The last resistance movement was hugely effective, Democrats beat Trump in 2020 and won sweeping victories in the 2018 midterms. “The resistance didn’t work” has become this line everyone repeats and it makes no sense - ThreadSky

whstancil.bsky.social • 40 days ago

The last resistance movement was hugely effective, Democrats beat Trump in 2020 and won sweeping victories in the 2018 midterms. “The resistance didn’t work” has become this line everyone repeats and it makes no sense

Reposted from Caryn Lonz

I mean, the lack of any new resistance movement might just mean a bunch of people learned that they needed to change things up—since the last resistance movement wasn’t effective.🤷‍♀️

Comments

sockandsandals.bsky.social•39 days ago

in the face of the things people know Trump is going to do, and how little issues affect him like abortion and immigration, people are beaten down. In that sense the resistance didn’t work: it didn’t manufacture a lasting counter narrative to Trump. We lost to him again he promised
to be worse.

adambonin.bsky.social•40 days ago

The resistance was effective. Biden shouldn't have sought reelection, and too many people around him knew it and were silent.

If we could solve the Biden/RBG/Ted Kennedy/(to a lesser extent because a majority wasn't at stake) Feinstein issue of how to nudge people out before it's too late ...

cbal84.bsky.social•39 days ago

Whomst did they elect in 2020?

danancona.bsky.social•39 days ago

Mmmm I dunno. I would say it had limited successes in building dimension I and II power, and a near-total failure on dimension III that proved disastrous.

anthony60202.bsky.social•40 days ago

What didn’t work was regaining power and acting like it was 1993 instead of 2021.

josephinejellybean.bsky.social•39 days ago

It was hugely effective at getting Dems elected. And at proving that getting Dems elected isn't a solution to our problems. Because the party is just the other half of the problem. And then they ignored the country and handed power to Trump.

peggy042.bsky.social•40 days ago

Dems have had to spend more time and energy fighting moronic leftists, who insisted they wanted to teach us a lesson & burn it all down, as we have fighting magats. We lost, and now we're going to let them enjoy the win. Hope they get exactly what they deserve.

idrivealot.bsky.social•40 days ago

Not sure this is complicated. Resistance needs something to resist. After 2020 dems were in power, thus no longer resisting. They failed to effectively consolidate power and in the meantime yes, the resistance died because there was nothing to resist.

ignominious.bsky.social•40 days ago

That’s assuming the only thing the resistance movement wanted was beating Trump. Maybe it was for a few seconds, but there aren’t many people equipped to herd cats. It’s like a bunch of people got together to do one thing, realized they didn’t like each other much, and went their own ways.

andrewagill.bsky.social•39 days ago

I think it's possible to say that the resistance movement in 2016-2021 was organized in one way, & that the same style of organizing would be less effective in the moment we are now in.

allidesire.bsky.social•40 days ago

why the fuck isnt anyone on the left doing anything to organize some sort of social movement?

mpfeiffer.bsky.social•39 days ago

The resistance literally saved the Affordable Care Act from being repealed!

lydovexer.bsky.social•39 days ago

Matt Gaetz really succeeded in killing legislative momentum during 118th congress. I think that played more of a role in depressing democrat enthusiasm than people realize.

ams1701.bsky.social•39 days ago

We DO need young, forceful, eloquent, actual LEFT meaning and not centrist new DNC leadership. The fossils continue to squelch them. Their are gonna form their our party if the DNC does not get their shit together. If they take the populist banner and run, the democracy might survive...maybe.

jamesbelcher.bsky.social•39 days ago

If "The Resistance" is using Democratic Party electoral outcomes as metrics, it's hosed. The Democratic Party is an insufficient bulwark against fascism.

I'm grateful to everyone building dual power outside of Ds and Rs.

stemthebleeding.bsky.social•40 days ago

We really don't take into consideration how profitable resistance was from 2017-2021, and how many people were complaining about their podcast subs, patreon numbers, and hits on YouTube dropped off after the election.

Shitting on Dems became profitable.

