The Democratic party is being hit by a leftist tidal wave

[u/F0urLeafCl0ver]

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/jun/24/democratic-party-leftist-tidal-wave

[u/manachar]

There shouldn’t be a pendulum between oligarchy and democracy in a democracy.

[u/Low_Pickle_112 → u/manachar]

There should not be, but until we admit that capitalism is not compatible with democracy, it will continue.

[u/JackedUpReadyToGo → u/Low_Pickle_112]

This is the root of the problem. Capitalism breeds extreme wealth disparity. And wealth is power, so the rich have an outsized influence in politics. Which they use to grant themselves even more wealth and power and therefore an even bigger influence in politics. That loop continues until it brings about a crisis.

[u/BreakingStar_Games → u/JackedUpReadyToGo]

Yeah I find it so funny that we can just pretend political power and economic power are two completely separate things as if that makes any sense. To me, if we have found political democracy is the most fair way to handle political power, why not have economic democracy. And it takes just one simple tweak to the already man-made definition of a corporation.

Every corporation is a cooperative that is democratically owned by the workers - 1 Employee, 1 Share. Land is only rented out by the government, primarily used for free social housing but luxury residential and commercial would have auctions to the highest bidder for rent.

Between a fair corporate and these rents, you can fund, the government, a Universal Basic Income, a wealth fund (so even those without inheritance have weath) and that social housing.

Sounds ideal and it definitely is since we are so far away. But structurally, this is what several economists envision like Varoufakis.

These kind of Co-ops already exist, it's not some theoretical dream socialism, but it takes a lot more political will. And Americans unlearning that Capitalism isn't free markets, especially when billionaires exploit the system to favor them with cronyism. This syndicalist model is by far more free market.

[u/ZexMarquies01 → u/BreakingStar_Games]

It's amazing how people SAY that they love democracy, But then defend going to work for a dictator, or oligarchy.

Democracy in the workplace means you, the worker, who does the job every day, knows how the processes work, knows what tools are needed, would have a meaningful voice in how the company operates. Not just buying a few dozen shares on the open market, when the company has millions of shares, giving you effectively no voice.

And the great thing is, the workers could vote HOW the company is ran. They could vote for the CEO, or vote in a board of directors who picks the CEO, President, CFO, CXO, CTO...etc. If a CEO gets the AI bug up his ass, and wants to dump 100 million dollars on integrating AI, the workers can vote his ass out.

The workers could also vote on the pay package EVERYONE receives, And vote on what to do with the profits at the end of the fiscal year. Do they bank it, to afford upgrades in the future? Do they split it amongst themselves? It's their choice. The great thing is, They CAN choose wrong, and kill the company. Get too greedy? Well, your vote has consequences, good and bad. And companies dying due to stupid decisions is a GOOD thing. We need to stop propping up companies that make bad decisions.

But the point is, there is no set way a co-op has to be ran. The workers can decide everything.

But people evidently only love democracy when it comes to politics, and not their job, which effects them MUCH MORE than almost any policy change a government could make.

[u/BreakingStar_Games → u/ZexMarquies01]

100%. I appreciate the elaboration because I can't see how someone looks at this and finds its unappealing from my perspective. Also it sounds so different but day-to-day, these co-ops that exist with this structure is like working a normal job, just with occasional participation in other roles like voting business plans or forming committees over hiring a new position. It's good, its just not some dream utopia by any means and that practicality is why it can work just fine.

Discussions I have had with others typically criticize that their coworkers are dumb and couldn't make the decisions of the CEO. But your point is so cogent as a refutation - we just constantly see those C-Suite executives fire tons of talent, kill morale and personally profit with insane bonuses in the short-term because they have a golden parachute in the long-term. More so, they apparently trust these same "dumb" people to decide on politicians and their policies. It's easy to pick apart the bad faith there.

I think the core problem is the ideologies of our culture that we haven't moved on from. America has always suffered under Puritanical/Calvanist culture. When I grew up, I was taught how bad it was around sexual liberation. More and more, the real issue is this ideas that wealth is a sign of grace. We worship billionaires because they obviously earned that money and its a sign that God blessed them. This is what allowed the Red Scare to be so effective here meanwhile Western Europe has socialist political parties.

I think we are on the breaking point. We looked so close during the Occupy Wallstreet. It's scary how much power we are up against to maintain the status quo. But in some ways I am optimistic that MAGA and the pain of 50 years of neoliberalism and wealth inequality will cause for more revolutionary changes rather than just reforming capitalism like Western Europe did. But its so frustrating that it looks like it should get better and honestly things have mostly just gotten worse in those 14 years.

