Views are my own and recently more fluid than normal.
Spain
Joined February 2014
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Thatcher Bean retweeted
Vance should never be allowed to "distance" himself from the Iran War, or act like he's somehow ever been meaningfully opposed to it, because aside from Trump himself, nobody has been a more consistent pro-war cheerleader, even trotting out the old Dick Cheney talking points
Thatcher Bean retweeted
I would love to stop having arguments about ill-defined terms like “leftists” and “moderates” and start having substantive debates on what, exactly, the vision forward is. If there is something you are pitching for Dems to do now, pitch it!
We just had an election where “moderates” like Talarico and Andrews won by going after corporate power and private equity. I agree with them on that! So are they leftists to you?
The label debate is intellectually void and just honestly boring.
Thatcher Bean retweeted
“The mandate of this election, if those who are about to wield power will heed it, is to negotiate a change in course. Some 250 years ago, that negotiation produced our Constitution. Since, it has produced laws like the Sherman Act, the Clayton Act, and the Federal Trade Commission Act. Indeed, some of the most transformational laws in U.S. history — laws like the Glass-Steagall Act, the Securities Exchange Act, the National Labor Relations Act, the Social Security Act, and the Fair Labor Standards Act — were passed during a brief span of years following the Great Depression, as part of the New Deal. The next Congress, and the Congress after it, should aspire to similar transformative work.
“But these laws, as well as the associated executive authority used to enforce them, came from legislatures who had in-depth knowledge of how our economy worked and the confidence to govern. Without offering criticism, I’ll note that many of the people who just took office are neophytes to their positions, and it would be unsurprising if they were skittish about offending the powerful without having done it before. Many won’t have the knowledge or experience to do so capably or competently. Others will.
“America excels at producing leaders, good and bad, from the random clay of its citizenry. Ten years ago, Zohran Mamdani was a random housing counselor and hip hop artist. Fifteen years ago, Donald Trump was a real estate developer and reality TV star. But underneath these characters is a large group of lawyers, business people, analysts, policymakers, workers, and citizens, who offer the advice and help to build the kind of society they value. That’s governing. It’s a team sport.
“And with that, I’ll make the pitch, once again, for you to submit your resume here. Or find other ways to get involved. It took hundreds of thousands of people decades to make the mess we’re in, and it’s going to take an equal amount of time and effort to get us out of it. Governing is hard, it’s not particularly well-paid, but it’s incredibly fun and meaningful. So if you want to try, you should. Now is the moment.”
Well said, @LeeHepner 👏🏾👏🏾
Antimonopoly, data centers, oligarchs and a smokejumper were all on the ballot in one of the most consequential elections of our lives.
In rare listicle form, here are 10 Things YOU Should Know about the Crushing Anti-Monopoly Election. open.substack.com/pub/mattst…
Thatcher Bean retweeted
The Democratic political class that turned hope and change into more of the same and created the conditions for Trump's ascent should not be considered the experts on what Dems should do right now.
Neither should Never Trump Republicans, who created the mess in the first place.
It's great for these people to participate in a popular front - but they shouldn't be the leaders or the media-anointed "experts." They've done a lot of damage that we're now going to have to clean up.
Those who have been trying to prevent that damage for decades are the experts and the leaders.
Thatcher Bean retweeted
The big lesson of the Biden years is that you have to prosecute these people. You can’t just move on. You need to make the next generation of grifters and hate mongers scared for their lives.
Thatcher Bean retweeted
Just… don’t Obama this. Undo the harm, prosecute their crimes, and change people’s lives
Thatcher Bean retweeted
What Democrats should do: draft and pass an Affordability Bill, focused on the "economics of essentials" (healthcare, housing, food, etc). Dare the President to veto it; if he does, dare Republicans to make it veto-proof. If it passes, so much the better; if it doesn't, it becomes a Blueprint for 2028.
The substance of the bill should be pricing reforms (eg, banning of 21st-century price-fixing) and structural reforms (eg changes to merger review for essential industries; private-equity accountability). Core stuff that the majority of Americans agree on.
Thatcher Bean retweeted
After the election there will have to be a reckoning, not just with Haley Stevens but those that promoted her: notably Chuck Schumer and @neeratanden
Thatcher Bean retweeted
Chuck Schumer has a lot of questions to answer about why the candidate he recruited in Michigan is endorsing the Republican
Thatcher Bean retweeted
Standing with Miker Rogers is a betrayal of everything Haley Stevens has fought for her entire career. It's also a betrayal of all of her supporters that believed in her. I hope @AbdulElSayed has a strong victory on Tuesday and that all Democrats and like-minded independents support vote for him.
