Haha this is fucking pathetic at this point.

Very sad seeing Dan's descent from writer to troll.

Remember when all the bernis Bros and retarded stein voters told us Hillary was just as bad as tRump? I do!

@1/@3 There’s no need to project.

@4: They’re still here, apparently. Thank god they’re happy with their God-Emperor Trump instead of that Neoliberal shill Hillary. Goodness knows where we’d be right now!

Remember when we told Clintonites their candidate was nearly as unpopular as Trump and they didn't listen? I do!

@7: Remember when you dipshits had the opportunity to get enough votes?

I do, i caucused for Bernie and he won my state. I also was interested in having someone left of Nazi running for office, but your feelings being hurt are more important than that.

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha WE GET IT YOU ARE OLD AND IRRELEVANT DAN

@7: Remember when Bernie suspended his campaign, and implored you to vote for Hillary? I do!

I didn't think dems could get any more entitled to votes after labor started abandoning them in the late 90s. We're all just too stupid for them. I guess continuing to tell us how it's our fault and it's because we're so stupid and evil is their strategy for getting votes back.

It hasn't worked since the late 90s but, knock yourself out. Assholes.

@8 what did you do to force Clinton to the left after the primaries when it was critical to indicate she wouldn't get another blank check from the left? Nothing beside telling people to vote Clinton and shut up. So don't start lecturing anybody about what they should and shouldn't do.

For the record, asshole, I said that people should vote for Clinton anywhere it looked close.

Remember when we told Clintonites that chasing the nonexistent center (code word for going right wing) and alienating youth and the left was a losing proposition, and they didn't listen? I do.

I can't imagine why these people keep losing. It couldn't possibly be because they fucking suck https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2018/01…

This is the type of discussion that will end up giving Trump a second term.

@10

Stein and others had almost no effect on results compared to Clinton running a right wing campaign that didn't motivate a large turn out. She got millions fewer vote than Obama in 2008 and 2012 despite ~1% pop growth per year.

The same people bashing Stein and others for not voting Clinton are the same as those pushing "the Russians did it" narrative. In other words, in their bizarro world, Clinton is not really responsible for what happened and that nothing should change (besides cosmetics) in the Democratic party. Perfect recipe to keep losing as we have seen over the past several decades when Democrats lost 1000's of elected seats to Republicans who have as little credibility as possible while maintaining a grip on policy.

see also my answer @12.

@19: The guy has actually done a lot of different work in radio. You'd know that if you spent the 90 seconds Googling his Wikipedia entry as I did. But carry on being a troll, all the page loads make the Stranger a few cents, so I don't mind.

Also, interesting new profile pic. Goya, but with the Easter Bunny. Interesting, even if I don't understand the symbolism.

It's rather dishonest to blame Stein for Clinton losing the rust belt with Clinton's history viz NAFTA, TPP, giving $400k speeches to Wall Street and refusing to release transcripts, essentially denying that most Americans didn't feel the recovery, etc ...

Weird how a black guy named Barack Hussein Obama was able to win in 2008 and 2012 (and with Stein in the race in 2012 at that!) while facing much stronger opponents than a rapist game show host.

Lee Camp still KNOWS that Stein would've won if only they'd let her in the debates.

Because tens of millions of Progressives pay enough attention to the news that they knew they couldn't vote for Clinton, yet didn't know Stein existed, and that's why she received a rounding error of votes?

The people blaming Moscow Jill for Hillary's lost blamed Ralph Nader for Gore's loss for the very same reason. If you blame and external force for your loss, you don't have to admit you lost because you somehow failed. Never mind that Al Gore was so wooden during the campaign that only policy wonks were inspired by him. Ignore the fact that his wife had alienated a lot on the left with her push for music and video game censorship. Not to mention a horrible vice presidential pick: Joe Liebermann. At the time, Liebermann was the most conservative Democrat in the Senate, and rarely voted with his own party. He left the party not too long after. But no, it was all Ralph Nader's fault: there was nothing wrong with the candidate or their message.

