Like many people voting in this election I was not impressed by either candidate. One was clearly too dangerous, vindictive and childish to hold the highest office in the land, so I voted for the other.
The biggest problem the DNC faces is its own conservatism. The failure of Hillary Clinton and Kamala Harris could be seen by most leftists on the ground from miles away. They run to the right and apologize for their liberal ideas, reassuring the mob of psychopaths who would never vote for them that they will make concession.
Gone are the days of progressive confidence. This failure has been ongoing since Carter decided to run to the center to appease a nonexistent middle of the road voter and the rest is history. A liberal, up against Reagan, thought it was wise to be less progressive. I can see how they get that idea but it’s poison. You simply lose all the energy of those who are excited about your platform. You’re not going to gain conservatives that way and you shouldn’t want too anymore.
Most voters are not middle of the road. Most of us have ideals and virtues we’d like to see in our community like proper health care, social welfare programs, better public education and job training programs. We want to know that marginalized communities are going to be taken care of. We want the rights of our LGBTQ+ neighbors to be enshrined in legislature, not open to discussion and undone by an election. As someone with disabilities I’d love to know that my preexisting condition won’t count against me, that’s uncertain now. The uncertainty many of us will live with is their fault but I believe that they can do better if they listen to their people. Sanders laid out a beautiful plan and people were open to it. People that ended up voting for Trump were open to it. This is not a problem of policy this is a problem of conviction. Progressive policy is sound and that drum needs to beat louder and without apology.
The Democratic leadership must stand up for what they believe in the way that the right stands for what they believe in. We cannot compete with the adrenaline and dopamine hit that a Trump rally gets even if we know it’s all hot air. The people there feel it. We need to run people who can stand firm on their ideas and get others on board without apologizing for being a Democrat. We need those unafraid to take a stand against war crimes being committed we can all see. We need those who listen to young voices on college campuses when they protest. We need someone who can do that both passionately and compassionately. Once that happens, we’ll start making real ground.
Jacob Padgett
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The DNC is weak but not because two candidates hid their progressive views. The DNC and the Harris campaign completely failed to assess or understand the electorate. That electorate, across wide demographics, had said in large numbers the country was going in the wrong direction and their vote reflected that.
The answer is not more progressivism. The vote on Tuesday was a strong repudiation of that. It was a clear rejection by voters of DEI and identity politics who are focused on being able to afford to feed and house their families and keep them safe.
Many Americans also voted to stop the trend by this administration to weaponize the DOJ against political opponents. They viewed that as the real threat to democracy and Americans across the nation agreed.
Now seeing Americans who supported Donald Trump disparaged as psychopaths or garbage furthers the divide and makes a mockery of the idea of unity. That‘s why many said they didn’t leave the Democrat party, the Democrat Party left them and the demographics of the vote Tuesday proved it.
Ralph Miller
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In 2015, Chris Matthews asked then-DNC Chairman Debbie Wasserman Schultz what the difference was between modern Democrats and Socialists. She danced around the question—not once but twice. Later in the week, Chuck Todd asked her the same question. Again, she refused to give a direct answer.
Some speculated Wasserman Schultz didn't want to offend the extreme wing of the Democratic Party. Fair enough. But today, nine years later, it's accurate to say that the extreme wing is now the majority of the Democratic Party. I'm sure Wasserman Schultz would have no problem answering the same question today.
Another reason for Trump's victory? CNN contributor Scott Jennings put it best. Jennings described the win as the “revenge” of the regular, anonymous American who “has been crushed, insulted, condescended to."
“They're not garbage, they're not Nazis, they're just regular people who get up and go to work every day, and try to make a better life for their kids, and they feel like they've just been told to shut up when they have complained about the things that have been hurting them in their own lives,” he continued.
We shall see who has learned from this election.
Sam Taylor
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This election victory by President Donald Trump (45) and soon to be (47) was a decisive decision and as of this posting with roughly 72 million voters for Trump who surpassed the Harris voting block of 66 million voters. What happened the Biden/Harris 81 million voters in 2020, where did they go?
The DNC and those controlling their party awarded Kamala Harris the nomination rather than the primary process, which would have definitely given the Democrats a better candidate. The Democrats identity politics bit them again.
Harris/Walz was the most progressive/leftist ticket offered to the American people in recent years. (CNN) Harris by her own record is left of Bernie Sanders the communist. (ABC) Walz who spent lots of time and over 30 trips in China (NBC) is as progressive as you get. Walz even spent his honeymoon in China. So evidently based on their leftist platform that agenda was overwhelmingly rejected last Tuesday.
I’m old enough to remember the old Southern “yellow dog” conservative Democrats, which was my family before the party was hijacked by the extreme leftists. Most of the Democrats I know would like to see some move back to the center left, not far left as you describe.
