What have you read that helps you understand the 2024 Election?
Convened by Eli Pariser
This doc is now closed for additions because all the takes have been taken and the election is now completely understood (just kidding, but I can’t curate it well any longer and it’s a pretty good sampling.) Thanks to everyone who participated!
Where Does This Leave Democrats?
Democrats Had a Theory of the Election. They Were Wrong
Spanberger Criticizes Democrats’ Strategy in Caucus Call
The Real Reason Harris and the Democrats Were Always Doomed
Silicon Valley, the New Lobbying Monster
Let’s Talk About the White Woman Problem
Sam Lessin Election Reflections
Richard Rorty’s prescient warnings for the American left (2019)
Democrats Walked into a Trap that Republicans Set for Them (2024)
Forget “Why?” It’s time to get back to work (2016)
A Practical Program for Resisting a Trump Second Term (2024)
Trump Offered Men Something That Democrats Never Could
Uniform Swing and Thermostatic Politics
You Did This to Yourselves, Democrats
Time for Democrats to Abandon the Mainstream Media (2024)
The Long Obama Era is Over (2024)
I Blame the Media (2024)
Why Does No One Understand the Real Reason Trump Won? (2024)
Thoughts on the Day After (2024)
The Senator Warning Democrats of a Crisis Unfolding Beneath Their Noses (2024)
Graph on global trend against incumbents (2024)
Our mistake was to think we live in a better country than we do (2024)
How Trump won – and what it means for the world
The story that is about to be pushed hard is that Kamala Harris lost because she was too far left.
Why Democrats Won’t Build Their Own Joe Rogan (2024)
Democrats Need to Fundamentally Rethink Everything (2024)
Voters to Elites: Do You See Me Now? (2024)
Five Thought Experiments Concerning the Underlying Disease
How Trump Won: Young Men's Red Wave, the Blue-City Flop, and the Incumbency Graveyard
Democrats Could Have Won. Our Excuses Mask a Devastating Reality.
Why Democratic funders don’t fund media
What’s Wrong With the Economy? It’s You, Not the Data (April 2024)
I Study Guys Like Trump. There’s a Reason They Keep Winning.
A New Era Dawns: America’s Tech Bros Now Strut Their Stuff in the Corridors of Power
Where to find hope if Trump wins
Places ravaged by opioids are giving Republicans the upper hand
The Cost of Living Crisis Explains Everything
A tale of two jets: The old media grapples with its limits
Poland Shows That Autocracy Is Not Inevitable
The Way Harris Lost Will Be Her Legacy
The Enshittification of Democracy
Democratic Turnout Plummeted in 2024, but Only in Safe States
Postmortem-Palooza: Ten Genres of Takes of Why We Lost to Trump
The Authoritarian Playbook for 2025
Ten Arguments for Deleting Your Social Media Accounts Right Now (2018)
Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right (2016)
10 ways to be prepared and grounded now that Trump has won
A new wave of movements against Trumpism is coming
A Winning Strategy is Hidden in these 4 Theories of Harris’ Loss
Inside the Republican False Flag Effort to Turn Off Kamala Harris Voters
Democrats Need to Reclaim Reality from the Right Wing Disinformation Machine
No, Ezra Klein, Non-profit leaders are not Responsible for the 2024 Election
Is This What Democracy Looks Like?
Why is it so much harder for us than it is for them?
How Democrats won in districts Trump carried
Michigan Muslim Voters Voted for Jill Stein followed by Donald Trump
New Exit Polls Reveal Surprising Key Issue in Election Outcome
The Electoral Problem for Democrats: It’s the Neoliberalism Stupid
An Empty Internet Gave Us Tradwives and Trump
EP note: Need to update this
Economic/Material Factors:
1. Post-pandemic economic anxiety and inflation, despite good overall economic numbers[a]
2. Housing affordability crisis and high cost of living
3. Perception of economy being bad, even when metrics were positive
4. Lingering effects of deindustrialization and globalization hurting working class communities
Media/Information Environment:
5. Dominance of right-wing media ecosystem (Fox News, Sinclair, talk radio, etc.) in setting news agenda
6. Social media platforms controlled by right-wing figures (especially Elon Musk's X)
7. Collapse of local news and mainstream media
8. Mainstream media's "both sides" approach and failure to adequately cover Trump's threats
9. Rise of influencer culture and political content on platforms like TikTok favoring the right
10. Social media silos increasingly create blue/red echo chambers with mutual hatred
11. Role of Russia with misinformation campaigns and social media influencers
Cultural/Identity Issues:
10. Backlash against "woke" politics and DEI initiatives
11. Crisis of masculinity and male alienation, especially among young men
12. Racial and gender-based anxiety about social change
13. Cultural conservatism, especially among Hispanic voters
14. Anti-immigrant sentiment[b]
Democratic Party/Campaign Issues:
15. Biden's late exit from the race hampering Harris's campaign
16. Harris's association with unpopular incumbent administration
17. Democrats' failure to effectively counter right-wing narratives / overreliance on traditional media (i.e. significant funding allocated to TV ads; median age of primetime viewers is now 65)
18. Party's perceived elitism and disconnect from working class voters
19. Over reliance on "defending democracy" messaging vs. offering positive vision
20. Focus on cultural issues over economic populism
Structural/Institutional:
21. Global anti-incumbent trend in post-pandemic era
22. "Thermostatic" voter reaction against Democratic governance
23. Collapse of post-WWII neoliberal consensus without clear alternative
24. Weakening of traditional democratic institutions
25. Growing distrust in government and expert authority
26. Inflation and bad economy[c][d]
Campaign Dynamics:
26. Trump's ability to deflect scandals and legal troubles
27. Effective use of grievance politics and cultural warfare
28. Superior right-wing ground game and voter mobilization
29. Trump's appeal as an "outsider" fighting the system
30. His ability to channel voters' anger and alienation
31. Republican ads demonizing transgender people - moving working class male voters
32. Jill Stein’s campaign
33. Elon Musk’s role in Pennsylvania
Policy Issues:
34. Biden Administration posture on ceasefire and Gaza and impact especially on youth voters
35. Muslim voters in Michigan voted for Jill Stein and Trump - Gaza issue
By: Ezra Klein
Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/07/opinion/ezra-klein-podcast-election.html
Contributed by: Eli Pariser (h/t Micah Sifry)
TL;DR (summary): Ezra argues that Democrats made a critical error in suppressing challenges to Biden and failing to address voters' real dissatisfaction with his administration, leading to Harris's defeat. He suggests that, like after Bush's 2004 win, this moment marks not necessarily a Republican realignment but possibly the end of the Obama coalition, requiring Democrats to build a new politics by engaging with new voices and places they've been avoiding, rather than retreating into contempt for Trump voters.