I suspect a large part of the same crowd are the ones calling for Oprah to be the Democratic nominee for 2020, because only she has the star power to beat the unbeatable Trump! Never mind that any Democrat but Hillary Clinton could have picked up moderate Republicans repulsed by Trump. Yes, I know those decades of Republican smears of the Clintons and Hillary in particular were false. I know the Republican hatred of her is baseless. That does not mean it is not what cost Hillary the election far more than Moscow Jill. I mean really, Moscow Jill isn't that powerful.

@17 Yup.

The vast majority of leftists and Bernie supporters voted for Clinton. They are not the same group anyway. Former Bernie supporters are not joining the Green Party by the tens of thousands. It's not the Green Party running candidates and supporting leftist Dems across the country. And it's neither the fault of the Greens nor the Bernie supporters nor leftists that the DNC ran just a polarizing and hated figure and ran such an ineffectual campaign- completely ignoring several states b/c their algorithms told them they were impossible to win and targeting suburban centrists rather than the working class and leftists/Bernie supporters- none of whom have jack shit to do with Greens anyway. So this sort of trolling is out of touch on so many levels.

I'm sure this is all Russia's fault anyway and the DNC is perfectly fine as they are.

Sometimes I wish they would just handcuff Dan Savage's hands so he can't type or post.

Such a Clinton lover; it's difficult reading The Stranger sometimes...

Marriage has got historic, religious and moral content that goes back to the beginning of time, and I think a marriage is as a marriage has always been, between a man and woman. Hillary Clinton. 2000

the constant berating of those that would not / did not vote for HRC is the Stranger's swan song. Clinton bought the nomination from the DNC (pushing aside the real progressive candidate) and then... she lost. if you are looking to assign culpability for TRUMP, you should look at your own role as a journalist that has consistently fostered the myth of HRC for your own personal gain.

Look, it's not about gay marriage. I think Dan does a pretty good job in understanding issues of civil rights. He's defended BLM's targeting of liberals for example because he knows it's how you push allies for support. And he's talked in detail about accepting that it took a massive decades-long LGBT rights movement to push popular support that ended up making it politically necessary for people like Obama and Clinton to become advocates for LGBT rights. This is how we get social change- you can't win only by supporting the candidates that are ALREADY on your side- you have to change what sides exist. Dan seems clear about this, and right- he's normally right about issues of civil rights, feminism, gay rights, criminal justice reform, etc. So you can't attack his worldview by pointing out that Clinton was a late-comer to accepting gay marriage since this is something he understands very well.

What's frustrating about Dan and other Hilary-supporting liberals is their inability to see systems of imperialism and exploitative capitalism for what they are. This is why they'll support the Iraq war, something Dan did even back when he was young, and why they can't see the extent of the differences between a liberal candidate and someone on the left (be it the Bernie side or the Green side) or why they blow off those demands as impractical, etc. And it's obvious why- the system has worked for Dan. So you get some shoulder shrugging about the US committing and supporting genocide and the destruction of civilizations abroad- it's maddening. I voted for Hilary when it came down to the general as there was no other choice, but to actively campaign for someone who holds such responsibility for the shit in Libya and Syria and Haiti- and then to suggest that we are being privileged or unreasonable for realizing there must be an alternative - well I just can't wrap my mind around that. And to look at what NAFTA did to large swathes of the US and Mexico, to look at what the financial deregulation of the 90s did to the entire planet, and then blame the tiny percentage of people who voted Green? Or obsess over cartoonish spy plots? It's not just Dan- it's an entire class of smug liberals, and I don't really know how to reach them. At the very least, even if you just go along with all of that, the fact is that Hilary and the Dems have not put a bit of effort into campaigning in red areas or red states, even when demographically they are shifting, already turning purple. Both Ryan and Cruz have serious contenders coming at them from the left- imagine if the DNC bothered to think long term? They should've been establishing a foothold in places like that since the crash at least. There is a literally a movement right now desperate for a leader, and rich urban liberals are obsessing over who to blame- is it the Greens? The Bernie Bros? The Russians? Look in the mirror, folks. You are setting yourself up to be the centrist obstacle to progress- it's how history will view you. And it's not that hard to recognize that the system is skewed in favor of the very rich, including imperialism abroad that unsettles civilizations, and that the vast majority of Democrats are complicit in this. It's hard to vote for that.

