Summary
Historians suggest Democrats might have fared better against Donald Trump by embracing the economic issues championed by Senator Bernie Sanders, who has long pushed for a focus on “bread-and-butter” concerns for working-class voters.
Despite Kamala Harris’s progressive policies, polls showed Trump was favored on economic issues, particularly among working-class and Hispanic voters.
Historian Leah Wright Rigueur argued that Sanders’ messaging on economic struggles could be key for future Democratic strategies.
Sanders himself criticized the party for “abandoning” the working class, which he said has led to a loss of support across racial lines.
If we had run Bernie in 2016, Trump would still be nothing but a punchline.
Lol at this delusional lib rewriting history that somehow Clinton won over trump 😂
It’s one think to think that Sanders is correct, but to think that the American people would have voted for him in 2016 is just extremely delusional.
If democrats were capable of listening we wouldnt have two terms of donald trump.
I usually vote along with the democrats, but neoliberals are so freaking elitist and clueless. As much as it pisses me off that I’m going to have to deal with whatever fascist bs Trump has in store, it’s really quite nice seeing them get their asses handed to them by a populist… It’s just too bad it wasn’t a left-wing populist.
It is absolutely clear now. The DNC is a private company whose main function is to fund raise, period. If they also win an election then that’s great, but if it comes to a choice between winning and raising money, they will choose raising money. They will never move to the left to win voters if it will cost them fund raising opportunities from the center and right.
This honestly makes so much more sense than anything else. I think you nailed it. Republicans are motivated by money and exerting social control so they write up manifestos (p2025), take over the courts, work hard to disenfranchise voters, lie, cheat, anything is on the table. The DNC does indeed seem fairly comfortable with losing by comparison, despite the fact that the leftist ideals they supposedly dabble in create a moral imperative to never lose. I wonder if Republicans fucking pay the DNC money to run these candidates we all know aren’t the best. They’re just good enough to get votes against mother fucking Trump. But not always good enough to win, barely good enough when they are, typically.
Republicans don’t need to pay the DNC, both are funded by the same billionaires most of the time.
The democrats represent the group of americans that think money and “american ingenuity” can solve all problems. No problem is a real problem because we can always solve it if we just try real hard to make the current thing better.
Thats why they are the status quo party, its literally their whole founding belief.
The republicans are a party of changing backwards, which only works sometimes, usually when people are upset: “remember when things weren’t awful…?”
The rest of the parties are thinking long term and are true parties of change but you need money to make it in politics, or else not enough people even know you exist at the higher political levels. There were I think five “third” parties on my ballot but I only ever heard people talk about one or two of them.
I’m not sure if its more likely the democrat party collapses out of disinterest and a third party replaces them, or if the democrat party will become a true party of change for the future.
It could just continue on as the party of “America is amazing and will always be amazing so vote for us for more amazing.”
Imo, you’ve got all the prices. However, I would put them in a different order.
Short answer: Republican or Democrat, the candidate that spends the most wins. Therefore, fund raising is winning.
There’s a small group of king-makers in the US and the candidate who offers them the most becomes president. Recently, the people who decide who gets to be president has started to include social media companies and amazon, who hosts half the Internet. Trump also cozied up to the American owner of the company the owns tiktok. Thats how he won. Trumps also great for social media engagement and news channel views.
Even candidates who happen to be better than the republican candidate, no democratic hopeful worth being of “the left” will ever be given enough money to become the president of America. Even if they started from a position that would appeal to them, they would have to compromise on everything that made them that in order to be allowed anywhere near the Whitehouse by the American ultra wealthy.
What you’re seeing isn’t the failure of the Democrats to correctly triangulate but the strength of the American ultra wealthy consent manufacturing machine.
I don’t disagree those factors are at play, but they’re not as important as you seem to think in this day and age.
Bernie had real grassroots support and the dems stomped it out. The key is populist rhetoric and speaking about change, the DNC has basically been running on “not Trump” and “well things are bad but they would be worse under Trump.” while that is true, that’s not a winning message, give people something real to fight for and you’ll win support.
On the contrary, they’re more important now than they’ve ever been. There also hasn’t been an election where the highest spender didn’t win. Its THE determining factor.
The same people who fund presidential campaigns for Republicans also spend lots of money on influencing democratic nominee choices. The whole things been captured.
Its like you all can’t see the woods for the trees, in the politest way possible. You see the state of trump and all the things that make him an aweful candidate and you say “how could the dems not beat that” instead of “what on earth could exert so much influence that even being that terrible couldn’t stop him?”
There’s no amount of “the dems not having a strong enough message” that overcomes the divide in the candidates, without huge influence. Their campaign wasn’t great but no where close enough to lose to someone like trump, in a fair fight. It would’ve had to have been utterly shocking from start to finish and, as bad as it was, it wasn’t that bad.
Republican or Democrat, the candidate that spends the most wins. Therefore, fund raising is winning.
you do know that in all last 3 elections dnc outspent gop by more than 50% ? last time we raised less than gop was with bush in 2004. harris raised more than 1.6 billion while trump raised about a billion. 600 million extra money they get is for not having a candidate with anti-rich anti-establishment anti-israel policies. hillary was similar story yet we barely saw her campaigning compared to trump. where does all this money go ?
compare that to jill stein who raised 2 million. dnc probably spent 10 times that money on just smearing her.
I’m not thrilled with the DNC either, but I’m not buying this whole idea that they are shooting themselves in the foot on purpose. The DNC does better when they win elections.
In previous elections, the candidate that raised the most money was more likely to win. Also, a moderate Democrat won the last election. They made the decisions they made in this election cycle because they thought it was their best chance of winning.
I don’t have access to the data that they have to determine whether the leftist that Lemmy wants on the ticket could actually win the general.
I’d certainly like to believe that it’s just that simple and all the DNC needs to do is put up a pro-Palestine Democratic Socialist and the election is in the bag… I just don’t know if that’s the reality on the ground. If that is not the reality on the ground, are the leftists that stayed home still committed to their protest? Or is there a point at which they would admit that we haven’t had a true leftist on the ticket because a true leftist is not viable?
I hope someone can put together some clear data to answer that question soon… I’m afraid that a pro-Palestine Socialist will get crushed by AIPAC funded attack ads about Marxism and supporting terrorism that will really stick with moderates, and that no matter how energized the base is it wouldn’t be enough to win the general.
I am not saying that they are losing on purpose. I’m saying that they are making decisions about policies and candidates based on fund raising rather than on attracting voters. On purpose or not, they did shoot themselves in the foot by courting disaffected Republican voters. Everyone knew they were not going to win a lot of those voters, but they sure did rake in a lot of dough. I believe that is their primary motivation.
Ive always liked Bernie. Bernie demonstrates the Democratic party would much rather lose with Kamala than win with Bernie. Never thought I would see them campaigning with Dik Cheney, the mask fell away for a few moments on that one.
