So, I finished the rest of Forward tonight. My second reading of this is a bit less positive than the first, given how I have since soured on some aspects of Andrew Yang's political trajectory post this book, and I have realized that i do have some fundamental differences in approach than him at times. Still, there is a lot I do agree with, it's just that our emphases seem different.
Chapter 19
This starts off very good. He basically gives us a rehash of the war on normal people and a push for human centered capitalism. I mean this is what drew me to yang in the first place. I love human centered capitalism, not just as a label for scrapping GDP like Yang uses it, but as an ethos to define an entire economic ideology. He pushed for UBI, and of course, he still supported medicare for all.
Beyond rehashing his 2020 classics, he kinda sorta fell apart on me though. He spent a lot of time discussing the virtues of a VAT while opposing the income tax. This is a huge difference I have with Yang. I dont like VAT for a variety of reasons. First of all, it devalues UBI itself. With a 10% VAT, Yang's UBI is only worth $10,800, not $12,000. Having a VAT isn't bad if we acknowledge this and overshoot our goal like Scott Santens' UBI plan attempted to do, but without that, it is a less optimal funding mechanism. I think a key aspect of funding UBI is that we should not subject the UBI itself to a tax. A lot of funding ideas, like VAT and LVT tend to focus on taxing people on things like consumption and land ownership, irrespective of their actual ability to pay. So if the person has no other income streams, where is the money coming from? Their UBI. And that shrinks their UBI and limits the effectiveness of the program. I know this is unpopular among a lot of people, Yang himself included, but I think taxing income is best. I admit that maybe we're not going to hit the millionaires like some people want. But, I'd rather have UBI act as a solid floor no one can fall under, and then tax income as people earn more money. I dont think this will have a major work disincentive. Most studies on UBI and NIT have looked at the effects of marginal tax rates between 30-70% and found that work disincentives are more mild than one would think. And all things considered, that's what the range of taxation would be under my UBI plan. People at the bottom part of the income distribution would pay something like 30% marginal tax rates, while this would go up to 65-70% at the high end. Most people in the middle would have a rate somewhere around 50%, akin to what people pay in the most progressive social democracies. That's about where my goal is.
His other proposal amounted to a jobs program, recognizing we need infrastructure improvements, shifts toward a green economy, etc. I mean, sure, we need some of these things, I have no doubt. But, I would only hire people to do things we NEED. I dont value work, jobs, or labor participation in and of itself. Quite the opposite. Yang seems to see UBI as needed as the economic reality is that people are up a creek without such a program. And don't get me wrong, I agree to some extent. BUT....I am more utopian in my desire to shift us away from work. I think we have a problem with values as a society, and we overvalue work and jobs. I dont see anything inherently positive about these things, whereas Yang is a bit more normie on this front. My ideal future is like the jetsons, or star trek, or RUR without the robots having a communist revolution. Ya know? We should value technology as a way to shift us away from work and toward a leisure economy. I could see a jobs program being a stop gap for the next ten years, but beyond that, I think we need to move away from work.
Chapter 20
Here Yang proposed a flurry of potential solutions to fix our political system, some of which I agreed with, some of which I did not so much. I'll just go through them.
Money for campaigns- He recognized repealing citizens united is likely a nonstarter, addressing a criticism I made of him in part 2, and he pushes his democracy dollars idea instead. Dont get me wrong, I support the idea, but I dont think this would be good in and of itself. I could see people throwing the money at presidential races and high profile congressional races while a lot of smaller races go ignored. Most people just dont care about local politics. Ya know? A big problem is there's just a lack of political knowledge among the population. Even as a political science grad I admit I kinda sorta just ignore a lot of local politics. I mean, how is the city councilman going to improve my life? Power is limited, and they're spending most of their time trying to kiss up to businesses down town so they can grow their tax revenue base. Of course, democracy dollars are intended to offset that, but how many people would really donate stuff there?