By: Lydia Polgreen and Tressie McMillan Cottom
Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/07/opinion/presidential-election-2024-democrats.html
Contributed by: Eli Pariser
TL;DR (summary): Tressie McMillan Cottom argues that Democrats misread the lessons of recent years, abandoning compelling storytelling about fundamental issues in favor of small tweaks, while also failing to effectively engage with both moral concerns of young voters and the economic realities of today's working class (largely women and people of color). She suggests that while the current moment is challenging, traditional demographic categories for understanding voters are crumbling, creating new opportunities for coalition-building, and reminds us that transformative change often seems impossible until it happens.
By: Sherrilyn Ifill
Link: https://sherrilyn.substack.com/p/why-are-we-here
Contributed by: Eli Pariser (h/t Micah Sifry)
TL;DR (summary): Sherrilyn Ifill argues that Trump's 2024 victory represents not a failure of electoral systems but rather America's continued compromise with white supremacy, which has been embedded in the nation's DNA since its founding. She suggests that we are entering another "nadir" period similar to post-Reconstruction, and while this will bring real dangers for marginalized people and democratic institutions, it must be met with institution-building and cross-racial coalition work, just as previous generations did during difficult periods.
By: Washington Post Website. 2020 audio recording reposted November 8, 2024
Contributed by: Talmage Cooley
TL:DR (summary): Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-Va.) criticizes Democrat party messaging strategy during a 2020 Democratic caucus call, saying the 2020 election "was a failure" for House Democrats due to preponderance of “woke” messaging that turned off middle-of-the-road voters. Democratic policies are not the problem as they poll well, Spanberger says, but she warns the judgmental tone of “woke” messaging turns off older and more traditional voters. The Washington Post reposted this audio November 8, 2024 as part of 2024 election analysis.
By: David Wallace-Wells
Contributed by: Eli Pariser
TL;DR (summary): David Wallace-Wells argues that beyond specific campaign issues, Democrats lost in 2024 because they had become the de facto establishment party over a generation of popular-vote dominance (winning 7 of 8 elections since 1992), making them vulnerable to anti-incumbent sentiment in a post-pandemic world where voters are increasingly rejecting those in power.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/10/14/silicon-valley-the-new-lobbying-monster
TL;DR: This New Yorker article details how Silicon Valley, led by political operative Chris Lehane, has transformed into a formidable political force by using massive spending and sophisticated campaign tactics to intimidate politicians, exemplified by the crypto industry's $170 million super PAC that helped defeat Katie Porter and influence other politicians' stances on crypto regulation. The article suggests this represents a broader shift in how tech approaches politics - moving from avoiding political engagement to actively wielding money and user bases as weapons to shape policy, raising questions about whether this represents healthy democratic participation or a concerning concentration of power among wealthy technologists.
By: Emily Amick, Emily in Your Phone
Contributed by: Alexandra Acker-Lyons
TL;DR (summary): “...we are actually living in a country of Karens all hiding in plain sight…We need to be better at talking to these women and the party needs to leave space for them to be targeted in a way that actually persuades them. This is work to be done by us, the white women who voted for Harris.”
By: Sam Lessin
Contributed by: Sarah Drinkwater
TL;DR: In a world of communication abundance rather than scarcity, Trump's strategy of flooding the zone with content[e], building a devoted core following, and being willing to iterate messaging repeatedly proved more effective than Harris's traditional, defensive approach of careful messaging and reliance on mainstream proxies - representing a fundamental misunderstanding by Democrats of how modern digital communication and community-building works.
By: Sean Illing
Contributed by: John Neffinger
TL;DR: Revisiting renowned pragmatist philosopher Richard Rorty’s 1998 warnings about how the American left lost its way and lost its connection with working people.
By: Farah Stockman
Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/16/opinion/trump-working-class-economy.html[f]
Contributed by: John Neffinger
TL;DR: Democrats lost the mantle of the party that looks out for the little guy by actually failing to defend working people against neoliberalism. Working people feel actively and legitimately betrayed.
By: Ben Rhodes
Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/08/opinion/republicans-democrats-trump.html
Contributed by: Anna Galland
TL;DR: “Many voters have come to associate democracy with globalization, corruption, financial capitalism, migration, forever wars and elites (like me) who talk about it as an end in itself rather than a means to redressing inequality, reining in capitalist systems that are rigged, responding to global conflict and fostering a sense of shared national identity”
By: Anil Dash
Link: https://www.anildash.com/2016/11/09/forget_why_its_time_to_get_to_work/
Contributed by: Ben Rahn
TL;DR: “There are concrete steps we can take immediately, which can set up habits that we can sustain for the years of struggle to come” 1. Organizations fighting for civil rights and social justice already exist in your community. Start fundraising, now. 2. Make stopping Trump a regular habit. Fight normalization in the media. Pursue a strategy of containment. If you can’t lead, support those who do. Build time into your schedule for these actions 3. Take care of yourself and others.
Extra context: I (Ben) recognize it’s a bit provocative to share a piece with this title in a “what helps you understand” bibliography. But I found it a helpful reminder to balance our search for meaning with a search for concrete, impactful action[g] – and one doesn’t need to wait for a conclusion of the former to start the latter.
By: Adam Gurri
Link: https://www.liberalcurrents.com/a-practical-program-for-resisting-a-trump-second-term/
Contributed by: Ben Rahn
TL;DR: 1. Federal policy relies upon state and local administrative capacity; protestors and activists must pressure blue-state officials to engage in strategic acts of opposition[h]. 2. Act on myriad opportunities to reshape the local political economy. (E.g.: They’ve destroyed unions; maybe we should go after car dealerships) 3. Develop an underground railroad for vulnerable communities[i]
By: Elizabeth Spiers
Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/06/opinion/trump-white-young-men.html
Contributed by: Sarah Mehalic
TL;DR: Opinion column explores the role of hegemonic masculinity in 2024, a concept which has been found previously by researchers to be “a better predictor of whether people saw Mr. Trump as a good leader in 2016 and 2020 than sexism or racism alone. It was a better predictor than trust in government or even party affiliation.”
By: Sarah Knight and Arkadi Gerney
Link: https://prospect.org/politics/2024-10-18-playing-hardball/
Contributed by: Eli Pariser
TL;DR: “In the face of red-state aggression, we think it’s time for blue states to embrace their governing majorities as affirmative sources of power—and begin to exercise those powers more fully, more effectively, and with greater coordination.”
