Thread by @doctorow

2022 is shaping up to be a bloodbath. The Trump census cooked the numbers to advantage Republicans, and GOP statehouses are poised to redistrict in ways that will hand potentially permanent minority rule to the GOP in Congress.

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There's a potential way out: #HR1, an omnibus bill of electoral reforms that would create durable, structural protections for voting rights and a level playing field for campaigning.

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To get a sense of how urgent the looming crisis is - and of how important HR1 is - listen to @ryangrim interviewing @schwarz and Rep @JohnSarbanes [D-MD] on this week's @intercepted.

theintercept.com/2021/02/01/dec…

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In theory, HR1 could be blasted through - Dems control the Senate, Congress, and the White House, and the future of the party depends on it, but I'm far from confident that they'll find the discipline and political will to make it happen.

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The Democrats keep squandering their majorities and wasting opportunities to make real change - changes that are must-haves, not nice-to-haves; changes needed to head off existential threats to the nation itself.

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Take the stimulus, which every Republican will vote against, which will only become reality if the Dems use their majority. Why are they bargaining themselves down?

https://twitter.com/StephanieKelton/status/1355871483072032768

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Yes, as @sensanders says, the Dems "have the votes" for a larger stimulus, but only if they use it, and everyone understands that they won't - not if it is bold, and reflects the will and priorities of the people, rather than the donor class.

thehill.com/homenews/sunda…

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That's because the Democrats - like the Republicans - are a coalition, not a party, but there's a fundamental difference between the two coalitions. The GOP coalition is between finance ghouls, religious maniacs, white nationalists and paranoid latter-day Birchers.

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Whereas the Democrats are a coalition between leftists, liberals...and Republicans. The party establishment includes figures whose policies are squarely in the GOP mainstream - if they were on the other side of the aisle, they be "hard liners," not "moderates."

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I'm not talking about people like Pelosi who want to reform a system governed by 80 rich old white men by replacing half of them with women and people of color.

I'm talking about Joe Liberman. Dan Lipinski. Michael Bloomberg. Richie Neal.

Monsters.

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But while the right has been doing entryism into the Democrats for a generation-plus, there's no reciprocal left-entryism into the GOP.

In states like California where Dems have solid majorities, Republicans join the Democratic party and primaries are the real elections.

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It's not even subtle! In NYC, 1.6m independent and GOP voters just switched their party affiliation to Democrat and lifelong Republican hard-liners are running for mayor as Democrats.

thecity.nyc/2021/1/21/2224…

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It's a completely understandable urge. If the real contest over policy is intra-party (whoever wins the primary wins the election), then you'd expect people who care about policy to form a faction in the party, irrespective of whether their politics align with the party.

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But it only seems to go one way. When Ontario shifted for the NDP, Bob Rae stood for leader and governed like he was from the Liberal party (which he later joined and spent the rest of his political career in).

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Blair and his cohort were Tories who took over the Labour Party. The safest Labour seats are also the most anti-Labour - thinking of my MP, Meg Hillier, who could easily have served as a Thatcher back-bencher.

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Why is there no left-entryism into right parties? In part, it's got to be because there's no business-model for it. Lipinski and Lieberman and Ritchie absorb titanic fortunes in corporate money.

There's no comparable source of money for leftists who join the Missouri GOP.

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Maybe that's all there is to it: the GOP - the right - stands for the rule of the few over the many, whether that's billionaires, white people, men, Christians, or the US empire.

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The people who support this position have power, which means they have money (power can be converted to money and vice-versa) so they can fund DINOs.

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But it's weird to think that a RINO is "a Republican who isn't racist or conspiratorial enough" while a DNO is "a Democrat who supports the unchecked power of wealthy people and multinational corporations."

You know, a Republican.

eof/