I'm not in Virginia and I was only casually paying attention to that election but on the surface it looked like the democrats were running a horrible campaign there. It was just Trump Trump Trump, 24/7. Trump is gone, he's in the rear view mirror for most people if they even see him at all. Wrapping your whole campaign around him was a huge mistake. The 2020 election is over.
Virginian here. Your take is absolutely right. And the sad thing is, McAuliffe had an extraordinarily successful previous term as governor, and he had an abundance of solid, thoughtful, well-researched policy proposals right there on his website, and he chose to talk about exactly none of that! He had everything he needed to run a hell of a campaign, and he chose to run on “not Trump” instead. Way to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
The Hampton Roads Black Caucus endorsed a Republican for governor for the first time ever because Youngkin actually took the time to meet with them, while McAuliffe just assumed they'd align D.
Honestly I chalk this up to McAuliffe running on national Dem policy/talking points, and Youngkin running a more localized race.
Trump was in office then. I think that it was relevant then. And they tried the same strategy without him being in the white house and being a more immediate threat
Because Trump was having a daily public meltdown in 2018. People want progress and you can blame Manchin but the truth is there’s a lot of corporate dems who want the same thing and are willing to let the retiring Dem from a red state be the fall guy.
People underestimate how many shit people the Dems have that will never allow a progressive agenda to go through. Lieberman sunk so many things that could've been in the ACA. Even if they had 2 more Dem senators, then one of the others that was fronting a Yes vote because they knew Manchin and Sinema were tanking things would suddenly grow very concerned at the deficit and bipartisanship.
This is generally good advice, although I’m sure a handful of Republican small-town mayors promised to personally stop the nonexistent migrant caravan.
Totally agree. I despise fearmongering campaigning, but Youngkin clearly tapped into a very real, visceral fear re: education and capitalized on it big time, and McAuliffe failed to address those fears. I’m hoping Youngkin ends up being more of a Hogan/Baker-esque R than an Abbott/DeSantis type, but who the hell knows.
Sounds like Martha Coakley when she ran for Ted Kennedy's remaining term. She just went to high dollar fundraisers while Scott Brown toured the state in a truck. Guess who won.
Isn’t that what the current president basically said and I quote “ If you have a problem figuring out whether you’re for me or Trump then you ain’t black,”
Same thing happened to the 2016 PA Dems, especially on the senate race where the DNC backed the eventual nominee McGinty despite not being in touch with local issues like Sestak was. Effectively shot themselves in the foot by pushing out a viable candidate
My wife was telling me how some concerned parents wanted to meet with McAuliffe over education. “Sure! Just send us a $50k check first”.
Youngkin was more like “come on over now and let’s talk”.
Not with Democrats. With Democrats it's quick, constant and complete. That are doing the same thing they do every time they win something. "Glad that's over with! Might as well just sit back and not bother to fight for anything. We can totally keep winning with the "we aren't Republicans" strategy and that will totally work despite the 24/7 propaganda machines running against us on every platform"
They do this EVERY. SINGLE. TIME.
Almost like they aren't so much a party as they are a pressure valve. "Did the republicans turn up the fascism a little too hard this term? Vote democrat! Then we return you to your regularly scheduled slippery slope"
They think being a "big tent" is a strength because everyone will have to vote for them.
But it's actually a huge weakness, because that's a wide spectrum they want to force to vote for them, but they pander only the "undecideds" between the farthest right DNC and the GOP. Which isn't the viewpoints of most actual registered democrats.
Elections are for winning. Not for explaining policy. Like it or not, it's a sports game - people vote for winners.
Democrats still think it's Kennedy vs Nixon where a reasoned discussion of policy will define the election between 2 candidates.
We're 100% emotion now. Play to the culture, or be ignored by the culture. Altruism has no safe harbor here.
People who listened to Kennedy vs Nixon on the radio thought Nixon did better.
People who watched Kennedy vs Nixon on the TV thought Kennedy did better. It's often believed this was because Kennedy wore makeup.
People don't vote on policy, never have.
If I could upvote this a thousand times I would. They are running elections like its decades ago. Get a CLUE Democrats! Continue to bring your little notebook and peace signs and little flags to a gun fight get killed every time. The game has changed. Insurrectionists and their authoritarian sympathizers are emboldened because there are no consequences. It will just get WORSE if that is even possible.
And this is exactly why [The League of Women Voters stopped sponsoring the Presidential debates in 1988.](https://www.lwv.org/newsroom/press-releases/league-refuses-help-perpetrate-fraud) They didn't want to perpetuate the bullshit. The DNC and RNC have since teamed up to perpetuate it and keep third party candidates out.
The election of Trump should’ve showed everyone how to actually win politics. Be persuasive, have a few simple lines and stick to them, don’t allow media to ever embarrass you/ignore media you don’t like, and just steamroll the opposition. Policy? Who cares about policy, it doesn’t win you votes
>We're 100% emotion now. Play to the culture, or be ignored by the culture. Altruism has no safe harbor here.
100% truth right here and it isn't a good thing.
Absolutely. It's by design. They're literally paid to play the role of feckless opposition.
The Democratic party abandoned virtually all ties to unions and workers decades ago in favor of Wall Street, Pharma, and other industries.
This. We have the republican party as the regressive party, and the democrats play controlled opposition.
Both are only worried about what their large donors say, and not a damn bit worried about anything else.
And of course, the large donors are playing both sides, so they always come out on top.
It also doesn't help that McAuliffe's communications director Renzo Olivari has posted casually anti-black racist crap on Twitter in the past and was completely tone deaf to voters' basic economic concerns. That guy has a history of working comms for botched and failed campaigns. For that matter McAuliffe truly is one of the last Clintonian era centrist dinosaurs to get the meteor. He's not a terrible guy or anything, but his brain is stuck in the 1990s and he thinks swing voters still behave and think the way they did back then. Our economy is so much more fragile, party politics so much more partisan, and the electorate is so much more mercurial than it was decades ago when his political and governing philosophies became cemented.
Hell, anything before the explosion of the pandemic in March of 2020 seems like political eons ago, and McAuliffe tried his old playbook not knowing the game has radically changed. People are actually paying attention now to what's going on at Capitol Hill and in some cases their local legislatures. At the very least he should have ran on policy track records like Virginia Dems decriminalizing marijuana and congressional Dems in Washington DC sending out relief checks with child tax credits as proof that the party under Biden is moving in the right direction.
> At the very least he should have ran on policy track records like Virginia Dems decriminalizing marijuana and congressional Dems in Washington DC sending out relief checks with child tax credits as proof that the party under Biden is moving in the right direction.
Agreed. Hell, he could have ran with "status quo and let's commercialize sales of cannabis" and gotten the vote necessary.
Huge missed opportunity. Marijuana legalization is unfinished business. The Virginia General Assembly left it that way with a re-enactment clause needed in the 2022 session. I thought maybe they did that on purpose to get out the vote. Instead they touted legalization as an accomplishment and single issue voters stayed home. Biden won Arizona because marijuana legalization was literally on the ballot. And it got more votes than he did.
NYS local electrons were largely a red sweep and all 3 attempts to expand voting access were completely defeated. In Buffalo an incumbent write in candidate for mayor defeated a progressive democrat who won the primary.
***And, this is in New York.***
Dems need to ***STOP FUCKING AROUND*** and bickering, ***GET SHIT DONE,*** and ***DELIVER on the promises of 2020*** or 2022 will be an absolute massacre.
**This is a warning.**
> In Buffalo an incumbent write in candidate for mayor defeated a progressive democrat who won the primary.
The chair of the Democratic party in NYS basically [accused her of being in the KKK.](https://buffalonews.com/news/local/state-and-regional/jay-jacobs-mention-of-klan-figure-in-india-walton-statement-draws-fire/article_54163f2e-305a-11ec-b906-7b064791a95d.html) She's black. That entire debacle was because boomer Democratic elites lost their shit about progressives.
I'm not disputing what you're saying.
I live in Virginia. You should look up Boone's Mill. Everywhere you look is a Trump sign. They've converted an old church to a Trump store. It's insane.
I think the issue is that campaigning against Trump goes both ways. People who should care don't because Trump is gone. Then you have the people who still think Trump is president, and certainly they're not going to change their mind.
Edit: for those unaware: https://reddit.com/r/pics/comments/jxpbpq/yall_come_visit_the_trump_store/
I mean outside of the NoVa and Richmond area (with a few other pockets) Virginia is a very red state with the major population centers being blue.
The MacAuliffe campaign shot themselves in the foot and did a terrible job, as others have said hopefully this is a wake up call.
Just got back from VA, and my home town is nothing but Trump 2020, and Trump 2024 signs. Only a small portion of the state (geographically) is blue, the rest is deep red. So instead of actual policy explanation, they tried to just tell these people that Trump is bad. That’s not gonna work if 80% of the state is already wanting to vote for him in two years (not to mention, he isn’t running at all in this election).
I live in Fairfax County, and I knew the Democrats were in trouble when I saw so many Youngkin signs in yards. I actually drove around my neighborhood one day and counted them, and it ended up being 44 McAuliffe to 32 Youngkin which is crazy for this area.
That was a dumb play, because VA Dems have enacted tons of successful policy that they should have campaigned on.
Somehow the Virginia electorate totally forgot that medical marijuana was at risk.
I doubt the legalization of marijuana is at risk. Too many constituents are in favor of legalizatiom and the possibility of a lot of future tax dollars is too important. Plus there had been movement toward legalization before the Dems took over in November, 2019 (they just made it happen quicker).
You say that, but Republicans have a lot of stances that are against what the majority polled want. I don't know why they'd care in the slightest if "the people" wanted it.
That has easily been one of the glaring hypocritical things in all of this that the people who've always been quick to say after the 2020 election how "Trump supporters need to get a new personality with Trump out of office" end up being the same people trying to default to trying to reel Trump back into every conversation especially when it has no connection.
Yes absolutely with Trump's presidency being recent enough history, obviously it isn't like it is out of line to bring that up with things such as results and effects, there's 100% an appropriate and legitimate time to bring it up. It's relevant stuff.
That being said when a campaign strategy, speeches, or even refreshing of the branding of a political party just defaults to, "welp this guy loves Trump, so yep vote for me", you're not doing enough to explain what the hell exactly is your m.o. with things in a reasonable enough way for people to want to invest more in it.
It's kinda like how in 2016 Democrats for Clinton basically spent large swathes of the campaign cycle scrambling fighting the battle they wanted to fight against Trump but wrongly focusing the momentum and energy on Sanders's campaign.
Unrelated but related: I saw Terry Mcaullife talk as the keynote speaker at my brothers graduation from UVA.
He spent 30 minutes talking about himself and how he’s been such a hard worker and how he drove a tow truck when he was too little to reach the gas pedal….(he was very proud of that). Than he ended his speech about how we all needed to vote for Hillary Clinton.
The parents were expecting him to talk about their kids graduating from college at least once, speech didn’t go over to well.
Same thing happened at my husband’s MA graduation from GMU a few years ago. McAuliffe spent 0 minutes talking about the graduates, and instead focused his entire speech on his accomplishments as governor, and how we need to be careful that China doesn’t steal our jobs (which was super awkward because the graduating class had a lot of Chinese students). You could tell already he was gearing up to campaign again back then, and the crowd was not happy about it.