Strategies include:
By: Charlotte Swasey
Link: https://www.cauldron.llc/medium-data-blog/what-im-seeing-uniform-swing-and-thermostatic-politics
Contributed by: Brandon Silverman
TL;DR: Analysis of the 2024 Harris-Trump presidential election shows a nationwide shift of about 7 points toward Republicans compared to 2020, with Trump winning 51% to Harris's 48%, and particularly strong Republican gains among Hispanic voters and in urban areas[m]. The consistent nature of this shift across states (known as uniform swing) suggests this represents a national rejection of Democratic governance rather than campaign-specific issues, likely reflecting a "thermostatic" response[n] where voters move right when they perceive government as having moved too far left. While the specific policy implications aren't clear since voter perceptions are based more on general "vibes" than specific issues, the author sees this as a serious rebuke that Democrats need to address.
By: Dan McLaughli
Link: https://www.nationalreview.com/2024/11/you-did-this-to-yourselves-democrats/
Contributed by: Sarah Mehalic
TL;DR: Opinion column contends that Democrats’ were elected with a mandate to restore normalcy and failed. Pointing to the Biden-Harris administration's policy choices on inflation and immigration, an embrace of further-left progressive stances, and the poor handling of the president’s age and acuity, the author concludes that Democrats repeatedly and consistently eroded trust among moderate voters, enabling Donald Trump’s return to office.
By: Ryan Cooper
Link: https://prospect.org/politics/2024-11-07-time-for-democrats-abandon-mainstream-media/
Contributed by: Ben Rahn
TL;DR: “The information environment—the combination of traditional journalism, social media, party propaganda, and so on—is preposterously biased and inadequate. Trump brushed aside any of about a thousand scandals that would have sunk any previous politician. Democrats need to take a long, hard look at what their information strategy should be[o], and more importantly, how their messaging can be reliably and consistently put in front of voters[p].”
By: Osita Nwanevu
Link: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/nov/08/obama-era-democrat-party-future
Contributed by: Ben Rahn
TL;DR: “Reliably tacking to the center might have worked as an electoral prescription in the Clinton era, it clearly offers diminishing returns now. The Democratic party is not being doomed by an unwillingness to run moderate presidential campaigns[q] or because the party is putting forward aspiring Squad members as candidates in Kansas…The Democratic party has not demonstrated any capacity whatsoever to speak to voters who simply don’t believe in the politics of old and aren’t interested in returning to it.”
By: Dan Froomkin
Link: https://presswatchers.org/2024/11/i-blame-the-media/
Contributed by: Ben Rahn
TL;DR: “The vast majority of voters still have some contact with the major traditional media outlets [e.g. broadcast networks, CNN, NPR, NYTimes, WashPost]...What voters heard and read…didn’t dissuade them from swallowing the right-wing narrative that the country is in decline, with an economy in shambles, with crime up, and with undocumented immigrants terrorizing people everywhere – none of which are true[r].”
By: Michael Tomasky
Link: https://newrepublic.com/post/188197/trump-media-information-landscape-fox
Contributed by: Linnea Cederberg
TL;DR: “Right-wing media is becoming the norm for 2/3rds of the country and normalizing right wing positions and narratives about Trump is the reason why people are voting for him. If we want Democrats and left-wing narratives to be popular, we need rich liberals to invest in building left-wing media narratives.”[s]
By: Michael Tomasky
Contributed by: Sherillyn Ifill
TL;DR: The article argues that Donald Trump's election victory was primarily due to the dominance of right-wing media (including Fox News, Newsmax, and others) which has grown larger than mainstream media and shapes the national news agenda by promoting narratives that favor Trump while portraying his opponents negatively.
By: Josh Marshall
Link: https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/thoughts-on-the-day-after
Contributed by: Eli Pariser
TL;DR: “Why did this happen? The most fundamental reason is that we’re coming out of a vast, global, public crisis that began just short of five years ago. The economy was good through most of Donald Trump’s first term. The pandemic was an epochal disaster, the full impact of which I believe most of us still haven’t gotten our heads around. Then, during that and coming out of that, life become a lot harder for most people. There was a major inflation shock. Housing became much harder to afford and stepping up the housing ladder, from renting as a 20-something to owning a home as a 30-something, for example, became much harder. The pandemic crime spike was relatively short-lived, as were the worst parts of the inflation. But the reality of a destabilized society has persisted.”
By: By Emily Guskin, Chris Alcantara and Janice Kai Chen
Link: https://www.washingtonpost.com/elections/interactive/2024/exit-polls-2024-election/
Contributed by: Aliya Bhatia (the Vot-ER one)
TL;DR This is early data, but if these cross-tabs represent the actual 2024 electorate, then people of color were heavily underrepresented in this election relative to their actual proportion of the US population.[t]
By: James Pogue
Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/19/opinion/chris-murphy-democrats.html
Contributed by: Aliya Bhatia (the Vot-ER one)
TL;DR Americans crave agency, and today’s world of large corporations makes it hard to experience that agency. To fix this, we need to not just defend institutions in the abstract (because that suggests that the institutions are working) but create institutions that promote agency and belonging for everyday Americans.
By: John Burn-Murdoc
Link: https://x.com/jburnmurdoch/status/1854485866548195735
Contributed by: Aliya Bhatia (the Vot-ER one)
TL;DR We're in an anti-incumbency year — EVERY sitting party up for re-election globally lost vote share, and actually, the US's sitting party did not lose as badly as others in other countries. Even with the best possible campaign, Biden or Harris at the top of the ticket may not have been able to outrun this trend. [Which segues quite well into Jennifer Pahlka’s piece]
By: Rebecca Solnit
Link: Our mistake was to think we lived in a better country than we do | Rebecca Solnit | The Guardian
Contributed by: Deva Hirsch
TL; DR We made the mistake of underestimating the extent of misogyny and racism in our country. A perceived crisis of masculinity, the complicity of mainstream media, the growing influence of Silicon Valley, and the unchecked power of social media have all played roles in fueling misinformation, disinformation, and hatred. The mainstream media has failed in its role as the fourth estate—failing both to hold our leaders accountable and to ensure the public remains well-informed.
By: Paul Wells
Contributed by: Liz Manne
TL;DR: The article argues that Trump's re-election victory should be understood as a reaction to decades of failed governance policies that led to declining life expectancy, industrial collapse, and widespread despair in middle America, rather than simply being dismissed as irrational voter behavior - even though the author believes Trump will likely make these problems worse.
