Discussion about this post

User's avatar
Linda1961 is woke and proud's avatar

Good analysis, Stephen. In spite of jumping in the race late, in spite of being a Black woman, and in spite of being the VP of a very unpopular president, she came very close to winning. Yes, close doesn't count in political races, but the emphasis should be on just how weak TACO's win was. Instead, we are told that he has a mandate and won in a landslide, and that America isn't ready for a woman president, especially a woman of color. Poppycock!

Harris falling short had more to do with listening to the paid political consultants and the focus groups than in listening to the Democratic base, and to the squishy political middle. Her campaign was making real progress, then seemed to stall. She started out listening to the voters, then switched to the paid political consultants. And national Dems still listen to the paid political consultants instead of the voters. Meanwhile, local Dems are winning by listening to the voters.

ETA: Biden was very unpopular, even before the debate, as you noted. I like to be realistic, even if I don't understand why something is true. Biden was unpopular, and I don't understand why.

Expand full comment
ArgieBargie's avatar

Great analysis. It's easy to focus on a single factor like "voters are bigots!" and extremely hard to look in the mirror and accept uncomfortable realities, or worse, what average voters perceive as being real.

I always said we were on borrowed time when Biden won in 2020, not only because he looked old and frail, but also because he was not the president we needed to put an end to the events of Jan 6, which continue 'til this day. This was not the time to follow "norms and traditions" or "restore sanity," or whatever the fuck milquetoast Democrats called it; it was the time for bold, decisive action, optics be damned. That never came under the abject failure that was the DOJ under Garland. The failure to hold Trump accountable cannot be overstated.

Regarding the economy, it was never going to matter how good of a job Biden did, because perception is a motherfucker holding the stupidest voters in the country hostage. And that perception, so effectively manufactured by Republicans and media allies (most MSM, not just Fox News) is that the economy was in shambles and we were headed for an economic recession. It didn't matter the real reason behind the post-COVID rising grocery prices, which predated Biden, it was all Joe's fault (the media dropped the the "egg carton" narrative overnight).

Same can be said for the manufactured "border crisis," which gave Republicans enormous leverage against Democrats and "Border Czar"(also made up) Harris.

We need to accept the fact Republicans are better at connecting with average voters, because they play to people's deepest prejudices. They successfully painted Democrats as economic failures who love open borders, want to prosecute political opponents, and are only concerned "woke stuff" (see how fucking maddening all this bullshit is?!).

There are other factors that contributed to the loss, of course, like Democrats failing to drive their base to the polls for a variety of reasons (*cough* Gaza *cough*)

TL;DR: Like Stephen said, the political climate was horrendous for any Democrat, not just Harris, but I still believe Biden dropping out was the right decision.

Expand full comment
38 more comments...

No posts