This is the first segment of a series that addresses problems facing the Democratic Party.
Earlier this week, a plane pulling a banner that read “Senator Heller: Keep your word. Vote no on Trumpcare” flew over West Virginia. Unfortunately, Heller represents Nevada, not West Virginia. Washington Post reporter Aaron Blake retweeted the photo, writing, “If you want a metaphor for why Democrats lose…”
A new professional wrestler in Kentucky calls himself “The Progressive Liberal.” In eastern Kentucky, he’s a villain. He spouts condescending rhetoric that insults the locals but sounds eerily like a progressive twitter feed. “You people need to be reprogrammed. You continually vote against your own interests. You put people in Congress and the White House that aren’t going to help you. They’re not going to bring your jobs back.” One conservative writer tweeted, “You honestly can’t tell the difference between middle America’s parody of Democrats and the candidates Dems actually run for office.”
Finally, former Reagan Administration official Bruce Bartlett, one of the original architects of supply-side economics, long ago rejected conservative economic dogma and has written extensively about the failure of trickle-down economics. However, Bartlett refuses to join the Democratic Party even though he tends to vote for Democrats these days. Why? Because, he says, the party lacks guiding principles. As he says, “[T]he party doesn’t really seem to stand for anything other than opposition to the GOP.”
Democrats face a huge public perception problem. After losing more than 1,000 legislative and Congressional seats in the last eight years, many Republicans and much of the press think the party is incompetent in their campaign operations. Much of middle America perceives Democrats as elitist and condescending. Even many people who don’t like Trump or what the modern GOP has become believe the party has no soul.
Despite these problems, the country has a governing coalition that’s waiting for the Democrats to become an effective opposition party. However, Democrats need to recognize their failures and work to define themselves in broad terms of what they are, not narrow ones of what they’re not. They need a more robust communication infrastructure to match what Republicans have built over the past 50 years. They need a narrative that transcends the election cycle to give campaigns the context to make them successful. And they need to update their campaign machinery to compete in the 21st century.
Democrats might win in 2018 without addressing these problems. If they do, they’ll learn the wrong lessons and find themselves losing again in the not-too-distant future. They need a fundamental reboot that addresses weaknesses in campaign organizations, core values, guiding principles and inclusion. More to come.
Thomas Mills is the founder and publisher of PoliticsNC.com. Before beginning PoliticsNC, Thomas spent twenty years as a political and public affairs consultant. Learn more >
Ellen- excuse me, but I’m curious. If you find the culture and the locals so disagreeable, why did you move to NC? And why do you stay?
Without addressing the needs of the disappearing middle-class, blue collar workers, college students drowning in debt, the high costs of prescription drugs, the problems with the ACA, and the corruption within the DNC, the Democratic Party will continue to become irrelevant. Their banal strategy of blaming Russia and Trump for the Clinton loss continues to show us that despite the “cleaning house” that Perez has done, the DNC is still the same, a moribund organization, desperately holding onto its neoliberal policies and Third Way Ideology responsible for concentrating monies, power and resources into the fewest hands since our last gilded age; they’re as bad or worse than Republicans. A strategy that has destroyed the middle-class, exported jobs to other countries, and rewarded the monied masters of corporations. Time for another party that truly represents the people and labor. The DNC is too addicted to oligarch and corporate monies to pivot back to the great party it once was.
Ellen,
A gentle request, perhaps youc offer readers more substance than Thomas seems to have?
Over the past 35 years, I’ve observed my “progressive” friends settling into north-eastern Chatham County. Mostly retirees from the urban north-east and mid-west. Generally very well educated, definitely upper middle class (how else could they afford to retire here), well-traveled, mostly pale of complexion, and uniformly displaying a lack of interest in learning much about the county in which they’ve settled. That disinterest is recognized by folk who’ve lived here 5,6,7,8 generations (not years).
As the number of newly arrived, significantly Democrat in party ID (Chapel Hill’s city limits extend almost to Chatham’s northern border) grew in magnitude, and being relatively aggressive by nature (see above ;-)), many of these folk became active in local politics.
