this post was submitted on 05 Feb 2026

103 points (84.6% liked)

politics

29241 readers

3256 users here now

Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!

Rules:

Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.

Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.

Example:

Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.

That's all the rules!

Civic Links

• Register To Vote

• Citizenship Resource Center

• Congressional Awards Program

• Federal Government Agencies

• Library of Congress Legislative Resources

• The White House

• U.S. House of Representatives

• U.S. Senate

Partnered Communities:

• News

• World News

• Business News

• Political Discussion

• Ask Politics

• Military News

• Global Politics

• Moderate Politics

• Progressive Politics

• UK Politics

• Canadian Politics

• Australian Politics

• New Zealand Politics

founded 2 years ago

MODERATORS

outrageousmatter@lemmy.world

aidan@lemmy.world

jordanlund@lemmy.world

little_cow@lemmy.world

Theonetheycall1845@lemmy.world

JuBe@lemmy.world

Lasherz12@lemmy.world

103

The Actual Gavin Newsom Is Much Worse Than You Think (www.nakedcapitalism.com)

submitted 1 month ago by technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com to c/politics@lemmy.world

34 comments fedilink hide all child comments

For anyone who wants a truly progressive Democratic Party, Gavin Newsom is bad news.

all 36 comments

sorted by: hot top controversial new old

[–] surfrock66@lemmy.world 55 points 1 month ago (5 children)

There is a spectrum. Trump/Maga/Conservatives are the worst and are actively marching us towards fascism. Corporate Democrats are the second worst. They're not making the change we need and are prioritizing the wrong people. Progressives would be the best.

We have a 2 party system. If you spend cycles looking at #2 and saying why you shouldn't vote for them, you hurt everyone. If the choice in this 2-party system is #1 or #2, you vote for #2, you swallow the medicine and take the pill, you tell yourself it's a vote against #1.

Newsom wouldn't be the best candidate, but all this psy-op crap about demonizing a Democrat front-runner is how you get the progressives to stay home and hand Trump (or his ilk) a third term. Low voter turnout for the left has to be fought. Sitting back and smugly criticizing why Democrats should do better literally killed Ukrainians, Palestinians, and American protesters. Getting people out to vote down-ballot is how we make the change we want and actually push to get a voting system that allows minority candidates to have a shot.

[–] UnspecificGravity@piefed.social 27 points 1 month ago (4 children)

Running corporate centrists is why we got two terms of Trump.

[–] surfrock66@lemmy.world 23 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Running corporate centrists set the board up for a loss, demonizing them and getting people to stay home is how we executed the loss. It wasn't a sure bet, and the fantasy that Harris would be as bad as Trump only exists in the minds of people NOT victimized by the gestapo and people who make money keeping progressives glued to their streams giving tips.

[–] UnspecificGravity@piefed.social 10 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I see that you buy into the idea that progressives are why the Democrats keep losing to fascists and not the fact that their platform has like 80% overlap.

[–] surfrock66@lemmy.world 13 points 1 month ago (1 children)

No, I think progressives need to push the party to the left, we need to get more progressive leadership into the DNC, and progressive results will grow the base to keep it sustainable.

But the language and outrage at this stage poisons the view of candidates, and in a general election, having people say "why would I vote Newsom when I just spent 3 years thinking what an awful corporate shill he is" makes people stay home, which hands the victory to the fascists. And there's a lot of people out there whose entire living is outrage farming for superchats, and it moves the needle.

If it's Ivanka vs. Newsom, you vote Newsom. This isn't a game.

[–] UnspecificGravity@piefed.social 13 points 1 month ago (1 children)

If it's Ivanka vs the Democrats the solution is to run someone that isn't Newsom and this is the right time to point that out.

Acting like this clown is a viable candidate two years before the election is exactly how we repeat this shit. You aren't helping anyone by helping to create that situation.

[–] surfrock66@lemmy.world 0 points 1 month ago

Politics in America is basically team sports, and language matters. "Newsom is bad" and "Khanna is better" are 2 different ways of speaking that have 2 different outcomes at the ballot box. It's time to not let outrage stack the deck against us.

