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On September 07 2020 04:35 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On September 07 2020 04:11 Zambrah wrote:Not only do I think progressive policies are better, more Americans than not think a lot of the core tenets of progressivism are better, a progressive platform is hugely popular, people love worker protections, universal healthcare, etc. These are only progressive fantasies because the rich shitheads who basically run the country don't want their bottom line touched. The DNC doesnt want our vote because their corporate overlords dont want Progressivism. I mean, by your own standards, Bernie put up a fierce fight in the primary, are you saying that alienating all of his voters is fine as long as they swing some moderates to Biden? How does a group of voters saying, "WE WONT VOTE FOR YOU IF YOU DONT BE MORE PROGRESSIVE" make it less likely for someone to chase those votes? This is a group of people who are saying, "WE WILL VOTE FOR YOU IF YOU DO THE THING!" the only thing that should signal is "hey if we do this then we'll get these people's votes." How is that different from any other voting bloc that basically does the same thing? The only people who aren't going to be saying things like that are people whose votes are nigh unswayable because theyre attached to a party. This is another argument that I hate, that because Progressives have to have their vote earned that their votes should be ignored, as if ignoring a group of potential voters is somehow good strategy. Its definitely not better in almost every way for Progressives if Biden wins, because then the dumb electability idiocy will go on and on and the sooner the media has to stop pushing that bullshit to justify preventing anything from changing in the US the better. I'd argue a Biden win makes the fight for Progressivism in the Democrat party much harder. Also Warren didnt drop out for Super Tuesday and that was basically when everything was decided. She was the spanner in the Progressive works, Im not saying if she dropped Bernie wins, he still probably loses, but trying to claim it was ever really Bernie vs. Biden 1v1 is just completely false. On an ending to my rambling inanities, have you heard that the wealth inequality in America is worse now than it was in France just before the French Revolution? You may despise GH but theres plenty of reason why America needs to look beyond electoralism and start considering it's founding revolutionary spirit. While GH may disavow violent uprisings I'm waiting for the day we cart out the guillotines and serve up some billionaire tartare.  Um GH has been calling for violent uprising forever, it is like his bread and butter. So you and him can have violent fantasies together. The part that frustrates me about your perspective is that you think you have to convince me on progressive policy, you don't. Me and most of the people outside of the US vote for these policies already. Just from the outside it is pretty easy to see that they are not currently wining enough votes in the USA. Warrens vote was split had she left sooner the same result her voters second choices was split. Fine if you don't want to call it a 1v1, but "all the centrists dropping out screwed over Bernie" is a false premise. The reality is he has less votes so his only chance was if multiple strong centrist cannibalized each other and he was able to sneak through. You can defeat the Billionaires without killing them by having people actually show up to vote. But instead millennial (and this is just fact) don't vote in any sort of significant numbers. They instead complain online through social media. There is more millennial voting aged people than boomers. But the reality is they don't vote, boomers might out vote them more than 2-1. Your democracy is in trouble because Americans don't value it. You want the policies you want without all the effort of getting out there and convincing people to vote. Heck so many can't even make the effort to vote themselves.
I don't have to convince you on policy at all, like I said, the policy part of progressivism is just popular, people like it, people want what progressives want to give them. You've said plenty of times that you support almost congruently what people like Bernie Sanders want to do, I don't believe I need to convince YOU on policy, I just also don't believe that we need to convince ANYONE about progressive policy because its already universally popular on it's own, and for those who its not popular with they'll never support it imo.
Where we disagree (aside from our differences with regards to the mighty guillotine) is the nature of voting in the US. You seem to believe that voters in the US are willing to swap around parties (at least enough to make the "moderates" a more valuable demographic to cater to than the progressives) and that the system is in any way okay as it is. US voting is ALL ABOUT disenfranchisement. "Just go vote!" is a very privileged notion in this country. A lot of people have jobs and they can't afford to miss work to potentially stand in line at a poll, its a travesty that we don't have a day off for voting given how sacred this country pretends it considers democracy. The parties at be aren't interested in us voting, if they were we'd have scraped through things that help people vote more consistently with less repercussion to their daily lives.
Again, policy wise I don't think we're that far apart from our relative ideals (save for a differing appetite for the rich), we just have very different ideas about the american electorate and I suppose the nature of electoralism in the US when it comes to enfranchisement.
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Northern Ireland27405 Posts
On September 07 2020 05:40 Introvert wrote:Show nested quote +On September 07 2020 05:15 Wombat_NornIron wrote:On September 07 2020 04:30 Introvert wrote:On September 07 2020 02:37 Gorsameth wrote:On September 07 2020 02:13 reborn8u2 wrote:On September 06 2020 20:03 iamthedave wrote:On September 06 2020 14:49 StalkerTL wrote:
For better or worse, the polls themselves suggest a pretty clear Biden lead that isn't really shifting unless you're taking into account pollsters that use a large amount of online methods such as using Amazon's Mechanical Turk. A lot of those same polls have extremely odd results, such as that Atlas Intel poll suggesting 48% of white Americans support Biden (that would be the largest white support for any Democratic candidate since LBJ) and 30% black support Trump (that would be a ~20 point improvement vs the 2018 midterm elections).
The polling itself, ignoring online heavy pollsters who put out polls in the immediate aftermath of the RNC and DNC, has shown a very consistent Biden lead of 6-10 points. Its a referendum on Trump's presidency and his method of governance has in him in the media every single day of the 4 years. There's just not many undecideds this election because there's no way you can avoid hearing about Trump, whether through the media or through social media.
There's a lot of garbage happening all around America to delegitimize the election, such as the Trump Administration doing their very best efforts to cripple the USPS so mail voting may come in later than sooner. So obviously Biden can lose pretty easily. But the polling wouldn't suggest this at all and obviously can't take into account things like voter suppression and the voting behaviour during the coronavirus.
I don't believe third parties are going to spoil the election for either side. Name recognition of the Greens and Libertarian candidate is close to non-existent in polling and more importantly there's few undecideds compared to 2016 where both Trump and Clinton were polling in the low 40s (and even the 30s in some states!). If there was ever a sign that Clinton was in trouble, it was the sheer number of undecideds and her inability to poll higher than something like 45%.
