The Baileys are my neighbors (not literally, but I live in a suburb of a midsized midwestern city and yards had a 50/50 mix of Biden and Trump signs) and this is exactly right. They are concerned with inflation, their kids’ schooling, maybe how the hell they will pay for college or if it’s even worth it, spooked by CRT and put off by accusations of white privilege, but also spooked by J6-ers. They liked Obama’s positivity and wonder Why Can’t We All Just Get Along. They don’t like talking about politics with their friends and family because it just leads to fighting. They don’t watch Fox or MSNBC because it stresses them out, they like CSI and Yellowstone.
If any Democratic staffers would like to study abroad, they can come visit my ‘burb.
I've read many articles and think pieces about how the Republican leadership in the 80's-90's crafted their messaging to make sure their most right-leaning, often racist, flank stayed inside the party. The coalition among the Chamber of Commerce types, the libertarians and the blood-and-soil types was held together with rhetoric and messaging far more strident than where the middle of the party resided. The problem is the blood and soil types believed the rhetoric. After years of losses (in their view) that group was agitated, frustrated with 'sell outs', and thought they'd been lied to by the Bushes and Romneys, so enter Drain-The-Swamp Trump.
The Democrats seem to me, have a similar problem. The rhetoric used by Schumer, Reid, et al, has always been more strident and more left wing than their actual governing. So their most vocal left-wing activists internalized the messaging, grew frustrated (remember Occupy Wall Street?), organized into strong Progressive organizations and have effectively taken over the party. Biden embraces the "are you on the side of Democracy or Bull Connor" messaging around the voting rights bill; this article describes Schumer. So now we have both parties seemingly taken over by their most radical fringes.
The first party that moves away from those fringes without losing them altogether will win for a long time. Trump won't do it. DeSantis probably won't either. Biden said he would, but hasn't. Which party will find the person who will do so first?
The voting rights debacle really is baffling to me. I’m what is probably their last year in full control of the government, Democrats spend the better part of a month campaigning around a bill that no one other than Democratic activists seems to care about. And it seems, I think even to the casual observer, that the bill never had a chance of making it through Congress.
This is what you use the president’s voice to do? Biden is finally front and center and he’s talking about Jim Crow 2.0? Again, was anyone other than Democratic activists persuaded that black people are in a situation, relative to voting, that should be compared to Jim Crow?
Democratic interest groups have got a lot more detached from reality since Harry Reid was leader. It's Schumer's job to rise above that but he's only human. People scream at you enough, it has an impact. It doesn't have to be anything to do with a primary.
Good on Matt for giving Schumer some pressure back towards reality, but Matt seems increasingly out-numbered by people claiming that Bernie's agenda would win WV (as Bernie's staff director did this weekend), or that Democrats should talk about reparations, among many other acts of electoral self-harm. This isn't just the left; on the right flank, Sinema blocked prescription drug price reform, the most popular idea in US politics. It's a terrible environment to govern in.
Since politics is about **vibes** I will say the vibes of the Democratic party have gotten even more "Bailey" hostile than the policy. Maybe this is just me being on Twitter too much, but there seems to be pretty much no sympathy if a middle class person says certain aspects of their life are hard. Angie Schmitt for example has gotten a pretty horrible reaction just for saying remote school is really hard on moms. I know not every twitter user is a political actor but it does seem to reflect a pretty bad instinct within the Democratic partly/on the left to just dismiss the picayune concerns of average folks. The old (Bill) Clinton line was "I feel your pain," and I think the genius of this is he would empathize with everyone about their problems not just people with "legitimate" problems or very bad life circumstances. It's not like empathy is a zero sum game, so what's the point of cutting some people out of the circle of compassion except to be mean?
My idea for Democratic staffers is that they should all be required, as a condition of their jobs, to listen to 1 hour of local sports talk radio per day. Swing voters abound there. They don't typically talk politics in any direct way, but you do absorb a lot about their values by listening in for long periods of time.
