The problem for Democrats is that they have won all of the major battles. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, ACA, gay rights, civil rights, women' rights, awareness of environmental issues, ending the Vietnam War. We won them all! Trump's not going to touch any of these.
Now Democrats have no major battles to fight. So, they come up with trivial ones that don't resonate with the public. They go after police, they go after people who don't want their daughters competing in sports against biological males, they go after a war half way across the world that America isn't sending soldiers to, they go after peoples' pickups and tell them to get an EV instead or they are sinners.
And they end up looking flat and silly.
The country, folks, is a Democratic country. Not a Republican one.
And it is white baby boomers and Francis Perkins who were in that fight that we won.
Yet, one of the major foci of progressives' ire is now white males, the very people who were largely responsible for many of these changes/improvements.
And instead of looking at themselves and their failures, "progressives" are now just talking louder.
"ending the Vietnam War"? History quiz: Who said "I'm not going to send American boys 10,000 miles from home to fight in an Asian war!" Hint: His initials were LBJ.
Yes, but to the extent that Trump manages to scrap the wins Democrats had that you list, there will be a restoration agenda. Even just an agenda of not making as much noise as Trump did might be a winner. Wouldn't it be nice to open a newspaper and not see the president, whoever it is, on the first page?
My point is that Democrats are struggling because they have nothing left of substance to fight for. So they substitute minor issues that don't resonate.
Maybe the Democrats should be "conservative" for a while unless you have some big substantive idea they should propose. It is clear that the deficit in 2028 will be so large that a major new program probably is impossible. Maybe what is needed is a few decades of slow recovery from the current national disaster. Maybe that is the only thing possible.
Well, ok, but could someone tell me what change the people want? If it was to limit immigration and kill DEI, Environmental Justice and Transsexuals in girls sports, they got what they wanted and I don't think it would be wise for Democrats to try to mess with those "accomplishments," although fair immigration laws will eventually be necessary. I have a lot of ideas of what I want, but I'm sure those things are unpopular and would only sink the ticket. What do you think "the people" want?
I approach this as a psychologist. And one of the main dimensions I see happening is that the American public, in general, doesn't want change. They want the way things were in the good old days. This is why MAGA meant so much to them. Go back to when America was "great."
We have been going through rapid change in everything. Health care? Nothing like it was 20 years ago. Jobs? You name it.
this doesn't mean people want to return to Jim Crow. Or to women being destined to stay at home. But there is a feeling of "calmness" and "control" that people can remember from their youth.
How about getting a meal on an air flight? You used to have space for your legs.
Trump's most popular moves have been to return to those "olden days of your." Even his stupid tariffs idea is an attempt to do that.
They don't want EVs. They want their pick-me-ups!
They want girls' sports back, which is one of the biggest accomplishments in the history of treatment of women.
Harris and Progressives meant tons of changes. That's what they are all about. Trump promised the way things used to be when things were in many respects "better."
I love it when Democrats keep citing "polls" that were off by 3-5 points in November as if they are legit. There are NONE in the top five of RCP that are legitimate or which came close in November. Notice who is not on there? All the legit pollsters like Big Data Poll, who has Trump +1, Rasmussen who has Trump +5 and so on. But again---and even Baris and Mitchell admit this---they always, always, ALWAYS underpoll Trump by 2-3 points. So it greatly pleases me when people cite this as evidence of Trump's "unpopularity."
Meanwhile the REAL evidence, which I keep pitchin' and you keep missin' it, is the voter registrations that are universally and consistently moving GOP. This would absolutely be impossible if those polls were right. In just the last few days NH moved from R +4.8 to R+5, NC saw the GOP take a whopping lead over Ds of 83,000 (!!!) in NC, a state Ds led by 175,000 must a year ago, AZ where the GOP has shot to a 324,000 lead. But one of the more interesting is the deep red state WY, where the GOP gained more than Ds and Is put together last month
Between real wages growing, more native Americans being hired, inflation at half of what it was under Biden, gas prices falling everywhere, and that $8 trillion that Trump has brought in in investments JUST SO FAR, the economy will be roaring. So spin away. It does my heart good.