Compare that to the consistent low-mid 40s for Trump and Biden consistently hitting 50. Even the single Kanye presidential poll I've seen suggests he has little pull and if he does have any pull he probably pulls more Trump voters than Democratic voters (not surprising, his campaign has been extremely evangelical). Didn't 100% of the polls in 2016 show a clear Hilary lead though? I thought after 2016 we all admitted that polling doesn't work because of how the data is collected (either the sample size isn't good enough or the questions are too simplistic). Just want to share my Boss's experience with polling. A bit of background, he is in his early 50's and was a lifelong democrat until Trump. As he put's it, he was a "Blue dog" democrat. He's been following and interested in politics his whole life, he literally studies all the local/state politics as well, we've had a lot of state constitution changes on the ballot in the last few years (he can talk about those alone for hours). Even as a teenager he couldn't wait to turn 18 so he could vote. He's always been very outspoken about his views/values. He's taken hundreds of polls in his life, but no more. When he decided in 2016 he was voting for Trump, he took 2 polls just before the election (over the phone). After that experience he says "I'll never take another poll again". He says that as soon as he stated he intended to vote for Trump the person giving the poll on the phone became extremely condescending and flat out rude. The other thing that really pissed him off was how loaded the questions were. He says there was no way for him to voice his opinions because all of the questions and answers were worded in such a way that there were no responses he could make that showed his opinion. He says he's now a "shy tory" en.wikipedia.org , and if you told him 10 years ago he'd be where he is now he would have "called you an idiot". With so many calling Trump supporters racists and nazi's, who can blame him for no longer sharing his politics. He says he would never even put a Trump bumper sticker on his car or wear a maga hat, for fear of vandalism, or violence. I think there are a lot of people who are in the same mindset. There has been a lot of suppression, vandalism, and violence against Trump supporters in the last 4 years. If you have been following mainstream media, you probably don't realize how bad the problem is, they don't give it any attention. The media as well as most major online platforms have been very one sided in what and how they cover stories, and have been flat out censoring conservative voices for years now. I don't think we can have any confidence in the polls. There certainly is a group of 'independents' who are just shy/ashamed Republicans who don't want to come out for Trump but what interests me most about this is how a 'life long democrat' could look at 2016 Trump and think 'this is the guy for the job', let alone 2020 Trump. What sort of political values and beliefs that match with Democrats for decades matches up with Trump? Jus to put this in the most straightforward way possible: Have you been paying attention to how each party has changed in the last decade? Maybe not very intentional, but this post comes off as highly skeptical that there is such a thing as a "Trump Democrat" when we can see entire regions and populations that have altered their voting patterns over the years, some of them drastically in 2016. Also recall that in 2016 Trump was seen as the most moderate GOP candidate in years (and he was certainly the one closest to the Democrats many times when he spoke). Meanwhile, progressive whining aside, the Democrat party has moved left on almost every issue even from Obama. It's why even "moderate" Joe Biden doesn't sound like his 1970s, 80s, 90s, or 00s self. He moves with the partly and they have moved left. In 2020 I would be pretty skeptical. 2016 I guess, although even then he was a bit of a strange outlier and difficult for some to piece together. His whole ostensible platform was a bit of a departure in a fair few areas, his past utterances on say same-sex marriage were a bit ahead of even his Dem opponents, so I do recall some commentary on him being socially liberal in certain areas. On the other hand you got plenty of glimpses of the Trumpian playbook to playing to the gallery and scapegoating various marginalised peoples. Or picking Pence as a VP which kind of wipes out him being on the right side of that issue back in the day. Which made people rather worried about him even when he was seen as a no-hoper to actually win. It’s hard to remember exactly what the kind of consensus was back through time like that, my recollection was not that he was seen as one of the most moderate GOP candidates in a few cycles, but that he had some moderate tendencies amidst a lot of really worrying tendencies. Perhaps a moderate candidate with extremism as a methodology. Like many, you focus far too much on the political game aspect of this, e.g. "the Trumpian playbook." Not that I'm going to scrap it up, but polling back then had him perceived as more of a moderate. Trump did in fact sign a more-or-less mainline Republican tax law (which, if you want another example of how parties change, see how the Democrats are currently trying to reinstate the biggest tax break for the well off that the bill eliminated). However, he has been relatively consistent in his overall messages on trade, Social Security, foreign policy, immigration, abortion, and other issues. Trump is not a typical Republican. He has promised to not touch Social Security, has been restrained in his use of force overseas, has sold out far less often on immigration, isn't afraid to talk up his pro-life stances, has acted on trade, etc. I think the people who hoped he would tone down his rhetoric in office are disappointed, but I'm not sure how many people who actually supported his ideas are really that bummed out. (And for me at least, it's a welcome surprise). Point being, the inability to see how there could be such a thing as a "Trump Democrat" comes off as far-too-common left wing arrogance and ignorance. The question "how could people possibly support Trump" is clearly offered only as a sardonic and dismissive quip instead of a question genuinely asked. But then again, apparently it's hard for many to even understand how someone could think that burning down buildings is bad, so maybe there is even more work to do.
It’s not dismissive, there are understandable reasons for some flipping camps back in the day, or continuing to do so.
I believe this discussion was prompted re appealing to undecided voters of which the ‘Trump Democrat’ would be one.
If we’re talking trying to win those votes I mean how do you do that without completely gutting your own platform and alienating your own base? And do you even drag those ones back?
It’s a bit nitpicky but even if you’ve voted blue for donkeys, you’re not really a Trump Democrat, more a Nouveau Republican. Or a Trumpublican. He has changed that party’s direction in certain areas, so assuming these people stay on board I’d consider them new Republican converts rather than lapsed Democrats, given the directions taken by both parties.
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Centrist politics are actually bad. I feel that needs to be said because people talk about centrist Democrats as if they aren't responsible for horrific and deplorable policy like Trump is.
We shouldn't pretend as if it's just a difference of opinion without horrific consequences. The status quo is FARRRRR from bloodless or without massive violence and death. So when people suggest more 'progressive' policy can wait they are making an argument in favor of perpetuating that horrific violence and death.
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Biden is an anachronism in today's Dem party. He'll be the last of his kind to grab any sort of high office (President/VP level). The Dems and GOP have switched demographics where the Dems have become the college-educated white-collar party. It's why they are so out of touch with the majority of folks when it concerns lock-downs and economic impact of COVID. Their base can work from home, or all ready make over 100,000$ so are less effected. The GOP has become the party of white HS/Vocational (Blue collar) and <2 year college educated folks. That's why places like MN, WI, PA, MI, etc. are starting to flip.
Progressive politics are dismissive of the common person while acting like they're speaking on their behalf. Honestly, the Dems are in far worse shape than they appear. They've cloistered themselves and pinned all hopes on becoming the party of minorities and the affluent who often have conflicting ideologies. The GOP seems to have pushed the Amash/Paul folks out and have become economically more akin to the 80s and 90s Democrats.
