What's another key to defeating Trumpism in the elections to come? Rebrand progressive policies as the true populism that a majority of Americans are craving -- and then deliver on those policies.
Excellent points - and I would add that "progressive" feels a lot like - dare I say it - "woke." One could even take a step further and say that "populist" sounds like "popular" (even though its root is related to "people").
Language matters, and the nuances and subtleties matter. A lot.
Another excellent article by Tristan Snell on the need to embrace, champion, and rebrand progressive policies as true populism to combat the fake populism of the GOP.
Faux populism is how Donald Trump took over the GOP and developed a following of very confused, gaslight Americans. I’ve been screaming for years that the Democratic Party should embrace progressive policies, which have been shunned by the establishment, corporate funded party apparatus.
Progressive policies are supported by the majority of Americans and, ironically, even red-state voters support them. You can see the enthusiasm and support for the true progressives in the Dem. Party such as Bernie and AOC. If branded properly, Bernie’s “political revolution” that we all need can come to fruition.
Mr. Snell’s last two articles should serve as the Democratic Bible and instructional manual going forward, to unite the country and end the Extreme Right’s stranglehold on the political system.
You are dead on, Tristan, and thanks for subscribing. We have nothing for which to vote. Nothing is the basis of the Democratic Platform. No one remembers the 2024 Democratic Platform. It was an unorganized list of platitudes waxed on, waxed off. I tried to give the DNC my suggestions. No one answers the phone. If I just had something to vote for. Throw me something, Mister.
I stopped donating to the DNC. Their messaging is very weak. I’m not on other social media. I don’t have time. The DNC Substack, the Blue Print, is so weak. They need Pete Buttigieg on board giving daily press briefings and rebuttals to the threats and lies from the other side. Pete is on Substack also.
This is already an established "party" [in New York] - but normally doesn't actually field candidates - just vets and endorses candidates and appears as a separate line on our ballots; usually that means it's just a repeat of the Democratic line. I always make a point of voting for the Democratic candidates on the WFP line. Makes me feel like I'm truly voting FOR something 🙂
"Why can progressive policies prevail in those states but progressive candidates cannot?"
Well ALLRIGHTYTHEN! Now, this right *here* is the very crux, is it not?
My very insightful answer follows.
A) Progressive policies are targeted: "Medicare saved Grandmaw." "Federal funding for the research labs at UAB brought in high-paying jobs and really boosted Birmingham's economy and tax base."
B) Progressive candidates are mushy bags of everything for everybody. They can't alienate anybody because the survey last month said that group represented 1.45% of the voters in my district and I've been brainwashed into believing that people vote in lock-step with what I perceive as their identity group. I also go high when they go low. Because I'm an arrogant twit. My opponent can blurt out "Trans People gonna rape your momma and steal your teevee!" and it sticks.
It's almost CW now that Biden shouldn't have run for a second term. But, in 2024, this wasn't the view of the most knowledgeable and experienced observers, who said that the resulting primary would have been a divisive mess, as a move to dump Harris would have been inevitable and it would have alienated black (and other) voters.
They were right. The core reason is that the Bernie/Hillary split in the Democratic party still exists, and Biden was the only candidate who more or less successfully bridged it. It's why he got the nomination in 2020, and why he decided he had to run in 2024. Much was made of his SC win in 2020. Less noticed was that he beat Bernie in the upper midwest, where Bernie had beaten Hillary in 2016. "We love Bernie, but we trust Biden, and he's more electable" said an Amalgamated Transit Union member explaining his union shifting its 2016 endorsement of Bernie to Biden.
And they were right to trust him. The first sitting President to walk a picket line. On You Tube, search "nabtu biden endorsement", watch that. NABTU's president, Sean McGarvey, eviserates Trump, then credits Biden with a golden age for his members, a sign of things to come for all working people. Doubling manufacturing construction (now declining) will do that. My own union, IUOE, had record membership and manhours under Biden.
But note the number of views. Last I looked, 5k. That's it. WTAF happened? I believe a split Democratic party didn't get behind Biden's economically populist program, and that's the real reason it lost. The "progessive" Hiliary wing cannot win a governing majority, and an economically populist party can. It must recognize this, and stop talking about "good" and "bad" billionaires as the new head of the DNC just did. Billionaires are a bad thing, period.