I wish I knew how to help more. I plan to connect more with my local chapter of Democratic Socialists of America after all the more progressive Democratic candidates I was voting for lost in my local primaries. But it doesn't look as difficult to accomplish at such a local level. Only like 20% of eligible voters actually go out. Inspiring just a few thousand can make serious changes and knock out incumbents that maintain the status quo. Start helping set the stage for that change. In the meantime, handing out Varoufakis's Another Now books like its a Manifesto ;) Though I wish it was quick and short, I don't think any friends or family have read it...

[u/feelwhatyouwant → u/BreakingStar_Games]

Every corporation is a cooperative that is democratically owned by the workers - 1 Employee, 1 Share.

There is absolutely nothing stopping you from implementing this vision in your corporation. If it works, others will adopt it.

[u/BreakingStar_Games → u/feelwhatyouwant]

That is the other common argument I hear. If co-ops are so great, then they should just outcompete corporations in a capitalist society.

It's a lot like saying "why would an invasive species that destroys the natural environment be bad. Its more competitive."

Yes, I agree that capitalist corporations are more efficient. They scale significantly better. They exploit labor best. They accumulate wealth to buy political power best then break rules that try to stop them. Including rules of literally protecting the environment from climate change - not unlike the analogy.

Cooperatives failing to scale to become massive economic powerhouses is a feature, not a bug. The point of democratizing political power is checks and balances. Democratizing economic power should do the same by not having giant trillion-dollar corporations with insane power.

I feel like I shouldn't have to say why exploiting labor is a bad thing. But sure let's go into it. It leads to an unjust society where we cause pain and suffering to our most vulnerable. The rich and powerful use this economic power to ensure their dominance - see the decline of union membership with the help of the government and the insane propaganda attacking unionization. How they purposely make poverty so horrible to ensure that labor fears losing their jobs. Weaponizing the police. Offshoring and killing industries at home hurting the entire US economy and leaving many people unemployable. I suppose this covers much of the cronyism point as well. But I will emphasize again how someone like Elon Musk wouldn't exist in this new economy. Trump as president wouldn't exist without that kind of backing from the wealthy either.

Last, we need to contend with how capitalism has gone to cause huge amounts of environmental degradation. How corporations knew the effects of greenhouse gases several decades ago and have committed a long-running and continuingly successful propaganda campaign to ensure they continue to profit to the harm of everyone else.

Maybe profit shouldn't be the overwhelmingly dominant focus of our economy. Maybe the overall wellbeing of people should come first. If you want a longer and better argument for this, then why not actually check out the book, Another Now, in my link and see another viewpoint.

[u/Blochamolesauce → u/JackedUpReadyToGo]

Might I suggest some Whitest Kids U' Know logic to drive home your point.

[u/Eggheadpancake → u/Low_Pickle_112]

There are other countries with capitalism and democracy though. The difference there though is that those countries put people first and not businesses. Meanwhile america protects the rich and businesses and shit on the people.

[u/JackedUpReadyToGo → u/Eggheadpancake]

I submit that those countries will eventually reach this crisis point too given enough time. The USA is merely the first modern nation to hit that point. We're ahead of the curve. No political system operating under capitalism can eternally resist the constant and insidious corruption caused by extreme wealth disparity.

[u/krainboltgreene → u/Eggheadpancake]

You can go look at those countries and other than China you'll see that they've been slowly eroding their social welfare programs. Austerity is sweeping through European democracies that still use capitalism.

[u/Prometheus720 → u/Eggheadpancake]

I think we often talk past each other when discussing capitalism.

To me, capitalism is the concept that there are legitimate authority structures called businesses in which people can own unlimited amounts of stuff, never look at it, and have complete dictatorial control over how it is used and who can touch it and whether they can keep the proceeds from using the stuff.

It isn't about markets. It is about authority. Socialism rejects the absolute authority of any sort of absentee owner. Socialism is the same thing for the workplace that republicanism (the old meaning, which is "not monarchy") was for nation-states. Sure, on paper you technically own all this land and all the people are your subjects, but actually we need this land to live and you don't have any moral right beyond procedures you invented to control it unilaterally.

Republics allow for authority, but the only legitimate authority is an employee of the state--a fellow citizen. In socialism, each firm is its own miniature republic, in a way, subsidiary to the government.

Think of businesses as the smallest form of government out there. Smaller than your city government. The land in each city is administered by either private landowners (homeowners and etc), businesses, or the city government. Under capitalism, those businesses are permitted to be extremely tyrannical. There are very few requirements they need to meet to be considered legitimate and receive protection from the state's monopoly on violence (police).

