Nice experiment, Ben, eager to see what the GOP version is like next week. The main limitation that I can think of is potential groupthink. These politicians obviously know what they're doing, but if all of their knowledge is running on assumptions of each other without verifying whether that knowledge is truly accurate, they could run a risk.
Aren’t a lot of the messaging decisions based on A/B testing and empirical research conducted by David Shor types? The research could be wrong, but the approach doesn’t strike me as epistemically closed.
I think his point is that it may be (probably is) based on the research of a small group of the same David Shor types upstream at the DCCC or similar orgs. So if those folks are making some faulty assumptions, everyone could be exposed.
The anti-corporate and healthcare messages ironically are plainly in the vein of the Sanders wing of the party, and directly opposed to the old DLC messaging and the sort of neoliberalism Yglesias has celebrated of late. These swing candidates aren't Bernie acolytes by any means but it's obvious economic populism and the anti-monopolist messaging (stuff Stoller and American Prospect care about) is polling well and is something Perez, Cartwright etc. want to run on
Even "working with Republicans" is something Bernie himself was proud to tout. He talked up working with McCain on veterans issues and had no issue making appearances on Fox, Rogan, and others
What was most interesting, yet unsurprising to me about the “working with Republicans” line, is that it was all about immigration and law enforcement. Really reflects where swing voters are on the issue, and how much those left groups have lost sway in the Democratic Party.
Bernie was the original anti-open borders leftist and bragged about funding cops as Burlington mayor. Even in 2020, he was anti-Defund and wanted to raise cop pay
Did the basically the same thing with homelessness, to I think similar effect. Hard to do the same in reverse by, like, trucking Westboro Baptists Church members in to random small towns. The concentration of Democrats in high-density areas makes this strategy of "move problems to places where Democrats see them and have to reckon them" kind of a one way street.
Regarding immigration, this is a two-fer: 1) “I voted for the bi-partisan immigration bill” and, 2) Trump is bad because the bill failed due to his malign influence.
The weird thing to me about people caring about the economy is they care about, essentially, the wrong things. Trump said, explicitly, that he wants to set interest rates himself and take over the federal reserve. If people cared about the economy and knew what that statement means (and its implications) he’d be polling at 10%. The consequence of the president taking away the independence of the fed would be the dollar losing the status of global reserve currency and the collapse of the economy, especially in the hands of someone whose biggest business move is strategic default.
If dems felt like voters understood economics, that quote would be plastered everywhere you could see it. I don’t think dems think people care or are really that knowledgeable of how things work, so they aren’t broadcasting it (they should though, some finance people had legitimately missed that quote and blanched when I shared it).
I always feel like when the economy is an issue to a voter, they’re looking for a pretext not to vote for a democrat that’s not going to get them yelled at in polite company.
I don't think we have to go straight from the idea that voters aren't sophisticated about economics to saying that pocketbook issues are just a pretext.
To be sure Trump is a dumpster fire... But if democracy and everything were super at stake why do we get Kamala? Nobody else wanted to put their hat in the ring because they didn't want to screw up their future chances at the presidency. Also nobody said crap about how far declined Biden had been. The same group that praised vindamin kept their mouth shut on this one. It really feels like the left wants to wear the right side of history merit badge but then have somebody like pelosi who won't vote against inside trading? So if somebody could point me to the principled left I'd love to see it I'm sure there's some. I remember how they tore apart klobuchar for being mean to staffers? Lol. Like what in the world is going on over here I've been voting straight line Democrats since 2016 but it's been a giant crap show of me hanging out in Democratic social circles and online spaces.
The vast majority of Dems are principaled. Labelling then all eith the sins of people they have to work with just encourages corruption. We will inherently elect less principaled people if they're still "corrupt" because they couldn't singlehandedly fix the country.
