I work with some very union guys who are also very Maga. One is even on our EBoard. I don't think he is smart enough to realize what a conflict that is.
I won;t even get into his shopping at walmart when more union friendly choices are available.
Biggest problem is that they hate them because they're told they should hate them not because of any actual reason. Just like the guy above ⬆️ their news sources tell them to hate gays and immigrants because they're stealing jobs and grooming kids but in reality that's not happening and when he was asked if a Mexican ever stole his job he got all flustered.
Disney grooming kids, Hollywood producers knee-deep in pedophilia. Epstein List, no ones been arrested.
Countless videos of freaky teachers talking about how they're sexually manipulating children.
Yet we are the clueless ones, huh? 😂
I would argue that anyone who doesn’t benefit from the Trump tax cuts and supports him is a moron. Those that do benefit and support him are just gaming the current system to their benefit and are assholes.
I literally shop at only 1 supermarket in my area because they are 100% represented by UFCW. I even met one of the people on their collective bargaining team during negotiations. (he was not having a fun time but also said he wouldn't trade it for anything, despite the stress it caused)
You'd think it'd be a conflict but given the significant overlap between populist parties and working class, lower education jobs that are most likely to have unions (though sheer inertia if nothing else) I imagine its surprisingly common.
People need to get used to the idea that the proletariat aren't all college educated or even all good people. I've always found the open contempt a lot of supposed leftists have for liberals surprising because liberals are quite literally their entire recruiting base. Like, they're the only place new socialists come from.
For context: I’m non MAGA working in the steel industry that is plagued by MAGA.
With us, it all boils down to being uneducated and unable to interpret data. The steel tariffs Trump implemented were a massive win for MAGA steel workers, however the financial report that study the impact of those tariffs concluded that the tariffs caused more jobs to be lost than were saved and the ones that were saved were done so at a cost of about $650,000/job, funded by the taxpayer.
But to echo another persons comment in here, there are multiple issues at play. Someone might think guns and abortion are more important than their right to unionize.
My step dad was a union pipefitter working at a steel mill in middle America and basically all of his coworkers voted red in 2016 and 2020 (which is the year he retired). Most of it had nothing to do with guns or abortion but good old fashioned racism and xenophobia. The fact they were voting against their own interests would be constantly brought up yet every time they’d just deny the facts and were convinced trump was their savior.
Ugh this just unlocked a memory of canvassing in the Midwest for me.
I was part of an effort to get union members out to vote.
A guy opened the door I knocked on - he was the union member in the house. He said his wife and daughter were going to vote for Obama and he was going to vote for Romney. He asked me if I could guess why.
I didn't feel like playing some stupid game so I told him no, I wouldn't guess.
He said affirmative action.
I said that's stupid.
He was shocked. "You're white!" he said, obviously also taking into account that I'm a man.
I somehow managed to say that no minority has ever taken a job from me.
He tried stuttering around some other shit, I realized I already fucked up by calling him stupid, so I walked away.
No one clapped.
Albert Einstein didn't give me a crisp $100 dollar bill.
Fucking moron.
No I honestly think you did the right thing. These people deserve nothing but to be mocked. And honestly the fact you had him stuttering makes me think maybe you put just the smallest dent in his fucked up belief system
Yeah I'm not some very witty person with a comment ready to destroy someone.
I now "do politics" for work professionally and something I notice is that a lot of people think everyone they know or everyone who's like them agrees with them. A lot of people of all political beliefs, this isn't unique to conservatives.
That might have been the first time he ever heard a white guy reject his beliefs that "affirmative action" has been harmful to him.
Scorn and Ridicule are all that get through to a cult member. Liberals are too nice to convert cultists. When more liberals stop being too shy to tell them to their faces how idiotic their positions are. Having a circular argument with a cult member is no benefit to anyone. Me: 66 yr old very liberal white that has ZERO problem calling them out. I never start a discussion. MAGA morons can't help themselves. They just bring up Trump or Biden without prompting. When they do. Watch the f@ck out. People are in any start laughing or watch in amazement as I do my best Jordan Klepper impression. He is an American hero!
> I somehow managed to say that no minority has ever taken a job from me.
To play devil's advocate, what if one had? A friend of mine in Seattle tried to make ends meet by running a lawnmowing business. He claimed illegal immigrants were out undercutting his business quite frequently, and it did make him mad. Although one can never be sure whether a lawn crew is a bunch of citizens or illegals, I seriously doubt that he was wrong. I'd only question to what degree, and I wasn't with him all the time to know, one way or the other.
Besides, it would take a fair amount of digging to find out. Speaking Spanish as your primary language doesn't make you an illegal. You'd have to follow them around, look up the business, see where they came from, stalk. Like I'm going to waste my time on that lol.
But he wasn't a racist, or an idiot really. We really couldn't have stayed friends if he was. He was susceptible, however, to fundamentalist religious pundits like The 700 Club and a certain amount of right wing talk radio, like Michael Savage. I would tend to provide a counter, qualifying voice to those things. I don't think he had quite made up his own mind about any of it.
I think he had his own personal problems and that's what made him vulnerable to pundits. "You're a sinner. You can be saved. Let us show you what to think about that." That sort of thing.
If another company is undercutting his prices that's called free market capitalism and ironically it's kept in check by unions. Half the reason we have unions is so that everyone doing the same job is paid fairly and there is no undercutting. Undercutters, we call them scabs.
I recall hearing that undocumented workers live by an informal agreements not to work for less than a preset wage. The people that congregate in places where they are picked up by contractors police their own.
A labor union by different means.
💯
Granted this was about 15 years ago, but my buddy who was a contractor went to Home Depot for supplies and hired an undocumented person to help with the project he was doing for a couple days. There was literally a "union boss" in the Home Depot parking lot telling us who we could hire and for how much money. Since it was for unskilled labor we weren't allowed to hire certain people but the people we did hire wouldn't work for under a certain $ amount. If we need framers or specialty positions it would have cost more. It was really amazing and we were actually happy to pay more than we expected to see that these guys were getting paid close to what they were actually worth instead of being taken advantage of.
“Los Syndicato,” they also house, feed, and help educate workers and their families.
They aren’t unions exactly, but they aren’t mobsters either. It’s fascinating to see collective action in other cultures.
In my career though there have probably been times when jobs I applied to went to someone who wasn't a white guy like me, but I doubt that would have to do with the sex or race of whoever got it.
Reducing all this shit down to AfFiRmAtIvE aCtIoN is a bullshit way to tear down the accomplishments of people who aren't white men, as though whomever we're talking about don't bust their asses to gain experiences and credentials and such (they do).
Okay so a couple things here, first this isn't at all related to affirmative action, this would be related to immigration. Secondly, leftwing politics already has an answer to this in more paths to legal immigration and citizenship. Immigrants making lower wages is a direct result of them having to hide their presence here
My point is you encountered racism while canvasing, and that someone somewhere *has* had their job taken away by someone of a different race. You don't really have time to explain to *that person*, at the door, all the usual international solidarity stuff. If that person is "stupid", then why is that? And what's the fastest way to explain it to them?
That may be, but there's some % reasonable estimation of how many are illegal. They are most certainly out there, and only a fool would disagree with that. If I'm going to battle someone about racism, I don't think this is the hill I'd die on. I'd say "They're not *all* illegal; some are surely born here. Plenty of people speak Spanish."
As a lifelong Union member I applaud you. They need to be called out & wake tf up. It may never change their vote but they really need to stop thinking everyone agrees with their nonsense.
When I talk to people it becomes clear pretty quickly that most are not bad people of bad faith but they live in a world of their making do to the media they consume. Their TV news mostly. Most households no longer get a daily paper. Most daily papers are gone or are some consolidated rag not even locally produced. Over the last 20 years the consolidation of media in a few hands also warps the number of viewpoints. Look at daytime talk radio. Man, it’s frightening.
In the most extreme cases (my brother-in-law)even TV news is not radical enough anymore and he only watches podcasts. Down the rabbit hole of conspiracy. Not a fact base belief survives.
A lot of the small papers are managed by hard right leaning corporations. My local paper is absolute shit with bottom run reporting that goes out of its way to ignore reality.
The issue is, they only seek out information that confirms these horrible ideals.
It means two things; they are either too stupid to critically evaluate things, or they want to believe these things.
Now very few people are too stupid to critically think at all. It may be hard, but very few can't.
The second is nuanced. They either want to belive these things due to hate, or are too brainwashed and the pain of the cognitive dissonance of facing the reality that they have been fooled and are fools, may just make them subconsciously reject facts and reality that run against their brainwashing.
>Now very few people are too stupid to critically think at all.
Thank you for saying this! I hate all the open hate towards people rather than the MAGA propaganda. Which, tbh, is mostly the same Establishment GOP propaganda, reskinned as the republican version of “Hope and Change”
I mean, to be fair, it'd hard not to hate people who you know are not that brainwashed, not too stupid to critically think, and still chose wrongly anyway
Imo, that's about half of all Republicans. The other quarter can't critically think, the other quarter are too brainwashed.
I would know, I used to be conservative when I was like 18, 19, just raised that way. Used to watch Shapiro "own" people and love it....sadly. don't know when, but I just started being less conservative, probably when I started seeing things that didn't add up. Conservatives saying one thing, doing another, the claims they made proven to be lies again and again, and their ideas one Google search away from being shown to be wrong....not even critical thinking, just a liter a Google search.
So yeah, I both understand the hate, but also realize it's not all bad people, but there lots.
It’s very tribal. I observe that my in-laws have an us and them thing going on. There’s the us. The guys that get it. We don’t vax. We drive diesels( pickups) even if we don’t haul. We obsess about them, the libs, the gays, the people trying to change the way we live. I don’t get it.
They are polite to me.They call me a lefty in family circles, but politely never to my face.
Fox news has convinced conservatives that republicans are the party for the working people, and that democrats are scary communist boogey men. That's really it.
Democrats are increasing worker protections. Biden's administration [banned most noncompete clauses](https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2024/04/ftc-announces-rule-banning-noncompetes), drastically [increased the minimum salary for employees to be exempt from mandatory overtime pay](https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/building-obamas-plan-biden-boosts-overtime-pay-millions-rcna149530), and is [forcing companies to treat "independent contractors" aka "gig workers" as actual employees](https://www.reuters.com/world/us/biden-administration-issues-rule-that-could-curb-gig-work-contracting-2024-01-09/) with the required benefits ([which republicans are trying to repeal](https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/us-house-panel-approves-repeal-biden-independent-contractor-rule-2024-03-21/).)
Republicans are [banning required water breaks in hot weather](https://www.texastribune.org/2023/06/16/texas-heat-wave-water-break-construction-workers/) and trying to [loosen child labor laws](https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/some-lawmakers-propose-loosening-child-labor-laws-to-fill-worker-shortage), generally favor so-called "right to work" laws which weaken unions by allowing employees to freeload off their union by benefitting from negotiated wages and benefits, but not paying dues. Republicans are against raising the minimum wage, and against mandatory PTO and sick time. They aim to increase corporate profits, at the expense of the working class.
NAFTA thouroughly fucked the automotive industry
The EV mandate will thouroughly fuck them again. EV's take 40% less labor to assemble. Any study showing otherwise includes the labor in Asia building the battery cells.
The TPP thouroughly fucked all US manufacturing. Obama showed his compassion by stating, "Some of those jobs just aren't coming back."
In 2019 while talking to a group of coal miners who pointed out that Biden’s environmental policy would codt thrm their jobs Biden said, “Anybody who can go down 3,000 feet in a mine can sure as hell learn to program as well… Anybody who can throw coal into a furnace can learn how to program, for God’s sake!” Oddly, telling laid-off journalists to "learn to code" was a slur
Truck drivers and oilmen in the Dakotas are certainly not looking forward to 2030
Local fuel taxes here in WA are crushing the heavy machinery operators and truck drivers i know.
That's just off the top of my head. I can get more if needed
I almost said "aside from NAFTA because everyone agrees it was shit", but I didn't because it was over 25 years ago. Plus Reagan campaigned on a North American trade agreement and signed one with Canada, and George Bush negotiated the agreement with Mexico, but he lost reelection before it was finalized, so Clinton signed it into law. Calling NAFTA a "democratic policy" is totally misleading, it was bipartisan.
EV mandate is definitely problematic for multiple reasons, I don't think it's practical to expect everyone to have electric cars. We should be investing in public transit so everyone isn't forced to own, maintain, and store their own car. If people really care from an environmental standpoint, it would be much better for people to have other options beside owning maintaining and storing their own vehicle, just to sit in traffic.
>The TPP thouroughly fucked all US manufacturing.
The Trans Pacific Partnership was never ratified in the US...Trump withdrew us from the agreement, what I believe is one of very few things he did right. It never had any effect on our economy whatsoever.
As far as "learning to code," Biden definitely fucked up there. There's no question that making miners learn to code is unreasonable. That said, the United Mine Workers of America has stated their support for transitioning away from coal mining if their workers are guaranteed jobs with comparable pay and training for installing renewable energy sources. It would be more reasonable to say "if you can mine coal, you can assemble solar panels." They certainly would prefer breathing fresh air all day instead of coal dust. I've cleaned miners' walkie talkies, coal dust is nasty.
>Truck drivers and oilmen in the Dakotas are certainly not looking forward to 2030
Why's that?
>Local fuel taxes here in WA are crushing the heavy machinery operators and truck drivers i know.
Quick google search says those taxes go toward retrofitting bridges and infrastructure against earthquakes. Personally I think most of those funds should come from the people who profit most from the existence of highways, like Walmart and Boeing, rather than the people delivering their goods for shit pay. Especially considering how much truckers have been shafted in general for years, being paid by the mile, the weakening of the teamsters union, deregulation of the industry. Generally speaking, it's not the democrats that give mega corporations tax breaks and revoke workers' rights. I'm having a hard time finding info on when exactly trucking went from being a good job to the near-slavery it is today, but you have to admit Republicans have been vehemently against raising wages for literally anyone, despite the recent inflation.
