I completely disagree with this “let’s be wishy-washy, middle of the road” approach. I think we need to be bravely progressive, and in particular to support those who are being targeted by the Republicans in leadership right now. Yes, we need to create a big tent, but we don’t need to throw selected groups under the bus to get there.
I completely disagree with this “let’s be wishy-washy, middle of the road” approach. I think we need to be bravely progressive, and in particular to support those who are being targeted by the Republicans in leadership right now. Yes, we need to create a big tent, but we don’t need to throw selected groups under the bus to get there.
I feel that what we need is someone that breaks out with a real vision. Trustworthiness and a backbone. I think it’s pretty crazy that they think they are gonna lock us down in a pay to play Christian hellscape. F that. Not on my watch.
Voters (at least the voters who change their minds and swing elections) don’t vote on policy issues. They vote on vibes.
Full stop.
Candidates need to be authentic…better to be authentic & to the left of your voters than be like Harris or HRC & have a good policy match to voters but be perceived as fake.
Yes Suzanne! While it is often said that winning parties legislate, it is clear that this paradigm of national politics is seriously perverted. A more accurate picture of American politics is a state such as Arizona who just swept the top executive and judicial posts of governance, and rejected trumpism and rightwing nationalism. Our diversity better reflects the national demographic than West Virginia and Montana. While our state houses still reflect local needs, they actually reflect the districting based on political ideology of the single party dominance over several election cycles. Our representation of people should be determined on zones of economic influence and we will see people electing, or unelecting if you may, the people whose personal interests define their legislative agendas.
I would like to ask Laura Egan SPECIFICALLY, which causes favored by Democrats she would have us not mention.
Is it the abandonment of those asylum seekers who, without proof, have been kidnapped and sent to a hellhole in El Salvador because "the border" polls well?
Is it the obvious acceptance of bribery by crooks foreign and domestic wishng to do business with the United States government?
Is it the decimation of useful functions of the government in the name of ending "fraud, waste, and abuse" in government? I would note here that waste is a subjective matter, abuse has no real meaning, and fraud is a crime. If fraud has been committed, WHERE ARE THE INDICTMENTS? The people who have lost their jobs are not fraudsters, but the bitcoin-pushing bloodsuckers may very well be. Should we not mention this because Musk had some popularity?T
Maybe it's the participation of trans athletes in women's sports. I actually think there is some validity to the idea that this might be unfair in some cases. But would stopping support for it stop Republicans from talking about it? See "defund the police" which maybe half a dozen dems ran on in 2020 but was still a potent weapon for the GOP .
in 2024!
Donald Trump does many things that poll extremely poorly. But he does them anyway. And pays not enough political price for it. Because he's seen as bold, not timid.
In every case, Egan seems to favor bowing to the Trump line as pushed by Fox and the rest of right-wing media. Whatever Fox says is what the American people want and we just need to accept that fact.
We need people who fight, not people who obsess about polls.
To expand further on this, we can see splits in MAGA now. Laura Loomer is deeply disappointed in Trump’s acceptance of a bribe in the form of a Qatari jet. Of course she opposes it for Islamophobic reasons but she isn’t wrong that this deal stinks to high heaven as corruption.
Instead of trying to pound wedges into the R’s rotten coalition, why is the Bulwark spending so much time pounding wedges into ours??
The very fact that Manchin won elections in West Virginia, and Tester being able to last until 2024. Both way outperformed the Dems at the top of the ticket.
If you want to talk about those who are still in office, there's Ruben Gallego.
Montana had 2 Dem Senators and a Dem governor as recently as 2014. It’s historically been a pretty purple state. An influx of right wing voters escaping CA, WA & other places has pushed it far to the right.
Tester didn’t change policy positions in a meaningful way over his 3 terms, the state moved around him.
Beshear deviates from the party on certain issues such as on gun control and let's not forget that he's a nepo baby and is likely only governor because of his last name.
AOC only outperformed Kamala because the Dem collapse was especially bad in NYC and AOC has exceptional constituent services and retail politics skills. Other Squad members underperform and badly.
