What are the lessons that Dems should take from this election? Is it problems of policy, priorities, woke, Biden, engage w/ MAGA, economic, messaging?

Question

As the Dems do their autopsy of why they died this year, what were the multiple causes of death?

What is the best method to revive this patient?

What did America see that the Dems did not?

Was it Trump campaign promises that lead to success?

With every human flaw known to man, why did USA voters overlook this fact & choose Trump anyway?

Is it as simple as the cartoon makes it out to be or is it "feelings / gut" instinct on Trump?

What are the lessons that Dems should take from this election? Is it problems of policy, priorities, woke, Biden, engage w/ MAGA, economic, messaging?

OlderAndWiser · Accepted Answer

1. Democrats have lied for four years about Biden's incompetence and they STILL have not removed him from office under the 25th Amendment. They have also lied about the failure of his presidency.

2. Not only did they lie about Biden, but they paved the way for him to become the Democrat nominee.

3. They realized their mistake too late.

4. They then chose Harris to be his replacement. She was, of course, an obvious choice, but she was also a horrible choice.

5. The people recognize Biden's term as a failure and Harris made some effort through slogans to distance herself from Biden, but when asked what she would do differently, she either avoided the question or said she would do nothing differently.

6. Harris is a horrible public speaker and her word salads are legendary, That explains her avoiding press conferences but that decision also had horrible consequences.

7. Her choice of a VP running mate was horrible. Walz was an easy target to attack.

8. Harris campaigned primarily by making personal attacks on Trump and the people are tired of the vitriol. She offered no solutions other than a few limited things that she copied from Trump.

9. The country is not far left and will not support a far left agenda. Half of the Democrat party has responded by asking "what is wrong with the voters?" They should be asking themselves "what is wrong with us?"

10. Trump has a track record and his four years vs. Biden's four years offered a clear and simple choice to voters. A very moderate candidate like Joe Manchin would have performed MUCH better than Harris and he would have had a chance for success.

Apparently, the Democrat party will need to suffer one or two more rounds of losses in the next election cycles before the more moderate Democrats try to wrest control away from the far left. Eliminate AOC and the squad, put the kibosh on Gavin Newsome's aspirations, and maybe Democrats can make a comeback. Otherwise, there is a real possibility of their party spawning a new third party that will split their vote and cast even more doom for Democrats.

BCA6010 · Accepted Answer

1. Cut the bullsh*t, especially the contradictory/mutually exclusive stances. In the age of the internet, you can't get away with pandering to opposing sides. You also can't call yourself a party that cares about rights solely on the issue of abortion, while demanding restrictions on rights that are actually enshrined explicitly in the constitution. In this respect, liberals are liberal in name only.

2. Cut the identity politics nonsense. The overwhelming majority of the country is sick of it, and automatically assumes there is nothing of value to be said whenever identity politics come up. Race and sex are not qualifications, or a substitute for policies and actions, and they invariably piss off a significant chunk of the country as a whole, while also eroding the Democratic base. Virtually the entirety Republican momentum right now is driven by disillusioned former Democrats, yet they keep getting falsely labeled as radicals, Nazis, racists, etc.

3. Stop ignoring the country as a whole, and prioritizing foreign interests. The priority of every US politician should be their constituents, period. This is exactly why the GOP establishment types are getting flayed by their party voters in favor of populists. Colluding with foreign governments, even "allies" (or worse, non-allies and even enemies) is a massive red flag, especially when the country is struggling. On that note...

4. Stop denying a problem exists just because it benefits the party/they don't want to deal with it. Identify real problems, address and take responsibility for them, and put an actual solution in motion. If something is genuinely misunderstood, then adequately explain why that's the case. "Trust me, I'm an expert" does not work anymore, especially after the COVID era.

TLDR: The party needs a total rebranding and expulsion of virtually every recognizable politician, to be replaced by new faces with serious drive who aren't completely out of touch in an echo chamber, ideally with some significant real world experience.

Ez-Bri-Z_v2 · Accepted Answer

It basically boiled down to anger from Democratic voters. Some were upset about the Israel/Palestine position that the Biden administration took. Some were legitimately upset that they were softer on immigration (although this is just wrong. It was repiblicans who killed that immigration bill). Some were upset that they didn't take a hard enough stance to support lgbt and mostly left trans people out of their statements.

It also doesn't help that Republicans always show up just to stick it to the Democrats. Democrats are not as organized and tend to be more tolerant to opposing views that they are likely to be more apathetic to voting.

Anonymous · Accepted Answer

Never underestimate the power someone has when old, white and obnoxious, claiming he can give you everything you want. Halfwits will always believe it. There are a lot of halfwits.