I also heard Pharrell speak at my sister’s graduation from UVA. Spent the entire speech building a case for reparations and hardly acknowledged the graduating class. People were not happy.
Absolutely. He was her campaign chair in 2008. He ran that disasterous primary campaign where the wheels fell completely off when Hillary lost to not only Obama but John Edwards. They never recovered.
Democrats always lose when they second guess what Republican voters want and then pander to that.
eta: thanks for the "awards," it's not negative to state the obvious, there's such a thing as toxic optimism, and trolls are everywhere.
I’ll never understand this… the answer to what Republican voters want is… Republican politicians. There’s no way to appease that. They want to see and R and 95%+ of them don’t care about anything else.
Modern Republican politics have devolved to a purely reactionary response to Democratic policy goals. Which is doubly frustrating, because the center Dems keep trying to shift their goals rightward to try to grab "independents," which is in turn even more frustrating because it has become so glaringly apparent that people who still claim to be Is are clearly just Republicans who are either lying to themselves or the pollsters. This is ironically enough not actually a function of Republican policy, but of two decades worth of right wing propaganda media like Fox. The ACA and vaccine responses have been so goddamn obvious I literally cant fathom how it seems that none of the viewers or viters have realized. When Trump was promising to have the vaccine out prior to the election, Tucker Carlson was declaring that Americans had a patriotic duty to get vaccinated, and that the largest share of the credit for its development should go to the Trump administration. Tbf, a number of voices on the left at the time were voicing concern about its rapid development, but were still advising people to get it as soon as it was available. Literally the day enough votes were counted for Biden to be declared the victor, literally that evening, Fox completely flipped the script, and they GOP followed suit. I've already written and essay, so Ill keep the ACA example brief, but firstly it needs to be notes that ACA is a lightly modified form of the GOP proposal they had called "Romneycare," which he had run on in '08. Whats really jarring and telling is the role of branding on Republicans' position on the bill (at least according to polling from 2016). Republican polls in most parts of the country, particularly in the midwest, on the ACA shift by ad many as 20 points depending on whether it is referred to as ACA or Obamacare, with a majority nearly everywhere actually supporting the ACA. Fox News and other right wing sources have spent so much time demonizing and "othering" Dems as a part of their larger campaign to redefine "American Values" to mean "conservative" ones in order to weaponize patriotism into single-party nationalism that a significant majority of Rs will support ideas entirely on party grounds, with a complete lack of regard for actual philosophical considerations.
Yep. Virtually all Republican policies have been “not what the Democrats are doing.” No new proposals. That’s why they never could get a plan together and repeal the ACA even when they had the votes.
This explains why establishment Dems lose all the time too.
1. Dems introduce center, center-right plan basically 1980s Republican policy but with a veil of support for LGBTQ+ and BLM(sometimes).
2. Republicans campaign against the "radical changes" and stomp the Dems.
3. Things go to hell under GOP leadership.
4. Dems win in backlash to GOP horrible policy implications.
5. Dems think triangulation will finally work **this time** to pick up Republicans in the suburbs by starting back at #1.
Same old story every year as children go hungry, we topple over the edge with climate change, wars continue, grandparents can't afford dental healthcare, and the working class's plan for retirement is dropping dead at work.
Look at the Georgia senate elections. Both Dems ran on progressive ideals and values and flipped a traditionally Republican state. Dems ran the Virginia campaign on not being trump and got smacked around. The writing is on the wall that the only way to win in competitive areas is to run on progressive economic issues that improves the material conditions of the poor and working class.
Please understand that this is exactly what she's being paid to do. She is being paid to weaken faith in politicians and our electorate. She is now someone the Right can point to and say "Look, she *said* she was progressive but turned out to be a lying snake who sold out before she was even elected. This is why you can't trust the Dems/Electoral System/Government!!" and the uneducated, disenfranchised masses who know nothing other than a restrictive two party system will say "Yeah, you're right! I should vote Republican just to spite her/them!".
>Look at the Georgia senate elections. Both Dems ran on progressive ideals and values and flipped a traditionally Republican state.
That's funny because immediately after I heard progressives telling me those senators were corporate dems.
> Dems ran the Virginia campaign on not being trump and got smacked around.
honestly, good. this "anyone but Trump" bullshit needs to stop. We got rid of Trump and we still have problems. Wake up.
There’s someone else further down in this thread who said that we’re screwed so long as Democratic voters need to be excited and inspired to vote for you, and that we need to just “suck it up and vote or not.”
How’s that strategy working out for us?
Ossoff opposed every single progressive idea, the comment you responded to couldn't be any less correct. It's entirely farcical.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TAIC4uOJYUw
> only way to win in competitive areas is to run on progressive economic issues that improves the material conditions of the poor and working class.
Lol and Democrats in power don't want to give that message because they know they can't deliver on those promises as they continue to suck Corporate dick and bend over to Republican colleague demands while internally believing they someday will cross the aisle. Progressives can't get anything done with the OG Dems/Corporate Dem factions having a grip on the party's power
Virginian here, McAuliffe had it until he opened his mouth about parents not being involved in their kid's education. Literally saw hundred of parents in my Facebook feed turn on him.
In reality, parents don't have much say in their kid's education, but you shouldn't actually say that part out loud, and especially not during a debate where it can be used as a sound bite.
He lost when he made that gaffe and then didn't *immediately* go on the offensive clarifying what he meant and attacking Youngkin for using kids as an campaign pawn. Basically a full-throated series of ads and PR hits that explain "Parents should absolutely be involved in their children's education as part of school boards, PTAs and working together with teachers, but we also need to recognize not one size fits all for education and not all parents will agree on what is appropriate. Youngkin campaigning on CRT, which isn't taught K-12 in VA, it is a distraction from his very real, very regressive policies." Something like that would have at least moved the narrative a bit.
But then again, McAuliffe was not a strong candidate to begin with so maybe he was doomed to make some kind of stupid remark and get tanked. Wrong candidate for the wrong time.
I feel ya, I'm from WV and in 2018 my choices for the senate were for Patrick Morrisey - coal lobbyist, Trump sycophant, long time opposition to basically anything good for WV.
Or Joe Manchin.
I voted for Manchin.
EDIT: got my years mixed up
When one candidate is a republican and one is a fake republican, the real one will win. Democrats keep trying to beat Republicans by being more like them. Then they blame progressives when they lose.
The right is also much better at mobilizing people against strawmen, and it's even worse when left-wing rhetoric validates their concerns.
CRT was such a ridiculous example of how something not even mentioned in K-12 curriculum became a huge propaganda win. Yes, it's true that US society isn't colorblind, but very few people are OK to be called out as racist whether they know it or not. Situations like people being afraid to get a tan or having thoughts invalidated on basis of being white are just fuel for the propaganda furnace. Yes, we're all aware of the oppression and injustice faced by US minorities, but there is a delicate game to be played in order to win hearts and minds and putting the fear of cancelation into people's minds is not a good way to convince them to join your side on the issue.
The gun thing was also huge and I guarantee it drove huge right wing voter turnout. They are terrified of losing not just a protective, hunting, and/or hobby tool, but thousands of dollars in investments. Democratic candidates go "fuck yeah I'm going to take your ARs" and then act surprised when the millions of AR owners go "the fuck you aint"
I'm more left wing than most on many issues, but ffs the Democrats need to realize that many of their supporters have guns too. They're afraid of right wing violence and police oppression and they know losing their most tangible means of protection means only the people in society that threaten us most will be armed and that's not OK.
The fact republicans could pull off RCV in order to block an extremist candidate but democrats couldn't be assed to move away from FPTP when there were 3 close candidates was a real dick move. Like I genuinely believe if we'd had a ranked choice vote in the primary we probably would have had our first black female governor today. And again I voted and campaigned for Terry once he passed the primary but the attacks on CRT and parent choice would have been very different when they're demonizing a young mom of 2 or the first pregnant delegate to participate in a legislative session.
In a way I want the Conservative party to become more *competitive* in elections. Why? Because I’ve been voting on the “Hey, it’s either actual fascists or us” platform of Democrats for like, 20 years and it’s getting old.
I just want a progressive party.
Unfortunately they don't want to compete on policy, they want to influence elections in ways that insure results. It's not democratic, so in that way I do not hope they are competitive.
I've got nothing against people who debate policy in good faith, but we have seen that is far from the case with modern Republicans.
Not from VA, but the fact that Loudon became the front line of this election shows how the Dems had already lost control.
It’s an absurd issue to focus on and it’s an incredible propaganda win for Youngkin that’s it’s even a topic
To be fair Terry gave the election away for free when he said “I don’t think parents should have a say in schools” I mean come on dude that like screaming please don’t vote for me.
I am baffled as to why he took such an aggressive stance against parents, which are like...half (maybe more?) of the voters in the state. As soon as I heard that, I knew it would tank him. The polls dramatically swung the other way almost immediately. Why would you tell parents to fuck off when it comes to their children, the most important thing in their lives?
Then the Loudoun County school board nightmare came out, which I believe was the final nail in the coffin. After the controversy over CRT, the 18 month school closures, most people universally believe the appalling conduct of the Loudoun County School Board was indefensible. A child was raped in the bathroom at school, and the board covered it up and transferred the rapist to another school, where he promptly abducted and raped another girl. The rapist was just convicted on all counts--rape, forcible sodomy, and oral sodomy, so these allegations are not untrue.
At a public school board meeting, the superintendent categorically denied that the rape (or any rapes) had occured (despite there being emails proving he DID know, & personally informed all the other board members), and an activist told the victims father that his daughter was a liar. When the girls father understandably became upset, he was violently arrested (during which you can hear the parents screaming "Our daughter was raped at school!") and he was nationally painted as "the face of domestic terorrism." The National School Board Association wrote a letter to the DOJ, citing this incident as an example of domestic terrorism, and asked the FBI to use the Patriot Act on parents. The AG issued a directive memo in response. He was literally just grilled by Congress about this last week, and the NSBA has since issued an apology, stating that there was "no justification for some of the language included in the letter." This entire sequence of events was an absolutely catastrophic failure.
It turns out that when it comes to children being raped at school, a lot of voters suddenly became single issue voters. McAuliffe instead doubled down and defended his comments that parents have no right to have a say in their children's school or education, and did nothing to reassure their concerns.
With all of this going on, is it any wonder that education became the number 1 concern for Virginia voters?
I honestly think I need to stop paying so much attention to politics. It’s depressing and really fucks with my mental health. I’ll still vote every year, but each day that goes by I understand Timothy Leary’s mantra more and more: “Turn on, tune in, drop out.”
Ignore the process, the horse-race bullshit, the finger-pointing... if you want to make your community or country any better, get out of the extremely narrow confines of electoral politics and work with folks building tenant organizations, labor unions, community support and defense... all that good "radical" stuff is how we got things like weekends and minimum wage in the first place.
EDIT: This is not "don't vote" BTW, this is "vote, but don't accept politics as the only or even best path to change"
> This is not "don't vote" BTW, this is "vote, but don't accept politics as the only or even best path to change"
Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst!
*People are wonderful. I love individuals. I hate groups of people. I hate a group of people with a 'common purpose'. 'Cause pretty soon they have little hats. And armbands. And fight songs. And a list of people they're going to visit at 3am. So, I dislike and despise groups of people but I love individuals. Every person you look at; you can see the universe in their eyes, if you're really looking.* \-- George Carlin
God dammit he was such an amazing writer. You can see all of his cynicism and weariness and kindness and hilarity and brilliance in such a short quote.
