It seems like the unions might switch to being Trump supporters, since so many of their members are. Or at least some unions. So maybe the Democratic coalition will realign a bit.
The beating heart of the Dem coalition is public sector unions + single women.
This includes not just direct public sector unions like the teachers union. It also includes highly regulated and subsidized sectors like healthcare, which are a kind of "guild" or quasi public sector union.
Single women include both welfare mamas and corporate professional women with bullshit jobs. Neither is very "pro-growth".
Most of your men that like building things, like actual things in the real world of atoms, are moving towards the right. Ezra talks about building houses. How do you think someone who ACTUALLY BUILDS HOUSES votes?
I just went onto open secrets for the largest homebuilder I know in the area. It's split 75% R / 25% D.
Look, if you want growth its easier to move to Florida or Texas and become a Republican then it is to try and change the Democrats, especially where they have one party rule.
I think it's interesting that all of the discussion around bureaucratic expansion and the professional managerial class remains almost completely unaddressed on the left. If these kinds of suppositions were flawed or incorrect, you would expect leftists to address them and dispute them. The fact that there's widespread silence-people trying to ignore the discussion altogether-makes me even more certain that there's something to it.
“The case only becomes stronger Klein’s goal — getting government to build more, faster. Abundance, the book, makes it clear that those progressive groups are part of the problem when they impose requirements for housing, energy, and industrial policy that gets in the way of government projects being done at all. Shafting the groups isn’t just a strategic victory — it’s a practical victory.”
Great article but you really have to proofread more
Building guy grunt here... I'm curious about all the cheerleading for building stuff by folks that don't even begin to have the faintest clue about building stuff. It's easy to write books that restate all the things some of us have been saying for 30 years. It's another thing to get stuff built. When it comes to building stuff, public input is bad, actually.
Great take, feels like Dems have an internal war right now between the Bernie/AOC faction and the Abundance faction. Abundance faction needs to get more serious about power, and how/what they plan to do.
It’s funny because Ezra was spot on about power in the past regarding the senate and filibuster.
Another question is who politically is willing to grab the mantle and stand up for this coalition? Seems like Ro Khanna is trying but would be do what you’re advocating above?
I'm imagining a movie where lobbyists and oligarchs are all vampires and the politicians who act as their proxies are bar-coded familiars. Opposed to them are "populists." And Klein et. al. are aristos, whom oligarchs quote as authorities, and whom populists name-call elites. And then there are the hounded and suppressed lefties and (...left out or shepherded like sheep ...) the unorganized rest of us? Well, the movie at least was done, it was Blade. I see in this piece an effort to model groups, but it has no Fed, IMF or central bank, nor markets for that matter. All those unmodeled parts, even disorganized "silent majority" people, aren't merely sheep. Could someone propose new ideas to involve them plz? Must only populists target them? Do any of these other modeled groups (other than populists, of course) care about polls any more?
HUGE flaw in your logic around campaign donations…corporations donated to Harris because they HAD to…Blackrock, Vanguard, and State Street have a firm grasp on the cajones of every CEO that runs a publicly traded company. Why? How? Look at who owns them. Of course there are some genuine liberal leaders but most fell in line with the WEF/Blackrock agenda somewhere between 2008 and 2020 to preserve their own reputation, prevent hostile takeover overs and the worst of all, avoid getting debanked. All Larry Fink has to do is make one phone call and if you are i. The Blackrock sphere, you lose everything.
To continue to speak about globalism as Ezra Klein does is not only insulting to anyone with eyes and ears, it discredits the individual supporting Globalsim. Very few people at this point will take you seriously.
I feel like the Dems have achieved this here, we have some ranting crazies but the trend is towards building. All new office buildings are biotech labs. Forests and fields can be chopped down for solar panels. Roads can be widened for bike lanes. Universities have bought up big sections of the city and are building labs/dorms/random grad school buildings on the land. Medical treatments have a much easier time getting support ie inclusion in a list of what insurance has to pay for.
Unfortunately the whole state depends on this for growth, so if the federal government changes priorities it’s a very abrupt clash of gears.
