I was at the gym this morning and Fox News was going at Democrats hammer and tongs. Hakeem Jeffries had an interview during the segment, and in the portion I saw, he said the usual (good) stuff about how Democrats are going to push back, protect Medicare/Medicaid, etc. He also used the standard line that a lot of Democrats use about “extreme right-wing” in an effort to make a distinction between Republicans who are hard-core Trumpers and the imaginary others who might possibly vote for a Democrat. The Fox hosts followed that segment with the comments about Democrats in general being too woke, how we’re staggering after the huge defeat we just had, etc.
It’s just unilateral disarmament to manufacture some imagined distinction between far-right and reasonable Republicans when you appear on Fox (or anywhere else). I’ve long been inspired by Steve M’s take on Fox News trying to “other” Democrats, no matter how “moderate” or “centrist” we are. We are the fucking enemy to them, we’re bad people, and in their ideal world, we’d be exterminated. This is not hyperbole. Tom Homan has already called for a DoJ investigation of AOC because she informed people of their rights on her social media.
The Harris campaign made a huge deal about having Liz Cheney on our side. On everything but democracy, she’s as right wing as they get. The reaction of the Republican Party — as a bloc — was to disavow her and there were many threats of violence that came her way. Anyone paying attention knows that there’s no such thing as a “moderate” Republican: Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins voted for RFK Jr, for fuck’s sake.
If we are going to communicate the extent of the threat that the Republican Party presents to the US, we need to have some frank talk. An unelected billionaire and Trump’s cabinet of clowns are endangering lives daily. Elon Musk is going to kill people by cutting staff at the FAA. RFK Jr’s nutty anti-vaxx nonsense comes at a time when we might be facing a pandemic of bird flu and an outbreak of measles among kids in Texas. Trans people are being scapegoated. The list goes on and on. They’re all extremists. Call them that.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
Is that the message that will resonate with Fox News viewers?
We can walk and chew gum at the same time. And we can have different messages tailored for different audiences. (It doesn’t all have to be aimed at MM and like-minded well-informed partisans.)
Elizabelle
Another DEMOCRATS ARE DOING IT ALL WRONG post by MM.
No thank you.
@mistermix.bsky.social
@Formerly disgruntled in Oregon:
I think the right approach, as I explained in the post, is to highlight the really bad things that are happening because Fox News viewers do not hear that. I’ll bet you a fair amount of money that the story I linked about FAA firings was not carried on Fox. Ditto for some of the other King Elon stuff that’s happening.
trollhattan
Here’s an interview with Christopher Walken. Everybody loves Christopher Walken. Once saw a readerboard outside a Portland beauty parlor “Walkens Welcome” with his mug on it. A very Portland thing to see.
Geminid
@Elizabelle: Jeffries made no distinctions when he labeled the opposition as “extreme right wing Republicans.” He was stigmatizing the entire party. This so-called distinction is being manufactured.
@mistermix.bsky.social
@Geminid: He did not say “extreme right-wing Republicans” . He said “extreme right-wing MAGA” or something similar. (I looked but couldn’t find a clip.). He did not say Republican. Don’t misquote or make up a quote to make your point. And if you think I’m wrong, do some work and find a clip, because I couldn’t.
Bupalos
I vibe with mistermix a lot, but this kind of talk is just actively doing Trump’s work for him. Dems need to understand that we can’t fight the same way R’s do because their program relies on black and white division the same way terrorists do. Reducing the grey zone only works for them because it’s a strategy that can only produce destruction.
If “we” could develop our own Fox News, we’d be strengthening actual Fox News.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
Not having seen the piece, I can’t comment on “the distinction”.
But, it again bears saying what Steve Gilliard said 20 years ago now:
And that means repeating constantly “They’re extremists”, or whatever pithy phrase works. And being on Faux “News” isn’t about finding a conciliatory message for their masses. Replace “Instacracker” with “Faux News” and the idea is the same.
way2blue
Many Democrats have a knee-jerk need to be considered ‘reasonable adults’. It’s a vanity that needs to be retired to the trash bin. Yesterday.