That's not what I'm talking about... If the nation is really at jeopardy I would expect different behavior from our elected Democratic representatives. Instead they're playing a disgusting and scary game of chicken that has a stuck with Vice President Harris. In what way would we test that the majority of Democrats are principled? I find it highly unlikely that they aren't people that just want to get ahead and it enrich themselves. Nimby's are a part of that. People that want free college education or student loan forgiveness also part of that (they could join the military and get their loans paid off or go to college for free but that's never really an option for the freeloading college type), nobody ever squared believing and upholding institutions and the idea of "Believe all women" (not that society is where it should be here). It's the moralizing and turning it into a type of left-wing evangelicalism (I didn't leave evangelicalism just to find the same type of secular blind belief in the supposed safe science-loving Democrats wing of life) . Or the people who will say trans women are women (which I totally believe) but if you ask them to explain it they would just be like uh That's what all my friends say... Or how about the 30% or so of Democrats that believe in astrology. So it's fine yeah we have bad Democrat leadership that acts badly even though they like to proclaim they are on the "right side of history". But I could tar the base just as easily as I can tar the right-wing base. Gosh it's so hard to have a country with real live people. And when the fervent left I don't know what to really call them The moralizing religious zealots of some kind of lefty morality. (White fragility). The "principled Dems". Just keep their mouth shut rather than calling it for what it is... So the principal parts of the party get a bad rap as being maybe more crazy than they are. But it's their own fault because they never told a bunch of 18-year-old college students they don't know about Iran and the broader political situation in the Middle East but feel that they are ready to weigh in at the age of 19. I mean it's just a hot mess and I wish the Democratic party would stop pretending that they are somehow above The same kind of nuts behavior on the right. Matt Drudge got his start (And I don't think he's a honest broker either). Publishing Clinton's indiscretions when left-wing media was going to kill it. I don't see Democrats when they have a majority of the court saying now would be a good time to reform the court so that everyone could feel represented somehow.
One point of clarification, MGP's district is more suburban than rural, about 500,000 live in Clark County, which is Portland suburbia. I'm sure it's more rural than the average district, but it probably wouldn't be competitive if not for the suburban part. Sorry I gotta point that out every time.
Anyways, as for running on economics, this is going to be tough for Democrats. They can run on specific proposals to lower costs, like the insulin price cap (I personally would like to see a little more on how to ensure we don't have supply issues, but voters probably don't), but their big problem is that inflation happened on Biden's watch and that's what voters are reacting to. That's baked in to the cake and there's not much they can do about it. This is part of why I think the popularism formula needs to account for deliverables. Because voters aren't policy wonks, they just blame whoever happens to be in office for whatever's going on (not always unfairly).
Billionaires and corporations are the boogeyman that Jews used to play in some societies* - they are the reason the virtuous people cannot get what they "deserve"
This is an easier narrative than explaining that most member of the middle class and upper middle class and even the working class don't want social democracy.
*I don't mean to accuse any populists of anti-Semitism. It's a parallel is all
I mean I can't think of a whole lot of human organizing that's done completely altruistically... when done best it's a win-win. So now it's not like they are like let's form an organization so we can create jobs. But that is exactly what municipalities that provide tax breaks try to buy the companies to come to their place to create jobs. or what Europeans do to get Airbus to build in a million different countries all over the place
I made a red hat that says “politicians don’t deserve flags” and I wear it to the gun range.
I almost never talk about politics there but when I do I focus on my general frustration with politicians. I slip in a few digs or jokes about Trump or Vance but they are always more funny than political.
AFAIK the hard left's only remaining national elected officials are a Senator from a D+35 state and Representatives from districts that are D+48 (AOC), D+59 (Tlaib) and D+63 (Omar). Bowman and Bush just lost primaries in D+52 and D+62 districts respectively.
Their supporters can make bold arguments all they like, as someone below did in arguing "healthcare" is a Bernie issue. But so long as left candidates can only win in the bluest of blue districts, I don't see how they can have any real credibility in directing the national party. That doesn't mean dismissing them wholesale. But ultimately the views of the people who run and win in tough races should be prioritised, as Ben's article implies.
There are a few other Squad-adjacent people, like Garcia and Ramirez in Chicago, and Jayapal in Seattle. Barbara Lee is still in office a few more months too.
Not to mention a couple of the old-school progressives who are still around as well. I'm not sure if they are considered hard left or not, though.
Lee and Jayapal's districts are D+74, Garcia is D+64. Ramirez is D+13 which is a lot redder than all the others but still solidly blue. An R Presidential candidate hasn't won it since 1988.
So, I feel your comment proves rather than disproves my point. These guys hold literally 0 competitive districts...why would you listen to them on how to win those?
Below is a link to a list of all the Progressive caucus members with the rating of their district. There is 1 from a red district (Cartwright), 1 even (Deluzio), and 12 from single digit lean Ds.
