What did Democrats do wrong?

[Reformed Offlian]

Does that make you a vote for Hitler? With hindsight even?

I guess Hitler was the lesser evil, too.

 

[Lukraak_Sisser]

One thing the Democrats could start doing is making it clearer that all the things US citizens are rightfully angry about are caused by GOP policies.
Needing to work 2/3 jobs in order to even get by? decades of GOP erosion of workers rights
No housing available? Decades of GOP policies making houses a gambling commodity and something bankers can get rich off.
A single hospital visit will bankrupt you? Decades of GOP policies turning US healthcare in a profit first and only industry.
If your boss is incompetent and ruins the company (s)he gets a bonus and tax breaks, whereas the normal workers get nothing? GOP trickle down economy.
etc etc.
Because no matter how you look at it, in the past 40 years or so, there have been only a few years of moments where the Democrats had actual power in the US, and the rest of the time it was either the GOP or democrats appeasing the GOP to prevent government shutdowns.

 

[johnny karate]

At the time, it was either that, or vote for communist authoritarianism. Can you really blame the Germans who, lacking the luxury of hindsight, voted for a fighting chance against Soviet Russia?

No, of course not. You're a time traveler swanning in from the 21st century, to tell Weimar Germany they'd be better red than dead. Which is also a lie.

This just makes Trump voters look even stupider since they were not faced with this dilemma and simply chose to burn everything down out of incoherent spite.

 

[Reformed Offlian]

This just makes Trump voters look even stupider since they were not faced with this dilemma and simply chose to burn everything down out of incoherent spite.

"In a way, all fascists have an El Guapo they must face some day. For some, Communism might be their El Guapo. For others, Black Panthers might be their El Guapo. For MAGA, El Guapo is an elementary school teacher with an 'All Are Welcome' poster on her classroom wall".

 

[Donal]

Unfortunately I don't think you've been following the news to be dismissing it out of hand like this. I could grab more, but best for me to manage how much time I spend on this vs the actual degree of discussion I can expect. Example 1, Example 2, Example 3, Example 4, Example 5

Example 1, Example 3, is not what you claimed. there is no evidence of catch and release or cashless bail after committing a violent felony.

Example 2 is a broken link

Example 4 not only misrepresents what a sanctuary state or city is, it glosses over the fact that ICE fouled up by not having the warrant ready AS IS REQUIRED BY LAW.

Also, wow, what an unbiased source.

A broken clock is right twice a day. But in this case you're just using it as a convenient deflection tool.

No, it debunks your whole screed.

First, the issue is two-fold. When you enter a country illegally (what you wash down to as "undocumented"), you have broken the law already,

You have committed a civil violation. Like rolling a stop sign or hiring undocumented immigrants. There's an important difference.

in most cases just by not entering the country through a designated port of entry.

Nope.

Then you had an administration actively encouraging it and refusing to enforce the laws leading to thousands of border crossings per day.

The Biden administration adhered to the law and did not encourage undocumented border crossings. He actually increased security along the border with the brown folks and worked with Latin American countries to improve conditions in those countries to stem the flow of mass migration. He even continued Trump's illegal "remain in Mexico" policy.

He increased the number of CBP agents. Not just for hunting brown folks, but to help process legal migration more quickly. As required by law. You want the government to follow the law, right?

He even tried to get a bill passed written by a Republican Senator giving Republicans everything they were asking for. What happened to that bill? Do you remember?

Secondly, Mexican cartels and smugglers exploited Biden era policies ad nauseum placing many more immigrants trying to cross the border at risk between how they have to pay the smugglers, and the risk incurred while relying on them to cross terrain on the way to the US.

You didn't read what you linked.

It's about cartels bringing victims across MEXICO'S southern border. It even says at the start

Migrant encounters at the U.S.-Mexico border have reached a four-year low,

And it goes on to say how your weak daddy is going to undo a lot of the reforms Biden did to process legal entry faster.

Fourth,

You missed third

subsidized immigrant shelters

Ya? and? You want more people sleeping on the streets?

