For the first time in a long time, Democrats have some real energy behind them. We have candidates that people are really excited about, ideas that people are really excited about, and most of us hope that this will lead to us retaking the Senate and the House — which will allow us to do some real fucking important things, like keeping Trump from nominating a fourth personal Supreme Court justice should Thomas or Scalia retire. Yaaaaay!
But because we can never, ever have nice things, there are some people working to destroy that chance. What people, you ask? Democrats!
You see, on Tuesday, the House voted 220–192 in favor of an incredibly stupid resolution “against socialism” and for voter suppression, in the form of the “SAVE Act.” A resolution introduced by a man literally named Crank. Jeff Crank. Of Colorado. And eight Democrats voted for it —
Kathy Castor and Darren Soto (Florida)
Vicente Gonzales and Henry Cuellar (Texas)
Jared Golden (Maine)
Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (Washington)
Don Davis (North Carolina)
and Gabe Vasquez (New Mexico)
This is, of course, not coming out of nowhere. It’s a response to the Democratic Socialists of America, to Zohran Mamdani, to Democratic candidates who don’t necessarily identify as DSA or as socialists but who want to do vewwy scawwy things like ensure that everyone has health care. An idea so incredibly radical that we’re practically the only country on earth that doesn’t do it.
These eight representatives just really want to let it be known that they want nothing to do with the 34 percent of Democrats who consider themselves democratic socialists, with the 78 percent of Democrats (and 65 percent of Americans) who want socialized healthcare, and probably just about every single policy stance that is getting people excited enough to rush to the polls and vote for progressive candidates.
They also want it to be known that they are actually stupid enough to believe that voting for this will somehow shield them from being called “socialists” by their Republican colleagues, which it absolutely will not. Luckily for them, the fact that the big bad scary democratic socialists like Zohran Mamdani are out here doing real good shit for people means it probably won’t hurt them too much.
Now, I would say that eight Democrats voting for this resolution is eight too many, but somehow almost worse are the Democrats who complained that they couldn’t sign up for hating socialism — specifically, the resolution calls out Democratic Socialists, who in many cases are these Democrats’ elected Democratic colleagues — because the stuff about the SAVE Act was included.
“This isn't a serious bill,” said Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-New Jersey), the staunch centrist who during Trump’s first presidency voted with Trump more than any other Democratic rep in the House. “If you actually want to take on socialism instead of playing political games, you don’t slip in the SAVE Act as a poison pill that you know no Democrat will vote for.”
Except for the eight who did.
Also, if you want to “take on” socialism, maybe come up with better ideas for improving people’s lives instead of putting out a meaningless resolution that will do literally nothing other than attack people in your own party. I’m not sure what those would actually be, but it’s at least worth trying. Absolutely no one who is struggling in this country right now is going to go “Golly, I’d like to not be afraid that if I get sick I’ll go bankrupt, I’d like to not have to worry about going broke trying to afford childcare, I’d even like to be able to buy a home someday, but those guys in Congress signed a thing saying they don’t like socialism, so I guess I’ll vote for the people who won’t do anything to help me!”
In fact, I’d argue that the reason that these dorks feel like they need such a “resolution” in the first place is because socialism is starting to look real good to people. Because talking about how bad socialism is — when all anyone is saying is that we’d like a strong social safety net like European countries that seem to be doing just fine and have extremely high happiness ratings, not that we want to be the USSR — just isn’t that compelling to people who are legitimately suffering under the capitalism they all seem to think is so great.
As if this all couldn’t get even more ridiculous, Gottheimer and his pals Hillary Scholten (D-Michigan), Jared Moskowitz (D-Florida), and Tom Suozzi (D-New York) tried to push for their own resolution condemning, specifically, the Democratic Socialists of America but without also supporting the SAVE Act, but they couldn’t get the Republicans of the House Rules Committee to take them up on it. Though, I have to say, it’s kind of stupid of them not to — it’s rare that any politicians are willing to go full on Harry and the Hendersons with a third of their party’s voters.
