I feel like a superstitious loon for saying this, but what I think should have happened differently is the universe should have worked like we rationally understand it instead like a glitched-up Matrix.
Trump’s offensive, obnoxious, criminal behavior is too extensive to even list without being tedious. He had almost zero platform except that immigrants are bad. Somehow more than half the voters in America picked him over a scandal-free, criminal-conviction-free opponent pushing optimism and making strongly positive proposals. The universe shouldn’t work that way. I really feel like this supports the theory that we are living in a simulation. It feels like somebody put their thumb on the scale to see what will happen.
Not surprised. The Harris campaign ran on the status quo, which many people are dissatisfied with, and pivoted to the right on various policy, when the people who like right-wing policies already have a party catering just to them - and that can come at the cost of alienating their own base or fracturing the coalition. For instance, many Latinos trend conservative in their values, but they voted Dem in the past because of all the “Build the wall” stuff. But then the Democrats said, “Trump’s just using it to posture, we’re the ones who are actually going to build the wall,” and they lost a bunch of Latinos and didn’t win over Republicans.
Promoting the Dick Cheney endorsement was an obvious unforced error, not even Republicans like him. Honestly a lot of their attempts to “reach across the aisle” seem more like patting themselves on the back for being “reasonable” than genuine attempts to understand and appeal to actual human beings. Like, generally, I think it’s a better strategy to accept that most of them are unreachable and focus on mobilizing your base, but if you are going to commit to that approach and make it the whole backbone of your campaign, then you actually have to understand who you’re trying to reach and how they think and why they do the things they do. Like, there are genuine ideological rifts on the right that are exploitable, like nationalism vs libertarianism, but Cheney and Bush tried to do something that both sides of that hate and it was a colossal failure, so bringing him on board just papers over those disagreements and makes it easier for them to consolidate around Trump.
A major problem that liberals have is that they’re attached to this idea of “reasonableness” where the best ideas will just naturally win out in the marketplace of ideas, and when the world doesn’t actually work like that they just can’t accept it. The right isn’t reasonable, they are (at least sometimes) proud of not being reasonable, because reason is the tool of the educated elite. And that actually almost makes a weird kind of sense, it’s like, imagine arguing that the earth is flat against a five year old - you could probably “win,” right? You have way more information in your repertoire and more experience with debate than they do, so you could selectively pick-and-choose things to support your point. So imagine being that five year old, having the sense that the adult is taking you for a ride, but knowing that you can’t debate or reason well enough to win on their terms. That’s the kind of psychology that we’re dealing with.
There are three ways you can respond to that situation. Either you say, “OK, these people are crazy and unreachable, let’s focus on mobilizing our own base,” or you say, “OK, we can work with that, we just have to go beyond reason and try to build trust or reach them on an emotional level,” (good luck with that, since that emotional level includes absolutely despising establishment career politicians, along with a substantial number of people who make up the dem coalition), or, lastly, you can keep trying to reason with them, and you will lose. Like, you could legitimate run a candidate who policy-wise is to the right of the Republican candidate on every issue and right-wingers still wouldn’t vote for them if they looked and sounded like a typical Democrat. You just have to wrap your head around that concept.
Given that Trump constantly does things that should screw himself over, and then he trips on a rock and somehow it’s fine. I think it comes down to two things: Trump is a very skilled con man (his one tangible skill) with unbelievable luck, and America is chock full of idiots. I really believe now that he could literally shoot someone on 6th Avenue in front of network television and get away with it.
It’s not that simple. Sure, he’s conning people, but it’s not because he’s particularly clever or skilled. He’s simply offering them an image that’s different from the establishment Democrats (and establishment Republicans, for that matter) who they despise. Of course, the right-wing propaganda machine plays a role, but the people themselves do a lot of the work towards inventing explanations for how he’s on their side. They believe in him because they want to believe in him, and they want to believe in him because he presents himself as an alternative to a failing system.
You’re absolutely right that he’s offering people the image they’re looking for. But speaking as someone with a few years training and experience in stage acting - nothing bigtime but legit, I’m not talking high school play - Trump has always been generally quite a good performer. He’s been called a “consummate liar” but it’s the same thing. He understands nuances of character and uses them consistently - a set of voices, facial expressions, head tilts, etc, that communicate sincerity. One of his bits is a straightforward tone that exudes honesty and gets people to remember stuff. He’ll say like, “Listen to me now…” and then repeat something he just said in this very “I’m leveling with you” tone. Sometimes he pauses to let it sink in and then repeats it again. Very effective way to get people to believe and remember a message. He has all kinds of little tricks to sound more believable to people who already want to believe him.