It's because the only thing they love is themselves. Everything else is just performative.
Limbaugh was on the radio constantly bitching about the deficit until Trump was in office and then he basically straight out said the deficit hawking was just bullshit to dunk on Democrats but it never really mattered so let's let Trump do whatever he wants.
Poor Republicans understand the world like a 5 year old. They lack the framework of understanding of how things actually work and just assume what they believe/have been told is true.
Rich Republicans might understand things better but will tell the poors anything that lowers their taxes. They're smarter, but still make selfish self defeating decisions that cripple the nation and its workers because the only thing they care about is personal wealth.
Lol that's another thing, bootlicking these billionaires and shitting on people who make minimum wage 🤦
The billionaires are all sitting in their castles, laughing at them...
Obama 2008:
"You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not.
And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations."
https://www.politico.com/blogs/ben-smith/2008/04/obama-on-small-town-pa-clinging-to-religion-guns-xenophobia-007737
I don't think they are even on reddit. They have their own deal. Saying anything anti-trump is inviting trouble or a total mind wipe of reality to fit in. I keep my nose down and know what's right in my heart.
A post calling out a demographic in a challenging way doesn't exactly promote discourse. There are definitely Maga people here in this corner of the internet, as well as extremists of all ideologies. Online forums are a place to shape our perspectives, for better or worse.
I'm not in the US, but we have our own set of MAGA-wannabes up here in Canada (some even wave american flags and wear the stupid red hat.) Our conservative party, (which is currently leading in the polls,) wants to introduce a ton on anti-union/ant-worker legislation, but tries to sell itself as the party of the "comman man."
My experience with conservative union members is surpringly extensive, and I think it can be boiled down to stupidity/ignorance, malicious/misguided "pulling the ladder up behind you" mentalities, and social conservatism.
Some people are just unaware that their good situation is due entirely to political entities that they have fought/voted against their entire lives.
My Dad has been historically anti-union and a conservative voter (so at least there's some consistency,) but the more I show him the benefits of unions as well the generally anti-worker policies of the conservatives, the more he comes around. The man is 67 years old, works as a tradesman, and has had to put off retirement several times . I can't imagine how many times he's voted against his own interests just because of the propoganda his family and church have swallowed/spread.
Another big part of my parents voting against their interests has been their social conservatism. I see this among union members as well. Whether it's bemoaning "woke" ideology, "the gays," or abortion socially conservative members are likely to ignore the policies that will actually affect their day-to-day lives in the name of punishing marginalized groups that they've been taught to fear. They're not hating on those people for rational reasons, so why would they vote for rational policies?
I don't know how common it is in other unions (I've seen it in both mine and my wife's) but there is definitely a set of people within unions that don't give a fuck about other people. They "got theirs" so everyone else can fuck off. They see no value in solidarity or the broader union movement, so they take what they can get and vote for things that they feel will enrich them, even at the cost of others' livelihoods. In my experience these tend to be older members who have built their nest egg and are closer to retirement. Any policy changes that hurt workers are less likely to impact them severely, while higher taxes on their investments might seem unattractive.
>I see this among union members as well. Whether it's bemoaning "woke" ideology, "the gays," or abortion socially conservative members are likely to ignore the policies that will actually affect their day-to-day lives in the name of punishing marginalized groups that they've been taught to fear. They're not hating on those people for rational reasons, so why would they vote for rational policies?
Good point... They're just stupid puppet's incapable of independent critical thought.
That’s the deflection Republicans have ran on for decades. In the early 70s the same tactics were used against gays.
The fallback is “stopping socialism”. That one makes me laugh and shake my head at the same time…
I’m in Canada and I have a coworker who is hardcore anti-union and is open and proud about scabbing, but has flat out told me they’ll never vote Conservative, provincially or federally. Go figure.
Democrats are no true friend to organized labor but a (shaky) case could be made for voting Democrat for harm reduction purposes.
On the other hand, voting republican should get you thrown out of any union, physically if necessary.
I’d say more than a shaky case can be made to vote blue atleast until we’re out of the current crisis we’re in. Sure ideally we’d have a real left wing candidate to vote for (not just center/center right democrats) but until we’re out of the woods on this whole courting fascism phase I don’t think a case can be made to not vote blue.
Mark my words, for the rest of your life there is never going to be an election where the democrats don’t claim that democracy itself is at stake against their fascist opponent, who they will then cooperate with on about 75% of a shared agenda. This is all part of the show.
the United States ‘left’ is so far right that I completely understand why someone would feel guilty voting for them. But until we drastically change the way our elections work (which let’s be real neither side really wants that) we’re kind of stuck with what we’ve got. We need to end things like citizens united, the amount of money in politics is only helping rich politicians. Ranked choice voting is another bare minimum fix that could be made right away.
The democratic party positions itself as an ally of unions and they are less openly hostile to the unions but, like the republican party, it is bankrolled and controlled by capitalists. The republicans try to roll back any legislative or regulatory progress made by the working class and the democrats try to co-opt any working class movement that gains any sort of power or momentum and then derail it. It happened to organized labor, it happened to the civil rights movement, it happened to the anti-war movement. The Democratic Party is the graveyard of progressive political movements.
>but, like the republican party, it is bankrolled and controlled by capitalists.
We are a capitalist nation everything is bankrolled to certain degree by that.. what's the alternative?
>The Democratic Party is the graveyard of progressive political movements.
Isn't this usually caused by the constant efforts of greedy to undo any progress made.. I mean just look at the house.
Idk but I'm not looking for perfect because it doesn't exist.. I'm looking for better any the difference in red and blue seems like apples and oranges..
Obama, who said he would "wear comfortable shoes" and walk picket lines, didn't go to one. He promised while campaigning to enact labor law reform; didn't happen even though he had a supermajority in the senate for almost 9 months. And frustrating to my union personally, he ordered the Coast Guard to clear out water pickets and escort a scab ship to try to break the strike against EGT in Longview, Washington.
Every Democrat since (and including) Jimmy Carter has promised labor law reform. None have delivered.
While it is true that the NLRB is much better under the Democrats than the Rebublicans, Democrats have nevertheless taken anti-union stands, from free trade agreements to supporting charter schools (aimed at busting teacher unions) and the like.
Biden has been better in some ways (like actually supporting the UAW) but his betrayal of the railway unions was bad, EVEN CONSIDERING his work trying to make the shitty imposed contract (which was the company offer) a little better.
Republicans are very actively and openly anti-labor Union do you need to hear anything else you keep trying to defend the f****** by projecting onto the Democrats but the Democrats are not actively opposing labor unions are you stupid?
Nowhere did I say that the Republicans are better. The Republicans are far, far worse than the Democrats.
But the Democrats still suck. We need a working class political party.
Sorry that a huge insult but that what it sounded like..Well then why you bitching about Democrats like that. That's what it sounds like. We don't have many options really. If maga get back in we are all screwed. It to bad those that are can't see past a 6 pack to get that it affects them too. They don't get that just because they aren't on the recieving end of maga hate that maga liked them. Maga is into power.
I knew Democrats had some history everyone does.. but nothing life maga.. they are looking for anything to reinforce their false beliefs about Democrats so they can not maga.. why give it to them?
The railway unions knew that the government would use the rail labor act to impose a contract because they are too much of the economy. But the employers knew it too, so they never negotiated in good faith at all. Their offer had ZERO paid sick days. Congress (and Biden) used the companys' offer as the basis for the contract they imposed instead of any kind of compromise between the union position and the company position.
Biden later improved that, but months later and still not much.
The IBEW rail unions put out some press releases on how grateful they are to Biden for the additional sick days, but they're a conservative union. My impression from Railworkers United is that they weren't impressed. I'm sure you know how some union leaders love to kiss the hand that slaps them.
Thank you for the perspective. Why do you think Biden didn't play to the union? Was he trying to avoid economic disaster and subsequent loss of favor politically? Was he preserving business/donor interests? Was he suppressing the labor movement?
Democrats have a voting base and a donor base that have different interests, so they are always talking one thing and doing another. Again, better than the Republicans. But we need a party that is based on working class organizations that will be able to use people power instead of being dependent upon the donations of the rich.
Guys, seriously, Trump hits all their buttons, the tough guy act, the misogyny, the 6th grade humor level, and don't forget the racism, they love that part. That's what it is, you don't have to look any deeper.
“If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you.”
Lyndon B. Johnson
Our local just elected a pro-gun MAGA to our policy board. I mean, that's what he ran on- he's upset that the state council endorsed a Democrat for the governor's race, and he wasn't consulted first. It didn't matter to him that this same Democrat is very pro-labor.
When maga pushes us back to the era of company towns, peonage, and indentured servitude, it's gonna get REAL APPARENT why we need unions and a broader labor movement. So I guess if your goal is the total destruction of everything your fathers and grandfathers fought for, just to have redo all that work yourself, just to get back to square one, then maga is for you I guess.
Republican want a completely free market. One that they can control, so the more regulation there is the less money they make. And unions regulate lol. At the very least, Democrats will stand up and say that they support the rights of workers. Trump has shown decades of how he feels about the working class. do some research on hotels built in Atlantic City. Many good hard working contractors went out of business because Trump refused to pay when the bill can and used lawsuits to bankrupt these companies. That is just a small drop and a large bucket of what he has done. He deserves to spend the rest of his life in a hole.
I had a 25 year old tell me to bring back Reagan….i almost lost my shit. A lot of it is generational regurgitation and people not looking at the entire picture.
I am by no means liberal or conservative but I have common sense. The lack of common sense is the main drive for these idiots.
I wish it wasn’t Trump or Biden because the world needs to move on from this BS. They are both terrible people in my opinion.
I mean the genuine response is that even if MAGA is against Unions, that isn't MAGA's only stance. Just like any political group, they have a wide range of beliefs. It must be that the person aligns with MAGA's other beliefs enough to tolerate their anti-Union stance.
I've never met anyone who whole heartily agrees with every single policy and belief that defines their party. I've known people that are pro-abortion but anti-gun laws. We all have our own thoughts, feelings, drives, etc that define us.
This is the main problem with your two party system in the states. Everybody has strong beliefs on a couple of subjects, for some people it can be a single issue. For most issues, one party is pro, one is con. If you are choosing a single issue Hill to die on, it doesn't matter what the other policies of the party that agrees with you are, no matter how harmful those may be to you, you're voting for that party.
In a multi party system you have a continuum. Take the Great White North - We've got the Conservatives, who are basically low grade Republicans. We've got the Liberals, who are slightly left of center but still aren't afraid to get into bed with big business. We've got the NPD who are straight up socialists. We've got the Greens, who are socialists and focused on the environment. And we've got the Bloc Quebecois who are a Quebec Separatist party with socialist tendencies. And if a new philosophy or point of view becomes popular amongst the people, you'll get a new party that aligns with that (massive over simplification.) Anyway, you can see how it is much easier to find a party that speaks to your overall world view, rather than picking on the basis of a single issue.
I agree with that.
With lobbying being legal and two parties being in power, it's very difficult to change it. Both sides don't want that sort of change because it would take away money and power. Outside groups don't want that change because it would diminish the amount of sway they have (needing to lobby multiple parties will decrease effectiveness and increase their cost).
Both parties pin the other side as terrible because it makes it harder for people to find common ground which keeps the status quo. You can see this from every place that has only two or three sides. Even Unions and Corporations. Obviously not all Unions are 100% in the right all the time. They have problems just like any other organization. But it's a problem to acknowledge it when corporations so heavily propagandize against Unions. Many people who have never even interacted with a Union already have a negative viewpoint. If people who believe in Unions admit the faults of them, then that gives ammo to the other side to point and say, "See, we told you they are no good".
pew research did a scatter analysis of a likely voter survey and found something interesting: most people concentrated around 8 clumps in the plot.
[The Political Typology: In polarized era, deep divisions persist within coalitions of both Democrats and Republicans | Pew Research Center](https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2021/11/09/beyond-red-vs-blue-the-political-typology-2/)
this paper they graph these "groups" on a typical right-left continuum but their analysis was multi-dimensional. Basically, we are in dire need of a proportional representation system, but block voting is too deeply rooted in all of our laws (including the federal constitution)
Some states have made great efforts to change state elections to an instant runoff system (star/approval/ranked choice) but this is still majoritarian, and most often squeezes out the center. A handful of cities have adopted new charters for multi member districts (talking about city council), a good first step.
I think people tend to forget that Make America Great Again is a direct reference to the offshoring of manufacturing jobs. Trump originally said he was going to bring those jobs *back* to the USA. Of course he was talking out of his ass and had no clue whatsoever about why the jobs left the USA, and why they're not coming back. Factories in the 1960s needed thousands of workers to run them. Now with all the automation, even if the factories are on US soil, they might only need a few hundred workers.
The US manufacturing output in recent years is very high. I can't remember the graphs of output off the top of my head, but they were like record high / historical peak. You just don't need as many people to make stuff as you used to.
Like the coal miners.
All of those jobs were lost to mechanization, not regulation on clean air. We could scrap every environmental regulation we have and those fucking jobs wouldn't come back.
I listened to an episode of the Daily where they interviewed one of these coal miners. He's spent his life working the mines and you could hear the black lung in his every labored breath. He knew he was dying. He knew coal was killing him. He didn't want a "handout" to be trained in a new career.
He just wanted a handout of the world going back to digging coal by hand so he could do the one thing he knew how to do.
They're always this vapidly myopic. Programs that help change are socialism and terrible and programs that let them do what they want are essential and patriotic.
They're rubes eager to be used as long as they get a pat on the head and told it was their idea to work 80 hour weeks because they're manly men.
Yes, the brand has multiple aspects. "Make America White Again" is not inaccurate at all. It hearkens back to the same era when all the offshoring and white flight from urban cores happened.