Of course, they probably don’t see things exactly that way. They just want their voters to stop, you know, wanting things. In general. Or to want them but be okay with the idea of moving towards them very, very slowly. Almost imperceptibly. Sort of like those street performers who pretend to be statues and you can’t see them moving but they’ll be in an entirely different position at 12 p.m. than they were at 7 a.m. Except in this situation, it means that by 2326, if we’re really, really good and never push for anything to get done, we could have universal day care. In the form of AI robot nannies.
Maybe their slogan can be “Make People Bored And Frustrated With Democrats Again”?
In an interview back in June, Gottheimer specifically told POLITICO that his goal this term, after having lost the Democratic primary for New Jersey governor last year, was to take on and defeat the left wing of his own party. You know, because that’s so very helpful and needed right now. Who among us could possibly think of a more important use of a Democratic representative’s time in this, the year 2026? Anything more pressing he could possibly be doing?
Well, he said he’d love to consider some of those issues, but that he won’t get to that until he makes every Democrat officially denounce Hasan Piker for all of the things Josh Gottheimer has made up, taken out of context, or wildly exaggerated about him. He’s even been making the rounds on Fox News to accomplish this goal, likely in hopes of reaching the channel’s well-established Democratic viewing base. After Abdul El-Sayed’s Democratic primary victory in Michigan, he wrote a whole article for Bari Weiss’s Free Press in which he dragged the evil socialists for “hijacking his party” and claiming that said victory was “the latest evidence that my party is being overrun by antisemitism,” and then got very mad at Bernie Sanders for suggesting that he did not want El-Sayed to win.
Gottheimer, of course, defines antisemitism as “Criticizing the Israeli government for actions that we would all, including Josh Gottheimer, be horrified and appalled by were it literally any other nation on earth.” Personally, I think that it’s kind of a bad idea to conflate the government of Israel and the actions of the IDF and the West Bank settlers with “every Jewish person on earth” and that doing so is more likely to engender antisemitism than the opposite, but that is actually the exact sentiment that Gottheimer is upset at Hasan Piker for holding to begin with.
Indeed, all four of the resolute have been raging against progressive Democrats for some time now, El-Sayed and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani in particular. They also all happen to very strongly oppose criticism of the Israeli government or of West Bank settlers for any reason, even if that reason is that someone simply did not enjoy the experience of being held hostage by a bunch of violent West Bank settlers, as was the case with Ro Khanna.
Given this, it’s honestly a bit hard to tell how much of this is motivated by opposition to “socialism” and how much of it is the fact that, generally speaking, people who don’t want people here to die from a lack of health care or not be able to afford housing, food and other necessities tend to not want people in other countries to die from bombs or lose their homes to bombs or to freaks who just straight up move in while they’re out for the afternoon because they’re “settling,” or to starve to death. Weird, I know, but it’s just how some of us are.
That being said, if one takes the stance that Israel is fully infallible and can never do anything wrong, and Israel has universal health care, subsidized daycare, and employment grants that add money to the paychecks of the working poor, then it follows that … well, I’m just saying.
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I would be remiss, I believe, to not point out that we have now been through several election cycles in which moderates spent a lot of time telling the progressives to shut up and “Vote Blue No Matter Who.” I’m not going to do that, because I actually do think it is the job of politicians to earn the votes of their constituents, and because I don’t think it’s all that helpful or welcoming. That being said, I’m not certain it’s the greatest midterm strategy for these folks to be telling a large percentage of the Democratic Party they they don’t want their votes, to vote for or put out resolutions “condemning” Democrats currently running in general elections, or to, as Rahm Emanuel has been doing, go around telling this very large faction to leave the Democratic Party and start a third party of our own. Am I crazy or isn’t that what a lot of people were mad about to begin with? I’m really starting to feel like I’m losing it here.
The fact is, these folks are hideously out of step with where a large portion of the Democratic Party is headed, both economically and on foreign policy. That is their right, as Americans, but I’m not sure it’s going to help them all that much the next time they have elections they want to win.
PREVIOUSLY ON WONKETTE!
Do we really need more Dems in disarray bullshit right now? Especially when rightwingers are still complaining that teenagers are “underbabied.”
https://bsky.app/profile/headquartersnews.bsky.social/post/3muiaqcrgd22f
Cmon, get together and act like a party for once.
Just what we need. Actual "Dems in Disarray."
Fuck these self-serving morons.