Great point. I speak with Baris occasionally and even he tells me that the truly accurate pollsters in 2024 are having a devil of a time reaching the "traditional Rump voter." He said that despite every effort they ALL continue to underestimate Trump's support big time.
Polls are what you make of them. Using them to "prove" who is going to win is a waste of time. Polls do show general trends pretty well, and good analysis read carefully is informative.
The AVERAGE (emphasis added) year-over-year inflation rate under Joe Biden was 4.95%. Source: Consumer Price Index, Bureau of Labor Statistics https://www.investopedia.com/us-inflation-rate-by-president-8546447 The average year-over-year inflation rate under President Donald Trump (in his first term) was 2.46%. (same sources)
*Ten* yards for egregious errors of comparative statistics, like comparing whales (48 months of Biden inflation data) to raisins. (3 months of Trump inflation data)
Ye must compare apples to apples. That can be 12 months--so, the latest CPI report, which notes: "The all items index rose 2.4 percent for the *12 months* ending March"; and the November 2024 CPI report, which notes: "The all items index rose 2.7 percent for the *12 months* ending November".
Or, if you want to average the CPI prints for January through March, fine: Trump's average is 2.6; Biden's average September-November is (rounding up) 2.6%
Personal foul and ejection from game for Larry, who apparently can't divide basic numbers by 2.
If you will read my comment closely, you will notice I compared four years under Biden (avg. 4.95%) with four years under Trump (2.46%). Twice Trump's first-term average is 4.92, very close to yet still less than 4.95%. Larry is right and you are wrong.
The original claim was "inflation *is* half of what it was under Biden", i.e. under Trump NOW. (Thence Larry's invocation of the present progressive: 'wages grow*ing*'/people 'be*ing* hired'/etc.) That claim is, according to the evidence at hand, wrong; therefore Larry is wrong; therefore anyone asserting his claim is correct--as you have done here--is also, by consequence, wrong.
A writer named Zachery Elwood has a substack oftentimes focused on how to have civil’ dialogue’. He has a great podcast interview with someone about how misleading polls are - the leading questions used, the interpretations…
The issue I have with calling Trumpism "right wing populism" is that his views on trade and immigration aren't all that different from pre-Clinton Democrats.
I can easily hear John Glenn, Fritz Hollings etc. making the same points on trade that Trump is.
On attracting the working class: blue collar workers are largely male, and the Democrat party is heavily female-coded. And that cannot be changed.
An easy step is to reaffirm the patriotism rooted in American ideals (eg., democracy) that inspired and united (imperfectly) Americans in WWII and the Civil Rights Movement.
This wouldn’t offend the Party’s donors (the chief obstacle to winning back the working class), but does mean surrendering left wing virtue signaling, which includes an exclusive focus on the ugly side of American history.
Most comments are premised on the notion the economy will only get worse, over the next 18 months. That may or may not be accurate. Most people were not betting on Trump to win a 2nd term when he walked into a NY Courtroom, so maybe calling the midterms 18 months before hand, might be a bit premature.
Both sides are still missing what will be a surprise midterm and 2028 issue. The 10 million migrants who walked into the US, mostly did so, with only the clothes on their backs. Most are sparsely educated and skilled. Dems and state governments spent hundreds of billions of tax payer dollars on their food, shelter, and healthcare. Trump ended all federal welfare, a few weeks ago. It took SF less than a month to sue, pleading the loss of federal funds to shelter migrants, will soon cause 2000 migrants to sleep on SF streets.
This scenario will play out in nearly every Blue city and state, and plenty of Red ones. Most migrants do not have the education or skillset to live in a high cost of living country like the US, without vast and permanent subsidies. It is not a character flaw, but the fact, regardless of how hard they are willing to toil, their education and skillsets, will rarely produce the income needed to reside in US, without subsidy If millions of middle class Americans were dropped into Zermatt, Knightsbridge, or Beverly Hills, they would be in the same boat. It is simple Math.
Dems seem to labor under the impression, now that Trump closed the border, the issue is over. They are sorely mistaken. Dems waved in 10 million people without asking permission from the American people. If only 10% cannot feed and shelter themselves, without subsidies, the US homeless population will more than double. Now Dems will seek to mandate that US taxpayers perpetually, and permanently, subsidize them. Good Luck with that.
