Pro-Sanders group rebranding into 'pragmatic progressives'

[lapucelle]

Stinging from the disappointment of Bernie Sanders’ loss in the 2016 Democratic presidential primary, supporters pumped millions into the powerful advocacy group Our Revolution to keep the progressive fight alive and prepare for another swing at the White House.

But after another defeat in 2020, the 79-year-old Vermont senator is unlikely to run for president a third time. And the organization centered on his fiery brand of politics is undergoing a rebranding.

Rather than insisting on “Medicare for All” — Sanders’ trademark universal, government-funded health care plan — or the climate-change-fighting Green New Deal, Our Revolution is focusing on the more modest alternatives endorsed by President Joe Biden. Those include expanding eligibility for the existing Medicare program and curtailing federal subsidies for fossil fuel companies.

snip================================================================================

“I think we are rooted in a bold, progressive vision, but we’re also pragmatic progressives,” Geevarghese said.

Sanders, who now heads the powerful Senate budget committee, can’t legally work with outside political groups like Our Revolution. But many of his top allies have been closely aligned with the group since its August 2016 founding.

The senator didn’t comment for this story.

snip================================================================================

California Rep. Ro Khanna, a member of the House Progressive Caucus, said Our Revolution has mastered an “understanding of the minutia” of policy better than many activist groups. Recently, the group’s focus has been “translating the ideals into practical wins,” Khanna said.

That’s a far cry from the group’s founding, when some activists worried that it was the kind of outside fundraising organization that could make Sanders — and his denunciations of big-money politics — look hypocritical. Sanders also spent the 2020 presidential campaign saying he didn’t want a super PAC, even as Our Revolution effectively acted like one for him.

https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-climate-change-election-2020-campaign-2016-3c6a4d7b4ff078f5eced9e389ac0f644?utm_source=Twitter&utm_campaign=SocialFlow&utm_medium=AP_Politics

[wryter2000]

1. Wonder where Nina Turner will fit in with this

Overall, this is a good move. What good has an insistence on Medicare for All done us?

[Budi]

2. Biden moved them to the middle?

Ok then.

[lapucelle]

3. I guess some of them finally accepted the fact that pragmatism helps accomplish long term goals.

That's how President Obama got the ACA.

And that's how we in NYS accomplished the $15 an hour minimum wage and tuition-free community college and state university while other states like VT are still chasing those goals.

[Tom Rinaldo]

5. Biden moved toward the left and they toward the center

President Biden and Senate Budget Committee Chair Sanders enjoy a good working relationship.

[Budi]

28. Naaah. Biden was there long before 2020 arrived.

Negotiations as Vice President
Biden played a key role in negotiating with Republicans on Capitol Hill after his election as vice president in 2008.

He helped the Obama administration pass several key pieces of legislation, including the 2010 Tax Relief Act, the Budget Control Act of 2011, which dealt with a debt ceiling crisis, and the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012. The 2012 act resolved the so-called "fiscal cliff."


Obamacare and the "Cancer Moonshot"
Biden has previously highlighted his role in the passage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), also called Obamacare. This was the Obama's signature piece of healthcare legislation, which passed in 2010 with limited bipartisan support and Biden's personal role seems to have been getting his own party on board.

He later helped to launch a "Cancer Moonshot" initiative in 2016 aimed at improving the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of the disease. The Lancet Oncology, a medical journal specializing in cancer, gave Biden an unprecedented endorsement on October 1, 2020 for his commitment to healthcare and cancer research.

Career in the Senate
➡️Biden sponsored one of the first climate change bills in the Senate in 1986 and went on to propose curbing greenhouse gas emissions in 2007.⬅️

In 2008, he successfully passed the PROTECT Our Children Act, which was aimed at addressing the online exploitation of children.

Biden has played a role in foreign policy, serving as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee three times. He spoke passionately about the need to place sanctions on Apartheid-era South Africa in 1986 and advocated for intervention in Yugoslavia in the 1990s as that country descended into civil war and ethnic cleansing.


He also pushed for former Eastern Bloc countries to join NATO after the fall of the Soviet Union, which many of them did.



