Gavin Newsom addresses the nation

[EyeballKid]

Court cases

Protests

Public Relations campaigns, including media interviews and social media coordination

Rallies

Political speeches in Congress and in public

There are a lot of ways to influence public opinion. Political movements like the Tea Party, Me Too, Black Lives Matter, Anti-Vietnam War, Civil Rights, etc. did not rely on things like Alex Padilla crashing a Kristi Noem press conference to "just ask some questions."

Alex Padilla is not doing anything to weaken Trump. Not. A. Thing. Some of the people on this board are so gullible. You play right into performance politics.

No, but I'd put @EyeballKid and @dukeman92 at the top of the list. I could probably come up with a top 10 pretty quickly from just this thread. So many thirsty people for performance art.

Dude, you continue to misconstrue my position.

Apparently you lost the plot with your one-man crusade against Newsom and haven’t looked back since.

 

[dukeman92]

No, but I'd put @EyeballKid and @dukeman92 at the top of the list. I could probably come up with a top 10 pretty quickly from just this thread. So many thirsty people for performance art.

Damn! That Newsom thread got you BIG mad...

 

[dukeman92]

Dude, you continue to misconstrue my position.

Apparently you lost the plot with your one-man crusade against Newsom and haven’t looked back since.

Man, that thread has him farther in his feelings than than a 40 year old single woman at a wedding.

 

[superrific]

I will say, I accidentally sent an earlier version of a reply I typed out to Snoop. My edited reply differs a good bit, but the idea is still the same.

At any rate, I’ll try to respond to your post.

I appreciate that you at least partially agree there’s value in engaging conservative or right-leaning voters, even if it’s not always about flipping them. But I think your post ultimately reveals the limits of the framework you’re working within, especially the way it flattens conservative voters into caricatures and substitutes a moral diagnosis for a political strategy.

You say it’s not “convenient” to reduce MAGA to hate and xenophobia because it’s based on what you see and what the studies say. But you’re not treating these studies as data points to think with, you’re using them as moral proof texts. You’re assuming that correlation is destiny, that because racial resentment correlates with Trump support, it must be the core driver for every voter in that camp, and that it therefore forecloses serious political engagement.

What makes that even more contradictory is that you then turn around and say we should be appearing on Fox News to “plant seeds.” Why would we plant seeds among a population that, by your own account, is incapable of recognizing human decency or responding to anything but grievance? Either these voters are emotionally reachable or they’re not. You can’t write them off as morally depraved and politically unreachable in paragraph two and then tell us it’s “low cost” and “worth a shot” to try to reach them in paragraph one.

What’s going on here isn’t really a political strategy so much as it’s branding. You want Democrats to appear open-minded and decent to people who, in your telling, are beyond reason. That’s not a political plan. That’s reputational damage control for professional-class liberals who are uncomfortable being seen as aloof. You’re not trying to win anyone over, you’re trying to feel better about not winning them over.

And that ties into the larger problem: liberalism still doesn’t know how to process the emotional power of populism. You treat MAGA as a mass psychosis rather than as a political formation that has emotional, cultural, and economic resonance, much of which has grown in the vacuum created by decades of bipartisan neglect. You mention jobs as an “empty promise” and then act like grievance politics came out of nowhere. But maybe the promise of jobs isn’t empty to people who watched their towns collapse while both parties gave them NAFTA and Walmart.

You say, “What positive thing does MAGA offer?” The answer is belonging. Narrative. Identity. A sense of being seen. It’s not just “hate” any more than the appeal of Obama was just “hope.” The left will never understand how to defeat that until it understands how it works. And that begins with refusing to treat half the country like they’re too poisoned to ever matter politically.

People’s political identity isn’t genetically hardwired. If we cede that emotional ground to the right, they will keep winning it.

1. That's not my assumption. That's your assumption about my assumptions. I do not believe that every single person in that camp shares the same views. but the vast majority do. That's why I simultaneously say, "let's talk to them" (which would be pointless if I believed they were all haters through and through) and "plant seeds."

2. The KKK also offered a great sense of belonging. You want to give them a way of belonging to a multiracial, diverse group, presumably aligned along class lines.

That's great and all, but Tom Hayden had the same ideas and laid them out at Port Huron. That was like 60 years ago.

 

[Calheel]

Ah, so you've moved the goalposts. Before it was a political stunt that you were criticizing. Now your complaint is about the "cheapness" of it all. Not sure what that term is supposed to mean exactly, or how one distinguishes a cheap political stunt from a legit political stunt.

Is Alex Padilla going to be as effective as the March on Washington.? Well, duh. But they are fundamentally doing the same thing on different scales.

As you have said yourself, Trump is spoiling for a fight on the streets, for an excuse to invoke the Insurrection Act. So maybe a March isn't the best idea for the moment. Maybe Senators getting arrested (which can't remotely be described as insurrection) is a better idea.

