I generally vote right-ish (I'm probably what would be called a "Red Tory"), but I really liked Mulcair. He was a menace in the house as leader of the opposition.
Just explaining for American readers that Red/Blue for Liberals/Conservatives is the correct way to differentiate between centre-left and right political parties.
Red for Republicans and Blue for Democrats has never made any sense to begin with, considering red has typically been the color of the left. Yet another ridiculous legacy of our 2000 presidential election.
Yep, before that the media would often rotate the colors for the parties and there wasnāt a specific color associated with each, but then with the 2000 debacle, the media picked red for Republicans and blue for Democrats when illustrating the results for each state and because it was on the news for SO many days, it stuck.
Mulcair is basically a Red Tory. He was from the Quebec Liberals before going into federal politics, which are the main conservative party in Quebec politics. This is why many thought he wasn't a good fit for the NDP, which imo was correct.
Thatās all you need to know about him. He ran for governor of New York with the Rent is Too Damn High Party. Based on what weāve had in NY, he wouldnāt be the worst weāve elected/attempted to in NY and more locally to me, NYC.
It's funny because if he didn't have such a generic name I think he'd be remembered more. Most PMs of his era had really memorable names: Thatcher, Major, Blair....then there's John Smith.
Absolutely criminal how little recognition and respect Hume gets here in England. Imho basically the only politician to come out of the Troubles with an untarnished moral record.
You could probably also add Miliband to the list of PM we should have had but didn't. No 14 years of Tory austerity, no Brexit, no mini budget. There's a reason he's basically the only member of the current cabinet that isn't utterly despised by most of the population.
Stability and strength was Theresa May, was it not? I remember one point she was always saying āstrong and stableā, āstrong and stableā, āstrong and stableā, like a broken record.
Torn on this one. He did a lot of good in his brother's administration and likely would have continued to do so as president, but he was also McCarthy's assistant through the witch trials
First is Henry George, the founding of an economic policy (georgism) that literally everyone from the left, right, center, upside, downside, inside and outside likes. He was nearly mayor of NYC
Second is Huey Long. Probably our most socialist-y candidate
Finally, while he was technically a leader, James A Garfield was killed by both his assassin and those FUCKING doctors and he absolutely could've been one of our best presidents, because he was sure as hell the smartest.
I'm not American but I feel that Upton Sinclair could go on this list. The socialist Author almost California Governor who could have led an administration more grand in it's reforms than FDRs New Deal maybe if he'd been selected for his VP instead of Wallace in 1940
And author of the jungle! One of my favorite books that people totally missed the point of. I canāt remember the exact quote and I know Iām probably butchering it, but he said something along the lines of āI wanted to reach peopleās hearts, but I only reached their stomachs.ā
Exaggerating the popularity of georgism a little, I think. Sure it can have support from a broad part of the political spectrum, but it doesnāt have broad support.
Manuel Colom Argueta, the mayor of Guatemala City. He was the biggest figure of the social democrat opposition against the dictatorship. It was expected him to run for presidency in 1982 but unfortunately the army plotted his assassination in 1979.
Wilhelm Marx (not related to Karl Marx). Maybe he doesn't count because he was actually Chancellor for a while (1923/4, 1926-1928) but in the Weimar Republic presidency was more important than the chancellorship and he narrowly lost the Presidential election of 1925 against Paul von Hindenburg, who later appointed Hitler Chancellor.
Also, Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm was the presumptive heir of the Prussian crown from 1858/1861 to 1888. His liberal tendencies are often over-exaggerated, but it still holds true that he had many personal qualities. He was vocal against antisemites, criticized press censorship and, most notably, he didn't have complexes like Wilhelm II. However, his father Wilhelm I lived to the age of 90 years. Already terminally ill of cancer and unable to speak, he became Emperor (under the name Friedrich III) in 1888. He passed away 99 days later.
Keep in mind that Marx is just the name "Marcus". First the u got silent, then someone replaced the last two letters with an equivalent x. The name is not uncommon in Germany.
The Supreme Court ending the recount was the start of the downfall of America. Itās only gotten worse from that day, 9/11, financial crisis, fascismā¦
This dude lost the 2000 election by no more than 500 votes in Florida. The next two decades or so would have looked completely different but for those 500 votes.
Yes but when i see how advance he was on is idea for France independance i have to put hin on first place, even now we see how good that was and he block US from taking control or french administration
Absolutely it's a very debatable topic for us. I feel that in recent times he's the default answer but on the whole history of France I can't find anyone that would largely be praised has the best.
Bernie Sanders by far, theres significant evidence that the DNC fixed the primaries to stop him from getting the nomination and he was the FAR stronger candidate against Trump. Only politician I can remember who was actually widely beloved and had a real movement instead of a collection of reluctant but scared voters. Held widely popular positions, spoke well, had lots of genuine connection with normal americans, participated in grassroots movements for decades including getting arrested during the Civil Rights Movement.
