Thank you Robyn! I agree 1000%. (Bret Stephens is Pamela Paul's ex-husband, BTW. Somehow she did not get better after divorcing him; maybe she's just better off financially. ) Gee, why doesn't Bedbug Stephens comment on the "Your Body My Choice" red hats? Doesn't he have the arrogance and self-importance to take on misogyny in this "great" land of ours? It's happening RIGHT NOW. Weak Sad POOP
I wasn't gonna post on the election until next week, there's a lot of thought and digesting that needs to go into this loss. But I already getting fucking sick of the "we just need to get better at messaging" platitude.
A large and decisive chunk of the electorate doesn't really absorb "messaging" unless it correlates with their lived experience. And it's not like Democratic messaging about income inequality has been nonexistent or inconsistent. We've been decrying it for over a generation. But we never actually DO ANYTHING about it. Not anything significant, anyway. We nibble around the edges, then we throw up our hands and give up when we discover that we don't have the power to do more, usually because of pro-billionaire defections within our own party. And we never do anything about that, because Democrats have such a short-term focus. Keeping a Manchin caucusing with us so we retain "control" of the Senate turns out to be much more important than all of our principles.
And that shit came home to bite us in the ass, with many so many winnable voters deciding that it doesn't matter, we're never gonna do anything about it, anyway. The owners just take more and more and will eventually wind up with the few goodies we can get for the working class, anyway.
That's what has to stop. If we pick some hills to die on, get knocked down and bloodied and then get up to fight some more, then maybe people will start believing that we mean what we say.
Great point! Recently heard Chuck Rocha, who helped Ruben Gallego to victory in AZ, talking about the senior advisors and controllers of the DNC not really speaking to voters where the live, how they live, really listening to them. He should know, he's a latino from south Texas. Also, the smart activists who help to win races are supported more by the PACs, and don't get a seat at the table when it comes to the DNC. (He was interviewed just after the election by Abbie Cornish on the podcast The Assignment. Check it out!) Instead of navel gazing, the DNC should poll its people and voters and activists, many of whom do NOT have a college degree but also are very smart (I refuse to equate "college degrees" with smart). STOP TRYING TO BE REPUBLICANS, DEMOCRATS! It's why I can't join you. Signed, an independent.
Bret Stephens is a fool dressed up in the NYT. The side he represents lives off of lies; he gives those lies a modicum of respectability by failing to see them for what they are, apparently, and proposing that the rest of us swallow them whole too.
The lies. The lies. The lies. And the Times of their lies
Ta, Robyn. Yes, better messaging, better PR. But getting our messages out there through the mountains of propaganda is going to take some very serious work.
The so-called Left has billionaires, too. Someone charistmatic and smart should get them to support our own propaganda channels and make them just as easy to find.
I never understood why long time media outlets, felt they should try to court RW viewere.
Instead of trying to be like fnc, be the opposite. They’re already an established format.
Be aggressive and entertaining, with actual, fact checked, journalism. Be funny. Take a cue from late night monologues, and SNL Weekend Update. Get a few of the prominent influencers from left leanng streaming sites, on Twitch or wherever, a larger platform.
They exist, they have an audience.
Relentlessly push the facts. Don’t be afraid to offer your perspective, news givers.
Make fun of, the stick up their asses legacy media types!
I think the core problem with Democrats taking credit for a good economy is that it comes across as 'mission accomplished' and aren't serious about further addressing distributional concerns.
Republicans are VERY good at making up a crisis to drive anxiety and insecurity about stuff, to gin up demand for an alternative 'brand'. They are good at creating the 'thigh gap' of American politics, if you will.
Counter-arguing with facts and logic is less effeffective at this stage, because Republicans have already beat us to the punch and engaged on that issue at an emotional level.
Ah yes--if you have to explain and seem like you're condescending while doing it, you've already lost. Yup, no argument there.
.
I believe it's too easy to be corrupted by the Rs when one is amongst them. In fact, given the rapid path to wealth in Congress on both sides of the aisle, it's too easy to be paid off to not do what's right, or at least look the other way; "pick your battles," compromise so much you get a win that doesn't do enough. AND we allowed the RW to jam the judiciary with RWNJs. We're in the shitter and we have to climb out, boys and girls. Oh, those splinters...
I wouldn’t be as angry if Trump rounded up Bret Stephens. I mean most journalists, very angry. Enraged. Even our best opinion piece writers. Riot in the streets.
I'll admit that the inaccurate and exaggerated caricature of modern liberalism crafted by Chris Rufo and uncritically parrotted by the media is probably off putting to a lot of folks. And unfortunately the very accurate fact of our moronic rape felon president elect was not.
Stephens gives the electorate waaaay too much credit for thinking through their reasons for voting as they did. All most of them heard was "no taxes on tips, overtime, and Social Security," tariffs on Chinese imports will fund our government, and deport all the immigrants. BTW, none of those things will ever happen, except for some gratuitous cruelty at the border.