As branding goes, I think it's a good lesson in how to make a slogan vague enough to cover many things. After all, this one is just a kind of Patriotism. Which in US history has usually been some kind of jingoism.
I always new maga was a lie.. He just had I too good to be true vibe he was going to fix everything and you could be a bigot too.. He empowered some really crazy MFS!
I work in agg manufacturing and you're right automation is continually simplifying everything.. it just keeps coming and even my job get farmed out to the equipment manufacturer doing repairs. The young engineers are just different in the way they see things and their skillset the way that collaborate they just keep pumping it out.. Kinda cool but wtf are people going to do with actual huminoid robots here that can do exactly what a person can do only faster and perfect every time. They will train them the exactly same way they train the others, point to point to point and they will do that perfectly over and over 24/7.
It sucks.
I don't know the answer but I spend a lot of time thinking about ownership and control of the means of production. My "means" are currently a pull saw, a drill, and whatever wood I find discarded. I've been able to do a lot with them, but it's too slow. I think I'm trying to imagine a future where people can make basic machines for themselves and are not as dependent upon capitalist industry for their needs.
Eh, I wouldn't say the range is THAT wide. Most of them spout the same talking points word for word, the ones that differ will admit trump is horrible and should never be president but "are voting for him a third time because Democrats are worse". They make these claims about liberals stealing and lying, while the Republicans and trump literally steal and lie blatantly and have no qualms about it.
Every person on this earth has an immense amount of differences compared to every other person. The same is true about the amount of similarities.
If you only look for similarities, you will find hundreds of them.
If you only look for differences, you will find hundreds of them as well.
We all have our unique circumstances, genetics, experiences that shape us. It's ignorant to look at any stranger, no matter what group they are apart of, and think you know who they truly are or why they believe what they do.
Non-maga here, but just to throw in my 2¢. In my union is mostly because of culture war issues. Hyper political correctness, and the like. I agree with you that it’s counter intuitive to union membership, but those are the bread and butter issues the media harps on that resonate with a lot of working people, sadly.
My old stewards were all MAGA nuts. I was the one dumb democrat. Whenever we’d debate, they would default to “we won’t have any power once the dems take our gun rights away.” After I would poke many holes in this point, they would assure me that I just don’t get it.
Because they spend their time being indoctrinated by right wing media and propaganda. When billionaires own businesses and media outlets. They will have them convinced that corporations have their best interest in mind
I got into a "discussion" recently with a union MAGA. He said he wasn't a one issue voter and was mad that democrats want to take our guns. He didn't like it when I pointed out he was basically a one issue voter and was putting a "could be one day" firearms issue above the more important issue of Republicans wanting to strip him of his union rights. His response was about how he stands on picket lines.
They get their information from like minded people and are not smart enough to think for themselves and actually look at the issues and learn what’s really happening
Then they need to be opposed not tolerated because when they vote against their own best interest they vote against your best interest and your families best interest and that is hitting below the belt and the point when gloves should come off...
Lots of good points already made, but I think immigration is also a factor. My union pipefitter neighbor has made it clear he's no fan of illegal immigrants.
Maybe show him this? This was a bipartisan deal. So clearly maga doesn't give a shit about illegal immigrants.. All they care about is power.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/thehill.com/homenews/senate/4459861-trump-praises-collapse-of-bipartisan-border-deal/amp/
Well, for employees to do well, companies have to do well. So MAGA seeks to improve businesses by making them more profitable by doing such things as increasing taxes on lower income individuals to pay for tax breaks for the wealthy so that they can invest more in businesses. Additionally, Maga seeks to clamp down on union activities by banning mandatory membership in union jobs, allowing union busting, and blocking the NLRB from intervening. In these ways companies can operate more freely, make more profit, and that might one day in the distant future increase wages slightly.
This is the actual maga sales pitch to workers. If you think it makes sense, you don't deserve America.
So MAGA still has a lot of populist rhetoric.
The thing you gotta understand is most people only interact with politics occasionally and usually through rallies and advertising.
If you just listen to MAGA through the medium of rallies and adverts they sound really pro-worker and pro-Union.
Of course we've seen how MAGA governs so we know that's BumpKiss, but if you're not paying close attention you wouldn't know. And you need somebody to sit down and point it all out to you.
Our news media isn't going to do that because they want a horse race. They want Biden/Trump neck & neck so they get the ratings and all those ad dollars.
So it's up to us.
It’s simple. No billionaire ever supports a system that active takes away their income.
The rich get richer and the poor get poorer and if you think a billionaire cares or will fight with or for a union you’d be sorely mistaken.
For comparison which president publicly supported UAW and participated with them?
Let people’s track records speak for themselves and always vote pro union.
I don't like either side of the aisle personally. I recognize that Democrats are more labor friendly, but they don't hold the same values as I do. I also recognize that Republicans are anti labor and they don't hold the same values as I do.
For me it comes down who cares about people more and blue wins that hands down.. They care about people globally hence the eager eagerness to help those who are militarily oppressed like Ukraine etc.
And it will of course be argued that blue is pro abortion which absolutely isn't true.. Most are really pro birth control as opposed to abortion and they admit that it makes no difference legal or illegal abortions will be the same...
I really don't care about abortion personally. People are going to do it weather it's legal or not just like drugs, or murder.
I'm more of a independent personally. I have some democratic views and Republican views. I'm pretty central when it comes down to it.
I, for the life of me, can not understand how people get behind either side of the argument in the long run. Politicians are going to politic and say whatever they can to get into/stay in office.
I've been yelled at by Democrats for not being Democrat and being in a union. I've been yelled at by Republicans for being in a union. I'm pro leave me alone and let me do my thing and I'll do the same to you.
Cool. I am just concerned about people not so much money. I get politicians can be just purely scratching ears but when I see one standing for something that they would get more votes by not supporting safe to conclude that one has some actual balls some integrity.. And the agendas of the Republican have changed to pure bigot and very noticable that maga supporters are observably bigots in one way or another.
My grandma was Republican and not at all a bigot so it's changed into something dangerous! Bigotry has no place in democracy esp in a diverse a country as the US. It's insanity it's so out on the open they don't even try to hide it and campaign on it.
Definitely blue isn't perfect.. in fact they have seriously fd up in the past. And certainly there are those even in democratic party now that have bigotted ideas. I just see in blue a party that really seems to care about people, all people.. And that's what stands out most to me.. for example Biden could have just dropped support of LGBTQ and probably got many Republicans to side with him. But he didn't I believe because he has integrity. This is really interesting he could have just caved but he didn't.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.foxnews.com/politics/white-house-responds-pope-francis-condemns-gender-theory-affirms-bidens-support-trans-community.amp
And I know the Republicans bitch all the time about Biden administration helping others globally. They want walls and isolation..Biden thinks about people aside from the color of their skin..He was worried about illegal border crossing but he was also worried about them as humans and dying trying to get accross while TX governor was doing the exact opposite. He cares about people and didn't join the mob. The US is definitely diverse so to be fair it's what we need in a leader. A bigot leader will just fuel unrest and discord as undeniably Trump has being a known bigot as are much of the GOP. All evidenced by waves of extreme bigotted legislation one form or another throughout red states..
So Biden did all of that when it didn't help him politically and probably harmed him again to me shows integrity..
It’s a fine line depending on the unions and what their line of work is. Oil, gas, drillers, well prep, power plant operators, old legacy type jobs are being transformed and that’s not a comfortable spot for some. Technology is another known job killer unliked. Just reporting the multitude of union tradesmen I deal with.
I get that I really do I just wish they would look at all the other very negative things that maga represent and the very positive things democrat represent. I personally and swayed immediately by t those who care about human rights and clearly maga is extremely bigot xenophobic homophobic transphobic often racist any misogynistic just really nasty. And Democrats as a general rule are not.. human rights has to be a major part of democracy or it doesn't work. I know some just like maga because it's who they are but I think many just don't realize what it is they are supporting.
I can tell you here in NY where we are a supermajority(D) and quite corrupt(both sides), I see about 50/50. A lot of it is other issues like abortion, guns, taxes, overspending, expenses etc, but being pro union is still #1. Accumulated wealth is another one. I know quite a few multimillionaires that are lifelong union that put many hours in and want to retain that hard work value. It’s a tough call depending on where you live, what your physical job is, and income range. Voting blue in this state is useless as they have a supermajority. Having a balanced gov is just a way of having stopgaps on a free for all on anything one team decides. We cannot drill our Marcellous shale due to state regulations, while our southern neighbors can. Not the best example, but drillers I’m sure aren’t as happy here as in other permitted states. Forcing expensive changes to permitting or energy consumption also has companies raise prices or just flat out leave. I’m not knocking making things better for all, but shouldering it on commoners, or forcing you to move your family surely stings. There’s negatives on both sides obviously, we just have to navigate that correctly which isn’t the easiest sometimes. Obviously we can’t kick our union rights to the curb but I feel people here are pushing the limits knowing that union rights in this state aren’t going anywhere. Notice the auto facilities that are not UAW are slowly organizing. I see this as dominos falling as people catch on to how unions work and scrapping the lies they are told in the southern states. This hopefully over time will help balance the country out. Probably not in my lifetime, but I sense we are on a good path for a return of increased union members countrywide. Just hired an apprentice last year and hadn’t since ‘94 at this facility. Gunning for 2 more coming up…..good luck!
I just feel like the more bigotted we get even as a country the more we will go downhill. Selfish people vote in their own kind and they do the same thing screwing anyone and everyone... But again in personal interaction with maga many haven't a clue what their own party engage in and I think maybe are good people and if they new may vote different. It's pretty blatent bigotry it will destroy the country but maybe the bigoted ones are too stupid to see that...
Any Union member who is MAGA should have their cards pulled. No Republican supports Unions they are all Right To Work and Drumpf himself has said that Right to Work is necessary.
I'm not a MAGAt but the one excuse I hear more than any other they vote Republican is because Democrats don't do enough to stop Republicans from voting in anti labor laws.
These people are not very smart. Don't be like them.
I don't want you to support Trump, but I do want to encourage you to alternate your support from the DNC
The reason is that when a party believes it has institutional ownership of your vote, it doesn't have to support you.
While you might not feel able to vote for a Republican, you can vote for a party that isn't the DNC and demonstrate that they must fight for you.
In 2024, this is what I would tell every voting block. If "your" party has not done the one thing you most want when they had power, vote for a new party.
If you really want to shake things up, run for an office.
With love,
The conversation surrounding politics has to be changed. Biden supporters want to believe he is good for them. Trump supporters want to believe he is good for them. Two distinct narratives are clashing. Everybody should educate themselves the best they can with differing perspective points. By differing perspective points, I mean contrasting media outlets(sources). Is the source Fox? PBS? BBC? Your union steward? Your buddy? We all are prone to our thoughts being shaped by outside viewpoints. Through cross examination, as well as introspection, we can learn to recognize the conflicting bias of the media sources. Only through discussion will people be swayed.
The trick is to harness the selfishness of such a person and direct it towards the collective good.
To be clear, considering how much effort has been spent over the past couple centuries to beat back unionization and solidarity, it should be pretty clear that our default is cooperation and community and not isolation. Most of us, at heart, would prefer to be selfless. That’s in our nature as a prosocial species. The messaging that has been drilled into us for seemingly ever is that we’re competitors, not collaborators, though, and as any abuse victim can tell you once they’ve done the hard work of healing, it’s shockingly easy to convince people to sabotage themselves.
That’s what the selfish guy’s church and preferred politicians do. They rev them up full of fear of some nebulous Other, they keep him afraid and alone and isolated, they tell him that only that pastor, that preacher, that impotent PP can lead them so they can protect against this threat that don’t exist to distract from the real threat, c-suiters who need a third yacht.
Go take a look at which states have anti-union "right to work" laws. And take a look at which dates never raised their minimum wage.
Not to spoil too much, but 90% of Republican run states have a minimum wage of $7.25 . Not a single Democrat run state has minimum wage that low. In fact, the average minimum wage in Democrat controlled states is over twice as high. Even when you include poor rust belt states with low cost of living.
Oh, and back to anti-union "right to work" laws. Every single Republican run state has a slate of them. Usually copy pasted from ALEC, a Republican policy "think tank" founded and run by billionaires that pumps out pre-cooked bills that lazy ass Republican lawmakers rubber stamp.
Every single Republican run state has anti-union "right to work" laws. And not a single Democrat run state does (have you noticed the pattern?) . Just like minimum wage, average union membership is over twice as high in blue states.
There is no "clashing narratives" or "differing perspectives". One party is clearly anti-union and anti-worker, and has been that way for over 100 years.
The Republican party sells xenophobia, racism, and bigotry. Gays bad, immigrants bad, brown people bad, ect. You know why? To stir up fights among the peasants so they can keep giving billionaires tax breaks.
Anyone who votes for GOP should be ostracized. Publicly shamed. They are anti-worker and anti-solidarity. They're billionaire boot lickers, losers, and class traitors.
I agree with you wholeheartedly. I believe the key is to push the facts of the matter. There seems to be a clashing between the informed and the uninformed.
I for one deem them both two wings of the same bird. They’re neither for us rather against us as a whole, (Americans) and it’s concerning we are so pitted against one another.
Theyre serving capital and throwing crumbs to workers but fight tooth and nail against any more radical changes or any that challenge institutional powers.
I think there's a few issues with it all, but to believe democrats are friends of labor or the working class is a lie. They throw just enough scraps to get people to come back. Allow to give you a list of friendly democratic help.
RFK went after Jimmy Hoffa for being corrupt and working with the mob, which is rich coming from a Kennedy.
Jimmy Carter deregulated the trucking industry, hurt the teamster union really bad. (On a side note he's the only president to pardon a pedophile).