“Retail politics skills”—stop right there. THAT is the whole enchilada. All this talk of “needing to moderate” is just hot air. People respond to the candidates. Reagan beat Carter and Mondale, Clinton beat GHW Bush and Dole, and Obama beat McCain and Romney because of the charisma gap. Political junkies shudder to acknowledge that it’s just that basic for most voters 🤷🏻♀️.
And would you care to name those “certain issue”? Are you saying we should run Mike Johnson candidates to appeal to the base nature of the politics of theocracy? Please stop the code speak and tell me what you mean to say.
Immigration, trans, gun control, crime, and in some locales, abortion.
And yes, directionally speaking. The Dems should run pro-democracy candidates with politics tuned to the constituency that they're running for. This means running tough-on-border candidates in AZ, TX, etc. This means running anti-gun control candidates in areas where gun ownership is high. This means tough-on-crime mayors. And it means running presidential candidates with politics tuned to the preferences of (and ideally from) the Rust Belt and Sun Belt. When the Dems had large majorities in the House and Senate, how did they do it? They had a lot of Joe Manchin types. They had people like Mark Pryor, Blanche Lincoln, Heidi Heitkamp, etc. in addition to Manchin and Tester.
I live in Arizona and the immigration issues were only a crisis in people’s minds in states that did not have borders with Mexico. What people have wanted on a national basis aligns with seriously reforming our immigration system. This is not what the MAGAs want. They have found electoral solidarity in the southern states whose theocratic culture does not sit well with diversity of our nation. It is not just trans, or immigration, it is white nationalism, and I would rather see it burn than relent.
Oh really? Then why did Gallego run so many ads about how tough he'd be on the border? And MAGA wouldn't be a national problem if it were just the southern states. This "white nationalist" movement also sure has a whole lot of non-whites supporting it as well (in fact, his margin of victory this time was provided by working-class non-whites, mostly Latinos), so I think there's more to it than that.
Because in the absence of meaning legislation border politics are the McGuffin of contemporary issues. Conservatives always demonize progress, meaningful or otherwise. There really isn’t more to the issue than that. They are not eating out dogs, eating our cats, eating our pets.
Because this time it’s not just progressives showing up.
I don’t think AOC or Bernie can win a national election (yet), but this need “moderates” have to stifle and dismiss them when they have not been any more successful has got to stop. A healthy democracy needs a range of viewpoints to be respected and represented.
I mean, I agree, they've been the only ones providing the necessary fight, and that's likely not independent from their ideology, as those who are more ideologically further from the center tend to also be temperamentally more combative due to shared traits underlying both. That said, it's very possible (and desirable, as Sarah often discusses) to be moderate and aggressive at the same time, and it is this combo that will win.
I agree it’s possible, but the problem is that it isn’t happening, and there is a reason for that: Imagine Joe Manchin was still in office. Going on an anti-Trump crusade would have killed him in West Virginia.
Now I personally think he should be willing to take the hit in this hypothetical scenario, but that’s not reality.
There is no one set of policies that make a candidate “moderate.” Moderates are moderates because of their eagerness to compromise and work across the aisle. Elissa Slotkin isn’t actually substantially different than AOC, if you were to do a side-by-side of their policy positions. But strategically, she is going for the compromise approach, and it’s the wrong way to go at this time.
I would like to see more moderates wake up and understand what’s at stake, and that they can’t compromise on fascism, but compromising on fascism is unfortunately exactly what I am seeing from them. Cory Booker was great; I was hoping more moderates would follow his example. But it appears to be a one-off, sadly. I don’t expect moderate Dems to budge until trumps popularity takes a nosedive, which is a shame, because if they were smart they would be CAUSING his popularity to nosedive.
I completely disagree with this “let’s be wishy-washy, middle of the road” approach. I think we need to be bravely progressive, and in particular to support those who are being targeted by the Republicans in leadership right now. Yes, we need to create a big tent, but we don’t need to throw selected groups under the bus to get there.
