It doesn't make sense to me. If it added up that white racism against blacks was a key factor in determining the election then I wouldn't have problem with it. I just don't see it. If you were to say that it was white racism towards mexicans than I could believe it more because that was part of Trump's platform and messaging.
-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
Democrats in the Wilderness
- Thread starter Unknown Soldier
- Start date
- Status
It doesn't make sense to me. If it added up that white racism against blacks was a key factor in determining the election then I wouldn't have problem with it. I just don't see it. If you were to say that it was white racism towards mexicans than I could believe it more because that was part of Trump's platform and messaging.
Yeah. They aren't doomed on the presidential level but the democrats do need to worry about their party on the local and state level. People will be looking for a more progressive option possibly 4 years for now once trump proves that he is a disaster. This election was possible the last election the republicans could rely on their current presidential coalition(their coalition from 2008 or earlier-now) to win an election.
Rigging elections in their favor won't save the GOP from the inevitable. Political parties can't govern forever. Were I live a political party was in power for 40+ years because of terrible and very weak opposition. Once the opposition became viable they got kicked out. The democrats may be down now but they are not out.
Auto_aim1
MeisaMcCaffrey
If they had won, the Dems would have been in power for the next 50 years. Instead they lost to a total political novice who didn't even have the full support of his party.
In one day, the narrative went from "Lol the GOP is dead" to "Dems have lost everything".
The actual battle was in four states and the DNC neglected those states. Can you believe it?
Steve Bannon is gonna gut the Democratic party now, and they have no one to blame but themselves. It was a fucking easy election to win.
Luckily, the demographics are still in their favour, so they can come back in 2020. Use Obamacare repeal as a vehicle for comeback.
In one day, the narrative went from "Lol the GOP is dead" to "Dems have lost everything".
The actual battle was in four states and the DNC neglected those states. Can you believe it?
Steve Bannon is gonna gut the Democratic party now, and they have no one to blame but themselves. It was a fucking easy election to win.
Luckily, the demographics are still in their favour, so they can come back in 2020. Use Obamacare repeal as a vehicle for comeback.
Lord Frieza
Member
The GOP won't hold the presidency for 40+ years.The US nationally is way to polarized to let a political party hold the presidency for that long.The opposition is also not as big as a joke in the US as the opposition was in Alberta Canada to the former government.The opposition was really tiny at times during that political party's reign.A political party can't even hold power on the national level in Canada for more than 15 years now40 years...man, I'll be dead by then
Man-is-Obsolete
Member
This is all very somber, but I still hope the silver lining in all of this is that it not only serves as a wake up call to the DNC but to the American people. Had Hilary won it would have been great but I still worry that obstructionist politics would still be played by the GOP and we would have another 4 years of minimal progress and further erosion of the lower to middle class which of course Dems would be blamed entirely.
Now the rug is about to be pulled out from under the lower and middle class by the GOP and maybe people will wake up and there will be Democrats in their districts ringing bells to gather those people. Guess we'll have see how the 2018 mid terms turn out.
Now the rug is about to be pulled out from under the lower and middle class by the GOP and maybe people will wake up and there will be Democrats in their districts ringing bells to gather those people. Guess we'll have see how the 2018 mid terms turn out.
If you watched the DNC debate earlier this week, you'd feel pretty good about whoever the next chair is making the needed reforms.
The bench can fill back up pretty quickly with the right people organizing and running the show and I think the next chair will be good to great.
The bench can fill back up pretty quickly with the right people organizing and running the show and I think the next chair will be good to great.
Polioliolio
Member
It's time we bring scientists back to the leadership of America. Who better to run the country than those practiced in the art of rational evidence based thinking?
(And no, not any of those republican doctors)
(And no, not any of those republican doctors)
michaelius
Banned
People learned that it doesn't work economically - and even if you get niced GDP growth it's usually just rich people getting even more while middle class is dying in USA and Europe.