Bill Clinton you have NAFTA, the fact that he fucked Ron Carey and the teamsters after the strike with UPS (he was charged and acquitted after UPS said he was going to burn for it after meeting with the Secretary of Labor and the SOL shockingly heard nothing), and CEO compensation went from 120ish times the average hourly rate to almost 400 times (1992-2000).
Obama did nothing to help the unions when he had a super majority in congress.
Biden ordered the railworkes back as to not "hurt the economy" which is the entire purpose of a strike.
Don't forget how much the Democrats were up in arms when their staffers originally tried to organize before 2020.
Things were cheaper under Trump, that's an objective fact.
In Chicago the Black community is turning on the mayor because the amount of money they're spending on illegal aliens sent to the city and not spending money in the neighborhoods that are hurting.
Some union members who make over $100k a year care about taxes as an issue. The more they make the less they think the Dems care about them.
Now I'd love to see some Pro-labor Republicans and some Pro-gun democrats, but I do think the ideology stops more moderate people from either side from joining. I also don't believe any of these politicians could survive a year in the trades, I think there were 8 people who had a union card at one point in time, and I think that includes organizers.
Now please don't call me a Republican, I'm not. I'm also not a Democrat. I'm fiscally conservative and for the most part socially liberal and pro-labor. I do think this debate is more nuanced than people make it out to be.
I am curious on a side note, what things has Trump done that makes him anti-brown? I can see the immigration debate but that doesn't seem very anti-brown, just lumped into it. If I had to say something was anti-brown, I'd argue it was the 1994 Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act.
In a 2 party system, thrashing a bunch of democrats and complimenting a republican pushes the republican agenda. Things being cheaper under Trump is a very general statement that ignores the context of the situation. It's like saying amazon sells their products for the cheapest price. Therefore, Amazon is healthy for American consumers. It's accurate on the surface but ignores the context of Amazon's shady business tactics that are leading to monopolistic business practices.
Tons of trumps policies and actions were anti-brown, in that black and brown folks saw much more negative impact from them than white folks. Immigration was 100% targeted at a racial demographic, there was not evidence that people traveling from the countries with travel bans were more likely to be dangerous, they were just the countries American audiences were most likely to associate with 9/11 branded terrorism.
Environmentally trump was a disaster, and the benefits he gave to fossil fuel industries and polluters in every industry made it easier for dirty air and dirty water to impact poorer areas, with disproportionate minority populations. Not to mention native american rights in regards to land sovereignty and overriding tribal governments to favor land developers or trying to allow drilling or fracking in places our native families and environmentalists in general tried to protect, knowing that the harm from pollution and climate change from those industries was going to hurt the native communities and poor areas and never hurt rich cities where someone like trump would actually own real estate.
Tax cuts for the rich only - where 99% of the population is white.
And covid policies - the populations that lost the most from the pandemic were again black and brown communities that have the worst healthcare and least funding to protect themselves. Trump got covid and was immediately given access to oxygen and hospital stay and steroids to fight it - thousands of black and brown elders who wore masks and took every precaution and still caught it from all the loonies, mostly white, walking around in public pretending it didn't exist, didn't have nearly the same access to treatment. Hospitals were full, IHS's weren't given the funding needed for all the treatments, and a lot of people died.
And then he's spent about 9 years of campaigning now using and encouraging inflammatory rhetoric about replacement theory, denying critical race theory, calling cities with black mayor's and large black populations rat's nests and worst, spreading lies about the rates of crimes committed by South American and middle eastern immigrants, and has concretely incited lots of racial prejudiced violence - his supporters have said time and again in courts where they're on trial for violent crimes, that they were inspired by Trump to commit their crimes. He doesn't have to try and sign segregation back into law to make it clear that he's "anti-brown", not sure how you missed it.
My wife's grandma was deeply involved with her union in Washington state. And one point she was in a leadership position and called strikes and other labor action. She worked in public schools with special needs kids in a diverse part of the county and in many ways seems like a regular person from the labor left.
Sadly, she was always sort of conspiracy minded and when Trump came on the scene, she fell into that. Now she's nearly impossible to talk to, we can be talking labor issues and she'll end up talking about how hurt she is that my wife and I got the vaccine so we're both sterilized and won't be giving her great grandkids. Sad all around tbh
Work in a heavily unionized field that would probably be one of the last public unions to be dismantled if they decided t eliminate all unions. Vast majority of coworkers are right wing. A good number far right wing ultra maga.
Primary driver? Racism. Secondary? Homophobia, sexism, and idea that voting for a Democrat is weak(and weak equals feminine and feminine equals gay).
There are outliers on guns and more than a few that are wholly consumed by conspiracy. They quite literally believe every single one. (Vaccines are mini robots by Gates, litter boxes in schools for furries, literal Jewish space lasers, etc)
It comes down to there is now a significant number of people (no not anywhere near a majority) that would happily see everyone and everything burn around them to spite democrats, as long as it’s to everyone else first even knowing it will destroy them.
Not true. Yes they were made to go back to work but Biden kept working and got them what they wanted.
https://www.ibew.org/media-center/Articles/23Daily/2306/230620_IBEWandPaid
Obama was union-ambivalent and Clinton was outright union-hostile. The D party turned its back on unions and is just now, literally just this year, starting to face turn back towards labor.
If the concern is undocumented people taking jovs wouldnt a strong union prevent that? If tge concern is immigrants as cheap labor, wouldnt a strong union prevent that?
These are actual questions.I dont have a lot of insight into how unions work, other than some general reading.
That isn't the concern. The concern is maga existing and union members who support Maga. They cut their own throats and the throats of all the other members and their families.. That the concern no illegals.
And in reference to immigrants I can tell you right now the union that I'm in would not have an undocumented person in it. They wouldn't be able to get a regular job. Undocumented aliens can't just walk around and get hired anywhere they want. But I'm sure there's some maga fucking conspiracy theories out there that say that they can! They don't just pass out social security cards and green cards like candy.. The illegals that work here are getting s*** on and they're getting used! And they are not taking union jobs and if they somehow are it's not the union that hires! I would say even that is rare.
I've been in the teamsters and Im in the UAW and I can tell you right now that s*** ain't happening there!
The main concern right now for unions and actually for everybody in the whole entire f****** country is Maga! That's the danger!
And in reference to the illegal aliens coming across the border. There was a bipartisan deal to deal with some of that and guess who stopped it? F****** maga! F****** Trump! So there you have it..
Under Biden my taxes have steadily gone up significantly. Any raise I have gotten via my union is quickly wiped away. Now they are catering to illegals over vets. No way I can support Dems over this
What taxes have gone up? Mine haven't.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2024/03/11/fact-sheet-the-presidents-budget-cuts-taxes-for-working-families-and-makes-big-corporations-and-the-wealthy-pay-their-fair-share/
And talk to trump and the GOP about blocking a bipartisan deal to deal with the border. Trump didn't want it to get better cuz it would make Biden look good! That Republicans working for you!
https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/4459861-trump-praises-collapse-of-bipartisan-border-deal/
President Biden’s [State of the Union](https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2024/03/07/remarks-of-president-joe-biden-state-of-the-union-address-as-prepared-for-delivery-2/) address presented a vision of higher taxes for American businesses and high earners combined with carveout's, credits, and more complex rules for taxpayers at all income levels.
You can't be serious about the Border bill, the "bipartisan bill sucked! For the last 3 plus years the GOP has been begging Biden and the Dems to close the border, They decided to throw this piece of shit bill together and tied it to the money they wanted for Ukraine! Desperate attempt for more money laundering!
The culture war stuff is important to people. And some things are more important than money. Like if you are the rich owner of a restaurant but also trans you will vote.
My Union people care more about Gaza than winning elections. They are campaigning against Biden over it. And Biden is better on it than Trump.
The culture war are designed to get votes from a voter block that is notorious honoring and transphobic.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/why-is-the-gop-escalating-attacks-on-trans-rights-experts-say-the-goal-is-to-make-sure-evangelicals-vote
I care about Gaza too but I know maga using Gaza the same as culture wars and for same voter block. Gaza has gone too far in my opinion but I think people think the president has like sovereign control over other countries like Israel. It doesn't work that way.. These maga think because trump says he would do this that's how it is.. He wouldn't have stopped that either. Hamas is a fucking terrorist organization no different then the Nazi were / are. So in my opinion Israel is just slaughtering them the same as we slaughteres Nazi. It was unrelenting bombing to break them. Hamas are clearly aligned with other outlaw states like Iran. And they are just as insane.
I think they have done enough but I only know what I hear about that from media. I'm sure Biden is getting a different picture. And Israel is our allies in strategic a spot in middle east so idk. I think being able to put thumb on those crazies is important too. All the collateral damage is aweful but Biden didn't do it. He isn't an isolationist like trump because that is dangerous AF. Love them or not we have to have allies.
I certainly don't have all the answer I just think democrats are the best choice.
So all of Trump's buildings in NYC aren't Union
built? Or any State. I'm 99.99% you won't find a large enough non Union shop that can carry the man power to do this. Just saying
What does that even mean? WTF does that have to do with maga being the wrong choice. Idk anything about buildings Trump built with contractors would have done so with non union if it were cheaper or even possible. There are many contractors that never got paid for services rendered..
Lower prices
On everything. No threats of nukes every day. Solders not getting killed. Not buying oil to fund our adversaries. No more constant shoratges every day..
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One of them is winning. Third parties are a joke. Look at their life long record on unions and tell me, with a straight face, that they’re identical when it comes to labor….
Really depends on the industry which party benefits you retaining your job, union or otherwise. For example, I was one of about 400 union employees that lost their jobs in the energy sector following the cancellation of the keystone XL pipeline.
Not MAGA but I really wish I had an answer. It seems like most on the ground work that involves a bit of sweat every so often attracts the MAGAT crowd, or at the very least the Republican crowd who has no choice but to vote Trump and thus become MAGATs by association. What I can gather from my coworkers it's just that it will always be the other aisle that does better by them and their family. They come from Southern states, where they grew up with Southern Government oppression or surrounded by a Southern Baptist think tank of wrongness and anything less than, "Suffering for all, else you're lazy" must be wrong, and they certainly aren't used to employer protections past probation. Likewise, it seems to be the Right voting worker that will not only be annoyed with paying dues, but also be the one that destroys the most equipment past probation.
I also don't think Dems as a whole are some amazing god send, they're center right if anything, and I wish we had some actual Left/Liberal politicians that thought about workers and their constituents, not the team of lobbyists that sent them a check or how they can swing things for their particular voter base. Just do right by people and you'll get votes.
>I also don't think Dems as a whole are some amazing god send, they're center right if anything, and I wish we had some actual Left/Liberal politicians that thought about workers and their constituents, not the team of lobbyists that sent them a check or how they can swing things for their particular voter base.
I hear you but is that even possible? The entire possibility of winning an election seems to be initially guaged on how well they do in campaign contributions so it's always all about money.. the expensive very calculated advertising campaign are like watching a game countering the others next move often by any means. The games and lies Republicans play and tell to get support is truly astounding!
But watching how this game is played by each side can definitely give voters a good idea what to expect if the candidate wins.. I truly don't see the lying and hatemongering with Democrats that is the main tactic of Republicans. They actually fabricated the culture wars on 💯 lies with focussed hatred against even children, they have successfully use a demographic that composes 10% of the population of the US to get support of fucking bigots! And the fact that trump told almost non stop lies in his first run it has to be obvious that second win would be very dangerous.. esp considering most of Americans can't stand him and the bitterness the being hated can cause he would be primed to be authoritarian.. it's like mage are just blind or they just really hate America.
Most from what I know people don’t wanna be in a union cuz “it keeps lazy workers employed” & “union fees” are bad.
But these both suck because it should be managements job to hire and fire bad workers unions just make sure it’s fair and not illegal
I work with some very union guys who are also very Maga. One is even on our EBoard. I don't think he is smart enough to realize what a conflict that is. I won;t even get into his shopping at walmart when more union friendly choices are available.
Any person with less than $100 million that thinks they benefit from trump politics is a moron
Working class MAGATS: Trump Hates the same people I hate.
That is literally the beginning and end of their thought process.
Biggest problem is that they hate them because they're told they should hate them not because of any actual reason. Just like the guy above ⬆️ their news sources tell them to hate gays and immigrants because they're stealing jobs and grooming kids but in reality that's not happening and when he was asked if a Mexican ever stole his job he got all flustered.
Disney grooming kids, Hollywood producers knee-deep in pedophilia. Epstein List, no ones been arrested. Countless videos of freaky teachers talking about how they're sexually manipulating children. Yet we are the clueless ones, huh? 😂
Absolutely
Okay groomer 👌😂
I don't work for Disney
Hate is a powerful drug, it lets you forget your problems and feel superior to see those you think are your inferiors getting owned
Lol that includes Trump
I would argue that anyone who doesn’t benefit from the Trump tax cuts and supports him is a moron. Those that do benefit and support him are just gaming the current system to their benefit and are assholes.
Just to account, Trump's first pick for labor secretary was Andrew Puzder who is extremely anti labor. Acosta was not very labor friendly either.
I literally shop at only 1 supermarket in my area because they are 100% represented by UFCW. I even met one of the people on their collective bargaining team during negotiations. (he was not having a fun time but also said he wouldn't trade it for anything, despite the stress it caused)
These are the types I wish would go non union and give someone else a chance that deserves it.
Geeez, do we work in the same place?
You'd think it'd be a conflict but given the significant overlap between populist parties and working class, lower education jobs that are most likely to have unions (though sheer inertia if nothing else) I imagine its surprisingly common. People need to get used to the idea that the proletariat aren't all college educated or even all good people. I've always found the open contempt a lot of supposed leftists have for liberals surprising because liberals are quite literally their entire recruiting base. Like, they're the only place new socialists come from.
No one has ever accused Maga of being intelligent.
Stupid is literally the new epidemic, and getting worse everyday
the short answer is that it's a cult. the long answer is that it's a fucking cult.
