So, there are three issues where I wanna discuss the liberal vs leftist divide in modern politics. First, let's talk NYC. Zohran Mamdani beat out Andrew Cuomo in a surprise upset. I did plan on watching the debate between the two, but sadly I never got around to it. But yeah. I dont like Cuomo. He's an establishment centrist who has been in power for forever and comes off to me as everything wrong with the modern democratic party.
However, Im not really a fan of Mamdani. I mean, there's progressive, and then there's LEFT. And a lot of LEFT LEFT people are....not the best on policy. I like to back my own progressivism up with actual logistics, whereas Mamdani comes off to me as part of the "stupid left" in supporting ideas like rent control, which have never been shown to work, and he wants socialized grocery stores for some reason...like what problem does that even solve exactly? And free public transportation, which I'm not opposed to, but I'm also unsure of the logistics of. Promises are nice, but how is he gonna pay for this? I hate to ask this but I wanna know.
And before anyone wonders why i suddenly sound like a centrist, it's this. In order for left candidates to succeed, they have to have an idea wtf they're doing in the first place. You cant just promise a bunch of crap with no ability to deliver on it. I'm sure mamdani means well, but yeah, I'm not sure if he actually has ideas that can be executed properly. And if he doesn't, that could be bad for the left in the long term. Because they won't succeed, they'll be voted out of office, and then the centrists will win again when dems do run. We gotta deliver. If we don't deliver, we bring shame to the movement and it will be set back. Idk, I just would like have had someone more in between these two candidates. Like I did watch at least the opening statements of the above debate, and the candidate that stood out most to me was Adrianne Adams, who had experience, but also wanted change. Idk. I just think we can do better than some socialist who is younger than me and has no idea what he's doing.
So...the second issue. The impeachment articles against Trump. Some progressives brought them over bombing Iran, but then the centrists shut it down. I....have to side with the center here. Mainly because of the context of this impeachment. Dont get me wrong, trump should be impeached for all of his lawless activity, but here, it was over the war powers act and bombing Iran. While congress does have the ultimate power to declare war, executives have been granted limited power to wage it on a short term basis in order to respond quickly to crises. I admit, Trump abused this power. However, holding him accountable for it could actually have negative effects on future executives from being able to exercise power as needed. It could have a chilling effect causing future executives to wait for congress to act while they spend months deliberating over BS.
A lot of the anti war left gets RABID over this. Like, we had the issues with Bush. 9/11 happened, Bush responded quickly, but he also kinda abused the war powers act in his own ways. I dont think he should have been impeached over it, but the leftist "anti war" people were foaming at the mouth screaming WAR CRIMINAL and calling for him to be called before the hague. Which was...kinda insane. I believe that Bush's actions were largely within the realm of American law, and I would argue the same for Trump, even if I very strongly disagree with Trump on Iran. Like...again, it's not that we shouldnt impeach Trump, it's that we should actually argue for doing so on him actually abusing power in a flagrant way. The war powers act is awfully grey and murky to use as the justification for it.
And finally, the third issue. I watched Vaush responding to a discussion Ezra Kelin had over trans rights with someone and he kinda went full leftist on it. Okay, so...again, I'm mostly for trans rights. But seriously, can we just...give up a little on the sports issue where we're on the wrong side of an issue like 20-70 in order to make progress? The problem with the "max left" is they wanna be morally pure in all circumstances, when sometimes, the public just isnt there. We can advocate for our own stuff, try to raise consciousness, change opinions, but at the same time, sometimes it's better to have SOME progress over pushing too hard, creating a backlash, and getting NO progress because we end up alienating everyone in the process. And even I have to play this game with my own ambitions with getting rid of work, for example. Sometimes the public isnt there, and attacking those who wanna achieve what progress we CAN make sets back progress altogether. Like, take me vs Andrew Yang, does Yang meet every single purity test I have? No. Neither does Bernie Sanders. But...attacking them too hard is gonna accomplish what? Tanking the people most likely to push things my way? Again, people might wanna look at my previous posts on how to properly purity test. Youre not gonna get 100% of what you want, you get 80% and youre in good shape.
And btw, despite whatever misgivings I have with Mamdani, I'd support him over Cuomo, just to put my money where my mouth is. But I digress.
Honestly, I dont like the centrist establishment of the democratic party. But at the same time, I dont like the left either. Im somewhere in between the two. I want progress to be made, but we need to do so intelligently and strategically. Going full socialist, or full anti war whackcase, or full SJW is just going to alienate people and create backlash that drives people to literal conservatism. Again, it's a balance. It's hard to do properly, but we gotta manage it or we're just gonna set ourselves up for failure.
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