This essay reminds me of a long sequence in one of Robert Caro's Lyndon Johnson books, just after Johnson assumes the presidency, where he is trying to get a budget passed, and he has to get Sen. Byrd to move the bill. He knows there is no other option if he wants to move legislation. And Byrd says the bill has to be below $100B (at the time). For some reason Byrd believes holding the line on this will be a legacy achievement for him. So Johnson goes to the liberals and says, we've got to get below $100B, no gimmicks. And they are angry, but he convinces them. And they pass a budget with many of Kennedy's key goals.
From Caro's perspective, Kennedy's agenda was stalled because he wouldn't accept that Byrd had a veto. It got un-stalled because Johnson did immediately. It's strange that between Schumer and Biden, they couldn't see that they just had to cut a deal with Manchin. It seems like there is well-known historical precedent for it.
Johnson also strongly believes that winning legislative victories is the key to winning legislative victories: that he cannot afford to be weakened by losing, even on small issues (like a grain subsidy bill, if I remember correctly). The Biden administration doesn't seem to understand that either.
"...the O’Reillys became the Baileys to clarify that he wasn’t talking about a niche ethnic audience."
Well, thank god he's focused on real Americans, Anglo-Saxons, instead of those drunken Hibernian apes, with their potatoes, plagues, and papism. The Democratic party will never get anywhere if it keeps pandering to the latest wave of ignorant immigrant scum to wash ashore. O'Reilly indeed! No "O'Reilly" can ever speak for the godly conservative bedrock of our nation.
For a year now, I’ve wondered—what’s happened to Schumer!? Was he always this bad? He’s no Harry Reid. Your column fills me with disappointment and growing anger. This feeling spills over to Joe Biden, and to the progressive zombie donor class that is *out of touch* with normie Democrats, independents and patriotic Americans.
One thought and one question: first, where does the moniker of being politically effective come from for a Chuck Schumer? Outside of the campaign work, where I'd agree he has been very good at fundraising, candidate selection, etc. Where are the legislative coalitions, the shrewd decisions to hold things together, big legislative wins, etc? I just don't see it, and I fear that such a media-friendly Senator sees that love reciprocated in terms of constant descriptions of his shrewdness without much to point to as a track record (and even Matt admittedly falls in this trap, noting this piece was hard to write, his fondness, etc).
As far as a description of what's happening here: to use the Yuval Levin framework, Chuck Schumer is not a committed institutionalist I'd argue. Not to the Senate, not even really to the Democratic party as an institution. Instead of saying "given my role in this institution, what should I do now?", I think he is firmly in the camp of "given my ability to use these institutions as platforms, how can I take advantage of that?" And I think it shows especially now when the stakes are high. As a backbench member, it's easier to get away with that - when you are the Leader the party and the Senate itself has a hard time withstanding the negligent if not anti-institutionalist approach. For a counter example, you can use Harry Reid and (trigger warning) Mitch McConnell, who I think are both leagues apart in terms of leadership and balancing the broader commitment to the personal interest.
I think there are maybe three currents that get conflated as Dem extremism:
1. Bernie economic leftism
2. Blogosphere/MSNBC/we’re at war with every Republican
3. Civil rights moral crusade
Lots of us (including me) are or have been part of all 3 at various times, but they have different dynamics, and we spend a lot of time fighting internally about which one is the most important. Biden won because he wasn’t Trump, but a lot of people wish it was more of #3 thing. And the moral rhetoric of #3 has an undeniable power, which sure has deranged some too-online people, but it also comes from a real place that really does motivate a lot of especially young voters (who Dems spent a LOT of time trying to reach), and pushing back on it with what feels like pragmatism is delicate. I don’t know what’s going on in Schumer’s head, but I bet for a lot of Dems it becomes a genuinely difficult argument from principle aside from other political considerations - in a way that’s qualitatively different from what “say no to your leftiest flank” used to be.
I enjoy basically all of Matt’s columns, but this one feels especially important. As a Schumer constituent, I’m going to encourage his office to heed it.
Of course, there’s approximately 0% chance I would support AOC in a primary over Schumer, so I guess I’m not who he’s worried about. Maybe I’ll have to give it a little bit of spin.