Martin
You can’t nanny the country into it. For one, nobody knows what to believe because we’ve poisoned all communication channels, so you have that to overcome. You need to demonstrate what should be happening. Having agencies that nobody has ever heard of is its own failure of government. Say what you will about the cops and military – they know how to advertise what they do.
Pick government systems in the states that are working and advertise them. But democrats have allowed the GOP to turn class conflict into a culture war because Democrats can’t stop sucking up to their own billionaires. Tell me that wasn’t the moment when the Harris campaign went off the rails, when her working class message campaigning with Sean Fein gave way to campaigning with Liz Cheney when the campaign decided they needed more bundled dollars. She went from showing what workers can concretely achieve by organizing to talking about threats that were abstract. That frank talk likely cost us an election.
Melancholy Jaques
@way2blue:
That’s because many Democratic voters believe that their electeds have to be “reasonable adults” and open to working with Republicans and other political bromides that give us – well me anyway – agita.
Tote-baggers in particular because they have Republican friends, they live in the same neighborhoods, sit on the HOA boards, their children go to the same schools, etc. They seem to be oblivious to the fact their Republican “friends” view them as enemies
Too many Democrats continue to cling to the notion that we can use facts & reasoning to get white people to stop voting for white supremacy over all other considerations. Same with trying to convince people that do not believe women should have power to vote for a woman. Trump won twice, the second time convincingly. Democrats, please stop believing in the fantasy of reasonable people of good faith with differences on policies. Please.
Baud
If you read Trump’s social media posts, he rarely just says “liberal” or “Democrats.” There’s usually some adjective like “radical” or “extreme” attached to it.
Professor Bigfoot
Of course, Democrats are doing it wrong.
We know just how much value the Democrats would gain by calling out the Republicans for being the right-wing, neo-Confederate, segregationist party.
NONE. Because it’s a feature, not a bug. BUT it gives our “allies” something to complain about.
Starfish (she/her)
There are too many deplorables for this damn basket. How I long for only having a basketful of deplorables.
John S.
@Martin:
Truth. One of the first things Ken Martin said after getting elected as DNC chair was:
So yeah.
Starfish (she/her)
AOC committed the crime of knitting while recording one of her videos, and people lost their minds. Maybe Tom Homan can investigate knitting.
TBone
Today, I fell in love with my tiny, rural College town again. We have a very on again, off again, love hate relationship (rural red County surrounding mostly blue Bucknell town). Today I was a proud citizen in a crowd of true patriots! 🎶
Of all colors & stripes!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0CVLVaBECuc
@mistermix.bsky.social
@Baud: Consider this:
It’s not always radical Democrats, it’s Democrats, all of our electeds, we’re “shredding the Constitution”.
trollhattan
@Starfish (she/her): That tic-tic-tic noise is simply unacceptable.
TBone
@Starfish (she/her): she should knit a pocket for his wife to keep his balls in.
gene108
Republicans are mostly white people. There’s no fucking way in heaven or hell anyone can go on an media platform and say something that basically boils down to “look whitey, you guys are fucking up this country in ways that are going to skull fuck you silly for any future you, your kids, and grandkids want to have because you keep voting for immoral lying stupid revanchist assholes”.
Look at the shit Hillary Clinton took for the “basket of deplorables” comment in 2016. It’s because everyone understood the “basket” she was talking about is made up of white people.
I got no fucking clue how to cut through the storm of right-propaganda and reach people, but part of the problem is criticizing white people, ie Republican voters, is equivalent to insulting America.
Also, Democrats need to do better with white voters, if they want to change the politics of this country. The only way things change is if Democrats can maintain a strangle hold on power for over a decade.
WaterGirl
I agree with you mistermix, that anyone who is still proudly considering themselves Republican is extremely right-wing. The Republican part is extremely right-wing. There is no daylight.