By: Beth Howard and James Mumm for People’s Action Institute
Link: https://peoplesaction.org/wp-content/uploads/The-Antidote-to-Authoritarianism-EN-2024-1.pdf
Contributed by: James Mumm
TL;DR (summary – it’s fine to use AI if you want, but no more than 2 sentences): If we want to achieve a multiracial pluralistic democracy and move toward an inclusive economy, we must ground ourselves in the best and most effective practices of relational, power-based community organizing. The Organizing Revival is our call to renew these practices to defeat authoritarianism.
By: Ian Bremmer
Link: https://mailchi.mp/gzeromedia.com/3j6xiex147?e=6920043c6f
Contributed by: Jonathan Soros
TL;DR Distrust of elites and post-pandemic inflation created insurmountable anti-incumbency bias. Campaign efforts to tout economic progress and disqualify Trump were stymied by information bubbles. Rest is round-up of foreign policy consequences.
By:Branko Marcetic
Link: https://jacobin.com/2024/11/election-harris-trump-democrats-strategy/
Contributed by: Gin
TL;DR The story that is about to be pushed hard is that Kamala Harris lost because she was too far left. It will be pushed because this is the Democratic establishment’s go-to explanation for all its failures. Despite assurances from economists that the US economy is in great shape; average americans are struggling.
By: Jennifer Pahlka
Link: https://www.eatingpolicy.com/p/curiosity-and-conflict
Contributed by: myself (and plus 1 from Aliya Bhatia)
TL;DR Dems need to look in the mirror at why we lost and demand change from the party. We need curiosity and conflict to change. This includes caring about outcomes, not just congratulating ourselves on well-intended policies.
By: Taylor Lorenz
Link:[u] https://www.usermag.co/p/why-democrats-wont-build-their-own
Contributed by: Billy Wimsatt
TL;DR: (it’s because liberal donors won’t invest in an equivalent to the right wing media ecosystem - How’s that for brevity? :)
By: Waleed Shahid
Link: https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/2024-election-lessons-analysis-democrats/
Contributed by: Billy Wimsatt
TL;DR: Overview of the reasons we lost with a call for boldness to actually break through to hearts and minds and win transformational change in people’s lives.
By: David Brooks (I know, I know…)[v]
Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/06/opinion/trump-elites-working-class.html
Contributed by: Billy Wimsatt
TL;DR: Insightful piece that the reason we’re losing working class voters is not just about economics or perception or the media environment, it’s about disrespect. He suggests, against type, that Democrats may need to be more like Bernie Sanders.
By: George Saunders
Link: https://shorturl.at/rxL1f
Contributed by: Lise Clavel
TL;DR: Parable style piece with the subheading “Our civic wells are poisoned. Why?” about how the media and unregulated capitalism are effectively the puppeteers of our constant discord, which they monetize to our great harm. Saunders is, as always, wise and funny and optimistic and truthful and very, very, insightful.
By: Derek Thompson
Link: https://www.theringer.com/2024/11/8/24290898/this-is-why-donald-trump-won
Contributed by: David Dillon
TL;DR: Derek outlines how globally, we’re seeing a trend of anti-incumbency — ruling parties across most developed countries have recently been voted out (or have seen dramatic losses in power). [w]
How Alarmed Should We Be if Trump Wins Again
By: Adam Gopnik
Link:https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/10/21/how-alarmed-should-we-be-if-trump-wins-again
Contributed by: Marina Gorbis
TL;DR: Written right before the elections, Adam foresees what’s to come and why we see ourselves with the results. Trump’s ascendance (and ultimately win) is putting a mirror to what we have become as a society. “Trump’s politics may be ugly, foolish, and vain, but ours is often an ugly, undereducated, and vain country. Democracy is meant to be a mirror, it shows what it shows.”
By: John Della Volpe
Contributed by: Sarah Mehalic
TL;DR: Respected Harvard pollster Della Volpe contends insiders warned consistently about problems appearing in the polling. The headline and some focus on the youth vote obscure his most interesting point: we are replacing metrics for meaning. “...this near-blind faith in random control trials and modeling[x] has created more than just an illusion of scientific precision — it has built an algorithmic fortress that isolates Democrats from the very voters they seek to represent. The irony is stark: a party full of voter data yet starved for true voter understanding and connection.”
By: Charlie Warzel
Link: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2024/11/you-are-the-media-now/680602/
Contributed by: Zane Shelby
TL;DR: The rise of social media platforms and podcasts has fragmented the media environment, allowing individuals to curate their own information sources and narratives. This fragmentation has led to a lack of shared reality, as people increasingly consume information that aligns with their personal beliefs.
By: Gabriel Winant
Link: https://www.dissentmagazine.org/online_articles/exit-right/
Contributed by: Zoe Hudson
TL;DR: A wide-ranging article, centered on a critique of the left, and calling for a direct confrontation with Trump, what he represents, and the “remaking of America he envisions”. Most interesting is the second half (after the takedown of the Democratic Party).
By: David Slifka
Link: https://seeds.bluem.ventures/p/what-happened
Contributed by: David Slifka :)
TL;DR: Some reasons why Democratic funders have had so much trouble building a media ecosystem.
By: Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor
Link: https://thedigradio.com/podcast/democratic-dealignment-w-keeanga-yamahtta-taylor/
TL;DR: How the Dem party misses class issues and refuses to expand the welfare state that they’ve traditionally stewarded.
By: Greg Ip, WSJ
Link: https://archive.is/dqnlR (orig: https://www.wsj.com/economy/consumers/whats-wrong-with-the-economy-its-you-not-the-data-cfa911e6 )
Contributed by: Ben Rahn
TL;DR: Some very compelling evidence that perception of national economic conditions have become detached from perception of personal/local economic conditions[z]
By: Ben Rhodes
Link:https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/08/opinion/republicans-democrats-trump.html?searchResultPosition=3
Contributed by: Jonathan Soros
TL;DR (summary): Trump has a clear authoritarian playbook of populist anti-elite message and attacks on “others” followed by power consolidation. This led Dems to defend the very institutions that people felt were failing them, and identitarian politics to defend those attacked by othering.
By: Carole Cadwalladr
Contributed by: Nicholas Coccoma
TL;DR (summary): The period from 2016 to 2024 represents the first wave of information disruption. We're now entering a more dangerous phase where tech oligarchs are aligning with political power to create an information environment dominated by chaos. Traditional methods of combating this will no longer work, as information sharing has been fundamentally altered.
By: Gideon Lichfield
Link: https://futurepolis.substack.com/p/where-to-look-for-bright-spots-if
Contributed by: Eli Pariser
TL;DR: “The main silver lining is that as the federal arena becomes more toxic, the local level will become more vibrant. States and cities are already where the most interesting policy and governance innovations are happening, and they will likely become more so.”