Spuck-uk
Banned
Liberalism works very well economically..for the rich.
The age - and whiteness - of Democratic leadership is really the issue that stands out most to me. With the right person in charge, it's possible to get the left energized and passionate. Obama proves that. Bernie tapped into it, too, even if it wasn't universal, so it's not like it just went away. It's out there.
We need young faces out there. No Clintons, no Bidens, no Sanderses. They need to be diverse in sex and race and culture. They need to be a rallying point for the America that Republicans keep fucking over.
We need young faces out there. No Clintons, no Bidens, no Sanderses. They need to be diverse in sex and race and culture. They need to be a rallying point for the America that Republicans keep fucking over.
Funky Papa
FUNK-Y-PPA-4
Same reason Dukakis is still riding that tank. Not unlike a freshly squeezed shit, bad campaings not only stink: they also stick to their candidates.
See also: her boneheaded "deplorables" remark.
Any old, rich white lady who carries around a bottle of hot sauce in her purse is lady after my own heart. Reminds me of my abuela in Albuquerque.
airmangataosenai
Member
I still am annoyed Schumer got the leadership role despite how he so easily abandoned progressive policy over and over. I really feel nervous abput 2018 as I do not think they have learned anything in selecting someone like him.
After elections there is a tendency to see the losing party as a lost cause for a long time. Republicans certainly said similar things after 2012 and determined that they needed to appeal to minorities more effectively. They didn't do that at all, and if anything chose the most racist/sexist/xenophobic clown in decades and they still won.
Voters are fickle, and the more one party wins the more likely the other party will be to win as people tend to be upset with governance and choose to vote those in power out fairly often, which is why it's so rare for the presidency to stay within one party for more than 2 terms.
The idea that either of the major parties would be weak for decades seems to be misguided, and if anything I'd say the Democrats are in a better position for the future as demographic trends favor them in the long term.
They'll almost certainly lose in 2018, but after that I suspect they'll be fine.
Voters are fickle, and the more one party wins the more likely the other party will be to win as people tend to be upset with governance and choose to vote those in power out fairly often, which is why it's so rare for the presidency to stay within one party for more than 2 terms.
The idea that either of the major parties would be weak for decades seems to be misguided, and if anything I'd say the Democrats are in a better position for the future as demographic trends favor them in the long term.
They'll almost certainly lose in 2018, but after that I suspect they'll be fine.
Schumer is bought and paid for. Since NY is so blindly blue he has no fear of not getting re-elected.
LegendofJoe
Member
If this comes to pass and the GOP is able to call a constitutional convention to consolidate their power the country will break apart. The West Coast and New England will separate from the US.
Instead of slow and steady progress for all people, we're looking at slow and steady progress towards tyranny. Awesome. What a time to be alive.
They have been in crisis since 2010, they just didn't recognize it because Obama was popular with minority voters in 2012.
They have been in crisis since 2010, they just didn't recognize it because Obama was popular with minority voters in 2012.
I read this article yesterday and thought it was kind of shitty. The Democratic Party is in bad shape -- being shut out of the White House and both houses of Congress, with a minority of governorships and state legislatures to their name will do that -- but the author is so extremely hyperbolic in his dressing down of the party's structure and future that it's not just disingenuous, it's actively destructive.
Like, this paragraph near the end:
What fucking bullshit. There's no time to do any of this? How in the fucking world did he come to that conclusion? If there's no time to diagnose past problems and rectify them for the future, well, the DNC should just disband I suppose and cede full control of the U.S. government to the GOP for the next 50 years. Everybody stop voting for, campaigning for, or running as Democrats - there's just no time for it!
The DNC chair debate the other night seemed like a positive step forward; all of the candidates seem to understand the party's grassroots problems, and how to work on correcting them. The party knows where it has gone awry during the Obama years and is making a concerted effort to fix them. Will those fixes be done in time for 2020, much less 2018? Who knows. But this article is such a reactionary and apocalyptic piece that it's hard to take seriously.
