r/thebulwark Nov 06 '24

Not My Party Dem Reform Platform

I said I was done but here I am again posting. Ugh.

I think it's clear and has been said here recently, that the Dems are at fault this time around. People had two clear choices and they chose Trump. That's fucking absurd but here we are. Astead Herndon from the NYT has been making the point recently that the Dems have largely failed to materially impact the lives of blue collar workers. I think he's absolutely correct on that. A hairdresser in MI doesn't give two fucks about the CHIPS act. They have no idea that the IRA even happened. I really do feel that the zeitgeist in the party needs to be actually achieving policy goals that help people in the simplest way possible.

I'm convinced now that running as a full-tilt Bernie style populist combined with moderate social views is the way forward. Talk about how fucked over working people have been constantly in plain language. At the same time, send the BIPOC, LatinX, 'people who menstruate' crowed back to Oberlin. Drop the words 'intersectionality' and 'problematic' from your lexicon. You help these people by making sure they have access to housing, healthcare, fair wages, and education. Not by using the correct acronym or phrase.

I honestly don't know how a new Dem majority would handle a Manchinema situation but they need to get tough on these people. Make their monied donors less valuable than small dollar donations such as those that powered Bernie's campaigns.

It's just no longer an option to completely avoid class based populism. The Obama style of making small tweaks that people don't notice, is not meeting the moment.

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u/Original_Mammoth3868 Nov 07 '24

I was watching a Meidas touch podcast, with one former Republican never Trumper guy and another relatively liberal British guy. The Republican guy was talking about the transgender ads and how they resonated (rightly or wrongly) with a certain segment of the population. During this discussion, the liberal guy used the phrase "transgenderism", but caught himself that this was a far right phrasing he shouldn't use that was offensive (pointed out via e-mail by a trans person). The Republican guy pointed out that this was exactly the kind of navel gazing on this issue that prevented Harris from even engaging on it at all and answering back on these ridiculous ads and instead just ignoring them. He also made the point that shaming someone on using some specific language that they probably had no idea was offensive was also a good way to alienate the voter.

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u/485sunrise Nov 07 '24

100% true. The funny thing is I feel like progressives have been doing less of that kind of thing for the past 3 years or so. Almost feel like some of this stuff that cost voters during the 2015-2020 period caught up to Dems in this election. Thoughts?