There is absolutely no impetus for the Democratic Party to do anything different than they (we) are doing.
26 will be a low turnout election which will flip the house Democratic. Donations will continue to be strong, Trump has pissed off a lot of Wall Street.
On the Democratic side I see token attempts to woo the working class by Chris Murphy, Rho Khanna, and others, but nothing really substantive. Harris thinks forgiving the loans of post docs will help, in Cambridge MA maybe even Sommerville.
I'm interested in seeing if Trump ultimately has any effect. Getting pissed at the things I don't like will do nothing, (public lands, medicaid, NIH) best to kick back and see if the things I was hoping he'd do, come to pass.
He's done a bunch of interviews using the right words for Connecticut, not sure they play as well in Bridgeport as they do in Greenwich. Mostly he is out there trying to get his name in the news saying the D party needs to change. Says nothing substantive. He knows he wants to be President, and knows connecting via populism is important, has no clue how to get there.
Didn't know he was one of the El Salvadorians, not a good look to be pro wifebeating alien smuggling gang member.
It's the working class that needs wooing, middle class for the Democratic Party includes everyone below the 2%, which really doesn't help much.
Concrete ideas needed. End the 50% tax bargain for capital gains. Tax capital gains and normal income the same. End the carried interest racket. Accelerate construction by greatly reducing permitting and its judicial review. The deficit is a tax on all future generations. If you can't pay for it, do not buy it.
Oh, as was true for many years: Stock buybacks are illegal inside trading. However, dividends, like interest on loans are a business expense, taxed via the recipient's income tax rates.
Status quo politicking is a disaster. If it is to be change, what change? The ascendant faction seems to want to double down on the unpopular culture war stuff. A lot depends on events too. Trump's strategy is clearly to move fast, break things and expect it will sort out before people vote again. A lot depends on whether this is a correct assessment.
It seems pretty clear that about 50% of the voters wanted to limit immigration, junk DEI and oppose transsexuals in women's sports. How many Trump voters had any understanding of tariffs is unclear to me and I am pretty sure that much less that 50% wanted to wreck the federal government or our relationship with Canada. A campaign that accepted the 2028 status quo on immigrants, ignored transsexuals, stressed that some of the federal government and the safety net would be restored, that the next president would try to restore necessary world trade, and not be a loud bully looks like a winner to me. Just what could be proposed, other than selective restoration, that would please the voters you want? Actually, I expect that the GOP candidate would probably also move in the direction of restoration while swearing fealty to everything done by his predecessor, as the first President Bush did.
California Democrat Josh Harder has organized an abundance caucus of 30 members in the House. One issue that could be bipartisan is permitting reform to shorten the time it takes to build housing and infrastructure.
2028 is a long way off, but maybe, just maybe a lot closer than the Democrats getting it together to be an actual party, that the people of America would put back into the driver's seat.
Trump must know by now that Liberation Day was a big flop. He is backtracking fast from his aggressive tariff rhetoric and making nice with China's Xi. The framework agreement with the U.K. is a plus but there is less there than meets the eye. Getting the U.K. and EU to back off on popular non-tariff barriers that protect food supply is not likely.
The problem for Democrats is that they have won all of the major battles. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, ACA, gay rights, civil rights, women' rights, awareness of environmental issues, ending the Vietnam War. We won them all! Trump's not going to touch any of these.
Now Democrats have no major battles to fight. So, they come up with trivial ones that don't resonate with the public. They go after police, they go after people who don't want their daughters competing in sports against biological males, they go after a war half way across the world that America isn't sending soldiers to, they go after peoples' pickups and tell them to get an EV instead or they are sinners.
And they end up looking flat and silly.
The country, folks, is a Democratic country. Not a Republican one.
And it is white baby boomers and Francis Perkins who were in that fight that we won.
Yet, one of the major foci of progressives' ire is now white males, the very people who were largely responsible for many of these changes/improvements.
And instead of looking at themselves and their failures, "progressives" are now just talking louder.
"ending the Vietnam War"? History quiz: Who said "I'm not going to send American boys 10,000 miles from home to fight in an Asian war!" Hint: His initials were LBJ.
