Sirota: Turner's defeat means blue-team identity politics is working

But for whom is the question? The answer: For corporations and their wealthy donors, not so much for we the people. The former is who backed Nina's primary opponent. And their framing of get along to go along is winning the day, painting progressive policies as radical when if fact that is exactly what we need. They peddle this blue-team identity tribalism, that only if we stick together can we defeat the evil enemy when in fact they are part of that neoliberal enemy.

The consequence is that with the climate and democracy crises looming we must implement so-called radical policies to address them or both die. That is not hyperbole but fact. And the establishment, corporate Democratic Party ignores those issues to maintain a status quo that continues to destroy both. They play on our fear of change for the cold comfort of ineffective incrementalism, which will only lead to the cold reality of disaster. 

"Critical-thinking activists have been replaced by superfans whose color-coordinated pom-pom cheerleading is endlessly amplified by social media algorithms and roundtable chat shows on corporate television networks whose owners have an interest in skewing the discourse. Meanwhile, vast swaths of the population on information overload have accepted the supremacy of kleptocratic oligarchy — and either don’t turn out or just follow the party signals to fill in their ballot.

"Inside this noisy sports stadium, earnest criticism is blasphemy, pressure is apostasy, and policy demands are seditious betrayals of the home team that will get virtual tomatoes and beer flung at you by mobs of hashtag-wielding rage tweeters. The result: The earth’s ecosystem is ablaze, right-wing authoritarians are on the march, oligarch landlords are preparing to turn millions out onto the street as soon as they can, the pandemic is medically bankrupting a generation — but what’s still most important to the Democratic establishment and many of its voters is being #TeamBlue."