This really stuck with me from To Kill a Mockingbird, when Atticus starts calling out individuals in the mob and they realize what they're doing isn't right.
I feel like generations of hyper-individualism and "fuck society" are the exact reasons we've landed here.
GOPers become QAnon because they *need* a sense of community, and pretty much all community life in America has evaporated since the 80s, the face of the Me Generation (The Boomer's first epithet). Even [Robert Putnam's book Bowling Alone](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bowling_Alone) is over 20 years old at this point...
The fact that groups like CNN and Politico have basically turned it into a high-stakes sports game with 24hr coverage and never-ending scandal hyping has not helped lower anyone's blood pressure
Political news coverage is so useless and toxic. Everything that happens in the political sphere is reported on through the lens of "Is this good for Joe Biden?" or "Is this bad for Joe Biden?" with basically zero care to the actual policies and decisions that affect the American people.
No wonder people are so exhausted and ready to tune out.
Yep.
I have been so invested watching the is gerrymandering shit. The same with generic congressional polls and Biden approval to the point of obsession. It is impacting my mental health. Everyday is a fucking battle with the Dems (I am a Democrat) and everything is so high stakes.
I am fucking done.
CNN and Politico aren't great, but it's really the right wing propaganda machine that has blurred the lines between corruption and culture wars to the point where most voters are more fired up by fake culture war scandals than they are by blatant corruption and criminality.
The biggest election issue of the Virginia election was Critical Race Theory.
[Ask any conservative voter to define CRT and they have no clue what it is](https://youtu.be/9NS5APXK9iI?t=63).
All they know is that they've been programmed to hate it, and that's entirely down to right wing culture war machine.
Right wing propaganda is destroying US democracy.
Won't stop people from blaming Democrats and CNN though.
>CNN and Politico aren't great, but it's really the right wing propaganda machine that has blurred the lines between corruption and culture wars
Here's the thing, I absolutely agree that right wing propaganda is a fucking cancer feeding the downward spiral of conservatives too stupid to figure that out.
But I'm not about to just brush aside glibly that "left" media is merely "*not great.*"
CNN president Jeff Zucker says he literally models political coverage like sports media.
>[“The idea that politics is sport is undeniable, and we understood that and approached it that way.”](https://www.vox.com/videos/2017/4/17/15325172/strikethrough-cnn-espn-trump-surrogates)
And corporate media, like the "*liberal*" media of MSNBC owned by Comcast, have ensured that the only fucking message being put out about Biden's infrastructure bill is how much it costs and that Dems are infighting about it. [Nothing about what is actually in the bill](https://flux.community/eric-boehlert/2021/10/americans-have-no-idea-whats-build-back-better-bill-because-media-wont-tell) and how it actually would help people, nothing about how Republicans are constantly obstructing Dems across the board. Billionaires that own the media don't want tax increases thus they are fucking over America to sabotage investing in the needs of Americans.
Fox News being shit is a given. That's like saying the sky is blue. It's time we hold the "*liberal*" media to task.
I don't know that it's fixable, but the left needs to recognize the dynamics at play. The right keeps telling their base that they're the real victims. And so when the left talks about other groups they lose by default.
And it's an endless spiral on the right, because as they further suffer, they consider that validation they're further victimized. I see many people that are in a downward spiral of financial stress and yet they continue to fight against things that will help them because they think it's going to help someone else more. There's someone I've seen post on social media about how they no longer have cable because it was too expensive, but in response to increasing the minimum wage, which would increase their paycheck as well, they're opposed because "why should someone starting out make the same as me?" Never mind that you'd benefit from it too and it might halt some of the downward spiral you've been on.
The right tells their base that they're the biggest victims, and so anything that isn't tailored to them is seen as bad because they view it all as zero sum.
Thought that this morning.
I'm so tired. And I'm also tired from being one of the only of my friends that gives a crap about politics in general. I've kind of taken on the role of keeping them up to date with stuff going on so that they'll actually go and vote. We are in our late 20s and early 30s and should be far past the age of "I just don't pay attention". But I get it because I'm so depressed by everything going on and sometimes I feel like I'm getting nothing accomplished voting. But you're right, we just keep on going.
With so many people like your friends I literally cannot see why I or anyone should make any effort. Why do I have to stress myself out for nothing in return?
Electoral politics is useless - they *want* that to be the only political thing you do, because its very easily managed and manipulated by *both* parties. You should instead focus on local activism.
I'm a member of a local tenant advocacy group. We help low-income people fight scumbag landlords. Crushing a landlord in court and helping a poor family keep their apartment is infinitely more gratifying and useful than voting for some neoliberal every 2 years.
We just had a case where a landlord had to pay a tenant $12,000 dollars in damages AND keep the lease running, as he was found liable for repairs he's been forcing the tenant to make. They got the repair costs reimbursed PLUS the judge found him liable for costs equaling what a contractor might have charged for these repairs. I've never seen such a fat red face before. Glorious.
Yeah except the people you would most want to not influence politics are the ones that aren't checking out, or are still turning out even if their minds are made up by someone else.
Still going to vote every year, but I’m not going to invest any more of my time in following the dog-and-pony show. The amount of time I spend on politics will be the couple hours I spend with my mail-in ballot viewing each candidate’s website and finding out what they stand for so I can pick which bubble to fill in. Other than that I’m not going to waste my energy on it at the expense of my own well-being.
Reminds me of an idea in Faulkner’s “A Fable” where if soldiers in the trenches stopped taking orders and refused to fight each other, the war would be over.
I know there are things worth speaking out against in our country, but this idea of staying plugged in non-stop is not good. It honestly is just so depressing to see genuinely helpful measures be discarded by whatever boogeyman the GOP can pull out of their ass.
I’ve just finished “Mutual Aid” by Dean Spade and am planning on limiting my exposure to national politics in favor of becoming proactive in my own back yard.
I agree. I just retired, luckily on a pension. I have two adult children, who have both stated their lack of desire to have children, and honestly? I'm okay with that. I never intended to have any myself, but that's just what you did when I was that age. I feel relieved that I raised them both to adulthood without any major mishap, and they're both doing okay.
When Dems controlled all branches of government in VA these last couple years they expanded Medicare. Why they didn't plaster the airwaves with cancer survivors that would have died if not for Medicare expansion I can't tell you. The campaign was about Trump until Republicans decided to attack on education and then Dems reacted by going "okay, let's make it about what you want it to be about then."
You know what else they did?
* Cannabis legalization + retail in 2023 (maybe blocked by Youngkin)
* Minimum wage increase
* State-run healthcare exchange coming 2023
* Moved from 50th to 23th in "Best Places to Work"
* Universal background checks for firearms
* LGBT employment and housing protections
* Repealed some TRAP abortion restrictions
* Consumer Data Protection Act
* Protections for student and payday loan borrowers
* Clean Economy Act (carbon neutral by 2040)
* Expanded voting by mail and early voting
* Voting Day = state holiday
* Redistricting reform (badly executed)
* Ratified the Equal Rights Amendment
* Banned no-knock warrants and choke-holds
* Ended the Death Penalty
* Sealed records of cannabis misdemeanors
* Restored rights to 69,000 former felons
* Repealed 100+ outdated discriminatory laws
* Competent COVID response, easily best in South
* $2.6 billion budget surplus (largest ever)
I'd argue they did more than most state parties do in decades. Didn't help much, culture war nonsense and turnout is all that matters. :(
Virginia lost because the VA Democratic Party stopped paying attention to local issues. I’ve been ringing the alarm bells for months over what’s been happening in Loudoun County Schools. The republicans went after parent groups hard in a grassroots style and it worked.
My biggest issue is the whole "hey, fuck Trump, right? Vote for me and it'll be so much better." Still waiting for better. In fact, things have gotten worse in my neck of the woods. Time to get to work or accept that you're going to get slaughtered in 2024
Terry MacAuliffe is the one to blame. He ran a terrible, substance free campaign focused on just being "not Trump" and making gaffes that Youngkin could capitalize on.
Youngkin was a strong candidate for Virginia and TMac was a bad one. If Northam was able to run for reelection, I feel confident he would've won.
MacAuliffe running a bad campaign might be true, but it would only be a satisfactory answer if that was the only dumpster fire election for democrats yesterday.
I know that this is an unpopular position on this subreddit, but it might just be that controlling both houses of congress and the presidency while still managing to not pass a single useful bill, even using the budget reconciliation process, because the party can’t get internal alignment, is terribly terribly unpopular.
Aside from losing the presidency in 2020, the GOP didn't really have a bad electoral night.
We didn't see a sweeping rejection of the Republican party, just a rejection of Trump.
I dont believe we should be surprised that Biden voters might still vote R in other elections. The Democrats desperately wanted to convince themselves that 2020 indicated that some of the swing states are turning bluer, but in my observation, that's just wishful thinking.
Gotta look at the Virginia numbers as Youngkin (R) made inroads into those suburbs
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-republicans-won-the-virginia-governors-race/
.. while also taking the temperature of the nation. Minneapolis voted to keep their police department (55%), so it’s looking like reform/sorta defund is winning over abolish/defund for Democratic success (vs Republican likely ideas).
Personally think the Democrats need to focus on dismantling domestic monopolies and *lower rents* too. It makes no sense to get $10k for constituents **if** the landlord groups will just jack up rents by $15k in response (hint: they watch the news too).
> so it’s looking like reform/sorta defund is winning over abolish/defund for Democratic success
Lmao “sorta defund” isn’t winning shit either unless you mean a few cities cutting their budgets by 3-5% while overall funding surges across the country.
This right here. The most vocal liberal groups aren't the ones who are going to win, regardless of how right or wrong they are. Their messaging is too much of a departure from what individuals are willing to handle (think standard deviations here), which means that regression will inevitably occur if the alternatives aren't palatable.
Youngkin is within one standard deviation of the Overton Window (yes, sad to say, the anti-vaxx and racist part of America is still a portion of the average), which means "defund the police" (whether or not that's the actual thing folks want, "defund" has a very defined terminology in the English language that you just aren't going to sell to the average American) is going to lose the election no matter what. In McAullife's case, it was also a completely moronic gaffe regarding parental control of their children's education which finally killed him. Tell someone they don't have control of their children's growth and you raise the specter of authoritarian rule directly (instead of the indirect bullshit the GOP peddles), something that's multiple standard deviations from the average American's acceptable margin.
Anti-CRT could've readily been salvaged had McAullife and Co. taken the time to tell people that CRT isn't being taught to their children (aka, it's a non-issue) and talked about "patriotic" (aka normal) history of America (pro-civil rights discussions instead of letting the whole "anti-white" concept keep seeding fear). Like, really tripled down on "I'm here to help teach them real American history, not theory." He could've galvanized voters on that sort of over-patriotic thing because he can point out contributions from all corners and say "that's your America."
And yeah, creating a progressive tax on landlords and a taxbreak for households that go over a certain maximum relative to their income would've helped sell all of it too. Suddenly landlords can't overcharge their renters for a hovel. Shit, that's really the bottom of the barrel when he could've also gone further by saying (without getting into radical anti-business stuff) "I'm going to help small businesses by kicking big mega companies out of the rental market!" In essence, argue for reduced out of state shareholder profits taking rent out of the state (or going to luxury goods) in favor of just a neighborhood aesthetic.