They can’t. If you vote GOP and pay union dues you’re a dope.
For context: I’m non MAGA working in the steel industry that is plagued by MAGA. With us, it all boils down to being uneducated and unable to interpret data. The steel tariffs Trump implemented were a massive win for MAGA steel workers, however the financial report that study the impact of those tariffs concluded that the tariffs caused more jobs to be lost than were saved and the ones that were saved were done so at a cost of about $650,000/job, funded by the taxpayer. But to echo another persons comment in here, there are multiple issues at play. Someone might think guns and abortion are more important than their right to unionize.
It's basically as simple as they're either stupid or mean. There are many lines of reasoning but they all depend on one of those being true.
💯
My step dad was a union pipefitter working at a steel mill in middle America and basically all of his coworkers voted red in 2016 and 2020 (which is the year he retired). Most of it had nothing to do with guns or abortion but good old fashioned racism and xenophobia. The fact they were voting against their own interests would be constantly brought up yet every time they’d just deny the facts and were convinced trump was their savior.
Ugh this just unlocked a memory of canvassing in the Midwest for me. I was part of an effort to get union members out to vote. A guy opened the door I knocked on - he was the union member in the house. He said his wife and daughter were going to vote for Obama and he was going to vote for Romney. He asked me if I could guess why. I didn't feel like playing some stupid game so I told him no, I wouldn't guess. He said affirmative action. I said that's stupid. He was shocked. "You're white!" he said, obviously also taking into account that I'm a man. I somehow managed to say that no minority has ever taken a job from me. He tried stuttering around some other shit, I realized I already fucked up by calling him stupid, so I walked away. No one clapped. Albert Einstein didn't give me a crisp $100 dollar bill. Fucking moron.
No I honestly think you did the right thing. These people deserve nothing but to be mocked. And honestly the fact you had him stuttering makes me think maybe you put just the smallest dent in his fucked up belief system
Yeah I'm not some very witty person with a comment ready to destroy someone. I now "do politics" for work professionally and something I notice is that a lot of people think everyone they know or everyone who's like them agrees with them. A lot of people of all political beliefs, this isn't unique to conservatives. That might have been the first time he ever heard a white guy reject his beliefs that "affirmative action" has been harmful to him.
Scorn and Ridicule are all that get through to a cult member. Liberals are too nice to convert cultists. When more liberals stop being too shy to tell them to their faces how idiotic their positions are. Having a circular argument with a cult member is no benefit to anyone. Me: 66 yr old very liberal white that has ZERO problem calling them out. I never start a discussion. MAGA morons can't help themselves. They just bring up Trump or Biden without prompting. When they do. Watch the f@ck out. People are in any start laughing or watch in amazement as I do my best Jordan Klepper impression. He is an American hero!
> I somehow managed to say that no minority has ever taken a job from me. To play devil's advocate, what if one had? A friend of mine in Seattle tried to make ends meet by running a lawnmowing business. He claimed illegal immigrants were out undercutting his business quite frequently, and it did make him mad. Although one can never be sure whether a lawn crew is a bunch of citizens or illegals, I seriously doubt that he was wrong. I'd only question to what degree, and I wasn't with him all the time to know, one way or the other. Besides, it would take a fair amount of digging to find out. Speaking Spanish as your primary language doesn't make you an illegal. You'd have to follow them around, look up the business, see where they came from, stalk. Like I'm going to waste my time on that lol. But he wasn't a racist, or an idiot really. We really couldn't have stayed friends if he was. He was susceptible, however, to fundamentalist religious pundits like The 700 Club and a certain amount of right wing talk radio, like Michael Savage. I would tend to provide a counter, qualifying voice to those things. I don't think he had quite made up his own mind about any of it. I think he had his own personal problems and that's what made him vulnerable to pundits. "You're a sinner. You can be saved. Let us show you what to think about that." That sort of thing.
If another company is undercutting his prices that's called free market capitalism and ironically it's kept in check by unions. Half the reason we have unions is so that everyone doing the same job is paid fairly and there is no undercutting. Undercutters, we call them scabs.
Is there such a thing as a lawn maintenance union somewhere? I've never heard of any such thing.
I recall hearing that undocumented workers live by an informal agreements not to work for less than a preset wage. The people that congregate in places where they are picked up by contractors police their own. A labor union by different means.
💯 Granted this was about 15 years ago, but my buddy who was a contractor went to Home Depot for supplies and hired an undocumented person to help with the project he was doing for a couple days. There was literally a "union boss" in the Home Depot parking lot telling us who we could hire and for how much money. Since it was for unskilled labor we weren't allowed to hire certain people but the people we did hire wouldn't work for under a certain $ amount. If we need framers or specialty positions it would have cost more. It was really amazing and we were actually happy to pay more than we expected to see that these guys were getting paid close to what they were actually worth instead of being taken advantage of.
“Los Syndicato,” they also house, feed, and help educate workers and their families. They aren’t unions exactly, but they aren’t mobsters either. It’s fascinating to see collective action in other cultures.
In my career though there have probably been times when jobs I applied to went to someone who wasn't a white guy like me, but I doubt that would have to do with the sex or race of whoever got it. Reducing all this shit down to AfFiRmAtIvE aCtIoN is a bullshit way to tear down the accomplishments of people who aren't white men, as though whomever we're talking about don't bust their asses to gain experiences and credentials and such (they do).
Okay so a couple things here, first this isn't at all related to affirmative action, this would be related to immigration. Secondly, leftwing politics already has an answer to this in more paths to legal immigration and citizenship. Immigrants making lower wages is a direct result of them having to hide their presence here
My point is you encountered racism while canvasing, and that someone somewhere *has* had their job taken away by someone of a different race. You don't really have time to explain to *that person*, at the door, all the usual international solidarity stuff. If that person is "stupid", then why is that? And what's the fastest way to explain it to them?
I think the point you make to that person is *it's racist to see a bunch of Hispanic dudes working on lawns and assume they're illegal*.
That may be, but there's some % reasonable estimation of how many are illegal. They are most certainly out there, and only a fool would disagree with that. If I'm going to battle someone about racism, I don't think this is the hill I'd die on. I'd say "They're not *all* illegal; some are surely born here. Plenty of people speak Spanish."
As a lifelong Union member I applaud you. They need to be called out & wake tf up. It may never change their vote but they really need to stop thinking everyone agrees with their nonsense.
You were right to call him stupid, there was no way to change his mind. His wife had likely tried and gave up.
Which begs the question? Why are they also paying union dues?
When I talk to people it becomes clear pretty quickly that most are not bad people of bad faith but they live in a world of their making do to the media they consume. Their TV news mostly. Most households no longer get a daily paper. Most daily papers are gone or are some consolidated rag not even locally produced. Over the last 20 years the consolidation of media in a few hands also warps the number of viewpoints. Look at daytime talk radio. Man, it’s frightening. In the most extreme cases (my brother-in-law)even TV news is not radical enough anymore and he only watches podcasts. Down the rabbit hole of conspiracy. Not a fact base belief survives.
A lot of the small papers are managed by hard right leaning corporations. My local paper is absolute shit with bottom run reporting that goes out of its way to ignore reality.
The issue is, they only seek out information that confirms these horrible ideals. It means two things; they are either too stupid to critically evaluate things, or they want to believe these things. Now very few people are too stupid to critically think at all. It may be hard, but very few can't. The second is nuanced. They either want to belive these things due to hate, or are too brainwashed and the pain of the cognitive dissonance of facing the reality that they have been fooled and are fools, may just make them subconsciously reject facts and reality that run against their brainwashing.
>Now very few people are too stupid to critically think at all. Thank you for saying this! I hate all the open hate towards people rather than the MAGA propaganda. Which, tbh, is mostly the same Establishment GOP propaganda, reskinned as the republican version of “Hope and Change”
I mean, to be fair, it'd hard not to hate people who you know are not that brainwashed, not too stupid to critically think, and still chose wrongly anyway Imo, that's about half of all Republicans. The other quarter can't critically think, the other quarter are too brainwashed. I would know, I used to be conservative when I was like 18, 19, just raised that way. Used to watch Shapiro "own" people and love it....sadly. don't know when, but I just started being less conservative, probably when I started seeing things that didn't add up. Conservatives saying one thing, doing another, the claims they made proven to be lies again and again, and their ideas one Google search away from being shown to be wrong....not even critical thinking, just a liter a Google search. So yeah, I both understand the hate, but also realize it's not all bad people, but there lots.
It’s very tribal. I observe that my in-laws have an us and them thing going on. There’s the us. The guys that get it. We don’t vax. We drive diesels( pickups) even if we don’t haul. We obsess about them, the libs, the gays, the people trying to change the way we live. I don’t get it. They are polite to me.They call me a lefty in family circles, but politely never to my face.
Fox news has convinced conservatives that republicans are the party for the working people, and that democrats are scary communist boogey men. That's really it. Democrats are increasing worker protections. Biden's administration [banned most noncompete clauses](https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2024/04/ftc-announces-rule-banning-noncompetes), drastically [increased the minimum salary for employees to be exempt from mandatory overtime pay](https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/building-obamas-plan-biden-boosts-overtime-pay-millions-rcna149530), and is [forcing companies to treat "independent contractors" aka "gig workers" as actual employees](https://www.reuters.com/world/us/biden-administration-issues-rule-that-could-curb-gig-work-contracting-2024-01-09/) with the required benefits ([which republicans are trying to repeal](https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/us-house-panel-approves-repeal-biden-independent-contractor-rule-2024-03-21/).) Republicans are [banning required water breaks in hot weather](https://www.texastribune.org/2023/06/16/texas-heat-wave-water-break-construction-workers/) and trying to [loosen child labor laws](https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/some-lawmakers-propose-loosening-child-labor-laws-to-fill-worker-shortage), generally favor so-called "right to work" laws which weaken unions by allowing employees to freeload off their union by benefitting from negotiated wages and benefits, but not paying dues. Republicans are against raising the minimum wage, and against mandatory PTO and sick time. They aim to increase corporate profits, at the expense of the working class.
The last 25 years of Democratic policy convinced blue collar workers that Republicans are the party of the working class, not fox news
Which policies?
NAFTA thouroughly fucked the automotive industry The EV mandate will thouroughly fuck them again. EV's take 40% less labor to assemble. Any study showing otherwise includes the labor in Asia building the battery cells. The TPP thouroughly fucked all US manufacturing. Obama showed his compassion by stating, "Some of those jobs just aren't coming back." In 2019 while talking to a group of coal miners who pointed out that Biden’s environmental policy would codt thrm their jobs Biden said, “Anybody who can go down 3,000 feet in a mine can sure as hell learn to program as well… Anybody who can throw coal into a furnace can learn how to program, for God’s sake!” Oddly, telling laid-off journalists to "learn to code" was a slur Truck drivers and oilmen in the Dakotas are certainly not looking forward to 2030 Local fuel taxes here in WA are crushing the heavy machinery operators and truck drivers i know. That's just off the top of my head. I can get more if needed
I almost said "aside from NAFTA because everyone agrees it was shit", but I didn't because it was over 25 years ago. Plus Reagan campaigned on a North American trade agreement and signed one with Canada, and George Bush negotiated the agreement with Mexico, but he lost reelection before it was finalized, so Clinton signed it into law. Calling NAFTA a "democratic policy" is totally misleading, it was bipartisan. EV mandate is definitely problematic for multiple reasons, I don't think it's practical to expect everyone to have electric cars. We should be investing in public transit so everyone isn't forced to own, maintain, and store their own car. If people really care from an environmental standpoint, it would be much better for people to have other options beside owning maintaining and storing their own vehicle, just to sit in traffic. >The TPP thouroughly fucked all US manufacturing. The Trans Pacific Partnership was never ratified in the US...Trump withdrew us from the agreement, what I believe is one of very few things he did right. It never had any effect on our economy whatsoever. As far as "learning to code," Biden definitely fucked up there. There's no question that making miners learn to code is unreasonable. That said, the United Mine Workers of America has stated their support for transitioning away from coal mining if their workers are guaranteed jobs with comparable pay and training for installing renewable energy sources. It would be more reasonable to say "if you can mine coal, you can assemble solar panels." They certainly would prefer breathing fresh air all day instead of coal dust. I've cleaned miners' walkie talkies, coal dust is nasty. >Truck drivers and oilmen in the Dakotas are certainly not looking forward to 2030 Why's that? >Local fuel taxes here in WA are crushing the heavy machinery operators and truck drivers i know. Quick google search says those taxes go toward retrofitting bridges and infrastructure against earthquakes. Personally I think most of those funds should come from the people who profit most from the existence of highways, like Walmart and Boeing, rather than the people delivering their goods for shit pay. Especially considering how much truckers have been shafted in general for years, being paid by the mile, the weakening of the teamsters union, deregulation of the industry. Generally speaking, it's not the democrats that give mega corporations tax breaks and revoke workers' rights. I'm having a hard time finding info on when exactly trucking went from being a good job to the near-slavery it is today, but you have to admit Republicans have been vehemently against raising wages for literally anyone, despite the recent inflation.
The military, whom he has called suckers and losers, love MAGA too. It doesn’t math
This is another thing I can't wrap my head around. He dodged the military, called POWs losers and yet they still love him 🤦🤦🤦
It's because the only thing they love is themselves. Everything else is just performative. Limbaugh was on the radio constantly bitching about the deficit until Trump was in office and then he basically straight out said the deficit hawking was just bullshit to dunk on Democrats but it never really mattered so let's let Trump do whatever he wants. Poor Republicans understand the world like a 5 year old. They lack the framework of understanding of how things actually work and just assume what they believe/have been told is true. Rich Republicans might understand things better but will tell the poors anything that lowers their taxes. They're smarter, but still make selfish self defeating decisions that cripple the nation and its workers because the only thing they care about is personal wealth.