I've said this many times before and will keep saying it: power changes in DC constantly. Prognostications like these rarely, if ever, hold true for the long term or even the medium term. 2004 was supposed to be the beginning of the permanent Republican majority, and Democrats swept control of Congress two years later and elected Obama two years after that. The Republican Party was supposed to be on its deathbed as recently as October of last year; now they have unified control of the government. After Romney's loss in 2012, the GOP diagnosed its party problems in a post-mortem report that, three years later, was not only ignored but the party's candidates -- and eventual nominee -- went in the complete opposite direction of what that autopsy called for, and won. In January 2005, Hillary Clinton and John Edwards were the frontrunners for the nomination; Barack Obama came onto the stage about 4-8 years earlier than expected and won in a landslide. In January 2013, the GOP was licking its wounds and the Dems believed Hillary Clinton would be the unchallenged heir apparent; three years later, Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders came out of nowhere to drum up unanticipated levels of momentum.
The Democratic Party isn't doomed any more than any previous party that was seen as doomed-but-then-not-really. There's a lot of work to be done, but it's very doable work that can yield positive changes in as little as two years. Get a grip and get to it.
Like, this paragraph near the end:
What fucking bullshit. There's no time to do any of this? How in the fucking world did he come to that conclusion? If there's no time to diagnose past problems and rectify them for the future, well, the DNC should just disband I suppose and cede full control of the U.S. government to the GOP for the next 50 years. Everybody stop voting for, campaigning for, or running as Democrats - there's just no time for it!
The DNC chair debate the other night seemed like a positive step forward; all of the candidates seem to understand the party's grassroots problems, and how to work on correcting them. The party knows where it has gone awry during the Obama years and is making a concerted effort to fix them. Will those fixes be done in time for 2020, much less 2018? Who knows. But this article is such a reactionary and apocalyptic piece that it's hard to take seriously.
I've said this many times before and will keep saying it: power changes in DC constantly. Prognostications like these rarely, if ever, hold true for the long term or even the medium term. 2004 was supposed to be the beginning of the permanent Republican majority, and Democrats swept control of Congress two years later and elected Obama two years after that. The Republican Party was supposed to be on its deathbed as recently as October of last year; now they have unified control of the government. After Romney's loss in 2012, the GOP diagnosed its party problems in a post-mortem report that, three years later, was not only ignored but the party's candidates -- and eventual nominee -- went in the complete opposite direction of what that autopsy called for, and won. In January 2005, Hillary Clinton and John Edwards were the frontrunners for the nomination; Barack Obama came onto the stage about 4-8 years earlier than expected and won in a landslide. In January 2013, the GOP was licking its wounds and the Dems believed Hillary Clinton would be the unchallenged heir apparent; three years later, Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders came out of nowhere to drum up unanticipated levels of momentum.
The Democratic Party isn't doomed any more than any previous party that was seen as doomed-but-then-not-really. There's a lot of work to be done, but it's very doable work that can yield positive changes in as little as two years. Get a grip and get to it.
Raven117
Gold Member
Thats just the Vox poll. Other Polls (like CNN) had Trump/Republicans in better shape handling the economy.
Regardless...If you look at just the "Rust belt." Clinton (and the rest of the Democrats) kept saying the economy is better...unemployment is down...the economy is better..Im the third term of Obama...
A lot of those blue collar folk just simply said..."Bull Shit its better" "you can't tell me its sunny when its raining outside" "Eff it, at least Trump came here saying he would fix it."
And they voted that way.
Mix in a few dog whistles...A few anti-establishment lines...and simply unlikeable Democrat candidate and badaboombadabing...Trump wins.