By: The Economist
Contributed by: Eli Pariser
TL;DR: “Before 1996, when Purdue patented OxyContin, cancer mortality was not a very good predictor of Republican vote share. But a relationship started to emerge in the decades that followed (see chart). The economists found that a one-standard-deviation increase in the cancer-mortality rate in 1996 predicted a 13.8 percentage-point jump in votes for Republican candidates in the 2020 congressional elections. In presidential elections, they found that it buoyed Republican nominees by an average of 12 percentage points between 1996 and 2020.” Eli note: No data yet on how this played out in 2024. But it’s extremely striking data.
By: Annie Lowrey
Link: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/11/biden-harris-economy-election-loss/680592/
Contributed by: Eli Pariser
TL;DR: “During the Biden-Harris years, more granular data pointed to considerable strain. Real median household income fell relative to its pre-COVID peak. The poverty rate ticked up, as did the jobless rate. The number of Americans spending more than 30 percent of their income on rent climbed. The delinquency rate on credit cards surged, as did the share of families struggling to afford enough nutritious food, as did the rate of homelessness.”
By: Max Tani
Contributed by: Chloe
TL;DR: “Trump’s victory isn’t a result of a failure by news outlets to sufficiently hold him accountable. The real answer is one that is a lot more uncomfortable to grapple with: The national news media is more limited in its reach and influence than ever in the modern era.”
By: Györgyi Gálik
Contributed by: Tom Glaisyer
TL;DR: Hungary is seen as a "canary in the coal mine" for the broader global decline in democratic governance, serving “as a cautionary tale of what happens when not only democratic institutions are undermined, but citizens’ very ability to make sense of the world is deliberately impaired.” The focus is on improving democratic practices by rebuilding the "soft infrastructures" necessary for effective governance—public dialogue, critical thinking, and democratic participation.
By: Anne Applebaum
Contributed by: Tom Glaisyer
TL;DR: “The victory of the Polish opposition proves that autocratic populism can be defeated, even after an unfair election. Nothing is inevitable about the rise of autocracy or the decline of democracy. Invest your time in political and civic organization if you want to create change, because sometimes it works.”
By: Tressie McMillan Cottom
Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/06/opinion/why-kamala-harris-lost.html
Contributed by: Tom Glaisyer
TL;DR: The writer critiques Harris’s campaign for not fully embracing her race and gender as strengths, instead attempting to minimize these aspects in favor of appealing to a broader electorate. The author compares Harris’s restrained campaign strategy to that of Stacey Abrams, who leaned into her identity more openly.
By: Dahlia Lithwick
Link: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2024/10/donald-trump-election-2024-democracy-press-vote-law.html
Contributed by: Jessica Clark
TL;DR: The term "enshittification" is used to describe the systematic degradation of valuable public services, particularly in the context of democracy. Trump and his supporters are intentionally undermining core democratic principles: public protest, voting, press freedom, and the rule of law. By attacking these pillars and framing them as failures, they erode trust in democratic institutions, leaving the public with little choice but to accept this decline.
By: David Weigel
Contributed by: Billy Wimsatt
TL;DR: Really interesting comparison of 2020 to 2024 partisan turnout turnout and performance with charts. Silver lining: We actually did pretty decently in the battlegrounds, and in 4 states (GA, NV, NC, WI) Dems actually overperformed their turnout in 2020. Bad news: The floor fell out in non-battlegrounds. I wish the piece did a deeper analysis - left me scratching my head! Why did dem turnout go up in NV but not AZ? Why did Dem turnout rise in WI, GA, NC, but fall in MI and PA? Clearly we’re doing some things right, or doing better (or less badly) with some types of voters, but which variables made the difference? Looking forward to a deeper dive. Still, this was an intriguing tease!
By: Waleed Shahid
Link: https://waleedshahid.substack.com/p/postmortem-palooza
Contributed by: Billy Wimsatt
TL;DR: Helpful overview of the postmortem landscape. Lots of good links to other pieces. The ten Genres are: 1). Dems didn’t deliver tangible economic change. 2). Dems are “too woke.” 3). Dems ignored the border. 4). Dems spent too much money. 5). Dems appear Elitist, not Populist. 6). Anti-incumbent sentiment post-COVID. 7). Entrenched Racism and Sexism. 8). Outplayed by Conservative media. 9) Harris failed to distance from unpopular status quo of Biden. 10). Harris seen as an empty suit.
By: David Brooks
Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/14/opinion/identity-groups-politics.html
Contributed by: Billy Wimsatt
TL;DR: Hey, that’s why I’m here, posting David Brooks columns so you don’t have to… why did we lose ground with young voters? Latino voters? Working class voters? Black voters? Are our conceptions of identity still accurate? Or are we married to political conceptions of racial, class, and gender identity that are becoming less true - and losing voters (essentially because we’re elitist woke progressives who aren’t listening to or respecting or connecting with many of the voters who we aspire and purport to represent).
None of the Conventional Explanations for Trump’s Victory Stand up to Scrutiny
By: Ben Davis
Link: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/nov/09/trump-victory-explanation-scrutiny
Contributed by: Carrie Cuthbert
TL; DR: Insightful critique of various explanations for Harris’ loss, including: “I propose a different explanation than inflation qua inflation: the Covid welfare state and its collapse. The massive, almost overnight expansion of the social safety net and its rapid, almost overnight rollback are materially one of the biggest policy changes in American history… At the end of Trump’s term, the American standard of living and the amount of economic security and freedom Americans had was higher than when it started, and, with the loss of this expanded welfare state, it was worse when Biden left office, despite his real policy wins for workers and unions. This is why voters view Trump as a better shepherd of the economy.”
Decapitation Strike
By: Timothy Snyder
Link: https://readwise.io/reader/shared/01jcrqtfjwef0ra26a8sh471ha
Contributed by: Matt Abrams
TL; DR: The Cold War text books need to be re-written. Putin is winning. Putin, with useful tools of Musk and Trump, has been playing the long game for Russia and Kleptocracy writ large by dismantling the US from the inside. “Imagine that you are a foreign leader who wishes to destroy the United States. How could you do so? The easiest way would be to get Americans to do the work themselves, to somehow induce Americans to undo their own health, law, administration, defense, and intelligence. From this perspective, Trump's proposed appointments -- Kennedy, Jr.; Gaetz; Musk; Ramaswamy; Hegseth; Gabbard -- are perfect instruments. They combine narcissism, incompetence, corruption, sexual incontinence, personal vulnerability, dangerous convictions, and foreign influence as no group before them has done. These proposed appointments look like a decapitation strike: destroying the American government from the top, leaving the body politic to rot, and the rest of us to suffer…We are confronted instead with a group of people who, were they to hold the positions they have been assigned, could bring an end to the United States of America.It is a mistake to think of these people as flawed. It is not they will do a bad job in their assigned posts. It is that they will do a good job using those assigned posts to destroy our country.”
