I think they’re misrepresenting the message a lot.
Here’s the post: https://medium.com/@JoeBiden/i-have-fought-for-the-democratic-party-my-whole-career-2ca4a2dac271
I personally think this is turbo dumb though:
I learned a long time ago that if you question someone’s motivations rather than their judgment you get nowhere. It’s hard to get past go if you start off by saying the other person is in the pocket of special interests or is corrupt. To get anything big done in this country, we need to persuade, to compromise, to reach consensus. That’s the way a democracy works.
KevinC
6475
I hate to use the phrase but Biden is just completely out of touch. Not in an elitist way, but in a “he’s fucking old and the Republican party has completely changed” way. I don’t doubt that for a sizeable chunk of his career that would have been the right approach but it’s completely out of step with the reality on the ground in 2019.
I had not even considered this particular bit of fallout from an impeachment trial in the Senate. Wonder if Pelosi would try to manipulate the timeline so the Senate portion starts after the biggest primaries? That would be a long delay though.
Mayor Pete: “Did I mention I’m no longer mayor of South Bend as of January 1?”
People like Joe Biden are how we ended up where we are now, and I’m not even being snarky.
Since Gingrich, the GOP’s strategy is to shift the Overton window to the extremist right. Dems offer a sensible immigration package? Republicans respond by throwing kids in cages, then “compromise” by saying, on second thought, they “just” want to eliminate the concept of political asylum altogether. The result is that formerly unthinkable ideas become part of political discourse and the GOP gets more and more of what they want over time as they “compromise” down from batshit radical ideas to merely formerly unthinkably radical ideas.
Essentially, when the Dems say, “Let’s compromise!” the GOP responds, “OK. Our offer is we get 100 percent, you get nothing.” Then the “compromise” ends up being the GOP gets 80% and the Dems patting themselves on the back for getting 20%.
The only way to disrupt such strategies is to respond to the “We get 100%, you get nothing” offer with “Our counter-offer is this: we get 100%, and you get a kick in the teeth” and then follow through if they don’t blink. Otherwise you will get played over and over and over again.
(And what’s wrong with questioning people’s motivations? Sometimes people’s motivations are very questionable indeed. If you put it completely off the table, you give your opponent carte blanche to start acting in bad faith - which again, is exactly the story of the GOP since the mid-90s.)
Sorry, I’m a little behind in this thread, and I know posting this reply will make me lose my place, but I just wanted to add how much I appreciate this post. Even though I did mostly science courses in college, the courses that I was “forced” to take in the liberal arts like Philosophy, ethics, art appreciation, history and French had a more lasting impact on me as a person, and this would be true even if I had studied to be a welder or a carpenter.
SlyFrog
6480
The problem is, to the great bulk of the country, this sounds like crazy partisan conspiracy theory ranting.
Stated as such? Yes.
Stated as, “Fuck privatizing Social Security. We demand universal health care, and we’re perfectly willing to raise taxes on the 1% to get it,” it’s insanely popular.
Not always, according to the polls. Wealth taxes poll well. Higher marginal income tax rates poll well. Free college polls well. And so on.
Donald Trump continues to look very, very beatable in 2020.
But the “yellow light” here is worth paying attention to also.
SlyFrog
6484
No, I’m not talking about the policies. I’m talking about the crazy, frothing demonization. What the person I quoted was going on about. All of “them” being evil, malicious monsters, intent on drinking the blood of our children, etc. Their group is beyond redemption, let’s take it to the streets and kick in their teeth! It just sounds silly, and really turns off normal people who don’t spend their lives in echo chamber internet forums, because you sound like a kook when you say things like that.
I don’t think you can have read what you were quoting, then. It was…factually accurate. Not crazy, not frothing, not demonization.
Well, I did say “kick them in the teeth” for effect in my metaphor (but only because the premise of the metaphor was that the offer was them keeping 100% - so what can you ask for that’s more than 100%?)
But the GOP being bad-faith radical extremists whose (so far quite successful) strategy is intentionally moving the Overton window? Yep, that’s a factual description of where we are. Unfortunately.
… but Democrats better not take any one single mildly unpopular opinion or they will surely lose.
There’s the reductionist, kneejerk response I was expecting from the silo.
That is truly the best takeaway from that. 100%.
Not: “Warren and Sanders and anyone else with a platform of M4A need to work out stronger messaging on it.”
Nesrie
6489
It doesn’t really matter if it’s the best take away or not though since media plays the extreme over and over and over again like it is.
Before there was any kerfuffle with M4A and Warren vs Buttigieg and others, healthcare was THE number one issue. It was the number one voting issue at the polls in 2018. We have that data. There are receipts. People wanted their healthcare PROTECTED first and foremost. Then on costs, private providers, keeping them, exchanges, single payer…things get a lot more fractured.
Now you can say that a reluctance to change the system dramatically to M4A with the elimination of private insurance is a media creation, but I would like to see some sort of widespread polling correlation on that, too.
People freak out – whether they should or shouldn’t – about changes to the healthcare system, even when it’s likely the changes could help them out A LOT. People with NO healthcare, or crappy predatory plans that did nothing hated the ACA…until they got used to it and realized it could help them. But it took years and years.
People are the way they are, and they vote based on issues that are important to them. And fear of dramatic change is a big motivator, and has been for a couple of centuries now.
Nesrie
6491
I am not referring to the the Medicare For All specifics, I am referring to the all the Democrats have to do is run with one tiny little policy a small number of people don’t like and they’re toast idea, focusing more on the mildly unpopular remark… and the media is kind of saying that.
Like if someone likes blue but the Democrats are running with teal, well of course they made them turn to Trump stuff. What choice did they have? They wanted blue… forget that Trump is running with orange.
Literally every idea Republicans have is hated by the public. Every single one. Except racism, the American public loves that.
Democrats propose policies to improve everyone’s lives, but brown people are part of everyone, so it polls badly in garbage states.
That’s my takeaway. Change my view.