Having said that, I think the way we phrase that depends on the audience. If we’re trying to reach the folks who did not see – even in the face of all evidence – that this is what they we’re voting for, then (no matter how true it is) not tarring all Republicans with the same right-wing brush increases the odds of at least some of them hearing us.
But yeah, let’s call it what it is when it’s a different audience.
We’re a big tent. We don’t all have to agree on this in order to pull together on the same side.
@mistermix.bsky.social
@Professor Bigfoot:
How would we know that? Democrats haven’t tried it. And, this is the time to make the point, since King Elon is rampaging through the Department of Education and trying to outlaw being black while attending college. (That’s almost not hyperbole, sadly.)
Again, my point here is that our time is better spent on any media platform injecting some hard, frank talk about the danger of the current coup. FAA is an example that I really think will resonate. Similarly, the insane notion that like 80% of Social Security is fraud. And so on.
Professor Bigfoot
@gene108: The thing is, the only way for Democrats to get more white voters is for Democrats to put civil rights at the very periphery of their policy prescriptions.
To get white people, we have to sell the rights of everyone else down the river.
John S.
@@mistermix.bsky.social:
Hakeem Jeffries typically refers to “extreme MAGA Republicans”. Here he is on Morning Joe a few months ago:
And as we now know, it’s the entire Republican Party jamming Project 2025 down our throats.
SleepyMonster
One approach is to attach the name to the behavior, not to individuals. You don’t even have to differentiate between R’s and D’s. Any representative, any senator, any person that’s not against these nominees, the destruction of our institutions, that’s a fascist. A Neo-nazi. An Orbanist. A totalitarian. Whichever you like.
We’ve learned this before. Anyone that thinks they can find middle ground with a fascist gets called a fascist. That might be hard learning for some of the expert negotiators we’ve elected, but it’s a known.
But also, voicing outrage at politicians isnt ‘bothering’ them. It’s giving them power. Options. That’s what politicians *do*. They *can’t* do anything except follow established norms *until* their public yells loud enough to convince them they have support to do something else.
Our politicians, anyway, who are actually politicians and not wannabe nobility.
Professor Bigfoot
@@mistermix.bsky.social: do you seriously expect white America to respond positively to a Black man essentially telling them they’ve elected white supremacist segregationists?
Did you notice the reaction when Obama mentioned the white cop “acting stupidly?”
For that matter, did you notice the white reaction to Obama AT ALL??
Geminid
@@mistermix.bsky.social: I decline your work assignment. I’ve heard Jeffries say “extreme MAGA Republicans” or “extreme right wing Republicans” plenty. So I don’t need no stinkin’ clip anymore than you do, which you evidently think you don’t even though you say I do.
And if you want to complain about me making up something, what about this:
You pulled that one out of thin air.
Belafon
The thing about the election is that there were two groups truly raising the alarm about the threat to Democracy, never-Trumpers and blacks. I guess the one thing they had in common was no one was listening to them.
Everything I kept hearing from the left tended to be her “not saying enough about my pet project.” Heck, she could talk about one project, but if she switched to another, then people were complaining that she was only paying lip service to everything.
No matter how much Harris, or some of us, raised the issue, people couldn’t seem to grasp that the end of democracy means the end of their favorite issue. And Republicans knew how to take advantage of it. They even crafted commercials that specifically targeted each side of an issue to divide Democrats.
I will never have trouble with her sitting with Cheney. The two women, standing or sitting together, knew what the actual problem coming was. I don’t buy that not having Cheney would have helped her, because as frustrating as farmers voting for the party that keeps hurting them is, Democrats who decide that both candidates are equal on their issue when there are parsecs between them are just as dangerous.
trollhattan
On today’s lunch menu, rilin’ Gyna.
Will allow as to Gyna getting butthurt, or pretending to be butthurt, with very modest provocation.
David Collier-Brown
NATO just got a very frank talk about the threat of the US, courtesy of Charlie Angus, a Canadian MP.