@29 you lost me at "Look."

It's a shame if your attention span can be derailed by one word, but odd that you still bother to respond. What if I said Lookiehere instead which is actually a verbal tick I have IRL? I don't respond to posts I don't read, especially not just to say I don't read them, but I know it's a common enough practice. Always makes me think of toddlers with fingers in their ears going "I can't hear you". Well, OK?

@7: We'd all be watching Hillary's calm and statesman-like reaction to North Korea's mad posturing, and talking about how nice Tim Kaine is *** sulks that we are not in this universe***

@ 28 - "I think a marriage is as a marriage has always been, between a man and woman"

Your knowledge of history is seriously lacking. Try to work on that before you post again, it makes you look stupid and ignorant.

Hilary's calm and statesman-like reactions to global crises included the Libya regime change, which aside from being against NATO authorization, devastating to an entire civilization and causing the funneling of weapons to ISIS, ALSO contributed to the current stand off we are having with North Korea right now. Libya gave up its nuclear program and the US responded with regime change, just like Iraq, showing the world that it didn't matter which admin they are dealing with (Rep or Dem), the only real protection against a US invasion is nuclear capabilities. People act like NK's position is "mad" without acknowledging how completely rational it is. And when Trump shreds the Iran deal, there will be more evidence for the 'sanity' of nuclear proliferation.

But that aside, Hilary would not be tweeting insane things, that is true. But her stint as SoS was a serious of disasters - I never understood how anyone could look at her actions in Central America, Haiti, Libya, Syria, Russia, etc, and walk away with the conclusion that she's a master statesman. And even this is after her support for the Iraq war and the Patriot Act.

This discussion is the never ending question until the end of time: Is it better we have Trump now or would it have been better that Clinton got in so the lefty leftists that turn left at every turn can have a better chance at winning more elections as soon as Clinton fucked up????? I just wanted the GOP to have a quick death, not this train wreck with the world rubber necking for the next 4 to 8 years.

@ 34 the quote was pulled from an old Washington Post piece, copy + paste (don't just have that swimming in my head at all times ready to blurt out as a conversation piece). since it seems you have some pretty strong feeling on the subject matter, you should discuss this discrepancy in your understanding of history with Robert Samuels at the Post. but if you do get in touch with him, I would not advise that you don't start the conversation off by calling him stupid and ignorant, nor would I start the a conversation out with, "Look" or "Lookiehere, it just makes you look like an arrogant prick.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/soc…

Cloudbusdaddy, who are the people asking that question? I never see leftists claim that Hilary would be as bad as Trump or that Reps are the same as Dems. This is Nader talk, and that was 20 years ago. Again, the vast majority of Bernie supporters voted for Clinton. There is very little cross-over between Bernie supporters and Greens in the first place- it's not the Green Party that has seen tens of thousands of new members in the last 12 months. The tiny percentage of people that voted Stein are not central to Trump's victory. It's an odd place to put focus.

The left has legitimate complaints about Clinton and the Dems. I understand being upset that Trump won. Most of us are. I don't understand blaming leftists for wanting a candidate that would support universal healthcare, financial industry regulation and an end to US wars abroad rather than blaming the Democrats for chasing the center.

@38, you have me mixed up with Ricardo.

Also, Cloudbusbuddy, if people are saying that, then that is a stupid claim, I agree. But it's still not an argument against the things the left is actually calling for. The fact that Hilary is better than Trump isn't an argument to limit our demands to what Hilary offers is what I mean.

@EmmaLiz

Do you think it's possible for the Democratic coalition to survive the rift that has been created by the 2016 election?
Is there a path to party unity?

Do you think it's possible for progressives and establishment Democrats to reach some sort of compromise so that we can move forward?

Why wasn't Susan in her army greens at the golden globes. Surely she needs to be combat ready, at all times.
Dan, flogging a dead horse doesn't help move the conversation forward. It's true the green voters, and they know who they are, will probably end up next to trump et al in hell. Let god decide their fate now.