The Violence Against Women Act
Biden co-sponsored the original Violence Against Women Act in 1994 along with Republican Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah. Biden was chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee at the time.

The act passed with bipartisan support in both houses of Congress and following its passage, intimate partner violence against females fell 53 percent up to 2008, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics.

The 1994 Crime Bill
This is perhaps the most controversial aspect of Biden's career.


Senate Judiciary Committee
As ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee in 1986, Biden urged then President Ronald Reagan to withdraw Jeff Sessions as a nominee for the federal district court in Alabama amid allegations that Sessions had made racially insensitive comments to staff while he was U.S. attorney in Mobile, Alabama. Sessions was not confirmed but went on to be a U.S. senator and attorney general under Trump.

Biden became chair of the Judiciary Committee in 1987 and served until 1995. He was instrumental in preventing the confirmation of Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork. Opposition to Bork centered on his views about the court's decisions on civil rights and abortion.

He also presided over the confirmation hearings of the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg in 1993. She was just the second woman to ever sit on the court.

That's just a snippet of Joe Biden's accomplishments telling us which side of the center line he sits.

He is Centet Left. A Democratic moderate. And in his own words, "I am not a socialist".

His accomplishments on behalf of fairness, women's rights, foreign policy to gun legislation &, Climate/Greenhouse gasses, make the case for why Joe Biden became our President on Jan 21, 2021.

No one can stake a claim in moving Biden anywhere.
Joe Biden moves as he sees fair & fit. And he has alwayse been capable of that.

That absolute trust, is why Joseph R Biden is President & no one else is.

No one moved Joe Biden off the course he successfully walked for 40 years.

[Tom Rinaldo]

72. Nice research. Yep, Joe Biden has always been center left, and a good man

Many have long called him a liberal. Others have called him a moderate. Some previously called him progressive, but there is pretty much a consensus among political observers that Biden has embraced positions in his platform and now his administration that are left of where his own political center of gravity had long been.

I like President Biden. I support President Biden. I am very very pleased with his leadership. Still I disagree with you that he has not moved to the left. The fact that he clearly was a liberal all along does not dissuade me from that view which is shared by a great many people, many if not most of whom are not Sanders supporters.

But this topic does not move me to engage in further debate. My original post as you recall was essentially one sentence. We can agree to disagree if you like, while still agreeing that we both are grateful that Joe Biden is our president.

[Cha]

61. Pres Biden Appointed Sanders to

that position and now Sanders is supporting Nina Turner who doesn't know the Difference between trump and Now Pres Joe Biden.

Sanders Campaign Co-Chair Nina Turner Rips Biden: Choosing Between Him and Trump is Like Eating From a ‘Bowl of Sh*t’

https://www.democraticunderground.com/100213815901

[Budi]

84. Bit the hand that reached out to him, did he?

Expected nothing less.

[Cha]

88. Exactly.. some "working relationship.."

Predictable.

[Kahuna]

108. Word...

[LizBeth]

4. So basically they are not trying to own what many other Dems have already promoted because

as we all told them, they were not being pragmatic and it wouldn't get done. Just maddening and all the damage they did in 2016.

[lapucelle]

8. They are dropping their push for medicaid for all and a green new deal.

They spent 5 years condemning Democrats for the type of pragmatism that they are now claiming to embrace.

That nonsense helped elect Trump. Too little, too late.

[LizBeth]

9. Totally hear you. All the damage they caused. I shake my head.

[Paladin]

15. I'll never forget or forgive them for 2016.

Not just for putting trump in office, but for the damage they did, here at DU. To this very day, I switch channels whenever Bernie Sanders turns up.

[Cha]

18. TY.. well said.

[Paladin]

19. I don't enjoy being that vengeful to a bunch of liberals.

But I passed my 20th anniversary at DU a few days ago, and the ugliness of the 2016 campaign was a definite low point at this place. Hope it never ever gets that bad, again.

[Cha]

22. I hear ya.. I don't like it either.

I just had my 19 year here in early July.

[LizBeth]

37. +1. And our opportunity for a first woman president not to mention the SC.

[Paladin]

39. And the creation of a trump-worshipping cult...

...currently trying to end our democracy.