The whole article is at https://charlieangus.substack.com/p/on-yeats-trump-and-putin?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=2946092&post_id=157338276&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=l2c0u&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
Candians are polite, but we’re allowed to tell the truth. I’m not sure any Republicans are.
Butch
I will say that I’m surprised and disappointed by Jeffries.
LeftCoastYankee
FWIW that “I thought having two daddies was woke” sign in the picture makes me laugh.
Also I think volume (both in sound and quantity) is more important than precision in this fight. There’s no need for nattering about nuance when they’re breaking f*king everything.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
The problem is, while it’s an attention getting label and simple enough for our very, very stupid fellow citizens to understand, it really not true about them being Fascists, in some ways they are more like Anarchists or paranoid drug addicts. Not sure what to call them, but Fascist as a label has it’s limits. Still, make them deny the charge.
Professor Bigfoot
@David Collier-Brown: The United States is capable of putting a battallion of troops, with their equipment, virtually anywhere in the world within 72 hours… and then supply said troops with ice cream.
I said often that Hitler himself could only dream of the power and reach of the US military; we need to keep it out of the hands of this would-be dictator.
It’s only rational that the entire planet is worried about us right now.
WTFGhost
Some of the stuff I’m seeing is the work of Fox and Republicans with deliberate triumphalism that denies the possibility of any danger or wrongdoing.
It makes me wonder.
Elon Musk can do *anything*, and be pardoned.
He has no official post, so, unlike the Secretary of State, can’t be halted by the courts.
He is not an attorney, and will never face bar discipline.
Trump can do *anything*, and you can’t question anyone as soon as he says “it was an official action”.
Republicans only have to face the voters in two years, when, they think, the voters will have long forgotten, which, if it were *merely* chaos, they might have. They don’t seem to get how stupid they are to trust Trump.
Call me a crank, here’s what I think the big reveal at the end of the first season (which is *not* the first full year): Elon Musk has screwed up the payments, both AP and AR, and well, gosh, and golly, this unlawful action destroyed *trillions* of dollars of *bonds*, but, okay, we pardoned him. And now, the US national debt is *slashed*!
Trump, and Musk, are so stupid they don’t get that the reason that US bonds are the ultimate safe investment is THEY WILL NEVER DEFAULT EVER EVER EVER. People occasionally took a negative net interest rate, to have their money in US bonds, not something more dangerous.
Any failure to pay any debt at any time destroys that. And as Krugman points out, what everyone thinks will happen is “there will be a lot of squabbling, but everyone gets made whole, including interest,” and if so, *GREAT*. But that means *everyone gets made whole*.
I think Trump and Musk want to find a way to reduce debt unlawfully. If Putin put the idea in their heads, remember, *all* Republicans had to do was senators come back into session, and hold a real trial, and expel him on the 19th of Jan 2020, forbidding him from running, and then, when Pence refused to pardon him, let him rot for taking a massive dump on our Constitution.
Just that. Instead, Putin might have convinced Trump to unleash a financial (thank GOD) nuke.
John S.
@Professor Bigfoot:
Well, according to this research paper it was not very good:
Unfortunately, their conclusion didn’t fit with your thesis:
Of course this sentiment borders on parody around here, and I don’t have the ability to access the full paper to see how they reached their conclusions.
Bupalos
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: they whole point here is the battle is over first part of “they’re x” not the second part. Just like the incident of the Clinton deplorable/non deplorable baskets that lost us ‘16, the Republicans’s political task is to convince the country that liberals we make no distinctions among “them.” It’s literally their prime objective to reduce the grey zone.
Kay
@David Collier-Brown:
That’s amazing. Thanks.
MomSense
I think we have to peel off the people who are not hard core trumpers and I don’t think calling all of them extremists will help that effort. He’s got a high ceiling of 45-47%. We are fighting in the margins with a really difficult target voter.
There is the kind of messaging that is cathartic for those of us that are partisan Democrats. That messaging is not going to work with the people we need to persuade.