And who were the protestors who got us out of the war? LBJ so messed up with that.
As today's Democrats are messing up with Ukraine, except they were sending vast amounts of money.
Yes, but to the extent that Trump manages to scrap the wins Democrats had that you list, there will be a restoration agenda. Even just an agenda of not making as much noise as Trump did might be a winner. Wouldn't it be nice to open a newspaper and not see the president, whoever it is, on the first page?
My point is that Democrats are struggling because they have nothing left of substance to fight for. So they substitute minor issues that don't resonate.
Maybe the Democrats should be "conservative" for a while unless you have some big substantive idea they should propose. It is clear that the deficit in 2028 will be so large that a major new program probably is impossible. Maybe what is needed is a few decades of slow recovery from the current national disaster. Maybe that is the only thing possible.
The problem is that it doesn't sell, although I think you are right. And as Yglesias said yesterday, people want CHANGE!
Well, ok, but could someone tell me what change the people want? If it was to limit immigration and kill DEI, Environmental Justice and Transsexuals in girls sports, they got what they wanted and I don't think it would be wise for Democrats to try to mess with those "accomplishments," although fair immigration laws will eventually be necessary. I have a lot of ideas of what I want, but I'm sure those things are unpopular and would only sink the ticket. What do you think "the people" want?
That's the $64.000 dollar question.
I approach this as a psychologist. And one of the main dimensions I see happening is that the American public, in general, doesn't want change. They want the way things were in the good old days. This is why MAGA meant so much to them. Go back to when America was "great."
We have been going through rapid change in everything. Health care? Nothing like it was 20 years ago. Jobs? You name it.
this doesn't mean people want to return to Jim Crow. Or to women being destined to stay at home. But there is a feeling of "calmness" and "control" that people can remember from their youth.
How about getting a meal on an air flight? You used to have space for your legs.
Trump's most popular moves have been to return to those "olden days of your." Even his stupid tariffs idea is an attempt to do that.
They don't want EVs. They want their pick-me-ups!
They want girls' sports back, which is one of the biggest accomplishments in the history of treatment of women.
Harris and Progressives meant tons of changes. That's what they are all about. Trump promised the way things used to be when things were in many respects "better."
What do you think?
I love it when Democrats keep citing "polls" that were off by 3-5 points in November as if they are legit. There are NONE in the top five of RCP that are legitimate or which came close in November. Notice who is not on there? All the legit pollsters like Big Data Poll, who has Trump +1, Rasmussen who has Trump +5 and so on. But again---and even Baris and Mitchell admit this---they always, always, ALWAYS underpoll Trump by 2-3 points. So it greatly pleases me when people cite this as evidence of Trump's "unpopularity."
Meanwhile the REAL evidence, which I keep pitchin' and you keep missin' it, is the voter registrations that are universally and consistently moving GOP. This would absolutely be impossible if those polls were right. In just the last few days NH moved from R +4.8 to R+5, NC saw the GOP take a whopping lead over Ds of 83,000 (!!!) in NC, a state Ds led by 175,000 must a year ago, AZ where the GOP has shot to a 324,000 lead. But one of the more interesting is the deep red state WY, where the GOP gained more than Ds and Is put together last month
Between real wages growing, more native Americans being hired, inflation at half of what it was under Biden, gas prices falling everywhere, and that $8 trillion that Trump has brought in in investments JUST SO FAR, the economy will be roaring. So spin away. It does my heart good.
These polls have samples which contain just over 1/3 Trump voters. Since the popular vote was roughly 50-50, they are oversampling Democrats.
Which they always do. The people who pay the bills (media companies and liberal foundations) want to support Democrats and demoralize Republicans.
Great point. I speak with Baris occasionally and even he tells me that the truly accurate pollsters in 2024 are having a devil of a time reaching the "traditional Rump voter." He said that despite every effort they ALL continue to underestimate Trump's support big time.
Underestimating Trump voters is not a bug. It is a feature.
Pollsters are not paid to be accurate. They are paid to generate confirmation bias.
Totally agree . . . unless you're a pollster who wants to get things right. Most don't.
