I’m technically jumping the gun, as the vote runs through the end of today, July 25, but a peek at the vote numbers so far, running 10-1 in favor and well past a necessary quorum, indicate that I’m not jumping the gun in reality.
This is the denouement of a long issue that’s had at least some degree of bad faith on “both sides,” as I see it. That’s why, per Idries Shah, there are never just two sides to an issue.
Personally, I still don’t disagree with everything in the Georgia Green Party’s message. In fact, I’ve had my own stance on this issue, outside “both sides” of the twosiderism on this issue, since long before the GaGP adopted the Women’s Declaration of Sex-Based Rights. But, as time has worn on, I’ve seen the GaGP and some of its allies as a more and more ineffectual messenger for parts of their message I agree with, and many of the individuals, in addition, having increasing additional messages I disagreed with. I’ve talked about this much more at my blog, where I eventually have come to a “pox on both their houses.” More on this, and some of the items below, is at my blog.
As for the big-picture future? I suspect twosiderism on this issue will continue to rule both inside and outside the Green Party.
As for the future at the state level? The GaGP didn’t have state ballot access in 2018, either. I can’t see its replacement making the state ballot in 2022.
As for the national GP issue? Between this, and “libertarian Greens” who clearly accent the first, like William Pounds, trying to form “independent Green Party” apparatus in some states, I suspect 2022, and even 2024, are going to be rocky years for the national party. Howie Hawkins has already said he’s eyeing a run again in 2024 and many of the “libertarian Greens” detest him.
The Movement for a People’s Party offers an outside challenge, even as some visible people like “Proud Socialist” Ryan Knight vacillate from support to denigration. (The latest I saw on Twitter, he’s back in the “support” camp.)
I largely agree, Jonah. Will Rogers’ famous maxim about not belonging to an organized party, being a Democrat? That’s Greens on steroids.
Over-determining the “decentralization” key value is one reason this is problematic, in my opinion.
On the big shots? The late Bruce Dixon of Black Agenda Report said that was especially the case with newly-minted Black Greens and state and national Black caucuses.
My own view is that to survive climate change will require radical changes that the duopoly parties cannot handle. A new organization is required. It cannot make the needed changes without getting at least 80% of the public behind it. The experiences of Russia, Cuba, Albania etc persuade me that when a minority ideological group takes over and suppresses the competition (which typically was trying to kill them earlier) and THEN tries to persuade the public, they get a lot of people who pretend to go along out of fear, who do not take initiative and the system eventually stagnates.
But our existing political system is designed around keeping any party from getting much more than 50% cooperation.
A new organization might get support by using new methods of organizing people, methods that work. A lot of people who are disgusted by the existing perpetual stalemates might join them, seeing that it’s actually functional, and might take up the new methods themselves to get increasing results.
It looks to me like the Green Party has many of the ideals that would be useful, and might evolve into something that could actually make a difference. But I have found that in practice the organization is utterly dysfunctional and not something that a lot of people would want to join in its present state.
AMC told me that she knows how politics works, and most Greens are clueless about it, and that’s why she’s been so successful. It looks to me like her tactics are inherently divisive. She got support by declaring an enemy she intended to stop. She could get a dedicated band of activists to work together to defeat the enemy. But since the enemy was always another faction in the same party….
Ventura supporters were a small minority in the party and were not very well organized. Jesse himself publicly described his plan — he wanted the other candidates to spend a year or more tearing each other down, and at the last minute, when each of them had a lot of party members who despised them, the party leaders would bring him in as the savior. He would not be worn down by the infighting, and the announcement would generate media interest etc. Basicly, he wanted the party insiders to rig it for him. He approached AMC about this and she basicly told him hell no, over her dead body, because she was already rigging it for her own candidate. I don’t think the Ventura stuff would have even resonated much except that Howie’s supporters had generated so much opposition to themselves.
This is how politics works, and we desperately need something better.
But I think very few party members agree with me. They don’t imagine a world where the Green Party could win. They accept the world as it is, and their place in it as a voice crying in the wilderness.
People can be big shots in the Green Party, which is maybe better than not being big shots anywhere at all. if the party changed to become popular, likely the same people would no longer be important.
They can struggle to make their own particular beliefs become the official Green Party beliefs that party members must not oppose. Socialists, anarchists, vegans, Georgists, regenerative agriculture enthusiasts, feminists, trans activisits, black radicals, antiwar activists, PETA activists, everybody wants to have a party that is 100% on their side and not too burdened with other points of view. That doesn’t lead to winning elections, but they can’t really imagine winning elections. PETA activists will not win elections until at least 51% of the voters stop opposing them…..