Competitive districts- Here he pushes for independent redistricting in order to reduce/eliminate gerrymandering. I like this idea but believe we need to go further and repeal/amend the reapportionment act of 1929. That's the one that limits the house to 435 members and was designed to protect the interests of politicians that represent rural districts, fearing that cities would come to dominate politics without it. This is why the GOP has such an advantage in congressional races. Even with independent redistricting, the system gerrymanders itself, because unless a district represents a large city like Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, which are large enough to have their own districts, smaller cities end up getting swallowed by a sea of red. That's what happens in much of PA, outside of the areas with the largest cities. And even if your district does lean left, that doesnt mean that it really predisposes itself to progressivism. My own district for example is more liberal, but only because it represents the votes of a lot of philly suburbanites who are fiscally conservative but socially liberal. Meanwhile my own politics are more fiscally progressive, but more socially moderate. I mean, this stuff is actually what drives a lot of the polarization and division in our country. Rural areas lean red, urban areas lean blue, the swing vote are suburbanites, and people who live in smaller cities that exist in every state are mere islands of liberal politics swallowed by a sea of red. We have next to no actual representation, because the district sizes are WAAAAY too big. I mean, this is why, the democratic party leans into social issues and is milquetoast on economics. It represents the interests of the bubble. And this is why the republicans are full of the DEY TUK R JERBS people, but instead of fixing the problems tend to lean into fake populism and obsess over social issues. The divisions of our politics is largely due to the demographics and perverse incentives of the system, and it's unhealthy. As I said, that's why im like politically homeless. I'm basically a small city progressive dealing with the economic blight associated with the war on normal people, I see it in my community every day, but given my city only has like 100k people in it or something, and districts have 800k people, good luck getting actual representation there. We're drowned out by that sea of red, or alternatively, the suburbanites in those larger cities like philly who are culturally just different and have different priorities. The reason why yang's 2020 agenda resonates like a wet fart is because no one really cares and those who are more affected by it don't really get representation. Again, we're talking cities ranging from say, 20k people to 200k people here. They exist. They're not centers of commerce. Most of them center around dying industries and our biggest employers these days are walmart and amazon. The democrats in particular don't seem to care. They're just interested in those big city votes and when it comes to people in the middle regions of pennsylvania, they're just like "we don't need you." Yeah, that's why you guys lost to trump in 2016, dumbbutts. That mindset also contextualizes why yang came across so many people who didn't trust the democrats on the camapign trail. What have the democrats done for these people since the 1980s? NOTHING. If we want to fix the system, we need to change the incentives, so yes, independent redistricting is good, but removing the reapportionment act of 1929 is good. We should ideally have something like 1300 representatives or something these days. THis would also remove the inherent republican bias in the electoral college as well.
Open primaries- I like the concept, but reading the details, I'm not sure on this one. The top five system is interesting but I havent researched this issue enough to have a solid opinion on it. I would agree closed primaries are a problem though. They're a huge reason why we end up getting stinker candidates. The only people who vote in dem primaries are the people who huff mainstream democrat's farts, with most people who have other opinions either not being registered as dem out of principle or are otherwise less engaged. Point is, they aint showing up for the primary. And that's how we get losers like Clinton, Biden, Kamala, etc.
Ranked choice voting- Fully support
Term limits- Not sure. He makes valid points. I know in discussing incentives he discussed seniority being a problem. But I've also heard if we have term limits, it might just ensure the people with the real power are the donors and lobbyists, although he has issues on that too. Still, he mentioned 18 years for each house of congress. That's valid. I've floated this exact idea before. I think this is a solid middle ground. So I lean in favor of this, but I can be persuaded either way.
Passing laws- here he mentioned getting rid of arcane rules that slow progress like getting rid of the filibuster. I'm mixed on this. I think the option should exist, but I'd go back to the talking filibuster rather than what we have now where the GOP can just hit the filibuster and obstruct everything. No, you wanna filibuster, you get up there and you talk for 24 hours straight like the good old days. This will allow people to do it to make principled stands, but not just obstruct everything. Make it take actual effort. Ya know? He also mentioned restoring earmarks. I kinda have to agree. I know we kinda hated earmarks and thought getting rid of them was good at the time, but that used to be how we got people on board with legislative agendas. Without them, things have grinded to a halt.
