Why are Democrats in trouble in blue states? Assume the headlines are correct and a red wave is coming. I’m trying to figure out why even in blue states they are in trouble. And let’s be polite and not scream about the polls being wrong. Assume they are right. Why are they right? What are Dems in blue states doing wrong?
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BellyCat
Cole…. You are drinking again?
Omnes Omnibus
Why?
John Cole
@BellyCat: No just overworked and undersexed
lollipopguild
The press has to make every race a “tight” or close race, they get more clicks and viewers that way.
Betsy
Because ”undecided voters” are stupid, can’t think or analyze, and so as they saying goes — they don’t know what they like, they like what they know.
And what they know is whatever the mass media is nattering about today. A couple of months ago it was loss of Roe oh noes, now it’s “Are Dems talking too much about abortion?”
sstarr
Inflation, gas prices, bad vibes, midterms. This election was always going to be very, very tough.
Matt McIrvin
I dunno, they don’t seem to be in trouble here.
Betsy
Also the right wing has several 24/7 propaganda machines, and Dems have none. See “people don’t know what they like, they like what they know,”above.
(I am convinced that for most people what passes for rational thought is the picking up of and subsequent reliance on random catchy phrases.
For example: “No pain, no gain”. It doesn’t mean anything — and in fact sports physiologists will tell you this approach is counterproductive — but it rhymes, so people believe it.)
John Revolta
As time goes on pollsters switch from “registered voters” to “likely voters” and use their own criteria for “likely”. This tightens things up and makes for drama.
Matt McIrvin
…And looking at the recent state polling trends on 538, I honestly don’t see any huge recent trend toward Republicans in blue states, I think it’s just the New York governor’s race that’s causing the freakout. Maybe MI but that’s not a very blue state.
Mike in NC
The media is just doing its usual thing to serve the billionaires and giant corporations that own them.
I was out this morning but my wife said they did a story on TV on how my former room mate retired VADM Mike Franken is tied in Iowa with 89 year old Chuck Grassley. The media doesn’t want to cover that at all.
Eljai
We have reached the point in the midterms where you have to tune out the news for your own sanity. Actually, we reached that point several weeks ago. The beltway press is going to do everything in their favor to make you think all is lost. Do. not. fall. for. it.
I’m not an unskew the polls idiot. However, they are over-reporting republican polls, cherry picking other polls and totally brushing off early votes and the increase in voter registrations among women. We’re in a better spot than republicans right now. We can do this. So turn off the newsfeed and write a few postcards.
Poe Larity
Dude, don’t worry, 2024 will be awesome once Jayapal takes charge.
SpaceUnit
Not screaming but I’m assuming the polls to be be bullshit. These assholes got nothing.
And wasn’t Cole just a day or so ago telling us he wasn’t interested in their Dems Are Doomed crap?
KrackenJack
I’ll save the soul searching for after the election. No appetite for a pre-mortem. Sorry.
Will
Bad vibes on the economy. Even with almost record low unemployment and millions of open job positions, people just feel like things are coming apart. They don’t pay attention much, but when they do the news hasn’t been great lately and that is even outside Republican echo chambers. Inflation, even Roe v Wade, will be discouraging to some people that they won’t even vote out of doom feeling.
Jackie
@Eljai: Yes.
I skim the headlines, and refuse to click on the polls. Everything is 50:50 now. I will watch the results Election Night and hope, hope, hope Democracy wins. I’m on the West Coast, and hope to go to bed relatively early that night at ease.
Redshift
Meh. I’m not going to argue the polls are wrong, but I think there’s a pretty good argument that they’re being presented with a lot more confidence than is warranted (see here, for example.)
That being the case, I don’t see any particular benefit in pure speculation about what Dems might be doing wrong if we assume they’re doing something wrong. Since there’s nothing I can do about it (other than what I’m already doing), there will be plenty of time to do that afterwards if it turns out they did in fact so something wrong.
piratedan
@SpaceUnit: its seems like the last few elections have given us the following:
GOP: tax cuts for the rich, punish immigrants for all ills and blame the Dems for being soft on crime and when in doubt, blame immigrants for the crime that Dems are being soft on. Doesn’t matter if its true, just say it and throw some numbers out there and imply that it is. Would just as soon be in charge and end elections as we know it.
Dems: this is what we have done, address the pandemic, address the job situation, address climate change, acted as the beacon of Democracies, support infrastructure, support working families and unions. Would appreciate an opposition party that hasn’t embraced fascism and believes that women should have agency over their own bodies.
The GOP ads have been relentless selling fear and that brings their people home and makes an impression on “undecided” voters who are susceptible to the last message that they see.
The media sees it as their job to sell clicks and since most news isn’t crowd sourced, they’re working for folks who don’t live in the same world as the vast majority of us and wouldn’t have the faintest clue of what reality is.
jonas
It basically boils down to three issues: 1. Inflation. Politicians — liberal or conservative — can’t really do much about that, but voters don’t give a shit, so they blame whoever’s in office. 2. Crime. It’s up in a lot of places, and Republicans have successfully pinned the blame on bail reform laws and liberal DA’s who have been reluctant to charge petty criminals with felonies that would lock them up for longer. It doesn’t matter that crime has also risen in red states with tough-on-crime prosecutors and LEO’s, but I don’t make the rules. 3. Migrants and refugees — again, only the Biden administration’s fault if you consider “it’s fault” being not building a stupid boondogle of a wall or employing thousands of snipers to take out any border crossers they spot, including children, or whatever. I don’t know, I’m only assuming that’s what they were saying on Tucker Carlson’s show last night.