Exposing yourself to police canines, batons and water canons as you cross the Edmund Pettus bridge to shame racist cops is not just a difference of scale from Alex Padilla crashing a Kristy Noem press conference.

Honestly, it is offensive to even juxtapose the bravery of those marchers with the self-promotion of Padilla.

 

[Calheel]

Damn! That Newsom thread got you BIG mad...

This is still the Newsom thread. We aren't finished quite yet.

 

[superrific]

Exposing yourself to police canines, batons and water canons as you cross the Edmund Pettus bridge to shame racist cops is not just a difference of scale from Alex Padilla crashing a Kristy Noem press conference.

Honestly, it is offensive to even juxtapose the bravery of those marchers with the self-promotion of Padilla.

That would be a good point if we were comparing their bravery. We are talking about whether publicity-gathering is intrinsic to politics. I contend that it is, and you dissemble with nonsense deflections.

 

[EyeballKid]

This is still the Newsom thread. We aren't finished quite yet.

You were finished a long time ago. Now you’re just digging in your heels, for no apparent reason.

 

[superrific]

This is still the Newsom thread. We aren't finished quite yet.

You were 10 pages ago. You just don't realize it.

 

[Calheel]

Dude, you continue to misconstrue my position.

Apparently you lost the plot with your one-man crusade against Newsom and haven’t looked back since.

My plot has been consistent throughout.

I don't think phony politicians who opportunistically try to grab the spotlight are doing anything to help the cause. In fact, I think they do nothing but strengthen Trump's hold on the middle of America.

Do you honestly think Padilla is scoring points with Middle America by storming a Kristy Noem press conference? Do you think that is hurting Trump in even the slightest?

 

[Calheel]

That would be a good point if we were comparing their bravery. We are talking about whether publicity-gathering is intrinsic to politics. I contend that it is, and you dissemble with nonsense deflections.

So who is moving the goalposts now?

Kingpin asked if Padilla was engaging in a publicity stunt. I answered.

Now you are talking about "publicity gathering."

You typically don't engage in bad faith arguing so I'll cut you a little slack. But again, for you to compare the Selma marches with Alex Padilla is absurd. And you obviously know the difference between a cheap political stunt and a publicity "gathering" .

 

[Kingpin]

I literally just listed 5-6 things they should be doing and are in fact doing in the post you are responding to.

You list public political speeches and yet crucify Newsom for doing so.

 

[Calheel]

You list public political speeches and yet crucify Newsom for doing so.

My issue with Newsom was the televised primetime address to the nation -- something that is the domain of presidents. I would have had no objection to Newsom making a speech at a rally or calling a press conference -- which are normal things for governors to do.

 

[EyeballKid]

My plot has been consistent throughout.

I don't think phony politicians who opportunistically try to grab the spotlight are doing anything to help the cause. In fact, I think they do nothing but strengthen Trump's hold on the middle of America.

Do you honestly think Padilla is scoring points with Middle America by storming a Kristy Noem press conference? Do you think that is hurting Trump in even the slightest?

I think you’re consistently looking at things in a vacuum instead of how these singular events build momentum over time, and you’re consistently pretending that i and others here care more about the performative acts of newsom et al than we do about substantive challenges to the Trump admin.

I think there’s a good chance for example, that Newsome‘s PR stunt will encourage more protesters to come out this coming weekend. That’s not a bad thing. In fact that’s the way movements gain momentum.

 

[Paine]

1. That's not my assumption. That's your assumption about my assumptions. I do not believe that every single person in that camp shares the same views. but the vast majority do. That's why I simultaneously say, "let's talk to them" (which would be pointless if I believed they were all haters through and through) and "plant seeds."

2. The KKK also offered a great sense of belonging. You want to give them a way of belonging to a multiracial, diverse group, presumably aligned along class lines.

That's great and all, but Tom Hayden had the same ideas and laid them out at Port Huron. That was like 60 years ago.

I appreciate the response, even if it was shorter than usual. I still think there are contradictions in your framework that you haven’t really resolved.

You say it’s not your assumption that every MAGA voter is motivated by hate, but earlier you said “literally all of MAGA is hate and xenophobia.” Then you listed examples to back that up and concluded the entire movement is rooted in grievance. So when you now say “I don’t believe they’re all haters,” it reads more like a disclaimer than something that actually informs your analysis. If you believed these voters were more complex, your language and framing would reflect that.

The KKK comparison only reinforces the issue. Yes, the KKK created a toxic form of belonging. But the fact that belonging can be dangerous doesn’t mean it isn’t also powerful. Every successful political movement has used it: from labor unions to civil rights to Obama’s 2008 campaign. The challenge is to offer a better kind of belonging, not to pretend that the emotion itself is illegitimate whenever it shows up on the right.

