Democrats seek new identity in post-Trump era

[liskddksil]

Democrats say they’re in need of serious course corrections to stay competitive in future elections, warning the party may no longer be able to rely on anger at President Trump to drive voters to the polls.

Top liberals interviewed by The Hill expressed concern that the party would drift back to old established ways after using Trump as a boogeyman to raise money and juice turnout for the past two cycles.

Democrats are alarmed after this month’s elections revealed soft spots among non-college-educated and Latino voters and are skeptical that they’ll consistently be able to rely on turnout from affluent white suburbanites who rejected Trump.

With Trump out of office, some Democrats say the party should fill the void of economic populism he’ll be leaving behind by aiming their policies and rhetoric at lifting working-class Americans who have felt ignored by Washington.

And they feel a renewed urgency to build out a centralized campaign infrastructure. They’re calling on President-elect Joe Biden to work on rebuilding the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and for party operatives to train their focus on winning state legislative races that Republicans have dominated.

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/527628-democrats-seek-new-identity-in-post-trump-era
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Very much worth reading.

[Autumn]

1. Good article, and some very valid points.

[robbedvoter]

2. Disarray!!!!

Democrats in disarray o’clock! We have an identity: the not Nazis

[jimfields33]

3. Nobody says disarray

However, work at the state level wouldn’t hurt.

[RKP5637]

4. K&R!!! n/t

[liskddksil]

6. Learning lessons from cycle to cycle is the most constructive thing a Party must do nt

[CrispyQ]

5. We need a marketing department, stat!

“Republicans have had a multidecade plan to focus on state legislatures to redraw congressional lines. They’ve had a methodical and disciplined plan and they’ve implemented it to amazing success,” said veteran Democratic operative Joe Trippi.

We're decades behind the 8-ball in messaging. While the repubs were funding think tanks to craft their message & buying radio stations to broadcast it, we were running as fast as we could from the word liberal. We need to take out that old Joe Conservative essay, dust it off, & come up with a comprehensive ad campaign that targets each one of the essay's points.

A Day In The Life of Joe Conservative

https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Essay:A_Day_In_The_Life_of_Joe_Conservative

Joe gets up at 6 a.m. and fills his coffeepot with water to prepare his morning coffee. The water is clean and good because some tree-hugging liberal fought for minimum water-quality standards. With his first swallow of water, he takes his daily medication. His medications are safe to take because some stupid commie liberal fought to ensure their safety and that they work as advertised.

All but $10 of his medications are paid for by his employer's medical plan because some liberal union workers fought their employers for paid medical insurance -- now Joe gets it, too.

He prepares his morning breakfast: bacon and eggs. Joe's bacon is safe to eat because some girly-man liberal fought for laws to regulate the meat packing industry.

In the morning shower, Joe reaches for his shampoo. His bottle is properly labeled with each ingredient and its amount in the total contents because some crybaby liberal fought for his right to know what he was putting on his body and how much it contained.

Joe dresses, walks outside and takes a deep breath. The air he breathes is clean because some environmentalist wacko liberal fought for the laws to stop industries from polluting our air.

He walks on the government-provided sidewalk to the subway station for his government-subsidized ride to work. It saves him considerable money in parking and transportation fees because some fancy-pants liberal fought for affordable public transportation, which gives everyone the opportunity to be a contributor.

Joe begins his work day. He has a good job with excellent pay, medical benefits, retirement, paid holidays and vacation because some lazy liberal union members fought and died for these working standards. Joe's employer pays these standards because Joe's employer doesn't want his employees to call the union.

If Joe is hurt on the job or becomes unemployed, he'll get a worker compensation or unemployment checks because some stupid liberal didn't think he should lose his home because of his temporary misfortune.

It is noontime and Joe needs to make a bank deposit so he can pay some bills. Joe's deposit is federally insured by the FSLIC because some godless liberal wanted to protect Joe's money from unscrupulous bankers who ruined the banking system before the Great Depression.

Joe has to pay his Fannie Mae-underwritten mortgage and his below-market federal student loan because some elitist liberal decided that Joe and the government would be better off if he was educated and earned more money over his lifetime. Joe also forgets that in addition to his federally subsidized student loans, he attended a state funded university.

Joe is home from work. He plans to visit his father this evening at his farm home in the country. He gets in his car for the drive. His car is among the safest in the world because some America-hating liberal fought for car safety standards to go along with the taxpayer funded roads.

He arrives at his boyhood home. His was the third generation to live in the house financed by Farmers' Home Administration because bankers didn't want to make rural loans.

The house didn't have electricity until some big-government liberal stuck his nose where it didn't belong and demanded rural electrification.

He is happy to see his father, who is now retired. His father lives on Social Security and a union pension because some wine-drinking, cheese-eating liberal made sure he could take care of himself so Joe wouldn't have to.

Joe gets back in his car for the ride home, and turns on a radio talk show. The radio host keeps saying that liberals are bad and conservatives are good. He doesn't mention that the beloved conservatives have fought against every protection and benefit Joe enjoys throughout his day. Joe agrees: "We don't need those big-government liberals ruining our lives! After all, I'm a self-made man who believes everyone should take care of themselves, just like I have."

Note: This was originally published (anonymously) under the title A Day in the Life of Joe Republican. But this is a misnomer. In the last 140 years, the Republican and Democratic parties have switched sides several times, with one being conservative and the other being liberal. But labels and party affiliations change. What doesn't change are the underlying political philosophies of liberalism and conservatism, and the fact that the liberals usually turned out to be right and the conservatives turned out to be wrong. And so it goes.

People are more liberal than they think. There are studies that show when ideas/proposals/legislation are presented without labels like liberal/conservative, left/right, or democratic/republican, people agree on tons of issues.