Yes, the damage from 2016 cannot be minimized.

[LizBeth]

50. Yes.

[Kahuna]

109. I'm a long time DUer. Almost 20 years. I totally sat out 2016 on DU...

I knew it would be ugly.

[Paladin]

110. You were wiser than I was. (nt)

[LetMyPeopleVote]

80. Welcome the establishment Our Revolution!

Link to tweet

[lapucelle]

86. Brilliant...

[lapucelle]

87. Don't they know that Biden already cancelled federal subsidies to the fossil fuel industry

by executive order during his his first week in office and that his budget goes even farther? Don't they watch the news?

https://grist.org/politics/biden-is-eliminating-fossil-fuel-subsidies-but-he-cant-end-them-all/

https://www.nrdc.org/experts/sujatha-bergen/market-warping-oilgas-subsidies-way-out-biden-budget

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-treasury-tax-energy/biden-tax-plan-replaces-u-s-fossil-fuel-subsidies-with-clean-energy-incentives-idUSKBN2BU2HL

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-07/biden-tax-plan-targets-fossil-fuel-subsidies-worth-35-billion

https://www.vox.com/22363539/oil-gas-subsidies-biden-solar-wind-tax-reform-infrastructure-bill

Link to tweet

[George II]

91. They're too busy telling elected officials what to do to actually see what they've already done.

[betsuni]

93. Of course not. It's assumed Democrats do nothing progressive and have bad intentions.

No checking or researching allowed. No reading the Democratic Party platform. Obama campaigning for president on a Green New Deal and a public option and his regulation of Wall Street, Hillary running on a public option and Medicare at 55 and all of her plans, Biden running on the most progressive platform in history and putting together the most diverse administration in history. All of that's not real! They don't REALLY mean it. I've been assured this many times.

Bernie Sanders was interviewed in 2017 and asked: now that Republicans control congress what about Medicare for All? He said the best thing would be to try for a public option and Medicare at 55.

[Nixie]

100. Amen! "Pragmatic progressives"...AKA DEMOCRATS.

This is a sad and pathetic admission here. It's just stunning how much disruption they cased over nothing just to promote themselves through some deceptive "brands." Wow.

[Nixie]

99. Thank you, lapucelle! This is and has always been the point with the brand builders.

All they accomplished by disowning previously "pragmatic" progressives -- also known as Democrats -- is to elect Trump. Now look at how much they have to morph their brand into mainstream ideas. Maybe some "green new deal" headbangers will now find a way to give Al Gore credit for the information he brought to light some 25 years ago. It's a pathetic reach for this exposed and rejected "Revolution." I'm still waiting for their apology tour.

[betsuni]

107. They managed to erase Al Gore from history, erase the history of the Democratic Party

and their supporters believed it. The party's over, though. The brand isn't selling anymore.

[Me.]

6. So....Our Revolution Is Turning INto

our revolution

Good thread lapucelle...

[comradebillyboy]

7. Our Revolution needs to do a lot more than just pay lip service

to pragmatism. There's nothing pragmatic about their darling Nina Turner. If they can be counted on to support Democratic candidates in national elections they might start building up some credibility. But they have a long way to go.

[lapucelle]

11. Agreed...

I'd like to see them take responsibility and apologize for the the damage they've already done.

[comradebillyboy]

12. I share that sentiment but I doubt it will ever happen.

[jalan48]

10. Glad they didn't do the Third Way thing.

[lapucelle]

13. Are you glad that Our Revolution is attempting to rebrand as a group of pragmaticists?

I wonder when they'll update their website to reflect their rebranding. It doesn't seem right to try to collect money by continuing to tout policies that you've already abandoned.

https://ourrevolution.com/issues/

[jalan48]

14. Absolutely!

[lapucelle]

16. Hopefully they'll update their website so folks won't be misled when they're making donations.

I'm sure their supporters will be just as glad about the rebranding as you are.

[jalan48]

20. As long as they don't start shilling for Wall St I'm good with the rebranding.

[lapucelle]

29. Democrats don't shill for Wall Street. As for Our Revolution, it's a dark money organization.

Rebranding can't disappear that fact.

