“We’re losing our damn minds”: James Carville unloads on the Democratic Party

By artappraiser on Fri, 02/07/2020 - 9:44pm |

James Carville spitting fire: "Here’s another stupid thing: Dem talking about free college tuition.... people all over this country worked their way through school, sent their kids to school, paid off student loans. They don’t want to hear this shit." https://t.co/uJqgcMHtH2
— John Noonan (@noonanjo) February 7, 2020

URL:

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2020/2/7/21123518/trump-2020-election-democratic-party-james-carville

5576 reads

Comments

“Eighteen percent of the population controls 52 Senate seats,” Carville said. “We’ve got to be a majoritarian party. The urban core is not gonna get it done. What we need is power! Do you understand? That’s what this is about.”

Give me an example of what you mean by distractions.

James Carville

We have candidates on the debate stage talking about open borders and decriminalizing illegal immigration. They’re talking about doing away with nuclear energy and fracking. You’ve got Bernie Sanders talking about letting criminals and terrorists vote from jail cells. It doesn’t matter what you think about any of that, or if there are good arguments — talking about that is not how you win a national election. It’s not how you become a majoritarian party.

For fuck’s sake, we’ve got Trump at Davos talking about cutting Medicare and no one in the party has the sense to plaster a picture of him up there sucking up to the global elites, talking about cutting taxes for them while he’s talking about cutting Medicare back home. Jesus, this is so obvious and so easy and I don’t see any of the candidates taking advantage of it....

Are we really sure Sanders can’t win?

James Carville

Who the hell knows? But here’s what I do know: Sanders might get 280 electoral votes and win the presidency and maybe we keep the House. But there’s no chance in hell we’ll ever win the Senate with Sanders at the top of the party defining it for the public. Eighteen percent of the country elects more than half of our senators. That’s the deal, fair or not.

So long as [Mitch] McConnell runs the Senate, it’s game over. There’s no chance we’ll change the courts, and nothing will happen, and he’ll just be sitting up there screaming in the microphone about the revolution.

The purpose of a political party is to acquire power. All right? Without power, nothing matters.

by artappraiser on Fri, 02/07/2020 - 9:55pm

Carville is a belligerent and aggressive partisan. I like that about him, the way he takes the fight right to the republicans. But I never forget who he is. He made these same arguments in the 08 primary when he supported Hillary. Who knows, Hillary might have won if she was the nominee, but she wasn't. She didn't win the primary and Obama did win the general. He made these arguments in 16 and Hillary didn't win. His track record making predictions isn't all that great.

by ocean-kat on Fri, 02/07/2020 - 10:09pm

Obama won and he pulled up all the grassroots organizations and focused on getting Obama re-elected. We got whacked in 2010 & 2014 Senate midterms and lost 2 more in 2018 while rolling the House. Here's the Senate picture for 2020 - dream how we pick up more than 1 of those red States (while not losing Alabama). We got hammered in healthcare in 2010 and ever since, but what's our big policy play for 2020? "Medicare 4 All"!!! Smart, guys. By 2052 they'll be ours, I can feel it coming.

Your Bayesian calculation the other day was spot on - a high percentage of a small minority is still much less than a decent percentage of a large majority.And that same logic applies here - in this case, the # of low-population states is that majority, the Holy Grail, while our GOTV focuses on the minorities in highly populated states that don't elect any more Senators.

by PeraclesPlease on Fri, 02/07/2020 - 10:57pm

Another version of the majority meme:

In order to pander to a tiny portion of Americans who are really into woke stuff, the Democrats keep arguing every policy they're doing will help minorities more who need it most. But this reduces white Americans support for these policies https://t.co/X4ZtzTXQCY
— Zaid Jilani (@ZaidJilani) February 8, 2020

Who actually needs whatever policy you can name most, someone in need. What % of what group is irrelevant. If you're someone who benefits from Social Security to stay above poverty line, it doesn't matter how many people who look like you need it.
— Zaid Jilani (@ZaidJilani) February 8, 2020

Goal of comprehensive policymaking is to address everyone's needs not draw a circle around one group and treat them like the most important subgroup for political reasons
— Zaid Jilani (@ZaidJilani) February 8, 2020

There is really no reason to do this other than for Democrats to try and curry favor with a tiny slice of elite liberals who are motivated more by expiating white guilt than helping people
— Zaid Jilani (@ZaidJilani) February 8, 2020

People experience life as individuals not groups. Democrats/liberals understand this when they say we shouldn't racially generalize about things like welfare recipients or criminal offenders but they forgot it all once critical theory took over their elite class
— Zaid Jilani (@ZaidJilani) February 8, 2020

by artappraiser on Fri, 02/07/2020 - 10:39pm

more along the lines of People experience life as individuals not groups.

the intellectual dark web & social justice warriors are the same.

