cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/54506028
cross-posted from: https://quokk.au/c/politics/p/1270828/iowa-dem-josh-turek-releases-anti-trans-ad-calling-for-a-federal-funding-ban-on-trans-care
On Saturday, Oct. 24, Josh Turek, the Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate in Iowa, released a new ad targeting transgender peopleāperhaps the worst anti-transgender ad of the entire election cycle to come from a Democrat. The ad begins with Turek talking about his disability and the importance of not discriminating, before immediately turning to adopt discriminatory policies toward transgender people. One such policy is a sports ban, a position sadly becoming increasingly common among high-profile Democrats in competitive races, and one that alone would have made this yet another newsworthy anti-trans ad. But Turek then goes further, advocating for a new policy: a proposal to ban federally funded gender-affirming care in the United States, one that would impact a substantial number of transgender people and make their care difficult to impossible to receive.
The depressing thing i fear is that polling on trans rights must be bad enough that some dems feel this is a position that benefits them. Newsom seems to think it benefits him, slimy amoral scumbag that he is.
The dems donāt want to accept any responsiblity for the perception that theyāre not meaningfully different from fascists, but they also want to throw trans people to the wolves when theyāre already one of the most murdered groups in society.
Itās just consultants. The audience and constituents that are being listened to are just consultants. Most people donāt give a fuck about trans people cuz they are such a tiny minority. Neoliberal consultants have seen the success of conservative culture war narratives and have adopted the, ācanāt beat 'em, join 'emā strategy because they donāt want to do the actual work beating culture war narratives would require, which is pushing progressive policies.
I donāt know what the polls say on this issue, but if the Democrats throw trans people to the wolves, itās because their ādonorsā said to; polling is only relevant if Amazon agrees.
For example, polls show support for term limits is 83%; it doesnāt matter, because Meta doesnāt want term limits. I could list ten issues with over 80% support from all Americans; theyāve wanted these very basic no-brainer things for DECADES.
Just like labor discovered long ago, Democrats (or Rs, bOtH sIdEs, etc) will abandon any issue for enough ādonationsā.
There was a massive study from princeton over a decade ago showing that since the end of the civil rights era, not a single piece of public policy reflected public opinion.
The conclusion was that there is no evidence that the US is a democracy, and it explicitly said weāve functionally been an oligarchy since the 70s.
I think meta has less to do with term limits than no one being willing to vote themselves out of a steady job.