Cartwright voted with Republicans, against Biden, when Biden slowed some weapons shipments to Israel. Deluzio seems like more of a real progressive, he sponsored a Medicare for All bill and has been on the left of the party on Israel. But he still voted to support Israel after 10/7, he's for fracking (he's from PA) and while he wants higher taxes on corporations, that's Biden's position (and policy), and I can't see him for broad based tax rises which is what I believe Medicare for All requires.
If I used the list below of all self-declared "socialists", there's also Casar from a D+27 seat and Davis from another D+74 seat, but Ramirez and Garcia aren't on it.
I was in Montana recently. Tester was courting split ticket voters. The ad featured a proclaimed Trump voter saying why he likes Tester and why he's a true Montanan.
In my deep blue part of California, I see mainly ads about our ballot propositions. It's a very different world.
Strong agreement (I have lived continuously in CA since 1973/age 15, and most of the time before then too).
But I suspect that for the forseeable future we are stuck with the low de facto threshold to qualify either via initiative or via the legislature (yes, I do know the basic history). It's hard to see the ballot prop needed to amend the constitution passing, although it could easily enough qualify :)
I'd be happy to just fix the effin recall process (meaning both recall qualification and the jungle election to select the successor), but even that is too much to ask I think.
Let's talk about Virginia. Let me inform you of what swingy women voters are talking about in Virginia, where soccer moms fell for the Youngkin "parent choice" line a couple of years ago.
Women's' reproductive health choice.
These women are angry, they are registering in record numbers and they are going to vote in record numbers. Remember how Youngkin's 16-week abortion restriction proposal worked out for Republicans in Virginia last year? They lost everything.
The guys I talk to are largely ignorant of this dynamic. Some say "oh, yeah, there's that." My gut sensing is that many of them feel threatened by a strong woman like Harris and I also sense a slight male voter shift toward Trump more for emotional reasons than any specific policy logic.
But the women are REALLY fired up. My prediction is that Democrats will outperform polls and that the highly motivated woman and minority voter turnout will carry the Presidency, Congress and maybe even yield a surprise in the Senate.
Let me finish by saying I have not met a woman under the age of 45 who says they will vote for or are even considering voting for Trump.
Oh yeah, I should mention that I man a booth soliciting people to register to vote, so not scientific but highly informed.
Democrats moderately under-performed the polls in the first post Dobbs national election, 2022. I have zero doubt you're right that the overwhelming majority of Democratic-leaning woman voters are angry and motivated about abortion rights. But Democrats are increasingly a party that reliably turns out to vote in elections, which implies there's not likely to be a huge pool of Democratic-friendly voters who frequently don't vote—but who can be induced to do so provided the message is sufficiently compelling.
"You're killing me Smalls." I'm going to ask for evidence here. Please cite the polls and the under-performing results. This was a mid-term that ALWAYS breaks against incumbent party and Democrats did very well. My data says we outperformed most credible polling, especially where abortion was an issue in the race.
>This was a mid-term that ALWAYS breaks against incumbent<
Midterms don't always break against the incumbency party. The GOP made House gains in 2002. Democrats made House gains in 1998.
>Democrats did very well<
By historical standards, Dems had a good midterm in 2022, indeed. Nowhere did I state to the contrary. Nonetheless, Democrats did suffer losses in 2022: they lost the House of Representatives. Losing a chamber of Congress is fairly significant!
>My data says we outperformed most credible polling, especially where abortion was an issue in the race.<
Well "your" data appears to depart from Nate Silver's. As I wrote at the outset, it was very modest (polls were pretty accurate that cycle), but nonetheless Democrats performed slightly worse in House races than the polls predicted. Money quote from Nate: "...the results were reasonably well-predicted by polls and forecast models, which had Republicans favored in the House, and the Senate as being close. Technically, in fact, Democrats were very slightly overestimated by the polls..."
Okay, so due to military service my bubble is 62 years old and has moved all over America and the world. Not too small of a bubble. Amd I did write "so not scientific but highly informed."
I've been confused about why commentators talk about a tension between persuasion and turnout strategies because it seems to me you can do both. And it always seemed logical to me that you want to motivate people who tend to vote D but don't always vote. As framed here I see that "turnout" means an issue-based campaign. In my experience, the work done to mobilize unreliable voters has nothing to do with messaging and is about reaching them by door knocking, phone calls etc. My guess is that this kind of work is just not on the radar screen for people engaged in online debates about campaign theory.
