This thread has been illuminating for me. I’m seeing now that the GOP, which sold its soul and threw out most of its moral standards, is still in the game because to hell with sub-groups. Those GOP rank and file who are wondering what happened to their party? Too bad. Mitch and the boys (and a few girls) are counting on you to hate the Dems so much, you’ll vote for Trump anyway. If not, no problem. We’ve got the electoral college on our side.
Meanwhile the Dems are arguing about how to win. Appeal to the swing voters–those odd people who seem to dither so much–or to the party faithful? How do you appeal to the party faithful when they’re split into so many subgroups with differing views?
Donald Trump is by far the worst president we’ve ever had, and that’s saying something. He’s a blight on everything the Founding Fathers believed in and Americans have fought and died for. I’ll vote for whoever opposes him. How many non-Trumpers will do the same, and how many need to be courted? How do you court one group without losing the other?
I think that’s Carville’s point. Any Dem that is nominated has your vote. So there is no need to keep going left and left and left to make you happier. They’ve got you already. They need to get those voters in PA, WI, MI, and MN who could be persuaded. And they don’t do that by being socialists.
Don’t abandon anything, just stop campaigning on shit that is turning a large portion of the population away from you. Stop spending so much time talking about free/affordable college (most people don’t go to college), forgiving student loans (most people don’t have student debt), M4A (most people already have insurance), reparations (most people aren’t directly tied to slavery) and poverty alleviation (most people aren’t impoverished, and even poorer people don’t consider themselves “poor”), and start talking about job training, affordable health insurance, retirement, protecting our kids, etc.
Once you’re elected, follow your wildest dreams. But unless you get elected, that won’t matter anyway.
Considering how filthy rotten the Republican Party has become, the GOP should be no where CLOSE to relevant anymore. They’re beyond vile. But the fact that they *are * still polling as well as they do tells me the Republicans are still better at messaging and wooing the voters they *need *to actually stay in the game. Democrats are still arguing among themselves over just how “free” college should be, and trying to convince those “swing” voters just how much that issue should matter to them.
Yeah…Clinton and Carville should be on the sidelines rooting for everyone and telling the country how awesome it is that the Dems are so inclusive and have such vibrant ideas and debates about those ideas. Everyone is welcome! Go everyone! This is how it should be done!
Instead they are freaking out and taking big whacks at their own party.
Instead they are grousing about how horrible Sanders is and the general lean to the left the party has taken.
As democrats, they are hurting the party and the cause. And they don’t seem to care.
Well, good luck with your orthodoxy. You are a true believer and that is noble and oh so good. When the dust clears, the fanatics will lose again. As always. And then they’ll grow up and wonder how they could have been so naive. Real progressives who understand how actual progress is made will be waiting for the reckoning. Patiently. Sigh.
I’m surely happy to tell you. White people. That’s why Trump won. Trump is the manifestation of white anger and fear. Trumpism is a disease and white people are the virus that unleashed it on America. Until white people are outnumbered and out-bred, soon thankfully, the disease will spread unchecked. It’s temporary and hopefully the damage can be mitigated, but that remains to be seen. Call it white-lash or backlash, it doesn’t matter. Terms like ‘centrists’ or ‘moderates’ only gloss over the fact that it’s a white people problem. Whites. There is no other rational explanation for such an irrational, unqualified and worthless human being to be installed in the White House. Only a huge majority of conspirators could accomplish this crime, and that is White Folks.
Imagine that you want to build the world’s most beautiful, miniature glass fairytale castle in your back yard.
Next to you lives a psychopathic 16 year old who spends his free time cutting on street dogs and you’re pretty sure that he’s the one who torched your bird feeder last month.
You’re definitely sure that he’s the one who smashed up the glass castle you were building, the last five times.
What’s your big problem in life?
a) How to build the most beautiful and majestic glass castle.
b) Figuring out a solution to the 16 year old psychopath, because otherwise it doesn’t matter what sorts of columns and promenades you use, it’s all just pie in the sky so long as he’s free to roam.