Jim Crow 2.0 is perhaps the worst political messaging possible. Really takes a Herculean effort to come up with something that brutal.
Like I am very concerned both that our democratic leadership averages 80+ and also that that is absolutely the best case scenario. The next generation of dem leadership is going to be insufferable.
I almost feel like Schumer would be playing these issues better if he was from a reddish state like Reid. There is something about being from a totally blue state that skews your vision of the world. I’m from minnesota (almost always blue but almost always just over 50% blue, so half of us are Rs) and I went to school in California. People from California have this image of the Midwest and the rest of America as this backwoods filled with cave people and misanthropes lmao they really think the rest of the country is either barbaric or evil. It’s really freakin weird. I think having more of a right flank to defend would make him better at working on these problems for the caucus again. But then again 🤷♂️
Thank you for writing this piece, Matt. I was confused as to why Schumer wasn’t taking more heat prior to the Voting Rights snafu, as he’s been bungling matters since at least the Trump impeachments (all, I believe, in the name of shoring up his left flank).
That said, how much of Schumer’s BBB failure is attributable to the Biden White House? It is my observation that presidents set the legislative agenda, while the controlling legislative body controls how much of that agenda comes to fruition. From the start, Biden made clear his aim was a “transformative presidency”. By setting such an aggressive starting point and proving unwilling to make concessions, did Biden set Schumer up for failure?
It was originally my assessment that such an aggressive starting point was a boon for progressive democrats. It allowed significant room for retreat while still producing major legislative wins. The fact that $1.5 trillion in spending was a compromise should have been viewed as a dream scenario by the Democratic Caucus and Biden White House.
Instead of getting progressives on board with this still impactful legislation, Biden has insisted on attempting to strong-arm Manchin and Sinema into helping him achieve dreams of transformative grandeur. Schumer played a role, but more of this governing catastrophe is attributable to Biden’s hubris, ineptitude, or some combination thereof.
The Baileys are my neighbors (not literally, but I live in a suburb of a midsized midwestern city and yards had a 50/50 mix of Biden and Trump signs) and this is exactly right. They are concerned with inflation, their kids’ schooling, maybe how the hell they will pay for college or if it’s even worth it, spooked by CRT and put off by accusations of white privilege, but also spooked by J6-ers. They liked Obama’s positivity and wonder Why Can’t We All Just Get Along. They don’t like talking about politics with their friends and family because it just leads to fighting. They don’t watch Fox or MSNBC because it stresses them out, they like CSI and Yellowstone.
If any Democratic staffers would like to study abroad, they can come visit my ‘burb.
I've read many articles and think pieces about how the Republican leadership in the 80's-90's crafted their messaging to make sure their most right-leaning, often racist, flank stayed inside the party. The coalition among the Chamber of Commerce types, the libertarians and the blood-and-soil types was held together with rhetoric and messaging far more strident than where the middle of the party resided. The problem is the blood and soil types believed the rhetoric. After years of losses (in their view) that group was agitated, frustrated with 'sell outs', and thought they'd been lied to by the Bushes and Romneys, so enter Drain-The-Swamp Trump.
The Democrats seem to me, have a similar problem. The rhetoric used by Schumer, Reid, et al, has always been more strident and more left wing than their actual governing. So their most vocal left-wing activists internalized the messaging, grew frustrated (remember Occupy Wall Street?), organized into strong Progressive organizations and have effectively taken over the party. Biden embraces the "are you on the side of Democracy or Bull Connor" messaging around the voting rights bill; this article describes Schumer. So now we have both parties seemingly taken over by their most radical fringes.
The first party that moves away from those fringes without losing them altogether will win for a long time. Trump won't do it. DeSantis probably won't either. Biden said he would, but hasn't. Which party will find the person who will do so first?
The voting rights debacle really is baffling to me. I’m what is probably their last year in full control of the government, Democrats spend the better part of a month campaigning around a bill that no one other than Democratic activists seems to care about. And it seems, I think even to the casual observer, that the bill never had a chance of making it through Congress.