Are the Democratic growth sectors going to continue? Medical seems to be the leg of the stool that is teetering the most. Effective price controls mean doctors leave the profession, leading to a shortage. Hospitals which were abundant are going through more consolidation. This was happening before doge.
Forests and fields can be chopped down for solar panels. This isn’t abundance and it isn’t sustainable. It’s insane and the very reason the urban snobs who run the Dems need to lose. Climate so-called science is about as corrupt and non scientific as it gets. Solar panels and wind farms will end up in the dust bin of history. Now I’m also betting that someone will figure out how to harness the enormous energy of the sun. Or the incredible heat inside the earth’s magma layer. But it isn’t going to be someone we know now, and certainly no Dem billionaire has the imagination to think differently. No, a lot of shit is going down with this ship. Pritzker et al Reid, Gates and the rest - will have their hands full protecting the little satrapies they’ve built. We’re at the stage after the iceberg scrapes the side, before the captain went down into the hold, when it could still be imagined that the ship could survive. Signed, former Democrat and reluctant Republican
I’ll be interested to see if it can keep going without support from the Federal Gov.
Is the plan of Abundance different from what I outlined above though? It’s basically finding more acceptable reasons for building sprawl, and the people who work or live in the sprawl or who service them don’t seem to care either way. Not judging btw.
No. I believe Klein and Thompson are both upper class millenials, the YIMBY movement is millennials of varying classes, most of the people I see at Abundance Democrat conferences are millenials, a lot of the VCs for Kamala call watchers were millenial, etc.
Abundance might not be a majority, but it's at least a powerful elite faction within millenials Democrats.
It seems like the unions might switch to being Trump supporters, since so many of their members are. Or at least some unions. So maybe the Democratic coalition will realign a bit.
The beating heart of the Dem coalition is public sector unions + single women.
This includes not just direct public sector unions like the teachers union. It also includes highly regulated and subsidized sectors like healthcare, which are a kind of "guild" or quasi public sector union.
Single women include both welfare mamas and corporate professional women with bullshit jobs. Neither is very "pro-growth".
Most of your men that like building things, like actual things in the real world of atoms, are moving towards the right. Ezra talks about building houses. How do you think someone who ACTUALLY BUILDS HOUSES votes?
I just went onto open secrets for the largest homebuilder I know in the area. It's split 75% R / 25% D.
Look, if you want growth its easier to move to Florida or Texas and become a Republican then it is to try and change the Democrats, especially where they have one party rule.
Illinois guy here. I'm actually thinking of moving to Texas or Florida. I'm surprised at myself.
I think it's interesting that all of the discussion around bureaucratic expansion and the professional managerial class remains almost completely unaddressed on the left. If these kinds of suppositions were flawed or incorrect, you would expect leftists to address them and dispute them. The fact that there's widespread silence-people trying to ignore the discussion altogether-makes me even more certain that there's something to it.
https://jmpolemic.substack.com/p/leviathan
“The case only becomes stronger Klein’s goal — getting government to build more, faster. Abundance, the book, makes it clear that those progressive groups are part of the problem when they impose requirements for housing, energy, and industrial policy that gets in the way of government projects being done at all. Shafting the groups isn’t just a strategic victory — it’s a practical victory.”
Great article but you really have to proofread more
fixed
“Back in reality, they’re no changing who the Democratic party represents without changing who manages the Democratic party.”
Also
That’s it, I’m getting a paid sub.
Building guy grunt here... I'm curious about all the cheerleading for building stuff by folks that don't even begin to have the faintest clue about building stuff. It's easy to write books that restate all the things some of us have been saying for 30 years. It's another thing to get stuff built. When it comes to building stuff, public input is bad, actually.
I think he should be locked in Klein bottle
Shorter: change or die. Longer: is the Democratic Party capable of doing what it needs to do going forward? Doesn’t look good from here.
Great take, feels like Dems have an internal war right now between the Bernie/AOC faction and the Abundance faction. Abundance faction needs to get more serious about power, and how/what they plan to do.