And stop lionizing the President responsible for "foaming the runway" for the "too big to jail" megabanks. The one Cornel West called "a Rockefeller Republican in blackface". You know the one.
The American Populist Party.....it has a nice fresh feel. It takes it TO the people, I think you've developed a great idea. Hopefully the dems will listen and adopt this new way of thinking. Great post, thanks Tristan 🙏💙
If one's hung up on what to call what once was known as just the Democrat Party, now called the Legacy Democratic Party, although there's nothing democratic about it, the party of FDR, HST, Adlai Stevenson, JFK, LBJ, then don't call it anything, just campaign, post, write, comment, petition, speak, teach about the issues & let Media & the Republicans call it. If the message & messenger ring true, the name won't matter.
democracy: dem prefix is from Greek “of the people”, yet we are actually living in capitalocracy, of the money. in 100 days over 142 executive orders to upend democracy, and over 725 lies. i understand the concerns re: language, yet progress or regress. Maria Ressa interview on Jon Stewart’s Weekly podcast was explicit with steps to forward democracy. 🤞🏼🤞🏼🤞🏼🤞🏼 the democrats need to be of and for the people, rather than this split mode with republican leaning policies and speeches.
The "Right" has co-opted or made pejorative a number of words/expressions: woke, liberal, progressive, leftist, liberty, patriot, "right", for example. Trump is a genius at talking first about something - like election integrity - first. He is scoffed at and attacked, at first. But Trump keeps hammering it and, eventually, RW media and even MSM pick up on it and the lie becomes normal. RW media disinformation is inordinately powerful. We have nothing that matches it. But we're a lot closer to winning elections - if there are even elections - than is stated.
populism carries such a stigma in my view, akin to mob rule. What’s wrong with “liberal”? That’s who most of us Democrats are and we’ve allowed media to turn that fine word into a slur.
Excellent points - and I would add that "progressive" feels a lot like - dare I say it - "woke." One could even take a step further and say that "populist" sounds like "popular" (even though its root is related to "people").
Language matters, and the nuances and subtleties matter. A lot.
Another excellent article by Tristan Snell on the need to embrace, champion, and rebrand progressive policies as true populism to combat the fake populism of the GOP.
Faux populism is how Donald Trump took over the GOP and developed a following of very confused, gaslight Americans. I’ve been screaming for years that the Democratic Party should embrace progressive policies, which have been shunned by the establishment, corporate funded party apparatus.
Progressive policies are supported by the majority of Americans and, ironically, even red-state voters support them. You can see the enthusiasm and support for the true progressives in the Dem. Party such as Bernie and AOC. If branded properly, Bernie’s “political revolution” that we all need can come to fruition.
Mr. Snell’s last two articles should serve as the Democratic Bible and instructional manual going forward, to unite the country and end the Extreme Right’s stranglehold on the political system.
You are dead on, Tristan, and thanks for subscribing. We have nothing for which to vote. Nothing is the basis of the Democratic Platform. No one remembers the 2024 Democratic Platform. It was an unorganized list of platitudes waxed on, waxed off. I tried to give the DNC my suggestions. No one answers the phone. If I just had something to vote for. Throw me something, Mister.
https://hotbuttons.substack.com/p/a-just-movement?r=3m1bs
I stopped donating to the DNC. Their messaging is very weak. I’m not on other social media. I don’t have time. The DNC Substack, the Blue Print, is so weak. They need Pete Buttigieg on board giving daily press briefings and rebuttals to the threats and lies from the other side. Pete is on Substack also.
"Working Families Party" please!
This is already an established "party" [in New York] - but normally doesn't actually field candidates - just vets and endorses candidates and appears as a separate line on our ballots; usually that means it's just a repeat of the Democratic line. I always make a point of voting for the Democratic candidates on the WFP line. Makes me feel like I'm truly voting FOR something 🙂
"Why can progressive policies prevail in those states but progressive candidates cannot?"
Well ALLRIGHTYTHEN! Now, this right *here* is the very crux, is it not?
My very insightful answer follows.
A) Progressive policies are targeted: "Medicare saved Grandmaw." "Federal funding for the research labs at UAB brought in high-paying jobs and really boosted Birmingham's economy and tax base."