A new group, Our Revolution, launched this week to continue the movement that his campaign started by raising and spending money to support “candidates in lockstep with Sanders’ ideals.” But it’s disappointing many who agreed with Sanders’ call for getting money out of politics because as a 501(c)(4) nonprofit, the group would not be required to disclose its donors.

snip=================================================================================

Our Revolution’s launch has been rocky. The New York Times reported that eight of the initial staff of 15 have resigned following the appointment of Jeff Weaver, who was in charge of Sanders’ presidential campaign, to run the group. The former organizing director, Claire Sandberg, specifically cited her fear that the group would “betray its core purpose by accepting money from billionaires and not remaining grassroots-funded and plowing that billionaire cash into TV instead of investing it in building a genuine movement.”

snip================================================================================

But without releasing the identities of contributors, it’s hard for the public to know whether that really is true. A group that decries the influence of money in politics should know that donor disclosure matters. Even as a 501(c)(4), Our Revolution could set an example for other nonprofits that spend on elections and choose to reveal this crucial information. Without doing that, it’s just another dark money group.

https://sunlightfoundation.com/2016/08/26/bernie-sanderss-new-political-group-wont-have-to-disclose-its-donors/

[Budi]

31. K & R Thank You, lapucelle

A lot of this cannot ever be shoved to the renmants of history.

The damage has been immesurable.

[jalan48]

36. LOL

[lapucelle]

38. What's funny, that Democrats don't shill for Wall Street or that OR is a dark money group?

[jalan48]

48. I'll go with yes and no.

[Budi]

51. Ummm... OR's rebranded that old 2016 meme. Keep up!

[George II]

56. So you're saying that Democrats shill for Wall Street and Our Revolution is not a Super PAC?

[Cha]

59. Prove your Accusation of Slurring the Democratic

Party.

jalan48 (11,957 posts)

20. As long as they don't start shilling for Wall St I'm good with the rebranding.

lapucelle (12,266 posts)

38. What's funny, that Democrats don't shill for Wall Street or that OR is a dark money group?

jalan48 (11,957 posts)

48. I'll go with yes and no.

[George II]

75. Mighty quiet, dear.

Last edited Thu Jul 29, 2021, 09:42 PM - Edit history (1)

[Cha]

79. Just as I thought.. Frickin Crickets.

The Democratic Party is on the Front Lines Fighting Against Fascism.. and we have to put up with someone trying to smear them with ".. shills for wall street.."

jalan48 (11,957 posts)

20. As long as they don't start shilling for Wall St I'm good with the rebranding.

lapucelle (12,266 posts)

38. What's funny, that Democrats don't shill for Wall Street or that OR is a dark money group?

jalan48 (11,957 posts)

48. I'll go with yes and no.

[lapucelle]

90. ...

[George II]

46. Which statement caused the "LOL"?

[LetMyPeopleVote]

78. Thank you for posting this

[betsuni]

83. +1

[George II]

44. What's this "shilling for Wall Street" BS?

[lapucelle]

58. Apparently he thinks it's ROLF funny to say "Democrats don't shill for Wall Street".

Last edited Thu Jul 29, 2021, 05:19 PM - Edit history (1)

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------



-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------




https://upload.democraticunderground.com/100215676023#post48

[betsuni]

60. It means that Democrats accept that the U.S. is a capitalist country and always will be.

That's my interpretation. The myth that FDR/LBJ were democratic socialists and that's why Democrats must be replaced with democratic socialists (transformed) and get back to their true progressive roots. Why it was fashionable for a while to call yourself an "FDR Democrat."

[George II]

89. They're skirting around the edge of FEC regulations...

The promotion of social welfare does not include direct or indirect participation or intervention in political campaigns on behalf of or in opposition to any candidate for public office. However, a section 501(c)(4) social welfare organization may engage in some political activities, so long as that is not its primary activity. However, any expenditure it makes for political activities may be subject to tax under section 527(f).

They have a whole page of dozens of candidate endorsements.

[Cha]

17. We're already there for a long time

now.. and Not "pro Sanders".

