I'm sick of post-mortems too, but... [View all]

[pat_k]

...here are a couple puzzle pieces -- no particular ranking or assertion that this or that item is "The Reason."

Unions
My step-father was a union steward at Boeing for decades. In his opinion, the Dems have done a lousy job with unions -- starting with NAFTA.
I don't want to argue how great we are for union people, or how we are comparatively better. The breach exists and we've got to repair that breach somehow.

Student loan forgiveness
Ties into the above and same source. Big problem. Ties right into our "brand" as elitist. Once again, I don't want to argue, but the forgiveness program just opened wounds with non-college educated working people. As my step-father put it. "I can't tell you how many truly qualified people lost promotions to some unqualified asshole with a degree. And now they get that degree at no cost? Fuck them."

Elitist brand.
Yes, it is part of the far right propaganda machine, but some of it sticks because there are grains of truth. One person -- can't remember who -- captured some of this pointing out that you can't reach working people by hammering on offering "them" the opportunity for education to become one of "us."

Stop ignoring what we are being told.
Anoiting an incumbent with a 40% approval is a death sentence. In the name of party unity we got behind very unpopular candidates (including Hillary) without a real contest. Let's not do that again. We've got a deep bench and when we are up against a "throw the bums out" mentality, we need a truly open primary to hammer things out.

Far-right brainwashing.
This is not a political propaganda war. It is a social problem. Some ideas here:
https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=19612951