Civic juries- This one I full on don't like. Im not a fan of direct democracy, as most voters have no freaking clue what they're doing here. I like the idea of representative democracy. We trust representatives to make law and handle all of the nuances for us, and we vote for them based on whether we think they've done a good job. We just need more options, which has tried to address elsewhere.
Ban on lobbying - Oh heck yes. Also would potentially solve my issue with term limits.
So yeah, all in all, some good solutions, some solutions im mixed on, and a handful i don't like. All in all, I like this kind of thinking though, and largely value and respect this sort of stuff though.
Chapter 21
Here he advocates for fixing the media. He supports tax credits to encourage people to buy newspaper subscriptions, which I wouldnt support, as i kind of have a "sink or swim" philosophy there (let local journalists rely on UBI to fund their lifestyles IMO). Cable news, he supported returning to the fairness doctrine, which I largely also support. With social media he supports amending section 230 to hold companies more liable for the stuff they publish. I'm hard NO on this one. I support section 230, and largely see yang's measure here as authoritarian. He seems to focus more on algorithms here, which we could discuss. I'd personally like to see net neutrality standards apply to most social media platforms without an explicit purpose to advance or be a safe space for a certain agenda. He talked about encouraging more user responsbility and encouraging people to verify their identity. Again, hard against, and i say this as someone semi anonymous here. I dont want this stuff attached to my real name. If it was, it would impact my ability to get a job, for example. I love the anonymous nature of the internet, and really think yang's desire to regulate social media and the like is just...no. I see him as too authoritarian here. Finally, to replace advertising, Yang supports giving people money to pay for ad free versions of social media sites. Again, I kinda think sink or swim according to the free market is fine here. I think we can talk about social media algorithms being more neutral, but other than that, I think his ideas here are awful.
Chapter 22
Chapter 22 talks about extremism and Jonathan Haidt's moral foundations theory. He talks about how the right and left have different moral foundations, and the right is more able to win rhetorically because they appeal to all 6 moral foundations. He also pointed out how his campaign used a different political language than most on the left engage in. He believes these moral foundations are not always something we can choose and that they are based on innate preferences. He thinks if we can't find common ground in the future, we may be heading toward a civil war.
Honestly, this is one of those times where I kind of cringe on this. I've seen people throw around this theory before, like in discussions of political philosophy, morality, where people lie on the political compass, and I'm going to be honest, I'm not really a fan of it. Because it seems to give this false equivalence between the philosophical basis between the left and right in terms of validity, and I just don't see the world that way.
Yes, a lot of the right's focus on stuff like authority, purity, and loyalty is kind of primal, and people are born with it. So what? It doesn't mean it's equally valid from an intellectual perspective. As you guys know if you follow this blog, I started out on the right, and I shifted left as I got older. A lot of the reason for that was my education. In terms of demographics, im predisposed to trumpism. I'm a white working class individual who grew up in the rust belt, watched the decline of opportunities happen over the course of my life, and I was raised conservative. But, as it turned out, college and education did make a difference. And to go into worldviews a la David Noebel again, worldviews matter.
While there are some elements of these things being biological, a lot of our morals is defined by our socializations. Do you think I don't have innate disgust reflexes that would predispose me to a high support for the concept of "purity" for example? of course I do. IRL, I'm a germophobe, and quite frankly, christian purity culture still haunts me on sexuality to some extent. I mean, sex ed in high school included comparing women who had sex outside of marriage is putting a hershey kiss in someone's mouth and then wrapping it back up again. I STILL have left over issues related to that crap quite frankly.
Yes, in preparation for my reaction, I retook a test online discussing the moral foundations, and my actual morality is associated with left liberal patterns of moral thinking. I like things like caring, fairness, and liberty, while I dont value authority, purity, or loyalty much at all. I admit there are some parts of this that are based on biology. Being autistic, and not giving much of a crap about the opinion of others and arbitrary social conventions, i just don't "get" the ideal of loyalty much. Like some of the questions were like "your friend broke up with someone and told everyone in her friend group not to date them, then soemone did, is that bad?" No. Quite frankly, your friends shouldnt dictate who you do and dont date, and while i could see this burning bridges, that's their problem, not mine. Or the thing about soccer players and wearing the wrong color shoes. I kinda get the team spirit thing, but at the same time, it's like...i dont value conformity and dont like having a group's ethics imposed on me. Stuff like that.
