Many Americans Say the Democratic Party Does Not Share Their Priorities

[superrific]

I do. Remember the election isn’t decided by what the majority of Trump voters want but what the majority of low-information swing voters want.

And for them, it is almost always the economy.

What's the excuse for the 45% of voters who aren't swing voters but are voting for this bullshit? And I'm sorry, I'm not going to accept this "it's the economy" conclusion when there is absolutely no objective evidence for that.

 

[Calheel]

So your answer to voters saying that Dems were “placing too much emphasis on social issues that they consider less urgent” is to say that Dems in fact should have talked more about social issues?

You gotta play defense in politics, too.

HY is right on this one. When I saw that Kamala is for “they/them” Trump is for you commercial, I knew it was a great political ad. Trump ran that ad nonstop in swing states and Kamala barely said anything. She should have pulled a Jd Vance and renounced everything she said before 2021, but instead she let that ad ruin her.

 

[BillOfRights]

"The opinion of 10,000 men
is of no value if none of
them knows anything
about the subject."


- Marcus Aurelius

 

[superrific]

She should have pulled a Jd Vance and renounced everything she said before 2021, but instead she let that ad ruin her.

Wouldn't have done anything. Because while it was a great ad, read between the lines. "They/them" isn't actually about trans people, any more than Kristi Noem's story of shooting her dog was about the dog.

 

[Calheel]

What's the excuse for the 45% of voters who aren't swing voters but are voting for this bullshit? And I'm sorry, I'm not going to accept this "it's the economy" conclusion when there is absolutely no objective evidence for that.

Who cares about them? They don’t decide elections any more than the Superrifics of the world who will never vote for a Republican.

Elections are about the 10% of the electorate that are actually persuadable to either side. Almost all of those people are low information voters. And they are the ones who decide elections

 

[finesse]

"The opinion of 10,000 men
is of no value if none of
them knows anything
about the subject."


- Marcus Aurelius

That's not how they count the votes.

 

[rodoheel]

You gotta play defense in politics, too.

HY is right on this one. When I saw that Kamala is for “they/them” Trump is for you commercial, I knew it was a great political ad. Trump ran that ad nonstop in swing states and Kamala barely said anything. She should have pulled a Jd Vance and renounced everything she said before 2021, but instead she let that ad ruin her.

Im not necessarily disagreeing with that. Im saying it’s a weird thing to say in response to the premise that voters supposedly want Dems to talk about economic issues, not social issues. I’ve been very clear that I don’t believe voters actually mean that.

 

[BillOfRights]

That's not how they count the votes.

"Many Americans say..."

But it's kinda how polls work.

 

[Calheel]

Wouldn't have done anything. Because while it was a great ad, read between the lines. "They/them" isn't actually about trans people, any more than Kristi Noem's story of shooting her dog was about the dog.

She needed to respond. Ignoring it was the worst strategy. And HY may be right that the reason Kamala didn’t respond is because she didn’t want to ruffle any feathers on the left.

 

[superrific]

Who cares about them? They don’t decide elections any more than the Superrifics of the world who will never vote for a Republican.

Elections are about the 10% of the electorate that are actually persuadable to either side. Almost all of those people are low information voters. And they are the ones who decide elections

I don't know if we are talking about the same things. I'm not only talking about the 2024 election, but even there I don't think you're right.

There's no reason that the MAGA idiots had to back Trump. They could have stayed at home like a lot of Dem constituencies. Instead they ran to the polls with glee to smear their poop around the whole world.

Or to put it differently: if 5% of the MAGAs had any fucking common sense at all, Trump would have lost.

 

[lawtig02]

She needed to respond. Ignoring it was the worst strategy. And HY may be right that the reason Kamala didn’t respond is because she didn’t want to ruffle any feathers on the left.

I agree it was a very effective ad. I also agree Kamala’s response to it (or lack thereof) was terrible. But the idea that the BOP must provide gender affirming care is not “nonsense.” It’s the law. As Trump’s own administration affirmed.

 

[CFordUNC]

You gotta play defense in politics, too.