So add that up and keep in mind that the average American voter 1. watches a lot of Fox and/or listens to idiot talk radio and 2. knows shit about anything and cares even less, if they even bother to show up to vote, and there’s your tight midterm election right there.
BellyCat
@John Cole: Fair point. Got Xanax? Keep calm…
Mike E
The Kansas constitutional abortion ban poll was 50/50 but lost 60/40. In Kansas. Oz got nothing out of the debate. Fetterman won by standing up, and his campaign will run ads on that grifter’s abortion gaff. Just keep telling everyone you know to be a fcuking adult and go vote.
Grover Gardner
Look, I know the economy is supposed to be great, but $24 for a 2 lb. pack of bacon? That makes NO sense. Interest rates are killing credit and the housing market. Gas prices in the Pacific NW are OOC. Unemployment is 3.5% but stores are bereft of personnel. The shelves in my Safeway are weirdly empty. I think people are having a hard time figuring it out. None of this will change our vote, but we’re in a decent position to sweat it out. I remain optimistic, but I think a lot of people are just baffled.
LeftCoastYankee
Housing insecurity (and costs) and homelessness for those in the city, and the media spinning this as “rampant crime” through the “local” media, for consumption by the outlying burbs.
The Democrats have no consistent or comprehensive message (yet) for housing, and yelling “crime” with absolutely no intent to fix anything is fine for Republicans since it sells outside the cities where their votes are anyway.
Also, the local “independent” media has succumbed to “sportscasting” coverage of the elections.
I guess “one party is eating horse paste and lighting it’s farts on fire, and the other party are grownups trying hard to fix a shitload of problems that will take some time” is too hard to write… oh wait, I just did that.
CaseyL
@Grover Gardner: I understand the bafflement, but the fact is the GOP has no plan to address any of that and, in fact, voted against Biden’s plans to do so.
This is the “Stupid Character in a Horror Movie” trope, but in real life: people are scared, so they decide the best thing to do is run to the dark basement.
Gary K
The Dems are seen to be the party in power, and the thermostatic reaction — among enough people to make the difference — is to vote the other party into greater power. Why do they have this reaction? Nobody seems to have a good explanation, but maybe it’s just that they are simple farmers, people of the land, the common clay. You know…
Shalimar
The Republican pitch appeals to people who are selfish, dumb, and cruel. That they are even remotely close to competitive is extremely depressing.
Shalimar
@Grover Gardner: My local grocery store has Jimmy Dean bacon buy one get one free for the next week. 2 pounds, $10.99.
You can cut grocery bills 20-30% if you watch sales carefully.
opiejeanne
@Grover Gardner: Costco is where we get our bacon now because it was $10/pound at our local supermarket more than 2 years ago.
Mai Naem mobile
Not in a blue state but I got a political call this evening from a supposed Katie Hobbs GOTV effort. The young woman calling spoke in broken English with a strong East Asian accent. It honestly sounded like the GOP dirty tricks effort from way back when they had actors putting on strong angry black and hispanic accents call traditionally Dem ethnic whites to depress the GOTV. I asked her what organization she represented. She initially refused to give it and then quickly said Solutions for Arizona LLC and hung up. Googling the phone # doesn’t help.
GoBlueInOak
Inflation – it’s a serious problem when it comes to securing the votes of the downwardly mobile. UE is low, wages are up, but inflation is up even more. Inflation adjusted real wages are down. Voters feel poorer as a result – because they are.
Crime: Much like the stimulus fueled inflation issue, the pandemic wreaked havoc with social order and in a lot of places that social fabric hasn’t re-knitted. Work from home is great for workers but crappy for Main Street & downtowns that now have a lot less foot traffic than pre-pandemic. Crime spiked during the pandemic and it’s not coming down fast enough.
Gas Prices: Americans are car addicted morons & have built an entire country the moronic idea that a built environment centered around the automobile is just the bee knees. This one is particularly hard nut to crack as even most Democrats are god awful on this topic.
Its a toxic brew ripe for a backlash by the barely pays attention swing voters who decide who gets to be in charge.
John S.
@GoBlueInOak:
And that’s exactly what the GOP counts on to win them elections.
Case in point, the wave of NRCC ads being run here in WA against Kim Schrier touting that she will raise a state income tax here. How the fuck is that even possible for someone in Congress to pull off? It’s not.
But Republicans count on people being morons, and they’re not completely wrong.
Tim in SF
If you have gay Republican friends, as I used to, then you’ll understand how some people will vote for their perceived economic self-interest over absolutely every fucking thing imaginable.
kindness
The msm is just showing it loves Republican Daddies. They’re in on it.