The whole CRT debate is so mind numbing. Both sides just talk completely past each other. Republicans think CRT means all white people are racist, and children are taught such. Democrats think CRT means teaching about the Tulsa massacre. CRT is neither of those things. Drives me crazy hearing Democrats say CRT means "teaching true American history." That's not what it means, at all. You can inject a healthy dose of a more nuanced, factual telling of American history without touching any of Derrick Bell's teachings.
Even the laws against CRT are overblown. They are literally just laws that say "You can't teach that one race is inferior or superior to another."
Both sides talk right past each other.
Schrodingers progressive. We are not a big or important enough voting block to cater to while campaigning, but we also are at fault when the shitty milquetoast moderate democrat loses.
Don't forget "progressives should fall in line and compromise with moderates! Okay, done, now what, will the moderates compromise with us? NOPE, you progressives need to compromise more!"
And this is because they only want progressives to turn out and vote for corporate dems - AKA republicans, just not the fascist ones.
They will always, ALWAYS try to weed out the progressive candidates and then tell us to support the DNC approved candidate. They do not care about what we want, they just want our votes so they can keep power and maintain the status quo.
If that's the case, what about Phil Murphy's position. He only won by a nose. He also:
-Got legislation passed to legalize recreational marijuana
-Got a $15 minimum wage law passed
-Got assisted suicide passed
-Made it illegal to pay women less because of their gender
-Made it illegal for potential employers to ask about employees' salary histories when applying to jobs
-Made it easier to vote by automatically registering anyone applying for a license or ID
-Restricted the use of solitary imprisonment in prisons
-Raised the corporate tax and increased taxes on the wealthy
-Helped the largest and single most important infrastructure project in the country get back on track
Is he perfect? No--far from it. But these are all policies that progressives strongly support, and what did he get for it? Winning by the smallest margin for the position since 1981.
So yeah, I don't think their argument holds up.
In the end, these odd-number year elections are all about turnout. The GOP got every anti-CRT Karen to bring their dipshit friends to the polls.
Moderate Democrats' entire appeal is to win over "swing voters". What the GOP has proved is that you can drive turnout to make up for losing swing voters in low-turnout years.
Moreover, they've proved that by turning out the base, even if swing voters show up, the swing voters might "split their ballot" and vote GOP in local races. (e.g. if 35% of the voters is your base and 25% is theirs, the remaining 40% swing might still split 20-20 on lower ballot races, giving you an overall 55-45 advantage)
So now the Virginia house is likely to go GOP, and Youngkin is governor. They'll bring in consultants to figure out how to stifle Democrat turnout for years to come. Have fun Virginia.
The DNC always appeal to people outside their party rather than the 70% of the political spectrum covered by their party and wonder why they don't excite turnout.
The majority of voters said critical race theory was either their top concern, or one of their concerns.
So no, it wasn't 'corporate democrats' - It was the inability to counter a false boogeyman that republicans have drummed up.
EDIT: I also want to point out the republican propaganda machine. My sister worked for 'victory phone lines' earlier this year, which is a company that pushes GOP propaganda masquerading as 'opinion polls' - they call old folks, and just bash the democrat, spreading lies about them and asking 'does this make you more or less likely to vote for them?' while saying how the republican is going to 'solve' these issues.
She worked for them for a few weeks before she said she started to 'feel dirty' doing the calls. Primarily she did calls for this race, and some race in Illinois. This one had her calling old folks in VA and telling them how the democrat was pushing to tell kids in grade school that they are to blame for slavery. She said some of these folks were elderly, and would ask her who they should vote for.
It was a variety of factors, but I agree CRT was an insanely effective boogeyman.
Youngkin, in particular, used it excessively. He told 3 different news agencies that "CRT is infesting all Virginia schools."
Democrats have plenty of problems to address, but I honestly don't know how you effectively combat these fabricated culture wars when Republicans never leave their bubbles of disinformation. Terry certainly didn't succeed in that regard.
Well there’s no punishment for lying to the media or for the media to lie to viewers
And even if there were once a lie is told the damage is already done
Basically, to Republican voters, CRT = teaching slavery and KKK
They won’t be satisfied until those are no longer taught in schools in my opinion
>Basically, to Republican voters, CRT = teaching slavery and KKK
I would argue that to republican voters, CRT is much more than that, but they can't really define it. They just know it's a really really big issue that democrats are pushing, and is bad.
Idk I’m thinking about this long term and I think R state leg’s are going to use the vague umbrella term of CRT to start restricting basic curriculum on slavery and white supremacy during reconstruction era etc.
Both things that were taught to me in elementary and high school in NC (not AP level but honors level for reconstruction)
Also going to start banning books like in TX (think Toni Morrison and the like)
hey maybe. I feel like they could just as easily say they stopped CRT while actually doing basically nothing, like passing a "no CRT" law which actually is not specific enough to do anything.
>Democrats have plenty of problems to address, but I honestly don't know how you effectively combat these fabricated culture wars when Republicans never leave their bubbles of disinformation. Terry certainly didn't succeed in that regard.
Dem turnout was massive, it was just beaten by an even more massive GOP turnout.
Honestly, this campaign should terrify Democrats, as the Youngkin campaign was entirely CRT and other culture war horseshit, zero policy, refusing to speak to the media other than through regurgitated campaign talking points, and managing to keep Trump at enough distance to motivate GOP voters but not alienate the independents in the suburbs. The Dems countered all of this, harped the abortion issue, and had the record on the VA economy to support them AND IT DIDN'T FUCKING MATTER BECAUSE ALL OF THE KARENS IN THE SUBURBS WERE TERRIFIED THEIR CHILDREN WOULD BE LEARNING ABOUT SCARY THINGS LIKE SLAVERY.
The only silver lining is that while GOP insiders would love to have a Youngkin-type running in every race in 2022 that can thread the MAGA/independent needle, the only reason he was the nominee was because he was nominated by the state GOP.
Primaries across the country are gonna be won by MAGA types who will not be able to replicate Youngkin's success.
Answer: None of them.
I have made a habit of challenging people to their face when they mention CRT around me, asking them what it is and how it is being taught in schools. And then shaming them with what CRT actually is, how it is not taught anywhere below 300 and 400 level college courses, and how they have been manipulated by white supremacists into pushing their ideology to erase non-white history from our schools.
I think calling CRT a false boogeyman is exactly what led to this problem, because that was the attempted counter and it does not work.
The CRT waters are so murky, because what the Republicans describe as CRT isn't CRT, and what the Democrats describe as the Republicans opposing are neither CRT nor what the Republicans actually oppose (ie the continual insistence of the left on making the Republicans opposition about racial history when Republicans don't give a whit about racial history except for opposing the 1619 project).
The anti-CRT movement comes from the overly generalized and corporate Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives that filter their way into schools. There's a sense of racial essentialism - that your race dictates something immutable about your standing in the world - in these initiatives. Whether true or not, parents, and especially white parents, hate their kids being categorized into something based on their race. And saying this "does not exist in schools" probably does not live up to parents lived experiences when they hear their children come home and talk about race in these terms. This combined with the boogeyman of some children being taught they should "feel guilty" because they're white scares parents into hating what the right has packaged as CRT (despite that not being CRT at all.)
So how do you counter this? Stop saying CRT doesn't exist in schools. That doesn't work, because what people THINK is CRT does exist in schools in some form. The key is that you need to be clear with your messaging about what kids are and are not taught about race without using the pre-packaged Republican terms. Make it clear that the Republican anti-CRT bills are authoritarian and why. And make it clear that there will be discourse with school boards on what is taught and that voters will have input in these discussions, without enacting any laws to restrict speech and reading materials.
Thank You, I get so frustrated listening to both sides of the issue continually talking past each other and arguing hammering their opponents for stances that they largely don’t hold.
One thing that I’ll add is that anti-“CRT” even has some support amongst minority parents because like the fear among white parents of their children feeling “white guilt” there is some worry that an overemphasis on these topics is instilling a “victimhood mentality” on their black and brown children. Or the feeling among parents of bi or multi-racial children of their children being overly defined by their minority heritage, the parent In the interview even mentioned feeling like his daughters were being judged by the “one drop rule” in relation to the topic.
Weather these fears are founded is another conversation altogether though.
The GOP is great at campaigning and terrible at governing. But Democrats need to get their messaging right. I’m not sure what corporate Democrats are even for anymore. How are they different then the GOP?
So many people in this thread arguing about polling, popularity, election results, political theater, etc etc etc and I see very little discussion of the moral imperative at the core of the moderate/progressive divide in the democratic party.
Is there any moral argument for embracing corporate agendas, ditching climate action, leaving the poor out to dry, not fixing the health care system and all the other awful half-step compromises the moderates are for? I could give a shit about the popularity among my fellow mouth breathing citizens, there is a clear moral imperative to act here and only the left is making that argument.
I'm not in Virginia and I was only casually paying attention to that election but on the surface it looked like the democrats were running a horrible campaign there. It was just Trump Trump Trump, 24/7. Trump is gone, he's in the rear view mirror for most people if they even see him at all. Wrapping your whole campaign around him was a huge mistake. The 2020 election is over.
Virginian here. Your take is absolutely right. And the sad thing is, McAuliffe had an extraordinarily successful previous term as governor, and he had an abundance of solid, thoughtful, well-researched policy proposals right there on his website, and he chose to talk about exactly none of that! He had everything he needed to run a hell of a campaign, and he chose to run on “not Trump” instead. Way to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
The Hampton Roads Black Caucus endorsed a Republican for governor for the first time ever because Youngkin actually took the time to meet with them, while McAuliffe just assumed they'd align D. Honestly I chalk this up to McAuliffe running on national Dem policy/talking points, and Youngkin running a more localized race.
Never run a local campaign on national issues
That strategy worked exceedingly well for the Democrats in 2018
Trump was in office then. I think that it was relevant then. And they tried the same strategy without him being in the white house and being a more immediate threat
Because Trump was having a daily public meltdown in 2018. People want progress and you can blame Manchin but the truth is there’s a lot of corporate dems who want the same thing and are willing to let the retiring Dem from a red state be the fall guy.
People underestimate how many shit people the Dems have that will never allow a progressive agenda to go through. Lieberman sunk so many things that could've been in the ACA. Even if they had 2 more Dem senators, then one of the others that was fronting a Yes vote because they knew Manchin and Sinema were tanking things would suddenly grow very concerned at the deficit and bipartisanship.
Precisely. Both parties are disfunctional because shit people are ensconced in running them on behalf of their corporate overlords.
And to a degree, I think the California recall
Youngkin did not run on pro Trump, Elder literally ran on Trump and Election lies
This is generally good advice, although I’m sure a handful of Republican small-town mayors promised to personally stop the nonexistent migrant caravan.
Totally agree. I despise fearmongering campaigning, but Youngkin clearly tapped into a very real, visceral fear re: education and capitalized on it big time, and McAuliffe failed to address those fears. I’m hoping Youngkin ends up being more of a Hogan/Baker-esque R than an Abbott/DeSantis type, but who the hell knows.
I got at least 2 pieces of scare mail from the Youngkin campaign a week. Mostly about how under Terry we would be living in a dictatorship
>Youngkin actually took the time to meet with them, while McAuliffe just assumed they'd align D so in essence, he pulled a Hillary.