[lapucelle]

21. Now Our Revolution is denying its a "rebranding".

rebrand
to change the way that an organization, company, or product is seen by the public

Link to tweet

[Cha]

25. Of course they are.. We were "into

getting shit done " with President Obama and VP Biden.

Welcome to the Democratic Getting Shit Done Party, whatever they're calling themselves now.

We'll see how "pragmatic" they are.

[lapucelle]

26. Our Revolution denies its a rebranding, but twitter is having none of it.

By the way, does Our Revolution know that Medicare expansion has been a plank in the Democratic Party Platform since 2016 and that President Biden eliminated federal subsidies to the fossil fuel industry by executive order in his very first week of office?

https://democrats.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/2016_DNC_Platform.pdf

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2021/01/27/fact-sheet-president-biden-takes-executive-actions-to-tackle-the-climate-crisis-at-home-and-abroad-create-jobs-and-restore-scientific-integrity-across-federal-government/

https://grist.org/climate/everything-that-happened-on-the-first-ever-climate-day-environmental-justice-national-security/

https://grist.org/politics/biden-is-eliminating-fossil-fuel-subsidies-but-he-cant-end-them-all/

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

And how did President Biden "fail to keep good union jobs in the US"? Is Larry Cohen still blaming Biden for not having all his requests met by President Obama in 2011?

Biden May Be the Most Pro-Labor President Ever; That May Not Save Unions

Yet it is the Alabama video that most clearly highlights the differences between Mr. Biden and Mr. Obama on labor. When state workers flocked to Madison, Wis., in 2011 protesting Gov. Scott Walker’s plan to roll back their bargaining rights, union leaders pleaded with the White House to send a top administration official in solidarity. The White House declined, though Mr. Obama did say the plan seemed like “an assault on unions.”

“We made every imaginable effort to get someone there,” said Larry Cohen, who was then president of the Communications Workers of America and is now chair of the progressive advocacy group Our Revolution. “They would not allow anyone to go.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/25/business/economy/joe-biden-unions.html

[Cha]

27. I hope they would know it... it's

their job to know what's really going on in the Getting Shit Done Dept.

Thanks for all the information!

[lapucelle]

30. "We didn't rebrand. We are just trying to change the way we are seen by the public."

[Cha]

32. Oh great.. they got a clue. Now

to see if there's any substance to that "change"!

[George II]

57. In other words they're rebranding.

[ShazzieB]

65. In other words, they're rebranding, AND they don't understand what the word "rebranding" means.

I mean, it's obvious that what they're doing is rebranding, but they genuinely don't seem to realize that's what it is. 🤷?♀️

[betsuni]

76. Many words were given new and wrong definitions.

I had to study them to figure it out.

Status quo = money in politics, the idea that all dysfunction in government is due to Congress being bribed.

Progressives = anti-establishment, the establishment being the Democratic Party, the true roadblock to progress because corrupt.

Neoliberal/Third Way = blaming Democrats for the right-ward shift in politics rather than the true cause, the radicalization of the Republican Party. Mistaken belief that 90s trade deals destroyed manufacturing, which had peaked in the 60s. Union membership peaked in 1955. Presidents Clinton and Obama couldn't get progressive things done not because Republicans controlled Congress for six out of their eight years, they just didn't want to.

Donor class = idea that all wealthy people only think about money, so they must all be Republicans. When they donate to Democrats they make them have the same economic policies as Republicans. Democrats always have to do what they say because all they think about is money, too. Used to be "millionaires and billionaires" then it changed to just billionaires.

Centrist = capitalist.

FDR Democrat = fantasy that FDR/LBJ were anti-capitalism democratic socialists. After McGovern's loss, it was decided that progressive New Deal policies didn't win elections. Democrats turned to Wall Street for money and have shifted Right since then, have same economic policies as Republicans because they are Wall Street shills. A revolution will return the Democratic Party to its supposed democratic socialist roots.

Trump voter = forced by economic anxiety to vote for Republicans because Democrats abandoned the working class.

Democratic Establishment = beholden to Wall Street/lobbyists/wealthy donors/corporations/billionaires/oligarchs/everybody, don't care at all about the working or middle classes, despises and fears progressives, will do anything to stop them. Corporate Democrats. Elites.