I think it’s fantastic that centrist Squishbrain Dan Savage can troll the left with lazy posts demonizing anybody with standards, but the left aren’t allowed to troll Squishbrain with lazy copy-pasted posts demonizing his moral relativity.

1) Shaming people not engaging in your preferred behavior is, on the balance, an ineffective strategy for motivating that behavior.

2) People vote almost entirely on the basis of tribal identity, NOT policy or any other rational argument. The most effective strategy for converting Greens will be tribal appeals, not consequentialist ethical arguments.

3) There are around 20 times as many non-voters as 3rd-party voters. Any strategy that motivates X% of people will garner FAR more votes targeting non-voters, or Republican voters, for that matter.

4) Plenty of non-voters WOULD vote if they could navigate disenfranchising barriers; these people require less effort to enfranchise than someone who goes to the trouble of intentionally voting for someone who will not win requires to change zir opinion. So, not only are non-voters a larger pool, they have lower requirements to convince.

In short, any consequentialist argument aimed at 3rd party voters is utter bullshit on its face, as it ignores effective allocation of resources for optimal consequences, violating its own supposed ethical tenets. STFU about Stein voters, Dan - this is just petulant lashing out, only driving the wedge deeper and harming future efforts at coalition-building. And I say that as someone who DID vote for the warmongering neoliberal capitalist asshole as the lesser evil compared to the idiot orange White supremacist conman-and-rapist.

Troll @43.
In the words of Bridget Jones "Why are you here?"

How dare any of you say anything wrong about Hillary! She is the one! The alpha and omega! You're all just sexist for not supporting her 100%! I know, an eldercare patient told me so!

Troll @45 Why are you here? This is a local alternative-rag. And you’re an Australian.

To paraphrase Mean Girls: You don’t even go here.

Look at that, my two favouite boys right next to each other. Hugs and kisses.

1. Mike Pesca is damn good as a political commentator on the Gist. Obviously those trashing him here as “sports commentor” neither listens to him nor realizes he was one of the few serious (as in fact based) journalists to interview Stein during the election to allow her to explain her platform.... I listened to it with great interest and walked away with the decided opinion that Stein was ignorant of foreign policy, disconnected from reality, and a complete grifter along the lines of Trump (but not nearly as bad). She plays the Green Party with vague platitudes and no real world way of accomplishing them.

2. I get very annoyed with the stupid GOP mantra that liberals live in a bubble. After all, thank you goddamned much, I live in reality, far more than some back words trash that believes in the delirious dreams of Bronze Age shepherds. But the retread of the failed communist memes that get thrown around here make me reconsider. We’ve tried the purely socialist societies before and they fail, time and again, because human nature. It’s why I think socialist democrat countries are the best choice.

3. And I am really sick of hearing those who supported Hillary called blind. Seems to me that, time and time again, people acknowledged she wasn’t perfect, but the best choice when it came between she and Trump. Why don’t you little angels take some of your own advice and wake up to the flaws in Stein and St. Bernie.

And by the way, the cheaters are those who expect to change the rules after the game is played when they can’t win. Bernie did NOTHING in all his years in the senate to develop relationships with the DNC or the other democrat senators with whom he would need to work. This is not to say that Sanders wouldn’t have been ten times the president as this current moron in chief

3. While I don’t like his tone (although mine hasn’t been friendly either) @44 is dead right. It is time to stop relitigating 2016, stop dividing us, because we need to defeat the Asshole-in-Chief before he sets us back to the stone ages.

Clinton is long gone.

Now, the SA shock doctrine socialists, bots, and trolls are already working to undercut any and all candidates from all wings of the Democratic Party and its allies in 2018 and 2020. The gloating over the GOP's planet harming policies and the specific harm to thousands and thousands of individuals oozes and stinks like a mixture of syrup and puss. I'm sure that meme factory in Moldavia will be giving them lots of photo memes to pass along in the months and years to come. Woo hoo!

@41 The question that “establishment” Democratic Party never seems to ask is what can Democrats do to heal the rift that happened in 2016. It’s not “what can we do to earn your vote” but “why won’t you vote for us?”