GoBlueInOak
@John S.: Yup. The average swing voter could barely find their own state on a map. You’d have better luck holding a conversation with a bowl of banana pudding than get a swing voter to properly explain how the separation of powers works.
prostratedragon
Tonight I uncovered a visceral need to avoid news about the election for the next couple of weeks (and maybe after even if the Dems do well). As some people above have pointed out, there’s nothing I can do about it beyond little individual citizen things, which I am doing. The rest is just extra worry.
“Don’t Do Anything (I Wouldn’t Do),” Angelo Badalamenti and the Two-Bass Hit
Grover Gardner
@CaseyL: Yeah, I know that. But some people want a change. And it wouldn’t surprise me if a lot of these problems, like high gas prices, magically “went away” if Republicans took back the Senate and the House.
@Shalimar: Yes, I know. I don’t have a problem with changing our menus, there’s only the two of us and my wife doesn’t even eat meat. ;-) But when you reach for a common purchase and it’s a) suddenly twice the price or b) not even there, it’s disconcerting to a lot of people. It’s like, WTF is going on?
GoBlueInOak
@Tim in SF: There’s currently a very large voter shift going on for the 2022 midterms of suburban women who voted for Biden swinging hard to the GOP. So yeah…totally.
NotMax
The same thing that goes on a fortnight prior to every election. Selective amnesia is a biennial phenomenon.
Wombat Probability Cloud
@Eljai: This!
livewyre
@GoBlueInOak: That’s how it’s been reported, but it turns out to be not so simple. We can’t rely on small-sample studies from horse-race ad-sellers.
JCNZ
Why isn’t there a “like” button on this hell-site, something that allows you to say “fuck yeah!” to comments, and add to the sense of community? This screaming into the void is unhealthy.
GoBlueInOak
@livewyre: That would be nice if it bears out, but the current mood on the ground is sour. I was actually cautiously optimistic a few months ago before Labor Day, but Dems have totally failed to cohere around a narrative. Silver lining to Dems losing House is hopefully the geriatrics in leadership finally give up the reins and we can get someone under 70 years old in charge of the caucus for once.
Betsy
@prostratedragon: Go therapy-sketching. That’s what I had to do for several days after the 2020Novbwr election. Take a couple of friends. Everyone must sketch.
Yes, even the non-artists.
guachi
A good election would look like Kansas abortion referendum. A bad election would look like Virginia governor’s race. I suspect it’ll look more like Virginia. At the end of the day not enough voters actually care about women’s rights to vote on it.
Inflation, which has nothing to do with anything any Democratic politician has done is a daily occurrence. Abortion restrictions are more abstract and require empathy for others. So, imo, combine that with it being a midterm and Ds are probably screwed.
Yutsano
@GoBlueInOak:
[CITATION NEEDED]
EDIT: I see the doom and gloom police are running rampant tonight. Not in the mood. Talk on the flip.
HumboldtBlue
I’ll say this on the back of concerned comments from this forum and my family text thread that Fetterman’s stroke and recovery are an issue and that could be concerning.
On the other hand, THE PHILLIES ARE GOING TO THE WORLD SERIES!!!! (watch the bat boy)
And on the other hand, women are dancing in Iran and I still sense that women, and more importantly, young men, who wanna enjoy the company of young women, will show.
Then again, there is the Phillies playoff run!
And a reminder, even Gritty trolled the Astros and considering Ted Cruz got a New York welcome showing up at Yankee Stadium, I’m pretty sure that motherfucker is gonna avoid Philadelphia.
What’s Going On?
Yutsano
@HumboldtBlue: I was talking to some people at work, and the run of the Astros looks a mite bit fishy. I’m not laying any accusations just yet, but if the Phillies get swept, I’m smelling rot in Houston, and I ain’t talking just the petrochemical plants. Oh and Corner Stone, wherever in the universe he is.
Mike in Pasadena
Women are not outraged about overturning Roe. Anybody who attended college in the last ten or so years is thrilled the GOP opposes student loan relief. Seniors are glad the GOP is going to end Social Security and Medicare. So, yeah, it makes sense that the GOP will prevail because reasons.
Chris T.
As an undecided voter, it’s important to me that the Democrats talk only about abortion. Also, why are the Democrats talking only about abortion?! We need to support Ukraine by getting the hell out of Ukraine! And what the hell is Biden up to raising the mortgage rates? I need my home valuation to go down so my taxes will drop, and I need my home valuation to soar so that I can remortgage, and I need the rate to be zero percent and I need my bank savings account to pay 25%!
(Sorry, I’ve been reading Nextdoor)
livewyre
@GoBlueInOak: If that’s what you’re going with, then it’s clear what you’re going for. Just had to check.
Chris T.
@jonas: Oh right, I totally forgot the whole crime thing. The same people bitching about not putting everyone in jail are bitching about paying taxes for a new jail (the existing one is falling apart).
mrmoshpotato
@HumboldtBlue:
LOL! The Trashstros should be stripped of that championship. Cheating bastards.
Go Phillies!
Eljai
@Yutsano: Yep. The media has decided on the narrative. Unfortunately, some have fallen for it. Obviously, not saying to be complacent. I’m just saying there’s no need to be despondent.
In states that report early turnout by gender, women voters are up over 9%. But the pundits tell me nobody cares about abortion anymore.
mrmoshpotato
@Eljai:
How many of these pundicks are bepenised?
NotMax
@mrmoshpotato
Well, Tuckums’ is tanned….