DNC = powerful secret organization rigging primaries and (of course) hating and fearing progressives.

Republicans = who?

[Budi]

33. Do they just make this shit up as they type ??

Organizing to expand Medicare for millions, end taxpayer subsidies for fossil fuels, guarantee voting rights and call out Biden for failing to keep good union jobs in the USA.

Sure sounds A LOT LIKE JOE BIDEN's campaign policy plan. Except for the desperate line about "call out Biden for failing to keep good union jobs in the USA." umm. You're talking about Union Man & Made in America Joe Biden here.
Ok. That accusation is just stupidly embarrassing now.


As for the rest of "Who they NOW are, ...
Did they lift it ?
Omg, that's not Rebranding, thats plagerism!

Fking desperate

May as well just cash in and find another line of work.
Go sell make-up on youtube.
Just stop it.
The adults in the Democratic Party will carry on as we always have.
Without you,

WOW! Watching the implosion....
CYA

[lapucelle]

34. Parts of it were in the 2016 platform as well.

They're a little late to get on board. The mistrust they sowed and the damage it caused cannot be undone.

[George II]

47. So now they're "expanding Medicare" instead of insisting on the nebulous "Medicare for All"....

Looks like they're going to continue to remain the divisive organization they were under their previous "organization". They're going to "call out Biden for failing to keep good union jobs in the USA"? HOW MANY UNION JOBS have left the USA since Biden became President?

I doubt even they don't know the answer.

[lapucelle]

85. Expanding Medicare was in both the 2016 and 2020 Democratic platforms.

The new president of OR blames Joe Biden for some perceived slight by President Obama in 2011.

Biden May Be the Most Pro-Labor President Ever; That May Not Save Unions

Yet it is the Alabama video that most clearly highlights the differences between Mr. Biden and Mr. Obama on labor. When state workers flocked to Madison, Wis., in 2011 protesting Gov. Scott Walker’s plan to roll back their bargaining rights, union leaders pleaded with the White House to send a top administration official in solidarity. The White House declined, though Mr. Obama did say the plan seemed like “an assault on unions.”

“We made every imaginable effort to get someone there,” said Larry Cohen, who was then president of the Communications Workers of America and is now chair of the progressive advocacy group Our Revolution. “They would not allow anyone to go.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/25/business/economy/joe-biden-unions.html

[George II]

92. I believe Hillary Clinton proposed that years ago, even before running in 2016.

[sheshe2]

23. To little to late.

The damage is done.

[brush]

24. It's always good to finally understand what can get done and to...

work towards it. They should consult with Rep. Clyburn who can show them how it's done.

[Budi]

35. Bernie handed the OR operations over to Nina Turner.

And THIS is a good reason why she doesn't belong in Congress.

Our Revolution literally has to now rebrand the entire business to sound like Joe Biden, after she left it to run in OH-11.

Man, that's a lesson learned the hard way!

[brush]

40. Too bad for Turner. When she was a state rep. she showed promise.

Since then she seems to have lost her common sense. I mean stating that the Democratic Party's presidential nominee is no better than a eating a bowl of sh_t is cray-cray.

Guess she got a little power in Our Revolution and it went to her head. Power not only corrupts, power also reveals.

[Budi]

42. Profound statement there, brush

"Power not only corrupts, power also reveals."
And there it is~

[brush]

94. Thank you.

[George II]

49. She hasn't been in office for more than 7 years.

[sheshe2]

73. well said, brush. TY.

[Budi]

41. Yup. James Clyburn is a very SMART man.

Wonder what triggered this rebranding?

Is the FEC looking into their finances or something?
I mean, its a bfd to rebrand an operation like OR.
Guess we'll find out!

[lapucelle]

70. You're right to suggest that they listen to seasoned leaders who know how get things done, but

they should also take responsibility and apologize for poisoning the well. And there are some who need to just stop poisoning the well.

We have someone in this thread clinging to the toxic, false narrative that "Democrats are shills for Wall Street".

And there are still some lobbing divisive, accusatory, bewildering, and counterproductive tweets that border on threats.