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Also, voting in the US is easy. There's early voting, absentee voting, mail-in voting, day of voting, etc. There are more ways to vote in the US than in the vast majority of other democratic societies. It's just moving goalposts to blame not having voting day be a national holiday to blame for your losses. It's silly and so transparent.
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I mean most people CAN vote, it's just very inconvenient in the US and that's still a form of disenfranchisement. People in the US are, to quote a lil RTJ here, "overworked, underpaid, and we underprivileged." We can't expect people to feel okay going out and voting until we make it convenient to do and done not on a work day. Given there's no will from our politicians to do things that make it a lot more convenient to vote were kinda just a little fucked here.
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On September 07 2020 06:25 Zambrah wrote:
I mean most people CAN vote, it's just very inconvenient in the US and that's still a form of disenfranchisement. People in the US are, to quote a lil RTJ here, "overworked, underpaid, and we underprivileged." We can't expect people to feel okay going out and voting until we make it convenient to do and done not on a work day. Given there's no will from our politicians to do things that make it a lot more convenient to vote were kinda just a little fucked here.
If Americans are this bad off, how does the rest of the world get along? We have lower tax rates, higher median incomes, lower cost of living, etc. than almost everywhere else in the world. You've convinced yourselves of a lie and then trot that lie out to make it out like voting is some death knell to a lot of people. I'm not saying things are perfect, but comparatively, the average American is much more well-to-do than almost everywhere else in the world. People can plan one day every few years to vote. It's a lousy excuse to push a false narrative.
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On September 07 2020 06:18 Wegandi wrote:
Biden is an anachronism in today's Dem party. He'll be the last of his kind to grab any sort of high office (President/VP level). The Dems and GOP have switched demographics where the Dems have become the college-educated white-collar party. It's why they are so out of touch with the majority of folks when it concerns lock-downs and economic impact of COVID. Their base can work from home, or all ready make over 100,000$ so are less effected. The GOP has become the party of white HS/Vocational (Blue collar) and <2 year college educated folks. That's why places like MN, WI, PA, MI, etc. are starting to flip.
Progressive politics are dismissive of the common person while acting like they're speaking on their behalf. Honestly, the Dems are in far worse shape than they appear. They've cloistered themselves and pinned all hopes on becoming the party of minorities and the affluent who often have conflicting ideologies. The GOP seems to have pushed the Amash/Paul folks out and have become economically more akin to the 80s and 90s Democrats.
There is so much spin here I'm surprised that you aren't dizzy.
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On September 07 2020 06:30 Stratos_speAr wrote:Show nested quote +On September 07 2020 06:18 Wegandi wrote:
Biden is an anachronism in today's Dem party. He'll be the last of his kind to grab any sort of high office (President/VP level). The Dems and GOP have switched demographics where the Dems have become the college-educated white-collar party. It's why they are so out of touch with the majority of folks when it concerns lock-downs and economic impact of COVID. Their base can work from home, or all ready make over 100,000$ so are less effected. The GOP has become the party of white HS/Vocational (Blue collar) and <2 year college educated folks. That's why places like MN, WI, PA, MI, etc. are starting to flip.
Progressive politics are dismissive of the common person while acting like they're speaking on their behalf. Honestly, the Dems are in far worse shape than they appear. They've cloistered themselves and pinned all hopes on becoming the party of minorities and the affluent who often have conflicting ideologies. The GOP seems to have pushed the Amash/Paul folks out and have become economically more akin to the 80s and 90s Democrats. There is so much spin here I'm surprised that you aren't dizzy.
Spin? It's well known the demographics have switched. The biden blue-collar union guy is more likely to be a GOP today than a Democrat. The Computer scientist, engineer, etc. who makes 100,000$+ is much more likely to be a Democrat today. Look how the parties have switched the last couple decades. Trump is far from your typical Republican as well.
Why do you think Trump is pushing stimulus checks, trade tariffs (The GOP were traditionally the free-trade party, not anymore, that's now the Dems as their demographics have shifted to white-collar folks), etc. It's whatever. I don't vote for either party, but yeah, spin spin spin.
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On September 07 2020 05:57 Wombat_NornIron wrote:Show nested quote +On September 07 2020 05:40 Introvert wrote:On September 07 2020 05:15 Wombat_NornIron wrote:On September 07 2020 04:30 Introvert wrote:On September 07 2020 02:37 Gorsameth wrote:On September 07 2020 02:13 reborn8u2 wrote:On September 06 2020 20:03 iamthedave wrote:On September 06 2020 14:49 StalkerTL wrote:
For better or worse, the polls themselves suggest a pretty clear Biden lead that isn't really shifting unless you're taking into account pollsters that use a large amount of online methods such as using Amazon's Mechanical Turk. A lot of those same polls have extremely odd results, such as that Atlas Intel poll suggesting 48% of white Americans support Biden (that would be the largest white support for any Democratic candidate since LBJ) and 30% black support Trump (that would be a ~20 point improvement vs the 2018 midterm elections).
The polling itself, ignoring online heavy pollsters who put out polls in the immediate aftermath of the RNC and DNC, has shown a very consistent Biden lead of 6-10 points. Its a referendum on Trump's presidency and his method of governance has in him in the media every single day of the 4 years. There's just not many undecideds this election because there's no way you can avoid hearing about Trump, whether through the media or through social media.
There's a lot of garbage happening all around America to delegitimize the election, such as the Trump Administration doing their very best efforts to cripple the USPS so mail voting may come in later than sooner. So obviously Biden can lose pretty easily. But the polling wouldn't suggest this at all and obviously can't take into account things like voter suppression and the voting behaviour during the coronavirus.
I don't believe third parties are going to spoil the election for either side. Name recognition of the Greens and Libertarian candidate is close to non-existent in polling and more importantly there's few undecideds compared to 2016 where both Trump and Clinton were polling in the low 40s (and even the 30s in some states!). If there was ever a sign that Clinton was in trouble, it was the sheer number of undecideds and her inability to poll higher than something like 45%.