[–] xtr0n@sh.itjust.works 8 points 1 month ago

More than one thing can be true. The DNC could have prevented our current mess by actually running primaries, not abandoning their base, not trying to court republicans and the millions of other things they do to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Progressive voters could have prevented this current mess by actually fucking voting for the tepid weak sauce DNC candidates once it was clear that we’re only getting that or literal Nazis in that election cycle. There’s plenty of blame to go around and a tragic shortage of mirrors.

[–] monkeyslikebananas2@lemmy.world 0 points 1 month ago (1 children)

With thinking like that, we may get a 3rd term! Yay!

[–] UnspecificGravity@piefed.social 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

How far up your own ass do you have to be to think that pointing out that this is a losing strategy is why your losing strategy didn't work?

[–] monkeyslikebananas2@lemmy.world 2 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

OK. Let me know how your strategy works out. I would love to have a true progressive candidate. I voted for Bernie Sanders and Dennis Kucinich in their respective primaries. I then voted and Hillary Clinton and Obama.

Politics is about compromise, and we all have to live with each other no matter how stupid we all think the other side is.

[–] jimmy90@lemmy.world -1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

corporate centrists are winning again now people realise the horrific truth of trump and liars like yourself

which side are you really on?

the kremlin's?

[–] ElectricAirship@lemmy.dbzer0.com 10 points 1 month ago

Or, and hear me out, the democrats actually run a candidate that doesn't think it's "bad policy" to help people.

[–] grue@lemmy.world 9 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

all this psy-op crap about demonizing a Democrat front-runner is how you get the progressives to stay home and hand Trump (or his ilk) a third term

No, having Newsom win the primary instead of a progressive is how you hand the fascists a third term. It's the liberals' turn to hold their noses and vote for a candidate who can actually win; if they refuse, the consequences are entirely their fault.

If you want to win, you have to support the progressive in the primary. That's reality, and reality doesn't give a shit if you like it or not.

[–] surfrock66@lemmy.world 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

That's what I'm saying, I support a progressive in the primary. But I'm not willing to start painting Newsom as the devil, because if he's the nominee, I'm not gonna want to go to people I talk to and say "Well, I know I said he's the devil, but now you have to support him." This isn't hard. I don't know why there's so much arguing about telling people to not burn a bridge in case you're backed into a corner to vote for the lesser of two evils.

[–] grue@lemmy.world -1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I don't know why there's so much arguing about telling people to not burn a bridge in case you're backed into a corner to vote for the lesser of two evils.

The answer to "why" is because, as 2024 proved, a neoliberal can't win. If we're backed into that corner, we're already screwed and your contingency doesn't matter.

Think of leftists like a crazy person holding a gun to America's head (the gun being fascism). If liberals don't capitulate to their demands, they will shoot. It doesn't matter if it's irrational. It doesn't matter if it's stupid. They already proved that they'll do it.

As a liberal, you are not in control of the situation anymore, and your choice is to capitulate to the left's demands (less profit for abusive plutocrats -- the horror!) or eventually find yourself being marched by ICE goons to the gas chambers.

If you want to do something useful, your only job is to get other liberals to come to terms with this new political reality. Pearl-clutching about some imagined fantasy where Newsom wins the primary and isn't fucking steamrolled in the general is absolutely delusional, counterproductive, wishful thinking wankery.

[–] surfrock66@lemmy.world 0 points 1 month ago (1 children)

"We progressives will hold the free world hostage analogous to a gun unless you give us what we want." Cool strategy, giving in to terroristic threats is deep in the American ethos and I am sure won't alienate anyone and quickly bring us to a progressive utopia.

[–] grue@lemmy.world -1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

I didn't say it was a strategy. I said it was reality, and that you delude yourself at your peril.

I don't control how leftists vote. Neither do you. The difference is that I'm willing to accept that truth and you apparently are not.

You move left, or you finish off democracy and probably eventually die in an ICE camp. I'm not even exaggerating; those are literally your choices.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

[–] gnuthing@piefed.social 3 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Democrats trying to guilt us into voting for them when they do everything within their power to perpetuate American imperialism. Personally, I'm done with it. I'm not going to compromise my own beliefs again for a bunch of liberal Zionist capitalists that profit off the misery of others. If they run actual leftists, I will vote for those individual leftists. But I'm not voting for some anti-trans asshole just because the dems keep pushing him

Biden could have made Israel stop committing genocide with our taxes and our weapons. Biden and Obama could have reeled in the abuses happening in ICE detention. They could have worked with Congress to pass some legislation to limit executive power, tax wealth, get Roe v Wade made law. Biden could have pushed through pending immigration cases, he pardons his own ppl but not our ppl?