Link to tweet

[brush]

71. AOC can be a pain at times. True enough. It should be all about negotiating.

Sitting down at a table and talking it out, you give some, you get some. POC reps included.

It's not about making threats at this critical time. We're decades behind other countries in infrastructure and to threaten with "a three-vote margin" statement is, frankly, immature as we may never get this close again to a deal. Dem control over the House and Senate is at stake as passage of both of these bills means millions of good jobs across the nation.

This is disappointing. I expect better from her.

[ismnotwasm]

43. But I thought Hillary Clinton was a..oh never mind.

I fucking give up

[George II]

45. So the group that is now a Super PAC and was once headed by Nina Turner has decided to become...

...."establishment Democrats" or "centrist Democrats", eh?

[Budi]

54. Well the odds of greater fundraiser hauls would increase by sounding like Biden

Is this a 'Follow the Money' kind of business move?

There's always an angle 🤔

[betsuni]

64. Fundraising by promising a revolution is bound to dry up after a few years.

I start to feel bad for the people who donated over the years but then remember how the booing after "Democratic establishment" was much louder than after "Republican establishment" and stop feeling bad.

[Budi]

66. New name: "HILLARY's REVOLUTION "

From OUR REVOLUTION 2017 to HILLARY's REVOLUTION 2021

Link to tweet

2017



2021


About says it all. 🙄

[betsuni]

68. She's the one who said, "I'm a progressive who likes to get things done" so yes.

[Budi]

69. Yup. They may as well call it Hillary's Rev since they're now using her policy platform

[lapucelle]

96. We would have been stronger together. If more of the folks who support Our Revolution had adopted

a pragmatic approach for the 2016 general election, we might have avoided the damage that Trump, his acolytes, and his supporters visited on all of us and all our institutions and the havoc they continue to wreak.

Instead all we heard was that the Democratic nominee hadn't earned their commitment to the greater good.

[betsuni]

97. Populism and conspiracy theories were popular for some stupid reason.

[betsuni]

52. Oh, did someone finally read the Democratic Party platform and realize their fictional neoliberal-

beholden to wealthy donors-Wall Street shills-corporate-establishment-corrupt-elite Democrats they made up don't exist?

"I'm a progressive who likes to get things done." Hillary Clinton.

Populism requires a charismatic leader, an outsider with lots of enemies out to get him so all the members of the group enjoy that nice warm feeling of righteous anger, purity, morality in the face of evil. Can't keep it going without that leader.

[Poiuyt]

53. We still need far left progressives to move the Overton Window to the left

Pragmatism will win the day, but as long as the republicans are pushing American politics further into fascism, we need to counter with progressive ideas that help all Americans. Like single payer, universal healthcare.

[Budi]

67. Another step Left of Joe Biden & you're over the cliff.

No thanks

[mvd]

98. Agreed

I don’t think this group has forgotten about its big ideas, which would help the country a lot. They have just changed strategy. Even Bernie has been talking more like the President in public at least. If we had a greater majority, we might be pushing harder.

I am still for the vulture capitalist system being cured with a good bit of Democratic Socialism and a lot here used to agree.

[mcar]

111. What one thing have they done to get their "big ideas" enacted into law?

Having their leader refer to voting for the 2020 Democratic presidential nominee as eating a bowl of sh!t?

Primarying good Democrats? Whining about not getting the perfect so the good gets trampled?

[mvd]

112. We've tried, and we've begun to get more support

We’ve also been working with President Biden to get more steps done. I see so much progressive bashing that I don’t understand. Working to get more people in Congress helps our agenda.

That comment was from Turner, and I don’t think that was a good of her say. It doesn’t reflect on me and many progressives.

[Hortensis]

55. Well, they've soiled our Democrats' proud identity as "progressive"

with their foolishly obstructive and destructive radical behaviors, as they always have with any label they'd adopted.

So of course it's time for another label change, or at least restyling.

And as always they look to Democrats for clues to what most people want and will vote for.

If only it were real. Pragmatism is all about doing what can be to achieve real progress under real-world conditions. And that's incompatible with those wired to dissent.