I mean, the basis of my own morality might have started out, to some extent, as being due to biology but a lot of it IS upbringing. And a lot of my morality and ethics comes from sound, internalized moral principles, and it is based more on things like logic, and reason, and whether this hurts or helps people, or imposes undue obligations on people. I basically believe, much like JS Mill would, that the only valid reason to restrict behavior is to prevent harm to others. And if we're going to impose a positive duty on people, it should come with greater well being and liberty. Like paying taxes to have a society without poverty and freedom to say no, I think this is a valid idea that very much falls within the idea of enlightened self interest. We value rules, because the rules benefit us, and humanity as a whole. That said, wanna know what i DONT like? Arbitrary morals and ethics based on authority and crap like that. Why should we value authority? The only valid basis of authority is to uphold the other values. We shouldnt value authority in and of itself. We should resent and want to dismantle unjust authorities, and seek to liberate people from being coerced into authoritarian social structures (like jobs). Loyalty, i mean, if you want to have whatever ethics in your little social group you want, that's fine, but i dont value supporting the group or people for its own sake. Unless the person means a lot to me, like a close family member or romantic partner, I cant say I really value loyalty. And purity? Well, while i get it, i also understand this is instinctual and often not really...rational, so I aint gonna impose rules on people. Honestly, a lot of these kinds of moral behaviors fall within the realm of personal morality, not morality that matters in politics. The purpose of political is to uphold life, well being, and liberty. Personal morality, we can discuss more conservative bases of it, but I dont think that people have a right to impose that on people. For example, if you find the idea of gay sex "icky", that's fine, i dont wanna make you engage in it. But when you try to tell others they cant engage in it because of your disgust reflex, that's where the line is drawn. A lot of stuff should be legal that disagrees with some of these more conservative oriented moral bases.
That said, and I say this, again, as an ex conservative progressive, I honestly value liberal morality more than i value conservative morality. I believe one side is objectively better in terms of politics and logic, and I believe the other side is irrational and appeals to base emotions and reflexes that do not provide a sound basis for public policy. That said, i couldn't give a crap less about conservatives and their morality. Screw their morality. They're irrational authoritarians who we should not listen to.
And this is where i disagree with yang. Yang loves to do this feel good reach across the aisle and sing kumbaya thing. but he seems to be the stereorypical "both sides are equally bad" enlightened centrist in the process. And we all see now how that has played out.
And as far as us heading toward a civil war. Uh...whose fault is that? He mentions Jan 6th in his book here. Who was at january 6th? Was it the left or the right? It was the right, right? And why did they do it? Because Trump lied to his base about the election being stolen, and he basically incited a riot. I'm sorry, there is no "both sides" here. Im not interested in hearing about the right and their side of the story. They are FACTUALLY WRONG. PERIOD. It's like this so much. There's a reason i dont discuss the right a ton on this blog unless I'm outright blasting them for being the epitome of evil. Because to me, the modern right IS the epitome of evil. We need to stop trying to contextualize and make excuses for the crazed Nutzi crowd. They are wrong, their moral basis is explicitly evil, and while I would give them free speech, other than that, F their feelings. I dont care about how they feel this isnt the america they want any more because SCREW THE AMERICA THEY WANT. Seriously, for them to get their way, WE would have to lose our freedom. And that's unacceptable.
I don't go as far as the paradox of tolerance folks, and I know yang would discuss those folks to point to the opposite extreme. And sure, they exist. yang discussed SJW nuts ("social justice fundamentalists") on his podcast this week with some dude who wrote a book on the subject, and I agree, they're illiberal and shouldnt be tolerated either. I have outright criticized them and blasted them a lot on here. But dont think, just because i believe Nutzis are entitled to a certain level of free speech that every member of our society is entitled to, and that they should be free from political violence like outright punching and harassing them like the "antifa" extremist types wanna do, doesn't mean that I support or in any way endorse them. No. I'm literally opposed to just about everything they are for, and Yang needs to stop acting like the threat to our democracy is a "both sides" issue. It's more 80% the right, and 20% the left. The side most predisposed to political violence and is an objective threat to our democracy is the right. The left have issues, dont get me wrong, and extremism exists on both sides, but just look at how the right has been acting since 2016. Nay, since 2008, if we really wanna come down to it. Or maybe we really should go back to 1994 (gingrich's contract with america) or even 1980 (election of reagan). But ESPECIALLY since 2016. The issue is more right than left. Even if crazy leftists exist, and SJWs exist, the Nutzis and the trumpers and the qanon whackos are on their own level of crazy, and are the greatest fundamental threat to our country. If anyone is going to bring us to civil war, it's these guys.