Historically, the most powerful democratic movements, from the labor movement to the civil rights movement, did create cross-racial, emotionally resonant political communities rooted in dignity, justice, and shared struggle. Was it hard? Yes. Did it require organizing, leadership, sacrifice, and moral clarity? Of course. But it happened. And it can happen again. It requires a broad political imagination.

Here’s where your logic breaks down: You say “let’s talk to them,” but you also describe them in terms so sweeping and moralized that there’s no real political reason to do so. If they’re unreachable and beyond reason, what exactly are we planting seeds for?

And that ties into your point about Port Huron. You treat Hayden’s ideas like a quaint failure because they’re old, not because they’re wrong. But 60 years later, many of the same forces SDS identified (elite consolidation, political alienation, economic dislocation) have only gotten worse.

Regardless, what I’m proposing isn’t a replay of Port Huron or the campus-centered politics of the New Left. That vision, while idealistic, was often disconnected from the everyday lives of working people and too wrapped up in cultural rebellion to build majoritarian power. My project is rooted in material politics, not abstract moral appeals or lifestyle radicalism, but the concrete promise of dignity, belonging, and economic security for a multi-ethnic working class that has been abandoned by both parties. It’s not about purity or protest; it’s about winning AND building something real and durable in the process.

Meanwhile, the alternative strategy you seem to endorse (technocratic governance paired with moral condemnation) has left millions of voters feeling abandoned and fueled the rise of right-wing populism.

If Democrats want to compete on the emotional and cultural terrain the right has claimed, they can’t do it with moral distance and data points alone. They have to offer people something real, not just in terms of policy, but in terms of meaning and solidarity. If you thinks that naive, then fine. I think it’s how we start taking actual politics seriously again.

 

[1moretimeagain]

My issue with Newsom was the televised primetime address to the nation -- something that is the domain of presidents. I would have had no objection to Newsom making a speech at a rally or calling a press conference -- which are normal things for governors to do.

It was 6:30 pm, is that really to late for a Governor’s speech?

 

[Calheel]

I think you’re consistently looking at things in a vacuum instead of how these singular events build momentum over time, and you’re consistently pretending that i and others here care more about the performative acts of newsom et al than we do about substantive challenges to the Trump admin.

I think there’s a good chance for example, that Newsome‘s PR stunt will encourage more protesters to come out this coming weekend. That’s not a bad thing. In fact that’s the way movements gain momentum.

There is no way to measure that. I'd bet that the No Kings protests were going to be huge no matter what, as they have been very well organized.

I say that you and @dukeman92 care more about performative acts because that it how your posts read to me. If your position is that you are hopeful that this kind of behavior eventually leads to something more meaningful, I can partly get behind that line of thinking.

 

[Calheel]

It was 6:30 pm, is that really to late for a Governor’s speech?

9:30/8:30 PM East Coast/Central time, which is where 75% of the population lives and when almost all presidential addresses are given. The timing of that speech was absolutely intentional and designed to make Gavin look like the president. That was part of my annoyance at that speech from the outset. That it was him cosplaying as president.

 

[hedge]

Truth is, millions of Americans are politically homeless. They are alienated from both parties. Not all of them are unreachable racists. Many are disillusioned, cynical, struggling, and desperate for something real.

I would add indifferent to that list. They figure it's not going to make that much difference to their lives who is the president or the senator from their state. They've lived thru multiple election cycles and haven't noticed much real difference in their lives regardless of who won. Of course they and a great many more disaffected (or otherwise) voters would instantly vote for someone who promised to direct deposit $10K into their checking account. In fact, I'm not so sure that's a terrible idea. Most political promises are just offers to put more money back into voters' pockets, but the way it's packaged doesn't feel real to them. A $10K payment is real and I suspect it would move the needle for millions of voters. Why not?

 

[Paine]

I would add indifferent to that list. They figure it's not going to make that much difference to their lives who is the president or the senator from their state. They've lived thru multiple election cycles and haven't noticed much real difference in their lives regardless of who won. Of course they and a great many more disaffected (or otherwise) voters would instantly vote for someone who promised to direct deposit $10K into their checking account. In fact, I'm not so sure that's a terrible idea. Most political promises are just offers to put more money back into voters' pockets, but the way it's packaged doesn't feel real to them. A $10K payment is real and I suspect it would move the needle for millions of voters. Why not?

Totally agree. “Indifferent” is right. It’s not based in apathy but in actual experience. These folks have lived through enough cycles to know that for them, nothing changes. So when someone offers a clear, material benefit; not a lecture, not a tax credit buried in bureaucracy, but something real and tangible, that hits. That’s why Trump put his name on the stimulus checks.

I know your $10K comment is half joke, half truth. People need to feel that politics can do something. If you don’t give them that, the right will fill the void with rage and identity. Personally…I think more people would rather have the check.