I have persuaded people to listen by highlighting the things we agree on first. Most of us want healthcare, education, affordable, security, housing, and groceries. But we begin to part ways when we start talking about how/whether-or-not the government is responsible for providing these things. It disarms some of the rhetoric about our differences and creates common ground. Imagine swing voters hearing Sister Harris say something like “you would be surprised how many things Donald Trump and I agree on in regards to the wellness of this country.” Then you’re better able to highlight his unhinged and incomprehensible “solutions” and her proposals for collaboration and compromise, which stand the chance of leading to more reasonable solutions Works for me in mixed groups anyway. A shift away from the them-versus-us energy makes room for better listening and consideration of pathways forward.
I don't think those who prefer the "Mobilization" strategy (i.e. present a bold policy reform agenda) actually take that stand because they think that doing so will mobilize new voters into their coalition. The vast majority just want political leaders to present their preferred policy reform agenda regardless of the electoral consequences. In other words, they prefer to be Right more than they want to win elections. Evidence for the "Persuasion" strategy will not change their minds, because it forces them to support candidates with more moderate strategies.
I think a lot of them have either motivated reasoned themselves into believing in mobilization or live in such a blue enclave that they can't conceive of swing voters as an actual thing.
Notable that she's correctly leading on how housing policy is driving up costs for average hard-working Americans. It's the only issue on her website with a dedicated page to it.
One more time: we have a vast amount of empirical research that demonstrates that swing voters are nothing like doctrinaire centrists. It's just a myth.
Are you saying this article IS describing swing voters as "doctrinaire centrists"? That wasn't my takeaway, but in what ways is a "doctrinaire centrist" different from what is described here? I found a previous mention in one of your peices of this phrase where you linked to this 538 article: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-moderate-middle-is-a-myth/
My takeaway from the 538 piece (which I only skimmed TBF) is that ~no swing voters are pro-immigration/pro-market-oriented, but otherwise all over the map.
I probably got my wires crossed on who is/is not saying swing voters are doctrinaire centrists, and what critique you are leveling. Just asking you to expand (or link to) what it is you're trying to convey in more detail. What is your critique, that this article is saying swing voters are a down-the-middle average of policy preferences? (ie that swing voters want "moderate" levels of immigration, with "moderate" levels of social support, etc.). Not my takeaway from this, but curious to read more as well, thanka
I believe you, who are some of the researchers and their papers that you find most salient on this topic? Like do we have a taxonomy of different flavors of swing voters?
Except a lot of us middle of the road voters that lean right know that it's a de-emphasis, it's a lie to secure our vote n the near term. And that like many of my friends and even some in this comment section on other posts say elections have consequences. This isn't coalition building or trying to find good governance that brings people together it's getting the football past the line and then working to spike all your policy agendas. Don't expect us to like coming to the left because it's the same garbage of winner-take-all politics so you can have some kind of progressive ideal for the country. Grifters going to grift. Panderers going to Pander. Supreme Court Justices going to say whatever they have to during their confirmation hearings. It's just gross at the end of the day.
Nice experiment, Ben, eager to see what the GOP version is like next week. The main limitation that I can think of is potential groupthink. These politicians obviously know what they're doing, but if all of their knowledge is running on assumptions of each other without verifying whether that knowledge is truly accurate, they could run a risk.
Aren’t a lot of the messaging decisions based on A/B testing and empirical research conducted by David Shor types? The research could be wrong, but the approach doesn’t strike me as epistemically closed.
I think his point is that it may be (probably is) based on the research of a small group of the same David Shor types upstream at the DCCC or similar orgs. So if those folks are making some faulty assumptions, everyone could be exposed.
The anti-corporate and healthcare messages ironically are plainly in the vein of the Sanders wing of the party, and directly opposed to the old DLC messaging and the sort of neoliberalism Yglesias has celebrated of late. These swing candidates aren't Bernie acolytes by any means but it's obvious economic populism and the anti-monopolist messaging (stuff Stoller and American Prospect care about) is polling well and is something Perez, Cartwright etc. want to run on
Popularism!
It's nice to see you admit not having any real principles. I was aware, but still.
Aren't politicians supposed to represent their constituents?
