There is no liberal media to speak of. I can drive anywhere in Ohio and get right wing radio. I can drive nowhere in Ohio and get left wing radio. After Obama won Ohio the second time, the last left wing radio station flipped and was gone. We had a protest march to I Heart Radio. I mean literally. You can think of the seven mountain strategy as diabolical or you can look at it as a blueprint for any political movement. Air America launched Al Franken and Rachel Maddow. We let Air America die. We did that.
We can wait for a future campaign like Obama for America to build this infrastructure from the ground up. Again. Or we can take the 20 year plan to be relevant again and start with creating sustainable liberal media.
Great post as usual Oliver. Just to be clear, both things can be true: Harris did about as well as she could inheriting a campaign from Biden with just 3 1/2 months to go AND the Democratic Party has failed in its duty to communicate effectively and legislate cleverly for decades. We really need folks like Soros to step up and do what the right has accused them of all along: setting up a true "liberal media" operation to counter the decades-long head start right-wing talk radio and cable "news" has enjoyed.
You make some good points. However, one of the most tiresome things I hear is that communication is a problem for the Democratic Party. The PROBLEM remains with the American electorate who are incapable of discerning anything of substance. There WAS a time that we had to research our candidates…..’cause of patriotism. Now it seems that we have to be courted and marketed to?
I don’t buy it at all. This neoliberal project of shifting the country’s wealth from the bottom to the top began with Reagan and was continued fairly uninterrupted since. The only group of citizens that were not multimillionaires and billionaires that benefited were the educated. All data available supports that conclusion. Biden did more for those left behind than any President since FDR, especially those in red states that will benefit from his policies. Those people thought he sucked and that we were in a recession when it simply was not true. Even now, with nothing changed but the election of a criminal who hasn’t yet taken office the “vibecession” is now over. So you tell me, what Democrat can overcome this abject stupidity? None.
This is exactly the case. 21% of Americans are illiterate and 54% of Americans have a literacy below 6th grade. This author is like so many uninformed pundits casting blame on Democrats simply because they just can’t grasp the dumbing down of Americans over the decades. James Carville is now chastising Democrats for speaking “NPR language.” He’d have us speak like idiots like the Oxford educated John Kennedy with his Foghorn Leghorn schtick so that idiots will vote for us. They’re both from Louisiana which ranks 40th in K-12 education. Resist the clowns, don’t join them! Put a fork in Carville, he’s done.
Correct the white majority keeps putting the GOP back in power after they do the most horrendous stuff legislatively and or politically. It's been that way for a while now. Most distressing to see however that a growing number of Latinos/Hispanics especially men, Asians are migrating to the MAGA, GOP side to be adjacent to the White power structure that in reality hates them, sort of like HITLERS JEWS.
The general consensus is that the election was lost when Biden didn't announce up front at the start of 2024 that he would not seek re-election, thereby wasting half a year that could instead have been used to run a real primary and/or construct a more comprehensive image for Harris. I dont post on Threads anymore which kind of solved the problem of the really "blue-maga-brained" who would deny this part of it.
When people say Harris ran a "perfect" campaign, they mean that given the lot she inherited, which was, "It's July 2024. Youre the candidate, go!" as you know they are not referring to the whole collapsing pile of mashed potatoes that was on top of.
If you want to talk about mistakes for Harris between July 2024 and Nov 2024, I already know you'd include the Liz Cheney thing, but what else? For me, the election was lost when she was asked directly what she'd do differently from Joe Biden and she said, "nothing". That was breathtaking because Joe BIden's approval numbers for valid or invalid reasons were in the toilet. If you want to argue against the "perfect campaign" narrative why not name some specific steps you think Harris could have taken to increase her chances? (because the results made it look like wow, there was never any chance, it was hopeless from the start).
Tony Blinkin and Biden need dragging. If Bidens top advisers felt he couldn't withstand the rigors of campaigning because of age, diminished abilities etc they should've done this much sooner to either allow for a primary or give Harris more time.
>> "For me, the election was lost when she was asked directly what she'd do differently from Joe Biden and she said, "nothing"." <<
Yeah. It's easy to say what should have been done when you get to use hindsight, but I really wish (in hindsight) that her answer had been more "The job of the VP is to support the Pres. To, in private, give him honest, candid advice and argue strongly when you disagree with him, then publicly support and push for whatever decision they have made. And as a *candidate*, I'm here to lay out what I will do as President. Some of which will differ from Joe and/or go further than he has. For example..."