To me it all looks like well practiced technique but there’s probably also some natural talent. I bet he was super good at lying to his parents as a kid. His skillset is actually pretty rare, and is a hallmark of a really effective salesman (or actor). His other talent, which is really the con man part, is picking the right audience. On some level he does understand them and how to push their buttons. With a vastly different character he could have been a fantastic therapist - although the rapist part probably would have ruined that.
Regardless of whatever skills he may have, material conditions are the primary reason for his relevance and success. This is generally how the world works. People say the same thing about Hitler, that he was so charismatic that he just hoodwinked the German people, but it was really the declining material conditions that allowed him to come to power. Trump is merely a symptom of a larger disease, and even when he’s gone the disease will remain, the conditions that created him will still be there waiting for another person to take advantage of the same things in the same ways.
Harris tried to address our material conditions too, just different ones. At this point I think a major reason Harris failed is that she’s a woman and mainstream America still isn’t ready for that, amazingly.
That’s completely false. Tammy Baldwin won in WI, Elissa Slotkin won in MI. It’s completely incoherent to blame the fact that she’s a woman.
Harris’ message did not resonate with people struggling to pay their bills. She completely attached herself to the policies of the Biden administration and the broader status quo.
Yes there have been women in Congress for many years. In fact if you wanted to make that point better you could have referred to Jeannette Rankin, who was elected to the House of Representatives in 1916 and again in 1940. It’s not “incoherent” to point out the fact that many people are still against having a woman as President. When Hillary Clinton ran in 2016 it came up a lot. And don’t take my mention of it as agreement - I voted for Harris.
Not really, if you look at the megaposts I put up in Politics, it pretty much broke exactly how I predicted (down to calling each of the Senate races so far… we still don’t know AZ, NV, ME and PA).
Biden was never going to win, not after that disaster of a debate, and there wasn’t time for a proper primary. Harris suffered from being the annointed candidate rather than the appointed one.
The only thing that could have been done differently would have been for Biden to announce he wasn’t running following the 2022 election.
That would have given time for a proper primary process and a decent candidate selection.
I still wonder why Americans call that debate a disaster. Biden was out this world 10% of the debate, but was sane and correct the other 90%. Trump was nuts 100% of it. I don’t understand why you guys from both parties think that the second one was more fit for running your country.
Trump sounds insane to you (and me) because you have differing opinions and his opinions are inhumane and immoral, but he was somehow still far more coherent than Biden during that debate. Dementia clearly hit him hard and that immediately disinfranchised a significant portion of voters. Dude tried to hold on for far too long and it might cost the USA it’s democracy.
Every time Trump was talking, Biden looked like a nursing home patient. He had the vacant look Alzheimers patients have.
Probably the one thing that could have changed it all
Something I haven’t seen discussed is that Kamala is a woman. There are a lot of misogynistic voters who will refuse to vote for a woman.
That explanation drives you away from the problems Democratic Party has. If people want to cast their vote, they will, if they are sexists or racists they vote for the other party. In this election we saw that a lot of people from both sides that voted in the previous election who didn’t want to vote now. It was much more people for the Democrats likely because they voted last time and were disillusioned in the democratic process.
Tammy Baldwin and Elissa Slotkin both won in states Kamala lost, so that narrative doesn’t really hold up.
Nobėdı ƿantſ t mentcėn ðiſ bikȯz it u̇ndṙku̇tſ ðeıṙ fæntėſı ðæt moſt ėmeırikėnz aṙ ſıkrit ſocėliſtſ weıtıŋ f æn ėmeırikėn Marx t ſpaṙk revėlucėn.
spoiler
Nobody wants to mention this because it undercuts their fantasy that most americans are secret socialists waiting for an american Marx to spark revolution.
İt’z dju̇ſt ð leftƿacd vṙjėn v “Ekėnȯmik Eıŋgzuyitı”
spoiler
It’s just the leftwashed version of “Economic Anxiety”
The Democrats threw it away.
For several races now they’ve been told by many actual progressives, they need to embrace economic-populism. They refused to. Instead embracing the Cheneys. They got out played by a convicted felon, who’s older than his IQ (thanks to another lemmon for that line. I love it).Just bafflingly long chain of poor choices dating all the way back to RBG.
Obama shoulda made her step down to replace.
Obama (or whoever has the power) shoulda told Joe he was sticking to one term after the 2022 midterms, and REALLY prepared for 2024 in earnest. They run the best primary they’ve ever ran. They do a non traditional media strategy.
But they did the opposite. Year after year. And then panic with a billion dollars and no path two months before an election that Trump has already been running for 2-4 years.
It goes back farther, to Bill Clinton embracing Neo-Conservitive economic principals.
That was the beginning of the end of the Democrats.
