They supported the “water protectors” in Standing Rock. That was a pretty regional issue.
ETA: whatever happened to those guys? Did the pipeline get built anyways?
Today’s Democratic “elite” is 1972’s middle of the road Average Joe. Today’s Averahe Joe Republican is 1972’s George Wallace voter.
Pro-union, pro-immigrant, pro-poor, pro-abortion, and pro-gun control stances, of course.
But I’d dispute that the right has any claim on pro-Christianity.
Enlightened, modern stances on civil rights, the environment, peace vs. war. I don’t think the right is more united than the left, I think the left faces other challenges: an unreliable voting base, a shrinking budget pie, and most importantly, an inability to communicate with the voters they need to win.
Not to litigate that argument again, but the parties are now ideologically seperate on the issue of science vs. religion, and both of them have displayed some hostility to the other.
Just let it be acknowledged that the Democrats are perceived to be pro-science, somewhat hostile to religion, and the Republicans pro-religion, somewhat hostile to science.
Take a look at those exit polls I posted a link to earlier. Why do you think it is that the right consistently wins people who attend church weekly and loses those who never do? Trump overwhelmingly won “White evangelical or white born-again Christians” (81%). He won 58% of “Protestant or other Christian” and 52% of “Catholic” while losing (badly) the following categories: “Jewish” “Something else” and “None”.
If the Democrats are actually pro-Christianity, they’re doing a poor job of persuading actual Christians of it. Why do you think that is?
But here’s the thing: What have the Democrats done to help unions as of late? I mean in terms of “optics” more than actual policy?
Policy without optics is nothing in today’s body politic. Yes, in spirit, the Democratic Party generally support those things, but as far as the “pro-poor” and “pro-union” aspects, what have they done which has made any news?
As far as pro-gun control, that is an issue I wish they would drop. They would attract more center-right single issue voters if they dropped gun control.
Also, I think people are underestimating just how contemptuous the Bernie and “Establishment” wings are of each other. They would rather bitch about how horrible the other is than work together to get things done.
I wish they’d drop it too. I’d love to see the right of the people to keep and bear arms become a bi-partisan issue rather than a deeply partisan one.
I think the biggest problem the Dems have are highly disliked political leaders (such as Schumer and DWS) and an optics problem, where the perception (even among the Left) is that the mainstream party is “out of touch.”
Listen to any far-left program like the TYT or Jimmy Dore or SecularTalk. They hate the mainstream Democrats almost as much as the GOP does.
The country just elected a billionaire to be president and the Democrats are elitists?
That’s a symptom of an elitist party though, being seen as out of touch.
That used to be the Republicans’ problem, but lately they’ve been seen more as troglodytes, which is pretty much the opposite of elitist.
Crazy world we live in, ain’t it?
Problem is the common man’s a troglodyte.
OMG, I kept trying to tell people that! It didn’t work though, because I don’t think Americans have ever really seen money as equalling elite status. They see “the elites” as primarily intellectuals who flaunt their superiority over common folk. But still, Trump, a New York billionaire who in the past has seemed more comfortable among the elites than the common man, seems a very poor vessel for that message.
I don’t know that we should get too caught up on that though because every election is unique and I’d be willing to bet that the Republicans who try to succeed Trump will probably be of fairly modest means as Presidential candidates go, and probably be much less wealthy than their Democratic opponents. While Democrats love the common man, they’ve also tended to be enamored with charming upper crust aristocrats like Kennedys and Roosevelts, whlie suspicious of down to Earth hicks like Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, turning to them only when desperate for a win.
Reddy Mercury, I’m curious: are you a Democrat, a Republican, or something else?
The common man, like the elite man, is both devil and angel, I think. He’ll respond to whoever appeals to either nature better. Democrats are appealing to altruism that most people just do not have and shouldn’t really even be expected to have unless they are selfless saints who have taken a vow of poverty. Worse, the common man doesn’t see the elite man willing to sacrifice anything at all to achieve social and environmental justice. Apparently, the common man is supposed to make all the sacrifices.
It is – the disagreement is just about the particulars. Very few on the left want to ban all guns. The Democrats have moved steadily to the right on guns over the past several decades, IMO, to the point that the only real disagreements are about the extent of background checks, the possibility of restrictions on things like magazine sizes, and similar details, rather than whether or not guns, or broad categories of guns, should be heavily restricted. But the NRA and a few other groups have convinced many Americans that there can be no discussion or disagreement even on these kinds of issues.
Much like the abortion issue, I think that has to do with suspicion of bad faith. Democrats have their position, but is their position their actual agenda? Going by their history, I don’t think they’ve actually changed. Just made a strategic retreat. As with most issues they lose on, they will try again when they believe the moment is opportune.
Aspects of the right-wing media (talk radio and evenings on Fox News, in addition to Breitbart and others) have successfully convinced many Americans that Democrats and liberals are inherently dishonest and/or inherently evil. This sucks, and there’s not much Democrats can do about it in the short term aside from continuing to try and advocate for good policies. This exists on the other side too, of course, but IMO (which might well be biased) it’s not nearly as influential, since there’s no caustic liberal mouthpiece with comparable influence to Limbaugh, Hannity, O’Reilly, etc.
I’m not clear on how the party advocating drastically cutting Medicaid and massively cutting taxes for the very wealthy can be construed as aligning with the common man and not with the elite.