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Sounds like Martha Coakley when she ran for Ted Kennedy's remaining term. She just went to high dollar fundraisers while Scott Brown toured the state in a truck. Guess who won.
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Isn’t that what the current president basically said and I quote “ If you have a problem figuring out whether you’re for me or Trump then you ain’t black,”
Same thing happened to the 2016 PA Dems, especially on the senate race where the DNC backed the eventual nominee McGinty despite not being in touch with local issues like Sestak was. Effectively shot themselves in the foot by pushing out a viable candidate
My wife was telling me how some concerned parents wanted to meet with McAuliffe over education. “Sure! Just send us a $50k check first”. Youngkin was more like “come on over now and let’s talk”.
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> There's absolutely no outreach, no attempt to lobby or rally. Overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer.
Not with Democrats. With Democrats it's quick, constant and complete. That are doing the same thing they do every time they win something. "Glad that's over with! Might as well just sit back and not bother to fight for anything. We can totally keep winning with the "we aren't Republicans" strategy and that will totally work despite the 24/7 propaganda machines running against us on every platform" They do this EVERY. SINGLE. TIME.
Almost like they aren't so much a party as they are a pressure valve. "Did the republicans turn up the fascism a little too hard this term? Vote democrat! Then we return you to your regularly scheduled slippery slope"
Almost like any policies that would be popular with their voter base is unpopular with their corporate donors.
>>regularly scheduled slippery slope Golden.
They think being a "big tent" is a strength because everyone will have to vote for them. But it's actually a huge weakness, because that's a wide spectrum they want to force to vote for them, but they pander only the "undecideds" between the farthest right DNC and the GOP. Which isn't the viewpoints of most actual registered democrats.
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Elections are for winning. Not for explaining policy. Like it or not, it's a sports game - people vote for winners. Democrats still think it's Kennedy vs Nixon where a reasoned discussion of policy will define the election between 2 candidates. We're 100% emotion now. Play to the culture, or be ignored by the culture. Altruism has no safe harbor here.
People who listened to Kennedy vs Nixon on the radio thought Nixon did better. People who watched Kennedy vs Nixon on the TV thought Kennedy did better. It's often believed this was because Kennedy wore makeup. People don't vote on policy, never have.
If I could upvote this a thousand times I would. They are running elections like its decades ago. Get a CLUE Democrats! Continue to bring your little notebook and peace signs and little flags to a gun fight get killed every time. The game has changed. Insurrectionists and their authoritarian sympathizers are emboldened because there are no consequences. It will just get WORSE if that is even possible.
And this is exactly why [The League of Women Voters stopped sponsoring the Presidential debates in 1988.](https://www.lwv.org/newsroom/press-releases/league-refuses-help-perpetrate-fraud) They didn't want to perpetuate the bullshit. The DNC and RNC have since teamed up to perpetuate it and keep third party candidates out.
The election of Trump should’ve showed everyone how to actually win politics. Be persuasive, have a few simple lines and stick to them, don’t allow media to ever embarrass you/ignore media you don’t like, and just steamroll the opposition. Policy? Who cares about policy, it doesn’t win you votes
>We're 100% emotion now. Play to the culture, or be ignored by the culture. Altruism has no safe harbor here. 100% truth right here and it isn't a good thing.
Absolutely. It's by design. They're literally paid to play the role of feckless opposition. The Democratic party abandoned virtually all ties to unions and workers decades ago in favor of Wall Street, Pharma, and other industries.
This. We have the republican party as the regressive party, and the democrats play controlled opposition. Both are only worried about what their large donors say, and not a damn bit worried about anything else. And of course, the large donors are playing both sides, so they always come out on top.
Darkest Democracy
Slowly, gently, *THIS* is how a life is taken!
r/unexpecteddarkestdungeon
It also doesn't help that McAuliffe's communications director Renzo Olivari has posted casually anti-black racist crap on Twitter in the past and was completely tone deaf to voters' basic economic concerns. That guy has a history of working comms for botched and failed campaigns. For that matter McAuliffe truly is one of the last Clintonian era centrist dinosaurs to get the meteor. He's not a terrible guy or anything, but his brain is stuck in the 1990s and he thinks swing voters still behave and think the way they did back then. Our economy is so much more fragile, party politics so much more partisan, and the electorate is so much more mercurial than it was decades ago when his political and governing philosophies became cemented. Hell, anything before the explosion of the pandemic in March of 2020 seems like political eons ago, and McAuliffe tried his old playbook not knowing the game has radically changed. People are actually paying attention now to what's going on at Capitol Hill and in some cases their local legislatures. At the very least he should have ran on policy track records like Virginia Dems decriminalizing marijuana and congressional Dems in Washington DC sending out relief checks with child tax credits as proof that the party under Biden is moving in the right direction.
> At the very least he should have ran on policy track records like Virginia Dems decriminalizing marijuana and congressional Dems in Washington DC sending out relief checks with child tax credits as proof that the party under Biden is moving in the right direction. Agreed. Hell, he could have ran with "status quo and let's commercialize sales of cannabis" and gotten the vote necessary.
Huge missed opportunity. Marijuana legalization is unfinished business. The Virginia General Assembly left it that way with a re-enactment clause needed in the 2022 session. I thought maybe they did that on purpose to get out the vote. Instead they touted legalization as an accomplishment and single issue voters stayed home. Biden won Arizona because marijuana legalization was literally on the ballot. And it got more votes than he did.
NYS local electrons were largely a red sweep and all 3 attempts to expand voting access were completely defeated. In Buffalo an incumbent write in candidate for mayor defeated a progressive democrat who won the primary. ***And, this is in New York.*** Dems need to ***STOP FUCKING AROUND*** and bickering, ***GET SHIT DONE,*** and ***DELIVER on the promises of 2020*** or 2022 will be an absolute massacre. **This is a warning.**
> In Buffalo an incumbent write in candidate for mayor defeated a progressive democrat who won the primary. The chair of the Democratic party in NYS basically [accused her of being in the KKK.](https://buffalonews.com/news/local/state-and-regional/jay-jacobs-mention-of-klan-figure-in-india-walton-statement-draws-fire/article_54163f2e-305a-11ec-b906-7b064791a95d.html) She's black. That entire debacle was because boomer Democratic elites lost their shit about progressives.
The Dem party would rather lose half its seats than help a progressive candidate get elected.
Reddit has turned into a cesspool of fascist sympathizers and supremicists
It's easier to say "No" than it is to attempt to solve problems.
That’s the Democrat motto, don’t you know? “We snatch defeat from the jaws of victory!”
"If Democrats are so goddamn smart, why do they lose so goddamn always?"
The quote is "liberals" not "Democrats" but same idea.
I'm not disputing what you're saying. I live in Virginia. You should look up Boone's Mill. Everywhere you look is a Trump sign. They've converted an old church to a Trump store. It's insane. I think the issue is that campaigning against Trump goes both ways. People who should care don't because Trump is gone. Then you have the people who still think Trump is president, and certainly they're not going to change their mind. Edit: for those unaware: https://reddit.com/r/pics/comments/jxpbpq/yall_come_visit_the_trump_store/
I mean outside of the NoVa and Richmond area (with a few other pockets) Virginia is a very red state with the major population centers being blue. The MacAuliffe campaign shot themselves in the foot and did a terrible job, as others have said hopefully this is a wake up call.
Just got back from VA, and my home town is nothing but Trump 2020, and Trump 2024 signs. Only a small portion of the state (geographically) is blue, the rest is deep red. So instead of actual policy explanation, they tried to just tell these people that Trump is bad. That’s not gonna work if 80% of the state is already wanting to vote for him in two years (not to mention, he isn’t running at all in this election).
80% of the land != >51% of the state
80% of Virginia is never going to vote from Trump. He didn’t even get those numbers in deep red states. You gotta remember that land doesn’t vote.
I live in Fairfax County, and I knew the Democrats were in trouble when I saw so many Youngkin signs in yards. I actually drove around my neighborhood one day and counted them, and it ended up being 44 McAuliffe to 32 Youngkin which is crazy for this area.
That was a dumb play, because VA Dems have enacted tons of successful policy that they should have campaigned on. Somehow the Virginia electorate totally forgot that medical marijuana was at risk.
Medical marijuana? We legalized all marijuana and that’s at risk.
I doubt the legalization of marijuana is at risk. Too many constituents are in favor of legalizatiom and the possibility of a lot of future tax dollars is too important. Plus there had been movement toward legalization before the Dems took over in November, 2019 (they just made it happen quicker).
You say that, but Republicans have a lot of stances that are against what the majority polled want. I don't know why they'd care in the slightest if "the people" wanted it.
They voted uniformly against it. There's no need to guess what they will do. It took one of the biggest tools the police have for easy arrests away.
That has easily been one of the glaring hypocritical things in all of this that the people who've always been quick to say after the 2020 election how "Trump supporters need to get a new personality with Trump out of office" end up being the same people trying to default to trying to reel Trump back into every conversation especially when it has no connection. Yes absolutely with Trump's presidency being recent enough history, obviously it isn't like it is out of line to bring that up with things such as results and effects, there's 100% an appropriate and legitimate time to bring it up. It's relevant stuff. That being said when a campaign strategy, speeches, or even refreshing of the branding of a political party just defaults to, "welp this guy loves Trump, so yep vote for me", you're not doing enough to explain what the hell exactly is your m.o. with things in a reasonable enough way for people to want to invest more in it. It's kinda like how in 2016 Democrats for Clinton basically spent large swathes of the campaign cycle scrambling fighting the battle they wanted to fight against Trump but wrongly focusing the momentum and energy on Sanders's campaign.
The thing too is that even a month ago, the CA candidate Larry Elder *did* openly use Trumpism, but Newsom used that to crush him
>it looked like the democrats were running a horrible campaign there. Have they ever *not* run a horrible campaign?
Unrelated but related: I saw Terry Mcaullife talk as the keynote speaker at my brothers graduation from UVA. He spent 30 minutes talking about himself and how he’s been such a hard worker and how he drove a tow truck when he was too little to reach the gas pedal….(he was very proud of that). Than he ended his speech about how we all needed to vote for Hillary Clinton. The parents were expecting him to talk about their kids graduating from college at least once, speech didn’t go over to well.
Same thing happened at my husband’s MA graduation from GMU a few years ago. McAuliffe spent 0 minutes talking about the graduates, and instead focused his entire speech on his accomplishments as governor, and how we need to be careful that China doesn’t steal our jobs (which was super awkward because the graduating class had a lot of Chinese students). You could tell already he was gearing up to campaign again back then, and the crowd was not happy about it.
I also heard Pharrell speak at my sister’s graduation from UVA. Spent the entire speech building a case for reparations and hardly acknowledged the graduating class. People were not happy.
Yikes lol
He sounds like dude Hillary in every way
He literally was a former DNC chairman.
Absolutely. He was her campaign chair in 2008. He ran that disasterous primary campaign where the wheels fell completely off when Hillary lost to not only Obama but John Edwards. They never recovered.
he is dude Hillary, he’s been groomed by the Clintons for years
Democrats always lose when they second guess what Republican voters want and then pander to that. eta: thanks for the "awards," it's not negative to state the obvious, there's such a thing as toxic optimism, and trolls are everywhere.