The only post-mortem: Harris did fine, the party doesn’t need to change - we won three elections in a row! Trump got less votes than in 2020, but Harris got many less votes than Biden 2020. Sooooo…. we’ve got to get people out to vote, millions of people. But our side has other things to do and gets complacent sometimes. We have to mobilize millions every two years. How? I dunno.
And while we’re doing that we need to get competitive in new states. I say Kansas and South Carolina, because that’s two elections in a row where we’ve lost them by 14% and you’ve got to start somewhere. Iowa too. Ohio and Florida don’t strike me as the future. Definitely Arizona and Georgia.
My sister says she needs to work for 3-5 more years (she works at a Uni in western PA) before she can retire. A woman she works with who is easily in her early 50's told her flat out that a woman can never be President. They aren't up to the job. So she voted for Trump. This woman has been watering down her red American blood with internalized misogyny. GAH! How many millions of women are like her?
Fuck it. IF Dems can't win by comfortable margins in PA, MI, WI and NV, shooting for KS and SC is pie in the sky. A drop off of 10 million votes is a big deal. Trump did NOT expand his voter base, in fact it shrunk, as you pointed out. We should have beat him again.
Nobody outside of NYC should give a shit what gets printed in the NYTimes and we should STOP treating the word salads printed there as if they were the pronouncements of the Oracle of American Delphi. Bullshit stirred thick with pompous self indulgence has no weight with me.
MAGAts don't read, and I'm guessing every liberal who had an NYT subscription has cancelled it. They can go the fuck out of business. Fill their headquarters with tiktok influencers and dental offices.
One thing is for sure, I will have zero sympathy for any Trump voter who loses their job or can’t afford bacon after Trump’s tariffs go into effect. They were warned.
No, you fucking halfwits. JOE BIDEN fixed the economy that Trump destroyed through his pathetic response to COVID. Trump INHERITED Obama's great economy, one he spent eight years building after Bush destroyed it.
I guarantee that within a month of taking office Trump will be gloating about "his" great economy.
Thank you Robyn! I agree 1000%. (Bret Stephens is Pamela Paul's ex-husband, BTW. Somehow she did not get better after divorcing him; maybe she's just better off financially. ) Gee, why doesn't Bedbug Stephens comment on the "Your Body My Choice" red hats? Doesn't he have the arrogance and self-importance to take on misogyny in this "great" land of ours? It's happening RIGHT NOW. Weak Sad POOP
I wasn't gonna post on the election until next week, there's a lot of thought and digesting that needs to go into this loss. But I already getting fucking sick of the "we just need to get better at messaging" platitude.
A large and decisive chunk of the electorate doesn't really absorb "messaging" unless it correlates with their lived experience. And it's not like Democratic messaging about income inequality has been nonexistent or inconsistent. We've been decrying it for over a generation. But we never actually DO ANYTHING about it. Not anything significant, anyway. We nibble around the edges, then we throw up our hands and give up when we discover that we don't have the power to do more, usually because of pro-billionaire defections within our own party. And we never do anything about that, because Democrats have such a short-term focus. Keeping a Manchin caucusing with us so we retain "control" of the Senate turns out to be much more important than all of our principles.
And that shit came home to bite us in the ass, with many so many winnable voters deciding that it doesn't matter, we're never gonna do anything about it, anyway. The owners just take more and more and will eventually wind up with the few goodies we can get for the working class, anyway.
That's what has to stop. If we pick some hills to die on, get knocked down and bloodied and then get up to fight some more, then maybe people will start believing that we mean what we say.
Great point! Recently heard Chuck Rocha, who helped Ruben Gallego to victory in AZ, talking about the senior advisors and controllers of the DNC not really speaking to voters where the live, how they live, really listening to them. He should know, he's a latino from south Texas. Also, the smart activists who help to win races are supported more by the PACs, and don't get a seat at the table when it comes to the DNC. (He was interviewed just after the election by Abbie Cornish on the podcast The Assignment. Check it out!) Instead of navel gazing, the DNC should poll its people and voters and activists, many of whom do NOT have a college degree but also are very smart (I refuse to equate "college degrees" with smart). STOP TRYING TO BE REPUBLICANS, DEMOCRATS! It's why I can't join you. Signed, an independent.
Bret Stephens is a fool dressed up in the NYT. The side he represents lives off of lies; he gives those lies a modicum of respectability by failing to see them for what they are, apparently, and proposing that the rest of us swallow them whole too.
The lies. The lies. The lies. And the Times of their lies
Ta, Robyn. Yes, better messaging, better PR. But getting our messages out there through the mountains of propaganda is going to take some very serious work.
The so-called Left has billionaires, too. Someone charistmatic and smart should get them to support our own propaganda channels and make them just as easy to find.
Bret is a cretinous tool, a pompous and pious patsy for the rich and infamous. Harumph!
[ Nota bene:
harumph
interjection
An expression of disdain, disbelief, protest, refusal or dismissal.