Even "working with Republicans" is something Bernie himself was proud to tout. He talked up working with McCain on veterans issues and had no issue making appearances on Fox, Rogan, and others
What was most interesting, yet unsurprising to me about the “working with Republicans” line, is that it was all about immigration and law enforcement. Really reflects where swing voters are on the issue, and how much those left groups have lost sway in the Democratic Party.
Bernie was the original anti-open borders leftist and bragged about funding cops as Burlington mayor. Even in 2020, he was anti-Defund and wanted to raise cop pay
Gun rights also.
https://x.com/numfuksteinstan/status/1827372520946753973
Did the basically the same thing with homelessness, to I think similar effect. Hard to do the same in reverse by, like, trucking Westboro Baptists Church members in to random small towns. The concentration of Democrats in high-density areas makes this strategy of "move problems to places where Democrats see them and have to reckon them" kind of a one way street.
"Rewarded" is telling.
Regarding immigration, this is a two-fer: 1) “I voted for the bi-partisan immigration bill” and, 2) Trump is bad because the bill failed due to his malign influence.
Yes, basic economic populism has always polled well, even if it hurts everyone in the long run.
The weird thing to me about people caring about the economy is they care about, essentially, the wrong things. Trump said, explicitly, that he wants to set interest rates himself and take over the federal reserve. If people cared about the economy and knew what that statement means (and its implications) he’d be polling at 10%. The consequence of the president taking away the independence of the fed would be the dollar losing the status of global reserve currency and the collapse of the economy, especially in the hands of someone whose biggest business move is strategic default.
If dems felt like voters understood economics, that quote would be plastered everywhere you could see it. I don’t think dems think people care or are really that knowledgeable of how things work, so they aren’t broadcasting it (they should though, some finance people had legitimately missed that quote and blanched when I shared it).
I always feel like when the economy is an issue to a voter, they’re looking for a pretext not to vote for a democrat that’s not going to get them yelled at in polite company.
I don't think we have to go straight from the idea that voters aren't sophisticated about economics to saying that pocketbook issues are just a pretext.
To be sure Trump is a dumpster fire... But if democracy and everything were super at stake why do we get Kamala? Nobody else wanted to put their hat in the ring because they didn't want to screw up their future chances at the presidency. Also nobody said crap about how far declined Biden had been. The same group that praised vindamin kept their mouth shut on this one. It really feels like the left wants to wear the right side of history merit badge but then have somebody like pelosi who won't vote against inside trading? So if somebody could point me to the principled left I'd love to see it I'm sure there's some. I remember how they tore apart klobuchar for being mean to staffers? Lol. Like what in the world is going on over here I've been voting straight line Democrats since 2016 but it's been a giant crap show of me hanging out in Democratic social circles and online spaces.
The vast majority of Dems are principaled. Labelling then all eith the sins of people they have to work with just encourages corruption. We will inherently elect less principaled people if they're still "corrupt" because they couldn't singlehandedly fix the country.
That's not what I'm talking about... If the nation is really at jeopardy I would expect different behavior from our elected Democratic representatives. Instead they're playing a disgusting and scary game of chicken that has a stuck with Vice President Harris. In what way would we test that the majority of Democrats are principled? I find it highly unlikely that they aren't people that just want to get ahead and it enrich themselves. Nimby's are a part of that. People that want free college education or student loan forgiveness also part of that (they could join the military and get their loans paid off or go to college for free but that's never really an option for the freeloading college type), nobody ever squared believing and upholding institutions and the idea of "Believe all women" (not that society is where it should be here). It's the moralizing and turning it into a type of left-wing evangelicalism (I didn't leave evangelicalism just to find the same type of secular blind belief in the supposed safe science-loving Democrats wing of life) . Or the people who will say trans women are women (which I totally believe) but if you ask them to explain it they would just be like uh That's what all my friends say... Or how about the 30% or so of Democrats that believe in astrology. So it's fine yeah we have bad Democrat leadership that acts badly even though they like to proclaim they are on the "right side of history". But I could tar the base just as easily as I can tar the right-wing base. Gosh it's so hard to have a country with real live people. And when the fervent left I don't know what to really call them The moralizing religious zealots of some kind of lefty morality. (White fragility). The "principled Dems". Just keep their mouth shut rather than calling it for what it is... So the principal parts of the party get a bad rap as being maybe more crazy than they are. But it's their own fault because they never told a bunch of 18-year-old college students they don't know about Iran and the broader political situation in the Middle East but feel that they are ready to weigh in at the age of 19. I mean it's just a hot mess and I wish the Democratic party would stop pretending that they are somehow above The same kind of nuts behavior on the right. Matt Drudge got his start (And I don't think he's a honest broker either). Publishing Clinton's indiscretions when left-wing media was going to kill it. I don't see Democrats when they have a majority of the court saying now would be a good time to reform the court so that everyone could feel represented somehow.
