To win back support, the Democratic candidate must offer a positive and coherent vision centered on care and progressive policies, rather than relying solely on anti-Trump rhetoric.
Democrats would rather lose than embrace progressives.
They go for who turns out to vote. Which is, drumroll please, the center voter.
If you want them to go left, then vote for them. Show up. No one is going to court voters that never show up.
Embracing the right hasn’t netted them anything and they keep doing it.
I vote every time. Don’t lecture me for being unhappy just because you’ve got the genocide and border policy you want. Centrists blame the left they deliberately alienate for any losses, while courting Republicans who will never vote for them. They interpret any win as a mandate to move to the right.
Left leaning here, dunno about you, but run channels with other left leaning progressives. I’m on a border between two states, I make it a point that my state when state/local stuff comes up, I get the news out, I get the word out, I try to drum up voting. Anyone in the other state, a massive collective ‘meh’. Same comes with the local votes.
“But Bernie” is the cry.
Voting isn’t just about the damn presidency. It’s a shit slog from the lowest levels all the way up and all the crowd I know in the left leaning can’t be faffed to show up for anything local so of course it’s going to be centrist on the top. The reason the right wing has so much power is they’ve made it a point since the Reagan era that anyone without an ® after their name WILL NOT run uncontested even it if it’s a superintendent to a school.
Yes, the Democrats are run by centrists because that’s who shows up to all the elections no matter how small or petty, but the lefts show up at Presidential elections and whinge about how nothing changes.
I hope I’m preaching to the choir when it comes to voting on the small elections, but unless you’re in a very different place than I am, if you did you’d pretty quickly notice you’re the rare leftist there.
It’s the center. And they do win elections when they go to the center. That’s Bill Clinton won, even Obama had to run on vague “hope”, and that’s how Biden won. Because the left never shows up to vote
Who said I’m centrist? I’m just saying that’s where they find voters and that’s where they win.
May I remind you that Dems have had all 3 of house of representatives, Senate, and presidency for only 4 of the last 24 years? They basically never win.
Democrats abandoned the centrist voter decades ago, they dont need to solicit their votes because they will get them regardless what they do. They appeal to right of center, then after they get that they will abandon right of center. So they go further right to solicit those votes. Rince and repeat year after year. This is how the party went from people like Carter to people to the right of Reagan and Thatcher
I would have just put the math in my original comment. Here’s my saved math’
Ok I’ve had this conversation and realized that people can’t do the math. So lets do it:
Let’s evaluate the last say 24 years and when the Dems had all 3 of the House of Representatives, Senate, and Presidency. Note they need all 3 to pass pretty much anything.
Obama had it for 2 out of 8 years. Biden had it for 2 out of 4 years. Let’s add it: That means Dems had control for 4 out of 24 years. Read that again, they had control for only 4 the last 24 years.
And that can still be filibustered. So if you want the filibuster proof majority, then Obama had it for 4 months. Not years, MONTHS. Biden never had it. Add it up: Dems had filibuster proof control for 4 months of the last 24 years.
Look at those stats again: Dems had control for 4 years of the last 24 years. For filibuster proof control, Dems had control for 4 MONTHS of the last 24 years.
This is why Dems keep going to the center to find votes, because they basically never have control. To get literally anything done they need to go to the center. Take your pick, either 4 years of the last 24 fucking years, or the 4 months or the last 24 years. And you wonder why they go to the center?
If you want progress you have to give Dems overwhelming and consistent victories.
They don’t go to the center to find votes, they go to the center to find corporate donors. There’s a difference.
If the left leaning voters choices are the centrist Democrats or the rightest republicans it’s not too strange for them to not vote when no one really seems to represent their values. Although I think they definitely should cause the scales are tipping in the wrong direction, but it isn’t their fault it’s the Democrats who prefer a shaky status quo to actual leftist policy. If either party wants to drum up votes and actually pretend to be democratic they should put proportional representation as a goal for their next term. That way at least the oligarchachal tyranny of the minority could be repressed. Of course neither does cause republicans will lose and Democrats don’t want to risk and actual leftist party overtaking them when Americans aren’t forced into the 2 party system.
It’s better to vote for a 3rd party or spoil your ballot rather than not voting at all. If you show that you will take the time to go to the polls, but will not vote for them, it sends a message. Not voting also sends a message but that message is that they shouldn’t care what you think because you won’t influence the election in any way.
If you want the Dems to move left, then they need to win. Because everytime they lose they go to the center to find votes. And that’s where they find them.
Dems have had all 3 of house of reps, Senate, and presidency for only 4 of the last 24 years. Or 6 years of the last 32 years. Or 6 years of the last 44 years. And you’re amazed that they go to the center to find voters? They need to. Because the left never shows up to vote as evidenced by your comment. And everytime they lose, like they’ve lost for 20 of the last 24 years, they go to the center to find votes.
You want to move the Overton window? You want things to move left? You do that by giving Dems consistent and overwhelming victories. Not a measly 4 years every 24 years.