Speaking of which, how do we prevent a civil war? By creating a new consensus on the issues. That's what party realignments are. We end up coming to a consensus as a society. Post 1860, we had a civil war over slavery, the north won, and that was the consensus. FDR in 1932 gave us the new deal. Boom thats a consensus that staved off both fascism and communism. 1980, Reagan, for better or for worse, gave us a consensus around neoliberalism. We need a new consensus. But ultimately, that consensus has to be one that espouses left wing progressive values, and one that pushes the right out of the existing overton window. If we have a consensus around the right and their values, that's going to mean dark times ahead. It's going to mean a return to the gilded age on economics. It's going to mean a regression on individual liberty and rights of all kinds of different groups on social issues. That's bad, that's literally dystopian, and unlike the right and their claims of left wing society being tyranny, this version of society they want would be tyranny. because it would mean going back to the 1950s or even earlier. That's what they want. The right has been fighting the left ever since the left scored wins in the 1930s onward. Since the 1930s on economics and the 1960s on social issues. The right wants to go back to how things were over half a century ago. That's their long term goal. And given they keep losing, theyre starting to think the only way we can get there is through force. And that's what january 6th was about. So yeah, screw the right. I'm not going to dignify them, play paddy cake with them, or validate their feelings. SCREW THEM.
That is all.
Chapter 23
In this chapter Yang talked about taxes and government. He started off discussing how the hierarchical nature of businesses makes changes fast and is efficient and how nonprofits and government are harder because you need to build consensus. This made me reflect on the idea of worker cooperatives and market socialism. I know theres a lot of talk about such things, but honestly, something that makes me iffy about "economic democracy" is that in practice, it's messy, isn't it? I mean, what would the actual logistics look like? Wouldnt it make businesses inefficient and full of stakeholders that dont like change, limiting people to a status quo that in the "adapt or die" mentality of the market environment is sometimes fatal? Not saying capitalist businesses don't fail, and let's be honest, a lot of the people who marvel at the glories of the free market here are often rich and also hate unions, or any regulation, or blah blah blah, but still, I do have to wonder about the logistics of worker coops here.
Beyond that, Yang talks about simplifying government. He thinks the government should file taxes for us, while in reality the tax lobby stops this from happening. In this sense I have to agree that yes, efficiency is better. He also talks about having tax bounty hunters in the private sector find tax evaders and collect a fraction of the settlement. Given biden has beefed up tax enforcement I'm not sure about this one, but it's an idea.
Beyond that, he talked about how slow and sluggish the hiring process is to do things in the federal government, and how hard it is to make a simple website. Yang talked about making a federal web site that is a one stop shop for well, everything. He even got a team of volunteers to make such site within a few months. Once again, showing the efficiency of the free market and the inefficiency of government.
Im going to honest, I kind of agree with yang here. The ex conservative in me hates all of the bloat the government has and i dont understand why its so hard for the government to do simple things. The problem is these systems get mired down in bureaucracy, while the free market tends to punish the inefficient by throwing them out of business. While we have all seen how "government run like a business" a la Trump isn't a good idea in a lot of ways (Trump never really ingratiated himself into how to handle government, hes used to throwing tantrums until he gets what he wants, which doesn't work in government), I do see where yang is coming from here. Imagine if we combined the efficiency of the market with the humanity of government. it really is the epitome of human centered capitalism in action.
