Can we at least acknowledge that there's a bit of walking back going on here vis-a-vis economic anxiety? Like, I sort of got the impression that the Hillbilly Elegy was aimed at some guy strung out on painkillers and flipping burgers at Wendy's because the Caterpillar factory closed shop. Now we find out that the real economic anxiety comes from the household making slightly above the median income and struggling to deal with college expenses while also eyeing that new Ford F-150 and an upgraded data plan and also **** that freeloading lucky ducky guy working fast food, no minimum wage increase for you that is not how we MAGA and don't even ask about health insurance. Feels like a bait-and-switch going on here.

I feel like we'll end up in the weeds pretty quick if we try to talk specifics, and since they'll vary a lot from place to place, we'll never agree and just get upset about everything. There is the larger point that if the median family in the richest nation in the world doesn't feel like they're getting by comfortably, then our problems are much bigger than like nafta or whatever. If median household income had moved over the past 40 years with like GDP/household, then it would be somewhere just over 100k/yr, and maybe people would be happier.

ok sure.

want thing like being able to afford health insurance(minor detail you left out), being able to save for college, being able to retire someday before they're 80? you really think all this anger is because they cant afford a new F-250 every 3 years???

when people say the left is out of touch with the average American, this is the kind of stuff they are talking about.

goofy, you are correct that the DOJ will wage war on the ACLU, and so on. They'll even try to codify and interpret it as vaguely Constitutional. But, this is sleight of hand. Understand that you are speaking of nothing short of a white nationalist coup of our Republic. It doesn't matter that it happened democratically. That isn't how Constitutionalism works. I'm not talking about philosophical bull**** here.

That's because it is. I'm aware that liberals get awfully anxious when I start invoking our tradition, but no one ever mistook it as a finished product other than fools. "Well twas a good idea, but looks like we lost this time." What the actual ****? No. No we didn't. Holy ****.

I left out the health insurance because it's tied to most peoples jobs, as in they pay a lot less for it than it actually costs. College can be paid for by grants and loans. You get social security/medicare when you're 65. But yea, the outspoken Trump supporters I know, and I live in Trump country, already buy new trucks every three years or so and are upset, like they think it's completely unfair, that they can't really afford it.

Heh.

I'm going to write a post about let's say Allegan County, Michigan. Look at the demographics, and how the voting broke down. There's an awful lot of mythology that they believe and apparently trick some of the more idiotic anthropologists into believing as well. Let's just say for now that you should read up on what median income means. Hint: an awful lot of them are well off, some of them are... not. And they aren't lying about caring for their own in some sense. Also not lying about concern for their children. That's all very real.

Now: ask them about the folks that pick their cherries, about the folks in Detroit, about the folks in California. These are interesting answers. They will fully expose their beliefs, especially when they mistake you for a confederate (politically). They really like to walk away if you challenge their beliefs. Hilariously, they do the same thing online. Awfully curious.

BTW, when you show your hand, they don't kill you.

They just start talking about sports and such.

Michigan you say?



Anecdotes are not data. But again, electoral malpractice is one theme that shouldn't be completely discarded.

Also from Michigan today (though not totally relevant to this particular thread)

Trump came to the vicinity. They made the pilgrimage. Of course Clinton should've physically visited. Her team obviously wasn't getting the right feedback, best explanation. Worst: gross negligence. I don't know. She was touring all over during the primary. Then she didn't. Your guess is as good as mine.

First I'd like to say that I think this whole, "Run a better candidate and visit MI/WI," strategy as all that needs to be done is vastly oversimplified and flat out wrong morally. I mean, you can improve as a party, so do it. Why NOT improve as a party? It's good for the country, it's good for your party, it's good for citizens. Take some ideas from the Bernie Sanders/Elizabeth Warren wing. Change the economic messaging and come up with bold new ideas.

If the Democratic party doesn't embrace the types of candidates millenials get excited about, they're going to be in for a rude awakening in either four or eight years. Either I can no longer argue with my friends that Trump is completely unacceptable because we're all still alive and well, or they begrudgingly come along in '20 because it's so obvious he's a mess, and then stay home in '24 when it's not as critical.

Anyway, with that said, I do find one part of the strategy here to be peculiarly interesting...

