lost the ones more easily duped by soundbites of lies.
“I love the poorly educated!” -Trump, 2/2016
It’s too bad she didn’t offer any soundbites of truth. Her entire campaign was built around being inoffensive to everyone which meant saying nothing that might evoke meaning. Lies thrive in that environment.
I’m easily the most politically engaged person I know. If I wasn’t listening (though I was) then that’s a really bad sign. We need candidates that drive engagement.
Kamala had a lot going in terms of technocratic improvements that actually would provide some value for voters, but there was nothing transformative, and there was no interesting narrative.
The most interesting thing she did was campaign with Liz Cheney, so that’s what got the attention. She wanted to convince right leaning voters that she understood them, but instead communicated that she is just another neoliberal warmonger. It doesn’t matter that she might have threaded the needle perfectly in her rhetoric because she stepped into a narrative that said otherwise.
I have spoken to two kinds of voters.
First off, was my dad. He never ever voted in his life. This was his first year of voting and he went Harris. Simply because he knew enough of what she was about and liked her character.
Meanwhile, the other party was my formerly adoptive mother. She voted Trump because “I just don’t like the other party”. That was her only reason. And that was just simply dishonest and uneducated.
So, it is possible that someone is capable of just even doing the tiniest research can give you an idea of who to vote for.
No, SHE didn’t.
Corporate News Fucked Up Again.
For some reason all the headlines about this seem to be about what the DNC or the Harris campaign should have done.
I don’t think it’s fair to just dump all the blame on corporate media. The news media landscape hasn’t meaningfully changed since Trump was first elected, but despite having 8 years to formulate a sound media strategy the DNC is still campaigning like it’s 2015.
Like, sure, the Democrats are running with a handicap in the current media landscape, but that isn’t new, and it’s the responsibility of the DNC to figure out how to overcome that disadvantage — a task that the current leadership has proven itself woefully incompetent at.
Yeah but like, it’s a bit crazy that the right has: Fox News, OAN, NewsMax (or whatever it’s called), Joe Rogan Experience (gateway drug/sanewashing), Benny Shaps network, X, Truth Social, Prager U, Tim’s Pool, right wing radio, and lots of other smaller shops and they all seem to claim corporate media is the worst and they’re all here to tell you the truth.
Don’t forget Sinclair Broadcasting. They’re the local branch of the right wing propaganda machine.
What’s crazier is when WB bought CNN and literally said Faux News was the plan for what they wanted to do, and loads of journalists resigned from CNN over the changes…
People still think any media organization owned by billionaires has a chance to be “on the left”.
If a billionaire (or group of billionaires) own a media company, it’s only to manipulate people into blaming anyone except billionaires for the current state of affairs.
Like, it’s great you’re realizing it now…
But the merger was two years ago…
None of this was done in the shadows, they came right out and said it. Publicly and repeatedly.
What you want to happen is happening. The Dems are getting their own versions of that shit.
The problem is they’re getting it for the same reason: to trick us into voting against our own interests.
The news media landscape hasn’t meaningfully changed since Trump was first elected
I think that’s the heart of the issue. Yes, DNC should have figured out away around all corporate media outlets but that’s an enormous, unbelievable ask.
Yes, the DNC should be mobile, and memeable, and . . . fuck, I dunno - on 3.14chan or whatever, but at the end of the day they still have to rely on the fucking Today Show and NBC Nightly News and the motherfucking New York Times to carry their message without shitting on it - which they absolutely will. never. do.
The right has poured hundreds of billions into this since the mid-90s. The left has no fucking clue. Despite having all the academics and content creators telling them what to do. It’s time to put a fist in the face of corporate news. Sweet talking has gotten us a fascist dictator.
I mean… bernies doing it. Dude is like 80 and is absolutely idolised by the younger generation and regular middle and lower class people because he seems to actually practice what he preaches and is genuinely interested in what’s good for people. Most politicians to me just give the impression of seeking politics to enrich themselves and clasping onto power to avoid losing that even when their senile and completely incapable of fulfilling their role.
For some reason all the headlines about this seem to be about what the DNC or the Harris campaign should have done.