Jacob, I myself and the voters for Trump even on this platform have been called everything from fascist, homophobe, racist, cultists, misogynistic, white nationalists and on and on and whom you yourself just called us psychopaths, which includes people from all walks of life including many Democrats who voted for Trump. This is another example of why Kamala got trounced. A large group of American people, or at least 72 million, are fed up with the lying mainstream media and the continuous bashing of President Trump and our beliefs and opinions. The leftist narrative has been rejected again.
It is my hope that your ideology of the DNC going even further left as you envision would be adopted. That would ensure that Republicans in next election would see JD Vance win all 50 states.
Jacob and all the other Harris supporters, I managed to live through the divisive eight years of Obama/Biden and so far this disastrous nearly four years of Biden/Harris so take a deep breath and you too can survive four more years of Trump even as bad as you folks detest him.
Arch R.
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Mr. Padgett, you had me going there for a while. As I read your commentary, I thought to myself that here is someone who is a real idealist who is looking for a better world, even though such idealism is based on socialism which is a failed philosophy and runs contrary to human nature.
But I just assumed that your heart was in the right place...that is until I read the last four sentences where you talked about war crimes and young college students protesting on campuses. I am assuming that you are referring to the recent anti-semitic protests which champion the destruction of Israel (From the River to the Sea). If so, you now, in my opinion, fall into a much different category.
Most of these students haven't a shred of knowledge about Israel or the history of the region and, as such, are a dangerous mob of "useful idiots" that beclown themselves as unwitting agents of Iran and its proxies where being gay is a death sentence and women are third class citizens. You might want to re-think your "progressive" talking points.
James Nelson
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Mr. Padgett, it seems to me that you still fail to see the problem. Conservatives want health care, social welfare programs, better public education and job training programs. However when one looks at the states that have been run by liberals for decades, many of us do not like what we see. Crime is out of control, homelessness is rampant, and jobs are going away. I do not want to see Chattanooga become the next city to look like San Francisco or Los Angeles.
We need a strong economy; liberal policies do not make that happen. There are three ways to make money. Mining, extracting minerals and raw materials including oil from the ground. Manufacturing, the making of a saleable product from the raw materials. And agriculture. Everything else is just passing around the same money. We need these jobs in America, so we can pass this money on to other Americans. Donald Trump is a successful businessman, he understands how this works. Ms. Harris, after a career in government, does not. People with jobs pay taxes. People with jobs buy things, giving other people jobs. They pay taxes. The government has money to pay for roads, schools, emergency services, job training and welfare programs. All the things we want government to do. Everything depends on a strong economy.
Ms. Harris’s campaign seemed to focus on three things. I’m not Donald Trump. I am a minority woman (identity politics) and abortion. She failed to distance herself from the failed policies of President Biden. In fact she embraced them; she would not change a thing.
In short, America did not buy what the Harris/Walz campaign was selling, or what the Democratic Party as a whole was selling. That is why they lost the Presidency, as well as seats in both the Senate and the House of Representatives. So now due to the failure of the Democratic Party, we have one party totally in charge, this never ends well.
George Odom
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Re one party in control, it’s the great pendulum of time with gravity taking a break. Let’s see how the price of eggs or the Port of New Orleans fares with wholesale deportations. Last tariff set was rectified for farmers with a payout for crops rotting in storage. Food processing, manufacturing, agriculture and construction in this country rely on low cost labor for the work force. Tell me how grocery prices and housing costs will improve with partisan removal of people here to make an honest wage versus the bipartisan legislation that was shoved aside to make a lie of an election issue.
That is a lot to stomach, so is the fact the Republican Party is willing to sacrifice itself for a narrow faction that rule to the edge, not the center of this society.
The Democrats are not the only losers here, true Republicans are as well, courage is overtaken by fear in the inability to put truth to power.
Prentice Hicks
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Talk about a serious disconnect with reality. Kamala Harris and her progressive policies are decisively rejected by the American people and Mr. Padgett says it's because they are not progressive enough?
That's a real head scratcher but I, too, hope the DNC goes even farther left and secures their place in the trash bin of history, alongside their champions Harris and Walz.
Dennis Wooden
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Prentice Hicks,
What I just interpreted from your response is that you approve of illegal immigrants working for pennies on the dollar while not paying into our system. I guess your argument is that this keeps inflation low as long as we support those that have cheated the system and would also indicate that you support employers and employees that have a “work around“ to keep illegal/cheap labor prospering.
Maybe you took business classes in 3rd world countries but that’s just my take. I do know first hand that immigrants that have obtained their work visas and citizenship through the proper channels have excelled in this great country time and time again.
Just FYI, the latter was very vocal in this past election for these very reasons.
Chris Morgan