Time for the Dems to Centralize, around a Centrist

dudalb said:
SO all Republicans are evil..including those who left the party because they can't stand Trump?
And I am not sure the soul of the Democratic Party is as far to the left as you thnk it is...
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Not evil, just incompetent and negligent. People have been warning them for years about their dog-whistling to racists.

Never Trumpers are already committed to not voting Trump. There's no reason to court their votes.
 
dudalb said:
I think you mean 2012 instead of 2016.
But point well taken.]
I just think, even with the dislike of Trump, the Americans are ready to go as far to the left as the Berniebros think it is....
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They also weren't ready for Al Gore, John Kerry and Hillary Clinton. Would they be ready for Joe Biden?

Who then?
 
angrysoba said:
They also weren't ready for Al Gore, John Kerry and Hillary Clinton. Would they be ready for Joe Biden?

Who then?
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There is an argument that the less moderate candidate has won every presidential election since 1980.

Reagan X 2 (ldo)
Bush (four more years)
Clinton (Bush raised taxes and reverted to being a moderate)
Clinton (This is at best unclear... Clinton was GOP light at this point but so was Dole, really)
Bush ( how could you out moderate Gore?)
Bush (ADAM AND EVE NOT ADAM AND STEVE; SUPPORT OUR TROOPS OR THE BABY JESUS WILL CRY)
Obama (McCain's whole trip was reasonableness, except his VP choice was maybe so bad as to flip this one)
Obama (Romney is like mayo, only without all the spiciness)
Trump (JFC)

I'm not sure trying to drift back to the center is a winning move.
 
A better way to put it is this:

In every election since 1980, imagine the two candidates (lol Perot) having this exchange:

Candidate A: Here, smell my finger.
Candidate B: That is just sick. Why don't you grow up?

Every election has been won by the candidate that would be more likely to be candidate A.

I mean, it is hard to imagine Reagan being on that side of it, except it is harder to imagine Carter or Mondale. Bush manages to be on both sides in consecutive elections, but, again, Dukakis was so meek that he wouldn't refer to himself as a liberal without qualifying the crap out of it. Clinton obviously did do this in a real non-symbolic way at some point so he's clear.

Uptight centrism is poison. Warren before she drifted center could have been candidate A. Bernie no doubt. The rest are too busy trying real hard to be likable and see how offended they can be by Trump having his finger under their noses without giving it right back. Bloomberg just maybe, but his finger would smell like money so Trump would like it...

Maybe I just need some sleep.
 
The latest Quinnepac poll shows the entire Democratic field beating Trump in an honest election. Which is the problem. It won't be an honest election.
 
Suddenly said:
There is an argument that the less moderate candidate has won every presidential election since 1980.

Reagan X 2 (ldo)
Bush (four more years)
Clinton (Bush raised taxes and reverted to being a moderate)
Clinton (This is at best unclear... Clinton was GOP light at this point but so was Dole, really)
Bush ( how could you out moderate Gore?)
Bush (ADAM AND EVE NOT ADAM AND STEVE; SUPPORT OUR TROOPS OR THE BABY JESUS WILL CRY)
Obama (McCain's whole trip was reasonableness, except his VP choice was maybe so bad as to flip this one)
Obama (Romney is like mayo, only without all the spiciness)
Trump (JFC)

I'm not sure trying to drift back to the center is a winning move.
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Both Clinton and Obama reflexively governed from the center, the latter even when he had a functional supermajority in the Senate backing him up. You'd be hard pressed to name anything they did which even resembles the massive structural changes being put forward by AOC and the other DSA-flavored nominal Democrats.
 
d4m10n said:
Dems won with a centrist unifying figure in 1992, 1996, 2008, & 2012.

In my entire adult life, they have never won any other way.
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If that's what you call Clinton and Obama, then what would you call the ones who've lost? (Mondale, Dukakis, Gore, Kerry, Other Clinton) It seems like you're describing a situation where only one approach has even been tried, and it's both won and lost.

But the more important point is that your depiction of those campaigns is far off. Maybe that's how they actually governed once they were elected, but it's not what they presented themselves as in their campaigns. They campaigned about how they were going to radically change everything. The word "change" became a cliché of Democrat/lefty campaigning from how much they kept blathering about it. In their campaigns, they pretended to be Bernie before Bernie was famous. And the campaign version of a candidate, not the future actual governing version, is the one voters have available to decide on.
 
Galaxie said:
Official GOP List of Commie-Socialist Dem Presidents:
1) Every single Dem since 1932
2) Ronald Reagan (as of 2016 rules amendment)
3) George H. W. Bush (see no.2)
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You forgot Nixon. Or maybe he gets a pass from the GOP because of Kent State or whatever.
 
Suddenly said:
There is an argument that the less moderate candidate has won every presidential election since 1980.
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A few things to keep in mind:

- The idea that moderates do better than extremists is not some sort of law. Statistically it appears to be the case, but there are exceptions. Sometimes external factors will come into play that will harm a candidate's chances regardless of how moderate/extreme they are. Or sometimes the candidate will just run a bad campaign.

- When deciding whether a candidate is moderate or extreme, you have to look at most/all of their policies, rather than just focusing on one element and labeling them moderate/extreme based on that. You also have to consider their position in relation to ALL the other candidates and party members. Just because a republican candidate doesn't hold the same positions as a democrat does not make him 'extreme'.

- The claim that we are making is that a moderate has a better chance than an extremist. If both candidates are moderate or both extreme, then the argument becomes irrelevant.

- There are certain aspects of the American political system that put Democrats at a disadvantage. (Electoral college, voter suppression). That means that even if being a moderate is an advantage, it could mean that they still lose because of those other disadvantages.