Honestly, we dont want massive bureaucracies doing stuff, we want simple policies doing simple things. This is why UBI is better than welfare. This is why medicare for all or at least a medicare extra for all public option is better than the hot mess that is obamacare. The more complex you make policy, the more moving parts that can break down along the way. So yeah, I do see where yang is coming from and largely agree here.
Chapter 24
Here Yang goes back and discusses grace and tolerance in detail. He basically acknowledges, we're all human, we all have flaws, we all have bad days, we should tolerate each other through our flaws and bad days. I do think remembering the human is important, but at the same time, this shouldn't stop us from firmly and unapologetically putting forward humanist ideas that make life better. Sometimes Yang gets a bit too warm and fuzzy with people who we quite frankly should see as "opposition." For Yang, that's a dirty word. it's a dirty concept. he wants to be friends with everyone, and IMO, sometimes that makes people a poor fit for politics, which ultimately is a battle over ideas. It's fine to recognize others' humanity. It's one of the reasons im not full on "paradox of intolerance" like the SJWs or as the dude yang had on his podcast calls them, the SJFs. But that's about where i draw the line. Everyone is human, everyone has certain rights within society, we shouldnt suspend these ideas just because we dont like people, BUT....in politics, again, it's a battle for ideas. And while I respect a lot of yang's ideas along the way, Yang himself sometimes strikes me as not cut out for politics. He's too soft, he's too unwilling to throw punches, he's not able to actually fight for the things that matter because his personality type is one of trying to be friends and find common ground with everyone. No, Andrew, you cant do that in politics and be successful. This is what this dude doesnt understand sometimes. Theres a middle ground between that "enlighten centrist" middle ground hes trying to make, and the fundamentalists who see everyone they dont like as evil. And he just fails to get it.
When i really come back to this, this is why the forward party failed in my eyes. Yang ultimately abandoned his ideas because he'd rather do this warm and fuzzy cieclejerk of singing kumbaya with people who doesnt agree with, than actually advancing the causes he claims to be for. Its his fundamental flaw, and why this dude will never get anywhere.
Chapter 25
This chapter discussed a lot of more personal memories, stuff like him campaigning for Warnock with MLK III in Georgia and stuff like that. he talked about interviewing for secretary of labor within the biden administration and pitched his idea for automation destroying millions of jobs, and pushing for solutions like a higher minimum wage, parental leave, rights to unionize, and a "race for a million jobs". I mean, again, for as much as the left criticizes the dude, he does seem pretty progressive push comes to shove. Still he seemed reluctant to actually take a position in the administration and didn't want to leave NYC. He turned his humanity forward organization into a lobbying organization for cash relief and jokes they were "the peoples' lobbyist", also based. He seemed proud to get cash relief on the radar, but im disappointed he hasnt stuck with it. Did this inflationary wave really poison the idea that badly? We need UBI advocates pushing back against the "inflation happened because we gave people money" angle, and Yang by shifting away from the idea and refusing to talk about it seems to be letting the idea die. And that's a shame. Everything in this inflationary wave can be contextualized. But if Yang doesnt wanna stand up for it, then we just lost one of our biggest advocates for it.
Either way at the end of the chapter he talked about how just as he seemed to be riding high, January 6th happened, and that seemed to change his focus. Dont get me wrong, january 6th is a problem, and i know some of what i discussed in chapter 22 above is related to january 6th, so let me reiterate. January 6th happened, because donald trump LIED to his supporters, who already have a cultish devotion to him and a revulsion to facts, education, or any sort of intellectualism, and who are in their own little worldview so hard that they actually believed him when he said that the election was stolen from him. He incited them to riot over a lie. he knew what he was doing, he was completely in the wrong, his supporters were in the wrong, and there's no making nice with these people andrew. We need to stop worrying so much about polarization and focus on UBI and cash relief. If you wanna solve the root causes of the problem, you need to push for a set of ideas for americans to build a consensus around. Forward doesnt have that. But you know what can cause it? A new New Deal. We need to do the same thing FDR did in the 1930s and push for a new vision that unites americans and causes them to step away from the cliff of extremism. And Yang, you had a good platform for that. So dropping that to go with this enlightened centrism nonsense just...isnt good.
It's sad how close this guy is to getting it and then he misses the mark.
