Gavin Newsom knows the popular image of him is of a smooth talker with slicked-back hair, the wealthy liberal who co-owns a vineyard.
He knows, regarding the presidential ambitions he’s hardly hiding, that the biggest question he would face out of the gate is whether he could sell Americans on wanting California to represent their future rather than seeing it as the place where the wackiest liberal dreams go to run wild.
The redistricting fight that Newsom and the state legislature are launching Monday could, he and his inner circle believe, give him all the rebuttals he needs.
He’s definitely gunning for the top job, but he is hardly a progressive, sadly
Edit: at least he is a fighter, something the dems have been sorely lacking
He fights for a certain set of billionaires who happen to be less destructive than the other set of billionaires. But don’t be fooled into thinking he is going to fight for anyone less privileged.
Well to be fair, he did sign into law a $20 minimum wage and labor standards for the fast food industry. That’s not nothing.
He didn’t fight for that law though, we dragged him to do the right thing, and we sacrificed carve outs to get it signed.
The carve outs are somewhat reasonable, airport/theme parks restaurants for instance are already ridiculously overpriced partly because of the absurd concession fees they pay to exist there, adding a huge wage increase would really be difficult to manage. Restaurants like coffee shops in grocery stores or theme parks are usually store/park employees already, no? I don’t know the deep details but these carve outs seem somewhat reasoned thanks to different wages possibly already being paid…I’m sure there is room for someone to get screwed though. There always is.
So he listened
He beats me because he wants me to be better.
I’ve agreed a lot with Newsom over the years and I’ve disagreed with him just as much. At this moment, I would say he’s got the right intentions to do good here. He would not be my personal primary choice, but he would at least would be willing to press states for better standards and would help stand against corruption. In California he’s at least pushing for the state to use more electric vehicles.
If he were to eliminate or seriously curb gerrymandering, I’d be incredibly grateful.
He’s definitely not my first choice either, but I like his brutal mockery of Trump and his willingness to fight dirty. I think that’s sorely needed right now.
He’s not a progressive at all, he wants to throw my people (trans folx) under the bus as hard as republicunts do
What’s the point of folx? Folks was already non gendered.
Trans Linux (or Unix) users, duh
Yeah, that’s a hard no. Truly stupid.
I want to know the reasoning before I say it is stupid. It definitely seems that way.
Folks is perfectly fine, neutral and inclusive. Even “Latinx” can be excused due to the masculine/feminine language tribute.
Maybe, even probably. But without hearing their reasoning I don’t know what they’re trying to accomplish. Maybe it’s something else entirely that we haven’t considered.
Irrelevant. Stupid, period.
I think he’s left-of-center leaning, but postures in a way that is throwing trans people under the bus to win votes from bigots that may lean left, center, or right. Do I think he personally would push for any trans sports ban? Not really, but he is playing it up to win over the voters that for some reason are treating trans people in sports as a hardline issue they are against.
It’s one of several reasons I wouldn’t want him specifically to win the 2028 primary; since I would like to believe our country still has enough kind people that we don’t need to step on each other for us to all get ahead.
If he wants to appeal to fascists it’s gonna end the same way it has before. He’s gonna lose because why would fascists vote for the fascist-lite when a full fledged fascist is right there. All he does in the end is make it more acceptable to strip my people of rights.
Maybe something on the level or worse than the pandemic happens and he can get in on that. But he still did major harm to my people, harm that cannot be undone fully for decades if not longer.
Either way he is playing with a dangerous ideology that will get trans people killed. Maybe not state sponsored but remember what happened with Nex Benedict, when this toxic hateful ideology becomes normalized it encourages violence.
I agree that this type of rhetoric is bad for the long term health and safety of trans people. I believe the move was done to boost Newsom’s own presidential chances in red and purple areas by creating a scapegoat of trans people.
I feel bad for my friends that are trans because the culture in America, mostly outside of younger generations, has many bigoted attitudes towards trans individuals. I think hearing Bill Maher talk about his bigoted views on people transitioning shocked me at how slow/little the older generations have moved on being accepting of trans people. Maher being a left-of-center boomer too didn’t give me much confidence that there are not swaths of people with even worse takes.
Unfortunately I believe you are right that it will take decades for things to truly get better for trans people since many of these older generations seem gridlocked in their views. I feel educating younger generations is what is most important in the push back against bigotry, since people are not born bigots but become that way.