Fifth, gangs have exploited migrant sheltering repeatedly to operate while recruiting

2 stories based on the word of one guy awaiting trial for shooting at cops. Kind of weird how there's no independent verification. that's the sort of thing that would have lots of work done by multiple agencies at every level. I guess we can take the NYPD at their word. Because they never get caught lying.

Legally, they're not allowed to base detentions and deportations solely on either.

LOL. Homan said they were doing it and SCOTUS said they can.

They're required to evaluate other more significant factors. If these deportations do happen due to racial and ethnic characteristics solely or primarily, and it's demonstrated, I do not disagree with you that those cases need to be addressed as soon as possible.

SCOTUS disagrees with you

It is an issue at the border because the volume of it (20 million people, 4 years) is directly influenced by years of policy that didn't enforce border security. The two are co-dependent on each other.

That number has never been confirmed. Your weak daddy jut throughs out big numbers to scare dumb, soft white folks.

 

[dann]

One thing the Democrats could start doing is making it clearer that all the things US citizens are rightfully angry about are caused by GOP policies.
Needing to work 2/3 jobs in order to even get by? decades of GOP erosion of workers rights

All the things? Decades of GOP erosion of workers' rights? I seem to remember an awful lot of Democratic presidents in recent decades ...

No housing available? Decades of GOP policies making houses a gambling commodity and something bankers can get rich off.

Again decades of GOP policies and exclusively GOP policies. What were the Democrats doing in those decades? And why are Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and a couple of others the only ones who point to those things as something that needs to be changed? And why doesn't the DNC back them up?

A single hospital visit will bankrupt you? Decades of GOP policies turning US healthcare in a profit first and only industry.

Again: Why didn't Harris pick all of those things as the major themes of her campaign? Why didn't actual Democratic presidents do something about decades of erosion of workers' rights, housing and healthcare? It's almost as if appealling to voters who liked the Cheneys was more important to them in 2024 than doing something for working people, wasn't it?

If your boss is incompetent and ruins the company (s)he gets a bonus and tax breaks, whereas the normal workers get nothing? GOP trickle down economy.
etc etc.
Because no matter how you look at it, in the past 40 years or so, there have been only a few years of moments where the Democrats had actual power in the US, and the rest of the time it was either the GOP or democrats appeasing the GOP to prevent government shutdowns.

Do you think that it's time for Schumer, the Clintons, Obama and Harris to back up the demands that working people have seemed to agree with during the Fighting Oligarchy Tour instead of trying to appeal to MAGA voters? (And to Israel!) Why not try to change the minds of MAGA voters instead of appealing to the dumbest of their ideas? And why accept that Democrats do the opposite of what they promised their voters to do?

Alberto C. Medina on X, Sep 25, 2025
“I feel like liberals have just enough empathy to be tricked by con men but not enough to care about the children in Palestine” is maybe one of the great political one-liners of our time.

In response to:

gianmarco on X, Sep 25, 2025
Thoughts on Jimmy Kimmel’s return

With a short video (2:06 min.)

 

[Emily's Cat]

"A group of extremists" didn't show up uninvited to the Unite the Right Rally; they organized it. Jason Kessler got exactly the crowd he wanted and expected, even if events didn't shake out the way he might have hoped.

The rest of your examples are iterations of the same irrelevant notion that the extremists were unwanted gate-crashers, rather than the actual organizers.

Alrighty, I suppose you're admitting that pro-hamas groups were the organizers of the many palestine protests.

Would you then argue that everyone who showed up to those protests are terrorists?

 

[Emily's Cat]

Henceforth, I think I will turn every response I give to you into a little game: I will try to figure out the dumbest way that someone can turn a fair criticism of the right into an unfair criticism of the left. I give myself a cookie every time your response matches my prediction.

I'd be super duper happy if you just exhibited some fair criticism of the left instead of excusing the worst behaviors of the left as "outliers that don't count" while simultaneously insisting that the worst behaviors of the right are representative of all conservatives and moderates across the board.

 

[Emily's Cat]

Seriously, my impression of what most people are saying is that, yes, the dems need to very carefully consider what went wrong, and how to rectify that in the future.

Uh huh. And what has been called out as things to change in the future? What topics have the progressives on this site agreed that Dems did wrong and need to change?