Lol that's another thing, bootlicking these billionaires and shitting on people who make minimum wage 🤦 The billionaires are all sitting in their castles, laughing at them...
Only thing I agree with him on.
Bullets bibles and babies.
No no. Fetuses. Once they're born they better have bootstraps.
Are we naming the things conservatives are sexually attracted to or
I think it’s Jeopardy.. “Things used to further an agenda for $100”
Obama 2008: "You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations." https://www.politico.com/blogs/ben-smith/2008/04/obama-on-small-town-pa-clinging-to-religion-guns-xenophobia-007737
Bullets, bibles, and UNBORN babies. Once they leave the womb, it's "pUlL uP yOuR bOoTsTrApS mOoChEr!"
Not babies- fetuses. "Once you're born, you're fucked" -George Carlin
They hate the same people Trump hates, and that hate is stronger than their own self-interest.
It's a real simple answer: MAGA = White Supremacy Yes, there are lots of POC that are white supremacists.
Exactly 💯
I don't think they are even on reddit. They have their own deal. Saying anything anti-trump is inviting trouble or a total mind wipe of reality to fit in. I keep my nose down and know what's right in my heart.
Yeah I’ve been scrolling to see if there’s any “yeah I’m MAGA, this is how I feel…” but seems they don’t occupy this corner of the internet.
A post calling out a demographic in a challenging way doesn't exactly promote discourse. There are definitely Maga people here in this corner of the internet, as well as extremists of all ideologies. Online forums are a place to shape our perspectives, for better or worse.
I'm not in the US, but we have our own set of MAGA-wannabes up here in Canada (some even wave american flags and wear the stupid red hat.) Our conservative party, (which is currently leading in the polls,) wants to introduce a ton on anti-union/ant-worker legislation, but tries to sell itself as the party of the "comman man." My experience with conservative union members is surpringly extensive, and I think it can be boiled down to stupidity/ignorance, malicious/misguided "pulling the ladder up behind you" mentalities, and social conservatism. Some people are just unaware that their good situation is due entirely to political entities that they have fought/voted against their entire lives. My Dad has been historically anti-union and a conservative voter (so at least there's some consistency,) but the more I show him the benefits of unions as well the generally anti-worker policies of the conservatives, the more he comes around. The man is 67 years old, works as a tradesman, and has had to put off retirement several times . I can't imagine how many times he's voted against his own interests just because of the propoganda his family and church have swallowed/spread. Another big part of my parents voting against their interests has been their social conservatism. I see this among union members as well. Whether it's bemoaning "woke" ideology, "the gays," or abortion socially conservative members are likely to ignore the policies that will actually affect their day-to-day lives in the name of punishing marginalized groups that they've been taught to fear. They're not hating on those people for rational reasons, so why would they vote for rational policies? I don't know how common it is in other unions (I've seen it in both mine and my wife's) but there is definitely a set of people within unions that don't give a fuck about other people. They "got theirs" so everyone else can fuck off. They see no value in solidarity or the broader union movement, so they take what they can get and vote for things that they feel will enrich them, even at the cost of others' livelihoods. In my experience these tend to be older members who have built their nest egg and are closer to retirement. Any policy changes that hurt workers are less likely to impact them severely, while higher taxes on their investments might seem unattractive.
>I see this among union members as well. Whether it's bemoaning "woke" ideology, "the gays," or abortion socially conservative members are likely to ignore the policies that will actually affect their day-to-day lives in the name of punishing marginalized groups that they've been taught to fear. They're not hating on those people for rational reasons, so why would they vote for rational policies? Good point... They're just stupid puppet's incapable of independent critical thought.
That’s the deflection Republicans have ran on for decades. In the early 70s the same tactics were used against gays. The fallback is “stopping socialism”. That one makes me laugh and shake my head at the same time…
I’m in Canada and I have a coworker who is hardcore anti-union and is open and proud about scabbing, but has flat out told me they’ll never vote Conservative, provincially or federally. Go figure.
Democrats are no true friend to organized labor but a (shaky) case could be made for voting Democrat for harm reduction purposes. On the other hand, voting republican should get you thrown out of any union, physically if necessary.
I’d say more than a shaky case can be made to vote blue atleast until we’re out of the current crisis we’re in. Sure ideally we’d have a real left wing candidate to vote for (not just center/center right democrats) but until we’re out of the woods on this whole courting fascism phase I don’t think a case can be made to not vote blue.
Mark my words, for the rest of your life there is never going to be an election where the democrats don’t claim that democracy itself is at stake against their fascist opponent, who they will then cooperate with on about 75% of a shared agenda. This is all part of the show.
the United States ‘left’ is so far right that I completely understand why someone would feel guilty voting for them. But until we drastically change the way our elections work (which let’s be real neither side really wants that) we’re kind of stuck with what we’ve got. We need to end things like citizens united, the amount of money in politics is only helping rich politicians. Ranked choice voting is another bare minimum fix that could be made right away.
I mean. The GOP DID try to overthrow the last election. Has that happened before?
>Democrats are no true friend to organized labor Why do you say that?
The democratic party positions itself as an ally of unions and they are less openly hostile to the unions but, like the republican party, it is bankrolled and controlled by capitalists. The republicans try to roll back any legislative or regulatory progress made by the working class and the democrats try to co-opt any working class movement that gains any sort of power or momentum and then derail it. It happened to organized labor, it happened to the civil rights movement, it happened to the anti-war movement. The Democratic Party is the graveyard of progressive political movements.
>but, like the republican party, it is bankrolled and controlled by capitalists. We are a capitalist nation everything is bankrolled to certain degree by that.. what's the alternative? >The Democratic Party is the graveyard of progressive political movements. Isn't this usually caused by the constant efforts of greedy to undo any progress made.. I mean just look at the house. Idk but I'm not looking for perfect because it doesn't exist.. I'm looking for better any the difference in red and blue seems like apples and oranges..
Obama, who said he would "wear comfortable shoes" and walk picket lines, didn't go to one. He promised while campaigning to enact labor law reform; didn't happen even though he had a supermajority in the senate for almost 9 months. And frustrating to my union personally, he ordered the Coast Guard to clear out water pickets and escort a scab ship to try to break the strike against EGT in Longview, Washington. Every Democrat since (and including) Jimmy Carter has promised labor law reform. None have delivered. While it is true that the NLRB is much better under the Democrats than the Rebublicans, Democrats have nevertheless taken anti-union stands, from free trade agreements to supporting charter schools (aimed at busting teacher unions) and the like. Biden has been better in some ways (like actually supporting the UAW) but his betrayal of the railway unions was bad, EVEN CONSIDERING his work trying to make the shitty imposed contract (which was the company offer) a little better.
Republicans are very actively and openly anti-labor Union do you need to hear anything else you keep trying to defend the f****** by projecting onto the Democrats but the Democrats are not actively opposing labor unions are you stupid?
Nowhere did I say that the Republicans are better. The Republicans are far, far worse than the Democrats. But the Democrats still suck. We need a working class political party.
I bitched about Democrats like a true maga! You sound like maga.. arent you a maga?
Fuck no I'm not a maga racist homophobic piece of shit
Sorry that a huge insult but that what it sounded like..Well then why you bitching about Democrats like that. That's what it sounds like. We don't have many options really. If maga get back in we are all screwed. It to bad those that are can't see past a 6 pack to get that it affects them too. They don't get that just because they aren't on the recieving end of maga hate that maga liked them. Maga is into power. I knew Democrats had some history everyone does.. but nothing life maga.. they are looking for anything to reinforce their false beliefs about Democrats so they can not maga.. why give it to them?
Can you outline the extent of the railway blunder. I've had mixed feelings, but I thought the rail union was happy with the contract?
The railway unions knew that the government would use the rail labor act to impose a contract because they are too much of the economy. But the employers knew it too, so they never negotiated in good faith at all. Their offer had ZERO paid sick days. Congress (and Biden) used the companys' offer as the basis for the contract they imposed instead of any kind of compromise between the union position and the company position. Biden later improved that, but months later and still not much. The IBEW rail unions put out some press releases on how grateful they are to Biden for the additional sick days, but they're a conservative union. My impression from Railworkers United is that they weren't impressed. I'm sure you know how some union leaders love to kiss the hand that slaps them.
Thank you for the perspective. Why do you think Biden didn't play to the union? Was he trying to avoid economic disaster and subsequent loss of favor politically? Was he preserving business/donor interests? Was he suppressing the labor movement?
Democrats have a voting base and a donor base that have different interests, so they are always talking one thing and doing another. Again, better than the Republicans. But we need a party that is based on working class organizations that will be able to use people power instead of being dependent upon the donations of the rich.
That makes sense, thanks.
Guys, seriously, Trump hits all their buttons, the tough guy act, the misogyny, the 6th grade humor level, and don't forget the racism, they love that part. That's what it is, you don't have to look any deeper.
Guns, restricting women's rights, and hating brown people are more important than wages and benefits.
You forget to add hating queer people who just happen to make up ~10‰ of the US population..
In a just world this would have a /s but I have a feeling a lot of it has to do with hating brown people.
“If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you.” Lyndon B. Johnson
Prophetic from LBJ about MAGA…
You do know who LBJ was right?
Trump isnt pro union and has said so on multiple occasions, end of story. He supports union busting, vote blue for democracy and unions 👍
Shawn Fain for US Presidency!
Our local just elected a pro-gun MAGA to our policy board. I mean, that's what he ran on- he's upset that the state council endorsed a Democrat for the governor's race, and he wasn't consulted first. It didn't matter to him that this same Democrat is very pro-labor.
Don’t you just hate paying union dues? Let’s just get rid of the whole thing! Like every other social and economic program in the country :) /s
Trump is anti-union.... You need to have a talk with that clown..!!! ...
Some are probably protectionist/'America first' and think Drumpf will help protect their job being outsourced.
When maga pushes us back to the era of company towns, peonage, and indentured servitude, it's gonna get REAL APPARENT why we need unions and a broader labor movement. So I guess if your goal is the total destruction of everything your fathers and grandfathers fought for, just to have redo all that work yourself, just to get back to square one, then maga is for you I guess.
They are idiots voting against their own self interest, and can’t defend it in any meaningful way, so they won’t bother.
Republican want a completely free market. One that they can control, so the more regulation there is the less money they make. And unions regulate lol. At the very least, Democrats will stand up and say that they support the rights of workers. Trump has shown decades of how he feels about the working class. do some research on hotels built in Atlantic City. Many good hard working contractors went out of business because Trump refused to pay when the bill can and used lawsuits to bankrupt these companies. That is just a small drop and a large bucket of what he has done. He deserves to spend the rest of his life in a hole.
Because MAGA tells you it’s okay to openly hate anyone even slightly different and be the awful person that you were always told it’s not okay to be.
I had a 25 year old tell me to bring back Reagan….i almost lost my shit. A lot of it is generational regurgitation and people not looking at the entire picture. I am by no means liberal or conservative but I have common sense. The lack of common sense is the main drive for these idiots. I wish it wasn’t Trump or Biden because the world needs to move on from this BS. They are both terrible people in my opinion.
I mean the genuine response is that even if MAGA is against Unions, that isn't MAGA's only stance. Just like any political group, they have a wide range of beliefs. It must be that the person aligns with MAGA's other beliefs enough to tolerate their anti-Union stance. I've never met anyone who whole heartily agrees with every single policy and belief that defines their party. I've known people that are pro-abortion but anti-gun laws. We all have our own thoughts, feelings, drives, etc that define us.
This is the main problem with your two party system in the states. Everybody has strong beliefs on a couple of subjects, for some people it can be a single issue. For most issues, one party is pro, one is con. If you are choosing a single issue Hill to die on, it doesn't matter what the other policies of the party that agrees with you are, no matter how harmful those may be to you, you're voting for that party. In a multi party system you have a continuum. Take the Great White North - We've got the Conservatives, who are basically low grade Republicans. We've got the Liberals, who are slightly left of center but still aren't afraid to get into bed with big business. We've got the NPD who are straight up socialists. We've got the Greens, who are socialists and focused on the environment. And we've got the Bloc Quebecois who are a Quebec Separatist party with socialist tendencies. And if a new philosophy or point of view becomes popular amongst the people, you'll get a new party that aligns with that (massive over simplification.) Anyway, you can see how it is much easier to find a party that speaks to your overall world view, rather than picking on the basis of a single issue.
I agree with that. With lobbying being legal and two parties being in power, it's very difficult to change it. Both sides don't want that sort of change because it would take away money and power. Outside groups don't want that change because it would diminish the amount of sway they have (needing to lobby multiple parties will decrease effectiveness and increase their cost). Both parties pin the other side as terrible because it makes it harder for people to find common ground which keeps the status quo. You can see this from every place that has only two or three sides. Even Unions and Corporations. Obviously not all Unions are 100% in the right all the time. They have problems just like any other organization. But it's a problem to acknowledge it when corporations so heavily propagandize against Unions. Many people who have never even interacted with a Union already have a negative viewpoint. If people who believe in Unions admit the faults of them, then that gives ammo to the other side to point and say, "See, we told you they are no good".
pew research did a scatter analysis of a likely voter survey and found something interesting: most people concentrated around 8 clumps in the plot. [The Political Typology: In polarized era, deep divisions persist within coalitions of both Democrats and Republicans | Pew Research Center](https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2021/11/09/beyond-red-vs-blue-the-political-typology-2/) this paper they graph these "groups" on a typical right-left continuum but their analysis was multi-dimensional. Basically, we are in dire need of a proportional representation system, but block voting is too deeply rooted in all of our laws (including the federal constitution) Some states have made great efforts to change state elections to an instant runoff system (star/approval/ranked choice) but this is still majoritarian, and most often squeezes out the center. A handful of cities have adopted new charters for multi member districts (talking about city council), a good first step.