So I don’t know. To win, we have to somehow represent varied interests. We must get support from a whole lot of independents, from former Democrats and former Republicans, from blacks and whites, from socialists and capitalists, from soldiers and pacifists, etc. But that’s a long run goal, and lots of people have short run goals.
I want us to find ways to satisfy a big variety of people, and further a big variety of goals at the same time. It follows that I must find ways to get my own goals put in place while also satisfying the big variety of other people’s goals today.
Sorry if this was too long and abstract. I could try to be more concrete, which would make it longer still.
True to a fair degree, Jonah.
In the last 12 months, the GP has had:
1. The Cult of Jesse use Dario as a stalking horse to try to wrest the nomination away from Hawkins;
2. Some people claim Andrea is a “GINO” (think about it) — I personally don’t agree with everything she says, but certainly don’t think that;
3. Dario playing “that” card;
4. Some of these same people above attacking Hawkins for saying Russia really did it (in reality, Russia hacked BOTH the DNC and ALSO the RNC, which I’ve regularly stressed);
5. As I mentioned, the likes of Pounds trying to create “independent” Green parties (I’m less sanguine about that than you, but I now identify as an “independent leftist).
Beyond that, and this, there’s other issues.
Howie lost my vote when he listened to Margaret Flowers and the late Kevin Zeese and started peddling the Xi Jinping Kool-Aid. (Maybe he started that on his own without urging. So, yea, I’ve officially been an “independent leftist for some time now.
Apart from the specific issue….
The specific issue is one small issue dividing the party. We have had other minor issues, like whether to call what we do socialism, and whether to legalize pimps and johns.
Someone I tend to trust says that the Georgia Green Party got taken over by a few people who did not actually represent the people they were supposed to represent. And the ONLY thing the national party could do about it was deaccredit them and later let a new Georgia Green Party join.
I don’t know what was going on in Georgia. But what should happen if a state party gets taken over by a small group? We’ve had accusations of that in Georgia, Rhode Island, Alaska, Ohio, Colorado, Arizona, and…. Probably there are less-public accusations for most states that have a Green Party. What should the national party do? How should the national party sort it out and decide which accusations are true, and which state parties to throw out?
What should happen if the national party gets taken over by a minority that doesn’t represent the Greens?
My personal belief is that the Greens have accidentally become centralized in a way that is not compatible with their key values. By accepting a single state party from each state, we create nodes of power which become unrepresentative whenever things break down at a state level.
Better to accept as many state parties from each state as we believe are composed of actual Greens. Each Green can officially belong to one of them, and give their national representatives votes proportional to the number of Greens who say they want that representative. If your state party or its GPUS National Committee member does not represent you, then tell that to GPUS and choose another.
Then to a large extent the problem solves itself.
Of course each solution brings new problems, but maybe our new problems will not need centralized control to solve, any more than this one does.
Pounds and many other long time, rank and file Greens are understandably upset with Andrea Mérida Cuéllar’s handling of the Colorado Green Party with it’s purge of long time CO Greens, and her tenure as National Green Party co-chair leading to questionable tactics being used to give Howie Hawkins an advantage over other Green Party primary candidates. The Greens who wish to form an Independent Green Party are using the National Green Party’s platform prior to 2014 or 2016 before an influx of eco-socialists forced changes in the Party’s platform (most notably dropping support for local & small businesses and the self employed. Plus older Greens were being deliberately pushed out of the party because “they remember Soviet style communism” and could not be expected to embrace eco-socialism and would not support violence towards others or the state. I have personally witnessed name calling, slander, character assassination, threats, etc. being directed towards fellow Greens and Green Party primary candidates by eco-socialists in the party as well as Cuéllar herself telling people to get out of the party, all because they object to her leadership, all the authoritarian changes in the party, the blatant croneyism, complete lack of accountability, and repeatedly implementing highly questionable changes in the party platform without putting it to a vote of the membership. Cuéllar is a former Democrat and still has ties to the Democratic Party. I would not be surprised to find out that she’s received financial and logistical assistance from DNC to sabotage the Green Party in something akin to “Operation Pied Piper” where Hillary Clinton’s campaign sought to promote Trump’s campaign and status as a candidate thinking he would be so far to the right, Republicans would have no choice but to vote for Hillary. But with the Green Party, the goal would be to push the Green Party so far to the left by having them nominate the SPUSA presidential candidate Howie Hawkins (which should have been disallowed by Green Party rules but was ignored) that disaffected Democrats and long time Greens would have no choice but to vote for Clinton.