Wait…
You’re surprised people are blaming the candidate that lost and her campaign team that was paid millions of dollars and spent over a billion and still couldn’t beat trump?
Why?
What is the logic where the people whose literal job was to win the election, aren’t at fault for losing the election?
And I’m scared to even ask, but:
Since you think they’re blameless, does that mean you really want us to do the same shit in four years again and hope this time screaming at people will be effective?
Cuz buddy, it’s never been effective at anything besides letting some shitty republican into the Oval
This is what happens when you sell all of the major news outlets to billionaires - they publish pro billionaire propaganda
Democrats ran another perfect losing campaign. Some people might say that losing makes a campaign definitionally imperfect, but that’s only sane people.
She lost to a carnival barker. Other than that, the campaign was perfect! Great news for the Democrats because they have the perfect formulae. (/s in case you missed it.)
There’s no way in hell either Kamala or Biden’s egos left any room for them to want to lose. They tried to win and to please their patrons at the same time and found out the hard way that it’s not always possible.
Sure they wanted to win but losing doesnt change Kamala’s or bidens lives at all. They dont have to bear the burden of the trump nonsense like average people might.
Corporate news is not the guardrails of democracy. Ultimately, the people are responsible.
Will we be nominating better voters next election, or should we try to nominate a better candidate?
Who’s “we”? Democrats? Leftists? I voted against Biden in both primaries (because this outcome from a shitlib was inevitable) but there were not a lot of good alternatives in 2024.
There will never be another fair and free presidential election in this country if Trump and his clownshow are allowed to take power.
Poor soul thinks said corporate media somehow exists completely outside of the scope of the DNC as if the DNC itself isn’t just a convention for corporate donors to show up and throw in their demands in exchange for campaign funds and lobbying money.
I mean I’m sure the headline NYT article about Clinton having a 91% chance of winning was totally some next level corporate funded psyop and not a one of the many thousands of advertisements paid for by the DNC. /s
No, it’s totally the corporate media that’s after her and has absolutely nothing to do with the candidate that dropped the entire uncommitted movement worth of constituents for $100 mil in corporate AIPAC money. /s
Once again, they are only looking at the people who DID vote… Those people always vote, and clearly the proportion of blue “always voters” is dwindling compared to red “always voters”. Yes ignorant voters lean red, but it doesn’t matter. Stop pretending like there’s a huge swath of “swing” voters. There’s not. Trump got basically the same votes this time. This election came down to the 10 million Biden voters who stayed home for Kamala. That’s it. All the rest of this is nonsense bullshit propaganda to obscure the truth. Why didn’t they come out for Kamala??
- Because she’s a woman
- The DNC failed to remind people what happened under Trump (Which is how Trump got away with “Are you better off than you were 4 years ago?”
- Less vocal on support for trans rights than Biden in his campaign and first days of presidency despite literal millions being poured into anti trans ads.
- Yes, the whole genocide thing, like talking about it or not, Michigan for example certainly lost a huge blue voting block just by the more predominantly Arab districts alone. Michigan, red. And nobody was thinking trump was the better option there, they just did not feel the need to participate
- They only mentioned how grave a threat a fascist who has openly talked about subverting democracy, and then were more than cordial when it came to a loss. The DNC didnt fail to mention, its that its not worth shit because trump is still a free man and our laws should have upheld those principles. You can remind people how presumeably bad it was, but it doesnt mean anything if youre not offering a clear better alternative while our system of laws is literally failing us.
God forbid Biden were to have run again, it would’ve still been a landslide, and he aint a woman. Maybe old as shit, but there is still a lot more common issues people grew to not like so much about Biden, then Kamala said she wouldnt be any different from.
I dump this comment because I personally believe reductive narrative will hurt our ability to effectively work together, and probably the biggest part the dems failed.
It’s not reductive to acknowledge that we have a sexism problem.
When mostly white and hispanic men voted for Biden but not Harris then it’s hard to pretend like that has to do with the economy or some other shit.
Biden and Harris have the exact same policies, white and hispanic men voted for Biden but stayed home for Harris, logically you have to accept it was about being a woman.
Can’t forget when I overheard someone say, “when was Biden is not running for president” as Trumps was announced he was president elect…
Democracy dies in ignorance
