If anyone has the rest of the interview, I’d love to see it.

  • Five@slrpnk.net
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    4 days ago

    In run-up to the 1964 election, civil rights leaders including Martin Luther King Jr. were given an audience with incumbent president Lyndon Johnson, where he asked them to scale down their protest activity until after the election so he could be confident he could win. They understood correctly that by continuing to protest, they had political leverage.

    Imagine an alternative reality where LBJ had not signed the Civil Rights Act, and instead Barry Goldwater had won and increased the segregation and discrimination facing African-americans. Would you blame them for using the only electoral political leverage they had available, and laugh at their misfortune?

    The only check the worst excesses of the Trump presidency has is the potential for widespread civil unrest. The Democrats aren’t capable of that. Grassroots Palestinian-american organizations are. In building that base of resistance, we shouldn’t make the same mistakes that caused the Democrats to lose the election. In the words of Nate Silver:

    Democrats…often get angry with you when you only halfway agree with them. And I really think this difference in personality profiles tells you a little something about why Trump won: Trump was happy to take on all comers, whereas with Democrats, disagreement on any hot-button topic (say, COVID school closures or Biden’s age) will have you cast out as a heretic. That’s not a good way to build a majority, and now Democrats no longer have one.

    Abbas Alawieh is concerned for the lives of his family and friends under another Trump regime. We all are. He is one of us.

    • AwesomeLowlander@sh.itjust.works
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      4 days ago

      Yeah, but you’re saying this about somebody who has committed that very sin, of condemning Biden because of disagreement on a hot button topic. Who then turns around and begs for help when the predictable happened. Isn’t that somewhat hypocritical?

      • Five@slrpnk.net
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        4 days ago

        Are you saying it is hypocritical for him to campaign for the people in Gaza under Biden, and then continue to campaign for the people in Gaza under Trump? That’s the opposite of hypocrisy.

        It is ironic that he condemned Biden because of a genocide and they both lost, and now you are condemning him because of a genocide.

        • PhilipTheBucket@ponder.catOP
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          4 days ago

          It is hypocritical for him to say that costing Biden votes is “campaigning for Gaza,” then translate that over into costing Kamala Harris votes even though she’s not the one who’s been making these genocide-friendly decisions, then suddenly be panicked that Trump is clearly going to make things quite a bit worse and it may be the total end of his country and his ethnicity on the planet. That was the totally predictable result of his method of “campaigning for Gaza,” and many, many people told him that, and got accused of being pro-genocide shills for the Democrats.

          If his movement had campaigned for Gaza in pretty much any other way, or if he had come out and admitted now that they fucked up and asked for help in pressuring the Trump administration or the global community, this wouldn’t be posted here.

      • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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        4 days ago

        The uncommitted movement backed Harris. While not officially endorsing her they urged voters to vote against Trump and not vote third party.

        Which leaves voting for Harris, without saying the words, “vote for Harris.”

            • PhilipTheBucket@ponder.catOP
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              4 days ago

              My point is that if the child isn’t vaccinated, and then dies of whooping cough, the uncle who put together a whole organized program to educate the family about the dangers of vaccines bears a lot responsibility for the tragedy.

              Yes, even more so than the pharmaceutical companies who lost the people’s trust through their actions.

              It would still be a heartbreaking loss if it was just Palestine that’s going to be lost. But the scale of the global tragedy is going to be much greater than just this man’s country. He’s helped to doom, not just his own family, but millions of other people’s families who weren’t even involved.

              • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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                4 days ago

                So you blame him for all of the protest voting that happened? As if people couldn’t read the news articles themselves?

                He gave the Democrats a chance to realize what lay down that road. He wasn’t the one who ignored the voters and in your analogy he also laid out the dangers of not vaccinating and made a doctor’s appointment that Mom didn’t take the kids to.