From TPM Reader NL …
I just had to chime here because I am deeply worried that we will learn the wrong lessons from 2024.
I understand Reader DS’s (#7) frustration with the outcome, but Reader AJ (#4) is much closer to the mark in my book. Look, 2024 was not a landslide for Trump. What makes 2024 so disappointing is that the map looks a lot like the House vote in 2022. Biden’s approval rating has basically been steady since late 2022. The economic conditions do not feel much different than 2022. Prices might not be rising, but they are pretty high relative to 3-4 years ago. Interest rates are high and housing is in short supply. A whopping 67% of people think the country is on the wrong track. Like many others, I thought the democracy argument would win the day. It did not.
This brings me to my big takeaway — too many people in Bidenworld bought into the power of the “democracy argument” that they thought there was less pressure on them to deliver tangible results to the electorate and that it gave them license to wrack up wins on pet issues. For the better part of two years, no one seemed to care that Biden was stuck with an approval rating in the 40s. If you believe democracy is truly at stake, you do everything in your goddam power to improve your standing with the electorate. It means pushing a border crackdown ASAP, supply side reforms (given the environment), etc. But, my God, we got none of this until it was too late. Everyone in the West Wing should have been running around with their hair on fire in 2022 asking themselves what they could do to improve the economic situation.That did not seem to happen until it was too late. The irony, as it turns out, is that the electrode put as much stock into the “democracy argument” as Bidenworld did.
A secondary takeaway is that ideologues seem to have taken over the policy apparatus of the Democratic party. A lot of people seemed more focused on fixing the shortcomings of Obama’s response to the Great Recession but in the 2021-2022 environment. This seems to be a problem across the board. I know a number of people in DOE who preferred Trump I appointees to Biden appointees. I mean, this has filtered down to the local level too. My son’s school district got rid of the gifted learning program because, you know, it’s racist. Apparently it’s also racist to enforce gun laws and traffic laws. I voted for all non-Democrats at the local level because I am getting sick of all the doctrinaire progressive s$%t. If my only experience of politics was Trump I and Biden, I am not sure if I would have pulled the level for Harris.
Yes, sexism might have hurt Harris some. Yes, the Democrats need to navigate new media better and go into “hostile” territory more. But the real problem is the background economic environment for people lower down on the economic scale was not great. Hell, it’s affecting my family too and we are well off — I have an hour-long commute because I cannot afford to move closer to work and we have only been able to manage inflation because I switched jobs (and added 45 minutes to my commute). But we’re managing and I love democracy. However, not everyone is so in the bag for Democrats and democracy. It was really unclear what Harris was going to do that was different. Did she criticize the administration on anything of substance? The Biden administration simply did not deserve another 4 years. Their only argument for 4 more years was that Trump is a menace.
At some point, Democrats need to care about the quality of governance and delivering results. I do not see it at any level because policy is set by people who all live in the same cocoon. This problem is real need of fixing. It is likely to get worse with Trump II.