One point of clarification, MGP's district is more suburban than rural, about 500,000 live in Clark County, which is Portland suburbia. I'm sure it's more rural than the average district, but it probably wouldn't be competitive if not for the suburban part. Sorry I gotta point that out every time.
Anyways, as for running on economics, this is going to be tough for Democrats. They can run on specific proposals to lower costs, like the insulin price cap (I personally would like to see a little more on how to ensure we don't have supply issues, but voters probably don't), but their big problem is that inflation happened on Biden's watch and that's what voters are reacting to. That's baked in to the cake and there's not much they can do about it. This is part of why I think the popularism formula needs to account for deliverables. Because voters aren't policy wonks, they just blame whoever happens to be in office for whatever's going on (not always unfairly).
I’m like kind of a left leaning person and I don’t quite understand the bogeyman that corporations play in the broader left coalition.
Like nothing in my life is not happening because Apple and Citibank and Pfizer are out wrecking shit.
Billionaires and corporations are the boogeyman that Jews used to play in some societies* - they are the reason the virtuous people cannot get what they "deserve"
This is an easier narrative than explaining that most member of the middle class and upper middle class and even the working class don't want social democracy.
*I don't mean to accuse any populists of anti-Semitism. It's a parallel is all
It's the oppressor-victim framework at large scale.
For real... Who wants to get in bed with a team that craps on people that give and provide people jobs which is a goal of the left
Corporations aren’t some altruistic entities that “give and provide people jobs”, they are structures that exist so that people can make money.
It’s fine to think that they get uselessly scapegoated, but it’s weird to act like they are anything other than pure self-interest.
I mean I can't think of a whole lot of human organizing that's done completely altruistically... when done best it's a win-win. So now it's not like they are like let's form an organization so we can create jobs. But that is exactly what municipalities that provide tax breaks try to buy the companies to come to their place to create jobs. or what Europeans do to get Airbus to build in a million different countries all over the place
I made a red hat that says “politicians don’t deserve flags” and I wear it to the gun range.
I almost never talk about politics there but when I do I focus on my general frustration with politicians. I slip in a few digs or jokes about Trump or Vance but they are always more funny than political.
A good joke is king.
AFAIK the hard left's only remaining national elected officials are a Senator from a D+35 state and Representatives from districts that are D+48 (AOC), D+59 (Tlaib) and D+63 (Omar). Bowman and Bush just lost primaries in D+52 and D+62 districts respectively.
Their supporters can make bold arguments all they like, as someone below did in arguing "healthcare" is a Bernie issue. But so long as left candidates can only win in the bluest of blue districts, I don't see how they can have any real credibility in directing the national party. That doesn't mean dismissing them wholesale. But ultimately the views of the people who run and win in tough races should be prioritised, as Ben's article implies.
There are a few other Squad-adjacent people, like Garcia and Ramirez in Chicago, and Jayapal in Seattle. Barbara Lee is still in office a few more months too.
Not to mention a couple of the old-school progressives who are still around as well. I'm not sure if they are considered hard left or not, though.
Lee and Jayapal's districts are D+74, Garcia is D+64. Ramirez is D+13 which is a lot redder than all the others but still solidly blue. An R Presidential candidate hasn't won it since 1988.
So, I feel your comment proves rather than disproves my point. These guys hold literally 0 competitive districts...why would you listen to them on how to win those?
I wasn't trying to disprove your point, which I agree with.
I was just saying that the "Squad" isn't quite as small as you made it seem. Separate issue.
Fair enough. I was just going by memory of DSA.
Below is a link to a list of all the Progressive caucus members with the rating of their district. There is 1 from a red district (Cartwright), 1 even (Deluzio), and 12 from single digit lean Ds.