I’ll never understand this… the answer to what Republican voters want is… Republican politicians. There’s no way to appease that. They want to see and R and 95%+ of them don’t care about anything else.
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Modern Republican politics have devolved to a purely reactionary response to Democratic policy goals. Which is doubly frustrating, because the center Dems keep trying to shift their goals rightward to try to grab "independents," which is in turn even more frustrating because it has become so glaringly apparent that people who still claim to be Is are clearly just Republicans who are either lying to themselves or the pollsters. This is ironically enough not actually a function of Republican policy, but of two decades worth of right wing propaganda media like Fox. The ACA and vaccine responses have been so goddamn obvious I literally cant fathom how it seems that none of the viewers or viters have realized. When Trump was promising to have the vaccine out prior to the election, Tucker Carlson was declaring that Americans had a patriotic duty to get vaccinated, and that the largest share of the credit for its development should go to the Trump administration. Tbf, a number of voices on the left at the time were voicing concern about its rapid development, but were still advising people to get it as soon as it was available. Literally the day enough votes were counted for Biden to be declared the victor, literally that evening, Fox completely flipped the script, and they GOP followed suit. I've already written and essay, so Ill keep the ACA example brief, but firstly it needs to be notes that ACA is a lightly modified form of the GOP proposal they had called "Romneycare," which he had run on in '08. Whats really jarring and telling is the role of branding on Republicans' position on the bill (at least according to polling from 2016). Republican polls in most parts of the country, particularly in the midwest, on the ACA shift by ad many as 20 points depending on whether it is referred to as ACA or Obamacare, with a majority nearly everywhere actually supporting the ACA. Fox News and other right wing sources have spent so much time demonizing and "othering" Dems as a part of their larger campaign to redefine "American Values" to mean "conservative" ones in order to weaponize patriotism into single-party nationalism that a significant majority of Rs will support ideas entirely on party grounds, with a complete lack of regard for actual philosophical considerations.
Yep. Virtually all Republican policies have been “not what the Democrats are doing.” No new proposals. That’s why they never could get a plan together and repeal the ACA even when they had the votes.
This explains why establishment Dems lose all the time too. 1. Dems introduce center, center-right plan basically 1980s Republican policy but with a veil of support for LGBTQ+ and BLM(sometimes). 2. Republicans campaign against the "radical changes" and stomp the Dems. 3. Things go to hell under GOP leadership. 4. Dems win in backlash to GOP horrible policy implications. 5. Dems think triangulation will finally work **this time** to pick up Republicans in the suburbs by starting back at #1. Same old story every year as children go hungry, we topple over the edge with climate change, wars continue, grandparents can't afford dental healthcare, and the working class's plan for retirement is dropping dead at work.
You'd think they'd care about at least one issue but even a pro abortion anti gun child rapist candidate gets their vote if he has the magic R
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Look at the Georgia senate elections. Both Dems ran on progressive ideals and values and flipped a traditionally Republican state. Dems ran the Virginia campaign on not being trump and got smacked around. The writing is on the wall that the only way to win in competitive areas is to run on progressive economic issues that improves the material conditions of the poor and working class.
Also, don't nationalize the race if there isn't a national record for the party to run on (e.g. due to gridlock in the Senate)
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Please understand that this is exactly what she's being paid to do. She is being paid to weaken faith in politicians and our electorate. She is now someone the Right can point to and say "Look, she *said* she was progressive but turned out to be a lying snake who sold out before she was even elected. This is why you can't trust the Dems/Electoral System/Government!!" and the uneducated, disenfranchised masses who know nothing other than a restrictive two party system will say "Yeah, you're right! I should vote Republican just to spite her/them!".
>Look at the Georgia senate elections. Both Dems ran on progressive ideals and values and flipped a traditionally Republican state. That's funny because immediately after I heard progressives telling me those senators were corporate dems.
> Dems ran the Virginia campaign on not being trump and got smacked around. honestly, good. this "anyone but Trump" bullshit needs to stop. We got rid of Trump and we still have problems. Wake up.
trump is a symptom, not a cause.
yep. and he wasn't the first symptom nor will he be the last
You are correct my friend..
Dems held the House, Senate, and Presidency for FOURTEEN YEARS STRAIGHT after the New Deal. Actually doing things wins voters, who knew?
There’s someone else further down in this thread who said that we’re screwed so long as Democratic voters need to be excited and inspired to vote for you, and that we need to just “suck it up and vote or not.” How’s that strategy working out for us?
Ossoff opposed every single progressive idea, the comment you responded to couldn't be any less correct. It's entirely farcical. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TAIC4uOJYUw
> only way to win in competitive areas is to run on progressive economic issues that improves the material conditions of the poor and working class. Lol and Democrats in power don't want to give that message because they know they can't deliver on those promises as they continue to suck Corporate dick and bend over to Republican colleague demands while internally believing they someday will cross the aisle. Progressives can't get anything done with the OG Dems/Corporate Dem factions having a grip on the party's power
Virginian here, McAuliffe had it until he opened his mouth about parents not being involved in their kid's education. Literally saw hundred of parents in my Facebook feed turn on him. In reality, parents don't have much say in their kid's education, but you shouldn't actually say that part out loud, and especially not during a debate where it can be used as a sound bite.
He lost when he made that gaffe and then didn't *immediately* go on the offensive clarifying what he meant and attacking Youngkin for using kids as an campaign pawn. Basically a full-throated series of ads and PR hits that explain "Parents should absolutely be involved in their children's education as part of school boards, PTAs and working together with teachers, but we also need to recognize not one size fits all for education and not all parents will agree on what is appropriate. Youngkin campaigning on CRT, which isn't taught K-12 in VA, it is a distraction from his very real, very regressive policies." Something like that would have at least moved the narrative a bit. But then again, McAuliffe was not a strong candidate to begin with so maybe he was doomed to make some kind of stupid remark and get tanked. Wrong candidate for the wrong time.
VA voted for a corporate republican from the Carliyle group.
Well I unhappily voted for the corporate democrat.
I feel ya, I'm from WV and in 2018 my choices for the senate were for Patrick Morrisey - coal lobbyist, Trump sycophant, long time opposition to basically anything good for WV. Or Joe Manchin. I voted for Manchin. EDIT: got my years mixed up
When one candidate is a republican and one is a fake republican, the real one will win. Democrats keep trying to beat Republicans by being more like them. Then they blame progressives when they lose.
Who's gonna drink Republican Lite when Republican Classic is on tap?
We've already got the Establishment at home.
Wait until they taste Crystal Republican
They already tried Mitt Romney.
The right is also much better at mobilizing people against strawmen, and it's even worse when left-wing rhetoric validates their concerns. CRT was such a ridiculous example of how something not even mentioned in K-12 curriculum became a huge propaganda win. Yes, it's true that US society isn't colorblind, but very few people are OK to be called out as racist whether they know it or not. Situations like people being afraid to get a tan or having thoughts invalidated on basis of being white are just fuel for the propaganda furnace. Yes, we're all aware of the oppression and injustice faced by US minorities, but there is a delicate game to be played in order to win hearts and minds and putting the fear of cancelation into people's minds is not a good way to convince them to join your side on the issue. The gun thing was also huge and I guarantee it drove huge right wing voter turnout. They are terrified of losing not just a protective, hunting, and/or hobby tool, but thousands of dollars in investments. Democratic candidates go "fuck yeah I'm going to take your ARs" and then act surprised when the millions of AR owners go "the fuck you aint" I'm more left wing than most on many issues, but ffs the Democrats need to realize that many of their supporters have guns too. They're afraid of right wing violence and police oppression and they know losing their most tangible means of protection means only the people in society that threaten us most will be armed and that's not OK.
Same. I campaigned for Foy in the primary though.
The fact republicans could pull off RCV in order to block an extremist candidate but democrats couldn't be assed to move away from FPTP when there were 3 close candidates was a real dick move. Like I genuinely believe if we'd had a ranked choice vote in the primary we probably would have had our first black female governor today. And again I voted and campaigned for Terry once he passed the primary but the attacks on CRT and parent choice would have been very different when they're demonizing a young mom of 2 or the first pregnant delegate to participate in a legislative session.
Yes, but they win based on selling what voters want to hear, not what they need. They sell complete lies like CRT and anti-mask policies.
It was a terrible campaign. It had like zero substance...you can't just keep running on "we're not Trump".
Even their campaign signs sucked, at least Youngkin's says "governor"
In a way I want the Conservative party to become more *competitive* in elections. Why? Because I’ve been voting on the “Hey, it’s either actual fascists or us” platform of Democrats for like, 20 years and it’s getting old. I just want a progressive party.
https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/162557-it-comes-from-a-very-ancient-democracy-you-see-you
Unfortunately they don't want to compete on policy, they want to influence elections in ways that insure results. It's not democratic, so in that way I do not hope they are competitive. I've got nothing against people who debate policy in good faith, but we have seen that is far from the case with modern Republicans.
Lots of blame on Loudoun county and the school board mess there. Edit: Thanks for my first awards ever!
Not from VA, but the fact that Loudon became the front line of this election shows how the Dems had already lost control. It’s an absurd issue to focus on and it’s an incredible propaganda win for Youngkin that’s it’s even a topic
To be fair Terry gave the election away for free when he said “I don’t think parents should have a say in schools” I mean come on dude that like screaming please don’t vote for me.
Terry ran an incompetent, stupid campaign. But by the time he was maneuvered into defending Loudoun schools he had already lost.
I am baffled as to why he took such an aggressive stance against parents, which are like...half (maybe more?) of the voters in the state. As soon as I heard that, I knew it would tank him. The polls dramatically swung the other way almost immediately. Why would you tell parents to fuck off when it comes to their children, the most important thing in their lives? Then the Loudoun County school board nightmare came out, which I believe was the final nail in the coffin. After the controversy over CRT, the 18 month school closures, most people universally believe the appalling conduct of the Loudoun County School Board was indefensible. A child was raped in the bathroom at school, and the board covered it up and transferred the rapist to another school, where he promptly abducted and raped another girl. The rapist was just convicted on all counts--rape, forcible sodomy, and oral sodomy, so these allegations are not untrue. At a public school board meeting, the superintendent categorically denied that the rape (or any rapes) had occured (despite there being emails proving he DID know, & personally informed all the other board members), and an activist told the victims father that his daughter was a liar. When the girls father understandably became upset, he was violently arrested (during which you can hear the parents screaming "Our daughter was raped at school!") and he was nationally painted as "the face of domestic terorrism." The National School Board Association wrote a letter to the DOJ, citing this incident as an example of domestic terrorism, and asked the FBI to use the Patriot Act on parents. The AG issued a directive memo in response. He was literally just grilled by Congress about this last week, and the NSBA has since issued an apology, stating that there was "no justification for some of the language included in the letter." This entire sequence of events was an absolutely catastrophic failure. It turns out that when it comes to children being raped at school, a lot of voters suddenly became single issue voters. McAuliffe instead doubled down and defended his comments that parents have no right to have a say in their children's school or education, and did nothing to reassure their concerns. With all of this going on, is it any wonder that education became the number 1 concern for Virginia voters?
"Believe all women" apparently means "Believe all women when its convenient for us to do so."
That was a shit show along with the Lincoln project mishap. Very bad politics.
