FRI, 4/12/2024 – BY CARL GIBSON

Occupy.Com

In 2024, leftist voters — particularly those in the six battleground states of Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin — have a lot more influence and power than they may realize.

Influence and power are things the left has typically not had a lot of in a country as conservative as the United States. But thanks to the Electoral College, leftists have perhaps the final say this November over whether democracy can hold on for at least another four years, or if fascism will take root and infect all facets of the federal government for decades to come.

As leftists, we’re used to being a minority in American political discourse. When both major parties argue about whether to take healthcare away from poor people entirely or to expand access to a heavily commodified version of it, we’re the only ones saying it should be free. When the two parties are bickering over how much police budgets should be expanded, we’re the only ones saying they should be significantly reduced.

And more recently, when Congressional Democrats and Republicans were trying to out-hawk each other on immigration and border security, it seemed like the left was the only political group urging Congress to remember the words on the Statue of Liberty that invites “huddled masses yearning to breathe free” to find sanctuary in the United States.

The left is admittedly a long way from achieving the utopian ideal most of us envision when asked about how we would run the country. Regardless of which side wins in November, the climate crisis will continue to intensify, the military-industrial complex will eat up a disproportionate amount of the federal budget, insurance titans will continue to serve as gatekeepers between life-saving healthcare and the people who need it, and corporate money will overwhelm the political system. These will unfortunately continue to be battles that many of us will have to fight for the rest of our lives.

But it’s important to state that the 2024 election is not about policy — it’s about something much more basic. The one overarching question voters will answer in the voting booth this November is whether we want to continue having a country in which it’s possible to keep fighting and making steady progress in the aforementioned battles, or if we will surrender entirely to the far-right’s goal of implementing a Christofascist dictatorship.

ADDRESSING THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM: GAZA

The Biden administration’s steadfast support of the Netanyahu regime even as it continues to massacre Palestinian civilians at an alarming rate is understandably the primary objection among leftists when Democrats ask for their vote. Michigan’s Muslim community — which makes up a significant bloc of Democratic-leaning voters in the Mitten State, particularly in Dearborn — has made it clear to Biden’s envoys that it will not cast ballots for a president who is green-lighting the bombing of their friends and family in Gaza.

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