Excellent post, Oliver. The Democratic Party, as I've been saying for 30 years, has to go back to its roots. Progressive taxation, regulated business, entrenched pro-choice, sensible gun control, universal health care. We certainly don't need to be Republican-lite. And we need to find ways to make noise about our pro-worker, pro-people policies. Biden headed a little bit in that direction, though he still tried too hard to be bipartisan.
What liberal media do u speak of OW? Dems can't get big media platformed on CABLE/OVER AIR TV or the AM RADIO 📻 DIAL. Musk/Zuckerberg own XITTER/FB both are in the corner for Trump. MSM(NON FOX, RW 📻) sane washing of trumpism & have GOP FRIENDLY corp ownership now. Niche media is fine except Republicans media success the last 40yrs has come in the form of LIMBAUGH AND HIS CLONES & FOX NEWS, EVERYTHING else from BREITBART to NEWSMAX to JOE ROGAN piggy backed on their success..
To frame unfettered support for the democrats as “MAGA” is not only ridiculous, it’s also offensive. As a trans woman, I HAVE TO support democrats no matter what since now, because of the REAL MAGA, my right to simply exist is in real danger. Trump won because 70 million Americans were more energized about their hatred of immigrants, women and trans people. It’s pretty simple. A woman ran twice against Trump and lost each time. Republicans ran a campaign of fear, misinformation and misogyny. We fight that first, by not comparing the ones that supported democratic values most with MAGA. It’s just lazy writing, and it stinks of clickbait.
Exactly people saw what happened on January 6 people saw what Trump did or didn't do during the COVID virus 🦠 of 2020, people have a GENERAL, people know who he is for all to see since 2015/2016 even if the general public doesn't spend as much time in social media as we do. Nothing was a really a deal breaker. Had trump and McConnell passed a 2nd stimulus bill in autumn of 2020 we have had 12yrs of Donald Trump & no democracy left.
So what is your solution or some possible solutions? I think democracy lovers are looking for a blueprint or strategy that we can follow. Are there any leaders in the Democratic Party we should be gathering around?
And stop with the small-ball shit and stilted coffeehouse jargon (I will strangle the next person to use 'center' as a verb outside the context of carpentry).
One does not respond to a propaganda barrage about impending doom by meeping about the transformative power of targeted tax credits. One does not respond to the very real effects of inflation by getting all wound around the axle prattling about the price of eggs. You go where the pain is--housing--and goafter who's responsible--Wall Street speculators gobbling up the supply.
Say,..'Get Wall Street off My Street', with legislation to shut that shit down (See: Sen. Merkley).
Agreed. You go no-holds-barred, no-words-minced directly at the Republicans. You call them on their shit clearly, forcefully, relentlessly.
Every Democrat who gets within 20 feet of a microphone should be pushing the "they're fucking you over" message. Ever campaign ad should be blunt in its language and pointed in its message.
Enough pussy footing around or being fearful that the Republicans and media are going to be shocked, shocked at your uncivility.
Oliver has frequently pointed to Democratic leaders like AOC and Maxwell Frost, who communicate effectively with the voting public and support meaningful legislation.
The problem is white supremacy, Oliver. No amount of Democratic Party messaging or organization is going to overcome that, especially if you won't say it out loud.
Harris could have said I was the AG of CA, before becoming VP. I will follow Us and International laws as the President of the US.
Harris came out of the gate and was embraced with a huge sum of individual donations!. There was little risk at that point, she could have sworn off PAC money. She did not. One month before the election Open Secrets reported her biggest donor was Raytheon the defense contractor.
I see that the Democratic Party has problems, big ones on the grass roots organization level and ignoring why so many democrats just didn’t vote is like hiding the elephant in the room. Abortion and women’s rights to their own bodies alone should have won the election. That issue won through grass roots on the state constitution level when people were willing to do the work, we left the issue on the curb.
The reliance on boomers and gen X to fix everything and whining when they fail is a useless strategy in the party. Pushing for a third party only makes things worse. Younger voters can’t just sit back and direct the party from social media. The point is to win and sadly the refusal to come together and fight together, failure to convince voters from the ground up that we can win common battles we all do agree on and most of America can agree on is the problem in my opinion.