//
Skippy-san
I think the GOP messaging on the economy is drawing blood. The complete ignorance of average Americans about how economics works favors the GOP. And – not to bash Biden, though – he is not actively making a message that can be retained by stupid people, of which there are far too many. The refusal of the GOP to even mention the economic impacts of the war in Ukraine is nothing short of criminal.
It is a sign of American stupidity that in every economic argument the teabaggers make, they ignore the war in Ukraine and its impacts on worldwide economics. They ignore the dichotomy in corporate earnings versus prices and pay absolutely no attention to the foundational impacts that almost two trillion dollars in stupid tax cuts, coupled with tax cuts 15 years prior, have on the economy.
The dumbing down of America continues because too many Americans have decided they don’t want to live in a democracy because they want fuel prices to be artificially low.
American selfishness knows no limits.
Jinchi
I don’t know about other blue states, but in mine the Democrats are expected to do just fine.
Brachiator
I got in late and have not had a chance to read all the comments, but a few thoughts.
I don’t know that Democrats are doing anything wrong. People are concerned about the economy. And unfortunately, they can easily be persuaded by the lie that government spending is bad and cutting back on spending must be good. And they wrongly believe that the GOP is “more responsible” compared to Democrats. And, because he loudly shouted it all the goddam time, some believe that Trump actually boosted the economy, even though the evil media consistently fact checked and refuted Trump’s lies.
Understanding economics is hard, and people fall back on simplistic explanations and refuse to dig deeper. Also, most people don’t have the patience to look for accurate, detailed economic reporting and depend on pundits and shallow op-ed pieces.
Also, some news sites are clearly biased against the Democrats. They will accurately report Federal Reserve reports on the back pages, but then give more prominence to interviews with opponents of the Biden administration. I laugh with bitterness when I see someone like Larry Summers quoted more often than the actual goddam Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen.
And sadly, some of it comes down to bigotry tinged selfishness. Even if they are doing okay, some white people fundamentally believe that Democrats care more about black folk, Hispanics and gays than they do about white people. Even if they believe in the big tent, they expect to be the first served, and for anyone else to be happy with leftovers.
Dan
Well Fetterman had a stroke, Hochul’s strategy of ignoring Zeldin didn’t work so now she’s on the back foot . . .
JWR
I caught a few minutes of PBS Newshour Monday evening, and Tamara Keith said something that tracks with what I’ve been thinking for a while now. Paraphrasing Keith:
And then it was on to other topics.
And Kristen Welker, Chuck Todd’s soulmate on NBC, was going on and on about the “enthusiasm gap!” and how the GOP is crushing us there. Whatevs, Kristen. Yer doin’ yer jerb.
But here’s to the Dems crushing the GOP this time around.
Jesse
John, this post shows that you’re a true Dem.
Dems tend to be the thinkers, the worriers, trying to hew to reality, generally not ragingly, blindly partisan, overflowing with confidence in their correctness.
That’s a good thing. Reality-based community and all. But in some circumstances, it can be bad. It makes us neurotic when things aren’t looking good for our side.
livewyre
Just to chime in, one of the things I appreciate about this place is the general candor – the ease of knowing what’s meant without having to dig through statements sculpted not to ruffle feathers. I’m confident that the fear expressed is real with no waffling or misdirection (from the OP at least).
Of course, that doesn’t mean I agree with letting it take the wheel. Determination is built not on being confident that we’ll win, but being confident that we can and should. That way it doesn’t matter what “alternative facts” are brewed up for us reality-based judicious observers to fret over. With everything on the line, we don’t lie down and wait for an end, but keep going. That’s what the empire of creating their own reality fears.
VeniceRiley
@mrmoshpotato: o er night the gender gap increased from that 9.x to 12.x.
Tony Jay
@John Cole:
Well, there’s your problem. You’ve got the over/under on that all mixed up.
Dems are doing and saying the right things, GOP are panicked about the Dobbs Effect and throwing shit at the wall, corporate media organisations are sniffing the shit and declaring it fabulously attractive.
When is it ever any different?
HumboldtBlue
Hola, mi gente. Ya Probaron Las Tortitas De Lentejas
BeautifulPlumage
I think part of the reason the ‘polls have tightened up” narrative is being pushed by FTFNYT and others is to feed a vote fraud push. “Our guy looked at 51% the week before election. How could they have lost by X%?” cry the MAGA.
ETA fuck it, not gonna correct the typo
prostratedragon
@Betsy: I just might do some such thing. Or play with the coloring books that came with my colored pens.
Evap
What’s with all the gloom and doom people? WaPo had an article yesterday about the record setting early vote in Georgia. We are close to 2020 levels of voting, well above 2018. The increase is everywhere but the biggest increase is in Atlanta and among women and Black voters. This is giving me some hope.
MomSense
I made the mistake of listening to NPR on the way to work and listened to Steve Inskeep’s convos with people in Akron. A few sensible people and a fuckton of stupid. I’m now reduced to watching idiotic high school dramas that are poorly dubbed in English. WTF Americans.
Chief Oshkosh
Believers believe their beliefs and doubts their doubts. Doubters believe their doubts and doubt their beliefs. A strong component of the political press’ strategy to become and stay wealthy is to make all Democrats into doubters. It’s tough to shake that off on any given day, John, even when you know it’s true.