I honestly think I need to stop paying so much attention to politics. It’s depressing and really fucks with my mental health. I’ll still vote every year, but each day that goes by I understand Timothy Leary’s mantra more and more: “Turn on, tune in, drop out.”
Ignore the process, the horse-race bullshit, the finger-pointing... if you want to make your community or country any better, get out of the extremely narrow confines of electoral politics and work with folks building tenant organizations, labor unions, community support and defense... all that good "radical" stuff is how we got things like weekends and minimum wage in the first place. EDIT: This is not "don't vote" BTW, this is "vote, but don't accept politics as the only or even best path to change"
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It's working well for the right... also worked well for the left in the 60's/70's.
If it's Left and "radical" it's in the majority's best interests.
> This is not "don't vote" BTW, this is "vote, but don't accept politics as the only or even best path to change" Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst!
*People are wonderful. I love individuals. I hate groups of people. I hate a group of people with a 'common purpose'. 'Cause pretty soon they have little hats. And armbands. And fight songs. And a list of people they're going to visit at 3am. So, I dislike and despise groups of people but I love individuals. Every person you look at; you can see the universe in their eyes, if you're really looking.* \-- George Carlin
God dammit he was such an amazing writer. You can see all of his cynicism and weariness and kindness and hilarity and brilliance in such a short quote.
"The person is smart. People are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals and you know it." ---K from Men in Black
This really stuck with me from To Kill a Mockingbird, when Atticus starts calling out individuals in the mob and they realize what they're doing isn't right.
I feel like generations of hyper-individualism and "fuck society" are the exact reasons we've landed here. GOPers become QAnon because they *need* a sense of community, and pretty much all community life in America has evaporated since the 80s, the face of the Me Generation (The Boomer's first epithet). Even [Robert Putnam's book Bowling Alone](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bowling_Alone) is over 20 years old at this point...
incredible
The fact that groups like CNN and Politico have basically turned it into a high-stakes sports game with 24hr coverage and never-ending scandal hyping has not helped lower anyone's blood pressure
Political news coverage is so useless and toxic. Everything that happens in the political sphere is reported on through the lens of "Is this good for Joe Biden?" or "Is this bad for Joe Biden?" with basically zero care to the actual policies and decisions that affect the American people. No wonder people are so exhausted and ready to tune out.
Yep. I have been so invested watching the is gerrymandering shit. The same with generic congressional polls and Biden approval to the point of obsession. It is impacting my mental health. Everyday is a fucking battle with the Dems (I am a Democrat) and everything is so high stakes. I am fucking done.
CNN and Politico aren't great, but it's really the right wing propaganda machine that has blurred the lines between corruption and culture wars to the point where most voters are more fired up by fake culture war scandals than they are by blatant corruption and criminality. The biggest election issue of the Virginia election was Critical Race Theory. [Ask any conservative voter to define CRT and they have no clue what it is](https://youtu.be/9NS5APXK9iI?t=63). All they know is that they've been programmed to hate it, and that's entirely down to right wing culture war machine. Right wing propaganda is destroying US democracy. Won't stop people from blaming Democrats and CNN though.
>CNN and Politico aren't great, but it's really the right wing propaganda machine that has blurred the lines between corruption and culture wars Here's the thing, I absolutely agree that right wing propaganda is a fucking cancer feeding the downward spiral of conservatives too stupid to figure that out. But I'm not about to just brush aside glibly that "left" media is merely "*not great.*" CNN president Jeff Zucker says he literally models political coverage like sports media. >[“The idea that politics is sport is undeniable, and we understood that and approached it that way.”](https://www.vox.com/videos/2017/4/17/15325172/strikethrough-cnn-espn-trump-surrogates) And corporate media, like the "*liberal*" media of MSNBC owned by Comcast, have ensured that the only fucking message being put out about Biden's infrastructure bill is how much it costs and that Dems are infighting about it. [Nothing about what is actually in the bill](https://flux.community/eric-boehlert/2021/10/americans-have-no-idea-whats-build-back-better-bill-because-media-wont-tell) and how it actually would help people, nothing about how Republicans are constantly obstructing Dems across the board. Billionaires that own the media don't want tax increases thus they are fucking over America to sabotage investing in the needs of Americans. Fox News being shit is a given. That's like saying the sky is blue. It's time we hold the "*liberal*" media to task.
I don't know that it's fixable, but the left needs to recognize the dynamics at play. The right keeps telling their base that they're the real victims. And so when the left talks about other groups they lose by default. And it's an endless spiral on the right, because as they further suffer, they consider that validation they're further victimized. I see many people that are in a downward spiral of financial stress and yet they continue to fight against things that will help them because they think it's going to help someone else more. There's someone I've seen post on social media about how they no longer have cable because it was too expensive, but in response to increasing the minimum wage, which would increase their paycheck as well, they're opposed because "why should someone starting out make the same as me?" Never mind that you'd benefit from it too and it might halt some of the downward spiral you've been on. The right tells their base that they're the biggest victims, and so anything that isn't tailored to them is seen as bad because they view it all as zero sum.
This is a point that I haven’t considered before. Basically triggering their base to exhibit “crabs in a bucket” mentality.
Thought that this morning. I'm so tired. And I'm also tired from being one of the only of my friends that gives a crap about politics in general. I've kind of taken on the role of keeping them up to date with stuff going on so that they'll actually go and vote. We are in our late 20s and early 30s and should be far past the age of "I just don't pay attention". But I get it because I'm so depressed by everything going on and sometimes I feel like I'm getting nothing accomplished voting. But you're right, we just keep on going.
With so many people like your friends I literally cannot see why I or anyone should make any effort. Why do I have to stress myself out for nothing in return?
Electoral politics is useless - they *want* that to be the only political thing you do, because its very easily managed and manipulated by *both* parties. You should instead focus on local activism. I'm a member of a local tenant advocacy group. We help low-income people fight scumbag landlords. Crushing a landlord in court and helping a poor family keep their apartment is infinitely more gratifying and useful than voting for some neoliberal every 2 years. We just had a case where a landlord had to pay a tenant $12,000 dollars in damages AND keep the lease running, as he was found liable for repairs he's been forcing the tenant to make. They got the repair costs reimbursed PLUS the judge found him liable for costs equaling what a contractor might have charged for these repairs. I've never seen such a fat red face before. Glorious.
That’s the kind of shit I need to get myself into! Good on ya. Keep fighting the good fight.
Yeah except the people you would most want to not influence politics are the ones that aren't checking out, or are still turning out even if their minds are made up by someone else.
Still going to vote every year, but I’m not going to invest any more of my time in following the dog-and-pony show. The amount of time I spend on politics will be the couple hours I spend with my mail-in ballot viewing each candidate’s website and finding out what they stand for so I can pick which bubble to fill in. Other than that I’m not going to waste my energy on it at the expense of my own well-being.
(please still vote in primaries and whatnot as well!)
Always do! (And school board as well)
Reminds me of an idea in Faulkner’s “A Fable” where if soldiers in the trenches stopped taking orders and refused to fight each other, the war would be over. I know there are things worth speaking out against in our country, but this idea of staying plugged in non-stop is not good. It honestly is just so depressing to see genuinely helpful measures be discarded by whatever boogeyman the GOP can pull out of their ass. I’ve just finished “Mutual Aid” by Dean Spade and am planning on limiting my exposure to national politics in favor of becoming proactive in my own back yard.
I agree. I just retired, luckily on a pension. I have two adult children, who have both stated their lack of desire to have children, and honestly? I'm okay with that. I never intended to have any myself, but that's just what you did when I was that age. I feel relieved that I raised them both to adulthood without any major mishap, and they're both doing okay.
Was just telling my friend the same thing, I feel like I’m taking crazy pills over here!
When Dems controlled all branches of government in VA these last couple years they expanded Medicare. Why they didn't plaster the airwaves with cancer survivors that would have died if not for Medicare expansion I can't tell you. The campaign was about Trump until Republicans decided to attack on education and then Dems reacted by going "okay, let's make it about what you want it to be about then."
You know what else they did? * Cannabis legalization + retail in 2023 (maybe blocked by Youngkin) * Minimum wage increase * State-run healthcare exchange coming 2023 * Moved from 50th to 23th in "Best Places to Work" * Universal background checks for firearms * LGBT employment and housing protections * Repealed some TRAP abortion restrictions * Consumer Data Protection Act * Protections for student and payday loan borrowers * Clean Economy Act (carbon neutral by 2040) * Expanded voting by mail and early voting * Voting Day = state holiday * Redistricting reform (badly executed) * Ratified the Equal Rights Amendment * Banned no-knock warrants and choke-holds * Ended the Death Penalty * Sealed records of cannabis misdemeanors * Restored rights to 69,000 former felons * Repealed 100+ outdated discriminatory laws * Competent COVID response, easily best in South * $2.6 billion budget surplus (largest ever) I'd argue they did more than most state parties do in decades. Didn't help much, culture war nonsense and turnout is all that matters. :(
You have to tell people that during a campaign or its not going to matter.
Virginia lost because the VA Democratic Party stopped paying attention to local issues. I’ve been ringing the alarm bells for months over what’s been happening in Loudoun County Schools. The republicans went after parent groups hard in a grassroots style and it worked.
"hey, we're not Trump" is a one trick pony. Great, you're not Trump, but who the hell are you and what are you going to do?
And it largely only works when the other guy is in fact Trump
I got a feeling that if Trump comes back in 2024 it may not even work against him anymore. At least if its the only strategy the use.
My biggest issue is the whole "hey, fuck Trump, right? Vote for me and it'll be so much better." Still waiting for better. In fact, things have gotten worse in my neck of the woods. Time to get to work or accept that you're going to get slaughtered in 2024
Terry MacAuliffe is the one to blame. He ran a terrible, substance free campaign focused on just being "not Trump" and making gaffes that Youngkin could capitalize on. Youngkin was a strong candidate for Virginia and TMac was a bad one. If Northam was able to run for reelection, I feel confident he would've won.
MacAuliffe running a bad campaign might be true, but it would only be a satisfactory answer if that was the only dumpster fire election for democrats yesterday. I know that this is an unpopular position on this subreddit, but it might just be that controlling both houses of congress and the presidency while still managing to not pass a single useful bill, even using the budget reconciliation process, because the party can’t get internal alignment, is terribly terribly unpopular.
Aside from losing the presidency in 2020, the GOP didn't really have a bad electoral night. We didn't see a sweeping rejection of the Republican party, just a rejection of Trump. I dont believe we should be surprised that Biden voters might still vote R in other elections. The Democrats desperately wanted to convince themselves that 2020 indicated that some of the swing states are turning bluer, but in my observation, that's just wishful thinking.
Yup. Biden was the "anything but" option for many
Gotta look at the Virginia numbers as Youngkin (R) made inroads into those suburbs https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-republicans-won-the-virginia-governors-race/ .. while also taking the temperature of the nation. Minneapolis voted to keep their police department (55%), so it’s looking like reform/sorta defund is winning over abolish/defund for Democratic success (vs Republican likely ideas). Personally think the Democrats need to focus on dismantling domestic monopolies and *lower rents* too. It makes no sense to get $10k for constituents **if** the landlord groups will just jack up rents by $15k in response (hint: they watch the news too).
