There's a whole lot of buyer remorse being expressed in town halls across the country as the full weight of Trump 2.0 begins to be felt by voters. Yet, the media goes on and on about how the Democratic Party is in free fall and offers a number of bleak scenarios for 2026 and beyond.
Some Democratic leaders are even attaching themselves to some rather unsavory creatures. Gavin Newsom has recently been found flirting with Steve Bannon, hoping to feed off the MAGA dissent in a presidential bid in 2028, but Bannon isn't abandoning the movement. Rather, he is robustly predicting Trump will win a third term. Bannon's chief problem isn't Donald, but Elon, whom he thinks has overstepped his role in the MAGA movement. Like most MAGAts, Steve seems to have a poor understanding of how the Constitution works. It would take 2/3s of Congress and 3/4 of the state legislatures to amend the Constitution to allow a president to seek a third term. Anyway, there's no way the American public will warm up to Gavin even if he were to wear a red hat.
What we are finding out is that the Democratic Party is in the midst of an identity crisis as its base shifts to the left while its conciliatory moderate leaders try to cling onto the middle ground. In a recent poll, most Democrats felt AOC better represented their values, but instead we see Chuck Schumer cutting deals with Republicans in the Senate to get their malicious spending bill through Congress. The majority of Democrats were against this bill, but Chuck managed to find 9 other Dems to vote for closure, which allowed the GOP to pass the bill by a simple majority. Dems gave up any leverage they had, but Chuck defended the move by saying he didn't want to be held responsible for shutting down government. Whatever concessions he was able to worm out of the Republicans were minimal. The outrage was so palpable that Chuck had to cancel his new book signing party out of fear of reprisals. Some are now calling for AOC to challenge Schumer for the New York senate seat in 2026.
That may be the last thing the Dems need at this point but if the old guard is not willing to step aside for the next generation then I suppose challenging these Congressional lifers in the primaries is the only option. AOC did this back in 2018 when she took out ten-termer Joe Crowley in New York's 14th Congressional district. It was part of a Democratic Blue Wave that saw Trump's power severely reined in for the second half of his tenure. I don't see any reason why history can't repeat itself.
It really doesn't matter what the Democrats espouse, they will continuously be branded liberal, socialist or even worse communist in social media. The middle ground has proven elusive time and time again. It makes more sense to rekindle the progressive spirit that once made the Democratic Party great. Currently, we see Democratic leaders fighting over scraps. None worse than John Fetterman, who initially projected himself as a progressive but has now drifted to the middle and become one of Trump's favorites in Congress. Don't let that trademark hoodie fool you. Once in Congress, it is all about staying in Congress, and John has made a conscious decision to align himself with the Center Right in order to keep his hard-earned seat.
The odd thing is that it was a very close election in 2024. It could have swung either way in the closing weeks and even days, yet the Republicans managed to eke the Presidency and just enough seats in the House to pull off the trifecta. It was a foregone conclusion they would win the Senate with West Virginia, Montana and Ohio in play. They only managed to gain one additional seat in Pennsylvania, Fetterman's home state. Democrats won 5 of 6 Senate contests in battleground states, all of which Trump won by narrow margins. Who knows what shifted the tide in those closing days? Yet, we see numerous pundits chastising Democrats for a failed campaign, including Clinton loyalist James Carville. This is a guy who was so sure Kamala would win that he was willing to eat his LSU baseball cap if she lost.
What we all underestimated was the pernicious flow of dark money in the campaign and how easily voters are influenced by fearful rhetoric, namely immigration. Laken Riley turned out to be a game changer for Republicans with even Fetterman signing onto the notorious immigration bill bearing her namesake that has given the Department of Homeland Security virtually unlimited power in detaining undocumented immigrants or any immigrants for that matter.
The Democrats need to seize on Jasmine Mooney's harrowing story, in which she was detained for more than two weeks because ICE had uncovered that she had overstayed her visa on a previous occasion. A perfect example of what happens when you give immigration officials unchecked authority. She not only highlights her own plight but that of other women who were detained for minor infractions. She noted that the real culprits are private contractors who run the detention facilities and profit by keeping persons indefinitely locked up awaiting immigration and asylum hearings. She named CoreCivic and GEO Group as two of the insidious corporations profiting off ICE.
Personal stories are what capture the imagination of voters, not statistics. You tell these stories every chance you get between now and November 2026 and don't let the Republicans or Democratic turncoats run away from these stories, like they are trying to do town halls where attendees are venting their rage at an administration failing to live up to any of its campaign promises. Instead, Trump now says he was being sarcastic when he stated he would bring the war in Ukraine to an end in 24 hours. He is similarly hedging on his pledge to bring down egg prices. As a result, Republican representatives are feeling the heat from their constituencies.
The main bone of contention at these town halls has been Elon Musk, who has greatly overextended his authority and is mandating major cuts across the board, including the VA and Social Security in his draconian effort to bring down costs. Musk claims he is saving billions, but more and more it is off the backs of veterans, working class and pensioners, who already find themselves struggling to make ends meet. He is literally taking from the poor and middle class to benefit the rich, as if all those tax cuts weren't enough over the last eight years. He has become so reviled that his precious Tesla cars have become an easy target for protesters, leading Trump to declare this vandalism an act of terrorism. It's Musk who is terrorizing the nation in his attempt to emasculate the federal government.
It's not like people didn't see this coming. Trump said he planned to slash government spending on the campaign trail but I guess these deluded voters thought it would be someone else's money, not realizing that we are all dependent on federal government in one form or another. Musk doesn't care where he takes the money, saying that the problem with Western civilization is that it shows too much empathy. This is what happens when you elect psychopaths into office.
The Democratic Party may be in a bit of disarray but it is safe to say voters will have had their fill of Trump by next summer when the midterm elections heat up. Unlike presidential elections, there is much lower turnout and it becomes a matter of getting your base out to vote. The best way to do that is to push progressive issues, not continue to cater to the middle ground as Schumer, Fetterman, Newsom and others are doing. The anger is palpable. Democrats need to seize the day!
Comments
Post a Comment