Tinare
I’m heartened by turnout reports. Generally speaking, when turnout is high, Dems win. Polls be damned.
Baud
@Chief Oshkosh:
Well said.
dervy scram
I might be worried if they weren’t singing the same tune they did in ’18 and ’20. But they are, and I am not.
eversor
@Will:
I’ve been job hunting through this record unemployment and I have an amazing resume, marketable IT skills, and am up to date all on my certifications. It’s… not good. In fact it’s grim.
There are lots of opportunities but as wages went up they all turned into contract jobs or contract to hire jobs. When the contract ends they don’t hire anyone. They extend the contract again. The pay is more than people made before but as you are a contractor now the benefits are worse. You’re also not getting retirement benefits. So sure, you make more now and you can find a job. But your healthcare costs are up, inflation is up, and your retirement has stalled out.
The economy is not really great and unemployment isn’t the situation the happy warrior crowd claims it is.
I’ve been on this loop for a bit now. I actually contronted the group I got the contract with and they told me point blank do not expect full time. The reality is there is going to be a recession and companies simply do not want to keep people on through it. So this is all contract to hire untill the recession hits at which point all those contracts are going to go away and people are going to get cut. When full time hiring starts again the wage bubble is going to go away and wages are going to drop.
It’s not just IT. This is impacting accounting, office services, HR, any of the “support services” that saw a nice wage boom is stuck on this loop. Everyone I know looking for jobs is seeing this. And this is the DC area of educated professionals interviewing at Law Firms, Consulting Firms, Defense Firms, Wealth Management Firms.
If you do get a permanent offer it’s 20k or more less a year than you made during the pandemic. They will openly state to you that this is the only way to secure a job through the recession. So take it now. Because people are going to be fighting for these jobs later.
Then there is the issue that stores are odd. They range from overstocked to empty. Full staffed to no staff. If I go to a fancy restaurant it’s booming and fully staffed. Go to just a nice one and that’s not the case.
There are more and more homeless encapments despite record uneployment and they are getting larger and more violent. They went up during COVID but there has been a post COVID boom in them, despite employment going up. Crime is up as well even though this is masked by the fact that stores simply don’t report petty shoplifting and other stuff now they close down or put locks on everything.
If we go to the super fancy organic butcher or the store that sells wagyu beef, pork, seafood, have all held at stable premium prices. If I go to Giant or even COSTCO that is not the case it’s up. This holds to all the food we buy. Premium and super premium is stable but that’s not something we buy outside of special occasions, everything else is up. The rent went up 200+ a month this fall to keep up with market increases. Gas is all over the map but usually about 4.50 here.
Stuff is visibly going down hill everywhere though it’s not as bad as I’ve seen it.
It’s not going to effect my vote. But shit’s grim.
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
I think Democrats are expected to win in a walk here in blue Maryland. I’ve heard NY Guv is closer than expected but Governor’s races are different. I mean look at MA and MD but also KS and KY and LA. Blue states with R guvs, red states with D guvs. It sucks to see R wins anywhere but so long as the State legislatures in those places stay blue the damage can be limited.
Jerry
I don’t know about elsewhere, but here in North Carolina, Ted Budd is finally getting hit in commercials about him wanting to gut Social Security and Medicare and raising the eligibility age to 70.
Llelldorin
I don’t accept that we are going to lose (I don’t think anyone knows), but if we did: Blue states are rife with “socialist as long as it doesn’t cost me anything and my 401k is up” types. Most large companies are now battening down the hatches for a recession, which is unnerving to people even if we’re not actually in one yet.
ian
Cole, did you remember to make sacrifices to Huitzilopochtli?
schrodingers_cat
Reporting on polls is the laziest form of journalism. I don’t base my vote on the polling or the reporting on it.
The weakest link in the Dem coalition are white people. Will taking bodily autonomy from them make the overall ww vote Democratic? If it does then the dudebro dominated MSM will be proven wrong like in Kansas.
I prefer to wait and watch save my wallowing for after the event.
Matt McIrvin
@What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?: Granted, most of the races in Massachusetts are not being polled at all, so I suppose it’s theoretically possible we could have a red wave brewing here that nobody sees. But I’ve seen no evidence of that, certainly not from the governor race that is being polled, and that is historically the strongest one for Republicans in MA. The popular R governor decided not to run again and the Republican nominee is a Trumpy extremist, and all the polls show him getting crushed (even though the Democrats are running a woman, which is historically an enragingly big liability here).
JMG
There’s a few block area of Boston known as Mass and Cass, for the intersection of two big streets, near I-93 as it goes north and south through the city close to the ocean. It’s close to the city’s public hospital but relatively few people live there if any. Its businesses are industrial and commercial. As a result of being, it has attracted the city’s homeless population, with the resulting petty crime, fights, and drug dealing. It’s a bad and unhappy scene. BUT my guess is that way fewer of one percent of Boston, let alone Massachusetts residents, have ever been there (I sure haven’t, lived here 50 years). Doesn’t matter. Mass and Cass leads the local news almost half the days of the week.