What he is saying that by 2018, the Democrats will not have enough time to make the inroads in state politics like the Republicans have...Governships...legislatures...etc. Further, the urgency that the 2018 Congress will be responsible for alot of redistricting for the next decade will make it more difficult for democrats to win
Regardless...If you look at just the "Rust belt." Clinton (and the rest of the Democrats) kept saying the economy is better...unemployment is down...the economy is better..Im the third term of Obama...
A lot of those blue collar folk just simply said..."Bull Shit its better" "you can't tell me its sunny when its raining outside" "Eff it, at least Trump came here saying he would fix it."
And they voted that way.
Mix in a few dog whistles...A few anti-establishment lines...and simply unlikeable Democrat candidate and badaboombadabing...Trump wins.
That's not really what he is getting at.
What he is saying that by 2018, the Democrats will not have enough time to make the inroads in state politics like the Republicans have...Governships...legislatures...etc. Further, the urgency that the 2018 Congress will be responsible for alot of redistricting for the next decade will make it more difficult for democrats to win
Hickbilly Deluxe
Banned
If they don't play their cards right, you bet your ass they will be. The GOP is set for two years to run rampant and get their shit passed. And if they are lucky, they may even get a second SCOTUS pick in those two years.
The democrats are now in Oh Shit territory, if things don't swing their way in 2018 they will be up shit creek without even being in the damn canoe. If they blow it in 2020 (which I can see them doing) they may as well disband and give up as they won't be winning shit after that.
So yes, they are in crisis mode. If they aren't, they deserve to get blown up in every election because stupidity like that deserves to be punished.
Why would the urgency for voting in 2018 make it more difficult for Democrats? Wouldn't that actually be a good motivational and organizing tool?
The Senate map looks tough for Dems, but they still stand to gain more seats in House and can really clean up on governors races this year and next; there are a lot of outgoing Republican governors, many in blue states, who can be giving their parties a tough go at a third term of Republican control. Trump is already deeply unpopular, and he and the GOP will have no Obama, Hillary, or Dems to blame for any problems that may arise in the next two years. Couple that responsibility with the trend of midterm elections typically favoring the party not in power, and I think Dems have a good at regaining a lot of ground in state seats in the next campaign cycle.
That seems like a ridiculous thing to say given that presidents have only once given their party a third consecutive term in the White House in the last 60 years. Unless 2024 ends up being a repeat of '88, where Dems put up a boring candidate against the successor of a very well-liked president, then that year looks way more winnable than 2020. It's hard to unseat an incumbent president but it's even harder for an outgoing president to keep the White House within their party afterward.
Raven117
Gold Member
From a National perspective, I think the Democrats are fine. for 2020.
The organization to effectively win and control state races is simply not in place yet.
All the dude was saying is that there is a sense of urgency. That's all. I agree there needs to be some FAST action at the state level for Democrats.
CraigerGamer
Member
Not that the Democratic party doesn't need to do some soul searching but please try and remember that the talking heads were saying the same thing about the Republicans after Obama won his 2nd term. They said the Republicans won't win another election in the next 10 years because they couldn't court African Americans or Hispanics. That the party had to reinvent itself to be more inclusive or they would be done as a political entity.
4 years later you see that instead of expanding their reach, the Republican Party doubled-down on its tea-party roots...and WON!
So, while its good for the Democrats to be analyzing where they went wrong, much of the rhetoric about being lost in the woods is just that, rhetoric.
4 years later you see that instead of expanding their reach, the Republican Party doubled-down on its tea-party roots...and WON!
So, while its good for the Democrats to be analyzing where they went wrong, much of the rhetoric about being lost in the woods is just that, rhetoric.
Couldn't agree more with this. Obviously, the Democrats have a lot of work to do, but let's not forgot that the party literally had a supermajority in the Senate less than 10 years ago. Nothing's permanent.
jack_package_200
Banned
Gotta love the smell of receipts in the morning.
Muppet of a Man
Member
This. Scientists and engineers should be running the country in today's world. Technology and invention are what most significantly improve society overall in this era. And humanity's overall prospects at this point.