ChasM
I’m sorry, but there is only one way to stop this. Governors in blue States, Commonwealths and Republics have to understand that the Fed is no more, we are on our own, and act accordingly.
Prepare for shutdown when they can’t pass budgets next month, and assume it will never re-open.
After shutdown, they should immediately recall their house and senate delegations.
Second, the States need to simultaneously pass legislation requiring state employers shift 80% or so of employees taxes to their own Treasuries.
There is no point in negotiating any kind of deal when xitterdee and xitterdump will do whatever they wany anyway, so starve the Beast.
It’s our money and it’s not like the IRS is going to be functional soon.
Next, use that money to re-hire as many former federal workers as we can to rebuild. Not like everyone can’t work from home.
My friend brought up the whose got the nukes problem from the USSR breakup, but who the fuck has the nukes now?
California, Washington, Illinois, Wisconsin and New England basically fund the country anyway. Let the rest apply for foreign aid.
@mistermix.bsky.social
@David Collier-Brown: Charlie Angus is really good.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@MomSense:
Thank you – we’ll put.
Why does this concept seem so hard to grasp for so many here?
bbleh
As to (the perennial topic of) “messaging,” I think there’s very little risk in pounding on what the Republicans are doing WRONG.
— We just had the worst airplane accident in the US in 15 years — in DC no less — and Trump is FIRING AIR TRAFFIC CONTROLLERS.
— Chickens and other birds are dying by the millions from flu — and egg prices are soaring in response — and Trump is SCRUBBING FLU INFORMATION FROM GOVERNMENT WEBSITES.
— Almost 70 MILLION Americans are enrolled in Medicare, and Trump is FIRING THOUSANDS at the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
followed by accessible stories about individual people affected
And sure, the hardcore MAGAts will deny the facts, or yes-but until they pass out from the effort, but for everybody else — particularly more agnostic normies — it’s more weight on our side of the scale (and in some cases entirely new — and easily verifiable — information), and it’s entirely devoid of name-calling or characterization.
LAC
I agree and yet here we are relitigating things. I thought some of us were supppsed to move on while we find the right baby voice to use to get back the leopard party folks who are fighting the leopards eating their faces.
robtrim
Is it a surprise that a handful of billionaires and their millionaire cohorts in congress want to destroy, or control, the Federal bureaucracy and its countervailing powers?
January 6, 2021 was the white trash notion of revolution – 2025 is budding oligarchy’s knee-capping of democracy and its constitutional agent, the Federal bureaucracy. Presidents and congresses come and go. But, the bureaucracy is the backbone of our Republic. And of course the underlying motive, conscious or unconscious, is to ensure that white, Christian, wealthy Americans remain in control of the country.
Citizen Alan
@Professor Bigfoot: I disagree. We need to persuade enough whites that the MAGAs will come for whatever subset of “white” they belong to after the rest of us are done away with. I wonder how many overweight diabetic Trump voters may wake up when RFK bans Monjaro because if your normal fasting blood sugar is 400+, you simply deserve to die.
@mistermix.bsky.social
@bbleh: This is the way, and what I think we should do.
@Belafon: FWIW, My point in mentioning Cheney wasn’t to re-litigate the election, it was to point out that the minute Cheney, who’s right-wing on everything but democracy, moved away from the R Party, it didn’t make them “re think” anything. Instead, they couldn’t move fast enough to cast her out from the party and ignore everything she said about democracy. Because, they’re extremists.
hrprogressive
I have refused to differentiate between different ‘flavors’ of Republican, because as far as I’m concerned, anyone still keeping an (R) next to their name after the first Trump Term are “a-okay with Trumpism”, even if they aren’t “true believers”.
That a ton of self-styled disaffected / “Never Trump” GOPer’s didn’t actually switch their Party ID and/or who they caucused with and/or stopped voting in favor of Republican Agenda Items means that they’re okay with it.
It’s not “Cowardice”. I’m so fucking tired of Democrats and other liberals using this word.
This is who they are. All of them.