The Testosterone Election
By: Scott Galloway
Link: https://www.profgalloway.com/the-testosterone-election/
Contributed by: Matt Abrams
TL; DR: We need to lean in to testosterone that is chest beating for decency, kindness, empathy, and integrity (my words: stand up hard against bullies and assholes…). “how did Trump win? A: His campaign determined the best way to win over young men and their parents was to act like a young bro himself. Think about it: rockets, crypto, Rogan, coarse language, offensive jokes. This election was supposed to be a referendum on women’s rights. It wasn’t. It was a cold plunge into testosterone.” More broadly, the political landscape in America shows deep dissatisfaction, particularly among young men facing economic challenges and underemployment. This has led to a shift in voting patterns, with many young voters supporting “bro” candidates who promise change and economic opportunity and appear larger than life, “tough guys”. To address these issues, there is a call for initiatives like paid national service, affordable housing, and vocational training to help young people thrive.
When Will Democrats Learn to Say No?
By: Adam Jentleson
Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/16/opinion/democrats-interest-groups-majority.html
Contributed by: David Slifka
TL; DR: “when Kamala Harris was running for the Democratic nomination in 2019, the A.C.L.U. pushed her to articulate a position on surgeries for transgender prisoners, needlessly elevating an obscure issue into the public debate as a purity test, despite the fact that current law already gave prisoners access to gender-affirming care. This became a major line of attack for Mr. Trump in the closing weeks of this year’s election.” … “the question “is this tactic more likely to trigger backlash than to advance our goals?” is the single most important one, yet it seems to be rarely asked by many of the groups’ leaders or funders.”
By: Protect Democracy
Contributed by: Jeremy Blanchard
TL;DR: More about what is to come than “what happened,” but I’m finding it bolstering to get a clear-eyed look at what we can expect from a Trump second term. Covers the 6 areas we can expect the executive to abuse powers in a fascist way: 1: Pardons to License Lawbreaking, 2: Directing Investigations Against Critics and Rivals, 3: Regulatory Retaliation, 4: Federal Law Enforcement Overreach, 5: Domestic Deployment of the Military, 6: The Autocrat Won’t Leave.
By: Jaron Lanier
Link: https://www.amazon.com/Arguments-Deleting-Social-Media-Accounts/dp/125019668X
Contributed by: Jeremy John
TL;DR: In this book, Lanier contends that social media’s design incentivizes division, spreading misinformation and fostering polarization. It undermines collective thinking by replacing thoughtful discourse with algorithm-driven conflict, eroding trust and shared understanding necessary for a healthy society. Deleting social media, Lanier argues, is a step toward reclaiming individual and collective agency. Because demographic data is so readily available to big data and therefore to algorithms, social media content algorithms with identitarian assumptions draw people to identity-driven conflictual content in order to compel engagement. These platforms increasingly control the ways that blue and red silos work on the internet, creating the thinkable and the unthinkable as well as the sayable and unsable.
By: Arlie Russell Hochschild
Link: https://www.amazon.com/Strangers-Their-Own-Land-Mourning/dp/1620972255
Contributed by: Jeremy John
TL;DR: In Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right, sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild explores the emotional and cultural foundations of political divisions in the U.S., focusing on Louisiana conservatives. Through immersive interviews, she uncovers a "deep story" that underpins their worldview: a sense of waiting in line for the American Dream, only to see others—particularly minorities, immigrants, and government beneficiaries—cutting ahead, often with liberal policies enabling them. This perception fuels feelings of betrayal, resentment, and alienation, which Hochschild links to the rise of right-wing populism. By empathetically delving into their lived experiences, Hochschild reveals the cultural and emotional roots of polarization, offering insights into the challenges of bridging ideological divides.
By: Daniel Hunter
Link: https://wagingnonviolence.org/2024/11/10-things-to-do-if-trump-wins/
Contributed by: Laura Rigell
TL;DR: The key to taking effective action in a Trump world is to avoid perpetuating the autocrat’s goals of fear, isolation, exhaustion and disorientation. Daniel advises readers to trust yourself and find people you trust, grieve, and release what you cannot change. Then, as a faithful proponent of the power of organizing and power-building, Daniel invites readers to “find your path,” offering four crucial types of action to be taken: protect people, defend institutions, disrupt and disobey, and build alternatives. He warns against self-censoring out of fear. And (something the bridge-builders would appreciate) invites readers to reorient their political map, and be prepared to collaborate with unlikely bedfellows. He advises to be real about power and look to examples of successful nonviolent resistance campaign from across the globe which successfully ensured that political violence backfired for those enacting it.
By: Mark Engler and Paul Engler
Link: https://wagingnonviolence.org/2024/11/a-new-wave-of-movements-against-trumpism-is-coming/
Contributed by: Laura Rigell
TL;DR[ab]:
By: Perry Bacon Jr.
Contributed by: Billy Wimsatt (h/t Tory Gavito)
TL;DR: One of my faves: Bacon reviews 4 theories in order of what he finds most convincing (anti-incumbent & inflation, anti-Black woman and diversity, the Bernie argument, and Dems seen as too left on immigration and gender identity) and makes the case that essentially a Bernie plus race class narrative approach - explaining that the billionaires are using immigrants and trans people to divide us so they can take our money.
By:
Link: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/11/15/republican-ads-false-flag/
Contributed by: Billy Wimsatt
TL;DR: Musk via dark money ops spent $45 million on misleading digital ads and mailers aimed at depressing Dem turnout. They sent pro-Israel fake Kamala ads and mailers to Arab Americans, pro-Palestine Kamala fake mailers to Jewish voters, and several other versions to specific communities. Unclear how big a difference this made, but wow $45 million and it corresponded with depressed turnout in key base communities.
By: Jennifer Rubin
Link: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/11/12/disinformation-threat-democracy/
Contributed by: Billy Wimsatt (h/t Denis Bidwell)
TL;DR: The right wing media machine has brainwashed a large percent of the US population in an alternative media universe. We desperately need a counter version.