WhiteSteve · Answer

Americans don’t have good enough character to lead any campaign with human rights as an issue. Americans don’t give a fuck about women, people of color, and LGBTQ+ people. You CANNOT have “decency” as a reason for anything, we’re scumbags who only care about our own wallets at the end of the day.

Also, the truth is not the Democrats’ friend. The primary reason they lost is because of the cumulative impact of a nonstop right wing propaganda machine, led by, but not exclusive to, FoxNews. These people do not fucking care what they have to say, as long as they spin every action, inaction, and coincidence as Joe Biden doing the worst thing ever done by a President in U. S. history. He falls down and has gone dotty in his old age, but he’s actually been at the helm of the best economic recovery from the pandemic in the world. But you’d never know that if you asked the right wing. They have NO SCRUPLES.

Meanwhile, Trump has had nothing but trouble since the last election, but they talk about him like a persecuted savior, it’s the craziest fucking thing I’ve ever seen. This dude just ducks accountability for all this shit, and his supporters just don’t care or believe that it’s some unjust investigation, despite all the known facts of the cases looking pretty bad for Trump.

In short, you can’t count on an American’s vote based on “the objective right thing to do”, you have to realize that you’re dealing with some of the lowest-quality humans the earth has to offer. I almost feel like we need to lighten up our own standards to counter them, speak to them in their terms. Tell them they’re “retarded” for voting for this guy. Tell them their admiration of Trump is “gay as fuck.” That’s the language they understand, I’m sorry. Only personal EMBARRASSMENT will make them renounce support, shame won’t, because they don’t care about shame. Personal shame is no longer the guardrail that it used to be.

blueonblack22 · Answer

Good question. Very good question. Thoughtful question and I both appreciate and respect that (I didn’t like your visual of course but I will pretend I didn’t notice that’s

Here is my feedback:

Do NOT assume that just because the other candidate is unpopular that’s enough to win. Dems already made that mistake in 2016. It did work for them in 2020 given the angst over the pandemic lockdowns. While that wasn’t necessarily Trump’s fault, voters are going to associate current events with the sitting the president. But that COVID was an extraneous event that benefited democrats. But again in 2024 they thought they could win with a weak candidate just because of anti-trump angst. WRONG. Give Americans a better candidate and give someone who is consistently more centrist. Kamala had a long history of supporting radical leftist initiatives (she helped bail out BLM rioters, green new deal, getting rid of fracking, etc).
Do NOT and I really mean it DO NOT insult average Joe voters who are supporting a republican. This started with Obama’s “bitter clingers” arrogance dbag comment back in 2008. Then HRC’s “deplorables” insult and Biden’s “garbage” insult. You want to mislabel and insult a candidate? Fine. Fine. Trump did that all the time but he never explicitly insulted average Joe voters supporting the dem candidate. Stay the hell away from insulting voters.
Re-iterating above leftists really took things to another level in 2015 and onward where they went around bullying, harassing, censoring, canceling and labeling ANYONE who plan to vote or did for Trump. So naturally some people stay quiet about their choices until they get in the voting booths (Trump’s “shy vote”). The polls were off on EVERY election Trump ran including 2020. Even though Biden won in 2020 it was much closer then the polls predicted. Use common sense and realize you will never win people over by insulting them.
“It’s the economy, stupid” - James Carvelle (top DNC campaign strategist to Bill Clinton). This is and always will be a top voter issue especially when the economy is stagnating or in a recession. Kamala Harris had no clear game plan to handle this. Partly because she’s was Biden’s VP who’s administration screwed up everything to being with (energy regulations and asinine spending drove up inflation). But she had no backbone to separate herself from the Biden administration.
DEI and wokeness. Dems need to be honest that Kamala’s number one qualification for being Biden’s VP was because and only because she is a black woman. But there is a problem: she’s never won an election outside California. She’s no Barack Obama. Not even close. She even accused Biden of “racism” in the 2020 primaries. She was coddled for almost her entire political. But when she was out up to a real test she was like a deer in headlights. Also, most Americans are ready for a female president but NOT someone like Kamala Harris. I personally would have chosen Nikki Haley over Trump.
When Biden won in 2020 I wasn’t surprised and accepted it even though I didn’t like it. I knew Trump had absolutely horrible optics during his 2020 campaign (stupid comments and even stupider tweets). Also his response to COVID wasn’t stellar either. But right now tons of dems are blaming Americans with “misogyny” and/or “racist” bs accusations. Leftist talk show hosts and journalists are doubling down on that bullshit. They are too stupid to realize that attitude to begin with is a major reason why Kamala lost the election. Also they are saying they are in a state of “mourning” which is pathetic. When Obama won in 2008/2012 and Biden when won in 2020 did you see republicans in a “state of mourning”.
I know January 6th will be brought up in response to above. I personally thought J6 was stupid, embarrassing and ugly. But it was also isolated, over in 3 hours, only one person died (Ashley Babbitt), etc. The perpetrators were all VERY harshly prosecuted. But leftists expect America to completely forget the mass destruction and carnage BLM did in 2020? Just memory hole it? That insanity 2 billion dollars of damage and got over 30 people killed (including innocent black people). I can’t remember one brave prominent democrat or leftist journalist calling that out (probably too afraid too) at the time. Instead they acted like it was not big deal or even worse justifiable. Bottom line is this: if people you ideologically relate to are doing something stupid (harassing random people, rioting, looting, etc) call that bullsh*t out. Really going there isn’t going to be any mass rioting bs when Trump gets inaugurated (I live in a deep blue state where that is likely to happen)

