Famous French economist, Thomas Piketty, says "go left" and Democrats will win more voters

[DemocracyMouse]

Even Bill Clinton would agree... ("It's the Economy Stupid" ), Democrats have to address the economic divide to increase voter turnout. Article about Piketty's deeply researched paper (174 pages with charts) in RawStory:

https://www.rawstory.com/2018/03/famous-french-economist-counterintuitive-idea-democrats-can-retake-america/

The author of Capital in the Twenty-First Century, a New York Times best-seller and the most-bought book in the history of Harvard University Press, has published a paper that uses exit polling data to argue that embracing economic populism would power the left toward huge electoral wins.

Piketty’s conclusion is that moving the Democratic party further to the left, at least when it comes to economics, would help it win. That’s because it would help them bring back alienated working-class and uneducated voters who either don’t vote now, or who are brought into the Republican fold through the party’s nativism and social conservatism.

Piketty’s analysis squares with what commentators from outlets like Salon, who employed the strident H.A. Goodman during the 2016 primary, have been preaching for awhile....

The future, then, would have a Democratic Party where “lower class voters” of all stripes, including lower education and lower income voters, support them while upper and middle class people formed the Republican party...

“If you look at the patterns of where gains are being made and who is creating the foundation for those gains, it’s the same: An energized Democratic base is linking arms with disaffected suburban voters,” Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel told the Times. “The president’s conduct has basically given voters this permission slip to go against the Republicans.”

[Eliot Rosewater]

1. All the DNC should need to do is be who they are, a quality political party

that is preferred by every thinking human being alive to any GOP party let alone this one.

[DemocracyMouse]

2. ...Stay static? Don't increase votes? I'm really missing your point

[Eliot Rosewater]

3. Have a nice day

[Hortensis]

31. Here's one worth trying to catch, Mouse.

Link to tweet

Link below, Mouse. See ya there!

[Hortensis]

32. We need to flip 23 seats. Here's HRC's recommendation how:

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[KPN]

14. So do you disagree with Piketty about

the income inequality issue? Or do you disagree that the party needs to grow in membership? Or both? I'm unclear on that, but that's what you seem to be saying. I partly agree with you if the first. The Democratic Party had a pretty good platform in 2016. Where I somewhat am concerned is in the differences between platforms and results/actions over time. The party has always had a fairly progressive platform. At the same time, the economic trend has been against the working/middle class for the past 40 years. That has adversely affected millions upon millions of Americans directly. Those people care more about actual results than platforms. How do we effectively address that? How do we get the notion across that things will be different? What do we as a party do in that regard?

[DBoon]

4. I think his point is valid

If we can peel away 10% of this target, we will win

The majority may be unreachable, but many elections are won at the margins

[ck4829]

25. Exactly

[rainy]

5. Hes right! Democrats would win huge running progressive

candidates.

[George II]

6. That's BS, and some references in the article are highly offensive, e.g.:

"It’s dense stuff—not the sort of thing the “low education, low income voters” he writes about are likely to read."

Really?

[ehrnst]

8. +1000. (nt)

[Eliot Rosewater]

15. Attack attack attack, just another day

[KPN]

16. Why do you find that offensive? Is it the words he used or the concept?

[Tarheel_Dem]

7. Stick to French economics, Piketty. What a load of crap.

[Qutzupalotl]

9. Agreed, lower income voters should be voting Democratic.

But if they need higher education or voluminous reading material to figure that out, we won’t reach them.

There’s an opening here, since Trump lied to coal workers. Our message should be somthing that lets people know we have their back. “We want to train workers for the jobs of the future.” Then actually do it.

[BoneyardDem]

10. If there is anything to be learned.....

it's that all elections are local. Lamb didn't win by being far left.

There are a lot of RED districts that can be won if we don't turn off those R voters by being extreme.

I think given the Blue Wave momentum, there is something wrong and off putting, when the Dems are suddenly being told to move in a different direction.

[NurseJackie]

11. Thank you! That's absolutely correct!

The fringe-left is fooling themselves if they honestly believe that a Vermont-style politician will play equally well in West Virginia (or Southwest Pennsylvania.)

I think given the Blue Wave momentum, there is something wrong and off putting, when the Dems are suddenly being told to move in a different direction.

I know, right? It definitely gives me pause and makes me wonder precisely what the motivation may be for such things.

I mean, honestly... I have some ideas that I believe to be accurate... but it's probably best that I not go into much detail here, for obvious reasons.