Republicans are much more demanding that their politicians be at the extreme of their end of the political spectrum than Democrats are and they seem to be doing pretty well, so that doesn't really explain much.
I agree with this to a point. I'm in an engineering school program and a lot of them seem to be of the wacky libertarian type. Can't really figure out why that is.
We won the popular vote.
There are a lot of messes to clean up, to be absolutely sure, but we're on the right side of the issues (not just morally, in terms of polling) and on the right side of demographics. We lost because the majority is unfocused while the minority is desperate to cling to their power and status and throwing out all sorts of dirty tricks to keep us down.
Think about this: conservatives are literally dying off faster than they can be replaced. Their control looks stronger and deeper than it actually is, but tools like gerrymandering are designed to spread your power like an occupying army: where the Democrats would win, you cram them into ghettos to create super-blue districts, but many of these "safe" GOP districts still have a lot of Democrats in them, and all it takes is a few thousand people in a state-senate district, or a few ten-thousands of people in a federal congressional district, to turn things around. This creates something similar to the psychological bias that leads people to think that dictators are unreachably popular, when in reality their public support was very low and they were just spreading out their resources to make it look like they had strong nationwide support. That's where the GOP is right now: they get and deserve credit for playing the game better, for figuring out how to maximize the impact of their voters and minimize the impact of Democratic voters, but like Napoleon or Hitler, you have to spread your resources out pretty far to conquer all of that territory, and then suddenly something goes wrong and it all comes crashing down because you didn't really have the numbers to control that territory forever.
Or take a less wordy scenario: if everyone kept their presidential party vote the same in Wisconsin in 2020, Trump would lose, because enough of his 2016 voters would be dead (or so mentally degraded as to no longer be eligible voters) even assuming nobody new registers to vote in 4 years time, where the picture becomes bleaker still.
There are three paths forward for the GOP:
1) Use their massive buffer to start making changes towards appealing to young and minority voters right now. If they piss off the base, they can afford to take a few electoral hits because of how strong they are at the moment.
2) Try to make whites vote R at the same rate Hispanics vote D. If they can figure out how to get 75% of white people to vote Republican (up from, like, the low 60s right now), then they'll lock in an advantage until the middle of the century, but that means figuring out how to make inroads among otherwise-progressive urban whites.
3) Figure out how to disenfranchise more people faster.
He wasn't saying that, though. He said, literally, there was no time to do anything that the Democratic party has to do. Which is what I take issue with. It's needlessly, and harmfully, hyperbolic and partly detached from reality.
White supremacy undefeated since "Let there be light"
A good step forward for liberals is to realize that rural Americans don't like bring called obsolete, and come to the realization that they are absolutely vital on environmental issues -- making inroads with habitat and hunting groups like Ducks Unlimited is one way to make sure the GOP doesn't do something fucked like bringing back DDT. Similarly, there are lots of birders out there and not all of them are liberals, either. Go down the line, and there's going to be a special interest group that gets fucked by Trump. It happened under Bush and it's going to happen again.
America is only as good as its least fortunate people and places, and the only way to ensure liberty is to make sure it is being fought for in every corner of the country.
Media is supposed to inform, prediction was always a bad game for it to play.
HellforLeather
Member
If the DNC cant see how they got robbed of their title as the economic populist party, then they are dumber than they look and should disband.
Im not as defeatist as that. While we'll likely lose a couple seats in the senate, I imagine republicans, after 2 years of Trump, will lose a lot of seats in the house. They lose 24 out of 435 seats and dems have control, and impeachment always begins in the house.
On the state level too, im gonna do everything to toss out our republican governor on 2018. Rauner's not staying in my blue state if I can help it.
On the state level too, im gonna do everything to toss out our republican governor on 2018. Rauner's not staying in my blue state if I can help it.
#3 is easy. With the right judges in place they could disenfranchise minorities wholesale like Pence did in Indiana or just remove voting places.
