A lot of people are taking a Democratic win for granted, including a lot of Republicans, because the GOP can’t hide that they’re responsible for causing a lot of economic harm to the United States. And it’s only going to get worse over the next few months.
I think it’s along the lines of sympathetic magic, combined with a sort of inchoate understanding that if we make enough noise about Trump being doomed, that’ll affect public perception in that direction.
Yes, somehow the Democrats are being blamed for the things the Republicans are doing. Because they’re not stopping the Republicans by doing … something.
The Democrats can’t stop the Republicans until they get some control back over the government. It’s up to us, the voters, to give the Democrats that power.
That said, I agree the issue in 2026 and 2028 won’t be over who gets more votes. I have no doubts the Democrats will win every fair election.
The problem, as the OP noted, is that Republicans are trying to prevent fair elections from happening and prevent votes from being counted.
In my case in 2016, it was pure naivete. I honestly believed our society had evolved to the point where someone like him could never get elected. I’ve learned a lot about the character, or lack thereof, of our society.
Cite? That’s not been my experience of the dope at all. Generally the discussion is about whether Trump will inevitably steal the midterms and the general election or whether the Democrats still have a chance to win another fair election. No one is assuming Trump will not cheat and may not succeed in cheating
Doing well in November is a reasonable expectation for Democrats, if they can keep a lid on dirty tricks by Republicans. Events between now and then will spell the difference between taking back both houses of Congress and disappointing gains.
Winning the Presidency is going to be much harder, even if they’re facing Couch Potato. Two years is plenty of time for Dems to screw up, and picking candidates that satisfy both their old guard and the off-with-their-heads radical wing will be tough. I can see something like a Harris-Buttegieg ticket going down in flames at the polls. Or even worse, Platner-Shapiro.
I think this,
combined with this,
makes me really question whether having the Democrats sweep both chambers might not turn into a Republican “briar patch”.
From the things I’m hearing, the harm coming to the United States over the next few years will be a disaster. The price of electricity, gasoline, fertilizer, food are all going to go through the roof. I’m not an accelerationist but I can’t help but think that it might be better if the Democrats don’t get a majority in either chamber.
I’m not. And I’m not reading most others as doing so, either.
People posting ‘what would happen if’ and ‘what should we do if’ aren’t taking that ‘if’ for granted.
Under any sort of standard politics, the Democrats would have an excellent chance in the midterms, for reasons already covered in this thread. Even under standard politics, an excellent chance isn’t a guarantee; and the midterms aren’t the presidential election year. And we’re not living in a time of standard politics. I don’t think there are a whole lot of people posting on this board who don’t know all that.
The 2026 elections are already underway. Every expert says it looks good for the Dems. 2028 is too far out to really give any informed answer.
Right.
They have, over and over.
Well, compared to trump & co, the Dems are a model of keeping promises. The problem with political promises is that the nation changes over even a year, not to mention the other side fights to stop those promises. The Dems have a pretty good record over all.
Unlikely.
I think most reasonable observers expect Democratic gains in 2026. This is based on polling (although that is not as robust), special election results (which have been extremely good for Democrats), and historical trends (incumbent parties almost always lose in midterms, and lose even more when economic opinion is poor).
One can take a betting market as a possible predictor - Kalshi currently has Democrat taking the House at 83%. I actually think that’s a bit low - I would put it at 90% myself.
I want to emphasize that this has nothing to do with the Democratic platform or even individual Democratic candidates. It’s just based on three things - polling, historical trends, and special election results.
2028 is far too far away to make any reasonable prediction about. I have yet to see any evidence that Democratic primary voters have learned the right lessons from the defeats in 2016 and 2024.
I have one other data point. I like to lurk at a few select right-wing boards. And the number of voices (and not bots - posters I have seen around there for a long time) that are vehemently opposed to the Iran adventure and the tariff wars might reveal a bit of a split between the “America First” crowd that latched onto Trump and now feel betrayed by the foreign adventurism and economic damage he’s causing.
We know the GOP doesnt have anyone better than Vance right now. That can certainly change. The Dems have Harris or Newsom- as of now, and that can certainly change. Vance vs either of them is a toss-up.
Right- even 25% of Republicans are against this “war”, with 67% of Indy.
Trump is a historically unpopular president, and none of his signature actions in Term 2 are popular with a majority of voters. “Generic Democrat” performs worse than Trump on every poll. Voters will follow specific Democrats (Stein, Shapiro, Spanberger) if they distance themselves enough from the national brand. Median voters absolutely despise the sort of left-wing extremism that they associate with “the Democratic Party” as a faceless entity outside of their own state’s Democratic governor. You can yell at them about how racist and wrong they are while you keep losing, or you can figure out how to win elections.
Until the Democrats can credibly get away from being the pro-crime party, the anti-male party, the anti-white party, and the anti-business party, they are always going to be at risk of losing any election no matter how crazy the Republican is. This reputation does not come from nowhere, it’s based on decades of actual statements and policies. And adding “the party that fully embraces its Hezbollah wing” to the list isn’t going to help things any. If someone gets on the stage at the 2028 DNC and does a fucking land acknowledgement, that might be a good indication that the party has enthusiastically decided that they Don’t Get It and aren’t interested in ever doing so.
There needs to be a serious discussion about policy changes and effectively communicating them, and no more nonsense about “charisma,” which again you can just auto-replace with “the idea that we can find someone with an impressive enough hairline to swindle voters into supporting things they don’t like” because that’s what it means.
No, that’s Republican propaganda, not actual Democratic “statements and policies”. The Democrats are the pro-plutocrat, pro-cop, mildly socially progressive party. The main difference in policy between them and the Republicans is that they are actual patriots, and aren’t militantly corrupt & treacherous misogynist white nationalists.
So the issue is less policy, but the Democrats finding out a way to get past the Republican propaganda. Until that happens changing their policies won’t matter because nobody will hear about it, just the Republican propaganda.
They have never, even been the “pro-crime” party. I have no idea where that came from, other than some MAGA propaganda.
Yeah, like electing Joe Biden for president- oh, wait…
Why do so many people listen to how the Republicans describe the Democrats, rather than just listen to the Democrats themselves. Would you listen to the big bad wolf describing the three little pigs to get an accurate assessment of the three little pigs? (there is actually a children’s book on this theme)
The problem isn’t that people on an obscure message board are so deep in the bubble as to believe this, the problem is that Democratic candidates pay thousands of consultants $300K a year each to repeat it to them as they lose elections.
Your complaint appears to be that progressives prefer progressive candidates, and vote for them in primaries, and they’re winning more and more Democratic primaries. Even if this is a problem (which I don’t concede), what to you propose doing about it? Like it or not, Democratic voters get to vote for the candidates they choose.
Exactly.
If you are putting forward candidates slightly to the right of Reagan: you are making MAGA credible.
First of all, there is no evidence at all that the Democrats are “pro-crime” and even saying that is ridiculous. Next, the Dems have been winning recently, time after time, or havent you noticed?