Polls are what you make of them. Using them to "prove" who is going to win is a waste of time. Polls do show general trends pretty well, and good analysis read carefully is informative.
"Inflation at half of what it was under Biden"
Man you're delusional. Do you ever actually check the stats before you spout this crap?
CPI under Biden in October 2024: 2.6% (https://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/cpi_11132024.htm)
latest CPI, in early April, under Trump: 2.4% (https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm)
2.6 divided in half is not 2.4; the math isn't that hard, Larry. You really must try harder.
The AVERAGE (emphasis added) year-over-year inflation rate under Joe Biden was 4.95%. Source: Consumer Price Index, Bureau of Labor Statistics https://www.investopedia.com/us-inflation-rate-by-president-8546447 The average year-over-year inflation rate under President Donald Trump (in his first term) was 2.46%. (same sources)
Five yard penalty for cherry-picking statistics.
*Ten* yards for egregious errors of comparative statistics, like comparing whales (48 months of Biden inflation data) to raisins. (3 months of Trump inflation data)
Ye must compare apples to apples. That can be 12 months--so, the latest CPI report, which notes: "The all items index rose 2.4 percent for the *12 months* ending March"; and the November 2024 CPI report, which notes: "The all items index rose 2.7 percent for the *12 months* ending November".
Or, if you want to average the CPI prints for January through March, fine: Trump's average is 2.6; Biden's average September-November is (rounding up) 2.6%
Personal foul and ejection from game for Larry, who apparently can't divide basic numbers by 2.
If you will read my comment closely, you will notice I compared four years under Biden (avg. 4.95%) with four years under Trump (2.46%). Twice Trump's first-term average is 4.92, very close to yet still less than 4.95%. Larry is right and you are wrong.
The original claim was "inflation *is* half of what it was under Biden", i.e. under Trump NOW. (Thence Larry's invocation of the present progressive: 'wages grow*ing*'/people 'be*ing* hired'/etc.) That claim is, according to the evidence at hand, wrong; therefore Larry is wrong; therefore anyone asserting his claim is correct--as you have done here--is also, by consequence, wrong.
A writer named Zachery Elwood has a substack oftentimes focused on how to have civil’ dialogue’. He has a great podcast interview with someone about how misleading polls are - the leading questions used, the interpretations…
Later I’ll try to give a link
The issue I have with calling Trumpism "right wing populism" is that his views on trade and immigration aren't all that different from pre-Clinton Democrats.
I can easily hear John Glenn, Fritz Hollings etc. making the same points on trade that Trump is.
On attracting the working class: blue collar workers are largely male, and the Democrat party is heavily female-coded. And that cannot be changed.
Also Gephardt.
An easy step is to reaffirm the patriotism rooted in American ideals (eg., democracy) that inspired and united (imperfectly) Americans in WWII and the Civil Rights Movement.
This wouldn’t offend the Party’s donors (the chief obstacle to winning back the working class), but does mean surrendering left wing virtue signaling, which includes an exclusive focus on the ugly side of American history.
www.savedemocracyinamerica.org
Most comments are premised on the notion the economy will only get worse, over the next 18 months. That may or may not be accurate. Most people were not betting on Trump to win a 2nd term when he walked into a NY Courtroom, so maybe calling the midterms 18 months before hand, might be a bit premature.
Both sides are still missing what will be a surprise midterm and 2028 issue. The 10 million migrants who walked into the US, mostly did so, with only the clothes on their backs. Most are sparsely educated and skilled. Dems and state governments spent hundreds of billions of tax payer dollars on their food, shelter, and healthcare. Trump ended all federal welfare, a few weeks ago. It took SF less than a month to sue, pleading the loss of federal funds to shelter migrants, will soon cause 2000 migrants to sleep on SF streets.
This scenario will play out in nearly every Blue city and state, and plenty of Red ones. Most migrants do not have the education or skillset to live in a high cost of living country like the US, without vast and permanent subsidies. It is not a character flaw, but the fact, regardless of how hard they are willing to toil, their education and skillsets, will rarely produce the income needed to reside in US, without subsidy If millions of middle class Americans were dropped into Zermatt, Knightsbridge, or Beverly Hills, they would be in the same boat. It is simple Math.
