General Discussion

Last edited Mon Dec 30, 2024, 01:32 PM - Edit history (1)

Many of our most thoughtful, good-hearted DU'er's from the old days were literally banned because they became critical of the DNC's corporate and neo-liberal turn.

You can't have a big tent if you can't brook disagreement, especially when all the critique is asking for is a return to the kind of old-fashioned, pro-labor, anti-war, pro-free speech values that the Dems used to stand for (and that Trump now pretends to embrace!)

I don't think we have to give up being anti-racist, etc.; I just think we need to get back to standing up for the middle class.

Another thing that would be helpful is to start talking a better game of taxing the rich. We've been cutting taxes for decades – always cutting a little bit for the middle class and a whole lot for the rich – and as a result, our economy, infrastructure, social safety net, etc. are a disaster. Other developed countries have much higher taxes and yet still have middle classes living in much greater material comfort, with free health care, longer life expectancies, free education, free childcare, lower retirement ages, etc. etc. We need to make the case for raising the taxes to do at least some of these things and make clear that the middle class can gain more than it loses from properly-designed higher taxes so long as the rich are made to pay their fair share.

There are many other issues like this, where we've allowed our policies to be run by Wall St. and big corporations. In all these areas, we need to talk a better game and make the case for the idea of our common social welfare, instead of continuing to acquiesce in the dog-eat-dog, might-is-right, greed-is-good ethos we've acquiesced in since Reagan.