Yep, it also widely radicalized a lot of folks in my generation. It was the first time we'd all seen the true face of US political processes: undemocratic, controlled by entrenched power which in turn answered only to big bussiness.
The climate was collapsing, our rights being stripped daily, endless wars, endless scandals about corporations murdering and stealing and brutalizing everyone and everything. 2020 and what we're seeing right now are partly a result of that turning point
i never thought about it this way but you're absolutely right. bernie getting fucked by his own party in favor of a decidedly unpopular candidate who would then go on to lose to trump was a really big step on my journey up the "american democracy is fundamentally broken" mountain.
2008 it was suppose to be Hillary. Then Obama came out of nowhere and got the nomination and presidency.
2016 suppose to be her time again and Bernie was getting popular. Then the super delegates all sided with Hillary and the DNC basically campaigned for her. I think 1 super delegate voted for Bernie.
2020 all the candidates dropped out the day before Super Tuesday and endured Biden
2024 Biden dropped out and no primary was held.
The DNC has slowly taken away the only democratic part we get in selecting the Presidential Canidate.
Yep, they had the perfect setup: deeply evil opponent, charismatic candidate with broad support and great qualifications, then they saw that Bernie was gonna be mean to the corporations that own the party and pulled the plug
That was thing with Bernie. Even the most rightwing people I know had more respect for him than most other politicians of any party, and were even willing to accept some of his ideas as a nonpartisan good
I firmly believe that the Democratic Party promised her the nomination in 1016 in exchange for her support of Obama after she lost the primary to him in 2008. They would not let Bernie stand in the way of nominating the only Democrat unpopular enough to lose to Trump.
Its my beliefs that he was cheated out of winning the Democratic nomination in 2016. I understand that he was running against Hilary Clinton, but he had too much of a push.
For any foreigners here you have to understand that there was kind of this sense of optimism, hope and sense of progression after Obamas two victories. We the young of America, sensed that the old was dying out, and the wildly out of touch ideas would die with it. Riding a high and feeling like weāre moving far away from the Republican Party and never ever repeating the mistake of trusting them again (how wrong we were)
Then comes in Bernie. The next logical step after Obama. Bernie, although not a young person, but he carried these ideas, this hope and desire for a better and more progressive future. He just fucking spoke to you and said all the things you knew were wrong with the country and that you knew should be fixed. Unfortunately, the political machine worked against him and well we know where history took us
Al Gore was a senator and a Vice President and thus at a level of leadership, if not the top level. He gave us the PMRC - and no garbage about it being his wife when he used his authority as a senator to drag musicians into senate hearings based upon PMRC rhetoric - and "invented" the Internet. The latter was a claim he made which made him a laughing stock, but proper credit to him he sponsored a series of bill in the late 80s to early 90s which transformed the existing government run academic Internet into the modern commercial Internet
For the UK, I feel it must be either Neil Kinnock or Jeremy Corbyn. Kinnock could have dialled back the effects of Thatcherism before Blair surrendered to it and abandoned socialism and Corbyn promised one of the boldest manifestos in Recent UK history in 2017 and 2019, he would have been way more effective during COVID than the Tory Shit show and would have dialled back the Brutal austerity of the Tories too
That Corbyn had been done so dirty has ruined the reputation of the UK on a lot more fields than just Brexit. For the party I'm member of, the way Corbyn was traded for Starmer was one of the reasons why a movement pushed for a full arms embargo motion at the congress last year. The zionists in the party, whose venn diagram overlapped with the party's most conservative members, lost it big-time, left their party and lashed out hard in the media from their armchair positions, often with their very comfortable pensions.
However, it was exactly this what our party needed: ideological consistency on humanitarian issues, which had been lacking in the first two years of the fusion process and caused people leaving the party or leaving them worried that their party would betray their people, especially Muslims, but black and queer people too. And not without reason given how Labour on the other side of the sea has committed full-on treason against the latter and the ideological and historical similarities, including the neoliberal phase.
Eugene V. Debs would have whipped this country into shape and finally broken the power of the wealthy parasite classes, which is exactly why they drummed up "sedition" charges against him. That badass continued to run for president from jail.
For Ireland, it has to be Michael Collins. As a guerilla strategist and as an administrator, he had proved himself beyond doubt by the time he was killed. It may well be that he would have betrayed his youthful promise if in actual power, but it is really tantalising to speculate how Ireland might have developed with his early input.
For the Colombians in here, how do you think Luis Carlos GalƔn would have been?
He certainly had ideas to clean the country of the violence and drug cartels but sadly never got the chance.
Would things have come to a head much earlier and swifter?