MisterWack · Answer

Democratic Party should take the approach that President Biden did which was advocate for the little guy NOT spend a whole campaign season (two) just saying “at least I’m not him”.

President Biden met people where they were, scared of the Pandemic & what it meant for their job…. People scared about their healthcare benefits that were almost slashed under last 4 years under Trump…. The civil unrest and more… Though the same man who brought the country together should’ve exited the race sooner. Every American at the time didn’t expect him to run again, yet he did. That was a miscalculation from the Party since they should’ve told him that his time is up before the primaries & before the debate. Biden convinced himself he was the only one to defeat Trump which is the same issue that got us in the first place with 2016.

81 million shrunk to possibly 70 million (we haven’t got all the votes counted though Trump won probably close to 72 million which is similar to last time), why? Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.

My advice: Focus on policy & legislation & change then do it just as President Biden did. Also don’t talk about Trump, talk about your party’s strengths and weaknesses to bring a better day. Rise from the ashes and show everyone what this Donkey can really do.

puurikke · Answer

Half of Americans have a literacy below sixth grade. You can’t win on facts when people can’t read. Emotion works better.

Biden created high inflation: everyone who got a diploma should understand how economics works right? But when you can’t understand what you are reading when the sentences get interesting, that lie looks like a fact.
It’s all the fault of immigrants: sounds good in theory, ‘they’ are not you or your friends. Let’s blame them. Everybody who knows how to read can check this fact and understands that social security and Medicare is funded for billions by undocumented immigrants. But when you can’t understand a basic factsheet, you go with your gut.

And then you have a group who is so selfobsessed they forgot that after voting in a 2 party system you should feel dirty and used. So Harris was not perfect in her stands about <Israel/inequality/your-pet-subject>. To many people didn’t vote because of it. And now they got a president who is infinitely worse on that subject. Just because they didn’t want to vote for someone who wasn’t perfect.

And last the bro-vote. Harris was black, Indian and worst of all a woman. The fact that the sentence ‘She slept her way up the ladder’ was so often used, even by women shows that misogyny is a very, very big thing in the USA.

So in the end:
1. There was a recession, the sitting party never wins when people feel the economy is tanking.
2. She is a woman, it will be decades before the US is ready for a female president for some reason.
3. Americans are illiterate and that’s a very very big problem.

Jersey2 · Answer

There is so much wrong with the Democrats. First, they are self righteous, arrogant, elitist assholes. Each of those points are defendable.

Sanders just said that first they were abandoned by white working class and then by Latino and black working class. It is funny as that was their base and now they sneer at working people and call them uneducated and clearly look down on them and certainly do not help them. Help and concern is being provided by MAGA now.

They act outrageously towards anyone who does not agree with them. They are a danger to free speech and a calm society. Many of the hate and act hateful.

They lie. Young people this week said they want truth from them which is another way of saying they lie, which they do. It actually comes second nature even if it is unbelievable as they just shut discussions down from their perspective with a convenient lie. An obvious case in point is that ‘Biden is the sharpest guy in the room’. And Harris confirmed that to the nation a month before he imploded at the debate.

Women are pissed about men in their sports which I am sure had some vote Trump who was explicit that he will fix it. Trump is explicit about such things, Harris and Democrats try to skate through tough conversations and not take a stand.

Then the crazy woke nonsense. School bathrooms, 87 genders, pronouns… all while Rome burns, meaning the economy.

Then more, an open border, statements saying it isn’t (more lies), $400 hotel rooms in NYC while the homeless and working class struggle, more lies on top of that to boot.

MAGA are the New Democrats taking care of the working class and women. And the Democrats are the old Republicans looking out for the elite which now includes the trans people. We have switched sides.

Avicenna · Answer

Democrats never think anything is wrong with their ever more extreme agenda- they just think they have a “messaging” problem, which they now interpret to mean they need to censor views that contradict their extreme agenda.