Compare that to the consistent low-mid 40s for Trump and Biden consistently hitting 50. Even the single Kanye presidential poll I've seen suggests he has little pull and if he does have any pull he probably pulls more Trump voters than Democratic voters (not surprising, his campaign has been extremely evangelical). Didn't 100% of the polls in 2016 show a clear Hilary lead though? I thought after 2016 we all admitted that polling doesn't work because of how the data is collected (either the sample size isn't good enough or the questions are too simplistic). Just want to share my Boss's experience with polling. A bit of background, he is in his early 50's and was a lifelong democrat until Trump. As he put's it, he was a "Blue dog" democrat. He's been following and interested in politics his whole life, he literally studies all the local/state politics as well, we've had a lot of state constitution changes on the ballot in the last few years (he can talk about those alone for hours). Even as a teenager he couldn't wait to turn 18 so he could vote. He's always been very outspoken about his views/values. He's taken hundreds of polls in his life, but no more. When he decided in 2016 he was voting for Trump, he took 2 polls just before the election (over the phone). After that experience he says "I'll never take another poll again". He says that as soon as he stated he intended to vote for Trump the person giving the poll on the phone became extremely condescending and flat out rude. The other thing that really pissed him off was how loaded the questions were. He says there was no way for him to voice his opinions because all of the questions and answers were worded in such a way that there were no responses he could make that showed his opinion. He says he's now a "shy tory" en.wikipedia.org , and if you told him 10 years ago he'd be where he is now he would have "called you an idiot". With so many calling Trump supporters racists and nazi's, who can blame him for no longer sharing his politics. He says he would never even put a Trump bumper sticker on his car or wear a maga hat, for fear of vandalism, or violence. I think there are a lot of people who are in the same mindset. There has been a lot of suppression, vandalism, and violence against Trump supporters in the last 4 years. If you have been following mainstream media, you probably don't realize how bad the problem is, they don't give it any attention. The media as well as most major online platforms have been very one sided in what and how they cover stories, and have been flat out censoring conservative voices for years now. I don't think we can have any confidence in the polls. There certainly is a group of 'independents' who are just shy/ashamed Republicans who don't want to come out for Trump but what interests me most about this is how a 'life long democrat' could look at 2016 Trump and think 'this is the guy for the job', let alone 2020 Trump. What sort of political values and beliefs that match with Democrats for decades matches up with Trump? Jus to put this in the most straightforward way possible: Have you been paying attention to how each party has changed in the last decade? Maybe not very intentional, but this post comes off as highly skeptical that there is such a thing as a "Trump Democrat" when we can see entire regions and populations that have altered their voting patterns over the years, some of them drastically in 2016. Also recall that in 2016 Trump was seen as the most moderate GOP candidate in years (and he was certainly the one closest to the Democrats many times when he spoke). Meanwhile, progressive whining aside, the Democrat party has moved left on almost every issue even from Obama. It's why even "moderate" Joe Biden doesn't sound like his 1970s, 80s, 90s, or 00s self. He moves with the partly and they have moved left. In 2020 I would be pretty skeptical. 2016 I guess, although even then he was a bit of a strange outlier and difficult for some to piece together. His whole ostensible platform was a bit of a departure in a fair few areas, his past utterances on say same-sex marriage were a bit ahead of even his Dem opponents, so I do recall some commentary on him being socially liberal in certain areas. On the other hand you got plenty of glimpses of the Trumpian playbook to playing to the gallery and scapegoating various marginalised peoples. Or picking Pence as a VP which kind of wipes out him being on the right side of that issue back in the day. Which made people rather worried about him even when he was seen as a no-hoper to actually win. It’s hard to remember exactly what the kind of consensus was back through time like that, my recollection was not that he was seen as one of the most moderate GOP candidates in a few cycles, but that he had some moderate tendencies amidst a lot of really worrying tendencies. Perhaps a moderate candidate with extremism as a methodology. Like many, you focus far too much on the political game aspect of this, e.g. "the Trumpian playbook." Not that I'm going to scrap it up, but polling back then had him perceived as more of a moderate. Trump did in fact sign a more-or-less mainline Republican tax law (which, if you want another example of how parties change, see how the Democrats are currently trying to reinstate the biggest tax break for the well off that the bill eliminated). However, he has been relatively consistent in his overall messages on trade, Social Security, foreign policy, immigration, abortion, and other issues. Trump is not a typical Republican. He has promised to not touch Social Security, has been restrained in his use of force overseas, has sold out far less often on immigration, isn't afraid to talk up his pro-life stances, has acted on trade, etc. I think the people who hoped he would tone down his rhetoric in office are disappointed, but I'm not sure how many people who actually supported his ideas are really that bummed out. (And for me at least, it's a welcome surprise). Point being, the inability to see how there could be such a thing as a "Trump Democrat" comes off as far-too-common left wing arrogance and ignorance. The question "how could people possibly support Trump" is clearly offered only as a sardonic and dismissive quip instead of a question genuinely asked. But then again, apparently it's hard for many to even understand how someone could think that burning down buildings is bad, so maybe there is even more work to do. It’s not dismissive, there are understandable reasons for some flipping camps back in the day, or continuing to do so. I believe this discussion was prompted re appealing to undecided voters of which the ‘Trump Democrat’ would be one. If we’re talking trying to win those votes I mean how do you do that without completely gutting your own platform and alienating your own base? And do you even drag those ones back? It’s a bit nitpicky but even if you’ve voted blue for donkeys, you’re not really a Trump Democrat, more a Nouveau Republican. Or a Trumpublican. He has changed that party’s direction in certain areas, so assuming these people stay on board I’d consider them new Republican converts rather than lapsed Democrats, given the directions taken by both parties.
He has changed that party’s direction in certain areas
Trump has not changed the partys direction all that much. He mostly changed the party,s rethoric to a new rethoric that managed to apeal to many blue colar working democrats. American elections are not won by the platform the partys has. The platform is imporant mostly for the rich donors and informed voters but those are a minority.
American elections are won (and lost) with rethoric and the general image of the candidate. (kenedy, reagan,clinton,obama,they all won the elections pretty much by beeing the charismatic person they are,and hillary pretty much lost because of the person she was)
Trump can have the image of beeing an a hole,but the truth is that beeing an a hole is less of a problem for the public then it was say 40 years ago.
"If we’re talking trying to win those votes I mean how do you do that without completely gutting your own platform and alienating your own base?"
You dont have to completely gut your platform,thats the beauty of it lol. You only have to strike the right tone and have the right rethoric. Then once you won the election you can start worrying about implementing your platform.
Trump has been brilliant with this (and the democrats outside sanders not so much,upon which more in my previous post),he lowerd taxes (mostly for the rich) but he had the right rethoric along the way (mostly aimed against china) which made it so many blue colar workers still saw him as the guy working for their interests.
Sanders was populistic with a lot of rethoric that did apeal to blue colar voters as well,of all democrats he can best be compared with trump in that aspect (though sanders had a different angle). This populism i think (unfortunatly i might add as personally i hate it) is for now the way to go for political succes in the usa.
It wont last forever and at one point it will backfire and there will be a counter force,but for now it still seems the way to go if you want to get a lot of votes.
It kinda also depends on how you want to play the game. Many democrats (and also republicans btw like romney) specially the establishment,they are decent people and they dont want to have to do anyting with trying to play the public with populism and cheap tricks. For that i aplaud and apreciate them but at the same time i realise they are increasingly a minority and they are facing an opponent which has zero limits when it comes to this. That in the end gives them a disadvantage.