What I see evryone rejecting is the idea that the dems' criticisism of Trump, and the republican party, made more people vote for Trump, because it hurt their feelings. Which is ridiculous.

You don't think that having a large number of Dem politicians all reciting the same claim that Trump is an existential threat to democracy and a fascist threat to the future of the US as essentially the ENTIRE basis of the last election was short-sighted and poorly received?

Additionally, I fail to see how participants in this thread persistently bitching about how horring Trump is, how it's all Trump's fault, and conservatives are evil racist sexist bigots is actually addressing what dems should do differently in the future.

 

[Random]

I'd be super duper happy if you just exhibited some fair criticism of the left instead of excusing the worst behaviors of the left as "outliers that don't count" while simultaneously insisting that the worst behaviors of the right are representative of all conservatives and moderates across the board.

While there are certainly many Liberal weirdos out there who believe in unacceptable things, by and large they are confined to college classrooms and ineffective protests. The Right-wing weirdos are in charge of the Government and are trying to prosecute their enemies for imaginary crimes. It's just not possible to "balance" them.

 

[Emily's Cat]

Do they?

Which dissenters did Biden threaten to revoke the visas of and deport simply for not being progressive enough? Which dissenters did the Democratic party censure for not being progressive enough? Which dissenters did senior Democratic leadership demand primary challenges against for not being progressive enough?

Not wanting to talk to former friends anymore because they won't shut up about trans nonsense isn't crushing dissent.

Oooh, clever monkey. Nice way to ignore half of YOUR OWN post in order to misdirect the discussion.

It's some IMAX-level projection, too. Which party punishes dissent? Which party habitually frames their political opponents as enemies?

You can't seriously be arguing that Democrats do NOT frame their political opponents as enemies? Hell, this last election cycle, they as a group framed their political opponent not just as an enemy of the democratic party, but as an enemy of democracy and a threat to the continued existence of the US as a country.

 

[Reformed Offlian]

Alrighty, I suppose you're admitting that pro-hamas groups were the organizers of the many palestine protests.

I said nothing about Palestinian protests. In fact, I rejected your earlier attempt to inject them into the discussion as irrelevant. Which if any pro-Palestinian protests were organized by pro-Hamas groups is an issue of fact that I have no special knowledge of. I know a bit more about Unite the Right because it happened in my hometown.

As explained earlier, your analogy is badly flawed. To make it more accurate to Unite the Right, we would need to be talking about protests whose tenor and content were explicitly and obviously pro-Hamas, with most if not all of its participants flying its distinctive banners, wearing its emblems, chanting its slogans, etc.

Would you then argue that everyone who showed up to those protests are terrorists?

Looks like we still need more fixes to bring the scenario into line with Unite the Right. What should one conclude about people who learned about the rally ahead of time by following pro-Hamas media, traveled some distance, in some cases upwards of a thousand miles to attend, looked around, saw all the pro-Hamas stuff, and decided to stick around and participate anyway?

 

[Reformed Offlian]

ETA: NVM

 

[Emily's Cat]

One thing the Democrats could start doing is making it clearer that all the things US citizens are rightfully angry about are caused by GOP policies.
Needing to work 2/3 jobs in order to even get by? decades of GOP erosion of workers rights
No housing available? Decades of GOP policies making houses a gambling commodity and something bankers can get rich off.
A single hospital visit will bankrupt you? Decades of GOP policies turning US healthcare in a profit first and only industry.
If your boss is incompetent and ruins the company (s)he gets a bonus and tax breaks, whereas the normal workers get nothing? GOP trickle down economy.
etc etc.
Because no matter how you look at it, in the past 40 years or so, there have been only a few years of moments where the Democrats had actual power in the US, and the rest of the time it was either the GOP or democrats appeasing the GOP to prevent government shutdowns.

So again, the thing Dems did wrong was to not blame Reps enough, and not be hard enough on Reps?

But let's take a look here, because I don't think this is as airtight as you think it is.