[Eliot Rosewater]

18. The propaganda that is allowed ....sigh

[Tarheel_Dem]

12. I hope, like you and me, Dems don't fall for this divisive crap AGAIN.

"...there is something wrong and off putting, when the Dems are suddenly being told to move in a different direction."

[jodymarie aimee]

26. In Wisconsin we have been in R hell for 10 years now

Super majorities, we are in chains..some of our candidates tried to appeal to the Rs...becoming more R as in guns, women's rights, climate, etc...guess what? They lost....Someone very wise once said.."If you become Republican lite, the voter is gonna vote for the REAL Republican...be who we are, progressive DEMS".

[lapucelle]

13. HA Goodman endorsed Jill Stein in the GE.

He's an unhinged conspiracy theorist who did everything he could to undermine the Democratic nominee in 2016 and personally slander HRC. Why anyone would drag trash like him into this forum to support a point of view is troubling beyond words.

Furthermore, the Raw Story article you cite argues against both Salon's facile endorsement of Picketty's theory and the exegesis itself:

"Piketty’s analysis squares with what commentators from outlets like Salon, who employed the strident H.A. Goodman during the 2016 primary, have been preaching for awhile."

snip=================================

"Neither Piketty or the Salon writers considered the possibility that the class-based realignment they envision is happening, but that the Republicans have a lock on the lower classes. And that the future of the Democratic party is in the hands of people like Texas ex-Republican Nancy Sharp.

“Have you ever heard of a stupider and trashier man than the president of the United States?” she asked the New York Times in December.

“If you look at the patterns of where gains are being made and who is creating the foundation for those gains, it’s the same: An energized Democratic base is linking arms with disaffected suburban voters,” Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel told the Times. “The president’s conduct has basically given voters this permission slip to go against the Republicans.”

[Eliot Rosewater]

17. The attacks are growing, daily. Noticed that did you? Me too

[lapucelle]

19. I can't believe that HA Goodman is being given any credibility here.

This is a Democratic forum.

[DemocracyMouse]

20. Why do some of you here think that being a traditional New Deal Democrat is "fringe"?

You must be sitting pretty. I can't see any other reason for lack of compassion for what most Americans are putting up with – lost pensions, 2-3 jobs, stagnant or dropping wages.

And putting down a serious economist because he's French?

Is DU really a dialogue among Democrats? Some of the above arguments sounds kind of planted by outsiders.

[DemocracyMouse]

21. Also, is Bill Clinton statement "It's the economy" a fringe statement?

Is the billionaire Warren Buffet being all "fringey" when he said we're up sh---'s creek if we don't address the severe concentration of wealth in the USA? Or when he said his secretary pays at a higher tax rate than he does?

Is it Fringe to read books about economics?

Let's fix this country.

[Nitram]

22. A famous French economist said it? Must be right. i mean left.

[Fiendish Thingy]

23. K n r - great article by a great progressive mind! Nt

[ck4829]

24. K&R

[Squinch]

27. What policies would constitute "going left" that are not already in the Democratic Party platform?

I dearly wish those who are screaming we need to "go left" would stop fighting against the Bill Clinton administration of 20 years ago and catch up with where the party actually is today.

[JI7]

28. So Why isn't Ben Jealous doing so Well ? in fact he is very far behind in the polls

i understand that the republican is anti trump and moderate and all of that but it's clear that Ben Jealous is a liberal so if that's what people want why isn't he getting the support ?

and that's a blue state.

[RussBLib]

29. Jealous will probably beat Baker in the Dem primary

but against Hogan it doesn't look too good. Still, lots of time to state the case to the voters.

Could be MD ain't as blue as it used to be.

[Hortensis]

30. Political scientists tracking these things say Democratic

LEGISLATORS have been going left for some while, returning to where we were back in the New Deal era. This follow an attempt to hold power in the 1990s by moving toward the center on some issues when America moved right as part of a big conservative wave that started around 1978 and continues to this day.

This move left has been proceeding to the point that the increasing gap between left and right in legislatures that need to be able routinely reach bipartisan agreements concerns scientists.

Scientists are also concerned that the takeover by extremism on the right is now being followed by increasing extremism among some on the left. Far smaller numbers, but still potentially dangerously destabilizing.

Those who are surprised to discover the "common knowledge" being spread about this by our enemies is just plain wrong should feel free to verify this by learning what we should all know and then be sure to pass this information around.