You can win by staying true to yourself and in the very long run i think that is the most promising way to go,but for short term succes in 1 single election (which it in the end often comes down to) it often falls short these days where the trend is towards more populism and less realism.
Anyway,i do hope the democrats can win with their current aproach and its not impossible,it could be a turning point where society and politics in general start to turn away from populism again and instead go towards more realism and honesty. But maybe populism hasnt reached its peak yet (personally i dont think it has yet but i hope i am wrong) and everything has to become more crazy and polarized first before we can return to a more moderate (and hopefully in all aspects a more equall) society.
The usa elections do have an enormous impact on european politics as well btw. Today in the usa,tomorrow in europe. Which is why the usa elections are also enormously important for the future of european politics. Not so much the speficic policys and party who wins,but the dynamic as a whole and what sort of candidate will win.
If trump manages to win that would be a huge boost for somewhat similar candidates and partys in europe. If biden wins that would be a huge boost for the more moderate and traditional parties in europe.
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On September 07 2020 06:27 Wegandi wrote:Show nested quote +On September 07 2020 06:25 Zambrah wrote:
I mean most people CAN vote, it's just very inconvenient in the US and that's still a form of disenfranchisement. People in the US are, to quote a lil RTJ here, "overworked, underpaid, and we underprivileged." We can't expect people to feel okay going out and voting until we make it convenient to do and done not on a work day. Given there's no will from our politicians to do things that make it a lot more convenient to vote were kinda just a little fucked here. If Americans are this bad off, how does the rest of the world get along? We have lower tax rates, higher median incomes, lower cost of living, etc. than almost everywhere else in the world. You've convinced yourselves of a lie and then trot that lie out to make it out like voting is some death knell to a lot of people. I'm not saying things are perfect, but comparatively, the average American is much more well-to-do than almost everywhere else in the world. People can plan one day every few years to vote. It's a lousy excuse to push a false narrative.
Americans also have the longest working hours of anywhere besides Japan and the shittiest and most expensive health care of any first world nation.
It's very easy to vote as an american if you are in the top 40-50% of the country.
It's very hard for a poor person working two 29 hour a week jobs that fire you if you ever miss a day (and will call you in unexpectedly at any time) to vote early or vote on voting day. There are also the states (like KY currently and FL in the past) that have gone the long way around Jim Crow laws. Prevent felons from voting and then disproportionately target black people for minor crimes (like pot possession) and suddenly 25% of black people in the state can't vote, but it's totally legal.
Most of these poor workers, coincidentally, vote democrat. The complaint most people have isn't "it's hard for ME to vote", it's "the barriers to voting are precisely targeted for the benefit of one side". Some states are much worse than others, with NC's being called targeted with razor precision against black people.
If every voter on both sides turned out to vote, the GOP would be reduced to nothing more than a handful of local positions. Dems have something like a 10-12% registration edge and there have never been any indications that independents in name only favor one party by more than 1-2% .
Likely voter models in polls have always benefitted republicans in the past because it was easier for middle class to rich white people to go vote than it was for poor POC. If they really care they'll turn out, and that's why we've seen likely voter models not matter as much in 2018.
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On September 07 2020 06:45 Nevuk wrote:Show nested quote +On September 07 2020 06:27 Wegandi wrote:On September 07 2020 06:25 Zambrah wrote:
I mean most people CAN vote, it's just very inconvenient in the US and that's still a form of disenfranchisement. People in the US are, to quote a lil RTJ here, "overworked, underpaid, and we underprivileged." We can't expect people to feel okay going out and voting until we make it convenient to do and done not on a work day. Given there's no will from our politicians to do things that make it a lot more convenient to vote were kinda just a little fucked here. If Americans are this bad off, how does the rest of the world get along? We have lower tax rates, higher median incomes, lower cost of living, etc. than almost everywhere else in the world. You've convinced yourselves of a lie and then trot that lie out to make it out like voting is some death knell to a lot of people. I'm not saying things are perfect, but comparatively, the average American is much more well-to-do than almost everywhere else in the world. People can plan one day every few years to vote. It's a lousy excuse to push a false narrative. Americans also have the longest working hours of anywhere besides Japan and the shittiest and most expensive health care of any first world nation. It's very easy to vote as an american if you are in the top 40-50% of the country. It's very hard for a poor person working two 29 hour a week jobs that fire you if you ever miss a day (and will call you in unexpectedly at any time) to vote early or vote on voting day. There are also the states (like KY currently and FL in the past) that have gone the long way around Jim Crow laws. Prevent felons from voting and then disproportionately target black people for minor crimes (like pot possession) and suddenly 25% of black people in the state can't vote, but it's totally legal. Most of these poor workers, coincidentally, vote democrat. The complaint most people have isn't "it's hard for ME to vote", it's "the barriers to voting are precisely targeted for the benefit of one side". Some states are much worse than others, with NC's being called targeted with razor precision against black people. If every voter on both sides turned out to vote, the GOP would be reduced to nothing more than a handful of local positions. Dems have something like a 10-12% registration edge and there have never been any indications that independents in name only favor one party by more than 1-2% . Likely voter models in polls have always benefitted republicans in the past because it was easier for middle class to rich white people to go vote than it was for poor POC. If they really care they'll turn out, and that's why we've seen likely voter models not matter as much in 2018.
You realize only about 5% of the work force works 2 jobs? The people in that situation are not 50% of the country like you implied. Similarly, most polls open early and close late meaning sure, it's inconvenient but you can go before or after work to vote if that was your only option (it's not, but let's act like it is). Then there are the people whooping on for a revolution while lamenting that people are too inconvenienced to vote. Like if people can't find a way to vote one day every few years how the hell are you going to get these people to join your "revolution"? Seriously, people got to think things through.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/01/opinion/working-two-jobs.html
Similarly, the Democrat demographics have become the affluent white-collar folks for the most part. So, I would argue that if you're going to say it's easier for those folks to vote then the Democrat base has the easier time voting.
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/mar/22/democrats-more-educated-republicans-pew-research-c/
According to Pew, 54 percent of college graduates either identified as Democrats or leaned Democratic, compared to 39 percent who identified or leaned Republican. One-third of Americans have a college degree.
Just 25 years ago, those numbers were perfectly reversed in the Pew survey, with the GOP holding a 54-39 advantage among people with college degrees.