I feel that what we need is someone that breaks out with a real vision. Trustworthiness and a backbone. I think it’s pretty crazy that they think they are gonna lock us down in a pay to play Christian hellscape. F that. Not on my watch.
Voters (at least the voters who change their minds and swing elections) don’t vote on policy issues. They vote on vibes.
Full stop.
Candidates need to be authentic…better to be authentic & to the left of your voters than be like Harris or HRC & have a good policy match to voters but be perceived as fake.
Nailed it
Yes Suzanne! While it is often said that winning parties legislate, it is clear that this paradigm of national politics is seriously perverted. A more accurate picture of American politics is a state such as Arizona who just swept the top executive and judicial posts of governance, and rejected trumpism and rightwing nationalism. Our diversity better reflects the national demographic than West Virginia and Montana. While our state houses still reflect local needs, they actually reflect the districting based on political ideology of the single party dominance over several election cycles. Our representation of people should be determined on zones of economic influence and we will see people electing, or unelecting if you may, the people whose personal interests define their legislative agendas.
Then why is it that the best electoral performers in Democratic politics were Tester and Manchin?
By what measure were they the best performers in Democratic politics? Neither one is in office any more.
I would like to ask Laura Egan SPECIFICALLY, which causes favored by Democrats she would have us not mention.
Is it the abandonment of those asylum seekers who, without proof, have been kidnapped and sent to a hellhole in El Salvador because "the border" polls well?
Is it the obvious acceptance of bribery by crooks foreign and domestic wishng to do business with the United States government?
Is it the decimation of useful functions of the government in the name of ending "fraud, waste, and abuse" in government? I would note here that waste is a subjective matter, abuse has no real meaning, and fraud is a crime. If fraud has been committed, WHERE ARE THE INDICTMENTS? The people who have lost their jobs are not fraudsters, but the bitcoin-pushing bloodsuckers may very well be. Should we not mention this because Musk had some popularity?T
Maybe it's the participation of trans athletes in women's sports. I actually think there is some validity to the idea that this might be unfair in some cases. But would stopping support for it stop Republicans from talking about it? See "defund the police" which maybe half a dozen dems ran on in 2020 but was still a potent weapon for the GOP .
in 2024!
Donald Trump does many things that poll extremely poorly. But he does them anyway. And pays not enough political price for it. Because he's seen as bold, not timid.
In every case, Egan seems to favor bowing to the Trump line as pushed by Fox and the rest of right-wing media. Whatever Fox says is what the American people want and we just need to accept that fact.
We need people who fight, not people who obsess about polls.
Wow! One of the ten likes I got to the above is from someone going by the name "Hillary Clinton". Could this possibly be Hillary Rodham Clinton?
To expand further on this, we can see splits in MAGA now. Laura Loomer is deeply disappointed in Trump’s acceptance of a bribe in the form of a Qatari jet. Of course she opposes it for Islamophobic reasons but she isn’t wrong that this deal stinks to high heaven as corruption.
Instead of trying to pound wedges into the R’s rotten coalition, why is the Bulwark spending so much time pounding wedges into ours??
The very fact that Manchin won elections in West Virginia, and Tester being able to last until 2024. Both way outperformed the Dems at the top of the ticket.
If you want to talk about those who are still in office, there's Ruben Gallego.
Montana had 2 Dem Senators and a Dem governor as recently as 2014. It’s historically been a pretty purple state. An influx of right wing voters escaping CA, WA & other places has pushed it far to the right.
Tester didn’t change policy positions in a meaningful way over his 3 terms, the state moved around him.
EEEEUUUUUUUWWWWW!!!
AOC also out performed Harris. So did other progressives. You can't compare a race in Montana to the nation.
For every Manchin there is an Andy Beshear, who won in Kentucky while being progressive.
Voters, especially independents, are not looking for the perfect midpoint between the parties.
Beshear deviates from the party on certain issues such as on gun control and let's not forget that he's a nepo baby and is likely only governor because of his last name.
AOC only outperformed Kamala because the Dem collapse was especially bad in NYC and AOC has exceptional constituent services and retail politics skills. Other Squad members underperform and badly.
