Vincent Oriedo, a biotechnology scientist, had just such a question. What lessons have been learned, he asked, from Harris’s defeat in this vital swing county in a crucial battleground state that voted for Joe Biden four years ago, and how are the Democrats applying them?
“They did not answer the question,” he said.
“It tells me that they haven’t learned the lessons and they have their inner state of denial. I’ve been paying careful attention to the influencers within the Democratic party. Their discussions have centred around, ‘If only we messaged better, if only we had a better candidate, if only we did all these superficial things.’ There is really a lack of understanding that they are losing their base, losing constituencies they are taking for granted.”
“We have set ourselves up for generational loss because we keep promoting from within leaders that that do not criticise the moneyed interests. They refuse to take a hard look at what Americans actually believe and meet those needs.”
All voters say Democrats should cut ties with big corporations and focus on economic populism. Taxing big corporations not identity politics whilst giving corporations a tax break.
Bernie Sanders is what people would have voted for. There is no confusion. The Democratic party does not “understand” this because they do not want to understand it.
In this political environment, when the corporations are the kingmakers, you can’t afford to not be a corporatist. Democrats and Republicans are both very pro-business, but big business likes the Republicans better because they are completely mask-off about letting them do whatever they like, while the Dems have to pretend they care about stuff like regulations to appease their voters.
Bernie, or someone like him, is essentially fighting an uphill battle. You can’t take money from corporations, while simultaneously having to defend yourself from far-right extremist slander and the DNC actively trying to sabotage you so they can replace you with a corporatist. Meanwhile, Trump can be the big tent and get everybody in bed with him because the right will clearly stoop to any level to win and businesses have no scruples about who sits in the chair as long as they get a return on their investment.
It’s frustrating. Maddening. We are completely screwed for the foreseeable future unless Trump manages to fuck up even worse than he did in his first term or a grassroots left wing movement really gets going in time for the next election, presuming the institution of voting isn’t completely ratfucked or dismantled by then.
this. Biden was relatively famous for making bad deals with repubs in congress, but somehow once those audaciously bad deals were made, the individual house and senate representitives votes to empower those bad deals materialized on the dem side of the chambers. Just out of thin air. So the rot goes far deeper than DNC and Biden. A good percentage of the party also needs cleaning out, along with the republicans. More or less this entire system is trash. Their oaths of office are a joke.
If this is true then we’re well and truly an oligarchy.
Doesn’t really seem like America really wants to cut ties with big corporations, seeing how people are voting. Nor identity politics for that matter, seems more important than ever among the right wing. Just that their identity politics is of a different kind.
I’m not saying I know wether it would be a good idea to actually do what you’re proposing. But I think people are way to quick to know the solution. Because it resonates with their own beliefs.
People aren’t voting anti-corp if anti-corp isn’t even on the ballot
Well, Bernie participated in two primaries, and in both cases he demonstrably, objectively lost the popular vote, which means that people did not vote for him.
Which is exactly what I am talking about, your idea sounds good to you, but you base it on your vibes, and numbers tell the different story apparently.
He lost in 2020 because of a coordinated campaign to get all the centrist candidates except Joe Biden to drop out, while Warren stayed in as a progressive candidate against Bernie.
They did this precisely because he was on track to win the popular vote among the Democratic base. No candidate was set to win a majority of the popular vote, but Bernie was looking at a clear plurality.
Bernie WAS winning the popular vote until the DNC deliberately prevented him from doing so.
That’s a very interesting theory that for some reason circulates around.
It has nothing to do with reality, both because in the final roaster there were both Bloomberg and Buttigeg, who got 3 million and a million votes respectively, and who aren’t exactly paragons of the leftist values, and also because more people voted for Biden than for every other candidate combined, he got 4 million votes more than Bernie, Warren, Bloomberg, and Buttigeg combined.
I don’t know where did you got all those theories, but they once again, seem to not correlate with reality.
It would be a nice story, in theory, but unfortunately in reality in 2020 finals there also were such bastions of leftist values like Bloomberg and Buttigieg. Which still would not matter because Biden got more votes than all the other candidates combined.
Which once again brings us to the question, where are all the Bernie voters that are suppose to bring his victory? Do they don’t know how to vote, do they too apathetic to do that or do they just not exist?
Ignore the sabotage from the DNC for this narrative to work
The whole thing about popular vote (I repeat, popular vote) is that whatever you think about the process of actually choosing candidate, and whatever trickery the DNC did, it does not affect how the popular vote went. There could be something to your words if there was a popular vote swinging one way and electoral picking swinging the other, but it wasn’t the case. All the millions people who in your mind would vote for Bernie didn’t show up to do it twice. Either that because they don’t vote and don’t know how democracy works, or because they don’t exist I don’t know, and I leave it up to you to decide which is worse.
You clearly didnt see what happened or what the DNC did.
Its not that people like this dont see it, its that they desperately dont want to see it. Cognitive Dissonance is very unpleasant. It makes you start doubting everything related to the concept in question, which is overwhelming even for the best of us.
Did they personally brake the legs of all the leftist voters so they don’t vote for their preferred candidate? Or did they just run a campaign against him and all the passionate Bernie voters just decided to believe their campaign and not vote for him?
I don’t see an explanation here that supports that “Bernie would won the election” narrative.
And I don’t think it’s a good thing, I totally agree that he would be the best president US ever saw and he absolutely, unequivocally was the best candidate with the best ideas. I just don’t believe american voting population wants what’s best for them, there is much to be done to undone centuries of capitalist propaganda. But this work doesn’t start with escaping into fantasy world, it stops there.
They didnt even give Bernie camera time, you are ignorant beyond belief my god
You probably think that if you attack me that means your arguments hold more weight, but you are sorely mistaken on that. I am slightly tired of you not actually engaging with what I’m writing, so let me state it last time, and I would like you to read it this time.
The fact that Bernie wasn’t able to win a popular vote in the democratic primaries twice doesn’t support the idea that he will be better at the general elections. Whatever opposition he faced, whatever they did to him in your opinion, will be tenfold in the generals. The opposition there will be stronger and richer. The notion that everyone secretly agrees with him and only evil they are keeping him from getting into the office is a very comforting one, but none of the numbers support it. Unfortunately.