The discrepancy becomes even greater when Pew distilled the sample down to people who have post-graduate education — at least some work toward a master’s, doctorate, law or similar degree. In that group, Democrats had a 2-to-1 edge, by 63 percent to 31 percent. In 1994, the two parties were almost evenly divided, with the Democratic lead just 47-45.
“While some of this shift took place a decade ago, postgraduate voters’ affiliation with and leaning to the Democratic Party have grown substantially just over the past few years, from 55% in 2015 to 63% in 2017,” Pew wrote.
So, please, continue...
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On September 06 2020 17:40 Zambrah wrote:Show nested quote +On September 06 2020 13:19 JimmiC wrote:
Pretty sure the Dems know that the left of Bernie vote is not coming their way and makes up a super tiny amount of the voting public. Communism is so unpopular in the USA it is the first attack the Reps use. If you want Trump out you are glad the Biden is sticking to the middle since that is what won him, by a lot, the Dem nomination. Doesn't the Dem nomination involve a shit ton of states that will literally never go Blue no matter what though? The Dem nomination doesnt seem to me like it speaks to picking the ideal candidate for the general election, after all, who gives a flying fuck what people in Alabama think about the Democrat's candidate when their state will NEVER flip red to blue? Thinking his chances in the general are stronger since he won the nomination is the kind of argument that let Biden's centrism look so appealing and its obvious by the amount of doubt about him floating around that the argument doesn't seem to be some golden ticket against Trump. If Democrats are having to worry so much about the margins and seem to be unable to afford alienating their progressive constituents maybe having Biden swing to the right so damn much because it won him the nomination isn't ACTUALLY a good thing for a general election when Democrats want an energized voting base thats excited to get out and vote for them.
Following this reasoning, California is about as irrelevant as Alabama. Except that instead of voting red, they'll vote blue, regardless. So just primary in swing states? Because those are the only ones that matter? Or should democracy try to give everybody a chance to vote?
Oh, and yeah, fptp and the electoral college are horrendous.
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On September 07 2020 05:57 Wombat_NornIron wrote:Show nested quote +On September 07 2020 05:40 Introvert wrote:On September 07 2020 05:15 Wombat_NornIron wrote:On September 07 2020 04:30 Introvert wrote:On September 07 2020 02:37 Gorsameth wrote:On September 07 2020 02:13 reborn8u2 wrote:On September 06 2020 20:03 iamthedave wrote:On September 06 2020 14:49 StalkerTL wrote:
For better or worse, the polls themselves suggest a pretty clear Biden lead that isn't really shifting unless you're taking into account pollsters that use a large amount of online methods such as using Amazon's Mechanical Turk. A lot of those same polls have extremely odd results, such as that Atlas Intel poll suggesting 48% of white Americans support Biden (that would be the largest white support for any Democratic candidate since LBJ) and 30% black support Trump (that would be a ~20 point improvement vs the 2018 midterm elections).
The polling itself, ignoring online heavy pollsters who put out polls in the immediate aftermath of the RNC and DNC, has shown a very consistent Biden lead of 6-10 points. Its a referendum on Trump's presidency and his method of governance has in him in the media every single day of the 4 years. There's just not many undecideds this election because there's no way you can avoid hearing about Trump, whether through the media or through social media.
There's a lot of garbage happening all around America to delegitimize the election, such as the Trump Administration doing their very best efforts to cripple the USPS so mail voting may come in later than sooner. So obviously Biden can lose pretty easily. But the polling wouldn't suggest this at all and obviously can't take into account things like voter suppression and the voting behaviour during the coronavirus.
I don't believe third parties are going to spoil the election for either side. Name recognition of the Greens and Libertarian candidate is close to non-existent in polling and more importantly there's few undecideds compared to 2016 where both Trump and Clinton were polling in the low 40s (and even the 30s in some states!). If there was ever a sign that Clinton was in trouble, it was the sheer number of undecideds and her inability to poll higher than something like 45%.
Compare that to the consistent low-mid 40s for Trump and Biden consistently hitting 50. Even the single Kanye presidential poll I've seen suggests he has little pull and if he does have any pull he probably pulls more Trump voters than Democratic voters (not surprising, his campaign has been extremely evangelical). Didn't 100% of the polls in 2016 show a clear Hilary lead though? I thought after 2016 we all admitted that polling doesn't work because of how the data is collected (either the sample size isn't good enough or the questions are too simplistic). Just want to share my Boss's experience with polling. A bit of background, he is in his early 50's and was a lifelong democrat until Trump. As he put's it, he was a "Blue dog" democrat. He's been following and interested in politics his whole life, he literally studies all the local/state politics as well, we've had a lot of state constitution changes on the ballot in the last few years (he can talk about those alone for hours). Even as a teenager he couldn't wait to turn 18 so he could vote. He's always been very outspoken about his views/values. He's taken hundreds of polls in his life, but no more. When he decided in 2016 he was voting for Trump, he took 2 polls just before the election (over the phone). After that experience he says "I'll never take another poll again". He says that as soon as he stated he intended to vote for Trump the person giving the poll on the phone became extremely condescending and flat out rude. The other thing that really pissed him off was how loaded the questions were. He says there was no way for him to voice his opinions because all of the questions and answers were worded in such a way that there were no responses he could make that showed his opinion. He says he's now a "shy tory" en.wikipedia.org , and if you told him 10 years ago he'd be where he is now he would have "called you an idiot". With so many calling Trump supporters racists and nazi's, who can blame him for no longer sharing his politics. He says he would never even put a Trump bumper sticker on his car or wear a maga hat, for fear of vandalism, or violence. I think there are a lot of people who are in the same mindset. There has been a lot of suppression, vandalism, and violence against Trump supporters in the last 4 years. If you have been following mainstream media, you probably don't realize how bad the problem is, they don't give it any attention. The media as well as most major online platforms have been very one sided in what and how they cover stories, and have been flat out censoring conservative voices for years now. I don't think we can have any confidence in the polls. There certainly is a group of 'independents' who are just shy/ashamed Republicans who don't want to come out for Trump but what interests me most about this is how a 'life long democrat' could look at 2016 Trump and think 'this is the guy for the job', let alone 2020 Trump. What sort of political values and beliefs that match with Democrats for decades matches up with Trump? Jus to put this in the most straightforward way possible: Have you been paying attention to how each party has changed in the last decade? Maybe not very intentional, but this post comes off as highly skeptical that there is such a thing as a "Trump Democrat" when we can see entire regions and populations that have altered their voting patterns over the years, some of them drastically in 2016. Also recall that in 2016 Trump was seen as the most moderate GOP candidate in years (and he was certainly the one closest to the Democrats many times when he spoke). Meanwhile, progressive whining aside, the Democrat party has moved left on almost every issue even from Obama. It's why even "moderate" Joe Biden doesn't sound like his 1970s, 80s, 90s, or 00s self. He moves with the partly and they have moved left. In 2020 I would be pretty skeptical. 