John Smith

With all due respect to @mattyglesias, the last few weeks have suggested to me that the center-left cares more about beating down the left than they do about beating Trump. We've seen the re-introduction of "woke" tropes by the Democratic establishment, weaponized against Abdul El-Sayed to suggest he's some kind of mysogonist, without any actual evidence. To accuse a Muslim man of misogyny is a classic trope, of course. If I was someone who cared about the future of the Democratic Party and it's ability to compete with the GOP, I'd be more enthusiastic about people like Abdul and Zohran, who model a positive "clean-living" masculinity. I'd be be enthusiastic about their ability to turn out young voters who are otherwise disaffected by a party that doesn't seem to want to listen to them. They're also practicing Muslims who respect the role of religion in public life, something we need more of in an overly secularized Democratic Party. This doesn't mean that everyone has to like Abdul or want him to win. Even if you want him to lose, you should see that he has something genuinely positive to offer to the Democratic Party. When the left wants to beat establishment candidates, it's called "factionalism." When the establishment wants to beat the left, it's not called that. It's just normal and unaccounted for. Take @neeratanden for example. Her feed is mostly about her disdain for the left. I don't see how this is constructive. And those of us who are not part of the Democratic establishment shouldn't concede too much ground on these points. I worry, though, that we have.

Democratic Socialists like @aoc and @NYCMayor do not believe what Democratic Socialist countries throughout the world do. In fact it’s a stupid name for the party. They aren’t socialists. They believe in social democracy similar to Norway, Denmark, Finland and Iceland. These countries are capitalists. They just realize that income disparity can’t keep getting greater without society helping those who can’t afford healthcare, childcare and retirement. They should rename themselves “social democrats.”