Cartwright voted with Republicans, against Biden, when Biden slowed some weapons shipments to Israel. Deluzio seems like more of a real progressive, he sponsored a Medicare for All bill and has been on the left of the party on Israel. But he still voted to support Israel after 10/7, he's for fracking (he's from PA) and while he wants higher taxes on corporations, that's Biden's position (and policy), and I can't see him for broad based tax rises which is what I believe Medicare for All requires.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congressional_Progressive_Caucus
If I used the list below of all self-declared "socialists", there's also Casar from a D+27 seat and Davis from another D+74 seat, but Ramirez and Garcia aren't on it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_socialist_members_of_the_United_States_Congress
What would you say distinguishes a "hard left" member from a "regular left" member of the Democratic coalition?
I was in Montana recently. Tester was courting split ticket voters. The ad featured a proclaimed Trump voter saying why he likes Tester and why he's a true Montanan.
In my deep blue part of California, I see mainly ads about our ballot propositions. It's a very different world.
California has too many ballot props.
Strong agreement (I have lived continuously in CA since 1973/age 15, and most of the time before then too).
But I suspect that for the forseeable future we are stuck with the low de facto threshold to qualify either via initiative or via the legislature (yes, I do know the basic history). It's hard to see the ballot prop needed to amend the constitution passing, although it could easily enough qualify :)
I'd be happy to just fix the effin recall process (meaning both recall qualification and the jungle election to select the successor), but even that is too much to ask I think.
Let's talk about Virginia. Let me inform you of what swingy women voters are talking about in Virginia, where soccer moms fell for the Youngkin "parent choice" line a couple of years ago.
Women's' reproductive health choice.
These women are angry, they are registering in record numbers and they are going to vote in record numbers. Remember how Youngkin's 16-week abortion restriction proposal worked out for Republicans in Virginia last year? They lost everything.
The guys I talk to are largely ignorant of this dynamic. Some say "oh, yeah, there's that." My gut sensing is that many of them feel threatened by a strong woman like Harris and I also sense a slight male voter shift toward Trump more for emotional reasons than any specific policy logic.
But the women are REALLY fired up. My prediction is that Democrats will outperform polls and that the highly motivated woman and minority voter turnout will carry the Presidency, Congress and maybe even yield a surprise in the Senate.
Let me finish by saying I have not met a woman under the age of 45 who says they will vote for or are even considering voting for Trump.
Oh yeah, I should mention that I man a booth soliciting people to register to vote, so not scientific but highly informed.
Democrats moderately under-performed the polls in the first post Dobbs national election, 2022. I have zero doubt you're right that the overwhelming majority of Democratic-leaning woman voters are angry and motivated about abortion rights. But Democrats are increasingly a party that reliably turns out to vote in elections, which implies there's not likely to be a huge pool of Democratic-friendly voters who frequently don't vote—but who can be induced to do so provided the message is sufficiently compelling.
"You're killing me Smalls." I'm going to ask for evidence here. Please cite the polls and the under-performing results. This was a mid-term that ALWAYS breaks against incumbent party and Democrats did very well. My data says we outperformed most credible polling, especially where abortion was an issue in the race.
>This was a mid-term that ALWAYS breaks against incumbent<
Midterms don't always break against the incumbency party. The GOP made House gains in 2002. Democrats made House gains in 1998.
>Democrats did very well<
By historical standards, Dems had a good midterm in 2022, indeed. Nowhere did I state to the contrary. Nonetheless, Democrats did suffer losses in 2022: they lost the House of Representatives. Losing a chamber of Congress is fairly significant!
>My data says we outperformed most credible polling, especially where abortion was an issue in the race.<
Well "your" data appears to depart from Nate Silver's. As I wrote at the outset, it was very modest (polls were pretty accurate that cycle), but nonetheless Democrats performed slightly worse in House races than the polls predicted. Money quote from Nate: "...the results were reasonably well-predicted by polls and forecast models, which had Republicans favored in the House, and the Senate as being close. Technically, in fact, Democrats were very slightly overestimated by the polls..."
He provides reams of data to support this claim.
https://www.natesilver.net/p/the-white-house-is-betting-the-election?r=7j7hw&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
"Let me finish by saying I have not met a woman under the age of 45 who says they will vote for or are even considering voting for Trump."
May I suggest that you are in a bubble and should not draw conclusions from that bubble and apply them to the larger world...
...and I would be more interested in pushback from a woman under 45...to my point.