We failed on messaging on Ukraine and the very real threat of Putin against the world going forward. We failed to single out BiBi and his cronies and their genocidal tactics against Gaza and had factions blaming Israel as a whole which was a mistake. In trying to hold the party together we ended up with weaker messages and no real solutions being pounded out. The right did name leaders names, we know MAGA will support Bibi, no matter what and use him as proxy to kill Muslims they find no use for. We know MAGA will cut off Ukraine and do its best to give Putin what ever lands he wants. MAGA was clear with who, what and how.
Changing the party, finding a common voice to win elections and having a strategy once we win has to start now. Get active within the party, work on naming the common enemies and solutions to defeat them. Hammer it out within the party, not the sidelines with varying causes. Communication was fractured, not missing. We are a team during elections or we lose.
Lastly, we don’t have a landslide majority in congress and neither do they, bipartisanship right now is the way forward in bits and pieces. We have to pick the winning ones and be clear where the line we won’t cross is until we do have a big majority on the local, state and federal level.
Or maybe there WAS ‘meddling’…? Like in 2000, 2016 and… 🤷♀️ But it would be unseemly to ask for a forensic audit(?) of EVEN the swing states… oh nevermind best for the country to just move on
Our party leaders should be shouting from the rooftops everyday! Are we perfect? No. Are we better than a cult brought together by hate, lies and propaganda funded by extremists and billionaires??? Absolutely! So our elected officials need to shout it from the mountain tops. Maga is not about freedom or Jesus. It's simply a well planned power grab.
I disagree in calling faltering Democratic policies and people "Blue MAGA". Democrats are nowhere near behaving like that fanatical cult. However, all your other points made are quite correct. If we are to offset Republican's truly failed policies we need a robust media counter- influence; a decidedly liberal, not compromised, stand on issues that benefit all people, not just oligarchs; and leadership that is boldly progressive and does not apologize for it.
There is no liberal media to speak of. I can drive anywhere in Ohio and get right wing radio. I can drive nowhere in Ohio and get left wing radio. After Obama won Ohio the second time, the last left wing radio station flipped and was gone. We had a protest march to I Heart Radio. I mean literally. You can think of the seven mountain strategy as diabolical or you can look at it as a blueprint for any political movement. Air America launched Al Franken and Rachel Maddow. We let Air America die. We did that.
We can wait for a future campaign like Obama for America to build this infrastructure from the ground up. Again. Or we can take the 20 year plan to be relevant again and start with creating sustainable liberal media.
Great post as usual Oliver. Just to be clear, both things can be true: Harris did about as well as she could inheriting a campaign from Biden with just 3 1/2 months to go AND the Democratic Party has failed in its duty to communicate effectively and legislate cleverly for decades. We really need folks like Soros to step up and do what the right has accused them of all along: setting up a true "liberal media" operation to counter the decades-long head start right-wing talk radio and cable "news" has enjoyed.
You make some good points. However, one of the most tiresome things I hear is that communication is a problem for the Democratic Party. The PROBLEM remains with the American electorate who are incapable of discerning anything of substance. There WAS a time that we had to research our candidates…..’cause of patriotism. Now it seems that we have to be courted and marketed to?
It’s very simple.
Don’t vote for fascists, liars, and losers
I don’t buy it at all. This neoliberal project of shifting the country’s wealth from the bottom to the top began with Reagan and was continued fairly uninterrupted since. The only group of citizens that were not multimillionaires and billionaires that benefited were the educated. All data available supports that conclusion. Biden did more for those left behind than any President since FDR, especially those in red states that will benefit from his policies. Those people thought he sucked and that we were in a recession when it simply was not true. Even now, with nothing changed but the election of a criminal who hasn’t yet taken office the “vibecession” is now over. So you tell me, what Democrat can overcome this abject stupidity? None.
This is exactly the case. 21% of Americans are illiterate and 54% of Americans have a literacy below 6th grade. This author is like so many uninformed pundits casting blame on Democrats simply because they just can’t grasp the dumbing down of Americans over the decades. James Carville is now chastising Democrats for speaking “NPR language.” He’d have us speak like idiots like the Oxford educated John Kennedy with his Foghorn Leghorn schtick so that idiots will vote for us. They’re both from Louisiana which ranks 40th in K-12 education. Resist the clowns, don’t join them! Put a fork in Carville, he’s done.
Isn't it possible it's both? The public is being stupid AND the Democrats have sucked at being effective?