Local TV news remains the most used news source by most people, especially voting old people. Here at least, it doesn’t have a political bias, it has a “things are terrible” bias. From news to business news to even the weather, the negative is accentuated. My belief is that the stations are attempting to scare their audiences into doing little more than staying home and watching TV.
SFAW
@Grover Gardner:
I thought it was $240!! For one pound!! Of rancid bacon!?!?!?
And gasoline is like $300 per liter!! And a one-bedroom, half-bath shack in East Overshoe, NH, is listing at 3 Million!!! Dollars!!!
OMFGOMFGOMFG
Prices are high because demand exceeds supply, and because the supply-chain issues persist. That’s true for consumer goods, and was true — and may still be true — for real estate.
Empty low-paying-retail positions when unemployment is at 8 percent is a bigger “WTF???” that when unemployment is 3.5 percent. As Atrios has been saying for more than 10 years: you want to get more/better workers, pay them more. If you’re paying shit wages for a shit job, expect positions to go unfilled — until enough people are out of work to force them to accept a shit job for shit wages.
Seriously, leave the scare-bombs to the RWMFs
Princess
Will comfortable white women whose husband’s have seen their husbands’ retirement savings shrink by a fifth to a quarter in the last six months and prices go up vote Democratic? That’s what we’re waiting to see. I don’t trust them, and I am one.
Personally, I think the Dems still have a better economic message and the GOP one (default and no social security) is terrible. But the press has ceded the economy to the GOP and framed this as abortion vs. economy, and those type of women are media consumers.
Cjcat
The majority of people are ignorant about how government actually works. They blame the federal for county and state regulations. They blame the president for everything though he isn’t a wizard that can wave a magic wand. They don’t understand how elections work on their state level. Part of that problem is no standard way of conducting elections from state to state.
Since they don’t have an understanding, they use their hearts instead of their heads and the GOP is very good at appealing to the lizard brain within us. Fear works, aggression works, resentments work. The Democrats say be better. The Republicans say be angry. Angry is easier.
I feel like after slamming others for ignorance, I should admit I don’t know much about foreign policy. That is one reason I come here, to learn from people like Adam and other front pagers. One of the other reasons I am speaking up after years of lurking is to work out a plan to reform our election processes which begins with educating the electorate so this will be my hobby horse I will probably run into the ground.
Betty
@jonas: Jonaas, that’s a very good summary.
Mimi haha
@GoBlueInOak: Oh yes. It’s always the women’s fault.
eversor
@Cjcat:
There’s simply too much information out there for even intelligent people to process so we rely on others. This leads to issues.
One group of people goes out and finds somewho who knows what the fuck they are talking about because they do this for a living and asks them. The other group goes out and talks to their priest/drunk at the end of the bar/family and listens to what they have to say on it. Hence the entire reality disconnect.
It’s not just government it’s everything. The sister in law to be is refusing medical treatment because her (drunken wreck of a) dad and her priest told her not to. They also all agree the election was stolen. For the medical never mind what the doctor said, her husband who as a Marine had EMT+ training for his job, lets listen to the priest and dad. She’s also a total Trumper and Jan 6 was a false flag. She knows, dad and the priest said so!
We all to an extent trust people we know over people we don’t know. But there’s a whole slew of people that don’t know shit about shit and don’t trust people who know what they are doing.
Matt McIrvin
@Cjcat: One big difference between the US and most other democracies is that we have many, many more elected positions at all levels of government, and also a far more complicated federated structure, which means that you actually have to know a lot more to vote effectively. Parliamentary systems, particularly, are easier from the end-user perspective–you basically just have to figure out which party you support, and you vote for that party in the general election. It also means the party positions can be much ideologically sharper.
There’s a kind of nerd view that shows up in technology that regards complex user interfaces as a test of worthiness and blames the user for problems. To some extent I think we do that when we talk about how dopey the voters are. I’m not sure it’s possible to have an electorate that’s knowledgeable enough about government to operate the American system effectively. It takes too much specialized expertise. People have other things to do with their lives.
SFAW
@HumboldtBlue:
Phuck the Phillies.
The only team I want LESS in the WS is the Barves.
Let’s Go Mets! (sob)
The Moar You Know
Every Dem I’ve spoken to does not want an honest answer to that question.
Matt McIrvin
@SFAW: Also, Trump followed by COVID basically shut down immigration to the US, and Biden hasn’t really done a huge amount to open it back up again because it’s frankly unpopular. “Protecting our borders” is the #1 gangbusters talking point from every right-wing oaf.
Guess what? We’re all worried about a labor shortage, gumming everything up? That’s how you get a labor shortage!!
SFAW
@Mimi haha:
That’s not what he/she said. But “you do you,” as the saying goes.
Cjcat
@eversor: That is a very good point. Part of political campaigning is to identify the influencers. That’s why postcards and booths at local events work. So let’s say that is part of the plan. Who are the influencers and how do we persuade some of them first?
cain
@Tim in SF: because they know us liberals will fight for them .. the entire system depends on us to protect the whole thing .. one thing that will happen when the whole thing breaks down is that those people will all be shouting and blaming us for not fighting hard enough while they vote GOP.
Matt McIrvin
@The Moar You Know: Well, if the honest answer is “we need to get way, WAY more racist,” then no, I’d rather just go down.