Btw I voted for Harris, basically straight ticket Dem, just to keep the other assholes out. But the further we get into this regime the clearer it becomes that is no a strategy that leads to meaningful change. You do what you want, but don't tell me that I've gotta swallow the shitty pill they are offering

[–] gnuthing@piefed.social 3 points 1 month ago

To add, if Obama's FBI had done more when they interviewed one of Epstein's victims back in 2011, then Trump would've never been president. Feds knew about all that shit since W in the oughts, and they let it keep happening. Not saying it's entirely Obama's fault, by why didn't his FBI or DOJ do something?

[–] surfrock66@lemmy.world 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

No one likes the 2 party system, it sucks. But in the 2 party system, that's the deal, you vote for the Dem or it's a +1 to the R. I don't like it either, but demonizing the Dems at this point to get people to stay home hands it to the R's. This rhetoric becomes dangerous. Saying you don't like the game doesn't mean you can sit it out without consequences.

[–] gnuthing@piefed.social 2 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Dems are the definition of controlled opposition:

a false protest movement in which a government or status quo authority controls both sides of a dispute. On one side lies the status quo authority, but on the other side lies those the status quo authority also control. Having the latter provides the appearance of a legitimate opposition, but in reality, it ceases all legitimate opposition. What’s left is just a shell of opposition, one that dishonestly pretends to oppose, but in fact stifles opposition.

I'm done voting for that. Dems want my vote, they can earn it by running socialists

[–] deltaspawn0040@lemmy.zip -4 points 1 month ago

Alright, if they run Newson I'm actually going to vote for trump. If America is so intent on dying a slow, painful, corporate death, I want to do my small part in hastening that.

[–] resipsaloquitur@lemmy.world 29 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Naked Capitalism is pure kremlin propaganda.

Not a fan of Newsom, but at least he’s putting up a show of resistance unlike feckless Chuck.

[+] Cyberflunk@lemmy.world 1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

[deleted]

[–] resipsaloquitur@lemmy.world 6 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

I read it for years during and after the global financial crisis. Susan (aka Yves) was right-on about many, many financial developments. She was fairly sharp in her criticism of Democrats, which opened my eyes to their malfeasance.

Things got murky when she dove into global politics. She published a few articles written by "experts" on Ukraine. Aside from the fact that Russia annexed Crimea (which she explained away as necessary), there wasn't much info on contemporary Ukrainian politics, so it was hard to dismiss those articles. But she threw a lot of shade at the Maidan revolutionaries who ousted Putin's puppet. She repeated Putin's talking points about "Nazis" in Ukraine — which in retrospect was obvious nonsense. E.g. https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2022/03/discerning-volodymyr-zelensky.html

Carrying Putin's water by doing some extra-fancy judo about how sanctions against Russia would only hurt the US: https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2022/03/america-shoots-its-own-dollar-empire-in-economic-attack-on-russia.html

She can't even call Russia's actions an "invasion" or "war" but "military operation" and quotes Tulsi "Definitely Not A Russian Plant" Gabbard approvingly: https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2022/02/russia-moves-troops-into-donbass.html

As we have said repeatedly, Putin does not have any interest in conquering Ukraine. However, he also wants Ukraine no longer to serve as a staging ground for US/NATO operations against Russia.

How do you know what Putin wants, Susan? Seems like he does want to conquer Ukraine. And Georgia. After having effectively conquered Chechnya and Belarus. And he's got eyes on Estonia.

She did deep dives into Hunter Biden for being on the board of a Ukrainian energy company (as if this is some incredible smoking gun). And, shock, Donald who totally didn't collaborate with Putin, demanded dirt on Hunter from Zelensky.

She made a huge deal of Vicky Nuland's (some big wig at the state department under Obama) leaked phone call (leaked by who?) saying "fuck the EU" to drive a wedge within NATO.