This is what you use the president’s voice to do? Biden is finally front and center and he’s talking about Jim Crow 2.0? Again, was anyone other than Democratic activists persuaded that black people are in a situation, relative to voting, that should be compared to Jim Crow?
Just disastrous, and difficult to comprehend.
Democratic interest groups have got a lot more detached from reality since Harry Reid was leader. It's Schumer's job to rise above that but he's only human. People scream at you enough, it has an impact. It doesn't have to be anything to do with a primary.
Good on Matt for giving Schumer some pressure back towards reality, but Matt seems increasingly out-numbered by people claiming that Bernie's agenda would win WV (as Bernie's staff director did this weekend), or that Democrats should talk about reparations, among many other acts of electoral self-harm. This isn't just the left; on the right flank, Sinema blocked prescription drug price reform, the most popular idea in US politics. It's a terrible environment to govern in.
Since politics is about **vibes** I will say the vibes of the Democratic party have gotten even more "Bailey" hostile than the policy. Maybe this is just me being on Twitter too much, but there seems to be pretty much no sympathy if a middle class person says certain aspects of their life are hard. Angie Schmitt for example has gotten a pretty horrible reaction just for saying remote school is really hard on moms. I know not every twitter user is a political actor but it does seem to reflect a pretty bad instinct within the Democratic partly/on the left to just dismiss the picayune concerns of average folks. The old (Bill) Clinton line was "I feel your pain," and I think the genius of this is he would empathize with everyone about their problems not just people with "legitimate" problems or very bad life circumstances. It's not like empathy is a zero sum game, so what's the point of cutting some people out of the circle of compassion except to be mean?
My idea for Democratic staffers is that they should all be required, as a condition of their jobs, to listen to 1 hour of local sports talk radio per day. Swing voters abound there. They don't typically talk politics in any direct way, but you do absorb a lot about their values by listening in for long periods of time.
This essay reminds me of a long sequence in one of Robert Caro's Lyndon Johnson books, just after Johnson assumes the presidency, where he is trying to get a budget passed, and he has to get Sen. Byrd to move the bill. He knows there is no other option if he wants to move legislation. And Byrd says the bill has to be below $100B (at the time). For some reason Byrd believes holding the line on this will be a legacy achievement for him. So Johnson goes to the liberals and says, we've got to get below $100B, no gimmicks. And they are angry, but he convinces them. And they pass a budget with many of Kennedy's key goals.
From Caro's perspective, Kennedy's agenda was stalled because he wouldn't accept that Byrd had a veto. It got un-stalled because Johnson did immediately. It's strange that between Schumer and Biden, they couldn't see that they just had to cut a deal with Manchin. It seems like there is well-known historical precedent for it.
Johnson also strongly believes that winning legislative victories is the key to winning legislative victories: that he cannot afford to be weakened by losing, even on small issues (like a grain subsidy bill, if I remember correctly). The Biden administration doesn't seem to understand that either.
"...the O’Reillys became the Baileys to clarify that he wasn’t talking about a niche ethnic audience."
Well, thank god he's focused on real Americans, Anglo-Saxons, instead of those drunken Hibernian apes, with their potatoes, plagues, and papism. The Democratic party will never get anywhere if it keeps pandering to the latest wave of ignorant immigrant scum to wash ashore. O'Reilly indeed! No "O'Reilly" can ever speak for the godly conservative bedrock of our nation.
For a year now, I’ve wondered—what’s happened to Schumer!? Was he always this bad? He’s no Harry Reid. Your column fills me with disappointment and growing anger. This feeling spills over to Joe Biden, and to the progressive zombie donor class that is *out of touch* with normie Democrats, independents and patriotic Americans.
I literally emailed this post to Schumer’s office. (Hopefully they’re already subscribed.)
