“It should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned working class people would find that the working class has abandoned them,” Sanders said.
“First, it was the white working class, and now it is Latino and Black workers as well. While the Democratic leadership defends the status quo, the American people are angry and want change. And they’re right.”
“Will the big money interests and well-paid consultants who control the Democratic Party learn any real lessons from this disastrous campaign?” Sanders asked.
“Will they understand the pain and political alienation that tens of millions of Americans are experiencing? Do they have any ideas as to how we can take on the increasingly powerful Oligarchy which has so much economic and political power? Probably not.”
Dems 100% sold them out and assumed they’d still vote D as long as a handful of issues were different.
The worse the Republicans got, the worse Dems got. Because they could get away with it and it increased donations.
The thing is it just energizes republicans and depresses Dem turnout.
If the goal is winning elections is a terrible strategy.
If you only care about money and the election is just a grift to you tho, it’s a win/win. The result of the election doesn’t really matter.
and now the ratchet effect will kick in again:
“See? The people WANT the republicans. That’s why they keep electing republicans. Therefore, if we want to be competitive, we must become more like republicans.”
That is the only lesson they are ever capable of winning. If they win, it’s because they were like the Republicans so they should be more like the Republicans. If they lose, ti’s because they weren’t like the Republicans enough.
The Democratic base, and i say this as someone who willingly voted straight D ticket and has for a long time, keeps trying to kick the football and the Democratic Party keeps yanking it back at the last second. Every time.
There was never really that much risk of Dems losing voters to the Repubs (at least as long as Trump was the R candidate). The real damage came from Dems losing enthusiasm.
This. I just had a very long argument with someone else that completely and utterly failed to grasp this simple concept. Trump ran as the most conservative conservative ever and his base loved him for it. Harris ran as the most conservative liberal ever and her base gritted their teeth and grudgingly trudged to the polls. And then the DNC is shocked and flabbergasted that they didn’t get a better turnout.
Centrists will never understand that when you run to the right, the right doesn’t buy it and the left believes you.
The thing that has driven me crazy for so long is this is the situation in America.
There are 70M Americans that will vote Republican and nothing will ever change their minds
There are 70M Americans that will vote Democrat and nothing will ever change their minds
There are a couple million independent undecided voters that everyone goes after
Then there are 100M+ people that sit out the election and no one seems to try to understand what would make them vote. It’s so crazy that we have just decided that there are red states and blue states and that’s how it is. A party that could retain some of either party while activating half the people that sit out would be a force to reckon with.
As the Democratic Party has tried to find some way to win again they have gone after which group? The handful of independents and the 70M republicans that aren’t going to vote for them ever. And the people sitting it out probably aren’t looking for them to shift right, if so they would be republicans.
I think this is a bit naive. Both partys will have done their homework and have a fairly good idea what it is those disenfranchised voters want. The problem is is what they want is at odds with what the party’s big donors want.
Naive is the Democratic party’s current position of favoring those donors over voters.
I understand that they’ve done a cynical calculus and decided to leave those voters on the sidelines. It is a failing strategy that successfully got them billions of dollars and lost the election.
It is not that I do not understand the deeper reason, it is that I reject it as a failure.
The deeper reason is that they believe in a highly hierarachical society in which they have earned the right to be in the top strata. That’s why they chase the big donors. That’s why their calculations will always put themselves and their grip on power above: the basic needs of impoverished Americans; or the lives of innocent civilians getting bombed out of existance; or future generations that will inherit our strung out eco system; and about countless other maladies and evils that beset our tettering civilisation.
They are not leftwing, they are the corporate bulwark against leftwing ideas. They are not big tent, they promulgate a very narrow reading of reality to the benefit of their paymasters.
In this we agree.
The democrats are just the blue colored boot of the oligarchs.
You mean to say that Dick Cheney’s endorsement didn’t excite the base?
To be fair, they should’ve voted Dem, but instead sat out against their own best interest.
The electorate is incredibly fucking stupid.
The strategy made sense to anyone with half a brain. It seems I overestimated the median American, though.
You’re right. Lot of people sat out because of inflation, which was driven by corporate greed, which of course a Republican is not going to address. The electorate needs a fucking education. Prices have stopped climbing aggressively. They’re not going to go back down. Wage growth is the next step, which is another thing a Republican will not address. Americans cutting off their nose to spite their face.
Dems had 3 years and change to address insane profiteering and price gouging that started with COVID “supply chain issues” which was wrapped under the guise of inflation and record profits. Where’s that bill again?
Kamala made 1 mention of a plan to scrutinize this issue and then backed down because of some potential backlash.
There’s education and there’s gaslighting. Your point is the latter.
Remind me again when Biden had a supermajority in Congress?
Edit: That’s what I thought.
Then their job was to be sure we all knew they were not ignoring it even if there was little they could do.
Their job was to demonstrate that they knew what was happening, had a plan to address it, and their plan was being blocked by politicians who had none of that. They didn’t even try and i don’t think they ever really wanted to. Same with Obama bailing out the banks and leaving the regular people with the bill during the financial crash of 2008. (That was in no small part Bush’s fault, but he didn’t even try something different.)