Okay, so due to military service my bubble is 62 years old and has moved all over America and the world. Not too small of a bubble. Amd I did write "so not scientific but highly informed."
I've been confused about why commentators talk about a tension between persuasion and turnout strategies because it seems to me you can do both. And it always seemed logical to me that you want to motivate people who tend to vote D but don't always vote. As framed here I see that "turnout" means an issue-based campaign. In my experience, the work done to mobilize unreliable voters has nothing to do with messaging and is about reaching them by door knocking, phone calls etc. My guess is that this kind of work is just not on the radar screen for people engaged in online debates about campaign theory.
I have persuaded people to listen by highlighting the things we agree on first. Most of us want healthcare, education, affordable, security, housing, and groceries. But we begin to part ways when we start talking about how/whether-or-not the government is responsible for providing these things. It disarms some of the rhetoric about our differences and creates common ground. Imagine swing voters hearing Sister Harris say something like “you would be surprised how many things Donald Trump and I agree on in regards to the wellness of this country.” Then you’re better able to highlight his unhinged and incomprehensible “solutions” and her proposals for collaboration and compromise, which stand the chance of leading to more reasonable solutions Works for me in mixed groups anyway. A shift away from the them-versus-us energy makes room for better listening and consideration of pathways forward.
(ed changed “swinging voters” to intended “swing voters”… 🙄)
I don't think those who prefer the "Mobilization" strategy (i.e. present a bold policy reform agenda) actually take that stand because they think that doing so will mobilize new voters into their coalition. The vast majority just want political leaders to present their preferred policy reform agenda regardless of the electoral consequences. In other words, they prefer to be Right more than they want to win elections. Evidence for the "Persuasion" strategy will not change their minds, because it forces them to support candidates with more moderate strategies.
I think a lot of them have either motivated reasoned themselves into believing in mobilization or live in such a blue enclave that they can't conceive of swing voters as an actual thing.
Monica Tranel's ad in Montana, attacking her opponent for owning a $16,000/month AirBnB, is a banger. https://x.com/MonicaTranel/status/1828426369535242259
Notable that she's correctly leading on how housing policy is driving up costs for average hard-working Americans. It's the only issue on her website with a dedicated page to it.
"...housing policy is driving up costs for average hard-working Americans"
Oddly enough, housing policy is also driving up costs for below-average, shiftless Americans. Why do you want to help them?
What this says to me is that individual Dem candidates are doing smart things within the contexts of their own districts or states.
Whether this translates to Harris in her national race remains to be seen.
One more time: we have a vast amount of empirical research that demonstrates that swing voters are nothing like doctrinaire centrists. It's just a myth.
If you read the piece you will note that “swing voters are doctrinaire centrists” isn’t the thesis
"...you will note that 'swing voters are doctrinaire centrists' isn’t the thesis"
I dunno: Do you have empirical research that demonstrates that?
Are you saying this article IS describing swing voters as "doctrinaire centrists"? That wasn't my takeaway, but in what ways is a "doctrinaire centrist" different from what is described here? I found a previous mention in one of your peices of this phrase where you linked to this 538 article: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-moderate-middle-is-a-myth/
My takeaway from the 538 piece (which I only skimmed TBF) is that ~no swing voters are pro-immigration/pro-market-oriented, but otherwise all over the map.
I probably got my wires crossed on who is/is not saying swing voters are doctrinaire centrists, and what critique you are leveling. Just asking you to expand (or link to) what it is you're trying to convey in more detail. What is your critique, that this article is saying swing voters are a down-the-middle average of policy preferences? (ie that swing voters want "moderate" levels of immigration, with "moderate" levels of social support, etc.). Not my takeaway from this, but curious to read more as well, thanka
I believe you, who are some of the researchers and their papers that you find most salient on this topic? Like do we have a taxonomy of different flavors of swing voters?
Except a lot of us middle of the road voters that lean right know that it's a de-emphasis, it's a lie to secure our vote n the near term. And that like many of my friends and even some in this comment section on other posts say elections have consequences. This isn't coalition building or trying to find good governance that brings people together it's getting the football past the line and then working to spike all your policy agendas. Don't expect us to like coming to the left because it's the same garbage of winner-take-all politics so you can have some kind of progressive ideal for the country. Grifters going to grift. Panderers going to Pander. Supreme Court Justices going to say whatever they have to during their confirmation hearings. It's just gross at the end of the day.