Start saying it, loudly, and repeatedly.
Citizen Alan
@John S.: The point he needs to be making is how even non-MAGA Republicans go along them because at best, they will be primaried and at worst, killed. Even the “good” Republicans are basically hostages for the radicals.
WTFGhost
@Formerly disgruntled in Oregon: Well, in my case, I’m brain damaged and neurodivergent, plus I’m always exhausted, And, I’m sorry, that wasn’t quite appropriate. I should delete it and start again, really and truly, because this happens to me *all* the time. “How often does the train go by?” Jake asks, Elwood reassures him “so often you won’t even notice it.”
So: I’ve learned to deflect those immediate feelings, and not let them fester. I’ve learned to forget who “wounded” me. I’ve learned that most of the time, I should just let it go, because I can’t explain why it hurts.
Now, I was, and remain, 99.99% sure you’re not talking about me (and I really don’t care if you are), but the question at the end really soured my mood, and, yes, I’m oversensitive. *WAY* oversensitive.
So, I’ll just say “let’s try to cheer the home team, or offer cheerful, hopeful, encouragement toward our point of view.”
Listen: I don’t think of you as having crashed my mood or even harshed my mellow, just… well, I guess the best way to put it is: I’m someone hoping, I’m offering hopeful encouragement toward my point of view, while still cheering the home team. Um. Is it working?
HopefullyNotcassandra
@Melancholy Jaques:
This man did not earn 50% of our vote. He came closer, true. Nonetheless, he did not earn a convincing win.
Ksmiami
Republicans are fascist, Neo confederate traitors. They simply need to be destroyed.
the only good Nazi is six feet under.
Ksmiami
@ChasM: exactly right. Break up this nation. It doesn’t fucking work
Baud
@@mistermix.bsky.social:
I didn’t say always. I’m pretty sure we sometimes say Republicans.
gene108
@Professor Bigfoot:
I’m fully aware of this. Unfortunately with the radical right in charge we can’t take any existing civil rights laws for granted.
If they get abandoned now, they’ll be gone for decades.
Sure Lurkalot
@Citizen Alan:
Golden oldie from March 2020, regarding sacrificing the olds for Trump’s economy:
I will never underestimate Republicans willingness to put everything on the line…their health, their livelihoods, their children, their life…to never, ever consider voting for a Democrat.
pajaro
I feel bad about being the bearer of bad news. Democrats lost the last election, and they lost it because more people voted for Republicans. Also, and relatedly, they lost the US House and Senate. In order to be on the winning side of any vote in the legislature, they are therefore going to need to appeal to representatives who are Republicans, and one way to do that is to convince voters who voted Republican and now regret it to talk to their Representatives. When they talk to Republicans in the legislature, they will need to get them to make common cause, at least on one vote. When they go out for votes in 2025 in Va. and NJ, and in 2026 in the rest of the Country, they are also going to want to convince people who might have supported Republicans that they have been lied to, and to change their votes.
I do not believe that, in expanding the number of votes we get, that there is an either-or choice between seeking to motivate voters who might be democrats and stayed at home, and voters who voted for the other team. We can seek votes from both groups and not talk out of both sides of our mouths when we do.
BellaPea
The comment about the fact that Rs view us as enemies to be wiped out reminded me of an encounter we had at the Atlanta airport last night. Our plane was delayed and a small group of us were talking about travel, family, etc. when 9/11 came up. I mentioned that my husband had gotten an upgrade to a suite at the Waldorf during business travel after that event, and a man in the group (he had hitherto been very pleasant) snorted and said “I wonder that they had the room with all of the immigrants that the house there!”
We didn’t respond to that and later my husband was talking about the international energy project he’s been working on for years (ITER) and said it was taking much longer than expected and this guy again spoke up and said “They need to call Elon.” The conversation pretty much died after that, but I finally figured it out. He was assuming we would automatically agree with him, trying to see if we were part of the tribe or the enemy. They can’t stand not to interject their own stupid politics into any discussion.