Thatcher Bean retweeted
If we want faster antitrust, we need enforcers to read the @TheProspect. This reporting powerhouse is always way ahead of the game. I believe this may have been the first national expose on Dollar General's overcharging way back in January 2024.
Thatcher Bean retweeted
At a workshop today fascism was described as a type of response to market failure. A collapsing market makes workers sense of their own value decrease in a market system. The fascist regime offers both an emotional antidote by proclaiming the affected classes’s racial superiority (and also blaming a scapegoat class) and then also an economic antidote in the form of aggressive full employment programs, such as preparing for warfare.
Thatcher Bean retweeted
People. Want. Direct. Hits. On. Corrupt. Politicians.
Name names.
Ro Khanna: “These billionaires are putting in $200M to try to kill Proposition 40. Some of the SEIU-UHW members I’ve talked to are tired of Democratic politicians like Gavin Newsom taking their marching orders from the donors who would fund a future presidential campaign. We are tired of a governor defying grassroots delegates in the California Democratic Party all because he’s on the side of Trump allies like Peter Thiel and Sergey Brin. You can’t pretend to be anti-Trump if you’re doing the bidding of Trump donors”
Thatcher Bean retweeted
Lots of people are figuring out that Obama turning hope and change into more of the same created the backlash conditions for Trump’s ascent. It’s taken a long time for people to absorb this painful fact, but it’s slowly seeping into America’s consciousness — which is good.
Thatcher Bean retweeted
Why are the AI “accidents” hacks and crimes ? Why aren’t we hearing about AI going rogue and curing cancer, solving food crises and accidentally making medical advancements ?
Break up California. It more closely resembles the merged companies it has failed to limit than a functional democratic institution.
Thatcher Bean retweeted
Gavin Newsom hands huge win to Trump and his billionaire cronies.
Today, billionaires have yet again bribed, censored, and bullied their way to the top. As a result, a billionaire media conglomerate closely allied with the president will soon own one of its closest rivals, including some of the nation’s most critical news outlets. Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund will co-own those outlets, too.
Layoffs will follow. People from L.A. to Atlanta will lose their jobs, small businesses will lose their contracts, your cable bill and movie ticket will be even more expensive. Dissent against money and power will be even harder to find.
This did not have to happen. Thanks to an extraordinary outpouring of grassroots anger against the merger, a coalition of 12 state attorneys general sued to block it. They beat Paramount in court, winning a court-ordered pause on the merger, and beat them again at the negotiating table, getting the conglomerate to agree to pause the merger until as late as next June.
But the Ellison family does not care about the law. Instead, they loudly threatened to leave California if their merger did not go through immediately. Gavin Newsom caved to that pressure. So did Xavier Becerra. And eventually, so did Attorney General Rob Bonta, agreeing to a weak settlement that will be exceedingly difficult to enforce.
People want champions who are not afraid of rich bullies. Newsom, Becerra, and Bonta did not meet that mark. The people who work in the film and TV industry and the small businesses who support it will suffer as a result. And so will everyone who values dissent in our democracy.
This is not the end. The coalition that fought to block this illegal merger will fight to break up big media. There is legislation pending in Congress today that would retroactively break up corrupt billionaire mergers. This industry was once marked with strict rules so that a small handful of conglomerates couldn’t own everything. There’s no reason we cannot return to that reality. There’s no reason we can’t build on it.
But today is a loss, and that loss will be felt by the people who can least afford it.
Thatcher Bean retweeted
There is just nothing in the DNA of the Democratic Party at any level that’s useful for standing up to corporate oligarchy and authoritarianism. They are simply not built for this. There is neither a coherent plan nor commitment to battle. Even if they win in the midterms, who has confidence they’ll govern in a way that meaningfully addresses what is actually broken in our lives?
All deal terms are now filed with the court. No more speculation.
Overarching critiques: No structural remedies, despite months of chest-thumping that they must be included.
All other commitments expire in just 5 years. That’s the blink of an eye. A countdown to a cliff.
storage.courtlistener.com/re…
Thatcher Bean retweeted
In general, the American Left has been good at producing individual celebs & bad at mustering the solidarity needed to build organizations.
By contrast, the American Right is not good at producing celebs but great at mustering the political solidarity (and money) that builds robust political organizations.
This has been a huge asymmetry in American politics. The left and its funders have focused on building/worshiping celebrity leaders, who are miserly about using their celebrity in solidarity with organizations/movements outside of their control. Meanwhile, the right and its funders have focused on diligently accruing raw political power.
It’s possible that this paradigm is finally changing, with the right focused on worshiping Trump’s celebrity and more of the left focused on actual organizing (DSA etc). We will see.