So lets look at your list....
Reagan X 2 (ldo)
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Reagan first came to power after Jimmy Carter (a.k.a. "History's greatest Monster"). Carter had to deal with the Iranian hostage crisis and the invasion of Afghanistan, both factors that would have harmed any candidate.
Bush (four more years)
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While the presidency of Bush Sr. was often seen as a continuation of Reagan's term, Bush himself was actually more moderate. Remember, he at one point labeled Reagan's plans 'voodoo economics'. And as president he supported stronger environmental protections and increased rights for people with disabilities.

So, I'd say overall Bush Sr. was a moderate, even before he was elected.
Clinton (Bush raised taxes and reverted to being a moderate)
Clinton (This is at best unclear... Clinton was GOP light at this point but so was Dole, really)
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I'd say Clinton was a moderate in both of his campaigns.
Bush ( how could you out moderate Gore?)
Bush (ADAM AND EVE NOT ADAM AND STEVE; SUPPORT OUR TROOPS OR THE BABY JESUS WILL CRY)
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Yes, Bush 'won' against Gore. But he lost the popular vote. Now, you could argue that 'a loss is still a loss', but the problems of the electoral college will impact ANYONE the democrats select as a candidate.
Obama (McCain's whole trip was reasonableness, except his VP choice was maybe so bad as to flip this one)
Obama (Romney is like mayo, only without all the spiciness)
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Obama was pretty much a moderate as a president. His 'health care reform' was an improvement over what existed before, but wasn't anywhere near as radical as "medicare for all". He brought in new financial regulations, but he didn't go as far as breaking up the banks. He was generally on the left when it came to social issues (abortion and gay rights), but his actions on gun rights were limited. (He wanted more regulations, but certainly didn't call for an outright ban.)
Trump (JFC)
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Again, another case where a candidate lost the popular vote, but still won thanks to the electoral college (not to mention voter suppression and Russian collusion.)
I'm not sure trying to drift back to the center is a winning move.
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Well, given the fact that some of the 'extremists' you listed were actually closer to being 'moderates', and that some of the 'extremist' victories were questionable at best, I'd say seeking out the political center is a good idea.

Could Sanders have beaten Trump in 2016? I do not know. Clinton had problems with her campaign that had nothing to do with her position on the political spectrum that Sanders would have avoided. But, the issues of voter suppression, Russian interference and the electoral college were still there, and he would have been impacted by them too.

And I am not discounting Sander's chances should he become the nominee in 2020. Its possible that Trump's problems will finally catch up to him. Its possible that his personality will be convincing enough to people. Its possible that republican actions (the tax plan, attempts to kill Obamacare, etc.) will be seen as a hard-shift to the right, so that it will be a case of far-left vs. far-right.

I'm just saying that statistically there are reasons that moderates do better on average than extremists.
 
The whole centrist=electable stance looks like a post hoc fallacy to me, usually promulgated by people who simply prefer centrist candidates.

Favorability ratings are generally a better predictor of who will get elected. Both Clinton's and Trump's were poor in 2016, which probably has something to do with why she merely won the most votes. Corbyn's were abysmal for at least a year prior to the UK election (if this tells us anything about US elections).

But in general, electability is a murky concept, certainly not something for voters to worry about.

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/youll-never-know-which-candidate-is-electable/

Political scientists study electability, but electability ain’t no science. Instead, researchers say, it’s basically a layer of ex post facto rationalization that we slather over a stack of psychological biases, media influence and self-fulfilling poll prophecies. It’s not ********, exactly; some people really are more likely to be elected than others. But the reasons behind it, and the ability to make assumptions based on it, well …

“[Electability] is this vague, floppy concept,” said Nichole Bauer, a professor of political communication at Louisiana State University. “We don’t know who is electable until someone is elected.”
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SuburbanTurkey said:
Not evil, just incompetent and negligent. People have been warning them for years about their dog-whistling to racists.

Never Trumpers are already committed to not voting Trump. There's no reason to court their votes.
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Could double their impact by getting them to vote blue.

Simply not voting for Trump is not the same as voting for the Dem.
 
mumblethrax said:
The whole centrist=electable stance looks like a post hoc fallacy to me...
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There have been studies into the area.

From: https://www.vox.com/2019/7/2/20677656/donald-trump-moderate-extremism-penalty
The hoary old chestnut that moderate candidates do better at the polls than relatively extreme ones is well supported in the academic literature. In 2002, for example, Brandice Canes-Wrone, David Brady, and John Cogan found that the more an incumbent House member breaks with party leadership on roll call votes, the better he does on Election Day. Andrew Hall in 2015 looked at very close congressional primaries and found that moderate candidates who narrowly win the nomination do better in the general election than extreme candidates who narrowly win the nomination. A follow-up paper he wrote with Daniel Thompson suggests this is because certain folk theories about base mobilization are mistaken, and extreme nominees “fire up” the other side’s base and increase opposition turnout. A new paper by Devin Caughey and Christopher Warshaw extends this literature by looking at races for state legislature and governor as well as Congress and finds, again, that ideology matters.
 
Instead of a "Returning to the Norm" theory of politics, maybe a " pendulum swings in the opposite direction" theory is more appropriate.
The Obama Presidency was portrayed by the Right as radical left (and too darkskined), which would explain the Trump nomination.
And Trump is such an extreme that Democrats might not be satisfied with a mere Centrist and would instead prefer a racial leftist to restore equilibrium.
After all, Obama started at the Center and was dragged to the Right. With Bernie starting from the Left, actually moderate policies might be achievable.
 
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