Obamacare is no more. So long as partisanship demands that each side destroy everything the other side built, you can hope and dream of anything great and desperately necessary that you could ever want and it won’t do a damn bit of good.
If you’re selling the American people on your magic fairytale castle, when everyone’s watching the 16 year old running around behind you, they’re all going to think that you’re a fantasist who doesn’t appreciate reality.
Carville knows more about politics than most of us, but I’d agree with his opinions there even if I’d never heard of him.
Propose that the government rebate P% of all student debt incurred between year Y1 and year Y2 and I’d support it. (No, I don’t know the optimal values of P, Y1 and Y2. I’d also put both minimum and maximum caps on the rebate.)
BUT that’s not what is proposed. The student who spent his savings on “hookers and blow” while scoffing at his debt gets his debt forgiven, while we just say “Thank you for your loss” to the student in otherwise identical circumstances who sacrificed to pay off his debt? That is hugely unfair. I’m amazed that Dopers … and Warren … don’t grasp the unfairness.
This pretty much. It means that those who scrimped and saved and worked hard to pay off loans, now feel that all of that went for naught. To add insult to injury, their taxes will now be raised to help pay off the loan-forgiveness of the hooker-and-blow students.
Either give them a reimbursement for their hard work and discipline as well, or scrap this plan - but as currently structured, it is terribly unfair.
Blank Slate: Sir, your divisiveness and partisanship will alienate Middle America, and your use of blasphemous obscenities such as this “OK Boomer” will serve only to embolden the enemies of the Republic. Harrumph, sir! Harrumph I say!
Also Blank Slate: White people are diseased.
Blank Slate, you’re a racist. You’re in no position to lecture anyone else about framing.
For all intents and purposes Trump and Clinton tied. There is no grand takeaway from that election other than that they were both terrible candidates who had more people voting against a candidate than voting for one. Both had enormous baggage.
Imagine a few votes had shifted in some key states and Hillary wins. Would that have been a sign that the GOP needs to go hard right to win and that the public is really clamoring for David Duke? Of course not. And for the very same reason, it is just as absurd to think the Dems need to go hard left to win.
You’re just going to hand Trump another win because the policies of a hard left candidate will be so out of whack with the middle of the road voters needed to win. The people wearing MAGA hats and those wearing pink pussy hats are at the extreme end of each party and are not representative of the average voter. I dare say that most posters on the SDMB are towards the extreme left.
Carville knows what he is talking about. We talk politics and argue because we study the issues and have strong opinions. The average swing voter really does not. He or she casts a vote because of the latest ad, what their friends who saw an ad say, the feeling that they get from the snippets on the news, or a meme on Facebook.
Those middle of the roaders who are making $18.50 are pissed that Bernie wants to give everyone $15/hr starting out when it took them years to get to $18.50, or when Bernie says he wants to radically redo health insurance. They are happy with their Cigna plan. Or better stated, they know what they are getting with their Cigna plan and it has worked so far. They will not read an article cited about how Bernie’s plan is better. That’s democracy. You have to capture the hearts and minds of those that you believe have below average intelligence or worse.
The Dems just don’t have a hand on the pulse of that working class attitude anymore.
Nonsense. Bernie’s signature policies such as Medicare for All, student debt relief, and Wall Street reform, all enjoy massive popular support. People want what Bernie’s selling.
Some folks saying, “We gotta start from a higher baseline, because then the psychopath won’t be able to reach it.”
Other folks saying, “No, we gotta make the base strong and build it lower to the ground, because even though that’s exactly the plan that the psycho smashed up last time, it’s sure to work this time.”
I’m not totally convinced the second group has the right of it.
I think it depends on the issue a little bit, but by and large I’d consider an issue to have “massive public support” if around 70-80% of voters are for it. Medicare For All is on the lower end of that spectrum, with 70% of all voters supporting it. Meanwhile Wall Street Reform is on the higher end with 81% of all voters supporting it.