I'm not convinced Clinton should have visited MI/WI. It's easy to be results oriented now, but as far as I know Trump wasn't really going there either. If your polling shows it's tighter than expected, you have two options: A) Go there, making that polling obvious and also drawing Trump into campaigning there. You may not even net-gain with this strategy, as his campaign may resonate more there than yours does. B) Project strength, say it's wrapped up there, and campaign somewhere on the attack instead of the defensive.

It's a tough argument to prove, in part because option A may depress some of your turnout if they think it's in the bag, but at the end of the day I don't think it's blatantly obvious Clinton should have visited or that it was gross negligence. She might have lost by more there if both candidates campaigned hard. There's simply a big difference in not visiting a state like MI/WI that is supposed to be firmly blue and questioning allocated time in states that are supposed to be in play. For example, clearly OH was a waste of time (-9%) and FL could have been won with more money/attention (-1.3%). Flip Florida and the country is still on edge sweating the Michigan results. I mean, how much time and money were spent on Ohio and Iowa? Georgia was closer, ffs. Iowa was safer than Texas, and Ohio wasn't far behind.

If there was gross negligence in the polling and allocation of resources, it was in thinking OH/IA were in play.

The other gross negligence of the campaign was failing to really stand FOR something instead of simply AGAINST Trump. When it came to messaging, they needed one thing she was absolutely for that was exciting. Lambasting him was correct, fine, good, all that... But she also needed to be for something exciting, like one good economic pitch that could have generated some excitement.

Could be a health issue, brotato.

It was more than obvious during the campaign that HRC was being out worked by TRUMP. HRC was a lazy campaigner. I think it was HuffPo that had a recent article about this. Compare her to Obama on the campaign trail when Obama ran.

President Obama Commenting on HRC Campaign Laziness

Quote:

"You know, I won Iowa not because the demographics dictated that I would win Iowa," Obama said Monday. "It was because I spent 87 days going to every small town and fair and fish fry and VFW hall, and there were some counties where I might have lost, but maybe I lost by 20 points instead of 50 points."

"There are some counties maybe I won that people didn't expect, because people had a chance to see you and listen to you and get a sense of who you stood for and who you were fighting for," he added.

Like, we just had a whole hudge long presidential campaign where neither of the campaigns were representing sound economic policy. How ****ed up is that? What does that even mean?

And if the clinton campaign really purposefully ignored WI/MI because they recognized it was close and they were trying to distract Trump, then they all need to stop what they're doing. Like they all need to just quit because they're so bad at it. Like, whatever is left of the democrat party should be barring anyone associated with the clinton campaign from everything. Debbie whatshername****ingwhater, Donna Brazilnuts, just leave and don't come back. If in four years bill or hilary wants to campaign for the nominee, just tell them to **** off.

But you really don't. Demographics and more minority turn out could have easily swung this election.

Then you need to take ideas from Obama, not Bernie/Warren. Millenials certainly can embrace a middle of the road dem especially as they get older.

What's wrong with Warren's ideas? It's not a good sign when the left portrays her as some wild-eyed caricature of liberalism, because it's not even close to factually accurate.

https://www.thenation.com/article/wh...sts-they-dont/

Thought this was pretty good

Did not know what her ideas are, so to the google.

Dangerously subversive imo.

I didn't read the article, because, even if there is some mythical working class group of people out there who voted trump, they voted against their interests. Like you could make the case that in today's world, working class means people making over 80k/yr, and that those people voted for their interests (I mean, they didn't, but you could make a convoluted case for it, and it would be terrible), but people in the 30k/yr to 80k/yr range certainly voted against themselves. The only way that you could say that they didn't is if we imagine that they haven't been paying attention to politics at all, ever, outside of the last 15 months.

When did the left portray her as a wild-eyed caricature of liberalism? IE, dessin is not on the left economically, not even a little. I don't mean that as him being wrong, but it's the DEMs being wrong. The DEMs, and Obama is part of this, Just tried to be always correct, taking all sides into account. That ends up being more Right than Left in practice because it's fantasy that there's no corruption from donors and it's absurd to act as if there's won't be. But, it's primarily a terrible system when one party sees itself as advocates and the other as objective technocrats.

The GOP advocates for industry and against labor, consumers and the environment. Warren is an advocate in opposition. That's the kind of hero we need.

I wasn't. I was pointing out that Warren isn't close to the most successful candidate among millenials. Wall St corporate owned champion for the 1% Obama has that distinction. So I don't think mainstream dems necessarily need to do anything different, policy wise, to get massive millennial turn out.