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Dem Post Mortem

 
 
 
It’s obvious that Harris lost because Joe didn’t rig the election for her. She did about the same as he did with real voters, he just secretly added a few million extra fraudulent votes for himself in 2020. Duh…
 
Harry Bosch said:
Swammerdami said:
There have been dozens of opinion pieces trying to explain the Election Day disaster. "Trump has won the culture war: Progressive forces will need a bold new vision and a wide-ranging communication strategy if they are to stand a chance in future elections" is yet another one but presents an articulate explanation for the debacle and a prescription for possible remedies.

... During the second Obama term, far-right ideologue Stephen Bannon and right-wing financiers Robert and Rebekah Mercer got together with military propaganda experts from UK-based Strategic Communication Laboratories (SCL) to ... weaponise social media and wage a culture war, polarising American society and pitting large swaths of the electorate against perceived cultural elites.

... Cambridge Analytica ... harvested millions of Facebook profiles without authorisation, and developed big data models to influence specific voters in battleground states with personalised political advertisements that exploited voters’ inner fears and anxieties about key issues, such as the economy, terrorism and immigration.

... During Trump’s 2024 re-election campaign, the momentum of the culture war helped him warp objective reality into a fantasy world where the American economy allegedly reached near catastrophic status, and migrants were to blame for virtually every ill of American society – from high housing costs to the opioid crisis, from low wages to gun violence. The Republican ticket used fake news and emotionally charged narratives that amplified frustrations about a range of issues into resentment and even hate against not only migrants, but also transgender people, progressive activists, the Democratic leadership and Harris herself.

...

The first thing that Democrats and progressive forces need to do is to recognise that, while frank and open debate is needed to chart a way forward, acrimony and fragmentation will not serve them well: the harsher the infighting, the stronger Trump and his administration will be. ... A militant approach is needed here to sensitise people about the need for respectful democratic debate informed by science and accurate information, and about the harms to human rights posed by hate speech.
...
The second front on which Democrats and progressives must come together is crafting a bold and wide-ranging vision for the future that is in radical contrast with Trumpism. This new vision should uncompromisingly endorse humanism, racial and economic justice for American citizens and migrants alike, protection of LGBTQ rights, and global solidarity.
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I think that the Dems focused too much on DEI and justice for minorities! The above recommends doubling down on this!? We need to get back to stressing economic issues (the left can win here); get back to polices that benefit all Americans regardless of their race or orientation.
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I tend to agree. The democrats have now been given an opening. They repubs are creating a government of the billionaires by the billionaires and for the billionaires. Musk is talking about gutting social security and Medicare and saying a,Eric and need to have austerity. After all we can’t tax the billionaires to pay for things. Frankly this is a godsend to liberals. We should sweep the house and senate in 2026. Then the White House in 28. Then we can maybe rebuild. In the meantime we have to slow down Trump and his minions. Massive protests and strikes.
 
SLD said:
In the meantime we have to slow down Trump and his minions. Massive protests and strikes.
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I'm not sure how effective that is going to be. Uncle Vlad is dead set on hiring Tulsi to run America's his Intelligence Agency, and the damage that can be done there will never be undone. That is only one facet of the destruction the apricot is poised to wreak. The economy, our education system, technology - ALL of it will be turned toward enhancing the Glory of The Felon.
By 2026, gaining Congress will just give the fucktard an excuse to blame democrats for his tariff inflation and the other pain he will cause through 2028, easing our transition into an election-free dictatorship like Russia's.
Americans are too stupid, spoiled and indifferent to even bother trying to understand how tariffs will be used to pick their pockets and line those of Cheato's billionaire donors, or how any of his other machinations are designed for billionaire benefits - so they/we have no excuse. I don't think pitchforks are going to turn the trick, and I am more pessimistic than I have ever been about the future of America's general population.
Knowing that division is Trump's best friend, I am beyond certain that he will be doing everything he can, right from the start, to sow discord among us, and blame whatever boogeyman "lib'rul" or democrat is handy, for all our ills.
 
robnisch said:
Almost 90 million did not vote!
This is what lost the election.
Get out the vote did not seem to work.
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Upthread someone (Angry Floof?) pointed out that some percentage of Democrats are flat out not gonna vote for a woman.
That makes me sad; it's not like there's some other Party to side with that favors women. Guess we just have to GROW THE FUCK UP.
If we ever get another chance, which I doubt.
It would be hard to imagine a worse candidate to run against than Donald J Trump the Felonious insurrectionist rapist, yet we managed to let him back into government, crowing about a "mandate".
 
Spacetime Inhabitant said:
marc said:
Pretty good post-mortem here I think

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Could you summarize his conclusion please, as the video is too long to watch?
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The shows episodes are long, and some of the comedy elements are lame, but their news reporting is actually pretty good.

So to sum up the part on the Dems, and how brilliant it was to use the same campaign advisers as Hillary, they point out how the campaign cozied up to billionaires to assure them that businesses will be fine, and palling around with Liz Cheney. Nothing shows how different you are from republicans than trying to be like them.
 
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robnisch said:
Almost 90 million did not vote!
This is what lost the election.
Get out the vote did not seem to work.
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Yup. You don’t win elections by going for the undecided voters. You win by motivating the base to show up. Harris failed to do that. She should have had a more populist economic message. She should have said we’re going after Musk and the other billionaires. We’re going to tax them to death!
 