Man… don’t take this language personally. It’s just the only way I know how to speak right now.
In what fucking world do you think a more progressive candidate would’ve turned Michigan and Pennsylvania blue?
Christ. I hope I’m fucking wrong. Because I do believe in a more progressive agenda. And I’m in Michigan. But this takeaway is absolutely fucking nuts to me.
The last thing we need is for the hardcore blue states to be even bluer while the battleground states are all red.
I don’t know, man. Explain your math to me. Because I can’t wrap my head around it. But I haven’t slept in like 36 hours, either, so maybe it’s just me.
I didn’t say progressive. Progressive is a very broad term that can apply to all sorts of things.
I said economic-populist. One of the few things nearly all of us agree on in this country, is that the corporations and the ownership class have too much power in politics, and they’re getting that power by stealing money from the working class. Trump was good at speaking to that, without actually doing much to help. The Democrats did some to help. But not enough, and they didn’t want to sell it much for fear of scaring off the ownership/donor class.
Leave behind all the racial, sexual, social justice progressive stuff. It’s divisive and won’t help you win. Helping the poor generally, will disproportionately help those people more anyway. Just without putting them in the spot light.
Totally fair, man. Thanks for clarifying. Sounds like a totally reasonable take.
Harris lost Michigan by fewer votes than the number of people who voted “uncommitted” in the primary.
I don’t think the lesson here is to be more moderate or more conservative.
You know, uncommitted doesn’t really bother me. Had I bothered voting in the primary, I’d probably have voted uncommitted, too. Because I’m not really happy about the administration’s handling of the Israel-Gaza situation.
But I damn sure voted for Kamala yesterday. I hope the Jill Stein voters feel really fucking smug about teaching Democrats a lesson when Trump tells Netanyahu to just push all the Muslims into the fucking ocean, and sells them the bulldozers to do it. I hope they all fucking cheer when they watch it livestreamed, Xclusively on X.
Because I assume that’s what they wanted out of this election, and by gum, they fucking got it.
I wonder if democrats feel good about supporting (leadership) or excusing (voters) genocide because they thought they had to to win, but lost anyway.
That was entirely about Israel and Gaza. The Democrats refused to distance themselves from the Republicans on that. Both sides were all in on the genocide. So yah people who felt it was the number one issue, had little reason to vote for Democrats over Republicans.
Little reason to vote Democrat over Republican?
Donald Trump said he wants Israel to “finish the job.” The Democrats at least were making overtures to peace. Were sending aid to Gaza.
Kamala was walking a tightrope. She was losing voters to Trump who didn’t think she was pro-Israel enough, and others to Stein who didn’t think she was anti-Israel enough.
Strategic voting is important in a first-past-the-post system, and those who rejected Kamala because she wasn’t sufficiently anti-genocide for them get to sit in the knowledge that they helped her lose, and helped put a man who will absolutely make the genocide worse in power.
Edit: But yes, my point was she probably could’ve gotten some of those voters if she’d been more anti-genocide.
Donald Trump said he wants Israel to “finish the job.” The Democrats at least were making overtures to peace.
Do you want 10 pounds of shit or 11? Who cares?
The pro-Israel crowd were already mostly evangelicals, all in on Trump from the get go.
Nobody would have voted for Stein if Harris took her Gaza rhetoric.I agree that she should’ve been pro-Gaza. I just also understand why she wasn’t.
It was calculated and cowardly, words that define the modern Democratic Party.
How many votes Harris got in the primary though?
Republicans are nazis. Nazis are a cancer on society. In civilization, life is based on cooperating, and in the jungle, life is based on you doing whatever you can physically pull off. Nazis bring the law of the jungle into civilization, with no regard for the things they destroy. They boldly gamble that the people they plan to murder will continue trying to cooperate with them, and leverage it at every turn to grab more and more power.
The Democrats’ playbook assumes cooperation from everyone. As it turns out, so much so that, as an organization, they literally cannot conceive of an opponent who, at the end of the day, won’t cooperate. That blind spot is where nazis strike. They’re the one opponent where you put your ordinary playbook away, and play dirty until there’s no more nazis, either because they’re dead, jailed, scattered, or they chose cut the crap for good. Then you go back to cooperating with those who will cooperate back.
“But then we’re no better than them” is the rallying cry of the Democrats. And–this is super important–when you aren’t dealing with nazis specifically, that’s absolutely how you should think. It’s how any decent person thinks, because a world where people don’t is a world that fucking sucks. So people do. It becomes the law of the land: sacred, normal, assumed.
Which makes it unchanging. And if you’re a nazi, that is, someone who is short-sighted enough to think that grabbing power by literally any means necessary is a good idea, and dedicate yourself to doing it with no regard for the fact that you’re ruining everything, then you can attack. Your chances of success spring from the flexibility of your own soullessness, and your opponents’ refusal to acknowledge that you’re actually that horrible.