It’s funny because Ezra was spot on about power in the past regarding the senate and filibuster.
Another question is who politically is willing to grab the mantle and stand up for this coalition? Seems like Ro Khanna is trying but would be do what you’re advocating above?
I'm imagining a movie where lobbyists and oligarchs are all vampires and the politicians who act as their proxies are bar-coded familiars. Opposed to them are "populists." And Klein et. al. are aristos, whom oligarchs quote as authorities, and whom populists name-call elites. And then there are the hounded and suppressed lefties and (...left out or shepherded like sheep ...) the unorganized rest of us? Well, the movie at least was done, it was Blade. I see in this piece an effort to model groups, but it has no Fed, IMF or central bank, nor markets for that matter. All those unmodeled parts, even disorganized "silent majority" people, aren't merely sheep. Could someone propose new ideas to involve them plz? Must only populists target them? Do any of these other modeled groups (other than populists, of course) care about polls any more?
HUGE flaw in your logic around campaign donations…corporations donated to Harris because they HAD to…Blackrock, Vanguard, and State Street have a firm grasp on the cajones of every CEO that runs a publicly traded company. Why? How? Look at who owns them. Of course there are some genuine liberal leaders but most fell in line with the WEF/Blackrock agenda somewhere between 2008 and 2020 to preserve their own reputation, prevent hostile takeover overs and the worst of all, avoid getting debanked. All Larry Fink has to do is make one phone call and if you are i. The Blackrock sphere, you lose everything.
To continue to speak about globalism as Ezra Klein does is not only insulting to anyone with eyes and ears, it discredits the individual supporting Globalsim. Very few people at this point will take you seriously.
I feel like the Dems have achieved this here, we have some ranting crazies but the trend is towards building. All new office buildings are biotech labs. Forests and fields can be chopped down for solar panels. Roads can be widened for bike lanes. Universities have bought up big sections of the city and are building labs/dorms/random grad school buildings on the land. Medical treatments have a much easier time getting support ie inclusion in a list of what insurance has to pay for.
Unfortunately the whole state depends on this for growth, so if the federal government changes priorities it’s a very abrupt clash of gears.
Are the Democratic growth sectors going to continue? Medical seems to be the leg of the stool that is teetering the most. Effective price controls mean doctors leave the profession, leading to a shortage. Hospitals which were abundant are going through more consolidation. This was happening before doge.
Forests and fields can be chopped down for solar panels. This isn’t abundance and it isn’t sustainable. It’s insane and the very reason the urban snobs who run the Dems need to lose. Climate so-called science is about as corrupt and non scientific as it gets. Solar panels and wind farms will end up in the dust bin of history. Now I’m also betting that someone will figure out how to harness the enormous energy of the sun. Or the incredible heat inside the earth’s magma layer. But it isn’t going to be someone we know now, and certainly no Dem billionaire has the imagination to think differently. No, a lot of shit is going down with this ship. Pritzker et al Reid, Gates and the rest - will have their hands full protecting the little satrapies they’ve built. We’re at the stage after the iceberg scrapes the side, before the captain went down into the hold, when it could still be imagined that the ship could survive. Signed, former Democrat and reluctant Republican
I’ll be interested to see if it can keep going without support from the Federal Gov.
Is the plan of Abundance different from what I outlined above though? It’s basically finding more acceptable reasons for building sprawl, and the people who work or live in the sprawl or who service them don’t seem to care either way. Not judging btw.
> Imagine for a second that all the degrowthers and socialists disappeared from the Earth.
We don't have to imagine very hard, thoughout history there have been tons of depictions of Hell
Nice try
Isn't the Venn diagram of "degrowthers and socialists" and "upper class milennials" a perfect single circle?
No. I believe Klein and Thompson are both upper class millenials, the YIMBY movement is millennials of varying classes, most of the people I see at Abundance Democrat conferences are millenials, a lot of the VCs for Kamala call watchers were millenial, etc.
Abundance might not be a majority, but it's at least a powerful elite faction within millenials Democrats.
Well ok, one is a proper subset of the other (and that was written kind of tongue in cheek)