I'm happy to explain to progressives how they ended up where they are, and what they should do to end their time in the wilderness- but much like the advice I give to the mainstream wing of the party- it will be tough medicine to swallow politico.com/news/2020/05/1…
I've discussed this before but I'll recap here. This a bell curve. Bell curves are handy bc they give us the distribution of most things in nature: height, weight, IQ, and ideology. Hard core Bernie people, like their far-right equivalents are from the extremes of the curve 
Being from 1 of the 2 tails of the distribution has a massively distorting effect. The alt-left media lives over in the tails. Like the alt-right media, many of the alt-left media hosts have an incentive to be fiery and controversial bc it helps drive engagement and viewers
Ooops I hit tweet early. I will continue the thread- hold on
Anyway- back to alt-left media and tail-living. Its nice living in tail world bc everyone agrees w everyone else and when that happens, all kinds of terrific things become possible like kicking all the immigrants out of the country or switching America to Medicare For All. But
the problem is that most of the voting population does not subscribe to tail-like thinking, bell people are largely non-ideological and have a massive status quo bias (hurts the left) and aren't racist bigots (hurts the right). And they getting scared by tail people- which is, of
course, why play #2 in every GOP campaign playbook is turn all Dem candidates, no matter how moderate they actually are, into tail candidates (a fact that progressive justy point out as a reason to nominate a real tail person). But back to the question at hand, why has the
progressive movement found itself out in the wilderness after (erroneously) thinking the nomination was in reach in 2020? Branding. The word socialist is the ultimate turnoff to bell people. And the choice of a standard bearer who had that label attached hurt them BADLY. Had the
movement attached themselves to someone who held virtually all of the same positions (Warren) but who artfully avoided the toxicity of "socialism" (and all its variants) they might be penning a different outcome, at least at the pres level. If I was leading the progressive
movement, I'd be purging the word socialist as fast as humanly possible out of the movement if I want to get serious about electoral power. BC I'll tell you, the reason no one in the @TheDemocrats @dccc @dscc wants you as a nominee pretty much anywhere is not bc of corporate $ as
many in the progressive movement are wont to be believe. Oh no. Its bc of the deep[ seated belief that you, and the socialist label, are electorally toxic. They are dead right about that label even if they're wrong about issues and positioning overall. If you want to ever hold
policy-making power you need to come to terms with the fact that the way the Democratic electorate and its congressional districts are structured- the states in its coalition that are blue on the senate map- you're never gaining the foothold the radical right got in the GOP by
staying, well, radical. The blue states are the economic workhorses of the country. You can't run them or serve from them as senators if you platform is to destroy capitalism. And as good as activism makes people feel- activism for the sake of activism while a country collapses
and a planet bleeds becomes just as greedy as the behaviors it purports to want to stop. The American system is designed for compromise & pragmatism not idealism (just as @SamanthaJPower, or better yet, read her book!) This cycle, in particular, offers the progressive movement
greatest opp for real influence it has ever had in the modern era if they can but see it. That remains an open question but I know @AOC does. She gets it. She's not compromising on her values but she recognizes she's got more influence inside than screaming from the sidelines.