2016 I guess, although even then he was a bit of a strange outlier and difficult for some to piece together. His whole ostensible platform was a bit of a departure in a fair few areas, his past utterances on say same-sex marriage were a bit ahead of even his Dem opponents, so I do recall some commentary on him being socially liberal in certain areas. On the other hand you got plenty of glimpses of the Trumpian playbook to playing to the gallery and scapegoating various marginalised peoples. Or picking Pence as a VP which kind of wipes out him being on the right side of that issue back in the day. Which made people rather worried about him even when he was seen as a no-hoper to actually win. It’s hard to remember exactly what the kind of consensus was back through time like that, my recollection was not that he was seen as one of the most moderate GOP candidates in a few cycles, but that he had some moderate tendencies amidst a lot of really worrying tendencies. Perhaps a moderate candidate with extremism as a methodology. Like many, you focus far too much on the political game aspect of this, e.g. "the Trumpian playbook." Not that I'm going to scrap it up, but polling back then had him perceived as more of a moderate. Trump did in fact sign a more-or-less mainline Republican tax law (which, if you want another example of how parties change, see how the Democrats are currently trying to reinstate the biggest tax break for the well off that the bill eliminated). However, he has been relatively consistent in his overall messages on trade, Social Security, foreign policy, immigration, abortion, and other issues. Trump is not a typical Republican. He has promised to not touch Social Security, has been restrained in his use of force overseas, has sold out far less often on immigration, isn't afraid to talk up his pro-life stances, has acted on trade, etc. I think the people who hoped he would tone down his rhetoric in office are disappointed, but I'm not sure how many people who actually supported his ideas are really that bummed out. (And for me at least, it's a welcome surprise). Point being, the inability to see how there could be such a thing as a "Trump Democrat" comes off as far-too-common left wing arrogance and ignorance. The question "how could people possibly support Trump" is clearly offered only as a sardonic and dismissive quip instead of a question genuinely asked. But then again, apparently it's hard for many to even understand how someone could think that burning down buildings is bad, so maybe there is even more work to do. It’s not dismissive, there are understandable reasons for some flipping camps back in the day, or continuing to do so. I believe this discussion was prompted re appealing to undecided voters of which the ‘Trump Democrat’ would be one. If we’re talking trying to win those votes I mean how do you do that without completely gutting your own platform and alienating your own base? And do you even drag those ones back? It’s a bit nitpicky but even if you’ve voted blue for donkeys, you’re not really a Trump Democrat, more a Nouveau Republican. Or a Trumpublican. He has changed that party’s direction in certain areas, so assuming these people stay on board I’d consider them new Republican converts rather than lapsed Democrats, given the directions taken by both parties.
I mean, those two things aren't mutually exclusive. Platforms change based on issues. When the Republican party was born it was also the party of tariffs, and remained that way for a long time. Maybe at the time they made sense! Then it wasn't. Now, it's having an internal fight about it.
I don't really think this is about undecided voters, this is about figuring out why people who formerly voted for your party would "vote against their own interests." Of course that phrase is exactly the type of arrogance I describe, and the fact it gets so much use is demonstrative. Even now, you grant "there are understandable reasons for some flipping camps back in the day, or continuing to do so." Can you describe any without tying in, say, racism? Xenophobia? "I got mine"? I think you might actually be able to. But many can't.
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United States24799 Posts
On September 07 2020 07:48 pmh wrote:
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That's a great point.
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Trump is only competative in Minnesota beacuse the former farm-labor votes that have elected the only legitimate socialist politicians in the nations history have been ignored for a few decades by a party that refuses to get over its fear of nixon coming back.
Empowering actual socialism like coops and unions would be hugly popular in the midwest and would ensure the electoral dream that Obama promised. Its legitimately union workers and farmers that are voting trump and the coasts are just calling them hillibillies with no "cultural exchange".
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Northern Ireland27405 Posts
On September 07 2020 07:24 Introvert wrote:Show nested quote +On September 07 2020 05:57 Wombat_NornIron wrote:On September 07 2020 05:40 Introvert wrote:On September 07 2020 05:15 Wombat_NornIron wrote:On September 07 2020 04:30 Introvert wrote:On September 07 2020 02:37 Gorsameth wrote:On September 07 2020 02:13 reborn8u2 wrote:On September 06 2020 20:03 iamthedave wrote:On September 06 2020 14:49 StalkerTL wrote:
For better or worse, the polls themselves suggest a pretty clear Biden lead that isn't really shifting unless you're taking into account pollsters that use a large amount of online methods such as using Amazon's Mechanical Turk. A lot of those same polls have extremely odd results, such as that Atlas Intel poll suggesting 48% of white Americans support Biden (that would be the largest white support for any Democratic candidate since LBJ) and 30% black support Trump (that would be a ~20 point improvement vs the 2018 midterm elections).
The polling itself, ignoring online heavy pollsters who put out polls in the immediate aftermath of the RNC and DNC, has shown a very consistent Biden lead of 6-10 points. Its a referendum on Trump's presidency and his method of governance has in him in the media every single day of the 4 years. There's just not many undecideds this election because there's no way you can avoid hearing about Trump, whether through the media or through social media.
There's a lot of garbage happening all around America to delegitimize the election, such as the Trump Administration doing their very best efforts to cripple the USPS so mail voting may come in later than sooner. So obviously Biden can lose pretty easily. But the polling wouldn't suggest this at all and obviously can't take into account things like voter suppression and the voting behaviour during the coronavirus.
I don't believe third parties are going to spoil the election for either side. Name recognition of the Greens and Libertarian candidate is close to non-existent in polling and more importantly there's few undecideds compared to 2016 where both Trump and Clinton were polling in the low 40s (and even the 30s in some states!). If there was ever a sign that Clinton was in trouble, it was the sheer number of undecideds and her inability to poll higher than something like 45%.