By: Janos Marton
Link:
https://janosmarton.substack.com/p/no-ezra-nonprofit-leaders-are-not
Contributed by: Billy Wimsatt
TL;DR: Response to recent pieces by Ezra Klein, Adam Jentleson, the Pod Save bros, and others critiquing the non-profit left for pushing Dem electeds to the left. His argument: Non profit leaders are not that powerful; electeds are responsible for their own decisions; issue advocates need to press Democrats to make basic changes on issues like criminal justice reform, and Dems and pundits should focus on delivering for their constituents instead of blaming left-leaning non profits.
By: Deepak Bhargava, Shahrzad Shams, Harry Hanbury
Link: https://democracyjournal.org/arguments/the-death-of-deliverism/
Contributed by: Bluesky user @absolutereality.bsky.social
TL;DR: (This article was published in June 2023, but I believe it predicts the election outcome as a result of many voters not understanding what the Biden administration accomplished or did for the working class.) “Deliverism” is a political theory that if you deliver economic improvements in people’s lives through policy, then they will vote for your political party. However, although delivering economic improvements to people is a worthy goal in-and-of-itself, deliverism alone cannot win elections. The authors suggest several mechanisms to fight authoritarianism. First, lean into identity, emotion, and stories for messaging. Second, speak to and offer ideas on how to solve violence, addiction, mental health problems, social isolation, loneliness, and a sense of social disintegration. Third, articulate a vision of the good life about how we should live, who we should care about, and what makes for a meaningful life in contrast to the hustle culture of neoliberalism and the status dominance of authoritarianism. Fourth, reinvigorate organizing and recruitment of new people, especially working-class people, into worker and community organizations.
By: The Drift editors
Link: https://www.thedriftmag.com/editors-note-14/
Contributed by: Bluesky user @absolutereality.bsky.social
TL;DR: Democrats talk “with an unearned assurance that voters would reward them for having the right opinions.” “The political theorist Benedict Anderson famously argued that nations are “imagined communities,” and it is hard to sustain an imagined community of America’s diversity and scale in the face of extreme economic inequality; the fracturing of the media monoculture into a bewildering patchwork of social media platforms, podcasts, streams, and cable news networks; and the decimation, exacerbated by the Covid pandemic, of offline social relationships and community institutions. Under such conditions, it is easy to suspect that anyone who insists we’re all in this together is just trying to rip you off — a suspicion that Trump is especially adept at vocalizing.”
By: Mike Podhorzer
Link: https://www.weekendreading.net/p/is-this-what-democracy-looks-like
Contributed by: Eli Pariser
TL;DR: “The real headline of this election isn’t about Trump’s victory. It’s about how the Federalist Society coalition of plutocrats and theocrats has all but completed its mission to repeal and replace the 20th Century by judicial fiat.”
By: Rich Snowdon
Link: https://tribaltrouble.net/7-2-harder-for-us/
Contributed by: Rich Snowdon
TL;DR: Seven hard truths that explain how the human operating system makes politics so much harder for progressives. A journey into deeper compassion for ourselves.
By: Timothy Snyder
Link: https://snyder.substack.com/p/decapitation-strike
Contributed by: Betsy Taylor
TL;DR (summary): “We should be wary of shock, which excuses inaction.” “ We have to get through the surprise and the shock to see the design and the risk.” We have two months.
By: Theodoric Meyer and Leigh Ann Caldwell
Link: https://wapo.st/40TNtUZ
Contributed by: Ian Magruder
TL;DR (summary – it’s fine to use AI if you want, but no more than 2 sentences): WaPo article analyzing the messages of the Democrats who successfully won races (in some cases by significant margins) in districts that Trump also carried. The bottom line is that they leaned in to the electorate’s deep sense of frustration and distrust in government generally. A key example being Kristen McDonald Rivet, who won a working class district by 7 points that Trump also carried. She also spoke to people in very simple terms that were not academic and felt authentic.
McDonald Rivet’s message was unusually blunt. “I root for the Lions, I hate Ohio and I think most politicians are full of [bleep],” she said in one TV ad.
The last line was particularly important in winning over Trump voters, McDonald Rivet said.
By: Steve Neavling
Contributed by: Betsy Taylor
TL;DR: Detroit Metro Times reports that many Arab Americans in Michigan followed through on their pledge to vote against Kamala Harris, with fewer than one in seven Muslims casting a ballot for the Democratic nominee. 59% of the state’s Muslim residents voted for Green Party candidate Jill Stein.
By: Macy Petty
Link: https://concernedwomen.org/new-exit-polls-confirm-the-surprising-key-issue-in-the-2024-election/
Contributed by: Betsy Taylor
TL;DR: 70% of voters indicated transgender issues were an important factor in deciding their vote. Hispanic men carried the largest demographic of voters who found the issue important in their voting choice (84%). In 10 key states, Hispanic men and women were Trump’s largest voter gain
By Anat Shenker-Osorio
Contributed by: Betsy Taylor
TL;DR: The people screwing over the working class are billionaires and Democrats focused too little of their ire in that direction. Meanwhile it is worth noting that Harris has 48.5 percent and growing to Trump’s 50 percent and falling, a 2.5 million vote difference in a pool of over 153 million votes.
By Tressie McMillan Cottom
Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/21/opinion/trump-trad-wives-podcasters-wellness.html
Contributed by: Betsy Taylor
Old categories like Left and Right were supplanted by Trump’s ability to tap into the information ecosystems - social media, memes and cultish groups where voting groups express their identities.
Traditional wives, Podcast bros, and Wellness influencers played a huge role. Now conservatives
have a cultural advantage and have done a better job of meeting people where they are at.
[a]It's not anxiety, the numbers used to show that the economy was great are wrong:
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2025/02/11/democrats-tricked-strong-economy-00203464
[b]Chicago now has all these Venezuelan candy vendors on many street corners, reminding me of Latin America. The homeless encampments have sprawled over the lakefront. We had about 50K immigrants from there come to Chicago without any prospects. I caught a Venezuelan man burgling my home. An Ecuadoran contractor I know said he had a bunch of bricks and he watched a video of two Venezuelan men walking off with the bricks. He said that Venezuelans are giving other Latinos a bad name.
What I am noticing is that issues like this are lacking in this analysis. I.e. "anti-immigrant sentiment" instead of "waves of immigration from Venezuela". The wave causes the sentiment. I'm pro-immigrant but I think there's a lack of recognition in the DP that this is an actual problem requiring a solution.
[c]People like me really did feel the strain of the economy, hard. I'm not sure why this isn't reflected in national statistics but anecdotally a lot of people were feeling the pinch of inflation. It's unclear to me why dems relied on economic statistics rather than the lived experience of Americans.