WTFGhost
@Ksmiami: When we took over Iraq, we acted like the only Baathist was six feet under, and they were powerless, and should be scattered to the winds.
Problem was, they were the only ones who knew how the government *ran*. You needed to let people who used to be mid-level Baathists renounce their former ideology, reward them for loyalty and summarily execute them if necessary (which I know is a question begging word: when is it “necessary”?)
I may have the names (“Baathist?”) wrong, but that’s the basics. Oh, yes, and then, they filled government jobs with Republican loyalists WITHOUT regard for whether they were qualified. Which they’ve just done to America.
Well, let’s pretend we’re the good guys (I assume we are, can’t see how we could be wrong, but, hey…). Pretend we win. Pretend Trump is on the “throne” and, like a bible death of old, displays “the dirt” inside. Somehow, someway, we’ve gotten line of succession straightened out, and a good person is in office.
You have to get all of the high ranking bad guys – and I did say “bad” guys, did more than just be Republican until their stomach turned.
Then you need to have amnesty for those who renounce their old ways, but you’re careful not to trust them. Still: you want them having nice-enough jobs so their children see you were merciful.
My opinion
Matt McIrvin
@trollhattan: Guess what!!! I’ve got a fever… and the only prescription… is more Christopher Walken!!!
Ksmiami
@WTFGhost: you pretty much described the us Marshall plan as how we applied it to Germany and Japan circa 1945-53. We need to utterly defang and destroy the GOP for America to live.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@BellaPea:
I found something else from Steve Gilliard that he wrote in 2003:
He nailed so much all those years ago…unfortunately.
John S.
@Sure Lurkalot:
This is the real issue. Anyone who still considers themselves a Republican is pretty much a lost cause in this era of tribalism and social media algorithmic bubble living.
You might as well ask a Chevy person to consider buying a Ford truck.
Matt McIrvin
@Sure Lurkalot: I remember that in the early days of the pandemic, long before there was a vaccine, there was this idea that maybe getting COVID would confer durable immunity (nope, but it wasn’t widely known at the time), and there was this whole coterie of right-wing people on Twitter who were preoccupied with the idea of deliberately infecting some group of young, healthy people with the disease, maybe by injecting them with live virus, so that after their recovery they would be an immune workforce. This was the idea they naturally gravitated to. There was some kind of sadistic, theatrical impulse that it appealed to.
And, you know, it’s only a few millimeters away from the idea of mass vaccination, but, no, actual mass vaccination didn’t appeal in the same way, in fact the right decided to scaremonger about it. It didn’t have that element of mortal human sacrifice (well, they pretended it did).
Martin
@Citizen Alan: You cannot persuade them, because you are talking economic issues and they are talking cultural ones. We pay for culture all the time – more expensive eggs is the cost of having cultural power. You cannot talk people out of smoking for health reasons if smoking is part of their identity.
You cannot talk Republicans out of their political motives by using the motives of Democrats. The GOP is 4 decades into a culture war. Why would you think they would care about democracy, about collective agreement when they declare half of voters to be invalid Americans? You have to tackle that underlying view first, and Democrats have ceded an awful lot of that ground.
The thing that seemed to be working was shifting the narrative away from their economic problems being the fault of immigrants to their economic problems being the fault of billionaires by empowering workers. Democrats keep letting themselves get yanked off of that.
It’s why I so strongly support AOC – she is fantastic at message discipline there. She doesn’t go after ‘extreme MAGA’ because that risks accusing the very voters you are trying to convince as being the problem. It’s why ‘deplorables’ wound up being a moniker that Republican voters proudly embraced and sought to live up to.
Martin
I think that was a simple case of ‘your idea sucks, but my identical idea is great because it’s my idea’.
The GOP wasn’t anti-science so much as they were against blue-state governors setting the national policy because Trump had shut down any federal effort to actually set policy. They opposed vaccination not because they oppose vaccination, but because they oppose Democratic leadership.