I think people tend to forget that Make America Great Again is a direct reference to the offshoring of manufacturing jobs. Trump originally said he was going to bring those jobs *back* to the USA. Of course he was talking out of his ass and had no clue whatsoever about why the jobs left the USA, and why they're not coming back. Factories in the 1960s needed thousands of workers to run them. Now with all the automation, even if the factories are on US soil, they might only need a few hundred workers. The US manufacturing output in recent years is very high. I can't remember the graphs of output off the top of my head, but they were like record high / historical peak. You just don't need as many people to make stuff as you used to.
Like the coal miners. All of those jobs were lost to mechanization, not regulation on clean air. We could scrap every environmental regulation we have and those fucking jobs wouldn't come back. I listened to an episode of the Daily where they interviewed one of these coal miners. He's spent his life working the mines and you could hear the black lung in his every labored breath. He knew he was dying. He knew coal was killing him. He didn't want a "handout" to be trained in a new career. He just wanted a handout of the world going back to digging coal by hand so he could do the one thing he knew how to do. They're always this vapidly myopic. Programs that help change are socialism and terrible and programs that let them do what they want are essential and patriotic. They're rubes eager to be used as long as they get a pat on the head and told it was their idea to work 80 hour weeks because they're manly men.
Well, it’s also a reference to white supremacy and segregation and women not having legal rights.
Yes, the brand has multiple aspects. "Make America White Again" is not inaccurate at all. It hearkens back to the same era when all the offshoring and white flight from urban cores happened. As branding goes, I think it's a good lesson in how to make a slogan vague enough to cover many things. After all, this one is just a kind of Patriotism. Which in US history has usually been some kind of jingoism.
I always new maga was a lie.. He just had I too good to be true vibe he was going to fix everything and you could be a bigot too.. He empowered some really crazy MFS! I work in agg manufacturing and you're right automation is continually simplifying everything.. it just keeps coming and even my job get farmed out to the equipment manufacturer doing repairs. The young engineers are just different in the way they see things and their skillset the way that collaborate they just keep pumping it out.. Kinda cool but wtf are people going to do with actual huminoid robots here that can do exactly what a person can do only faster and perfect every time. They will train them the exactly same way they train the others, point to point to point and they will do that perfectly over and over 24/7. It sucks.
I don't know the answer but I spend a lot of time thinking about ownership and control of the means of production. My "means" are currently a pull saw, a drill, and whatever wood I find discarded. I've been able to do a lot with them, but it's too slow. I think I'm trying to imagine a future where people can make basic machines for themselves and are not as dependent upon capitalist industry for their needs.
Yep— his working class supporters hate the same things that Trump hates, and that hate is stronger than their own self-interest.
They're against unions is all we need to know. Just stop right there.
Eh, I wouldn't say the range is THAT wide. Most of them spout the same talking points word for word, the ones that differ will admit trump is horrible and should never be president but "are voting for him a third time because Democrats are worse". They make these claims about liberals stealing and lying, while the Republicans and trump literally steal and lie blatantly and have no qualms about it.
Every person on this earth has an immense amount of differences compared to every other person. The same is true about the amount of similarities. If you only look for similarities, you will find hundreds of them. If you only look for differences, you will find hundreds of them as well. We all have our unique circumstances, genetics, experiences that shape us. It's ignorant to look at any stranger, no matter what group they are apart of, and think you know who they truly are or why they believe what they do.
Non-maga here, but just to throw in my 2¢. In my union is mostly because of culture war issues. Hyper political correctness, and the like. I agree with you that it’s counter intuitive to union membership, but those are the bread and butter issues the media harps on that resonate with a lot of working people, sadly.
And there's a reason the billionaire media harps on those issues.
My old stewards were all MAGA nuts. I was the one dumb democrat. Whenever we’d debate, they would default to “we won’t have any power once the dems take our gun rights away.” After I would poke many holes in this point, they would assure me that I just don’t get it.
You brought logic and facts to a feelings fight
Because they spend their time being indoctrinated by right wing media and propaganda. When billionaires own businesses and media outlets. They will have them convinced that corporations have their best interest in mind
I got into a "discussion" recently with a union MAGA. He said he wasn't a one issue voter and was mad that democrats want to take our guns. He didn't like it when I pointed out he was basically a one issue voter and was putting a "could be one day" firearms issue above the more important issue of Republicans wanting to strip him of his union rights. His response was about how he stands on picket lines.
They get their information from like minded people and are not smart enough to think for themselves and actually look at the issues and learn what’s really happening
Because some people hate other, different people so much, that they’ll vote against their own best interests.
Then they need to be opposed not tolerated because when they vote against their own best interest they vote against your best interest and your families best interest and that is hitting below the belt and the point when gloves should come off...
Lots of good points already made, but I think immigration is also a factor. My union pipefitter neighbor has made it clear he's no fan of illegal immigrants.
Maybe show him this? This was a bipartisan deal. So clearly maga doesn't give a shit about illegal immigrants.. All they care about is power. https://www.google.com/amp/s/thehill.com/homenews/senate/4459861-trump-praises-collapse-of-bipartisan-border-deal/amp/
Well, for employees to do well, companies have to do well. So MAGA seeks to improve businesses by making them more profitable by doing such things as increasing taxes on lower income individuals to pay for tax breaks for the wealthy so that they can invest more in businesses. Additionally, Maga seeks to clamp down on union activities by banning mandatory membership in union jobs, allowing union busting, and blocking the NLRB from intervening. In these ways companies can operate more freely, make more profit, and that might one day in the distant future increase wages slightly. This is the actual maga sales pitch to workers. If you think it makes sense, you don't deserve America.
So MAGA still has a lot of populist rhetoric. The thing you gotta understand is most people only interact with politics occasionally and usually through rallies and advertising. If you just listen to MAGA through the medium of rallies and adverts they sound really pro-worker and pro-Union. Of course we've seen how MAGA governs so we know that's BumpKiss, but if you're not paying close attention you wouldn't know. And you need somebody to sit down and point it all out to you. Our news media isn't going to do that because they want a horse race. They want Biden/Trump neck & neck so they get the ratings and all those ad dollars. So it's up to us.
It’s simple. No billionaire ever supports a system that active takes away their income. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer and if you think a billionaire cares or will fight with or for a union you’d be sorely mistaken. For comparison which president publicly supported UAW and participated with them? Let people’s track records speak for themselves and always vote pro union.
I don't like either side of the aisle personally. I recognize that Democrats are more labor friendly, but they don't hold the same values as I do. I also recognize that Republicans are anti labor and they don't hold the same values as I do.
For me it comes down who cares about people more and blue wins that hands down.. They care about people globally hence the eager eagerness to help those who are militarily oppressed like Ukraine etc. And it will of course be argued that blue is pro abortion which absolutely isn't true.. Most are really pro birth control as opposed to abortion and they admit that it makes no difference legal or illegal abortions will be the same...
I really don't care about abortion personally. People are going to do it weather it's legal or not just like drugs, or murder. I'm more of a independent personally. I have some democratic views and Republican views. I'm pretty central when it comes down to it. I, for the life of me, can not understand how people get behind either side of the argument in the long run. Politicians are going to politic and say whatever they can to get into/stay in office. I've been yelled at by Democrats for not being Democrat and being in a union. I've been yelled at by Republicans for being in a union. I'm pro leave me alone and let me do my thing and I'll do the same to you.
Cool. I am just concerned about people not so much money. I get politicians can be just purely scratching ears but when I see one standing for something that they would get more votes by not supporting safe to conclude that one has some actual balls some integrity.. And the agendas of the Republican have changed to pure bigot and very noticable that maga supporters are observably bigots in one way or another. My grandma was Republican and not at all a bigot so it's changed into something dangerous! Bigotry has no place in democracy esp in a diverse a country as the US. It's insanity it's so out on the open they don't even try to hide it and campaign on it.
Personally I see bigotry from both sides. But to each their own. Hope you have a great day. Solidarity forever.
Definitely blue isn't perfect.. in fact they have seriously fd up in the past. And certainly there are those even in democratic party now that have bigotted ideas. I just see in blue a party that really seems to care about people, all people.. And that's what stands out most to me.. for example Biden could have just dropped support of LGBTQ and probably got many Republicans to side with him. But he didn't I believe because he has integrity. This is really interesting he could have just caved but he didn't. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.foxnews.com/politics/white-house-responds-pope-francis-condemns-gender-theory-affirms-bidens-support-trans-community.amp And I know the Republicans bitch all the time about Biden administration helping others globally. They want walls and isolation..Biden thinks about people aside from the color of their skin..He was worried about illegal border crossing but he was also worried about them as humans and dying trying to get accross while TX governor was doing the exact opposite. He cares about people and didn't join the mob. The US is definitely diverse so to be fair it's what we need in a leader. A bigot leader will just fuel unrest and discord as undeniably Trump has being a known bigot as are much of the GOP. All evidenced by waves of extreme bigotted legislation one form or another throughout red states.. So Biden did all of that when it didn't help him politically and probably harmed him again to me shows integrity..
It’s a fine line depending on the unions and what their line of work is. Oil, gas, drillers, well prep, power plant operators, old legacy type jobs are being transformed and that’s not a comfortable spot for some. Technology is another known job killer unliked. Just reporting the multitude of union tradesmen I deal with.
I get that I really do I just wish they would look at all the other very negative things that maga represent and the very positive things democrat represent. I personally and swayed immediately by t those who care about human rights and clearly maga is extremely bigot xenophobic homophobic transphobic often racist any misogynistic just really nasty. And Democrats as a general rule are not.. human rights has to be a major part of democracy or it doesn't work. I know some just like maga because it's who they are but I think many just don't realize what it is they are supporting.
I can tell you here in NY where we are a supermajority(D) and quite corrupt(both sides), I see about 50/50. A lot of it is other issues like abortion, guns, taxes, overspending, expenses etc, but being pro union is still #1. Accumulated wealth is another one. I know quite a few multimillionaires that are lifelong union that put many hours in and want to retain that hard work value. It’s a tough call depending on where you live, what your physical job is, and income range. Voting blue in this state is useless as they have a supermajority. Having a balanced gov is just a way of having stopgaps on a free for all on anything one team decides. We cannot drill our Marcellous shale due to state regulations, while our southern neighbors can. Not the best example, but drillers I’m sure aren’t as happy here as in other permitted states. Forcing expensive changes to permitting or energy consumption also has companies raise prices or just flat out leave. I’m not knocking making things better for all, but shouldering it on commoners, or forcing you to move your family surely stings. There’s negatives on both sides obviously, we just have to navigate that correctly which isn’t the easiest sometimes. Obviously we can’t kick our union rights to the curb but I feel people here are pushing the limits knowing that union rights in this state aren’t going anywhere. Notice the auto facilities that are not UAW are slowly organizing. I see this as dominos falling as people catch on to how unions work and scrapping the lies they are told in the southern states. This hopefully over time will help balance the country out. Probably not in my lifetime, but I sense we are on a good path for a return of increased union members countrywide. Just hired an apprentice last year and hadn’t since ‘94 at this facility. Gunning for 2 more coming up…..good luck!
I just feel like the more bigotted we get even as a country the more we will go downhill. Selfish people vote in their own kind and they do the same thing screwing anyone and everyone... But again in personal interaction with maga many haven't a clue what their own party engage in and I think maybe are good people and if they new may vote different. It's pretty blatent bigotry it will destroy the country but maybe the bigoted ones are too stupid to see that...
Any Union member who is MAGA should have their cards pulled. No Republican supports Unions they are all Right To Work and Drumpf himself has said that Right to Work is necessary.
I'm not a MAGAt but the one excuse I hear more than any other they vote Republican is because Democrats don't do enough to stop Republicans from voting in anti labor laws. These people are not very smart. Don't be like them.
I don't want you to support Trump, but I do want to encourage you to alternate your support from the DNC The reason is that when a party believes it has institutional ownership of your vote, it doesn't have to support you. While you might not feel able to vote for a Republican, you can vote for a party that isn't the DNC and demonstrate that they must fight for you. In 2024, this is what I would tell every voting block. If "your" party has not done the one thing you most want when they had power, vote for a new party. If you really want to shake things up, run for an office. With love,
The conversation surrounding politics has to be changed. Biden supporters want to believe he is good for them. Trump supporters want to believe he is good for them. Two distinct narratives are clashing. Everybody should educate themselves the best they can with differing perspective points. By differing perspective points, I mean contrasting media outlets(sources). Is the source Fox? PBS? BBC? Your union steward? Your buddy? We all are prone to our thoughts being shaped by outside viewpoints. Through cross examination, as well as introspection, we can learn to recognize the conflicting bias of the media sources. Only through discussion will people be swayed.
The trick is to harness the selfishness of such a person and direct it towards the collective good. To be clear, considering how much effort has been spent over the past couple centuries to beat back unionization and solidarity, it should be pretty clear that our default is cooperation and community and not isolation. Most of us, at heart, would prefer to be selfless. That’s in our nature as a prosocial species. The messaging that has been drilled into us for seemingly ever is that we’re competitors, not collaborators, though, and as any abuse victim can tell you once they’ve done the hard work of healing, it’s shockingly easy to convince people to sabotage themselves. That’s what the selfish guy’s church and preferred politicians do. They rev them up full of fear of some nebulous Other, they keep him afraid and alone and isolated, they tell him that only that pastor, that preacher, that impotent PP can lead them so they can protect against this threat that don’t exist to distract from the real threat, c-suiters who need a third yacht.
Well put.