Source: Wiktionary ]
PWOC [Provided WithOut Comment]:
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/11/opinion/trump-harris-republicans-democrats.html
I never understood why long time media outlets, felt they should try to court RW viewere.
Instead of trying to be like fnc, be the opposite. They’re already an established format.
Be aggressive and entertaining, with actual, fact checked, journalism. Be funny. Take a cue from late night monologues, and SNL Weekend Update. Get a few of the prominent influencers from left leanng streaming sites, on Twitch or wherever, a larger platform.
They exist, they have an audience.
Relentlessly push the facts. Don’t be afraid to offer your perspective, news givers.
Make fun of, the stick up their asses legacy media types!
I think the core problem with Democrats taking credit for a good economy is that it comes across as 'mission accomplished' and aren't serious about further addressing distributional concerns.
Republicans are VERY good at making up a crisis to drive anxiety and insecurity about stuff, to gin up demand for an alternative 'brand'. They are good at creating the 'thigh gap' of American politics, if you will.
Counter-arguing with facts and logic is less effeffective at this stage, because Republicans have already beat us to the punch and engaged on that issue at an emotional level.
Ah yes--if you have to explain and seem like you're condescending while doing it, you've already lost. Yup, no argument there.
.
I believe it's too easy to be corrupted by the Rs when one is amongst them. In fact, given the rapid path to wealth in Congress on both sides of the aisle, it's too easy to be paid off to not do what's right, or at least look the other way; "pick your battles," compromise so much you get a win that doesn't do enough. AND we allowed the RW to jam the judiciary with RWNJs. We're in the shitter and we have to climb out, boys and girls. Oh, those splinters...
I wouldn’t be as angry if Trump rounded up Bret Stephens. I mean most journalists, very angry. Enraged. Even our best opinion piece writers. Riot in the streets.
But Bret Stephens, ehhhh….
Throw in David Brooks, make it a two-fer.
I'll admit that the inaccurate and exaggerated caricature of modern liberalism crafted by Chris Rufo and uncritically parrotted by the media is probably off putting to a lot of folks. And unfortunately the very accurate fact of our moronic rape felon president elect was not.
Bryan Tyler Cohen did a really good piece on it. Worth listening.
Can someone remind him that in a world in which there is a David Brooks he is not needed.
In a world with David Brooks neither one is needed.
Stephens gives the electorate waaaay too much credit for thinking through their reasons for voting as they did. All most of them heard was "no taxes on tips, overtime, and Social Security," tariffs on Chinese imports will fund our government, and deport all the immigrants. BTW, none of those things will ever happen, except for some gratuitous cruelty at the border.
I bet you that if you ask a MAGA in 6 months how much a dozen eggs cost they'll have no fucking clue.
Exactly
The only post-mortem: Harris did fine, the party doesn’t need to change - we won three elections in a row! Trump got less votes than in 2020, but Harris got many less votes than Biden 2020. Sooooo…. we’ve got to get people out to vote, millions of people. But our side has other things to do and gets complacent sometimes. We have to mobilize millions every two years. How? I dunno.
And while we’re doing that we need to get competitive in new states. I say Kansas and South Carolina, because that’s two elections in a row where we’ve lost them by 14% and you’ve got to start somewhere. Iowa too. Ohio and Florida don’t strike me as the future. Definitely Arizona and Georgia.
The lesson here is Big Gretchen will Never get a shot. “It was Misogyny saved the Beast”.
Sorry women, we didn’t vote hard enough.
My sister says she needs to work for 3-5 more years (she works at a Uni in western PA) before she can retire. A woman she works with who is easily in her early 50's told her flat out that a woman can never be President. They aren't up to the job. So she voted for Trump. This woman has been watering down her red American blood with internalized misogyny. GAH! How many millions of women are like her?
Too many and add them to the Christofascists and it’s enough.
Fuck it. IF Dems can't win by comfortable margins in PA, MI, WI and NV, shooting for KS and SC is pie in the sky. A drop off of 10 million votes is a big deal. Trump did NOT expand his voter base, in fact it shrunk, as you pointed out. We should have beat him again.
Nobody outside of NYC should give a shit what gets printed in the NYTimes and we should STOP treating the word salads printed there as if they were the pronouncements of the Oracle of American Delphi. Bullshit stirred thick with pompous self indulgence has no weight with me.
MAGAts don't read, and I'm guessing every liberal who had an NYT subscription has cancelled it. They can go the fuck out of business. Fill their headquarters with tiktok influencers and dental offices.
One thing is for sure, I will have zero sympathy for any Trump voter who loses their job or can’t afford bacon after Trump’s tariffs go into effect. They were warned.
Burn this whole shitshow to the ground.
They're all over social media justifying their votes because HE'LL FIX THE ECONOMY.
No he won't, you stupid fuckers....
No, you fucking halfwits. JOE BIDEN fixed the economy that Trump destroyed through his pathetic response to COVID. Trump INHERITED Obama's great economy, one he spent eight years building after Bush destroyed it.
I guarantee that within a month of taking office Trump will be gloating about "his" great economy.