Yeah, I don't really get why she runs this super-centrist, gun-totin', pointedly non-Woke campaign to woo the mythical center, loses handily, and the DNC concludes that the problem was that they didn't make enough concessions to the Right. Like, no, the exact opposite is the problem. Well, of course I do know why, but I think they're stupid. Their banker friends aren't going to be any happier under the turbulence of Trump than they would have been under a true progressive.
 
marc said:
Spacetime Inhabitant said:
marc said:
Pretty good post-mortem here I think

Click to expand...

Could you summarize his conclusion please, as the video is too long to watch?
Click to expand...

The shows episodes are long, and some of the comedy elements are lame, but their news reporting is actually pretty good.

So to sum up the part on the Dems, and how brilliant it was to use the same campaign advisers as Hillary, they point out how the campaign cozied up to billionaires to assure them that businesses will be fine, and palling around with Liz Cheney. Nothing shows how different you are from republicans than trying to be like them.
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RFK Jr. called the Democrats the "Party of Dick Cheney" in the week before the election. The Democrats definitely threw Braer Rabbit in the briar patch on that one by accepting endorsements from Bushy Republicans. That was a sure fire way to keep the base away and I can pretty much assure that every Republican voted for Trump even if they didn't publicly say they would. I would be surprised if Cheney and Romney didn't vote for Trump.
 
I remember when the Kochs pretend endorsed Hillary. Yeah right. That was sincere.
 
Politesse said:
Yeah, I don't really get why she runs this super-centrist, gun-totin', pointedly non-Woke campaign
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That campaign being too moderate wasn't the problem. US is still a center-right country.
The problem was that Kamala Harris was not a believable candidate for such a campaign. During her tenure in the Senate she was considered one of the most, if not the most, left-wing Senator. In 2019 she contested the outside-left lane with Bernie and Warren with stupid ideas such as banning fracking and offshore drilling. She also implied that Joe Biden was a racist because he opposed forcible bussing in the 70s. Kamala tried to pivot to a more moderate campaign in 2024, but she didn't stick the landing. That she only had a shortened campaign didn't help either.
Note also that Biden campaigned in 2020 as a moderate, but then caved to the Bernie-Squad wing of the Party over and over again. A particularly egregious example was when he admitted that he likely did not have legal authority to extend the eviction moratorium, but did so anyway because Cori Bush pushed him to do it.
With Capitol Sit-In, Cori Bush Galvanized a Progressive Revolt Over Evictions
to woo the mythical center,
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What evidence do you have that the center is "mythical"?
loses handily,
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She lost by a greater margin than e.g. Hillary or Gore, but nowhere in the neighborhood of the real Democratic disasters that were the Mc(Doesn't)Govern, Mondale and Dukakis campaigns.
and the DNC concludes that the problem was that they didn't make enough concessions to the Right.
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Why are you conflating middle/center/moderates with "the Right"? What concessions to "the Right" do you think Kamala made?
Like, no, the exact opposite is the problem.
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I disagree. A more credible candidate could have been successful with the same campaign.
On the flipside, Kamala running an unapologetically left-wing/fauxgressive campaign would have led to a worse defeat, and would likely also have increased Republican majorities in the House (where GOP majority is now thin, one silver lining of the election) and the Senate.
Well, of course I do know why, but I think they're stupid. Their banker friends aren't going to be any happier under the turbulence of Trump than they would have been under a true progressive.
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I wonder whom you would consider a "true progressive"? Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, sure. But who else? Would Tim Walz qualify? How about Kamala Harris ca. 2019?
 
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Derec said:
She lost by a greater margin than e.g. Hillary or Gore, but nowhere in the neighborhood of the real Democratic disasters that were the Mc(Doesn't)Govern, Mondale and Dukakis campaigns.
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If you're running against a sociopathic clown criminal, those are pretty depressing figures.
 
Elixir said:
Derec said:
Why are you conflating middle/center/moderates with "the Right"?
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Why are you confusing yourself with a centrist moderate? That’s what all extremists do - they declare whatever their views are, to be “the center”.
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Well, it's what every radical *hateful* extremist does. They want to seem balanced compared to the believer in pushing towards the extreme of tolerance, who will generally wear their beliefs right on their sleeves. These are not to be confused with the extreme radical "progressive"* who is themselves confused and hurts themselves and other causes and also wears their heart (and idiocy) on their sleeves.

You might imagine that the people who want the right thing for the right reason and are doing the right thing to accomplish it are heartily shot in the dick by people who fail at any one or more of those.
 
Let’s not fool ourselves. There are way far right and way far left extremists that are so extreme that they closely resemble each other. Because of this, virtually nobody is left without someone to point to who is more extreme than they are, proving that they represent the center.
Kumbaya, Derec, you fucking Nazi! We’re all right here in the center with you! 🤗

(I know you’re not a Nazi Derec, lol)
 
Jarhyn said:
Well, it's what every radical *hateful* extremist does. They want to seem balanced compared to the believer in pushing towards the extreme of tolerance, who will generally wear their beliefs right on their sleeves.
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Do you really think that is a good way to aminate people who stayed home to come vote for Democrats? To call them not just "extremists", but "hateful extremists" just for disagreeing with some fauxgressive sacred cow or another. :rolleyesa:
 
Elixir said:
Upthread someone (Angry Floof?) pointed out that some percentage of Democrats are flat out not gonna vote for a woman.
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Did she provide evidence for that? Or just speculation? And what percentage is claimed for this? Technically, 0.02% is "some percentage" ...

I do not think KH being a woman was a problem, but that she as an individual was a poor candidate who was dealt a poor hand to begin with.
 
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