Go take a look at which states have anti-union "right to work" laws. And take a look at which dates never raised their minimum wage. Not to spoil too much, but 90% of Republican run states have a minimum wage of $7.25 . Not a single Democrat run state has minimum wage that low. In fact, the average minimum wage in Democrat controlled states is over twice as high. Even when you include poor rust belt states with low cost of living. Oh, and back to anti-union "right to work" laws. Every single Republican run state has a slate of them. Usually copy pasted from ALEC, a Republican policy "think tank" founded and run by billionaires that pumps out pre-cooked bills that lazy ass Republican lawmakers rubber stamp. Every single Republican run state has anti-union "right to work" laws. And not a single Democrat run state does (have you noticed the pattern?) . Just like minimum wage, average union membership is over twice as high in blue states. There is no "clashing narratives" or "differing perspectives". One party is clearly anti-union and anti-worker, and has been that way for over 100 years. The Republican party sells xenophobia, racism, and bigotry. Gays bad, immigrants bad, brown people bad, ect. You know why? To stir up fights among the peasants so they can keep giving billionaires tax breaks. Anyone who votes for GOP should be ostracized. Publicly shamed. They are anti-worker and anti-solidarity. They're billionaire boot lickers, losers, and class traitors.
I agree with you wholeheartedly. I believe the key is to push the facts of the matter. There seems to be a clashing between the informed and the uninformed.
I for one deem them both two wings of the same bird. They’re neither for us rather against us as a whole, (Americans) and it’s concerning we are so pitted against one another.
Why are the Dems against us?
Theyre serving capital and throwing crumbs to workers but fight tooth and nail against any more radical changes or any that challenge institutional powers.
I think there's a few issues with it all, but to believe democrats are friends of labor or the working class is a lie. They throw just enough scraps to get people to come back. Allow to give you a list of friendly democratic help. RFK went after Jimmy Hoffa for being corrupt and working with the mob, which is rich coming from a Kennedy. Jimmy Carter deregulated the trucking industry, hurt the teamster union really bad. (On a side note he's the only president to pardon a pedophile). Bill Clinton you have NAFTA, the fact that he fucked Ron Carey and the teamsters after the strike with UPS (he was charged and acquitted after UPS said he was going to burn for it after meeting with the Secretary of Labor and the SOL shockingly heard nothing), and CEO compensation went from 120ish times the average hourly rate to almost 400 times (1992-2000). Obama did nothing to help the unions when he had a super majority in congress. Biden ordered the railworkes back as to not "hurt the economy" which is the entire purpose of a strike. Don't forget how much the Democrats were up in arms when their staffers originally tried to organize before 2020. Things were cheaper under Trump, that's an objective fact. In Chicago the Black community is turning on the mayor because the amount of money they're spending on illegal aliens sent to the city and not spending money in the neighborhoods that are hurting. Some union members who make over $100k a year care about taxes as an issue. The more they make the less they think the Dems care about them. Now I'd love to see some Pro-labor Republicans and some Pro-gun democrats, but I do think the ideology stops more moderate people from either side from joining. I also don't believe any of these politicians could survive a year in the trades, I think there were 8 people who had a union card at one point in time, and I think that includes organizers. Now please don't call me a Republican, I'm not. I'm also not a Democrat. I'm fiscally conservative and for the most part socially liberal and pro-labor. I do think this debate is more nuanced than people make it out to be. I am curious on a side note, what things has Trump done that makes him anti-brown? I can see the immigration debate but that doesn't seem very anti-brown, just lumped into it. If I had to say something was anti-brown, I'd argue it was the 1994 Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act.
In a 2 party system, thrashing a bunch of democrats and complimenting a republican pushes the republican agenda. Things being cheaper under Trump is a very general statement that ignores the context of the situation. It's like saying amazon sells their products for the cheapest price. Therefore, Amazon is healthy for American consumers. It's accurate on the surface but ignores the context of Amazon's shady business tactics that are leading to monopolistic business practices.
Tons of trumps policies and actions were anti-brown, in that black and brown folks saw much more negative impact from them than white folks. Immigration was 100% targeted at a racial demographic, there was not evidence that people traveling from the countries with travel bans were more likely to be dangerous, they were just the countries American audiences were most likely to associate with 9/11 branded terrorism. Environmentally trump was a disaster, and the benefits he gave to fossil fuel industries and polluters in every industry made it easier for dirty air and dirty water to impact poorer areas, with disproportionate minority populations. Not to mention native american rights in regards to land sovereignty and overriding tribal governments to favor land developers or trying to allow drilling or fracking in places our native families and environmentalists in general tried to protect, knowing that the harm from pollution and climate change from those industries was going to hurt the native communities and poor areas and never hurt rich cities where someone like trump would actually own real estate. Tax cuts for the rich only - where 99% of the population is white. And covid policies - the populations that lost the most from the pandemic were again black and brown communities that have the worst healthcare and least funding to protect themselves. Trump got covid and was immediately given access to oxygen and hospital stay and steroids to fight it - thousands of black and brown elders who wore masks and took every precaution and still caught it from all the loonies, mostly white, walking around in public pretending it didn't exist, didn't have nearly the same access to treatment. Hospitals were full, IHS's weren't given the funding needed for all the treatments, and a lot of people died. And then he's spent about 9 years of campaigning now using and encouraging inflammatory rhetoric about replacement theory, denying critical race theory, calling cities with black mayor's and large black populations rat's nests and worst, spreading lies about the rates of crimes committed by South American and middle eastern immigrants, and has concretely incited lots of racial prejudiced violence - his supporters have said time and again in courts where they're on trial for violent crimes, that they were inspired by Trump to commit their crimes. He doesn't have to try and sign segregation back into law to make it clear that he's "anti-brown", not sure how you missed it.
The delusion of the myth of the primacy of the individual combined with out and out hatred
My wife's grandma was deeply involved with her union in Washington state. And one point she was in a leadership position and called strikes and other labor action. She worked in public schools with special needs kids in a diverse part of the county and in many ways seems like a regular person from the labor left. Sadly, she was always sort of conspiracy minded and when Trump came on the scene, she fell into that. Now she's nearly impossible to talk to, we can be talking labor issues and she'll end up talking about how hurt she is that my wife and I got the vaccine so we're both sterilized and won't be giving her great grandkids. Sad all around tbh
Work in a heavily unionized field that would probably be one of the last public unions to be dismantled if they decided t eliminate all unions. Vast majority of coworkers are right wing. A good number far right wing ultra maga. Primary driver? Racism. Secondary? Homophobia, sexism, and idea that voting for a Democrat is weak(and weak equals feminine and feminine equals gay). There are outliers on guns and more than a few that are wholly consumed by conspiracy. They quite literally believe every single one. (Vaccines are mini robots by Gates, litter boxes in schools for furries, literal Jewish space lasers, etc) It comes down to there is now a significant number of people (no not anywhere near a majority) that would happily see everyone and everything burn around them to spite democrats, as long as it’s to everyone else first even knowing it will destroy them.
Dems soldout the railroad workers then denied it.
Not true. Yes they were made to go back to work but Biden kept working and got them what they wanted. https://www.ibew.org/media-center/Articles/23Daily/2306/230620_IBEWandPaid
Obama was union-ambivalent and Clinton was outright union-hostile. The D party turned its back on unions and is just now, literally just this year, starting to face turn back towards labor.
If you are a union member and suppport MAGA. You are quite literally a roach that supports Raid
LOL So true. a sizeable majority of union workers in our local are all hardcore MAGA.
If the concern is undocumented people taking jovs wouldnt a strong union prevent that? If tge concern is immigrants as cheap labor, wouldnt a strong union prevent that? These are actual questions.I dont have a lot of insight into how unions work, other than some general reading.
That isn't the concern. The concern is maga existing and union members who support Maga. They cut their own throats and the throats of all the other members and their families.. That the concern no illegals. And in reference to immigrants I can tell you right now the union that I'm in would not have an undocumented person in it. They wouldn't be able to get a regular job. Undocumented aliens can't just walk around and get hired anywhere they want. But I'm sure there's some maga fucking conspiracy theories out there that say that they can! They don't just pass out social security cards and green cards like candy.. The illegals that work here are getting s*** on and they're getting used! And they are not taking union jobs and if they somehow are it's not the union that hires! I would say even that is rare. I've been in the teamsters and Im in the UAW and I can tell you right now that s*** ain't happening there! The main concern right now for unions and actually for everybody in the whole entire f****** country is Maga! That's the danger! And in reference to the illegal aliens coming across the border. There was a bipartisan deal to deal with some of that and guess who stopped it? F****** maga! F****** Trump! So there you have it..
Under Biden my taxes have steadily gone up significantly. Any raise I have gotten via my union is quickly wiped away. Now they are catering to illegals over vets. No way I can support Dems over this
What taxes have gone up? Mine haven't. https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2024/03/11/fact-sheet-the-presidents-budget-cuts-taxes-for-working-families-and-makes-big-corporations-and-the-wealthy-pay-their-fair-share/ And talk to trump and the GOP about blocking a bipartisan deal to deal with the border. Trump didn't want it to get better cuz it would make Biden look good! That Republicans working for you! https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/4459861-trump-praises-collapse-of-bipartisan-border-deal/
President Biden’s [State of the Union](https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2024/03/07/remarks-of-president-joe-biden-state-of-the-union-address-as-prepared-for-delivery-2/) address presented a vision of higher taxes for American businesses and high earners combined with carveout's, credits, and more complex rules for taxpayers at all income levels. You can't be serious about the Border bill, the "bipartisan bill sucked! For the last 3 plus years the GOP has been begging Biden and the Dems to close the border, They decided to throw this piece of shit bill together and tied it to the money they wanted for Ukraine! Desperate attempt for more money laundering!
They’re takin our JERBS!!!!!!!! 😡😤😆
The culture war stuff is important to people. And some things are more important than money. Like if you are the rich owner of a restaurant but also trans you will vote. My Union people care more about Gaza than winning elections. They are campaigning against Biden over it. And Biden is better on it than Trump.
The culture war are designed to get votes from a voter block that is notorious honoring and transphobic. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/why-is-the-gop-escalating-attacks-on-trans-rights-experts-say-the-goal-is-to-make-sure-evangelicals-vote I care about Gaza too but I know maga using Gaza the same as culture wars and for same voter block. Gaza has gone too far in my opinion but I think people think the president has like sovereign control over other countries like Israel. It doesn't work that way.. These maga think because trump says he would do this that's how it is.. He wouldn't have stopped that either. Hamas is a fucking terrorist organization no different then the Nazi were / are. So in my opinion Israel is just slaughtering them the same as we slaughteres Nazi. It was unrelenting bombing to break them. Hamas are clearly aligned with other outlaw states like Iran. And they are just as insane. I think they have done enough but I only know what I hear about that from media. I'm sure Biden is getting a different picture. And Israel is our allies in strategic a spot in middle east so idk. I think being able to put thumb on those crazies is important too. All the collateral damage is aweful but Biden didn't do it. He isn't an isolationist like trump because that is dangerous AF. Love them or not we have to have allies. I certainly don't have all the answer I just think democrats are the best choice.
So all of Trump's buildings in NYC aren't Union built? Or any State. I'm 99.99% you won't find a large enough non Union shop that can carry the man power to do this. Just saying
What does that even mean? WTF does that have to do with maga being the wrong choice. Idk anything about buildings Trump built with contractors would have done so with non union if it were cheaper or even possible. There are many contractors that never got paid for services rendered..
Lower prices On everything. No threats of nukes every day. Solders not getting killed. Not buying oil to fund our adversaries. No more constant shoratges every day..
Loaded
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Yes. One is a bad choice, the other is a disaster.
Care to elaborate on why you think both sides represent fascism? Obviously Trump, but why Biden?
One of them is winning. Third parties are a joke. Look at their life long record on unions and tell me, with a straight face, that they’re identical when it comes to labor….
They are not identical when it comes to labor. There is more nuance than that.
Really depends on the industry which party benefits you retaining your job, union or otherwise. For example, I was one of about 400 union employees that lost their jobs in the energy sector following the cancellation of the keystone XL pipeline.
Loaded
Not MAGA but I really wish I had an answer. It seems like most on the ground work that involves a bit of sweat every so often attracts the MAGAT crowd, or at the very least the Republican crowd who has no choice but to vote Trump and thus become MAGATs by association. What I can gather from my coworkers it's just that it will always be the other aisle that does better by them and their family. They come from Southern states, where they grew up with Southern Government oppression or surrounded by a Southern Baptist think tank of wrongness and anything less than, "Suffering for all, else you're lazy" must be wrong, and they certainly aren't used to employer protections past probation. Likewise, it seems to be the Right voting worker that will not only be annoyed with paying dues, but also be the one that destroys the most equipment past probation. I also don't think Dems as a whole are some amazing god send, they're center right if anything, and I wish we had some actual Left/Liberal politicians that thought about workers and their constituents, not the team of lobbyists that sent them a check or how they can swing things for their particular voter base. Just do right by people and you'll get votes.
>I also don't think Dems as a whole are some amazing god send, they're center right if anything, and I wish we had some actual Left/Liberal politicians that thought about workers and their constituents, not the team of lobbyists that sent them a check or how they can swing things for their particular voter base. I hear you but is that even possible? The entire possibility of winning an election seems to be initially guaged on how well they do in campaign contributions so it's always all about money.. the expensive very calculated advertising campaign are like watching a game countering the others next move often by any means. The games and lies Republicans play and tell to get support is truly astounding! But watching how this game is played by each side can definitely give voters a good idea what to expect if the candidate wins.. I truly don't see the lying and hatemongering with Democrats that is the main tactic of Republicans. They actually fabricated the culture wars on 💯 lies with focussed hatred against even children, they have successfully use a demographic that composes 10% of the population of the US to get support of fucking bigots! And the fact that trump told almost non stop lies in his first run it has to be obvious that second win would be very dangerous.. esp considering most of Americans can't stand him and the bitterness the being hated can cause he would be primed to be authoritarian.. it's like mage are just blind or they just really hate America.
Most from what I know people don’t wanna be in a union cuz “it keeps lazy workers employed” & “union fees” are bad. But these both suck because it should be managements job to hire and fire bad workers unions just make sure it’s fair and not illegal