HY is right on this one. When I saw that Kamala is for “they/them” Trump is for you commercial, I knew it was a great political ad. Trump ran that ad nonstop in swing states and Kamala barely said anything. She should have pulled a Jd Vance and renounced everything she said before 2021, but instead she let that ad ruin her.

Nobody on here said it wasn’t an effective ad or an effective line of attack. What we are saying is that it is the *Republican Party* who is bizarrely obsessed with transgender people, not the Democratic Party. Look at the couple of Trump voter posters we have here- it’s quite literally all a couple of them talk about.

And anyway once that ad came out, what on earth was Kamala supposed to say? “Actually no we don’t support sex change surgeries on prison inmates, oh and by the way it was actually under the Trump administration where this policy was put in place”? Yeah, I’m sure so many of the people who would believe the Trump ad would also believe the Kamala rebuttal.

Republicans win on the transgender issue because there’s literally no effective defense that can be mounted by the Democrats other than stone cold silence on it. But stone cold silence on the issue causes the Democrats to be in between a rock and a hard place; they either lose the election because they lose moderates, or they lose the election because they lose progressives AND don’t actually sway any moderate voters anyway.

 

[superrific]

She needed to respond. Ignoring it was the worst strategy. And HY may be right that the reason Kamala didn’t respond is because she didn’t want to ruffle any feathers on the left.

Kamala didn't respond because she didn't want to talk about that issue, which makes sense. I'm no political operative. I don't know whether "ignoring it was the worst strategy." I don't know that anyone knows that.

I just fail to see how Kamala disavowing that would have reached the low-info voters you say decided the election. And since the GOP campaign was truth-free, it's not as if anyone would accept the disavowal any way. And yeah, Kamala was struggling with the left because of Gaza, so she decided the best course of action was to refocus attention on where everyone agrees. It didn't work, because "threat to democracy" didn't resonate and the XX strategy playing on abortion rights turned out to be a dud.

If it were me, I would not have put so many eggs in the "women will vote for us because abortion" as that theory has never proven true. I said as much at the time. It's just not the most important issue for lots of women. But again, I'm no political operative, and it's easy as fuck to sit here on a message board and say, "they should do X, they should do Y"

 

[BubbaOtis]

In what way are they not your team? Have you been a secret liberal all this time, posting nothing but conservative stuff? Gleefully at times?

And your post about "stop digging" and "bought and paid for" is triumphalist bullshit in a time where that is wholly inappropriate. The country is literally burning.

Super ignore me if you want. It's not as if you learn anything anyway. You're just the same guy posting the same shit all the fucking time.

Ironically I first heard the "stop digging " phrase when John Kerry used it against W in the 2004 campaign. You're the poster child for the frantic "sky is falling" partisan. The country is literally burning?? Seriously? Maybe part of a county in LA..
I'm done with you.

 

[Calheel]

Nobody on here said it wasn’t an effective ad or an effective line of attack. What we are saying is that it is the *Republican Party* who is bizarrely obsessed with transgender people, not the Democratic Party. Look at the couple of Trump voter posters we have here- it’s quite literally all a couple of them talk about.

And anyway once that ad came out, what on earth was Kamala supposed to say? “Actually no we don’t support sex change surgeries on prison inmates, oh and by the way it was actually under the Trump administration where this policy was put in place”? Yeah, I’m sure so many of the people who would believe the Trump ad would also believe the Kamala rebuttal.

Republicans win on the transgender issue because there’s literally no effective defense that can be mounted by the Democrats other than stone cold silence on it. But stone cold silence on the issue causes the Democrats to be in between a rock and a hard place; they either lose the election because they lose moderates, or they lose the election because they lose progressives AND don’t actually sway any moderate voters anyway.

Yeah, that's exactly what she should have said. In politics, flip-flopping is no longer an issue -- JD Vance proved that. Just say loudly that you don't support government funded sex change operations.