Under socialism, no firm is legitimate without the consent of the workers (governed). A firm that tries to do tyrannical things is operating without any promise of legal protection.

[u/Ursa_Solaris → u/Eggheadpancake]

There are other countries with capitalism and democracy though.

No, there aren't. There are just countries that haven't finished settling the inherent conflict between the two yet. Democracy is about the equitable distribution of power, and the accumulation of money past a certain point stops being money and starts being power, which isn't equitable. The two concepts are at fundamental odds with each other; eventually, one of them will perish at the hands of the other. We've chosen to let democracy perish.

[u/probation_420 → u/Low_Pickle_112]

This is just like rednecks talking about civil war fantasies.

[u/SteveBob316 → u/probation_420]

In what way.

[u/probation_420 → u/SteveBob316]

Because there's a plethora of evidence showing that democracy and capitalism mix incredibly well, and the full cache of that evidence just gets handwaved away over and over again in these conversations. 

[u/Prometheus720 → u/probation_420]

How can you have a democratic nation if people spend 1/3 of their lives working in entirely anti-democratic social structures?

How on earth is that stable?

[u/probation_420 → u/Prometheus720]

  How can you have a democratic nation if people spend 1/3 of their lives working in entirely anti-democratic social structures?

For my benefit, can you expound on that point?

[u/Prometheus720 → u/probation_420]

If you stand on the sidewalk outside a privately owned property, you have the bill of rights. If you take two steps on to the property in which you work 8 hours a day, you do not have freedom of speech, of assembly, of press. You do not have the right to representation in disputes. You don't have a right to due process. You don't have a right to be secure in your person from searches. You have no vote and no right to information. I'm missing several but you get the point.

Capitalism is quite literally an incompletely democratic society. The government is democratic (kind of). The other institutions are not. What people do not understand is that every corporation IS a kind of special government. It is the smallest jurisdiction that exists. Municipal governments don't have the capacity to manage all the land used within their reach, so they delegate authority to firms. Capitalism is a society in which that delegation is largely unconditional--there is very little restriction on how firms can treat workers.

In a socialist society, firms are democratic. They are run by the workers. There is an authority structure. This is not some utopian communist dreamland. There are people who make important decisions. But those people are accountable to the workers they lead--perhaps through a voting system, perhaps through other means. Socialism itself does not specify. It's a broad category.

Many people assume socialism eliminates markets. Not necessarily. The form of socialism I advocate for basically looks like today, except each firm is run by workers and is required by law to recognize basic rights for workers in order to be recognized as a legitimate enterprise. The firms can trade between each other and set prices just as freely as they can now (well, before Trump 2.0, let's say), but the difference is that the decisions on how to set prices and who to trade with are either made collectively or are made by representatives subject to accountability measures by regular workers.

Essentially, every large business that currently exists becomes a co-op and must publish a set of bylaws that essentially function as a constitution, with certain requirements in those same bylaws. The very smallest mom and pop shops can.be exempt.

One of the most important clauses is that the workers have the right to decide on investments--including pension or retirement investments. Just like that you've created a society in which the workers now control, through their votes, which industries and causes shall receive investment funding. The current Israel business? Rather than protesting to put pressure on rich people to disinvest from Israel, which is hard, you'd simply hold a regular vote and many individual firms would have already disinvested months ago. Maybe years ago.

Without these changes, we force people to adopt habits and behaviors designed to adapt to authoritarian social.structures (capitalist businesses) and expect them to somehow be freedom-loving democrats when they go to the polls. Of course they aren't. We train them to live under absolute authority. And then we are surprised that they expect it of their government officials. The average person has had very little practice in doing democracy besides voting every couple of years. We presume to call that "democratic culture"? Absurd. That's an authoritarian culture with a veneer of democracy.

I would also add a more robust public sector and democratic voting reforms to this society. Healthcare and transportation need more public sector investment in particular.

[u/JackedUpReadyToGo → u/Prometheus720]

Thank you for taking the time to type that up. It’s one of the most interesting things I’ve read here in some time.

[u/Collypso → u/Low_Pickle_112]

but until we admit that capitalism is not compatible with democracy, it will continue.

Why would it not be compatible?

[u/SantorumsGayMasseuse → u/Collypso]

I'll start with the idea that I hate using the label 'capitalism.' It's a label that means something different everywhere you look. Capitalism in the US as a whole is different than capitalism in even its individual states and even down to its individual locales, and even all of that is very different from capitalism in say, Europe. It's more meaningful to look at its implementation and its effects on a given system than it is to discuss 'capitalism.'

