Hi, Shrewd!        Login  
Shrewd'm.com 
A merry & shrewd investing community
Best Of PoliticsBest OfAll BoardsThe Shrewd’m WeeklyLearn to InvestHow to Become Shrewd
Search
Shrewd'm.com Merry shrewd investors
Search
Best Of PoliticsBest OfAll BoardsThe Shrewd’m WeeklyLearn to InvestHow to Become Shrewd


The week's question
In March 2025, in the thread "Re: OT, out", Umm asked the members: "Do you think it is because America is made up of magical soil that makes businesses based in America magically profitable?" This week it is put to everyone again. The button below opens the small thread re-asking it - read what others have said so far, then give your own answer as an ordinary reply.
Answer this questionContinue to Shrewd'mThis note won't appear again
Halls of Shrewd'm / US Policy
Unthreaded | Threaded | Whole Thread (16) |
Author: albaby1 ✶❂🐝 GOLD
SHREWD
  😊 😞

Number: of 86278 
Subject: Re: Clintonites lost bigly
Date: 06/10/26 6:08 PM
Post New | Post Reply | Report Post | Recommend It!
No. of Recommendations: 9
Your mistake is insisting that these issues of civil rights and environmental justice are separate from the dynamic of class inequality and wealth concentration. They are not.

While you can address the opportunity structure for some minorities through policies aimed at racial equality, you’ll never achieve for all unless you attack the class inequality at the root of racial privilege.


That is indeed the claim of the Sanders wing. It has been from the beginning of his efforts. That theory is a big reason why he lost in 2016, and why he lost in 2020. He believes that, but huge swatches of black voters don't necessarily share that view:

Democrats who wish to beat Trump but prefer Sanders to former Vice President Joe Biden, must ask themselves the following question: Can a campaign that rests primarily on class warfare and economic justice, one that largely relegates race to a concern simply encompassed by economic reform, attract enough black voters to prevail?

Recently, we conducted a national survey of the black community to answer this question. We found that if Democrats hope to mobilize the African American community, a Sanders-style message framing Trump as a threat to the poor and the working-class isn’t the best way to do it. If the goal is to maximize black turnout in 2020, a message emphasizing the threat that Trump poses to racial progress, according to our survey, is more effective.


politico.com - Why bernie sanders economic message isnt enough to win over black voters

As noted in that article, there's a big chunk of voters who don't believe that class inequality is at the root of racial privilege. They believe that racism is at the root of racial privilege. That you can't fix racism by going after the banks and oligarchs (to paraphrase Clinton's very effective attack on Sanders from 2016).

This is probably very frustrating to those who are historical materialists (like many socialists, and certainly Marxists), who have faced a lot of obstacles in raising voters' class consciousness and struggle with why the voters don't self-identify prioritizing class instead of other issues (or the way the voters used to act, according to the What's the Matter With Kansas). They believe the voters are wrong for not recognizing that class, not race, is what's most important. But whatever the reason, class consciousness has faltered in the face of other identity markers.

That's what I think is your mistake. I certainly don't believe that issues of civil rights and environmental justice are separate from the dynamic of class inequality and wealth concentration, but I don't believe that that the former are as strongly determined by the latter as I suspect you do (and certainly the Sanders wing of the party does). And I certainly don't think that the big chunks of the Democratic party that chose Clinton and Biden over Sanders in 2016 and 2020 believe that assertion, either. And I think the historical record supports their skepticism.
Post New | Post Reply | Report Post | Recommend It!
Print the post
Members reply directly to albaby1 here — and replies get answered. Reading is free; so is joining the conversation. Join Shrewd'm »
This community has written 86,214 posts about US Policy. The article-length ones it recommended most:
It's going to get worse · 33 recs · 2025
G’day Donny · 30 recs · 2026
Old Related Story · 28 recs · 2026
HCR is a national treasure · 27 recs · 2025
Fascism in America · 27 recs · 2025
Unthreaded | Threaded | Whole Thread (16) |


Announcements
US Policy FAQ
Contact Shrewd'm
Contact the developer of these message boards.

Best Of Politics | Best Of | Favourites & Replies | All Boards | Followed Shrewds | Open Questions | Moving a community