this post was submitted on 21 Jul 2025
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Roosevelt did great things for Americans while still being capitalist. The needle can be moved left without violent revolution.
"Both sides bad" is weak sauce.
Quick reminder that there were other things going on in the 20s and 30s. You know, the height of socialism in the West, a strong labor movement willing to burn down factories, stuff like that. The New Deal didn't come because leftists played nice.
The coal wars threatening to kick off a second civil war, y'know small things.
Blue Morpho apparently never learned about the Battle of Blair Mountain or the Railway Strikes.
So there ARE conditions by which reform can occur, neat.
Yes, but you have to be willing to crack bourgeoisie skulls.
A socialist movement independent from either of the major parties too!
I feel like Western labour just doesn't have any leverage anymore. The rich simply do not need us. They have outsourced enough labour that they really don't care if we strike en masse. Like, shut down which factories? They're all overseas.
That's what they want you to think. Their own lives depend on Western labor. That's who runs the ports, the railways, the warehouses, etc. Also a lot of high-tech stuff is still in the West.
No, the new deal only came to be after violent protests, and was largely a betrayal of labor groups because it gave a much watered down version of what was actually demanded, all while Roosevelt broke the strike he promised to support while campaigning. Read "Labor's Giant Step Forward" by Art Preis if you want a more detailed accpunt
In addition to the points raised by some of the other comments I'd remind you of one uncomfortable truth. The business plot was attempted fascist takeover of America. That was thankfully put down because remarkably there was one honorable ex-marine they tried to involve the plot. That's Smedley Butler. In the wake of that that attempted fascist coup basically nobody was punished. In large part because Roosevelt told them as long as they kept their mouth shut and didn't block the New Deal he wouldn't go after them. That's basically the only reason it got through. Truncated as it was even then. Because most of the richest and most powerful people in the country we're looking down the barrel of a gun otherwise.
Prescott Bush and his cronies should have been hanged.
And Smedley Butler Day should be a national holiday.
If you had to go back almost a hundred years to find any kind of example, I'm just going to gesture broadly at the next hundred years and rest my case.
can it be done again without another series of protests and pain the current era of capitalism?
Roosevelt was the least bad president and was ruling during a time where the US ended up on the right side of a conflict. He still did not abolish capitalism or the American empire, nor did he have any intentions to.
But that doesn't make the democrats good, it doesn't make one side better, it doesn't make the US good.
One side IS objectively better.
That's proven by economic stats.
That's proven by voting history.
That's proven by criminal conviction history.
There is no debate which side is better if you're even remotely interested in facts.
You take the side that is better and you reform it by primarying the reps that won't play ball for their constituents., sending a clear message to the reps that remain. That is how democracy works in its most effective form.
Both sides are varying degrees of the same ideology, give all the money to the economic elite so they bribe both parties into maintaining that policy above all other considerations.
One side shrugs and calls it free market forces(D) as you suffer under that policy goal, the other points and laughs at you and says you deserve it(R). That is the extent of our "freedom" under American democracy.
One side appoints Justices that voted against Citizens United and one appoints Justices that voted for it. That's a huge distinction.
With unintelligent comments like yours and all the discussions happening below meme threads, conflicts and violence is where we are heading to. I encourage you to learn more about the things you are talking about.
Yep.
All the keyboard warriors talking about revolution need to either pick up and gun and do it or get off their asses and help primary bad Dems to send a message and start the reformation process.
No one who made it out of high school should be saying "both sides" because it's a profoundly stupid and unproductive thing to say. Did we have masked squads disappearing people before January? Did our allies all hate us? Were we threatening fucking Canada? Were we paying tariff taxes?