Chapter 26
Here, he outlines his vision for the forward party. He really is good at problem definition in this book. he acknowledges the economic problems, and he also acknowledges the political problems. I just wish that he put his ideas first instead of singing kumbaya with people he doesnt really agree with on much.
To revisit his original principles:
Ranked choice voting and open primaries- I largely agree
Fact based governance- I agree here too, but this is why we must come down hard on the right. They've lived in an alternate universe for decades now. That universe has different names. The fundamentalist christian worldview. Trumpworld. In 2012, Jon Stewart called it "BS mountain." We need to stand for the facts, and again, the only way to do that is to embrace a vision that is sadly more left than right.
Human centered capitalism- Again, based
Effective and modern government- Yes, let's make government simple and "just work", yes. I agree.
UBI- I mean, bruh, do you even need to read my blog to know this? I love UBI.
Grace and tolerance- I know early on when I first visited these since principles, I was leery of this one. And after seeing where forward has gone since, I have to say, I gotta reject this one.
Because let's look at where forward went. All we have now are RCV, open primaries, independent redistricting, and a fixation on this "grace and tolerance" idea. This came at the expense of all other priorities, including UBI and human centered capitalism. he abandoned his original vision to go in with this crap, and it's disappointing. Sorry, it is. We need people with balls to push for bold ideas. This forward party isnt it any more.
I was willing to tolerate this at first. I mean, some level of grace and tolerance is good. Again, we dont wanna be so fundamentalist we ignore the oppositions' humanity. I feel like this is the problem that a lot of ideologues in society have. BUT....ideas are important, and maybe we shouldnt be playing patty cake with people who fundamentally have different value systems than us. Values are important, worldviews are important, ideologies are important, ideas are important, and policies are important. Again, moderation is key here. Theres a middle ground between extreme fundamentalism and what yang's doing. I think the fundamentalist christians kinda had it right when they said, hate the sin, love the sinner. Dont ignore peoples' humanity, but when they're for things that are actively harmful, at some point we have to push back and stop them. And sometimes we have to be aggressive in pushing our ideas. I dont see why this middle ground isnt obvious. It was obvious to people not long ago. Ya know, the idea that you can disagree with them and not want them dead or in jail or something? Ya know? We can recognize peoples' basic humanity while still being like "you guys are wrong, your ideas are bad, and we are against you." I mean, that's kind of the cornerstone of democracy. We can all hate each other, but push comes to shove, we abide by the democratic transfer of power, we all sit together at the dinner table at thanksgiving, blah blah blah. Ya know? Again, middle ground.
Afterword
Yang ultimately decided to run for NYC mayor while writing this book. He mentioned how he wanted to help reopen NYC post covid. He wanted to garner the support of unions but they rejected him in favor of opponents. Again, relationships in politics are everything. As the city reopened he mentioned how the race pivoted from being about COVID and the need for cash relief, where Yang was strong, to being about crime. He ended up endorsing Kathryn garcia, and ultimately, Yang didn't get strong support. They had RCV and the race extolled the virtues of it, but in my opinion, it also showed why this isn't the end all be all.
I mean, yang lost. Wiley, who would've been my second choice lost. Eric Adams, the establishment pick, won. And that's the thing. The establishment pick still won. Yang mentioned only 11% of people showed up to vote, which, fair point. But the ones who did were all the people who huff the democratic party's farts. Outsiders didnt show up. The race was primarily between the establishment faction and the insurgent progressive faction that i typically default to when not backing yang. And let's be honest, the progressives were not nice to yang. I remember when that race went on. They attacked yang over everything, went insane over purity tests, and called him a grifter and blah blah blah. I hate to say it, but yang kinda proves their point sometimes, considering where he's gone since with forward. I still think grifter is a bit too strong of a word, but "sell out" isnt necessarily IMO. The point is, progressives like people with convictions. They want all politicians to be like bernie, for better or worse. Or even more hard lined than bernie since they accuse him of selling out too.