Needing to work extra jobs to get by. Erosion of workers rights? You might be able to make that argument, but only in the context of weakened union protections, I think. On the other hand, workers have been granted equal opportunity laws, protection against discrimination, safety regulations, mandatory breaks and lunches, FMLA, worker's compensation insurance, increased overtime pay, affirmative action, and increased minimum wage. In addition, however, there's been an increase in work visas allowing more competition for jobs, lax control of illegal entrants working many labor jobs, and the destruction of US industrial work as it gets outsourced to foreign countries. Most of those things - both good and ill - have had bipartisan support or at best silence from both parties. I don't recall Dems rallying to protect US industry, or to control immigration and prioritize US job placement, or to reduce work visas.

No housing available. You're right that allowing secondary and tertiary market actions on mortgages contributed to this situation, but it wasn't something pushed by Reps nor was it opposed by Dems. It had tacit approval from both parties. But there was a lot more that has contributed to this current situation. For example, overcorrection for redlining extended sub-prime mortgages to people who really couldn't afford them and increasing the risk of default. Following that bust, a large number of houses were purchased by foreign venture capital and rent rates increased substantially. Stops put in place during Covid exacerbated this, even though it was well intentioned, by disallowing evictions for non-payment of rent. That led to apartment owners being unable to afford to keep their properties, and a large number of those properties were sold to foreign interests. I don't recall Dems taking action to protect property owners from bankruptcy, nor to limit the ability of foreign interests to purchase a significant chunk of the US housing market. Compounding all of this is the gentrification of urban areas which increases rents and housing prices in the areas where most jobs are, which pushes workers out.

Hospital visits causing bankruptcy. You're right that this is a problem. But GOP didn't cause this, both parties did. Allowing both health care providers and health insurers to be publicly traded entities introduced a significant conflict of interest into the system, and both parties are to blame for that. Additionally, it's been a Dem platform to socialize insurance, to subsidize premiums, and to continually demand that more and more services be considered essential health benefits, and to eliminate underwriting, while not imposing any requirements on the delivery of care. This has created a situation where negotiating power is in the hands of large provider systems, in many cases ones that insurers are required to have in network in order to be able to sell insurance at all. Over the last few decades, the prices that providers charge for their services have continued to rise much faster than inflation, and in the last few years it's skyrocketed. Providers are making considerable profits, and engaging in some questionable billing practices that push up premiums and the cost of insurance. There's a whole lot wrong in the medical industry in the US, but you're fool if you think only GOP is to blame for this situation.

At the end of the day, most of the problems in the US can't be laid solely at the feet of one party or the other. And the unwillingness to come to a reasonable solution across the aisle isn't something that is exclusive to republicans.

 

[I Am The Scum]

I'd be super duper happy if you just exhibited some fair criticism of the left instead of excusing the worst behaviors of the left as "outliers that don't count" while simultaneously insisting that the worst behaviors of the right are representative of all conservatives and moderates across the board.

Sorry! I'm not in the cult of centrism. So to me, fair criticism means proportionate criticism, not evenly-balanced criticism (which appears to be your belief). In order for me to follow through on your request fairly, you would need to show me a Democrat president/candidate doing the leftist equivalent of praising the attendants of a neo-nazi rally, inviting Holocaust deniers to lunch, or appointing someone to high office after they had spread multiple antisemetic conspiracy theories and did two nazi salutes on stage. Until then, the lion's share of my criticism is going to go to the people actually doing those things.

 

[Reformed Offlian]

but as an enemy of democracy and a threat to the continued existence of the US as a country.

Did they do this before or after a MAGA mob broke into the Capitol to disrupt the counting of electoral votes? This isn't the pot calling the kettle black. This is the rake calling the spade a spade. And the spade's rejoinder, which you, being a left-leaning moderate totally-not-a-Trump-supporter, are naturally keen to endorse and amplify, boils down to telling the rake: "*You're* a spade!"

 

[Pixel42]

You can't seriously be arguing that Democrats do NOT frame their political opponents as enemies? Hell, this last election cycle, they as a group framed their political opponent not just as an enemy of the democratic party, but as an enemy of democracy and a threat to the continued existence of the US as a country.

To be fair, subsequent events have proved them right. Come to think of it so did prior events, like him trying to overturn the result of the 2020 election with intimidation (in Georgia) and violence (on Jan 6th).