> they blast perceived enemies & biases, but ultimately are undermined by in-group battles for power
> they talk about outgroup sociopathy, but rarely deal with one another as human beings
— uberfeminist (@uberfeminist) February 8, 2020

social justice warriors = pedantic aspergers

intellectual dark web = pedantic aspergers, but this time right wing
— uberfeminist (@uberfeminist) February 8, 2020

by artappraiser on Sat, 02/08/2020 - 5:14pm

We're playing checkers, they're playing smashball.

(yeah, Weinstein may be "Democrat" but it's how the GOP functions)

https://digbysblog.net/2020/02/defeating-bullies-lessons-from-fighting-w...

by PeraclesPlease on Fri, 02/07/2020 - 11:41pm

Steyer: how to beat Trump?

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/tom-steyer-democrati...

by PeraclesPlease on Sat, 02/08/2020 - 6:44am

Yeah, how to beat Trump is a good and important question. But I've seen no evidence anyone knows the answer. If we had that answer Carter would have won a second term, Mondale and Dukakis would have won, Gore and Kerry would have won. All of them were establishment picks to one degree or another. All of them were considered the safe choice. I'm not saying we should take a chance on a left candidate instead of the moderate. I'm saying no one really knows.

by ocean-kat on Sat, 02/08/2020 - 3:38pm

Clinton won 1st time because of Perot, maybe 2nd time as well (he got roughly same as Dole + Perot, but on an electoral basis may have been the clincher). Republicans have been using some similar tricks for a while now - would think we could counter, but we're slow learners. Shady stuff in Ohio for Kerry, shady in FL for Gore, shady in PA, MI, WI and MN for Hillary. But these aren't the tiny states choosing the Senate. I dunno what the message is, but pretty sure "white people don't count" isn't it.

by PeraclesPlease on Sat, 02/08/2020 - 4:32pm

Well here you go. Thank god for Carville, he's figured it out. I was so wrong when I said no one knows how to beat Trump. Carville know not only how to win over 400 electoral votes but 55 votes in the senate. I'd like to introduce to you, the next president of the United States, Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO).

by ocean-kat on Sat, 02/08/2020 - 8:28pm

Democrats need to spend less time attacking Trump’s character and his ego, and more time going after the horrific things he’s actually doing as president.

by PeraclesPlease on Sun, 02/09/2020 - 1:08am

FWIW, it appears Bloomberg and Bloomberg's advisors believe in doing just the opposite of that:

Our country has a rich history of presidents who respected the power, decorum, and influence of their office.

Unfortunately, that rich history ended the day Trump became president. pic.twitter.com/3QEncsTiNA
— Mike Bloomberg (@MikeBloomberg) February 9, 2020

I have a small suspicion that he might be doing that, spending all that money on Trump character attacks allover the place, so that the other candidates don't have to? But I could absolutely be wrong about that. Why? Cause Bloomberg is egotisical in a much different way than Trump, he likes to prove that he is an excellent manager who can solve any problem, that's what he gets off on. The real stable genius thing, wants to be in the history books as that but also just enjoys doing it. This whole thing can err on the side of dictatorial, though.

Edit to add, look at his slogan on the Twitter home page: WE WILL GET IT DONE. Whatever it is. The trains WILL run on time.

by artappraiser on Sun, 02/09/2020 - 6:40pm

How to talk to Gen-Z / millennials for social s curity recipients (rather than "well, we're going to lose anyway...")

Every DC think tank panel ever pic.twitter.com/KRUYtYNmzC
— Allegra Harpootlian (@ally_harp) February 8, 2020

by PeraclesPlease on Sun, 02/09/2020 - 5:23pm

So is this kid an influencer or not? And what pronoun(s) does he they prefer to use?

Whatever the case, for some reason, methinks he needs to be careful about trusting liberal populist boomers.

by artappraiser on Sun, 02/09/2020 - 6:00pm

Food fight! Two old guys!

James Carville fires back after Bernie Sanders calls him a "political hack": "At least I'm not a communist" https://t.co/xdp2UaPc57 pic.twitter.com/MNgrNYy5Mg
— CNN Politics (@CNNPolitics) February 14, 2020

by artappraiser on Fri, 02/14/2020 - 1:14am

“We’re losing our damn minds”: James Carville unloads on the Democratic Party

Comments

Sections

Bloggers