B) Progressive candidates are mushy bags of everything for everybody. They can't alienate anybody because the survey last month said that group represented 1.45% of the voters in my district and I've been brainwashed into believing that people vote in lock-step with what I perceive as their identity group. I also go high when they go low. Because I'm an arrogant twit. My opponent can blurt out "Trans People gonna rape your momma and steal your teevee!" and it sticks.
Get it?
It's almost CW now that Biden shouldn't have run for a second term. But, in 2024, this wasn't the view of the most knowledgeable and experienced observers, who said that the resulting primary would have been a divisive mess, as a move to dump Harris would have been inevitable and it would have alienated black (and other) voters.
They were right. The core reason is that the Bernie/Hillary split in the Democratic party still exists, and Biden was the only candidate who more or less successfully bridged it. It's why he got the nomination in 2020, and why he decided he had to run in 2024. Much was made of his SC win in 2020. Less noticed was that he beat Bernie in the upper midwest, where Bernie had beaten Hillary in 2016. "We love Bernie, but we trust Biden, and he's more electable" said an Amalgamated Transit Union member explaining his union shifting its 2016 endorsement of Bernie to Biden.
And they were right to trust him. The first sitting President to walk a picket line. On You Tube, search "nabtu biden endorsement", watch that. NABTU's president, Sean McGarvey, eviserates Trump, then credits Biden with a golden age for his members, a sign of things to come for all working people. Doubling manufacturing construction (now declining) will do that. My own union, IUOE, had record membership and manhours under Biden.
But note the number of views. Last I looked, 5k. That's it. WTAF happened? I believe a split Democratic party didn't get behind Biden's economically populist program, and that's the real reason it lost. The "progessive" Hiliary wing cannot win a governing majority, and an economically populist party can. It must recognize this, and stop talking about "good" and "bad" billionaires as the new head of the DNC just did. Billionaires are a bad thing, period.
And stop lionizing the President responsible for "foaming the runway" for the "too big to jail" megabanks. The one Cornel West called "a Rockefeller Republican in blackface". You know the one.
Yes Tristan, why not reframe, rebrand FDR’s 1944 ‘ Economic Bill of Rights’ into a bold, New Democratic Party…
We’re here for the 80%
The American Populist Party.....it has a nice fresh feel. It takes it TO the people, I think you've developed a great idea. Hopefully the dems will listen and adopt this new way of thinking. Great post, thanks Tristan 🙏💙
If one's hung up on what to call what once was known as just the Democrat Party, now called the Legacy Democratic Party, although there's nothing democratic about it, the party of FDR, HST, Adlai Stevenson, JFK, LBJ, then don't call it anything, just campaign, post, write, comment, petition, speak, teach about the issues & let Media & the Republicans call it. If the message & messenger ring true, the name won't matter.
democracy: dem prefix is from Greek “of the people”, yet we are actually living in capitalocracy, of the money. in 100 days over 142 executive orders to upend democracy, and over 725 lies. i understand the concerns re: language, yet progress or regress. Maria Ressa interview on Jon Stewart’s Weekly podcast was explicit with steps to forward democracy. 🤞🏼🤞🏼🤞🏼🤞🏼 the democrats need to be of and for the people, rather than this split mode with republican leaning policies and speeches.
Since the way we do our politics now is zero-sum, the Democrats could be the cooperative party.
https://open.substack.com/pub/quartzevelyn/p/the-public-wants-a-reckoning-not?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=dx77b relates to our discussion today
I've been saying that all along. Look up Elizabeth Mary lease she is a populist candidate in the Golden age.
The "Right" has co-opted or made pejorative a number of words/expressions: woke, liberal, progressive, leftist, liberty, patriot, "right", for example. Trump is a genius at talking first about something - like election integrity - first. He is scoffed at and attacked, at first. But Trump keeps hammering it and, eventually, RW media and even MSM pick up on it and the lie becomes normal. RW media disinformation is inordinately powerful. We have nothing that matches it. But we're a lot closer to winning elections - if there are even elections - than is stated.
populism carries such a stigma in my view, akin to mob rule. What’s wrong with “liberal”? That’s who most of us Democrats are and we’ve allowed media to turn that fine word into a slur.
Gay people reclaimed "queer" through pure sass. I want to reclaim "liberal".