She constantly criticized NATO "enlargement" (aka countries sick of being under Russia's boot wanting security) and repeated the supposed handshake verbal agreement that NATO would never expand into former Soviet territory. Supporting Jill Stein to split the left vote. She gave an interview to RT (Russia Today) and clapped back at those who said it's a Russian state propaganda news org. She didn't tell lies, but look at what RT is peddling: "Russia good, USA BAD!" On and on, things we now know are Russian propaganda.

Where I completely broke with her was when she did some 7D chess supporting Donald — mocking anyone who said anything negative about him as having Trump Derangement Syndrome. She downplayed Donald's Russia connections. Stopped reading for a while.

Then, on J6, I popped back in to see what she had to say. Which was "wull, ackshually, you see, it wasn't really a coup, or even an attempted coup, because of yadda yadda yadda."

https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2021/01/maga-cosplayers-seize-capitol-while-cops-flounder.html:

And its not as if the protestors were hardbodied skinheads carrying bludgeons and sporting brass knuckles

No, they had guns and zip ties and nearly executed members of congress. They wanted to hang Mike Pence for not stealing the election for Donald. There's fair evidence that if Mike Pence had gotten into the car with the Secret Service he may not have survived.

They did kill a cop. Ashli Babbit was killed because she wouldn't turn away from assaulting Congress.

As ugly and embarrassing as the Capitol seizure was, it did not begin to rise to the level of a coup (read the Wikipedia bio of Sukarno or the review of this book focused on the coup that removed him from officeand see the contrast). There wasn’t a serious or even half-hearted effort to seize critical infrastructure, control communication (no classic suspension of news broadcasts or launch of insurrectionist pronouncements), terrorize the population through executions or other shows of force, or purges of opposed faction members. The reporting is still spotty, but it appears only the RNC, and not the DNC, was on the receiving end of a pipe bomb.

Yeah, her brain is totally cooked. Tankie.

And I don't even need to read what she's saying about Newsom to know what it is. "Yeah, Republicans are bad, but can you believe how bad this Democrat is?" Because that's what she said about Kamala Harris in the primaries. Kamala sucks, and I hate picking the lesser of two evils, but she sucks a lot less than a vengeful Donald.

And Susan did the same thing with Hillary. Who, quelle suprise, Putin hates with a special passion.

[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 9 points 1 month ago

I really think most people know this.

Oligarchs are sinking a shit ton of money on building name recognition, but absolutely no one that would ever vote D actually likes his policy. But the only chance he has at winning is if idiots decide not to vote in the Dem primary.

[–] Maeve@kbin.earth 8 points 1 month ago

A Times review of campaign finance records identified eight of San Francisco’s best-known families as being among Newsom’s most loyal and long-term contributors. Among those patrons are the Gettys, the Pritzkers and the Fishers, whose families made their respective fortunes in oil, hotels and fashion. They first backed him when he was a restaurateur and winery owner running for a seat on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1998, and have continued their support through the governor’s race. They are not Newsom’s largest donors: The families in total have given about $2 million of the $61 million that donors have contributed to his campaigns and independent committees backing those bids. But they gave while he was a relative unknown, providing crucial support to a political newcomer in the years before his campaign accounts piled high with cash from labor unions, Hollywood honchos, tech billionaires and donors up and down the state.

[–] Chippys_mittens@lemmy.world 5 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (3 children)

Are there any current progressives you'd sign off on as good news?

[–] cattywampas@lemmy.world 7 points 1 month ago

I'm biased as an Illinoisan but Pritzker has been fantastic. Long track record of passing legislation that helps regular working class people, and at least publicly he seems like he really cares. I hope he is truly a class traitor like Teddy Roosevelt.

[–] daannii@lemmy.world 3 points 1 month ago

AOC, Omar, Bernie of course but he's too old for president.

[–] AmidFuror@fedia.io -1 points 1 month ago

It's Karl Marx or no one.

[–] Zerlyna@lemmy.world 3 points 1 month ago

This was informative, thank you.

[–] REDACTED 3 points 1 month ago

It's hard to disagree, but we also should be aware that such articles could very well be sponsored by Trump/MAGA as a smearing campaign against whoever wants to run against him as a president.

If it comes down to it (but should not because Trump can't run again), you don't really have a choice

[–] melsaskca@lemmy.ca 2 points 1 month ago

I saw him show up and speak at Davos recently. Up until then I never realized what a phony grandstander he is. Still, almost anyone in the world is better than the current commander-in-cheat.