In general, I thought Kamala's biggest liability was being part of the administration. I really wanted Andy Beshear to run. But Biden made sure that wouldn't happen with whatever backroom deal he cut with Kamala. And apparently, Kamala thought that meant that she couldn't put any daylight between herself and Joe on just about any issue. In the end, I think it would have been very tough for any Democrat to convince the male Latino voters in PA, AZ and NV and the male Arab voters in MI that Democrats weren't responsible for inflation/Gaza, but Kamala's campaign strategy made that basically impossible. And not playing defense on the trans issue didn't help. You can't campaign scared.

 

[Centerpiece]

I do. Remember the election isn’t decided by what the majority of Trump voters want but what the majority of low-information swing voters want.

And for them, it is almost always the economy.

It’s always gonna be about the economy.
With that in mind, let’s see what the economy looks like in 2026 around the midterms… we shall see how the low-info swing voters feel then.
I think Elon’s stated goal was to tear down the country completely - including and most assuredly the economy. Let’s see who Joe Blow Low Info votes for then.

 

[lawtig02]

Kamala didn't respond because she didn't want to talk about that issue, which makes sense. I'm no political operative. I don't know whether "ignoring it was the worst strategy." I don't know that anyone knows that.

I just fail to see how Kamala disavowing that would have reached the low-info voters you say decided the election. And since the GOP campaign was truth-free, it's not as if anyone would accept the disavowal any way. And yeah, Kamala was struggling with the left because of Gaza, so she decided the best course of action was to refocus attention on where everyone agrees. It didn't work, because "threat to democracy" didn't resonate and the XX strategy playing on abortion rights turned out to be a dud.

If it were me, I would not have put so many eggs in the "women will vote for us because abortion" as that theory has never proven true. I said as much at the time. It's just not the most important issue for lots of women. But again, I'm no political operative, and it's easy as fuck to sit here on a message board and say, "they should do X, they should do Y"

In hindsight, I think it’s pretty obvious she should have responded. I’d have suggested an ad with Kamala saying something like this —

I’m sure you’ve seen my opponent’s ad saying that I want to use taxpayer money to fund sex change operations for prisoners. My opponent is a liar. And a hypocrite. He’s a liar because what I ACTUALLY want is to show respect to all Americans, and to follow the law. He’s a hypocrite because it was his own administration that said the law requires providing gender affirming care to inmates. I hope you’ll vote for me because I care about all of you, not just billionaires and cop beaters. And because unlike my opponent, I’ll tell you the truth.

 

[CFordUNC]

Yeah, that's exactly what she should have said. In politics, flip-flopping is no longer an issue -- JD Vance proved that. Just say loudly that you don't support government funded sex change operations.

In general, I thought Kamala's biggest liability was being part of the administration. I really wanted Andy Beshear to run. But Biden made sure that wouldn't happen with whatever backroom deal he cut with Kamala. And apparently, Kamala thought that meant that she couldn't put any daylight between herself and Joe on just about any issue. In the end, I think it would have been very tough for any Democrat to convince the male Latino voters in PA, AZ and NV and the male Arab voters in MI that Democrats weren't responsible for inflation/Gaza, but Kamala's campaign strategy made that basically impossible. And not playing defense on the trans issue didn't help. You can't campaign scared.

I hear you. And my contention remains that attempting to play defense on the transgender issue would have had zero impact on the outcome of the election (but that’s not to say she shouldn’t have tried, I suppose)

 

[TullyHeel]

None of this should be more important than a person using common sense and saying someone like Trump shouldn't be President unless they are okay with a fascist country for only straight white Christian nationalists.

 

[Zoo_View]

This fellow HY12 is a poster child for the decline of the University of North Carolina. It used to be a world class institution, until the GA started packing it with DEI applicants from rural areas.

There's this perception out there that somehow he can do better, but I'm just not sure that's true. None of these assclowns can keep more than one idea in their head at once, and so all rationality goes out the window as soon as someone shows them something they don't like.

No.

He’s a poster child for why college undergraduates should not be able to major in business, engineering, and similar majors while foregoing a Liberal Arts education.

HY2012 is highly credential and limited in education.