It’s not “will you vote for us if we support health care, promote 20 Now, dismantle the PATRIOT Act, legalize Marijuana, or engage in economic practices to benefit the average American voter?” It’s still “you lefties and your goddamned purity tests.”

Just look at WA’s senate fools Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell. Neither of them support single payer despite it being popular among voters across both sides of the aisle. Both of them repeatedly supported the PATRIOT and FREEDOM Acts, and have frequently bent over backwards to push economic bills that benefit Boeing and Microsoft (ex: TPP and the Ex-Im Bank) even as they move factories or tax bases out of Washington.

Does the Democratic Party want to heal the rift? Come over to our side a bit and stop calling our demands “purity tests.” Because, you know what? I’m damned happy to have standards. And, I’m damned proud to have these so-called purity tests. Not having purity tests is how we got Democrats like Joe Lieberman and Rodney Tom.

@52

If established Democrats came to you and said what will you give us "... if we support health care, promote 20 Now, dismantle the PATRIOT Act, legalize Marijuana, or engage in economic practices to benefit the average American voter?”

If the establishment Democrats were willing to meet some of your demands, would you be willing to compromise with them, and what compromises would you feel comfortable making?

Do you think it's possible for the establishment and progressives to find a workable compromise, or is the Democratic Party finished?

Adam, sorry I didn't see your post last night and I'm working today so this will not be as thought-out as I'd like it to be, but yes. I don't know what you guys mean by leftists as that is a big group of people ranging from commies to anarchists, etc, but the majority of leftists in the US (and most of the organized ones) range from progressive left democrats to democratic socialists. The smear that they are unwilling to compromise or that they expect purity is ridiculous. Consider that in the last election (last Nov) around half the Dem candidates that won elections (ranging everything from city councils to house) did so with the help of DSA for example, who has also endorsed several Democratic federal level candidates, including I believe the man running against Paul Ryan as well as Bernie, etc. That's just one org. Other leftist orgs include groups like Justice Dems who are focused on getting money out of elections and Our Revolution who is led by Nina Turner, a leftist Democrat. There are organized leftists who want a complete overhaul of the entire system which I'm willing to consider if they are actually doing work- running local candidates, providing alternatives- but on the federal level, there is no other game in town but the Democrats, and this idea that lefties are being purity test spoilers when they are quite literally the people in the tens of thousands who are door-knocking and campaigning and filling Town Halls and supporting candidates is ridiculous. They are the ones leading the national campaign for single payer, they are the ones who have brought you the language of the 99%, they are the ones leading the antiwar resistance, and they are obviously the ones who started all of it with the BLM campaign for criminal justice and police reform. Anything the Democrats have relented to any of these issues has been brought over with them kicking and screaming, and it's centrist Dems that seem uncompromising to me- telling me repeatedly that I have to vote for their candidate to stop the GOP no matter what. No matter how many countries their candidate wants to destroy, no matter how many people their candidate wants to deport, no matter if their candidate wants to support single payer, etc. Just vote less evil and shut up or it's MY fault that the GOP will continue to destroy the country.

So yes, I believe there will be healing of the rift, and yes I believe the Dems will start winning- but it's going to be because the mainstream Dems are forced to move left. If it doesn't happen, everything will continue to fall apart so I have to believe it. What is frustrating is the mainstream liberal refusal to see their sides' complicity in all this. The Pelosis and Clintons and Obamas and Bidens and Schumers of the country enable the move to the right. It's not about compromise anymore- we need to be fighting them. They won't do that because it is biting the hand that feeds them.

And compromise is one thing. What issues do you consider willing to compromise on? Because we are at the point where some cities have had their public schools completely shuttered. Where we are at war with so many countries that I've lost count, but we've completely destroyed millions of lives and entire civilizations. I'm not OK with what is happening in Yemen. We could end it now. And I don't like being told I'm being uncompromising because I don't want to vote for someone who is committing a genocide. Why don't we ALL stop voting for people who commit genocide? If liberals would get on board with that, the Democrats would be forced to respond. Same with healthcare. Same with DACA and immigration. Same with the police murdering people in the streets while wearing military gear they got through endless Dem support of Patriot Act. And the Dems do these things. Bush and Obama both set up the deportation machine and prisons that Trump is using right now. What do you want me to compromise about?