One thought and one question: first, where does the moniker of being politically effective come from for a Chuck Schumer? Outside of the campaign work, where I'd agree he has been very good at fundraising, candidate selection, etc. Where are the legislative coalitions, the shrewd decisions to hold things together, big legislative wins, etc? I just don't see it, and I fear that such a media-friendly Senator sees that love reciprocated in terms of constant descriptions of his shrewdness without much to point to as a track record (and even Matt admittedly falls in this trap, noting this piece was hard to write, his fondness, etc).
As far as a description of what's happening here: to use the Yuval Levin framework, Chuck Schumer is not a committed institutionalist I'd argue. Not to the Senate, not even really to the Democratic party as an institution. Instead of saying "given my role in this institution, what should I do now?", I think he is firmly in the camp of "given my ability to use these institutions as platforms, how can I take advantage of that?" And I think it shows especially now when the stakes are high. As a backbench member, it's easier to get away with that - when you are the Leader the party and the Senate itself has a hard time withstanding the negligent if not anti-institutionalist approach. For a counter example, you can use Harry Reid and (trigger warning) Mitch McConnell, who I think are both leagues apart in terms of leadership and balancing the broader commitment to the personal interest.
I think there are maybe three currents that get conflated as Dem extremism:
1. Bernie economic leftism
2. Blogosphere/MSNBC/we’re at war with every Republican
3. Civil rights moral crusade
Lots of us (including me) are or have been part of all 3 at various times, but they have different dynamics, and we spend a lot of time fighting internally about which one is the most important. Biden won because he wasn’t Trump, but a lot of people wish it was more of #3 thing. And the moral rhetoric of #3 has an undeniable power, which sure has deranged some too-online people, but it also comes from a real place that really does motivate a lot of especially young voters (who Dems spent a LOT of time trying to reach), and pushing back on it with what feels like pragmatism is delicate. I don’t know what’s going on in Schumer’s head, but I bet for a lot of Dems it becomes a genuinely difficult argument from principle aside from other political considerations - in a way that’s qualitatively different from what “say no to your leftiest flank” used to be.
I enjoy basically all of Matt’s columns, but this one feels especially important. As a Schumer constituent, I’m going to encourage his office to heed it.
Of course, there’s approximately 0% chance I would support AOC in a primary over Schumer, so I guess I’m not who he’s worried about. Maybe I’ll have to give it a little bit of spin.
Jim Crow 2.0 is perhaps the worst political messaging possible. Really takes a Herculean effort to come up with something that brutal.
Like I am very concerned both that our democratic leadership averages 80+ and also that that is absolutely the best case scenario. The next generation of dem leadership is going to be insufferable.
I almost feel like Schumer would be playing these issues better if he was from a reddish state like Reid. There is something about being from a totally blue state that skews your vision of the world. I’m from minnesota (almost always blue but almost always just over 50% blue, so half of us are Rs) and I went to school in California. People from California have this image of the Midwest and the rest of America as this backwoods filled with cave people and misanthropes lmao they really think the rest of the country is either barbaric or evil. It’s really freakin weird. I think having more of a right flank to defend would make him better at working on these problems for the caucus again. But then again 🤷♂️
Thank you for writing this piece, Matt. I was confused as to why Schumer wasn’t taking more heat prior to the Voting Rights snafu, as he’s been bungling matters since at least the Trump impeachments (all, I believe, in the name of shoring up his left flank).
That said, how much of Schumer’s BBB failure is attributable to the Biden White House? It is my observation that presidents set the legislative agenda, while the controlling legislative body controls how much of that agenda comes to fruition. From the start, Biden made clear his aim was a “transformative presidency”. By setting such an aggressive starting point and proving unwilling to make concessions, did Biden set Schumer up for failure?
It was originally my assessment that such an aggressive starting point was a boon for progressive democrats. It allowed significant room for retreat while still producing major legislative wins. The fact that $1.5 trillion in spending was a compromise should have been viewed as a dream scenario by the Democratic Caucus and Biden White House.
Instead of getting progressives on board with this still impactful legislation, Biden has insisted on attempting to strong-arm Manchin and Sinema into helping him achieve dreams of transformative grandeur. Schumer played a role, but more of this governing catastrophe is attributable to Biden’s hubris, ineptitude, or some combination thereof.