Cjcat
@Matt McIrvin: I think that is why we have had such trouble with the message that democracy is in danger. It is complicated and difficult to understand. So, riding my hobby horse, how do we explain elections in a way that is fast and easy? There is another plank in our goal in reforming elections.
lee
I’m in Texas and Beto is tied with Abbott. I’m skeptical about this ‘red wave’.
Elizabelle
Wow, was this ever a good thread to stay out of.
Write post cards. Knock doors. Talk with people.
The Moar You Know
@Matt McIrvin: no, that’s not remotely close.
Taxesmycredulity
Whenever I see polls and reporting about how enthusiastic Repubs are about voting, I’m not worried because I believe that many, many of them are women and men who will be voting to protect their reproductive rights. They’ll be voting in huge numbers, just not for Repub candidates.
Matt McIrvin
@Cjcat: I think one thing we need to do is re-normalize partisan straight-ticket voting, and get people out of the mindset that it’s for dum dums. It’s a good deal better than leaving most of the races blank because you were worried you didn’t know enough, or splitting the ticket just because you heard it’s a good thing to be “nonpartisan”.
Republicans will vote a straight ticket without remorse. Democrats need to.
Cjcat
@Matt McIrvin: I am not sure about that one. People are identifying less and less with either party. I have many younger people in my circle that have no use for Democrats even though they dislike Republicans more. Most are just waiting for the boomers like me to die and think that will solve the problem. They are attracted to younger politicians regardless of party. So that part, increasing Democratic voters, might be better at a later stage of election reform after we have a more informed electorate. My focus on that would be in getting rid of gerrymandering and abolishing winner take all first. I think that alone would produce more Democratic votes but I am open to persuasion.
JML
The GOP message in MN is the most nakedly race-baiting I’ve ever seen here. It’s basically “If you vote for Walz the N-words are going to burn down your house, rape your wife, and kill your children”. It’s seriously ugly. Even the SecState race has gotten ugly AF; some super PAC is running attack ads against Steve Simon calling him corrupt, criminal, and responsible for business collapsing. Steve Simon! The super nerdy nice guy who just wants voting to be easy and business registration to be simple.
The GOP are insane and must be driven into the sea.
SW
Human nature. We suck. When I was young I used to believe that human beings were basically good and rational. That we are born with a bullshit detector and whenever an argument over policy ensues, the average person would be able to tell who was lying and who was truthful. Because the truth resonates with us. It makes logical sense. So all we really need is for the arguments to made well and then we humans blessed with the ability to separate bullshit from reality would choose reality.
But I have learned in my old age that this simply isn’t true. My naive picture of how things work or should work didn’t understand confirmation bias. People believe what they want to believe. Rationality and logic has damn all to do with it. And it extends well beyond the generally accepted parameters of politics. No, humans with rare exceptions, are self-centered. The hero of their story. And when things are difficult or uncomfortable, the last person you blame is the hero of the story. It is always someone else’s fault. The government is the ideal someone else.
Grover Gardner
@SFAW: Mock all you want. I’m suggesting what people actually see day-to-day in my part of the country. If John wants to know why Oregon might go red for governor, if not the state legislature, this is likely why. Prices for food, gas, housing and credit have soared in these parts. There’s a strong perception that things are broken.
catmandid
Like everyone else already said – inflation is the biggest hurdle right now. Not the Dems’ fault, but they’re also not saying much about it in most places while the Repubs have done nothing but scream about how Dems are the reason why your $100 worth of groceries costs $250 now for months. They don’t have a plan to fix it, but that’s never been important compared to painting the Dems as useless and out of touch focusing on [pick an issue] instead of the thing where people are going to have to choose between heating their homes and feeding their kids this winter.
Matt McIrvin
@Cjcat: It’s really simple math: if the right will turn out and vote for Republicans all the way down the ticket, and the left won’t do it for Democrats, the Republicans will have control and then we can’t get any of those reforms to the election system, because the Republicans who control it will just game it to keep winning.
If we can’t explain this to people, I don’t know what else there is to do.
Matt McIrvin
@SW:
If that were the explanation, then the bad guys would always win every election, and they don’t. “People are bad” doesn’t explain why things are worse NOW than they were at some other time.
There have been times in history when the political situation markedly improved; why did that happen? What was going on then?
I am also suspicious of claims that human nature is degenerating and was better at some time in the past. I don’t think that’s true at all. If anything, surely people in 1920 or 1861 sucked even more than they do now.
Matt McIrvin
@catmandid: The near-shutdown of immigration is probably one of the big things pushing food prices up, but I don’t think people want to hear that, because anti-immigration rhetoric is still really popular. Like I was joking on another blog, I’m sure the Republicans are trying to figure out some way that immigrants are bringing inflation into the country.
SFAW
@Grover Gardner:
Yes, I’m sure (Democrat-turned-“independent”) Betsy Johnson polling at 14 percent has absolutely nothing to do with Kotek (D) and Drazan (R) being in a dead heat.
ETA: As Maine gubernatorial voters can tell you
ETA2: And the average US price for a pound of bacon is about $7.50.