The best evidence is Bernie in 2020. Open field. Progressives didn’t show up in enough numbers.
If Bernie wasn’t left enough then what would be?
I think the best counter would be to get money out of politics. These groups and massively wealthy individuals only have power because many politicians will do anything to get that money.
Stop letting them buy influence. Make it hard to find a loophole. And actually punish people for violating campaign finance laws.
As a leftist, it absolutely boggles my mind how utterly naive and stupid other leftists and Democrats can be. No, you don’t need more great policies - policies are not going to win you the election. We already have great policies.
Republicans don’t give a flying fuck about policy. You know what they are really good at though? Fucking voting!
As much as I know you will hate to hear this, the only thing that is going to prevent you from Republican fascism next year is to spread the word and vote against these idiots who are poised to win in 2024. Do whatever it takes to get the apathetic voters out of their goddamn chairs and vote blue in November.
I disagree. One thing I think Democrats have been missing has been a vision for the future. The closest we got was Obama’s “Hope & Change” which didn’t have any real meat to it. Having a clear set of policy goals that people can get excited about will drive voter turnout, thus beating the Republicans.
I see tons of people complaining that the Democrats don’t have any policies except “We’re not Republicans.” That on its face should be good enough, but since it’s not maybe doing something else would help. And don’t just make it for 2025, but a permanent change. Like how the Republicans worked for decades to overturn Roe v. Wade.
I think that not having or discussing policies is a feature not a bug.
It started with the GOP and the DNC pick up on it. The idea being that if you don’t talk about a policy then your opponent can’t attack you for it. Instead every election cycle politicians talk in big generalities and no real substance because it’s a safer strategy.
That is intentionally misrepresenting what he said entirely. His point was that policies don’t win elections. If they did, Republicans would basically not exist now.
Public image wins elections. Obama was only able to overcome American voters’ racial biases and win 2008 because of his public speaking abilities and building his character over the course of the years beforehand. He also actually did pretty well as a president, at least significantly better than the presidents since Reagan imo, which definitely secured him the re-election regardless of his incredible charisma, but no amount of good policies in his previous campaigns could’ve made up for charisma.
Since Biden just dropped out, it’s Kamala’s job now to secure the election by improving her public image. She’s already gotten on that to some extent by recently starting to emphasize how much she contributed to many of the key good policies throughout her Vice Presidency – it tells voters about what kinds of policies she supports, yes, but it’s mainly a way to tell voters “hey, I’ve been here this entire time, I’ve implemented all this amazing stuff despite it never breaking the news, I’m competent and fit for the job”; the image of efficiency & competence is more important than the actual policies themselves.
A “leftie” Project 2025 counterpart would just make most voters immediately think dems (and Harris) as more divisive and even petty/retaliatory. It’s stupid to think like that, yes, but voters are pretty irrational. This includes like at least 1/10 of the democrats’ voterbase (and I’d wager probably a lot more in important swing states with a high suburban&rural population like Michigan) which is basically slightly conservative middle-class centrists who would prefer progressive policies (excluding some of the socially progressive ““identity politics”” as they call it) but are easily pushed into “collaborator” territory if they feel like dems start being too “radical”, too “divisive”, too “virtue signaling”, etc. Such problems are inevitable when you brand yourself as “the party of compromise”.
As much as I know you will hate to hear this, the only thing that is going to prevent you from Republican fascism next year is to spread the word and vote against these idiots who are poised to win in 2024. Do whatever it takes to get the apathetic voters out of their goddamn chairs and vote blue in November.
And never miss any election again - especially LOCAL elections, where your vote is likely a much larger fraction, and where the impacts are more likely to be clearly felt on your daily life. I actually get reasonably progressive democrats on the ballot here, and you probably do too. Go vote for them.
I didn’t care about a progressive project 2025. I want guardrails that neuter project 2025 from being an effective project 2029.
Voters have very short memories and Cheeto Mussolini losing doesn’t mean that this repugnant bullshit won’t be enacted in the future.
We need federal court reform.
Protections for non appointed federal employees.
Protections for women’s health.
Protections for voting rights.
Protections for religions (of and from).
And probably dozens of other things to make sure project 2025 doesn’t become project 2029.
We cannot wait for the religious right to act before we respond. We have to respond now. They have shown us their hand and they think we are too weak to stop them. It is time we relegate their views and ideals to the trash heap in which they belong.
Could we also do something about not allowing propaganda to be called “news”? I realize that’s dicey with the 1st amendment, but we’ve got some smart people that should be able to figure something out.
It used to be a thing but it only applied to over the air broadcasters. This would actually still be a good thing as most local stations would fall under this and many people trust their local more than cable news. It would hinder things like this
As much as it gets under my skin that people would rot their life away watching propaganda, at the end of the day it’s their choice. Don’t take peoples freedoms to consume content
Don’t call it that.
Knowing how great democrats are at branding, they’ll 100% call it that and nobody will be able to work out which is which after everyone’s done muddying the waters.
