(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Elizabeth Warren's 2020 campaign was exciting. We need someone similar in 2028. [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.', 'Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags'] Date: 2023-02-22 Politics today is depressing. Worldwide, right wing governments have risen in a number of countries. We’re seeing death and destruction in Ukraine. Word is that attacks on Palestinians have increased. In the United States, Abortion is banned a number of places, and Republicans are ramping up attacks on culture war targets. Voting rights bills, childcare, and other useful bills didn’t pass. Moderates fighting progressives hasn’t helped, solidly blue New York’s governor is pushing a problem judge, and AIPAC and Cryptocurrency and others decided ot massively jump into democratic primaries. It wasn’t like this a few years ago. New health care systems were proposed. Expanding the supreme court was on the table. We might really take a crack at global warming (Though a bill did pass for this, there’s still a lot more work to do.) So let’s go back to one of the exciting things from a few years ago, Elizabeth Warren running for president. Why was Warren so Exciting? A good president will support strong policies. They will hire a good team to put those into action. They will have a good personality for handling crises and surprises. They will work with other politicians to pass their programs. Elizabeth Warren has these qualities. Several candidates did. Warren was highest in the polls. It’s simple, really, but I like to focus on the positive. So i’ll add some details. She’s still known today for helping to staff the administration, to recommend people. There were no fantasies about republicans being our friends, or protests forcing republicans to support programs. She brought up proposals about housing or ocean policy you rarely see from presidential candidates. Would these have all passed? In a 50/50 senate like we had, unlikely. And also unlikely policies would have passed as written. But we would see administrative action, good staffing, and a buildup of proposals for when more democrats got elected in congress. The Opposition Warren has good qualities for a president. Doesn’t seem too controversial. But a number of candidate’s supporters were angry that she ran, far angrier than at Klobuchar or even Biden, the main competitor everyone else would have. Buttigeig supporters seemed unusually happy if bad news for Warren was announaced. Unfortunately, I don’t have saved examples You will have to trust me. I do have examples for Sanders supporters. Famous people who endorsed Warren over him were harassed and attacked. This thread sums up the criticism. No, she didn’t back off on medicare for all. Expecting Warren to play a supporting role is a theme. The quoted person above and many other Sanders supporters expected her to play second to Sanders. “I supported Warren, but now I support Biden” is a meme. Harris supporters routinely complain about Warren getting credit or attention for things, like the student debt forgiveness from last year. Harris’s supporters are the angriest that Warren ran. They are still angry long after the primary, criticizing Warren for pushing student debt cancellation and figuring out how to do it. Or for supporting pro-abortion candidates after the Dobbs decision leak. Or for stealing Harris’s policies. Allegedly. You can check their proposals, they aren’t close to the same. Sometimes Warren is interviewed by people. These people seem to like her. Which is bad for some reason. This series of tweets sums the whole experience up. This anger surprised me. Sanders vs. Clinton had big splits in goals and political background. Obama vs. Clinton had some silly, over the top fights, but first black vs. first woman president will get people invested. I was also not in internet politics as much in those years. Running by having plans, by being the person who wants to do big things and knows how to do it, seem like a straight up good thing, at least not that controversial. Of course, these angry folks got things wrong. The main criticism of Sanders was the people he hired and some harassment and discounting of social issues. Several high profile supporters and staffers have moved on the write wing media or podcasts. Student debt relief was not a controversial program as many claimed. Abortion is rather important to a lot of people. Where does this negative attention come from? The optimistic, problem solving candidate. I’ve been told that policy is boring and government procedures put people to sleep. I should instead talk about feelings and values. Let’s do some values. Some politicians present as angry at the system. Some present as vaguely positive: we’re all in this together, we’re all one country. Some are ambitious, running for office because that’s just the thing you do. Some are veteran small businesswoman fathers of two who understand regular people like you. Some are entitled, seeing any challenge as a personal affront. Some are conspiracy nuts. A few slather their face in orange and rant about windmills. Warren ran as a problem solver. She combined the optimism that problems can be solved, that we can make our lives better, with the technical knowledge, focus, and determination to pursue solutions. It’s a campaign that said “Here’s a problem, here’s what’s hurting, here’s how we can fix it”, describes how, and sets about making it happen. Petty, status obsessed, gossipy commentators find this threatening. They can’t help wanting to knock such politicians down. Al Gore’s accomplishments in getting the internet funded and some environmental problems were attacked by media in 2000. Stacey Abrams, the most famous Georgia organizer, is unpopular and a bad politicians according to some commenters. I have not seen similar commentary for Steve Sisolak, or Christie Smith, or anyone else who lost in 2020, fundraising juggernaut Val Demings is criticized for running the wrong kind of campaign but not for repelling people as a person. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez campaigns and fundraises for better candidates, to get better politicians elected, and is a widespread hate target all around. I am not one of these commentators. Optimistic, determined politicians who support good policies: I want more. While I wouldn’t chose moderate 2000 Al Gore, probably not somewhat moderate Stacey Abrams for president, their achievements in specific areas are worthy of respect. I would without question support similar politicians supporting more progressive policies. These politicians bring out the best in people, Abrams encourages others to support organizing efforts, Ocasio Cortez and Warren encourage good involvement in all sorts of ways. Maybe Al Gore is an odd one out, I was too little to understand politics in the 1990’s. Electing president awesome in 2028 Should Warren run again? She could run. The big problem is her age, but the current 80 year old president is performing about how a younger version would, and Warren is still in good shape. Just ask the fake Marine veteran from 2019. But investing in a single politician is idiotic. If warren is the only possible candidate who supports good policies, staffs with good people, and can turn goals into good policies, we’re in deep trouble. She wasn’t the only one in 2020, and shouldn’t be the only one in 2028. And we want others with these qualities in state governments and congress. Expecting too much of individual politicians followed by giving up when they don’tlive up. Some political commentary pegged Abrams and O’rourke as “done” or as bad politicians after 2022 elections. Abrams actually ran about the same as other statewide races, and O’rourke’s governor run went about as you’d expect in still red Texas. Their work is still valuable, other people doing similar work and similar runs in Arizona seem to be durably flipping the state. Force the vote on social media complained about squad members not passing health care. But there’s only so much a few people can do, about half of democratic representatives just voted for an anti-socialism commentary bill three decades after the cold war. Most of the mentioned people are famous because they took on hard challenges that will fail sometimes, but it is still better to take on those challenges and elect high quality people than give up. Much of what politicians do is convince others to support their goals, so the best response to individual politician’s who you support is to join in and help others with similar good qualities get power. Whoever president awesome and congressional awesomes are, its good to prepare conditions early. This means reminding people of how much competent, knowledgable progressives have gotten right, vs. moderates and conservatives. It means reminding everyone of the useful things government could be doing. Or what qualities make a good president. And looking for politicians with the right qualities, and seeding names early. We also have to elect good congressional and state and local politicians, as always. About Me I’ve followed politics on the internet, I see what happens when one praises Elizabeth Warren. Some of you will have responses. I have responses to those. I am frustrated and angered by internet politics. To the point where I just didn’t bother doing anything in the 2022 elections, was so fed up. I will write about why in the future, here is one example. I never, ever, ever want to hear about black voters again. Unless you have real data. But staying out does no good. In fact, its probably a goal of some people making these arguments. I’m working on some videos right now that I’ll be publishing on several social medias. They should allow me to argue things on my own terms. I’ll also run arguments by different audiences. Let’s just say that different audiences have different behavior. Also descriptions/explainers to people who already follow other explainers aren’t much good. The youtube personality Perun is an inspiration for this, his videos and this site’s Ukraine coverage are where I get the vast majority of information about the war there. Unlike Perun I’ll tell people to do things, there’s not much we can do to influence the Ukraine war, but we do influence politics at home. For personal information? I’m keeping that secret. Separating my politics commentary from my day to day life. See you next time. [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/2/22/2153953/-Elizabeth-Warren-s-2020-campaign-was-exciting-We-need-someone-similar-in-2028 Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/