SFAW
@Matt McIrvin:
It’s obvious: the Mexican drug “mules” are bringing it in, hidden inside their cantaloupe-sized calf muscles
eversor
@Cjcat:
Sadly I think this is futile as well at points. The “influencers” all have their own pet projects. In her case the dad is a loon and beyond help and it’s not really him. Her parish priest is firmly “you cannot trust medical advise from baby killers, people who think men can marry men, and people who think boys are girls”. This is why she is stuck in this situation. Doesn’t matter that her husband, and all her (including met to be) brothers in law all have EMT or EMT+ training because we are all veterans who had to go through it due to our jobs, or what the doctors say. We don’t count.
I see this sort of attitude often. Another of the other sisters of the SO has it as well and it’s lunacy. It boils down to “if you are a traditional Christian on these issues I will listen to you. If you are not I won’t” and at a certain point you just throw up your hands and say “fine go off, kill yourself, I don’t fucking care”.
What enrages me is lets go back to influencers. In this case and I know it holds true for other immigrant groups they have their own locked media groups that the larger “we” don’t see. In their case as filipinas it’s all very Catholic and right wing stuff. And they saturate themselves in this. As a typical family there they have six children oddly all girls and the sisters that broke free of this and lost their religion are all doing fine, fully vaxed, and horrified by all of it. But I’ve seen these channels at family events and it’s father right than OAN and really creepy.
So how do you access that? Because a lot of what’s thought of as “reachable groups” you probably don’t know who the influencers are. And that media bubble is freaking insane. If you think Qanon is bad it’s worse than that.
I guess part of the issue is that often I see democratic reach outs as upper middle class whites who are utterly ignorant as to what the internal media is in these groups and it’s often shockingly right wing centered around church, family, gender roles. And anybody who does not parrot all that is instantly not to be trusted. To the point of they don’t trust lawyers, doctors, or any sort of expert if they don’t squwak the line.
Sorry for the rant but we have all been trying to deprogram her before something dumb happens. Cause “I didn’t have COVID, I have alergies” was bad. But we are now in the “it’s not cancer” phase of this madness and while personally I won’t shed a tear or give a flying fuck if she passes I know the SO will be heart broken as will the husband and I don’t want them to go through that. Even more enraging you’re a spouse to a retired Marine officer you have good healthcare, just show up and take it!
Llelldorin
@The Moar You Know: Oooo, can I take a guess? At least in California, the problem is that all genuine political division is being papered over by the fact that both sides of the obvious political split are currently inside the Democratic Party. If California were a nation-state, we’d have three parties: a centrist bloc with about 40% of the vote, the Republicans with their current 33%, and then a progressive bloc with about 26%. Because we’re a US state, the centrist and leftist groups pretend to be unified and thus wind up stridently standing for nothing except the least controversial issues (mercifully both centrists and leftists are pro-choice in California, for example).
Cjcat
@Matt McIrvin: My purpose in raising the issue of election reform here is to get feedback from smart, dedicated and passionate Democrats like you. I think that making reform a non partisan issue will increase the grassroots appeal.
I feel like I am highjacking this thread a little and RL is calling. Let’s argue it out in an open thread sometime.
Matt McIrvin
I actually think that what Cole is specifically worried about up top is the New York and Oregon governors’ races, and the answers are different and specific to New York and Oregon. It’s not like there’s some general collapse of Democratic governance happening in Blue America, any more than it was happening when voters in Massachusetts kept electing Republican governors.
Gary K
@JCNZ: You’re doing it wrong: a jackal shouldn’t “scream,” it should “howl.”
SW
@Matt McIrvin: No, human nature never changes. Just a thin veneer on the surface. We sucked in the past we suck right now and we will suck in the future.
Paul in KY
I think it is pushpolling via newspapers/TV.
Grover Gardner
@SFAW: Of course it has something to do with the problem! Kotik is seen as Brown 2.0 and people want something different–because they sense that things aren’t going well here. Why do we even need to argue about this?
Oregonians don’t care what the “average” price of bacon or gas is. Gas is still well over $5/gal here. Food is more expensive (yes, there are supply chain issues specific to this part of the country), housing is scarce and expensive, homelessness is a serious problem, etc etc. These are actual *reasons* why Dems are in trouble here. I don’t know why you want to wave these things away.
Tony G
About half the people in the U.S. (in any country, I suppose) are about as dumb as a bag of hammers, and right-wing media exploits that fact. Furthermore, about 30% of the people in the U.S. are not only dumb but openly white-supremacist fascists. Hence, “we” get the government that “we” deserve.
eversor
@Tony G: white CHRISTIAN fascists, our issue has always been religion as much as race. Dodging that is suicide.
SFAW
@Grover Gardner: Kotek is “Brown 2.0”? OMFG! I’m amazed Oregon hasn’t fallen into the ocean.
Didn’t these morons learn anything from “going to the mat” for Nader and Sanders and Jill Stein?
Inflation sucks everywhere, worldwide. The only Dem “failure” is that they/we are not explaining it in terms the Unicorn Brigade can (or maybe chooses to) understand. Of course, there will always be some contingent that chooses NOT to understand, because it doesn’t fit their preconceptions that “both parties are the same” (but Dems are worse because they’re not giving us everything they said they wanted to do).
Jcnz
@Gary K: NOW you tell me!