Democrats generally believe that the off-year election on November 2nd was not good news. But from all the post-election spinning, whining and explaining it appears they remain clueless to the all-important “why.” Why did voters all over the nation deal the Democratic Party – especially the powerful Progressive faction – a karate kick to the gut.
Former United States Senator from Missouri Claire McCaskill took up her designated seat on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” to say that Democrats need to unite – and not engage in any blame game. That would be the most stupid thing Democrats could do. They need to learn why their political party was so broadly and deeply rejected … humiliated. And the reason is the result of specific Democrat leaders’ actions and Democrat policies. If they do not find those people and policies responsible for the debacle, they will not fix the problem.
In fact, judging from the post-election commentary and spin, Democrats still do not get it. They are still in their echo chamber claiming that nothing about the Democratic Party – or their policies – is the problem.
Oh, they do claim that they did not “message” well enough. Their general reaction is that … if the voters were not so stupid and understood all the good things the donkey party wants to provide them, Democrats would have come out on top on November 2nd.
The big excuse — masking as self-criticism — is that they did not explain all the good things in their two mega spending bills. I cannot imagine that even a passive voter has not heard over and over of all those goodies in the Biden bills. If Democrats think their problem is voter ignorance, they will continue to lose ground. Maybe … just maybe … it is the policies and practices of the Biden administration that are the problem.
They do point to polls that suggest that most Americans like all those welfare proposals. But that seems more and more the fault of the polling. If you ask a voter if they like parental leave, they may say yes … but they may not support other provisions of the all-encompassing legislation.
Or voters may be savvy enough to see the downside of the legislation. Excessive spending, higher prices due to inflation, higher taxes. Maybe the folks back home understand that THEY will be paying for all those increased taxes on corporations at the point-of-sale.
When Democrats say, “look at what we are actually doing … and will do,” the voters also see the crisis at the border, record inflation, a messed up Covid handling, supply-chain constipation, gas prices soaring, etc., etc., etc.
Some Democrats take some blame because of the failure to pass those “popular” Biden bills. That is perhaps the dumbest explanation of all. Ask yourself … if you liked all the provisions in the Biden bills – and you anticipate that much of it would be passed in the near future – would you actually vote against the candidates who are supposedly liked doing what you like. Wouldn’t you want to give the Democrats more political capital and power to complete the job.
I would argue that the voters were telling Democrats that they did not like all those expensive goodies. They want the Democrats to slow down, scale down. The election results were AGAINST Democrats – AND Democrat policies, programs and proposals. Especially those of the Progressive left.
In a past commentary, I opined that Biden & Co. would lose support among the American people no matter if his HUGE transformative legislation passed or not. I think the results of the recent election adds credibility to my point.
Then there is the Trump-as-Rasputin strategy. In the recent election, Republicans across America proved that they are not the Trumpian cultists as the Democrats portray. They are running as individual Republicans on Republican issues. Trump was not on the ballot and will not be until 2024 – if ever.
Republicans, independents and even some Democrats are not going to be driven away from the policies they prefer by bogus narratives and baseless name-calling. The Democrats and their media propaganda outlets can use broad-brush smears and demonization through cheap-shot guilt-by-association strategies, but I am confident that they will fail – and we have just seen the first act of that failure.
There is a reason why the “Let’s go, Brandon” euphemism is sweeping the nation. It captures a mood — a mood that Democrats and too much of the media still do not understand. It is a political arrogance that says, “no matter what the voters think and do, WE are still right!”
Albert Einstein described insanity as doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. If Democrats continue to peddle their same old political narratives and strategies, they are like to see similar results in 2022.
So, there ‘tis.