The resistance to casting blame on the Democrats is a large part of what Oliver is talking about. The problem needs to be acknowledged.
Correct the white majority keeps putting the GOP back in power after they do the most horrendous stuff legislatively and or politically. It's been that way for a while now. Most distressing to see however that a growing number of Latinos/Hispanics especially men, Asians are migrating to the MAGA, GOP side to be adjacent to the White power structure that in reality hates them, sort of like HITLERS JEWS.
The general consensus is that the election was lost when Biden didn't announce up front at the start of 2024 that he would not seek re-election, thereby wasting half a year that could instead have been used to run a real primary and/or construct a more comprehensive image for Harris. I dont post on Threads anymore which kind of solved the problem of the really "blue-maga-brained" who would deny this part of it.
When people say Harris ran a "perfect" campaign, they mean that given the lot she inherited, which was, "It's July 2024. Youre the candidate, go!" as you know they are not referring to the whole collapsing pile of mashed potatoes that was on top of.
If you want to talk about mistakes for Harris between July 2024 and Nov 2024, I already know you'd include the Liz Cheney thing, but what else? For me, the election was lost when she was asked directly what she'd do differently from Joe Biden and she said, "nothing". That was breathtaking because Joe BIden's approval numbers for valid or invalid reasons were in the toilet. If you want to argue against the "perfect campaign" narrative why not name some specific steps you think Harris could have taken to increase her chances? (because the results made it look like wow, there was never any chance, it was hopeless from the start).
Tony Blinkin and Biden need dragging. If Bidens top advisers felt he couldn't withstand the rigors of campaigning because of age, diminished abilities etc they should've done this much sooner to either allow for a primary or give Harris more time.
>> "For me, the election was lost when she was asked directly what she'd do differently from Joe Biden and she said, "nothing"." <<
Yeah. It's easy to say what should have been done when you get to use hindsight, but I really wish (in hindsight) that her answer had been more "The job of the VP is to support the Pres. To, in private, give him honest, candid advice and argue strongly when you disagree with him, then publicly support and push for whatever decision they have made. And as a *candidate*, I'm here to lay out what I will do as President. Some of which will differ from Joe and/or go further than he has. For example..."
A primary would have still produced, most likely, Kamala Harris as the candidate.
Excellent post, Oliver. The Democratic Party, as I've been saying for 30 years, has to go back to its roots. Progressive taxation, regulated business, entrenched pro-choice, sensible gun control, universal health care. We certainly don't need to be Republican-lite. And we need to find ways to make noise about our pro-worker, pro-people policies. Biden headed a little bit in that direction, though he still tried too hard to be bipartisan.
I don't think in terms of policies and platform that the Dems have move far from that root. What's lacking is the fortitude and humility/patriotism.
Dems need to have the backbone to stand up and fight, and the old guard needs to stop seeing themselves as personally key to success.
Great post, Oliver. We have to get the right message…everywhere. Not just MSNBC.
What liberal media do u speak of OW? Dems can't get big media platformed on CABLE/OVER AIR TV or the AM RADIO 📻 DIAL. Musk/Zuckerberg own XITTER/FB both are in the corner for Trump. MSM(NON FOX, RW 📻) sane washing of trumpism & have GOP FRIENDLY corp ownership now. Niche media is fine except Republicans media success the last 40yrs has come in the form of LIMBAUGH AND HIS CLONES & FOX NEWS, EVERYTHING else from BREITBART to NEWSMAX to JOE ROGAN piggy backed on their success..
To frame unfettered support for the democrats as “MAGA” is not only ridiculous, it’s also offensive. As a trans woman, I HAVE TO support democrats no matter what since now, because of the REAL MAGA, my right to simply exist is in real danger. Trump won because 70 million Americans were more energized about their hatred of immigrants, women and trans people. It’s pretty simple. A woman ran twice against Trump and lost each time. Republicans ran a campaign of fear, misinformation and misogyny. We fight that first, by not comparing the ones that supported democratic values most with MAGA. It’s just lazy writing, and it stinks of clickbait.
That's unfortunate and true. Another click bait article from a SHYTE poster.
Exactly people saw what happened on January 6 people saw what Trump did or didn't do during the COVID virus 🦠 of 2020, people have a GENERAL, people know who he is for all to see since 2015/2016 even if the general public doesn't spend as much time in social media as we do. Nothing was a really a deal breaker. Had trump and McConnell passed a 2nd stimulus bill in autumn of 2020 we have had 12yrs of Donald Trump & no democracy left.
