I believe a piece of it that real solutions a)take a long time to come to fruition (often decades - solar power was proped up by subsidies for a generation before it became economical on its own) and b)have costs (eg making housing more broadly affordable makes it a worse investment) and many people aren’t going to take that shit. Solutions next year at no cost (or only at a cost to “other” people) or die.
So any politician who proposes real solutions that can work can’t get votes. Politicians who propose fantasy solutions get voted in over and over, because even when their solutions don’t pan out, “at least they are trying.”
I agree with you that there are certain issues that will require long incremental complex change that is hard to sell to a populace addicted to short simple sound bites. I also believe there are a lot of issues that can be implemented in a congressional term that can be summarized easily, but dems refuse to do them because it would require large systemic change that there donors don’t want. Messages like Medicare for all, free childcare, student loan forgiveness all funded by a wealth tax on billionaires. This is a very popular, simple message you can give to the masses while at the same time laying out those long term complex technocratic plans for those who care.
The dems are only giving those technocratic plans though, and it shows as less and less non-college educated people are voting democrat. We can say theyre just stupid sheep but those sheep are a majority of the population and if we don’t cater to them, we’ll never win another election.
The examples you give aren’t popular enough, in enough right places (since legislative representation is uneven) to get the 60 Senate seats of support required to make them law. At least in part because the donor and lobbying class opposes them as currently framed, but enough voters are swayed by donor-class-funded messaging to prevent voting in sufficient supportive legislators.
I believe a piece of it that real solutions a)take a long time to come to fruition (often decades - solar power was proped up by subsidies for a generation before it became economical on its own) and b)have costs (eg making housing more broadly affordable makes it a worse investment) and many people aren’t going to take that shit. Solutions next year at no cost (or only at a cost to “other” people) or die.
So any politician who proposes real solutions that can work can’t get votes. Politicians who propose fantasy solutions get voted in over and over, because even when their solutions don’t pan out, “at least they are trying.”
I agree with you that there are certain issues that will require long incremental complex change that is hard to sell to a populace addicted to short simple sound bites. I also believe there are a lot of issues that can be implemented in a congressional term that can be summarized easily, but dems refuse to do them because it would require large systemic change that there donors don’t want. Messages like Medicare for all, free childcare, student loan forgiveness all funded by a wealth tax on billionaires. This is a very popular, simple message you can give to the masses while at the same time laying out those long term complex technocratic plans for those who care.
The dems are only giving those technocratic plans though, and it shows as less and less non-college educated people are voting democrat. We can say theyre just stupid sheep but those sheep are a majority of the population and if we don’t cater to them, we’ll never win another election.
The examples you give aren’t popular enough, in enough right places (since legislative representation is uneven) to get the 60 Senate seats of support required to make them law. At least in part because the donor and lobbying class opposes them as currently framed, but enough voters are swayed by donor-class-funded messaging to prevent voting in sufficient supportive legislators.