Why don't mainstream liberals simply start making demands of their candidates too? If they did that, we could entirely transform the Dem party in a short period of time.

Also I'm a resident of a red state that is now purple and I want to point out that the DNC has been entirely absent from any politics here or attempts at organizing since the early 00s. They don't think long-term. There is only the GOP and the left here, and the left does all the organizing work without any funding or intervention from federal politics- we get no help. Where have the Dems been at this time? After the election, I saw my local Dem party county office (where I've been active for years) radicalize. About half the people stayed the same, but the other half- people who'd previously called themselves Obamamamas and voted for Clinton even in the primary have been demanding that candidates support single payer. ALL of them joined Justice Democrats, several of them joined the DSA or Our Revolution or Indivisible, etc. They are all doing work for medicare for all right now, they are all protesting the DACA rescinding- they've been involved in everything that has happened all year. And the DNC has been a part of NONE of it. These are people who are Democrats, who want to be Democrats, but who get NOTHING from the Democratic Party and never have.

And Clinton did not campaign here at all. The state is purple now. It probably won't go blue at the midterms, but it's possible. For sure, though, it will be blue by 2020. Imagine what the Dems could have accomplished in all these years if they'd bothered doing a damn thing, even a bit of organizing here. There are so many things they could do- I could talk about it for hours but I have to work.

But yes, it fucking pisses me off to hear people say it's the left and progressive who won't compromise when the Dems literally offer nothing but "less evil" to most of us and then we get blamed for the GOP winning.

Ha, love it when Dan blames a 3rd-party candidate that few can pick out from a line-up.
Nah, this has nothing to do with $Hillary having 16 years as a politician to prove her loyalties. Nah, this has nothing to do with the DNC's un-democratic opposition of Bernie Sanders. Nah, this has nothing to do with foreign governments, voter suppression, voter fraud...
...yeah, it's Jill-Fucking-Who's fault.

Remember when Bernie when on national TV and told his supporters NOT to vote for Clinton? I sure don't!

@EmmaLiz

Thank you for the well thought-out response.

The way I see it, establishment Democrats, or Centrist if you like, only have one thing to offer. Money.
More specifically, they have donor money.
The problem is those donors have demands that go directly against the wishes of the average Progressive.
In my opinion, establishment Democrats are Centrist because that's what their donors want them to be, and that's how their donors want them to vote.
Centris only seem to advocate for the status quo, which is in direct opposition to any form of progressivism.
The problem has always been that there aren't enough progressives to pass legislation on their own. They just don't have enough representatives in Congress to get anything done.

Personally, I think the Democratic party is about to split. I don't see any way that it can be avoided, because the Centrist aren't going to betray their donors, and the progressives aren't going to betray their beliefs anymore.

The Establishment and progressives have two different agendas, and I don't see a way for them to work together anymore.

The spectacle of watching Democrats spend an entire year telling independents, "You aren't even one of us, and neither is your candidate," and then standing there in impotent fury while those folks voted (or didn't bother to vote) as if they actually believed what they'd been told.

If Democrats want to unite the Left, they need to banish from their vocabulary the phrase "not even a Democrat." "I'm With Her" would have been a lot stronger slogan if Clinton had paired it with "I'm With You."

@54 and @55
EmmaLiz. Well said.

However, the main hindsight problem Dems and lefty-Dems like me have with those I might call "the actual left" is a problem with those who said there was no difference between voting for Trump or voting for Clinton, but who now don't have the courage to say they were wrong OR don't have the courage to say the specific outcomes from refusing to compromise in this case are worth it in the long run.

Also, I strongly agree that the Yemen policy carried out by the Obama administration appears criminal to me and the complete avoidance of the issue during the elections cycle (and now for that matter) was extremely troubling to me. However, it seemed obvious that political activism challenging those policies would have some chance of having an impact under a Clinton administration, but ZERO impact under a Trump administration, as is being born out right now. I'm not joking when I say that President Trump probably had absolutely no idea where Yemen was before the election and it appears to me that he has no capacity for processing that starvation and murder of people who aren't him is a bad thing.