Add in first past the post and you have two giant funnels labeled “Democrat” and “Republican” into which all political efforts ultimately fall. Biggest pile wins. People understandably don’t know about those metaphorical funnels, so they do what would be smart in another system–vote third party. But under first past the post, a third party is just a hole in the side of your funnel feeding into the other one. It just adds to the other pile. It’s the false dichotomy that was actually a true dichotomy.
So really there are two things that could have worked. One, progressive takeover of the Democratic party, and deal with the nazis properly instead of being that which they can leverage. Two, get nazis to think through their end game, and realize that they themselves do not want what they’re fighting for. When they say “yes we do!”, that’s just a refusal to think it through the rest of the way:
Ok, you want power. What does that get you? “Dead enemies”. Ok, what does that get you? “Victory!” Ok, what does that get you? “Security and strength.” Ok, what does that get you? “Peace”. Ok, what does that get you? “… I guess then I could relax and just enjoy my life?” Ok, what does that get you? “Then I would be ok inside”. Only a friend and a sage can guide someone through this, because it requires cooperation and introspection. It’ll just trigger an attack if an opponent does it to them.
You can see how unlikely those both are, but they would both work like fuckin bangers if they got off the ground. But those are the two ways you fundamentally change that dynamic. Play dirtier than the people who play dirty and win so you can restore cooperation, or get them to realize that playing dirty isn’t actually what they want anyway.
As someone from Europe who only has Lemmy.world account: i am surprised, i thought you guys were handling it lol good job in keeping the façade tho, it was convincing
Dnc clowns were staffing news and politics subs. God forbid anyone had an unsanctioned discussion
This time? There was no real opportunity for meaningful change. The Democratic party is far right economically, and they depend on the donations of plutocrats and megacorps. Regardless of either Democrats or Republicans getting elected, the donor class wins and working Americans lose. Some will say Harris attempt to appeal to the right wing is what made her lose, and perhaps there is an element of truth to that. Its unlikely that the Republican base she attempted to woo would actually vote for a Black woman running as a Democrat over the old, rich White guy running as a Republican. However, the owners of the Democratic party - the ones who immediately had millions of dollars to donate the day Biden dropped out - they didn’t lose. The only way the owners could lose is by appealing to progressives and winning an election.
The time to begin doing something differently was decades ago, building power and organizing from the bottom up. Socialists need to begin running in and winning local elections, and pushing hard against First Past The Post elections.
Not really surprised. I’ve been feeling this is the way it would go since the convention. They trotted out the Clintons yet again, indicating they were going to try to run the same failed campaign again. Everything since has felt like being on a nightmare carnival ride. You know a lot of what to expect, but you can’t stop the car or influence things. Someone else’s hand is on the lever, and you’re at their mercy
Not surprised, just disappointed… A lot.
Should have reformed how voting happens to get rid of first past the post, winner takes all.
He is winning the popular this time too isn’t he?
From the looks of it, yes. For me it’s more about getting rid of the two party system that is hurting choices and leads to potentially dumb outcomes than anything. Regardless of the outcome from that election.
It was probably a bad idea to run a candidate that they all knew was cognitively-impaired, and an even worse one to put him in situations where he couldn’t be stage-managed.
The US should have dedicated around 10% of the defense budget to a defense against Russian bot-farms.
X, Facebook, Google and Microsoft should have been seized by the state, turned into publically owned utilities, and run by a committee.Aren’t those companies already publically owned?
The US is, apparently, not ready for a woman president. Especially a non-white woman president.
Y’all weren’t entirely ready for Obama either, given how he was treated.
Didnt dnc cry this in 2016… Maybe they will learb a lesson this time?
Getting peoples votes not to be counted is a form of election fraud and Trump and his team pulled out all the stops and stole this election with such tactics.
Trump is a felon, fraud and a liar
Say what you will, but this election wasn’t stolen. It was lost. Shamefully so, but it’s to be expected when you run a vastly unpopular candidate on the curtails of “more of the same” during an economic downturn (caused by social elite); democrats fell far out of touch and it was pretty clear to see, so much so that near 20 million people who’d voted against Trump hot off his fiasco of a presidency decided they just didn’t care enough to show up.
Trump did it for 4 years, payback is a bitch ain’t it?
It would be fair, but misinformation probably isn’t best fought with misinformation. At least not if we want to keep our democracy when the challenge comes.
I am deeply surprised, and am not sure what could have been done differently. (Of course, if I was aware of something that should have been done differently, then I would probably be less surprised over this outcome.)