Now “active” is a good thing. Not so good, though, was an attitude that came with this activity. Fairly or not, that attitude was seen as arrogant (and condescending) by many folk living further south and west in the county. Perhaps it was best exemplified by a posting, nine or ten years ago, on a local popular chat list. The post, from a resident of the northeast, was in response to expressed concerns over what was viewed as anti-business, overly ecological positions espoused by some local Democratic leaders. It went something like: “We don’t need to listen to the rest you. We are better organized and we turnout.”
In the short term that attitude was significant in leading to a Republican majority (2010 election) on Chatham’s board of commissioners. First time since Reconstruction. Things returned to “normal” for Chatham in ’14, but the local Republican Party is much stronger than it was before.
This long story is simply in support of Thomas’ position, as I interpret it, that Democratic Party leaders, especially in the south, the mid-west, in the generally rural and not particularly diverse sections of our country, might be well-served to be more sensitive to voters who don’t watch Rachael. 😉 If you’ll allow a stretch – in the spirit of comity. Rather than poor comedy.
Yes Peter,been there, done that. Transplanted New Yorker myself here in very affluent western NC, dabbled in local democrat politics and left. I’m as tone deaf as they come so am the last person to ask what other people want. So all I can do is guess based on what gets locals excited and what appears to have worked in 2016: Best guess:
Protect us from being over run by hoards o outsiders who don’t share my culture or values
Allow us to protect ourselves
stop taking my hard earned money to give it to those who won’t work
stop giving those others a free ride at my expense whether it is my taxes or taking my job
change the liberal message of “give to those poor “others” to a chicken in every one of “our” pots
and so on. I agree it isn’t rational or fact based, but when was fear ever factual or rational? Besides which, how many people are actually paying attention to what is going on?
At least six things need to happen for the Democrats to regain control of the House, which will require flipping 24 seats now held by Republicans.
One, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi needs to disappear, resign from her post or enter witness protection. She is a superb public official and was a good speaker, but these days she is toxic. If she remains in her position and Democrats are taken down next year in these House races, she is a goner. But that would be too late to save her party — and her country — from the Trump madness.
Second, Democrats need to learn that it is not enough to be against Donald J. Trump. Every American who can walk and chew gum at the same time knows he is the worst president in our history and represents nothing short of a danger to the republic on multiple layers. While nearly an 18-month span is several lifetimes in politics and by the time the midterm elections roll around Mr. Trump and his gang could be in major legal jeopardy, Democrats must tend to their plans and proposals for the country. They need to let Mr. Trump further self-destruct and the investigations surrounding him work their course.
Third, Democrats need a positive message that connects with the so-called ordinary Americans. The party for eight years gave the impression that it largely is concerned about elites, gays, lesbians, transgenders, and others on society’s fringes and could not care one whit about the plight of the working men and women of the country. The party’s efforts were misunderstood, but the misunderstanding proved as ruinous as does Leader Pelosi’s leadership role.
Fourth, Democrats need to re-embrace the big tent of Franklin D. Roosevelt. The party must welcome those who oppose abortion, even those who oppose gun safety measures. That is what FDR did — he brought in the haters of black people and the uplifters of minorities, the big spenders and the fiscal conservatives.
Fifth, Democrats need to work like the dickens to regain local offices. A party that loses nearly 1,000 offices over an eight-year period, as did Democrats during the Obama presidency, is unlikely to win federal offices, either.
Six, Democrats need to adopt the political equivalent of football’s Bruce Arians. The coach of the Arizona Cardinals tells his team at the beginning of each season something like this:
“Our goal is not to make the Super Bowl. Our goal is to win the Super Bowl!
The Democrats goal should be to win politics’ equivalent of the Super Bowl by retaking both houses of Congress and the White House. If the party is unable to adapt and make the hard choices facing it, then it is unworthy of the public’s trust and will allow a narcissitic madman to continue to violate the Constitution and endanger the core of our republic.
yadayadayada More editorial commentary saying nothing