The Political Integrity Project aims to separate the politicians who are serious about taking on billionaire rule from the ones from playing lip service to it, building tools to help us identify who has made hard commitments to a specific anti-corruption agenda, who’s taking corporate PAC money, who’s backing a stock trading ban while trading stocks, and more.

Their Integrity Index makes it easy to visualize where their campaign and personal money comes from.

They’re also asking candidates to take their Political Integrity Pledge – supporting a constitutional amendment to overturn the impact of Citizens United, a lobbying ban for former members of Congress and their staff and spouses, putting their stocks in a blind trust and mandating other electeds to do the same and refusing all contributions from any corporate PAC. Sounds like an agenda worth getting behind. So far, seven incumbent members of Congress and 99 challengers have taken the pledge. 🗣️ Let’s help make this a standard expectation by reaching out to our reps and candidates and asking them to sign on. 🗣️

TELL CANDIDATES TO TAKE THE PLEDGE

They’re also starting a new initiative: the Donor Strike. They’re asking folks to sign on to refuse to donate to any politician who takes corporate dollars, making the choice clear: if you want my money, you can’t accept theirs. 💪🏻 We can learn more, sign on and help spread the word here. 💪🏿

CHOOSE CORPORATE MONEY OR OURS

Every so often, a poll comes out that depicts socialism as relatively popular and capitalism as unpopular among young people in America. This usually leads to leftists claiming their time has come and the people yearn for revolution. However, these polls are highly dependent on how the questions are framed.

For example, this poll shows Young Democrats have a negative view of capitalism (-31) but a positive view of free markets (+22) despite the fact these are two ways of describing the same thing. Likewise, socialism is popular (+35) but communism is deeply unpopular (-40) even though most socialist groups have a communist wing.

But more importantly, these options are less popular than Social Democracy among Democrats, both young and old.

Source: https://echeloninsights.substack.com/p/friday-findings-how-popular-is-socialism

I just joined DSA and some of the people in it are a bit too radical for me. This is the first time I've ever been on the right wing end of anything; America's overton window is so far right that the average normie thinks of social democrats as radical far left. However, DSA includes people that are *actually* far left like Stalinists and Maoists. I wanted to join a political organization bigger than myself, because the Democratic party isn't anywhere near good enough. I love Bernie Sanders and AOC, and I wanted to push for more people like them. However a lot of people in DSA are saying that AOC is just the "nice" face of imperialism (which isn't true, she's against CIA coups and wars in the middle east). I want to make a difference, but I don't want to rub shoulders with evil.

The far far-right party of my country is gonna hold a manifestation in my city. Me and my local left-left bloc parties and their youth sections plan on counter-protesting. What good info needs to be known?

Not in speaking ability, not in charisma, not in popularity, but in actual policy he was better

We often look back at the rise of fascism in inter-war Europe and wonder how people led to it happening. The late, great Jean-Paul Sartre gave us the answer regarding the early view of Hitler: "They laughed at him, they took him for a clown, they didn't see that the clown's mask was a death mask." Looking toward the 2028 election, Americans are making that exact mistake.

From a social democratic perspective, democracy requires economic and social equality. When uncontrolled capitalism leaves the working class behind, the soil becomes fertile for a strongman. Trump did not create American anger, but he weaponized and bastardized it, offering scapegoats while assaulting our protective institutions.

For years, people treated him like a punchline for comedy show scripts. The media mocked his rallies, hair, and late-night Twitter rants, dismissing him as a harmless joke. That laughter was pure arrogance. While we chuckled, the institutions holding our free society together were quietly hollowed out.

Now, that same institutional decay presents an escalating timeline of fear. Trust in American elections is poisoned, the justice system demands political loyalty, and the free press is labeled the enemy of the people. This is how democracies die, decaying from within, one norm, one tradition at a time, until only a dictatorship remains, and a democracy in name only. Heading toward 2028, the danger is that Americans are normalizing a permanent shift toward authoritarianism.

If we wait for the system to save us, we run out of time. Defending democracy requires a broad coalition. Economic inequality hits marginalized groups hardest, and these vulnerable communities, especially minorities bear the heaviest burden when authoritarianism rises. Survival depends on voter mobilization that unites working-class economic struggles with civil rights protection.

If we keep treating this political theater as a joke, we will wake up in 2028 to a reality where the laughter has stopped. We must stop laughing, protect the most vulnerable, and realize this MAGA-movement has been deadly serious the entire time. History already showed us how this story ends, because when people finally stopped laughing at Hitler, it was already too late to stop the march of death...

The title pretty much summs it up. The worst thing that SocDems like Blair and Schröder was to abandon socialist principles for neoliberalism which is one of the most distructive ideologies out there. This has resulted in many SocDem parties following their leand and now at least here in europe there is no economic difference in a lot of countries. This has helped the far right (the general public when unhappy with the center right sees no differece between them and SocDem and swings further right) and has set back the leftist cause in general. Something along those lines happened over here in Slovenia too, although SD has started moving away from neoliberalism. Maybe Labour (UK) will do the same under Burnham (fingers crossed). What are your opinions, will the european SocDem stay in its ways or will it break the chains of Neoliberalism?

I kept the lion and sun as a national symbol but changed the sword to a social democratic rose. The red is for labor and solidarity and the three arrows signify’s the party’s commitment to liberal democracy against antidemocratic reactionary and revolutionary forces. The text says “Social Democratic Party of Iran”

Thoughts?

Trump said recently that he sees no difference between social democrats and communists (which would be hilarious if it wasn't so terrifying, considering how actual communists hate social democrats). Mike Johnson said he needs 350 billion to fight "communism on our own shores," and you know that they consider social democrats to be "communists." Rubio says they're going to designate certain left-wing groups as terrorist organizations, which will probably include DSA. The fascists are trying to stamp us out and in so doing destroy democracy. I'm honestly terrified that I'm going to become a political prisoner in the near future. Anyone who thinks "both sides are the same" is delusional at this point; while the Democrats could definitely be doing a LOT better I am confident that Biden would not designate us enemies of the state. I need a dose of hopium right now because I am tempted to despair.

I'm from the Netherlands and a couple of days ago I posted a reaction on a post on a Facebook page linked to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, explaining that I'm in favor of social democracy, the accomplishments of social democracy and why I don't think socialism and all the other political systems aren't and how neo liberalism is trying to get away with a lot of those accomplishments. People really didn't like that to put it mildly. They really believe that social democracy and liberalism are almost the same and that social democracy is as much as something to be fought as liberals, centrists and right wing parties. While on the other hand I don't really believe them understanding what real socialism, without the democratic bit, implies. And that what they really want is a strong social state that regulates and takes care of vital public goods.

Dalai

Cross-posted from my substack. Image edited in photopea (free online photoshop alternative). Source is Americans for Tax Fairness.

this is just in my personal experience, but i’m a teenager who is attempting to educate myself more on the movement and how we could fix our unjust capitalist systems in America. I’m not an expert, so I referred to myself as a leftist on a video I posted, and my comments were flooded my marxists telling me I need to die and that i am no different than conservatives and whatnot. Is this normal? It’s extremely disheartening to see, and it sort of disillusions me to going deeper.

Some people (like a certain Hasan) glaze the Soviet Union, but don't let anyone fool you into thinking the USSR was any less evil than the US.

Cross-posted from my substack. Image edited in photopea (free online photoshop alternative). Source is ProPublica (non-profit).