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Breaking down the illusion of 2 parties
(lemmy.world)
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this post was submitted on 21 May 2026
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But this could have been said about different sets of democrats at various pivotal moments in recent politics.
At this point, the failures are so consistent, and the ability to fight back so feckless, I find it more convincing that there are institutional powers that build rotating villains out of party members to keep the theater of fighting in a system that is built to turn one way.
It does seem pretty incredible how often there are just enough defectors to always prevent anything being achieved.
I understand. It’s believable enough. Until one gets closer to it - regular people working together against not just fascism but the usual republican efforts of stripping wealth, demonizing underclasses, destroying education and the environment; The monolithic-ness of the party doesn’t pan out, it’s just a default placeholder for everyone not part of it.
Plus there’s the whole no-black-or-white-only-shades-of-gray that make it difficult to talk about some aspect in only two sentences.
The non-fascist-white-man’s party has to be all things to all other people, which no group can be, so it’s inevitably at odds with itself.
The ‘control’ of such opposition is difficult to start with and often impossible.
It doesn't need to be monolithic, and it doesn't need to be black and white to admit that there are pressuring forces in the democratic party, and I find it very believable those pressuring forces are largely driven by moneyed interests protecting themselves. Citizens united has given incredibly perverse intensive structures in our politics, and people with money and power have built the incentives to strongly bias towards those that conveniently fail to meet the moment.
With that the ways that the democratic party as a whole, even when not trying to wrangle a big tent, fail to recognize issues like the supreme court, or fail even to imprison traitors and pedophiles. At a point the failures are hard to dismiss as eternally having only barely not enough political power.
"pressuring forces in the democratic party" is a long way off from "controlled opposition"
There were two times in the history of the country that the Democrats had extensive political power.
In the 1830s to the 1850s, the Democrats had majorities in Congress and generally controlled the presidency and the courts. They used that power to extend the reach of slavery, genocide native Americans, make war on Mexico, and generally work toward evil and malfeasense.
In the 1930s through the 1960's they had wide majorities in Congress and generally won the presidency. They used that power to reduce wealth inequality and extend voting and civil rights to minorities.
Political power can be used for good or Ill.
I don't believe they are fully controlled opposition, and I think my comments here have been generally explaining the nuance. With that I do think they could be fairly described as engineered or cultivated opposition, where the systems and power structures have been built in a way that allows for little change that would disrupt power.
That is absolutely true. The system is designed to resist any attempt to restrain capital and it's Beneficiaries.
How do you mean? Not vote for a nominee like? Or something else.
It’s true. They should have renditioned him to a black site, amirite. Due process is a joke anyway. That’s the mistake old people make.
I can be more specific on the first point, but how quickly you jumped to hyperbole suggests to me you're not really wanting to have this conversation in good faith.