But if I were brought in as a consultant to the Democrats, I would tell them to stop being the party of elites that despise the working class (especially the white working class), take working class concerns seriously, and execute policies that benefit the working and middle classes.

shortster · Answer

First and foremost, they shouldn't push people out of their primary to prop up a dementia riddled candidate. Second when they realize that they can't hide his mental decline any longer; they shouldn't push him out and just install his replacement without any say from the rank and file democrats. Thirdly, when you're the vice president running for the presidency and the economy is a mess; you probably shouldn't tell voters that you wouldn't do anything different than the current president and the other guy is the second coming of Adolf Hitler. Finally, if you do push out the current president out of the party nominee for president in favor of the vice president for health conditions; you should probably push him out of the presidency via the 26th amendment, as well. That way you don't have him going around undermining you and your messaging.

lightbulb27 · Answer

honestly, go back and review a lot of the content written on this site by @exitseven and others, it covered the bases well. craft a proposal and we'll review it.

In general... the shift to middle kamala made was right but too late, I doubt people trusted her, nor understood her direction and vision nor trusted it was even hers.

Syntosi · Answer

Problem of energy. People simply did not get off their asses to go vote. Sadly, making a rational argument for why they SHOULD vote is usually not enough to motivate them to actually vote. They need to be hyped up as if they are going out to play in the Superbowl or something.

Maybe_Maybe_not · Answer

Ideologically  There's no fundamental problem I see. Strategically The orange storytelling strikes better. I suppose the Dems could cut one of the legs, by ceasing to defend some rights. Will they walk then? I doubt it. There's the economics, that's what most people think about. It looks like the Dems story is not convincing on this topic.

HighValue · Answer

Democrats are evil. There is no reconciliation. They also ordered FEMA workers to not help Trump supporters.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/jgsygeVcepM

Punish and prosecute all democrats that made up false charges. Fauci needs to be in prison for life or get the death penalty too.

Fireguy17 · Answer

that the vast majority of the people have had enough of their ideals, policies, failures, the crappy economy, inflation, high oil prices, being dependent on other countries for just about everything, men competing in women's sports, males using women's bathrooms, all of thier lies, having 5 year olds picking out their gender just to name a few.

AviatorTom · Answer

To be more successful, Democrats need to better understand who the electorate is, and what the electorate wants, rather than telling the electorate what the Democrats think is best for them.

In 2024, the Republicans generally did a better job of that than the Democrats did, which is why the Republicans will be completely in power (President, Senate, House, Governors) in 2025.

Vegasrunner · Answer

Don't run a woman, it's as simple as that. As much as Democrats want to believe America is this great Baston of hope and change, at its core it's still a racist and misogynistic country. They literally could have thrown a rock hit a white man and nominated him and he would have won the election. It's no coincidence Cheetoe defeated two women but lost to a senial old white man.

Hispanic-Cool-Guy · Answer

Don't ignore nor lose touch with the common man and woman which includes cost of living and the things most average Americans care about.

Don't promote gay ish to kids or that is normal to be transgender.

Don't try to restrict parents rights over their kids.

Secure the border. No one that cares a even a bit about their country wants to see foreigners coming in illegally.

If Democrats fail on what I just wrote they will lose again in 2028.

Juxtapose · Answer

Even after all these failures you still don't get it..

seeyounexttuesday · Answer

The democrats have become warmongers who support billion dollar corporations, anti-freedom, and are purposely destroying the country. They should probably stop.

exitseven · Answer

Do not call most of the country Garbage for starters.

Anonymous · Answer

Democrats will figure out why they lost and double down on it.  America had 4 years of Biden/Kamala.

Likes2drive · Answer

Because they weren’t for the people or working class, they were out for themselves and people saw that

Ladsin2 · Answer

All of the above? When you force multiple highly influential life long democrats leave the party and join the opposition you have major issues.

WatchedPot · Answer

lol I dig the humor here.  Vote or shut up.  I'm just glad the process is over. Tomorrow we'll handle the problems the next faces and causes.

msc545 · Answer

Stop trying to run minorities or women. The US is too misogynist and racist for that.

Twalli · Answer

Harris was a female and didn't have a way to attract Palestinian Americans to vote for her.

Anonymous · Answer

50% inflation and threats of 110% taxation and genocide in their next term

Dargil · Answer

Nothing, like they learned in school.

John_Cobretti · Answer

Constant gaslighting.

Pterodon · Answer

They were out of touch with reality

DJB72 · Answer

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What are the lessons that Dems should take from this election? Is it problems of policy, priorities, woke, Biden, engage w/ MAGA, economic, messaging?

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