Dems seem to labor under the impression, now that Trump closed the border, the issue is over. They are sorely mistaken. Dems waved in 10 million people without asking permission from the American people. If only 10% cannot feed and shelter themselves, without subsidies, the US homeless population will more than double. Now Dems will seek to mandate that US taxpayers perpetually, and permanently, subsidize them. Good Luck with that.
There is absolutely no impetus for the Democratic Party to do anything different than they (we) are doing.
26 will be a low turnout election which will flip the house Democratic. Donations will continue to be strong, Trump has pissed off a lot of Wall Street.
On the Democratic side I see token attempts to woo the working class by Chris Murphy, Rho Khanna, and others, but nothing really substantive. Harris thinks forgiving the loans of post docs will help, in Cambridge MA maybe even Sommerville.
I'm interested in seeing if Trump ultimately has any effect. Getting pissed at the things I don't like will do nothing, (public lands, medicaid, NIH) best to kick back and see if the things I was hoping he'd do, come to pass.
It's a long time until 2028.
What attempts has Chris Murphy made to woo the middle class? Flying to El Salvador to wine and dine with MS-13 gang banger?
He's done a bunch of interviews using the right words for Connecticut, not sure they play as well in Bridgeport as they do in Greenwich. Mostly he is out there trying to get his name in the news saying the D party needs to change. Says nothing substantive. He knows he wants to be President, and knows connecting via populism is important, has no clue how to get there.
Didn't know he was one of the El Salvadorians, not a good look to be pro wifebeating alien smuggling gang member.
It's the working class that needs wooing, middle class for the Democratic Party includes everyone below the 2%, which really doesn't help much.
Agree.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VdUHNl_kE2o
Concrete ideas needed. End the 50% tax bargain for capital gains. Tax capital gains and normal income the same. End the carried interest racket. Accelerate construction by greatly reducing permitting and its judicial review. The deficit is a tax on all future generations. If you can't pay for it, do not buy it.
Oh, as was true for many years: Stock buybacks are illegal inside trading. However, dividends, like interest on loans are a business expense, taxed via the recipient's income tax rates.
Status quo politicking is a disaster. If it is to be change, what change? The ascendant faction seems to want to double down on the unpopular culture war stuff. A lot depends on events too. Trump's strategy is clearly to move fast, break things and expect it will sort out before people vote again. A lot depends on whether this is a correct assessment.
Serious sorting within the Democratic Party will happen after the 2026 midterms, which will be a vote on whether to restrain Trump or accelerate MAGA.
It seems pretty clear that about 50% of the voters wanted to limit immigration, junk DEI and oppose transsexuals in women's sports. How many Trump voters had any understanding of tariffs is unclear to me and I am pretty sure that much less that 50% wanted to wreck the federal government or our relationship with Canada. A campaign that accepted the 2028 status quo on immigrants, ignored transsexuals, stressed that some of the federal government and the safety net would be restored, that the next president would try to restore necessary world trade, and not be a loud bully looks like a winner to me. Just what could be proposed, other than selective restoration, that would please the voters you want? Actually, I expect that the GOP candidate would probably also move in the direction of restoration while swearing fealty to everything done by his predecessor, as the first President Bush did.
OK, fine, so everybody wants change. What does this mean in terms of actual action items? I'd love to see some suggestions.
California Democrat Josh Harder has organized an abundance caucus of 30 members in the House. One issue that could be bipartisan is permitting reform to shorten the time it takes to build housing and infrastructure.
2028 is a long way off, but maybe, just maybe a lot closer than the Democrats getting it together to be an actual party, that the people of America would put back into the driver's seat.
Insightful - probably because I feel the same way but now backed up with data.
I am more hopeful of change nationally, although in my own State - Washington - not likely.
When you come to a fork in the road, take it.
Trump must know by now that Liberation Day was a big flop. He is backtracking fast from his aggressive tariff rhetoric and making nice with China's Xi. The framework agreement with the U.K. is a plus but there is less there than meets the eye. Getting the U.K. and EU to back off on popular non-tariff barriers that protect food supply is not likely.