Honestly, this is why im not gung ho on yang's direction here. RCV in and of itself solves nothing. There are too many rival factions within the dems that are larger than us for us to win elections any way. We need to focus on building coalitions based around a set of values, principles, and policies. Yang started out with some decent policies, but then he went all in with "let's make nice with these anti trump conservatives", which just gets progressives' ire even more. I cant even mention yang in progressive circles without some fire breathing "socialist" going on about how he's a sell out and blah blah blah and how human centered capitalism is a joke and we need literal socialism. It hapepns more than you think. And I'm actually willing to push back. Sometimes this just leads to them screeching into the void about how im wrong, but i have had some people have begrudging respect for me after a solid discussion about policy preferences, ideology, etc.
As I see it, the best hope for us to get thigns done, is to build a coalition with other progressive lefties. Yang's vision IS progressive. I know theres the saying in the UBI community, its not left or right, its forward, but in the modern environment, again, it's much more left than right. The right is intellectually bankrupt, they're not worth dealing with. Most people who are pro UBI in a serious way come from the left. Because at the end of the day, once we put the idea to paper and make a plan to get there, what the left wants and what the right wants are two different things. And my vision is far more left than right. I know i rip leftists a lot on this blog. I do, I admit it. And they deserve it when I do. BUT....who are we more likely to get progress from, people who genuinely want to make the world a better place and have a worldview based somewhat in reality and/or sound academic principles? Or the crazed religious nutters who stormed the capitol because their cult leader convinced them that the election he lost was stolen? it's not even close. The right doesnt even want to make the world a better place. Let that sink in. THEIR VALUES ARE SO WARPED THAT THE IDEA OF ELIMINATING OR REDUCING HUMAN SUFFERING AND MAKING THE WORLD BETTER ISN'T EVEN A GOAL OF THEIRS. Seriously, try talking to the right on values. I've had some major oh crap moments recently when i realized that we cant even agree that the point of morality and government is to reduce human suffering and to ehance the quality of life. Seriously, this is why i dont respect moral foundations like "purity" and "authority" and "loyalty." Really, i dont even RESPECT them. because they're not even based on reason, and if we cant even agree on the most basic of ideas and values, then why should i waste my time trying to deal with these guys?
Again, as you can see, this is a major disagreement I have with yang. He wants to see the best in everyone, and again, everyone does have some basic humanity, and they are entitled to dignity, rights, whatever. I mean im not totally against grace and tolerance, but i do think yang overdoes it by a factor of 10 or more. Again grace and tolerance is supposed to be baked into our liberal democracy's ethos. Rahter than having a system where we kill, imprison, or deny the rights of those we disagree with, we...live and let live. Amazing. I know. But that's just basic american democracy. While its good to emphasize this in an era where political violence is becoming disturbingly commonplace, let's not freaking get carried away. I feel like yang gets carried away.
Conclusion (mine)
So, this book in general. Do I like this book as much as the war on normal people? Not by a long shot. Yang had it right in 2020, and now? hes a shell of his former self. While he had the best of intentions here, its clear he went all in with his warm and fuzzy grace and tolerance stuff over everything else. This book is more hit and miss for me as a result. When he talked about UBI, human centered capitalism, and the like, he was dead on. When he talked about political dysfunction and constructive institutionalism, still doing a pretty good job here. But then there were parts where i just got turned off. Yang isnt perfect, hes a flawed human being. His ideas arent perfect, and honestly, I think that since this book was written his party has since face planted. Again, too much grace and tolerance, not enough of anything else. Again, not saying some level of grace and tolerance isn't needed, but looking back at this book, it's aging poorly for me. The first read through of it i liked it a lot. Almost as much as the war on normal people. This second time he just kinda misses the mark for me. I cant help but think of what could have been, and how he just made the worst decisions possible to drive his original movement into the ground. Disappointing.
I mean, the war on normal people was a solid 9/10 for me.
This book? Meh....7/10? I mean, it's still yang, im gonna find common ground with the dude, but uh...let's just say I feel like I can see the seeds of forward's own destruction in this book. I really just wanted more 2020 yang. Not this. And his shift of priorities upsets me. I would say i agree with about 70% of what is proposed in this book, I just feel like that other 30% is kinda important and speaks to why ive cooled on yang so much in the past year.
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