“Retail politics skills”—stop right there. THAT is the whole enchilada. All this talk of “needing to moderate” is just hot air. People respond to the candidates. Reagan beat Carter and Mondale, Clinton beat GHW Bush and Dole, and Obama beat McCain and Romney because of the charisma gap. Political junkies shudder to acknowledge that it’s just that basic for most voters 🤷🏻♀️.
And would you care to name those “certain issue”? Are you saying we should run Mike Johnson candidates to appeal to the base nature of the politics of theocracy? Please stop the code speak and tell me what you mean to say.
Immigration, trans, gun control, crime, and in some locales, abortion.
And yes, directionally speaking. The Dems should run pro-democracy candidates with politics tuned to the constituency that they're running for. This means running tough-on-border candidates in AZ, TX, etc. This means running anti-gun control candidates in areas where gun ownership is high. This means tough-on-crime mayors. And it means running presidential candidates with politics tuned to the preferences of (and ideally from) the Rust Belt and Sun Belt. When the Dems had large majorities in the House and Senate, how did they do it? They had a lot of Joe Manchin types. They had people like Mark Pryor, Blanche Lincoln, Heidi Heitkamp, etc. in addition to Manchin and Tester.
I live in Arizona and the immigration issues were only a crisis in people’s minds in states that did not have borders with Mexico. What people have wanted on a national basis aligns with seriously reforming our immigration system. This is not what the MAGAs want. They have found electoral solidarity in the southern states whose theocratic culture does not sit well with diversity of our nation. It is not just trans, or immigration, it is white nationalism, and I would rather see it burn than relent.
Oh really? Then why did Gallego run so many ads about how tough he'd be on the border? And MAGA wouldn't be a national problem if it were just the southern states. This "white nationalist" movement also sure has a whole lot of non-whites supporting it as well (in fact, his margin of victory this time was provided by working-class non-whites, mostly Latinos), so I think there's more to it than that.
Because in the absence of meaning legislation border politics are the McGuffin of contemporary issues. Conservatives always demonize progress, meaningful or otherwise. There really isn’t more to the issue than that. They are not eating out dogs, eating our cats, eating our pets.
Yes that’s why she and Bernie are drawing enormous crowds in red states. Because she is an underperformer that nobody likes.
Bernie drew huge crowds in all of his campaign rallies in the 2016 primary, but who ended up winning that primary? (Same goes for 2020, btw.)
Because this time it’s not just progressives showing up.
I don’t think AOC or Bernie can win a national election (yet), but this need “moderates” have to stifle and dismiss them when they have not been any more successful has got to stop. A healthy democracy needs a range of viewpoints to be respected and represented.
I mean, I agree, they've been the only ones providing the necessary fight, and that's likely not independent from their ideology, as those who are more ideologically further from the center tend to also be temperamentally more combative due to shared traits underlying both. That said, it's very possible (and desirable, as Sarah often discusses) to be moderate and aggressive at the same time, and it is this combo that will win.
I agree it’s possible, but the problem is that it isn’t happening, and there is a reason for that: Imagine Joe Manchin was still in office. Going on an anti-Trump crusade would have killed him in West Virginia.
Now I personally think he should be willing to take the hit in this hypothetical scenario, but that’s not reality.
There is no one set of policies that make a candidate “moderate.” Moderates are moderates because of their eagerness to compromise and work across the aisle. Elissa Slotkin isn’t actually substantially different than AOC, if you were to do a side-by-side of their policy positions. But strategically, she is going for the compromise approach, and it’s the wrong way to go at this time.
I would like to see more moderates wake up and understand what’s at stake, and that they can’t compromise on fascism, but compromising on fascism is unfortunately exactly what I am seeing from them. Cory Booker was great; I was hoping more moderates would follow his example. But it appears to be a one-off, sadly. I don’t expect moderate Dems to budge until trumps popularity takes a nosedive, which is a shame, because if they were smart they would be CAUSING his popularity to nosedive.
Well said, Suzanne. Thank you.