[d]https://www.marketwatch.com/guides/banking/paycheck-to-paycheck-statistics/. and https://www.cnbc.com/2024/10/30/many-americans-are-still-living-paycheck-to-paycheck-report-finds.html. Many Americans report they are living paycheck to paycheck.
[e]2 total reactions
Kass reacted with ➕ at 2024-11-13 18:11 PM
Grant Sunderland reacted with ➕ at 2024-11-17 02:06 AM
[f]I think this analysis is fundamentally sound and important - it's not only a messaging problem or a structural problem that faced governing parties in 2024, etc. it's a "which side are you on" problem for establishment Democrats, their consultants, and high net worth funders. What this article misses though is that the majority of workers in 2024 are service and care workers, not factory workers, and that only 10% of US workers today are in unions (compared with 35% in say 1955). NAFTA and its legacy def accelerated the trend of working class voters - across race - moving away from Democrats and toward Trump's right wing populism. But it is on a whole range of policy and governing issues that Democrats have failed to center working class people and communities, including but not limited to failing to stand up to very successful corporate strategies to make it MUCH more difficult for workers across the service and care economy to successfully form unions and neglecting to write new rules to include workers who have been left out and written out in modern US labor law.
[g]2 total reactions
Eli Pariser reacted with 👍 at 2024-11-08 19:03 PM
Megan Goering Mellin reacted with 🙏 at 2024-11-08 22:43 PM
[h]1 total reaction
Megan Goering Mellin reacted with 💡 at 2024-11-08 22:43 PM
[i]1 total reaction
Megan Goering Mellin reacted with 🕯️ at 2024-11-08 22:43 PM
[j]wouldnt this have worked already if effective? whether in something like higher ed or recently with Medicaid expansion - have not seen any data that this moves minds/voters/decisions
[k]Because they took away the expansion once the Covid state of emergency was ended and up to 30 million people were disenrolled (haven't seen the final tally) in the largest Medicaid disenrolment history.
No, it doesn't win people over to give them Medicaid and other basic needs for 2 years and then take it away.
Just like they let the child tax credit expire.
If you lift people out of poverty with programs temporarily and then end the programs you plunge those people right back into poverty.
Biden could have easily made the expansion of Medicaid and other benefits permanent.
[l]Sure, I didn’t specify this but I was thinking more about the paradigm of red states like Fl where they didn’t even accept and implement the Medicaid expansion, residents were profoundly affected by that state level choice but it was a non issue with voters
[m]1 total reaction
Megan Goering Mellin reacted with ☑️ at 2024-11-08 22:55 PM
[n]1 total reaction
Sarah Mehalic reacted with 👍 at 2024-11-12 15:59 PM
[o]1 total reaction
Megan Goering Mellin reacted with 🔥 at 2024-11-08 23:00 PM
[p]1 total reaction
Kass reacted with ➕ at 2024-11-13 18:06 PM
[q]This is a very pressing question right now on many levels. Is the "problem" with Harris that she was too moderate, or not moderate enough?
There are very different lessons to derive here.
To win, do Dems need to go farther right?
Or, did people love the congruence + progressivism of Trump (i.e. being extremely pro-change), even if the direction of that progressivism is toward pervasive destruction?
If anyone finds sentiment analysis *from actual Trump voters* in their own plain language, I'd be so interested in that research.
[r]1 total reaction
Megan Goering Mellin reacted with 🔥 at 2024-11-08 23:37 PM
[s]and/or buy out fox/affiliates, OAN, and spotify studios and install new leaders/producers and standards
[t]Because the ask was to put editorial thoughts in the comments rather than in the text — I heard secondhand about donors and donor advisors saying earlier this year that they did not want to invest in turnout among voters of color. Given these crosstabs (and again, assuming they are somewhat proportional to the electorate) — I'm not sure that choice had the intended effect.
[u]story link is down, agree w the tl;dr but does it address that we actually had a joe rogan, specifically joe rogan himself? he supported obama and sanders. We disengaged him and those he reaches because he's a problematic dipshit, but that's not how we win.
[v]Plus one to Billy here — as a Southerner who has also worked in the rural south, this also resonated with me
[w]Adding some additional commentary someone added here to keep the document tidy:
The incumbent parties in the following countries lost either an election (or significant seats) in the past 18 months: US, South Korea, Slovakia, Australia, Sweden, Italy, Finland, Slovenia, Poland, Portugal, France, UK, Lithuania, Austria, and Japan.
“Not since 1905 has every governing party facing re-election in a developed country lost vote shares in 2024”
Moreover, we essentially experienced the “2nd pandemic election.” In 2020 voters wanted a return to normalcy, and while normalcy was (largely) restored, the rockiness wrought by inflation was too much to reward Democrats with a 2nd term.
Kristen Soltis Anderson also discussed her analysis of the 2024 election, noting a significant rightward shift across most demographics. While men, especially younger men and Latino men, showed the strongest move toward Trump, even younger women and other diverse groups shifted. This widespread swing defied pre-election narratives and highlighted complex voting patterns.
Lastly, the “trust vector” has shifted from the “top → down” to the “bottom → up” as more people trust influencers on important matters like public health than they do our institutions like the CDC.
[x]I find it difficult to accept the premise that RCTs and models generate “inauthentic, overly tailored messaging” while traditional polls supposedly do not….
That said, there are extremely legitimate critiques of the role of “analytics” in civic engagement and political spaces. An immense amount of money was guided this cycle based on short-term cost efficiency calculations. By definition this put at a disadvantage the kinds of programs that 1) are difficult or impossible to evaluate empirically and/or 2) are geared towards achieving some kind of impact over a longer period of time. The types of solutions that are needed in the era of a wrecked informational ecosystem are likely both of those things…
1 total reaction
Justin Rolfe-Redding reacted with 🤔 at 2024-11-15 20:10 PM
[y]1 total reaction
Eli Pariser reacted with ➕ at 2024-11-14 14:26 PM
[z]Nope. And we will never get out of this mess if those on "our side" are perpetuating this narrative.
The low unemployment number counts homeless people with a part time minimum wage job as employed.
GDP growth enriches the top richest 1% even further, not regular people.
The stock market going up is meaningless to normal people. Poor and working class people do not own stock. The vast majority of all stock is owned by the wealthy.
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2025/02/11/democrats-tricked-strong-economy-00203464
[aa]1 total reaction
Kass reacted with ➕ at 2024-11-15 00:34 AM
[ab]I don't have time to read this one at the moment but trust the recommendation by George Lakey that it's a valuable read. Maybe some else can read and fill this in!
1 total reaction
Jeremy Blanchard reacted with 👍 at 2024-11-18 17:00 PM