaws that make him a bad fit for politics. He values trying to deescalate conflict and personal relationships at times over his ideals. And honestly, that is a major weakness that hurts his messaging and political career. While yang thinks this new forward party will grow, it wont grow with the kinds of people who agree with him. The party will effectively be taken over by people with a much different ideology, and will be a lukewarm and useless endeavor.

Honestly, Yang made a huge mistake here as far as im concerned. He might realize it some day, but by then, it will be too late. His movement will be compromised. And he will need to start all over again if he just doesn't abandon his original goals outright. And that's why I can't support this.