Compare that to the consistent low-mid 40s for Trump and Biden consistently hitting 50. Even the single Kanye presidential poll I've seen suggests he has little pull and if he does have any pull he probably pulls more Trump voters than Democratic voters (not surprising, his campaign has been extremely evangelical). Didn't 100% of the polls in 2016 show a clear Hilary lead though? I thought after 2016 we all admitted that polling doesn't work because of how the data is collected (either the sample size isn't good enough or the questions are too simplistic). Just want to share my Boss's experience with polling. A bit of background, he is in his early 50's and was a lifelong democrat until Trump. As he put's it, he was a "Blue dog" democrat. He's been following and interested in politics his whole life, he literally studies all the local/state politics as well, we've had a lot of state constitution changes on the ballot in the last few years (he can talk about those alone for hours). Even as a teenager he couldn't wait to turn 18 so he could vote. He's always been very outspoken about his views/values. He's taken hundreds of polls in his life, but no more. When he decided in 2016 he was voting for Trump, he took 2 polls just before the election (over the phone). After that experience he says "I'll never take another poll again". He says that as soon as he stated he intended to vote for Trump the person giving the poll on the phone became extremely condescending and flat out rude. The other thing that really pissed him off was how loaded the questions were. He says there was no way for him to voice his opinions because all of the questions and answers were worded in such a way that there were no responses he could make that showed his opinion. He says he's now a "shy tory" en.wikipedia.org , and if you told him 10 years ago he'd be where he is now he would have "called you an idiot". With so many calling Trump supporters racists and nazi's, who can blame him for no longer sharing his politics. He says he would never even put a Trump bumper sticker on his car or wear a maga hat, for fear of vandalism, or violence. I think there are a lot of people who are in the same mindset. There has been a lot of suppression, vandalism, and violence against Trump supporters in the last 4 years. If you have been following mainstream media, you probably don't realize how bad the problem is, they don't give it any attention. The media as well as most major online platforms have been very one sided in what and how they cover stories, and have been flat out censoring conservative voices for years now. I don't think we can have any confidence in the polls. There certainly is a group of 'independents' who are just shy/ashamed Republicans who don't want to come out for Trump but what interests me most about this is how a 'life long democrat' could look at 2016 Trump and think 'this is the guy for the job', let alone 2020 Trump. What sort of political values and beliefs that match with Democrats for decades matches up with Trump? Jus to put this in the most straightforward way possible: Have you been paying attention to how each party has changed in the last decade? Maybe not very intentional, but this post comes off as highly skeptical that there is such a thing as a "Trump Democrat" when we can see entire regions and populations that have altered their voting patterns over the years, some of them drastically in 2016. Also recall that in 2016 Trump was seen as the most moderate GOP candidate in years (and he was certainly the one closest to the Democrats many times when he spoke). Meanwhile, progressive whining aside, the Democrat party has moved left on almost every issue even from Obama. It's why even "moderate" Joe Biden doesn't sound like his 1970s, 80s, 90s, or 00s self. He moves with the partly and they have moved left. In 2020 I would be pretty skeptical. 2016 I guess, although even then he was a bit of a strange outlier and difficult for some to piece together. His whole ostensible platform was a bit of a departure in a fair few areas, his past utterances on say same-sex marriage were a bit ahead of even his Dem opponents, so I do recall some commentary on him being socially liberal in certain areas. On the other hand you got plenty of glimpses of the Trumpian playbook to playing to the gallery and scapegoating various marginalised peoples. Or picking Pence as a VP which kind of wipes out him being on the right side of that issue back in the day. Which made people rather worried about him even when he was seen as a no-hoper to actually win. It’s hard to remember exactly what the kind of consensus was back through time like that, my recollection was not that he was seen as one of the most moderate GOP candidates in a few cycles, but that he had some moderate tendencies amidst a lot of really worrying tendencies. Perhaps a moderate candidate with extremism as a methodology. Like many, you focus far too much on the political game aspect of this, e.g. "the Trumpian playbook." Not that I'm going to scrap it up, but polling back then had him perceived as more of a moderate. Trump did in fact sign a more-or-less mainline Republican tax law (which, if you want another example of how parties change, see how the Democrats are currently trying to reinstate the biggest tax break for the well off that the bill eliminated). However, he has been relatively consistent in his overall messages on trade, Social Security, foreign policy, immigration, abortion, and other issues. Trump is not a typical Republican. He has promised to not touch Social Security, has been restrained in his use of force overseas, has sold out far less often on immigration, isn't afraid to talk up his pro-life stances, has acted on trade, etc. I think the people who hoped he would tone down his rhetoric in office are disappointed, but I'm not sure how many people who actually supported his ideas are really that bummed out. (And for me at least, it's a welcome surprise). Point being, the inability to see how there could be such a thing as a "Trump Democrat" comes off as far-too-common left wing arrogance and ignorance. The question "how could people possibly support Trump" is clearly offered only as a sardonic and dismissive quip instead of a question genuinely asked. But then again, apparently it's hard for many to even understand how someone could think that burning down buildings is bad, so maybe there is even more work to do. It’s not dismissive, there are understandable reasons for some flipping camps back in the day, or continuing to do so. I believe this discussion was prompted re appealing to undecided voters of which the ‘Trump Democrat’ would be one. If we’re talking trying to win those votes I mean how do you do that without completely gutting your own platform and alienating your own base? And do you even drag those ones back? It’s a bit nitpicky but even if you’ve voted blue for donkeys, you’re not really a Trump Democrat, more a Nouveau Republican. Or a Trumpublican. He has changed that party’s direction in certain areas, so assuming these people stay on board I’d consider them new Republican converts rather than lapsed Democrats, given the directions taken by both parties. I mean, those two things aren't mutually exclusive. Platforms change based on issues. When the Republican party was born it was also the party of tariffs, and remained that way for a long time. Maybe at the time they made sense! Then it wasn't. Now, it's having an internal fight about it. I don't really think this is about undecided voters, this is about figuring out why people who formerly voted for your party would "vote against their own interests." Of course that phrase is exactly the type of arrogance I describe, and the fact it gets so much use is demonstrative. Even now, you grant "there are understandable reasons for some flipping camps back in the day, or continuing to do so." Can you describe any without tying in, say, racism? Xenophobia? "I got mine"? I think you might actually be able to. But many can't.
Could certainly give it a shot like. Legitimate immigration concerns, decline of particular industries and indeed a sneering, rather dismissive attitude from the other side that’s attempting to win your vote. Amongst others. The rather infamous ‘just learn to code’ article springs to mind.
Actually have bold policies that are targeted to the needs and wants of particular areas and your wider platform. And push it harder too.
Messaging is important after all. Go green but frame it as American jobs in making the technologies of the future and you will help build it. Ticks a bunch of boxes.
Over in the UK we had areas of post-industrial decline for decades. Plenty of space and time to do a bold strategy of incentivising industry to move operations to those regions struggling economically. Never really happened to stall the brain drain and lo and behold Brexit happened and we got the ‘why did these historic Labour areas vote to leave, must be racist’ kind of ridiculous handwringing.
The US is even more diverse economically and culturally than we are over here, a one-size fits all kind of strategy, or at least one not having regional-specific kind of policy is missing a trick.
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EPT