Well, they have nobody else but themselves to blame. They become the ultimate Republican party. After a newcomer defeated the party champion in the primaries and became president, they stopped the support for the local and state races over time. This are the places, where the younger people and the new generation within the party usually start. This because they wanted that money for their own races and did not want to get challenged by some young people. It was bad enough that they had to call that young senator Mr. President, which was something they secretly agreed, they earned way more after so many years in Washington. This is also why they ignored him during the midterms and lost.
So they created a system where this would not happen anymore, the long term old oligarchy stopped first monetary and after that even support in manpower for those races. So if you want to start on local or state level for the democrats you are on your own now. This time nobody should stop their coronation and how they wanted to run the country and the party. So it was easy for people like Trump to make them look like the political establishment, because they were.
Of course they will blame Comey or Putin now, but the democrats have killed their own party and it is sad that old guys like Bernie or Biden have now to salvage that ship.
So they created a system where this would not happen anymore, the long term old oligarchy stopped first monetary and after that even support in manpower for those races. So if you want to start on local or state level for the democrats you are on your own now. This time nobody should stop their coronation and how they wanted to run the country and the party. So it was easy for people like Trump to make them look like the political establishment, because they were.
Of course they will blame Comey or Putin now, but the democrats have killed their own party and it is sad that old guys like Bernie or Biden have now to salvage that ship.
Agreed.
The polical maxim "It's never as good as it looks and it's never as bad as it looks" is spot on.
Dems were corrupt beyond belief to run a candidate both with all-time low ratings and the FBI on her case - the party will be godawful until they get rid of the carcass of the Hillary camp. How out of touch or in your pockets do you have to be to run such a toxic frontrunner. Beyond saving really.
Anyway Dems need to work hard again, and start back at the grassroots. Don't throw away traditional advertising or campaign rallies, and don't fundraise so much from the goddamn top .01% - Dem leadership must not realize we live in a kickstarter/gofundme time.
Anyway don't see much hope for the party considering its fractured leadership, not to mention the slim chances that Obama resumes fulltime DNC duty, or finding another Obama (who would just be bullied by the Debbie Schultzes of the party anyway)
Anyway Dems need to work hard again, and start back at the grassroots. Don't throw away traditional advertising or campaign rallies, and don't fundraise so much from the goddamn top .01% - Dem leadership must not realize we live in a kickstarter/gofundme time.
Anyway don't see much hope for the party considering its fractured leadership, not to mention the slim chances that Obama resumes fulltime DNC duty, or finding another Obama (who would just be bullied by the Debbie Schultzes of the party anyway)
BriareosGAF
Member
Those of us who lived through the Gingrich permanent conservative majority, and then the permanent liberal demographic majority, and now this, have trouble taking this discussion seriously. That said I see two major areas of emphasis moving forward:
- replace partisan districting with independent groups, or some other technocratic solution
- replace first past the post voting with ranked choice
Both of these are designed to introduce more fairness in the electoral process and hopefully reduce these weird episodes.
- replace partisan districting with independent groups, or some other technocratic solution
- replace first past the post voting with ranked choice
Both of these are designed to introduce more fairness in the electoral process and hopefully reduce these weird episodes.
Less crisis and more complete disrepair. Ellison gets it, thankfully.
Psamtik. Death's Demise
Banned
Once the next round of voting restrictions sails through, the Democrats will never again win the Presidency, and will never again hold a Congressional majority.
Look no further than Russia, where opposition parties are essentially extinct, to see where we're headed.
Look no further than Russia, where opposition parties are essentially extinct, to see where we're headed.
onadesertedisland
Member
Because Democrats ignore all but the pretty, flashy, big races. The problems are at the city/state level where republicans have taken over through gerrymandering. No new blood wants to run when they're going to be left hanging out to dry by the national party as the DNC doesn't run unless it is a lock.
- Status
Similar threads
- Locked