Let's Discuss
There have been a lot of posts lately about where we as a party have gone wrong – why we are losing elections, why we are losing influence over the electorate, et cetera.
Posters have brought up the undue influence of corporate money in our elections, how we must rid the party of the Wall Street types, how we have lost touch with the working class. But let’s look at the facts.
The Democrats have always stood up for the working class. We are the party that has fought for an increase in the minimum wage, for the social safety nets that catch those who are down on their luck before they fall any further into financial disaster. We are the party that wants universal healthcare for all, so that hard-working Americans aren’t bankrupted by medical bills they can’t afford.
We are basically living with a two party system, and our party continues to be the party that stands with the working class, while the other party has consistently given tax breaks to the wealthy, while promoting legislation that increases the tax burden of the middle-class.
Aside from the obvious machinations of Russian influence and voter suppression in the last election, let’s explore what has been made obvious by Trump’s “win”.
The Republicans stood for divisiveness; we stood for inclusiveness. They won.
The Republicans stood for government intrusiveness into the lives of women who want dominion over their own bodies, and LGBTers who want the same rights hetero people have. They won.
The Republicans stood for deporting illegals who were “stealing” good-paying jobs. They won.
The Republicans stood for “good Christian values” while profferring a self-professed “pussy-grabber” as their candidate. They won.
The Republicans stood up for a candidate who bragged about being “too smart” to pay taxes, “too smart” to pay workers for their services, “too smart” to have his brand-named goods manufactured in the States when offshore workers are willing to produce the same goods for a fraction of the cost. And yet, HE won.
The Republicans stood for dismantling and/or eliminating literally everything that helps the working-class, from affordable healthcare, to affordable education, to protecting every citizen’s right to clean water, safe food, safe drugs, and a livable wage. They won.
Trump supporters didn’t vote for him because he represented a break with Wall Street, or ridding our electoral system of the influence of the monied. They didn’t vote for him because he refused the financial contributions of Big Business. In fact, his entire campaign was based on his own money-making prowess as an alleged billionaire who was handed an inheritance he never worked for.
In view of all of the above, it strikes me as ludicrous to say that we Democrats lost the election by not being the party of the working-class, or because we have somehow failed them. In a two-party system, it is abundantly clear which party has always supported the working class and which party doesn’t, and never has.
The cries of let’s open the party to the working-class is not only a misleading and totally untruthful statement – given that we have never been “closed” to anyone, especially the working-class – it is an insult to a party that has fought for the welfare of the working-class for decades.
While ridding politics of the influence of monied interests is a noble cause, we most assuredly did not lose the last election to those who oppose such influence. We lost to the party that clings to it, and the voters who don’t give a shit how much money gets poured into elections, nor where it comes from. We lost to voters who believe that “ties to Wall Street” are unimportant, as long as those ties serve to elect a man who will rid the country of people they don’t like.
The lost election had nothing to do with voters who were looking at Democrats as people beholding to Big Money. It had everything to do with voters who see Democrats as beholding to people who are non-white and non-Christian, and those who refused to get on the bigot/racist bandwagon.
This past election wasn’t about money and its influence on political parties; it was about the party who appealed to those who couldn’t care less how much money is involved, as long as they hear what they want they want to hear.
The Democrats didn't lose because we're too cozy with corporate money - in fact, quite the opposite. We lost to a candidate who never stops talking about money and its importance in assessing someone's political worth. We lost to a candidate whose entire campaign was premised on attaining wealth as the be-all and end-all in weighing who was fit for the presidency and who wasn't, all other considerations to be ignored.
So let’s stop pretending it was the issue of "money in politics" that led to a Democratic defeat - it wasn't. Let's stop pretending that the Republicans are now the party of the working-class - they're not. Above all, let's stop promoting the idea that the Republicans "won" the election due to their concern for middle-class Americans - they have no such concerns.
I expect dumbass Republican voters to be dazzled by bullshit. I also expect intelligent Democrats to recognize bullshit when they smell it.
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That said, and given that we got 3 million more votes, I’d say we did NOT lose. Rather, he acquired the office via the gerrymandered manipulation of a broken anachronism. I’ve been at the table where the guy who took away the poker winnings was later shown to be a cheat; he got the money, but he didn’t “win” it. Meanwhile, I’m still proud to be a Democrat, a member of the party with 3 million proofs of our dedication to our time-honored principles.
“They”, on the other hand, can strut their “win” all they want. That’s all they’ve got. We know who we are. We also know who they are not.
Time to unstack their deck.
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A) The election was flat out f'ing stolen, period.
B) Chastising ourselves endlessly take energy away from correcting this abomination of a stolen election result.
Review the numbers and include the electoral votes and the popular vote along with the number of suppressed votes -even just those that can be verified by voters being turned away at the polls or other irregularities - in the tally.
Sure, we had divisions in the party and things got pretty nasty, partially due to the propaganda machine, and partly due to our unwillingness to recognize each other because we had enough trolls to fan the flames of individual sensitivities. It wasn't that we blew it, we were robbed. Now we have to stop the steamroller before there's nothing left.
