Democrat 2020

[Montmorency]

Thread Note: Harris, Warren, and Gillibrand now all support the Green New Deal, in addition to Medicare for All.

That's exactly the point. My change will just be spent on booze or given to his mafia overlords, further encouraging the problem.

Doesn't really sound like you care about solving the problem, then. No help until utopia, apparently. Rising tide lifts all boats is neoliberal rhetoric. In 1990 you would have said: Nein aid für den Ostdeutschen! Universellus Sozialismus firstus, no special treatment for any Germans!

In rejecting any attempt to do something to ameliorate the problem in the short-to-medium term, you display callousness not just toward the homeless themselves but to all the non-homeless who have to deal with the externalities of an unmoderated homeless population. Perhaps then you'll be tempted to round them up in prisons to get them out of sight, or maybe even exurban camps...

This satire article is strawmannish, but you're veering dangerously close to a heap of straw.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Though the 2020 Democratic campaigns have barely begun, I feel it’s important to express my frank outrage with the way the field is shaping up. With the few announced candidates and the swirling rumors about potential campaigns, I’m already fed up with the Democratic party, and I plan on letting them know that when I get to the ballot box in a year and a half. So in 2020, as I did in 2016, I will be casting a protest ballot. The Democratic party needs to know I’m upset. But unlike in 2016, when I voted for my boy Gary Johnson, this time I plan on really sending a message. I’ll be voting for incumbent Donald J. Trump to show just how far left I really am.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. As a straight, white, male, do I really stand to lose anything if Donald Trump is somehow elected again? Not really. BUT! I do stand to lose something if an embarrassing old Democratic fogey is elected instead. That something? My pride. You see my conflict now.

And don’t tell me the Democrats are offering up fresh, young, exciting far-left candidates. They’re not. Kamala Harris? She’s a cop! (According to the Twitter handle of someone who gets retweeted into my timeline a lot, anyway.) And Beto O’Rourke? Maybe he was fresh when I first started hearing his name, but now he gets talked about so much he’s as warmed over as a cool bowl of porridge. How do I get it through the thick skull of the Democratic party: I DO NOT WANT PORRIDGE IN THE OVAL OFFICE.

Even my beloved Bernie has betrayed me. Turns out he’s just as hypocritical as the rest of them! He promised to upend the establishment and stir the pot! But I’ve been following him closely, and I’m sad to report that he… let me check my notes here… ah, right: he has been “showing up for work” and “sitting at his desk.” Showing up for work?? Sitting at your desk?? With a white supremacist in the White House? Bernie, Bernie, Bernie. You were supposed to be different.

[...]

Is it so much to ask for radical, sweeping, overnight change? I realize that several of the Democratic candidates are campaigning on free college and universal healthcare for all. But none of them are campaigning for free college and universal healthcare for all overnight. They’re suggesting strategies for working within the confines of Washington to produce gradual results over time. Um, sounds a little MODERATE to me, doesn’t it??

You mean race defines the class. You can end the race problem now either by replacing the race-based underclass with a whiter underclass, or by ending the problem of an underclass entirely. I find the second option preferable, it helps everyone and it includes the same attempts to end racism. You could argue that getting support for option two includes convincing people that their racism is wrong, otherwise they will not vote for option two in the first place.

Ilhan Omar addresses homelessness: https://www.facebook.com/IlhanMN/pho...type=3&theater

You could make her president with my blessing (not that you need my blessing, but we're discussing here...), if it weren't for the 40 years of age minimum I guess.
It's not wrong to help people now, but applying a bandaid for 500+ years is not a great solution, or is it?

https://www.americanprogress.org/iss...ic-inequality/

In 2016, the median wealth for black and Hispanic families was $17,600 and $20,700, respectively, compared with white families’ median wealth of $171,000.

What bandaid? Having fewer billionaires or banks is not something that will automatically eliminate these disparities. There are frankly multiple etiologies associated with any social ill you care to name. There are no panaceas, and why the hell should anyone assign you credibility when you sound like Brezhnev telling the Soviet people that their discomforts are irrelevant because "really-existing socialism" will hopefully probably solve all of them for future generations if they just shut up and persevere? How about, identify all the different parts of the status quo we don't like, and start fixing them, because each fix contributes toward the greater project? It's not the other way around. Reform does not 'trickle down', and you have to grasp that. Otherwise, why do we need free college or national healthcare? Just wait till we get rid of all the oligarchs, then we can invest in handouts like those. Unless - you benefit directly from healthcare and education but not from women or queer people being more secure...

In all, you're wrong on the facts (what people want and need, what can be done, what is useful to the cause) and the ethics (refusing to address harms that don't directly harm you is a hallmark of individualistic conservatism.)


In the Omar link, she links to a homeless services organization called Youthlink. Is getting the homeless into shelters to keep them from freezing today a bandaid and a waste of "focus"? Why do they need shelters now when they could have flats in 10 years? Why do they need psych counseling and financial advice now when sometime in the future (TBD) everyone will have access to counseling and everyone will be financially secure? Right?

Since you like Ilhan Omar so much, here is her platform on criminal justice reform:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Re-imagine Our Criminal Justice System
The criminal justice system has been built to criminalize people of color and Indigenous people, disproportionately sending them to prison for minor offenses and entrapping them in a vicious cycle of incarceration. If we are going to dismantle systemic racism in our country, we must radically transform our approach to criminal justice and invest in restorative justice practices.

The United States spends $182 billion each year towards incarcerating people
There is a one-in-three chance that a black individual will be imprisoned, compared to a one-in-seventeen chance an individual who is white will
In 2016, nearly 1,000 civilians were shot and killed by police nationwide
37% of young black males who have dropped out of high school are now in prison or jail
Vision and Policy Priorities
INVEST IN ALTERNATIVES TO INCARCERATION
It is unacceptable for any corporation to make money off of incarcerating human beings. For-profit prisons reinforces a criminal justice system that seeks out reasons to incarcerate people of color and Indigenous people. We must prioritize restorative justice models and fully fund these programs at the national level. We must work to drastically lower the number of people incarcerated in the United States.

Ban private prisons
Pass legislation that funds preventative and diversionary programs, specifically focusing on ending the school-to-prison pipeline
Restore felon voting rights
Ensure that those being released from incarceration are fully supported in their transition back to society
OPPOSE FEDERAL PROGRAMS THAT CRIMINALIZE COMMUNITIES OF COLOR
Programs like Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) and the Black Identity Extremism program function to monitor and criminalize black immigrants and African-Americans, especially black Muslims. They are based on a model of racial profiling and meant to incite fear and the suppression of black organizers and activists.

Pressure the FBI to end these harmful programs
Pass the End Racial Profiling Act, which would ban all racial profiling by federal, state, and local agencies
END THE WAR ON DRUGS
The War on Drugs has disproportionately impacted communities of color. The only way to repair the harm caused in communities across the country is to end the War on Drugs, and repairing the damage by intentionally investing in education, housing, healthcare, and employment

Legalize recreational cannabis nationwide, expunge the records and seek amnesty for those incarcerated for cannabis-related offenses
End mandatory minimum sentencing laws for low-level offenses
Invest in an public-health approach to the addiction crisis
Demilitarize police departments and push for federal investigations into local departments who utilize practices like arrest quotas

Do you think all of that is a waste of time?