Suddenly Biden's blamed for EVERYTHING.

whstancil.bsky.social•40 days ago

There were historic suburban shifts towards Democrats, propelled almost entirely by anti-Trump sentiment. Since that’s where the vast majority of the population lives, it’s a big boon to Dems

laurarosee123.bsky.social•40 days ago

The suburban shifts were encouraging.

thesuitburnsbetter.bsky.social•40 days ago

I guess this depends on how one defines "resistance movement" but wasn't the big 2020 dem turnout more attributable to the pandemic (increase in mail-in voting, shift from high ed suburbanites over masking, vaccines)?

whstancil.bsky.social•40 days ago

The current conventional wisdom that rather than attempting to produce a backlash to Trump’s derangement and corruption and obvious, facial unfitness for office, they should… win a policy debate? Over taxes or something? …is so far removed from reality that it makes me what to throw things

liberalkmd.bsky.social•39 days ago

We did all that and he still won…I think that’s pretty demoralizing to know that nothing matters.

zecat123.bsky.social•40 days ago

The idea that the key to beating Trump last year was campaigning on democracy rather than inflation and immigration is baffling

ealluia.bsky.social•40 days ago

Centering the campaign on the exact issues the public personally hates you for seems like a terrible idea. This is like advising Republicans to talk a lot about abortion to prove to the public that their distrust of you on the subject is misplaced.

zecat123.bsky.social•39 days ago

The public would have hated them for those issues whether they acknowledged them or not

ealluia.bsky.social•39 days ago

It matters whether an issue is at the forefront of people's minds and is commonly believed to be something that should be a major factor in who you decide to vote for. This has a real impact on swing voter choices.

ealluia.bsky.social•40 days ago

A big part of the goal of at political campaign is to have the public thinking about the things you want them to be thinking about when deciding who to vote for. And you achieve that primarily by controlling their attention. That's why controlling media matters so much.

ealluia.bsky.social•40 days ago

If you spent the last several generations failing to care about controlling the media while the other side obsessed over it - well, you've dug yourself a hole - but you can at least think about how to shift public attention within the media system as it actually exists onto your preferred topics.

robairone.bsky.social•40 days ago

rolodexpropaganda.bsky.social•40 days ago

If 2024 taught us anything about the resistance, it’s that it’s only effective as an opposition movement, and when it gains power, certain elements (ahem…) are more interested in tearing down their own side…

realeric.bsky.social•40 days ago

We already won every policy debate during the election, but we're still getting tariffs and mass deportations.

ealluia.bsky.social•40 days ago

Trump was successfully kept personally unpopular, which is what "resistence politics" can do sans legal mechanisms actually being enforced. He won, while remaining fairly unpopular, because sentiment about the country's state of affairs was miserable and he was the opposition to the incumbent party.

ealluia.bsky.social•40 days ago

If you don't keep trying to resist him by highlighting his egregious unfitness for office, he is going to get more and more popular, particularly because authoritarians capturing media channels has that effect. That's what Trump's movement has being trying to do and has been succeeding at.

whstancil.bsky.social•40 days ago

Yes

kitmik.bsky.social•39 days ago

nah, once he causes a recession and ridiculous inflation he's gonna hit new records of unpopularity. and this is despite the media being pro-trump.

ealluia.bsky.social•39 days ago

Assuming there is a recession, particularly a severe recession, that will test the power of the MAGA propaganda apparatus. But I wouldn't assume that.

ealluia.bsky.social•39 days ago

You can have bad policy that merely limits potential growth than otherwise would have existed rather than being catastrophic. I know the Trump team keeps signaling actions that *would* be catastrophic, but don't count it as a done deal. We don't know how far they are going to go.

kitmik.bsky.social•39 days ago

well, so far they seem fuckin hell-bent on doing the tariffs and deportations. based on that, plus the crypto stuff that could bliw up at any moment, plus musk implying there's "tough times ahead" i'm assuming a recession. it seems almost certain to me, unless trump's completely bluffing.

kitmik.bsky.social•39 days ago

basically, the way things are going, this time around trump is gonna worsen the lives of MAJORITY of americans in a way that they can feel. people will notice they're poorer, no matter what the propaganda tells them. this means he's gonna be incredibly unpopular.

midwest-fernee.bsky.social•40 days ago

I agree with you. He won because he was capturing headlines. This "sit-back, shut up, let us be the grown-ups" routine will not work. Dems need to be loud, fighting for people, fighting against Trump, visible everywhere possible. People need to know they are the party who will fight for them.

loki1001.bsky.social•39 days ago

The Resistance worked great. It just resulted in victories for the Democrats who proceeded to fumble everything so badly that Trump is now back in the White House.

richardkeppler.bsky.social•40 days ago

Once Trump is in, will you change your policy of lecturing people that they’ve never had it so good?

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