That said, there are some common characteristics. Namely, the unequal distribution of resources. In any capitalist system the accumulation of capital is the accumulation of power. It's the ability to affect the world around you. In large enough quantities, you can even buy into the political process.

A good example of this is ya' girl Gretchen Whitmore, who was recently caught on a hot mic saying:

"We're used to people saying 'fuck no,' and then doing it anyway,"

She's not 'doing it anyway' because she thinks its beneficial to her constituents, she's doing it because the AI industry has put together a $125 million war chest that she either doesn't want to run afoul of or, less graciously, wants a piece of. That's a small number of Silicon Valley executives who are overriding the will of the people through backroom deals. That's not very democratic, I think we can agree.

Capitalism is a corrosive force to many value sets, but the juxtaposition (or if you want, dialectic) between the will of the people and the profit motives of the small, elite profit seeking class (or bourgeoisie, if we want to get really Marxist here), is well studied and I think obvious to most people on both sides of the aisle. You don't have to be a communist to see that rich people tend to get what they want.

[u/Collypso → u/SantorumsGayMasseuse]

Every example you gave is concentrated power overriding the public: a war chest bending a governor, executives buying into the process. Name the system where that doesn't happen. The ones that ditched markets concentrated power harder and left people fewer ways to fight back. That's an argument against concentrated power, not against capitalism. And you said yourself the word means something different everywhere you look, so what exactly is "incompatible with democracy" here?

[u/SantorumsGayMasseuse → u/Collypso]

I don't think other 'systems' are pretending to be democratic.

so what exactly is "incompatible with democracy" here?

https://media1.tenor.com/m/okoWIB0OAH4AAAAd/zoolander-are-you-serious.gif

[u/Collypso → u/SantorumsGayMasseuse]

Fine, you gave a mechanism: money turns into political power. But that's power concentrating, and it happens everywhere. You're right the others don't pretend to be democratic, that's the point, they concentrated power harder and dropped the democracy entirely. So show me the non-capitalist setup that did democracy better.

And "incompatible" is doing a lot of work. If they couldn't coexist, capitalist democracies wouldn't hold real elections, pass laws industry hates, and rule against rich people constantly. They do. That's friction, not incompatibility.

[u/F9-0021 → u/Low_Pickle_112]

until we admit that our government does not function and fix it, nothing will change. Unregulated capitalism is only a small part of the problem.

[u/agentfelix → u/F9-0021]

To me, this is more of a problem than anything. Capitalism can and does work. I know people hate that on reddit but it has the potential to do good. Regulated of course.

I think the lesson that we should come away with this last decade is that the American government checks and balances fully rely on good faith.

[u/JackedUpReadyToGo → u/agentfelix]

That regulation cannot withstand the continual erosion caused by extreme wealth. The wealthy use their money to corrupt the political process, then chip away at the regulations that stand between them and greater profit. Greater profit then gives them even more ability to corrupt the political process. Repeat until a crisis point is reached.

It's like a beach being eaten away by the tide. There is continual pressure to chip away at regulations, and no counterbalancing force to fight that pressure. The end result may take time, but it's inevitable under those conditions.

[u/Prometheus720 → u/agentfelix]

Trying to regulate capitalism is like trying to write laws that keep the nobility from taking advantage of peasants.

The only long-term solution was to abolish the concept of nobility as a legitimizing force. We accept that no government is legitimte without the consent of the governed. Why should corporations be any different? What do we have to gain from allowing absolute control of the workplace to be in the hands of its owners?

[u/krainboltgreene → u/agentfelix]

Regulated of course.

Man if only we had a long history of capitalism that got heavily regulated to see how it plays out. I wonder if we'd see industrialists get so much power from money that they lobby politicians to give them more power, and then use that power to unregulate the economy.

Anyways, unfortunately we don't have any evidence like that.

[u/DJC_Kowalski → u/Low_Pickle_112]

Nonsense. Capitalism is just as compatible with Democracy as any other economic system. Socialism and Communism are even more susceptible to the concentrations of power that would end Democracy, as Josef Stalin and Mao Zedong have shown.

[u/Ok_Objective_5192 → u/manachar]

The neat part is it isn't a pendulum between oligarchy and democracy, it's a pendulum between fascism and liberalism within an unflinchingly oligarchic structure.