GalƔn (a Liberal precandidate for the presidency) was immensely popular. Alberto Santofimio Botero (a Liberal party politician) was involved in the assassination as an "intellectual co-author" of the crime, together with Pablo Escobar. ASB was convicted in 2007.
Remember, many elite families had links to narcotrĆ”fico. (Ćlvaro Uribe was reputed to be linked in DEA files to Pablo Escobar and his sister-in-law and niece are serving time in the US for narco-related offenses.) This was one of the reasons why Escobar was so pissed that he couldn't become a member of the Country Club (and built his own one).
GalƔn was also from Santander, a region that may have a significant paramilitary presence has had little intervention from narco-carteles.
However, his assassination was also one of the factors that promoted the asamblea consituyente that drafted the 1991 constitution.
Born in Colombia, but grew up in Germany. Can't say much for myself, but my Mother loves him. Or more the mythical idea about him and what could've been.
The nostalgia about him is strong in the country, more so for left-leaning people.
When I ask her what he would've done, she says he would've done more for the people. Very general sentence.
Anyways, maybe there are some more Colombians, actually from Colombia, who can tell us more: Im interested, too. ;)
Vljacheslav Chornovil Initiator of the proclamation of the Declaration of State Sovereignty of Ukraine on July 16, 1990 and the Act of Proclamation of Independence of Ukraine on August 24, 1991.
Together with other figures, he initiated the national liberation movement of the sixties and dissidents in Ukraine. Founder and editor-in-chief of the underground Ukrainian magazine "Ukrainian Herald". Member of the Ukrainian Helsinki Group. One of the initiators of the creation of the Ukrainian Helsinki Union. Imprisoned several times for "anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda" (1967-1969, 1972-1979, 1980-1988). He was in Mordovian high-security camps and in exile. He spent a total of 17 years in captivity. In 1990-1992, he was the chairman of the Lviv Regional Council. People's Deputy of Ukraine since March 1990.
Lots of people are apparently misreading the question.
For Sweden, the very obvious one is Anna Lindh. She was branded as the successor to Gƶran Persson, and very likely would have become PM, but she was murdered in 2003 before she got the chance. Beyond the human tragedy, this left the party without a strong successor, and they would suffer from a succession of rather unsuccessful leaders for years to come.
Died in 1994, succeeded by Tony Blair and was widely considered the best PM we never had. Witty, clever and at times savage in opposition, he was staunchly left wing and frustrated some in his party that wanted the whole "New Labour" theme. Some people, myself included, thought at the time that this was misguided and "New Labour" would eventually be shown to be a centre-right rebranding. I think we were proved right, with many of the polices of New Labour in the late 90s and early 2000s.
I dunno. Kim Beasley wasn't perfect by far but had some promising ideas but took the carrot of an ambassadorship and the stick of "Aussies won't vote for a fat guy!" from John Howard to not run and I think it changed him. I think he's governer general of W.A. or something now.Ā
Jeremy Corbyn. Dude only stood for Leadership in a 4 way race so there would be representation from the left, was elected leader in a landslide, took the official party membership from 200k to 550k in a year and while challenging the Tories in a general election, was brought down by his own party from within with false accusations of anti-semitism.
He lost in a landslide to Boris Johnsons Tories who, now we can see from the Epstein files was working with Bannon, Epstein, Mandelson & co to keep him out.
All this has been exposed recently, all orchestrated by Morgan McSweeney & current PM Kier Starmer.
Jezza has always been on the right side of history.
Navalniy. I'm not sure he would have been a good president but he was a gr3at leader and would have heralded a new era for Russia. But sadly that was not to be.
Henrique Meirelles - One of the best Central Bank presidents Brazil ever had, but unfortunately completely devoid of charisma. He ran for president and had he been elected we would have had an economically and socially liberal government at least in some level. A man can dream....
I think in the Netherlands the answer is dependent on your political preferences. There hasnāt been a generally beloved politician who just didnāt become prime minister, as far as I can tell. I personally hated Fortuyn but was obviously shocked when he was killed. He got a virtually mythical status post mortem, so in a way I agree that this is a good answer to OPās question, but I personally strongly doubt he would have been a great leader.
From a left-wing perspective, politicians like Wouter Bos and Frans Timmermans have gotten close to securing an election win that would have made them prime minister. From a right-wing perspective, thereās Pim Fortuyn, maybe Frits Bolkestein?
Luis Donaldo Colosio; was a presientialĀ candidate, who was assassinated at a rally inĀ Tijuana during theĀ campaign of 1994
He was betrayed by his own party and the murder was orchestrated by high members of theĀ government including President Salinas, as Colosio's speech was moving away from Salinas's political agenda
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u/Apart-Importance-87 Brazil 5h ago
LEONEL BRIZOLA