Professor Bigfoot
I love the idea; but if you think the majority of white Americans have internalized of Pastor Neimöller…
Eventually even they will be directly harmed by the regime, but by then it will be far to late for the rest of us.
Professor Bigfoot
@gene108: I believe that if we abandon ANYONE, eventually they will take EVERYONE who is not them.
The mechanisms they create to oppress trans folk will be used on the next target of the regime, only more efficiently.
cain
@trollhattan:
We need to do a Portland balloon-juice meetup.
MomSense
@Formerly disgruntled in Oregon:
The divide seems to be people who talk to voters during campaigns and people who don’t.
Melancholy Jaques
@Formerly disgruntled in Oregon:
Because your argument is that the thing that Republicans do to win over & over is something we Democrats should never ever try.
kindness
The current MSM is never going to portray Democrats as we see ourselves. This MSM is wedded to Republican framing of every issue and every question. So any Democratic answer will sound like gobblytygook. If we think better messaging is the answer, look at the medium you are using.
Melancholy Jaques
@HopefullyNotcassandra:
He got three million more votes after he tried to overthrow the government than he did before he tried to overthrow the government. His violent attack made him more popular. As they say on social media, let that sink in.
I understand that it’s painful to admit that a corrupt, lying bigot convicted of financial fraud is more popular than competent people trying their best to help everyone, but the fact is that he is.
Bupalos
I’d say it’s because a primary activity here is catharthis and internet bonding over polarized speech. “We want to brainwash people into simpleminded reactionary thought processes just in reverse!” is the kind of thought that only can happen on the internet. We can’t do that because you can’t do post-truth authoritarianism in reverse through copying them and adding one weird trick. You have to just figure out how to make people see reality, not how to warp it the other way.
Bupalos
@John S.: Things change all the time. Political identities can and do melt in (historically speaking) the blink of an eye.
strange visitor (from another planet)
@Melancholy Jaques: that can be accounted for by population growth. they had enough time to mold MAGA youth and eight years for them to become of age.
the mystery to me is all the missing democratic votes.
dww44
@Melancholy Jaques: shuda seen that interview of Bill Clinton by Cory Booker on CSPAN Book TV this weekend. About Clinton’s new book. Booker at one point said that he’s done some of his best work in the Senate with Ted Cruz and Later messy Graham because he keeps his door open for Republicans., I swear I think that elected Democrats are misreading the mood of the Democratic base.
Bupalos
@gene108: “selling people down the river” does not actually ‘get’ white people at all. And “getting white people” didn’t prove to be our proximal identity problem in 2024. We got slightly more white people. Slightly fewer black people. And a lot less Hispanics.
Here’s one of our core problems attracting voters – many of them believe we view the world in ethnically and socially divided terms of who we as a party prioritize helping. We don’t make use of our own “rising tide lifts all boats” narratives and don’t talk about freedom as a collective good. We attack Trump’s version, and we do it in these terms of “but that will be especially hurtful to x group!” We’re seen by the kind of marginal voters that we are shedding as a party that is only concerned about American prosperity by way of “special interest groups” that are being prioritized over them. This dynamic works in almost every demographic. This black man think we prioritize trans people over him. That Hispanic thinks we prioritize new refugee immigrants over her. This is how Trump can implausibly pull off “She’s concerned about they/them, Trump is concerned about YOU.” The miraculous thing is that we’re so deep in this rhetorical hole that this maneuver can work with people that Trump is in many contexts actively and openly hurting.
TurnItOffAndOnAgain
There’s nothing useful in reacting or calling arms against problems that aren’t real, or at best exaggerated.
Ebony
So the consensus here is that the Democratic party needs to be careful of the delicate feelings of the Republicans, because otherwise they will lose votes. If that is the case, then it is ok for me to refuse to support anyone who mock people who never been in a relationship, people who look down on people who never been in a relationship, or think people who never been in a relationship are less than human. In fact, I’m going to stop giving my sister and her lazy husband money. If they are so great since they are married, then they don’t need my loser money.