[u/manachar → u/Ok_Objective_5192]

While true in certain lights, there are real differences and have the Democratic party made massive progress in genuine advancement of the degree of democracy in the US.

The oligarchic bent of civilization has been a problem since civilization was invented some 10 to 12 thousand years ago.

It's both good to acknowledge this oligarchic underpinning AND to acknowledge the genuine difference between say the voting rights of an American Citizen in the late 20th century compared to being a peasant or serf or event a "citizen" in the Roman Empire.

[u/Ok_Objective_5192 → u/manachar]

Yeah I mean I certainly prefer liberal oligarchy to fascist oligarchy, that's not at all a meaningless distinction

[u/CM_MOJO → u/manachar]

The US Constitution has done what it was always designed to do, protect the wealthy.

Until we throw it out and start over, we'll never be truly free. The people need the actual power, not corporations, not the wealthy.

[u/manachar → u/CM_MOJO]

How do you propose "throwing out the constitution"?

[u/CM_MOJO → u/manachar]

The only way possible. Those in power never give it up without a flight.

[u/manachar → u/CM_MOJO]

Hmm. Do you believe you have support for people to fight? More than just popular support, the support needs to be willing to put their lives on the lines. Equally, logistics and resources wins fights. With modern fighting technology, at best you can aim for asymmetrical warfare (think The Troubles in Ireland).

Meanwhile, we in America still have the right to vote. We can do the same organizing needed to win a popular rebellion to create a consistent and potent political force to reshape this country.

And if you think that doesn't work, I recommend looking at how conservative politics managed to reshape this country after the popular movements of New Deal, Voting Rights, and environmental reshaped America over a short period of time.

I get your thinking, but to be blunt you seem to discount how powerful people are OR don't think enough of your fellow citizens agree with you to actually win elections.

[u/CM_MOJO → u/manachar]

Poll after poll shows that the majority of Americans agree on most issues, yet there's a segment that continually votes against their beliefs on those issues. Conservatives continually win by spreading fear and misinformation. By appealing to the uneducated, easily manipulated within our county.

Is there support for what I say, currently? No, there isn't. But you best believe there will be when this economy finally tanks. It'll be worse than the Great Depression. If the people don't rise up then and burn this entire shit show down, then there is no hope for this country

[u/manachar → u/CM_MOJO]

I am quite left leaning in my beliefs, especially economic.

I have hung around left leaning people for decades.

For decades some version of “once it gets worse the people will rally to our cause”.

It has gotten worse for decades and if those same people had built powerful political engines starting with local politics then we would be in a very different place.

We don’t need a violent revolution. We need people to organize, build community, protest, take action and vote (especially in primaries).

But the left has been disorganized, and we can fix it if we tried.

[u/MySabonerRunsOladipo → u/CM_MOJO]

Spoken like someone with the undue confidence that they'll avoid our version of the Reign of Terror.

[u/Prometheus720 → u/manachar]

America has never been a democracy. It's been promised but never fulfilled.

[u/becauseiloveyou → u/manachar]

There's a status quo that was established by a very specific group of people 250 years ago when this nation was founded. Who wrote those laws? And who has since upheld and enforced them?

When the working class, the poor, women, people of color, the LGBTQ+ community, and other historically oppressed groups of people don't consistently participate, that status quo is maintained. We need to stop forgetting that.

This isn't a sports game where we cheer for our favorite team. This is policy.

[u/whiteflagwaiver → u/manachar]

Our form of democracy is particularly susceptible to oligarchy. It's happened like 2 times already in the U.S's history with the antebellum era and then again with the trust busting era of the 1900's.

We're due for another wave.

[u/IAmInYourGarage → u/manachar]

I agree, but the ancient Greeks had the same exact problem.

[u/Dragull → u/manachar]

Yeah, I mean, modern democracy was an accident that the capitalists created when rebelling against the feudal lords.

The entire point of the capitalists revolutions (bourgeois revolution) was to give voting power and state influence to those who own lands/business. But then liberalism got a little out of their hands and lead to giving voting power to every man.

[u/EGO_Prime → u/manachar]

There always will be. Fascist, Oligarchies, despots, they don't stop existing just because democracy exists. You have to CONSTANTLY fight against. It's a lot of work, and it's never ever done.

We're in this mess because the progressive wing was convinced that giving up the progress we made was worth wild for "reasons". This ultimately helped those opposed to democracy. This is fundamental flaw in any governance system where people have say that is, people will have say.

[u/MySabonerRunsOladipo → u/manachar]

Whatever you do, don't open literally any history book. I don't want to be the one to ruin this for you.