So what is your solution or some possible solutions? I think democracy lovers are looking for a blueprint or strategy that we can follow. Are there any leaders in the Democratic Party we should be gathering around?
And stop with the small-ball shit and stilted coffeehouse jargon (I will strangle the next person to use 'center' as a verb outside the context of carpentry).
One does not respond to a propaganda barrage about impending doom by meeping about the transformative power of targeted tax credits. One does not respond to the very real effects of inflation by getting all wound around the axle prattling about the price of eggs. You go where the pain is--housing--and goafter who's responsible--Wall Street speculators gobbling up the supply.
Say,..'Get Wall Street off My Street', with legislation to shut that shit down (See: Sen. Merkley).
Agreed. You go no-holds-barred, no-words-minced directly at the Republicans. You call them on their shit clearly, forcefully, relentlessly.
Every Democrat who gets within 20 feet of a microphone should be pushing the "they're fucking you over" message. Ever campaign ad should be blunt in its language and pointed in its message.
Enough pussy footing around or being fearful that the Republicans and media are going to be shocked, shocked at your uncivility.
Oliver has frequently pointed to Democratic leaders like AOC and Maxwell Frost, who communicate effectively with the voting public and support meaningful legislation.
Yup. AOC, Frost, Raskin, Schact...
The problem is white supremacy, Oliver. No amount of Democratic Party messaging or organization is going to overcome that, especially if you won't say it out loud.
Harris could have said I was the AG of CA, before becoming VP. I will follow Us and International laws as the President of the US.
Harris came out of the gate and was embraced with a huge sum of individual donations!. There was little risk at that point, she could have sworn off PAC money. She did not. One month before the election Open Secrets reported her biggest donor was Raytheon the defense contractor.
I see that the Democratic Party has problems, big ones on the grass roots organization level and ignoring why so many democrats just didn’t vote is like hiding the elephant in the room. Abortion and women’s rights to their own bodies alone should have won the election. That issue won through grass roots on the state constitution level when people were willing to do the work, we left the issue on the curb.
The reliance on boomers and gen X to fix everything and whining when they fail is a useless strategy in the party. Pushing for a third party only makes things worse. Younger voters can’t just sit back and direct the party from social media. The point is to win and sadly the refusal to come together and fight together, failure to convince voters from the ground up that we can win common battles we all do agree on and most of America can agree on is the problem in my opinion.
We failed on messaging on Ukraine and the very real threat of Putin against the world going forward. We failed to single out BiBi and his cronies and their genocidal tactics against Gaza and had factions blaming Israel as a whole which was a mistake. In trying to hold the party together we ended up with weaker messages and no real solutions being pounded out. The right did name leaders names, we know MAGA will support Bibi, no matter what and use him as proxy to kill Muslims they find no use for. We know MAGA will cut off Ukraine and do its best to give Putin what ever lands he wants. MAGA was clear with who, what and how.
Changing the party, finding a common voice to win elections and having a strategy once we win has to start now. Get active within the party, work on naming the common enemies and solutions to defeat them. Hammer it out within the party, not the sidelines with varying causes. Communication was fractured, not missing. We are a team during elections or we lose.
Lastly, we don’t have a landslide majority in congress and neither do they, bipartisanship right now is the way forward in bits and pieces. We have to pick the winning ones and be clear where the line we won’t cross is until we do have a big majority on the local, state and federal level.
Or maybe there WAS ‘meddling’…? Like in 2000, 2016 and… 🤷♀️ But it would be unseemly to ask for a forensic audit(?) of EVEN the swing states… oh nevermind best for the country to just move on
Our party leaders should be shouting from the rooftops everyday! Are we perfect? No. Are we better than a cult brought together by hate, lies and propaganda funded by extremists and billionaires??? Absolutely! So our elected officials need to shout it from the mountain tops. Maga is not about freedom or Jesus. It's simply a well planned power grab.
Like the R the D party is led by people who should have retired years ago.
I disagree in calling faltering Democratic policies and people "Blue MAGA". Democrats are nowhere near behaving like that fanatical cult. However, all your other points made are quite correct. If we are to offset Republican's truly failed policies we need a robust media counter- influence; a decidedly liberal, not compromised, stand on issues that benefit all people, not just oligarchs; and leadership that is boldly progressive and does not apologize for it.