 

[Helen]

You don't think that having a large number of Dem politicians all reciting the same claim that Trump is an existential threat to democracy and a fascist threat to the future of the US as essentially the ENTIRE basis of the last election was short-sighted and poorly received?

Additionally, I fail to see how participants in this thread persistently bitching about how horring Trump is, how it's all Trump's fault, and conservatives are evil racist sexist bigots is actually addressing what dems should do differently in the future.

Turns out they were, and are, right, as Pixel42 said above.

 

[dann]

You don't think that having a large number of Dem politicians all reciting the same claim that Trump is an existential threat to democracy and a fascist threat to the future of the US as essentially the ENTIRE basis of the last election was short-sighted and poorly received?

In 2024, Trump was a fascist threat to democracy. In 2025, the fascists Trump, MAGA and the oligarchs behind Project 2025 are actively disassembling democracy*.

Additionally, I fail to see how participants in this thread persistently bitching about how horring Trump is, how it's all Trump's fault, and conservatives are evil racist sexist bigots is actually addressing what dems should do differently in the future.

In 2025, conservatives are evil racist sexist fascist bigots. They were evil racist sexist fascist bigots in 2024, too. Otherwise, they wouldn't have voted for the evil racist sexist bigoted fascist. What the resistance should do differently in the future is to put up a fight against racism, sexism, bigotry, fascism and, first and foremost, classism, which very few Democrats do. They don't even argue against those things.
Newsom, for instance, is all about parodying the form of Trump's propaganda and not really touching on the contents of the MAGA policies. And how could he, when most of it is identical with the kind of society that Democratic presidents have been running for decades? Is this new version of Newsom very different from the old version of Newsom, the guy who invited right-wing celebrities on his podcast?

This Is Gavin Newsom (Wikipedia)
Notable guests such as Charlie Kirk, Tim Walz, and Ezra Klein have also made interviews on his podcast. (...) He converses with them to explore differing viewpoints across the political spectrum. Newsweek said that "Newsom defended his podcast as a chance to have the conversations the Democratic Party refuses to have…"

And let's not forget Sean Spicer, Steve Bannon, Frank Luntz, Newt Gingrich, Dr. Phil (but not Bernie Sanders, AOC, Mamdani - or even Elizabeth Warren.)
Much like when Kamala Harris campaigned with the Cheneys ...

From Lukraak_Sisser's post, which I criticized in post 2,496:
People needing to work 2/3 jobs in order to even get by.
No housing available; a gambling commodity and something bankers can get rich off.
Hospital visits bankrupting people. US healthcare a profit-first-and-only industry.
Bosses getting bonuses and tax breaks, normal workers getting nothing. Trickle-down economics.
etc etc. in the past 40 years or so.

These are very good points. Lukraak_Sisser's mistake was to pretend that this was all due to the GOP and MAGA and had nothing to do with the kind of politics that campaign donors have paid and are still paying Democratic candidates to represent in the past 40 years or so.

* ETA: Not that I'm a big fan. After all, it's what led to the current predicament and all the stuff mentioned in Lukraak_Sasser's post.

 

[dann]

This is an old one that Democrats did wrong, but the occasion is new:

Assata Shakur, an icon of Black liberation who was exiled to Cuba, dies aged 78 (TheGuardian, Sep 26, 2025)
In 2013, Shakur was the first woman to land on the FBI’s most-wanted terrorists list. While opponents vilified Shakur, her life and memoir inspired racial justice movements for decades.

Momodou on X, Sep 26, 2025
Remember: Obama doubled the bounty on Assata Shakur. That tells you everything you need to know about that bastard. Assata’s image has been and will continue to be taken up as a symbol of resistance to empire, whilst Obama will be remembered as the dog of US imperialism.

Maritza on X, Sep 26, 2025
@grok is this true

Grok on X, Sep 26, 2025
Yes, in 2013 under the Obama administration, the FBI added Assata Shakur to its Most Wanted Terrorists list and offered a $1 million reward. Combined with New Jersey's existing $1 million bounty, this doubled the total to $2 million.

Assata Shakur: Turnpike shootout mistrial: Medical evidence (Wikipedia)