So, a lot of the Hillbots, in desperate defense of their brand of the democratic party, are trying to now make the argument that even though Hillary lost, Sanders would not have won against Trump either, and would instead have done worse because he's further left and because the GOP had dirt on him related to his far left politics and ties. You know, stuff about him not having a job until his 30s, being kicked off a commune for not working, and honeymooning in the USSR, etc. I think that this theory is still relying on "conventional logic", the same kind of logic that is so out of touch with this election, and that it totally misses my core thesis of why the democrats lost. Once again, this was not an outstanding victory for the GOP. It was a loss for the democrats.
If you have not noticed, the democratic party has had a bad year, and this was before the election results came down. They alienated their base, they ignored their economically depressed voters, they bullied people with identity politics and fear tactics, they astroturfed whole websites to turn them into echo chambers, and they ran a horrid campaign that more or less could be summed up as "you ingrates better vote for me or else." As such, the democratic party was in a complete civil war between the Clinton and the Bernie people. They ran an establishment, conventional politician in an election in which people wanted change, and this gave the edge to Trump.
Here's the thing. As I said in a previous post, in 2008, the GOP got 60 million votes, in 2012, they got 60 million votes, in 2016, they got 60 million votes. It seems like their turnout is consistent, and that's both their floor and their ceiling. I'm not saying in different cases that they can't get more, but the fact that their vote totals have no changed tells me their base is remaining pretty constant, as you would expect from a party that is stagnating and not really bringing in more people (or if they are, they're losing others in the process). On the flip side, what happened on the democratic side? Obama had almost 70 million votes in 2008, 65 million in 2012, and Clinton had around 60 million this year, coming only slightly ahead of Clinton. The only variable that really changed here was the democratic votes. Something cost the democratic party votes, and it's not because these votes went to the GOP, it's because they went to no one.
Negative campaigning can be a thing, but if you haven't noticed, this election was a crapshow in which everyone got hit with a crapton of negative campaigning, except Bernie, who was more subtly sabotaged by his own party. Obama also got a crapton of negative campaigning against him. HE was called a socialist. HE was accused of not even being born in this country. All kinds of conspiracy theories came out against him. But there's one thing that really separated the negative campaigning we've seen against Obama, Trump, and what we would have seen against Sanders, and what happened with Clinton. Clinton was in a unique position to be dogpiled on by people in BOTH parties. The right hit her with attacks on Benghazi, emails, etc. The left hit her with accusations of stealing the primaries and being biased against Sanders and general corruption. Whereas in 2008 the democrats were united against the GOP, this election, they were divided, because half of their own party didn't like their nominee, and because people were told to fall in line behind her or else.
Yes, the GOP would have had a lot of nasty things to say about Sanders, just as they would have had a lot of nasty things to say about Clinton and Obama, just as the democrats had tons of ammo to use against Trump. But most accusations of Sanders would only work well among republicans, just like all the socialism, death panel, and birther nonsense only worked well on the republican base. The democrats still turned out for him regardless, and they would have enthusiastically turned out for Sanders. The republicans have been crying wolf on the whole socialism thing for years, and this election would have been no different. So what if he didn't have a job in his 30s? So what if he didn't work on a commune? So what if he wrote some rape letter thing that people so badly take out of context? So what if he honeymooned in the USSR? This would have only played well with the older crowd, who wasn't going to vote democratic anyway. It would not have been a big deal to younger supporters who have grown up in a post cold war era, and who don't care about that stuff. Sanders is the one with the solutions to our problems. Trump doesn't have them, Clinton doesn't have them.
A lot of establishment people really don't seem to get what happened this election. They're clueless. They're truly, freaking clueless. They're using the same logic that cost them the election in analyzing it. The reason the democrats lost was because they didn't like their own candidate. It had nothing to do with the republicans. The republicans were weak this election too. They've been in a weakened state since 2008, and only succeeded this time because the democrats pissed off half their own voting base. The sooner people realize this, the better. We could be looking at a democratic majority in the Senate (I'm ignoring the house because gerrymandering) and a president elect Sanders right now if these clueless people let us have our way. Oh yeah, I didn't mention the senate in my breakdown of the electoral analysis, but if we remember, it could have gone either way with a slight edge to the GOP, but much like the presidency, the republicans won it overwhelmingly, and in ways that violated all polling expectations. I believe the loss of the senate was linked to Clinton, and Clinton's campaign hurt the down ballot candidates because people didn't turn out to vote. Because of these clueless people, we get nothing. The sooner these guys get out of the way the better. The left will rise again, but only if the centrists and their conventional logic give us the keys to the car.
No comments:
Post a Comment