[betsuni]

62. They've used those slogans as a purity test for so long, I image it's going to take awhile

to get used to the change. Like the Knights Who Say "Ni!" changing what they say to something more complicated. "Ni!" was so easy, like the slogans.

[Hortensis]

63. Easy because they won't even try to live up to them.

Not that they could, and that's the point. If they were pragmatic progressives, they'd be Democrats.

ODing on hypocrisy here. Better to get away while still laughing and shrugging.

[Skittles]

74. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

whatever

[LetMyPeopleVote]

77. This makes me smile

I was a day one contributor to Joe Biden and got to meet him twice at private fundraisers. Joe is middle of the road and pragmatic. I was on the Our Revolution mailing list and I am still on the Just US Democrat list (their emails are really sad but fun to laugh at). Joe is a real Democrat and I am glad that Our Revolution is changing

Link to tweet

Rather than insisting on “Medicare for All” — Sanders’ trademark universal, government-funded health care plan — or the climate-change-fighting Green New Deal, Our Revolution is focusing on the more modest alternatives endorsed by President Joe Biden. Those include expanding eligibility for the existing Medicare program and curtailing federal subsidies for fossil fuel companies. The group says it wants to make sure Biden keeps his promises on those and other top issues.

The shift reflects a progressive movement that is at a crossroads. Biden won the Democratic nomination last year by offering more centrist alternatives to much of Sanders’ agenda. Since then, progressive candidates have faced a series of electoral disappointments and are contending with anxiety from moderate Democrats worried that the party’s leftward shift could cost them control of Congress during next year’s midterm elections.

[Cha]

81. Yeah, President is the Leader.. they're following

him!

[DFW]

82. After the Wall fell in Berlin

The ruling Party that ran East Germany with an iron Stalinist fist, the Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands (SED), or „Socialist Unity Party of Germany,“ had its diehard adherents, but figured they weren‘t going to attract many more by keeping the old name.

So, they renamed themselves the Partei des Demokratischen Sozialismus (PDS), the Party of Democratic Socialism. That fizzled pretty quickly, too. I think the fact that they had the same cast of characters gave them away.

Then they joined with those elements of the West German Social Democrats and West German Greens for whom their own parties weren‘t far enough to the left, and formed „Die Linken,“ or „The Leftists.“ THAT, at least got them enough voters nationwide to at least put them back on the radar, and actually get them over the 5% hurdle required for parliamentary representation. Though a few holdouts from the old regime hang on there, they can at least finally claim to have a leadership that is not made up of people who actively supported killing their own citizens at the Berlin Wall. For those who never saw it in real life, I did, and the border wasn‘t called The Death Strip for nothing.

Pragmatic Progressives is just another label, but if some teeth are put into the „pragmatic“ part, I find that a positive step. If it means nothing more than trying to make Nina Turner more easy go swallow, then it wasn‘t worth the effort, but if it means a more unified effort to get things done in the face of a monolithic, better financed extremist right, I say, bring them on. Comments about the party leader being equal to a bowl of shit to be left at the door, please, along with anyone unwilling to repudiate them.

[ShazamIam]

95. To me that all looks like a reflection of some Democratic leadership unity building. nt

[DFW]

101. If so

It's far from the worst thing that could happen to us right now.

[ShazamIam]

103. I should have added, I think it's great, but I have a lot of reservations.

[DFW]

104. And I have at least as many.

In Germany, the East German SED became the Party of Democratic Socialism became "Die Linken" for self-preservation, and not because they all simultaneously came to the conclusion that the decades-old policy of murdering people trying to get across the border to the West had been a bad idea after all.

Their sincerity will shine through (or fade into darkness, whichever) very shortly, I think.

[ShazamIam]

105. In the U.S. the only certainity in politics has been a strong steady movement to authortarianism.

[DFW]

106. Europe has a lot of "been there done that, hate that" from first-hand experience

The huge irony is that the current generation, the one profiting from the fact that their grandparents and parents said "never again," think the safeguards are in place to ensure that they could never suffer under such a regime. They thus place themselves in dire danger of falling for the same scam their great-grandparents fell for in the 1930s.

[Budi]

102. No. It's theft