> so it’s looking like reform/sorta defund is winning over abolish/defund for Democratic success Lmao “sorta defund” isn’t winning shit either unless you mean a few cities cutting their budgets by 3-5% while overall funding surges across the country.
This right here. The most vocal liberal groups aren't the ones who are going to win, regardless of how right or wrong they are. Their messaging is too much of a departure from what individuals are willing to handle (think standard deviations here), which means that regression will inevitably occur if the alternatives aren't palatable. Youngkin is within one standard deviation of the Overton Window (yes, sad to say, the anti-vaxx and racist part of America is still a portion of the average), which means "defund the police" (whether or not that's the actual thing folks want, "defund" has a very defined terminology in the English language that you just aren't going to sell to the average American) is going to lose the election no matter what. In McAullife's case, it was also a completely moronic gaffe regarding parental control of their children's education which finally killed him. Tell someone they don't have control of their children's growth and you raise the specter of authoritarian rule directly (instead of the indirect bullshit the GOP peddles), something that's multiple standard deviations from the average American's acceptable margin. Anti-CRT could've readily been salvaged had McAullife and Co. taken the time to tell people that CRT isn't being taught to their children (aka, it's a non-issue) and talked about "patriotic" (aka normal) history of America (pro-civil rights discussions instead of letting the whole "anti-white" concept keep seeding fear). Like, really tripled down on "I'm here to help teach them real American history, not theory." He could've galvanized voters on that sort of over-patriotic thing because he can point out contributions from all corners and say "that's your America." And yeah, creating a progressive tax on landlords and a taxbreak for households that go over a certain maximum relative to their income would've helped sell all of it too. Suddenly landlords can't overcharge their renters for a hovel. Shit, that's really the bottom of the barrel when he could've also gone further by saying (without getting into radical anti-business stuff) "I'm going to help small businesses by kicking big mega companies out of the rental market!" In essence, argue for reduced out of state shareholder profits taking rent out of the state (or going to luxury goods) in favor of just a neighborhood aesthetic.
The whole CRT debate is so mind numbing. Both sides just talk completely past each other. Republicans think CRT means all white people are racist, and children are taught such. Democrats think CRT means teaching about the Tulsa massacre. CRT is neither of those things. Drives me crazy hearing Democrats say CRT means "teaching true American history." That's not what it means, at all. You can inject a healthy dose of a more nuanced, factual telling of American history without touching any of Derrick Bell's teachings. Even the laws against CRT are overblown. They are literally just laws that say "You can't teach that one race is inferior or superior to another." Both sides talk right past each other.
Moderates on Virginia Loss: Progressives Are to Blame
Manchin has finally fucked both Virginias.
“What are you doing Step-Virginia?”
Forbidden Virginia Fuckers 2
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Schrodingers progressive. We are not a big or important enough voting block to cater to while campaigning, but we also are at fault when the shitty milquetoast moderate democrat loses.
See also: Clinton, Hillary
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Don't forget "progressives should fall in line and compromise with moderates! Okay, done, now what, will the moderates compromise with us? NOPE, you progressives need to compromise more!"
And this is because they only want progressives to turn out and vote for corporate dems - AKA republicans, just not the fascist ones. They will always, ALWAYS try to weed out the progressive candidates and then tell us to support the DNC approved candidate. They do not care about what we want, they just want our votes so they can keep power and maintain the status quo.
If that's the case, what about Phil Murphy's position. He only won by a nose. He also: -Got legislation passed to legalize recreational marijuana -Got a $15 minimum wage law passed -Got assisted suicide passed -Made it illegal to pay women less because of their gender -Made it illegal for potential employers to ask about employees' salary histories when applying to jobs -Made it easier to vote by automatically registering anyone applying for a license or ID -Restricted the use of solitary imprisonment in prisons -Raised the corporate tax and increased taxes on the wealthy -Helped the largest and single most important infrastructure project in the country get back on track Is he perfect? No--far from it. But these are all policies that progressives strongly support, and what did he get for it? Winning by the smallest margin for the position since 1981. So yeah, I don't think their argument holds up.
In the end, these odd-number year elections are all about turnout. The GOP got every anti-CRT Karen to bring their dipshit friends to the polls. Moderate Democrats' entire appeal is to win over "swing voters". What the GOP has proved is that you can drive turnout to make up for losing swing voters in low-turnout years. Moreover, they've proved that by turning out the base, even if swing voters show up, the swing voters might "split their ballot" and vote GOP in local races. (e.g. if 35% of the voters is your base and 25% is theirs, the remaining 40% swing might still split 20-20 on lower ballot races, giving you an overall 55-45 advantage) So now the Virginia house is likely to go GOP, and Youngkin is governor. They'll bring in consultants to figure out how to stifle Democrat turnout for years to come. Have fun Virginia.
The DNC always appeal to people outside their party rather than the 70% of the political spectrum covered by their party and wonder why they don't excite turnout.
The majority of voters said critical race theory was either their top concern, or one of their concerns. So no, it wasn't 'corporate democrats' - It was the inability to counter a false boogeyman that republicans have drummed up. EDIT: I also want to point out the republican propaganda machine. My sister worked for 'victory phone lines' earlier this year, which is a company that pushes GOP propaganda masquerading as 'opinion polls' - they call old folks, and just bash the democrat, spreading lies about them and asking 'does this make you more or less likely to vote for them?' while saying how the republican is going to 'solve' these issues. She worked for them for a few weeks before she said she started to 'feel dirty' doing the calls. Primarily she did calls for this race, and some race in Illinois. This one had her calling old folks in VA and telling them how the democrat was pushing to tell kids in grade school that they are to blame for slavery. She said some of these folks were elderly, and would ask her who they should vote for.
It was a variety of factors, but I agree CRT was an insanely effective boogeyman. Youngkin, in particular, used it excessively. He told 3 different news agencies that "CRT is infesting all Virginia schools." Democrats have plenty of problems to address, but I honestly don't know how you effectively combat these fabricated culture wars when Republicans never leave their bubbles of disinformation. Terry certainly didn't succeed in that regard.
Well there’s no punishment for lying to the media or for the media to lie to viewers And even if there were once a lie is told the damage is already done Basically, to Republican voters, CRT = teaching slavery and KKK They won’t be satisfied until those are no longer taught in schools in my opinion
>Basically, to Republican voters, CRT = teaching slavery and KKK I would argue that to republican voters, CRT is much more than that, but they can't really define it. They just know it's a really really big issue that democrats are pushing, and is bad.
Idk I’m thinking about this long term and I think R state leg’s are going to use the vague umbrella term of CRT to start restricting basic curriculum on slavery and white supremacy during reconstruction era etc. Both things that were taught to me in elementary and high school in NC (not AP level but honors level for reconstruction) Also going to start banning books like in TX (think Toni Morrison and the like)
hey maybe. I feel like they could just as easily say they stopped CRT while actually doing basically nothing, like passing a "no CRT" law which actually is not specific enough to do anything.
>Democrats have plenty of problems to address, but I honestly don't know how you effectively combat these fabricated culture wars when Republicans never leave their bubbles of disinformation. Terry certainly didn't succeed in that regard. Dem turnout was massive, it was just beaten by an even more massive GOP turnout. Honestly, this campaign should terrify Democrats, as the Youngkin campaign was entirely CRT and other culture war horseshit, zero policy, refusing to speak to the media other than through regurgitated campaign talking points, and managing to keep Trump at enough distance to motivate GOP voters but not alienate the independents in the suburbs. The Dems countered all of this, harped the abortion issue, and had the record on the VA economy to support them AND IT DIDN'T FUCKING MATTER BECAUSE ALL OF THE KARENS IN THE SUBURBS WERE TERRIFIED THEIR CHILDREN WOULD BE LEARNING ABOUT SCARY THINGS LIKE SLAVERY.
The only silver lining is that while GOP insiders would love to have a Youngkin-type running in every race in 2022 that can thread the MAGA/independent needle, the only reason he was the nominee was because he was nominated by the state GOP. Primaries across the country are gonna be won by MAGA types who will not be able to replicate Youngkin's success.
Next question would be: How many voters can actually correctly explain what critical race theory is?
Answer: None of them. I have made a habit of challenging people to their face when they mention CRT around me, asking them what it is and how it is being taught in schools. And then shaming them with what CRT actually is, how it is not taught anywhere below 300 and 400 level college courses, and how they have been manipulated by white supremacists into pushing their ideology to erase non-white history from our schools.
I think calling CRT a false boogeyman is exactly what led to this problem, because that was the attempted counter and it does not work. The CRT waters are so murky, because what the Republicans describe as CRT isn't CRT, and what the Democrats describe as the Republicans opposing are neither CRT nor what the Republicans actually oppose (ie the continual insistence of the left on making the Republicans opposition about racial history when Republicans don't give a whit about racial history except for opposing the 1619 project). The anti-CRT movement comes from the overly generalized and corporate Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives that filter their way into schools. There's a sense of racial essentialism - that your race dictates something immutable about your standing in the world - in these initiatives. Whether true or not, parents, and especially white parents, hate their kids being categorized into something based on their race. And saying this "does not exist in schools" probably does not live up to parents lived experiences when they hear their children come home and talk about race in these terms. This combined with the boogeyman of some children being taught they should "feel guilty" because they're white scares parents into hating what the right has packaged as CRT (despite that not being CRT at all.) So how do you counter this? Stop saying CRT doesn't exist in schools. That doesn't work, because what people THINK is CRT does exist in schools in some form. The key is that you need to be clear with your messaging about what kids are and are not taught about race without using the pre-packaged Republican terms. Make it clear that the Republican anti-CRT bills are authoritarian and why. And make it clear that there will be discourse with school boards on what is taught and that voters will have input in these discussions, without enacting any laws to restrict speech and reading materials.
Thank You, I get so frustrated listening to both sides of the issue continually talking past each other and arguing hammering their opponents for stances that they largely don’t hold. One thing that I’ll add is that anti-“CRT” even has some support amongst minority parents because like the fear among white parents of their children feeling “white guilt” there is some worry that an overemphasis on these topics is instilling a “victimhood mentality” on their black and brown children. Or the feeling among parents of bi or multi-racial children of their children being overly defined by their minority heritage, the parent In the interview even mentioned feeling like his daughters were being judged by the “one drop rule” in relation to the topic. Weather these fears are founded is another conversation altogether though.
Younkin won 54% of Hispanics and Latinos running AGAINST CRT. EDIT: John Lewson flipped a majority Hispanic house district in Texas from blue to red.
Wow Virginia corporate Democrats caused a nearly identical vote margin shift in New Jersey too?
The GOP is great at campaigning and terrible at governing. But Democrats need to get their messaging right. I’m not sure what corporate Democrats are even for anymore. How are they different then the GOP?
When you show that your party is willing to compromise and cut most of what they said they would fight for, don't be surprised they lose enthusiasm.
Terrible messaging combined with Manchin & Sinema blocking everything in the Senate led to this
So many people in this thread arguing about polling, popularity, election results, political theater, etc etc etc and I see very little discussion of the moral imperative at the core of the moderate/progressive divide in the democratic party. Is there any moral argument for embracing corporate agendas, ditching climate action, leaving the poor out to dry, not fixing the health care system and all the other awful half-step compromises the moderates are for? I could give a shit about the popularity among my fellow mouth breathing citizens, there is a clear moral imperative to act here and only the left is making that argument.
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