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The data [from Pew] suggests that the progressive vision of winning a presidential election simply by mobilizing strong support from Democratic constituencies simply did not materialize for Mr. Biden.
Wtf did I just read? The idea is to mobilize strong support from Democratic constituencies by running a progressive candidate who supports progressive causes. Obviously, if you run a right-winger like Biden, he’ll draw more support from the right and fail to mobilize the left. Are they trying to pretend that Biden was a progressive or something? What an incredible take.
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For that evidence they’d need to look to Congressional downballot races which are more fluid and open to experimentation. The evidence of progressive voter mobilization doesn’t show up there either.
I disagree. This is from the 2020 election:
Funny enough, the two Florida democrats who lost in blue districts also specifically distanced themselves from a ballot measure to raise the minimum wage on the basis that it was too progressive - both they and Biden lost in Florida while the ballot measure passed.
Progressive policies are broadly popular. Running on things that are popular tend to get you more votes. People like it when you do stuff for them.
The only evidence I’ve seen to the contrary is a NYT opinion piece that cites centrist think tanks and random people’s opinions. I didn’t see anything in there that looked reliable or compelling.
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Thank you for filtering out the irrelevant information and editorializing in the opinion piece.
I’ll concede that there is some evidence to support your position, but I would still argue against it. Much of the data used in these studies comes from a different political landscape than what we’re dealing with today. There are many studies that show increasing political polarization over time, and I would argue that that reduces the fluidity of voter choices. Republican voters now are less likely to vote for a Democrat now than they were in the 90’s, when, for example, Bill Clinton won Louisiana and Tennessee. I would also point out that this conventional wisdom failed to account for Trump’s 2016 victory and the fact that the Republican party remains strong despite becoming increasingly extremist.
I don’t have time to read through all of your studies but I did read through the first. Something I found notable, which I expected, was that while the study found that extremism was correlated with general election losses in both parties, the effect was significantly more pronounced in the Republican party. This makes the successful rise of right-wing extremism even less coherent with your point of view. But from my perspective, it makes perfect sense - in the current polarized environment, mobilizing one’s own base is more effective than appealing to the center, so much so that even if you’re promoting broadly unpopular policies, it can still win against someone who has failed to adapt.
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Of which they’ll get 0
I’m not so sure. I think it’s established that the percentage of Republicans who won’t vote for Trump is a lot higher than the percentage that will admit to it in front of their peers.
All we need is a few %, low single digits.
Your uncertainty doesn’t have bearing here. There is a preponderance of evidence showing that since 2016 (and before), there number of ‘swing’ voters has diminished to basically nothing.
Neither Trump nor Biden are actually running against each other , because no voters are going to be converted from one side to the other.
They are both running against “the couch”, in that whoever can convince enough of their voters that the election is worth showing up for, will win.
Also, if you were a Republican, why wouldn’t you vote for Trump? He delivered, in one way or another, on all the major policy goals of the base. For the Republican agenda, he’s been the most effective president since Reagan.
Bidens camp is in a fever dream with this strategy. And I agree with the article. it is their strategy.
They are both running against “the couch”, in that whoever can convince enough of their voters that the election is worth showing up for, will win.
Yep, which is why we see a massive number of people around here who are actively trying to depress Democratic turnout by complaining about Biden and the Dems. A whole bunch of alleged leftists really don’t seem like they mind another Trump presidency since they aren’t, after all, trying to convince voters to vote against that.
Bidens camp is in a fever dream with this strategy.
Oh. Huh. Imagine that.
Also, if you were a Republican, why wouldn’t you vote for Trump? He delivered, in one way or another, on all the major policy goals of the base.
You fucking what? He got three SCOTUS justices and tax breaks for billionaires and…?
He tanked the economy and killed over a million with his handling of COVID, the wall didn’t get built, Mexico didn’t pay for any of the repairs that did, Hillary has -34 felonies to her name, his trade war with China didn’t bring back manufacturing, Russia was emboldened by his term, American global superiority was damaged by his garbage foreign policy, fossil fuel usage is continuing to decline in favor of renewables…
So other than showing bigoted racists that it’s okay to be a loudmouth bigoted racist in public (which I will admit is a Republican goal) what “major policy goals” did he actually achieve?
For the Republican agenda, he’s been the most effective president since Reagan
Yeah, I would argue that he’s the least effective GOP president since Regan.
He tanked the economy and killed over a million with his handling of COVID, the wall didn’t get built, Mexico didn’t pay for any of the repairs that did, Hillary has -34 felonies to her name, his trade war with China didn’t bring back manufacturing, Russia was emboldened by his term, American global superiority was damaged by his garbage foreign policy, fossil fuel usage is continuing to decline in favor of renewables…
I agree with all that. But you and I don’t live in the same world that Republican voters do. They litterally live in a completly different media and ‘story of history’ landscape. You obviously do, and should, despise all of the things that Trump did while he was president. But there is no denying that these were the things that Republican voters wanted him to do. And he gets to blame any failures on Democrats or the deep state or whatever other kookie bullshit they come up with.
You can and should hate the Republican agenda, but you shouldn’t put blinders on to suggest that Trump didn’t pursue it aggressively, and actually accomplish much of it. He got tax cuts for billionaires. He got the Supreme Court, and thus Roe. He at least tried to do almost all of the things he said he would do. You should disagree with all of those things, but you are not a Republican voter. Neither am I. But we should be clear headed about what Republican voters want, especially considering how horrible it all is.
