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> Making drastic changes to a party because you narrowly lost an election with a candidate that never won a primary is dumb.

That depends on who you lose to.



How is a candidate that didn't win a primary _narrowly_ losing to a candidate that won a primary a big deal?

Like if Democrats decided to run Ron DeSantis how huge do you think Trump's lead would've been?


If you're a marathon runner, and you lose to another marathon runner, that's OK.

If you're a marathon runner, and you lose to a toddler, that's probably not.

The Dems fought an eminently beatable candidate and lost, and they continue to struggle with messaging now (stop putting Schumer up there to deliver it!). They flubbed the response to Dobbs, the consultant class nixed the Harris campaign parts that were working (weird etc.) in favor of things that don't (Cheney endorsements). etc.


> If you're a marathon runner, and you lose to a toddler, that's probably not.

You understand that in this analogy, the toddler won the NYC marathon 2 years ago and then beat somebody that lost their local 5k?


I do!

The party that keeps losing to the toddler in varied fashion needs to do some soul searching and make changes instead of spending a bunch of political capital keeping AOC out of roles.


How you frame a problem, determines what solution you are going to find.

I went over many assumptions after the elections, to understand what I had missed. But things changed when I asked a different question.

Its not a question of how Harris lost. Its a question of how Trump ran in the first place.

With that change, things clicked into place.


Decades of ignoring existing anti-trust laws leading to large conglomerates with monopolistic pricing power?

Unfriendly labor rulings like the time you spend in mandatory employer required security screenings doesn't count as paid time?

Do share with the class what you think is special about Trump running consider he's done it for 4 elections [1] and considered it against Obama (you may remember the whole birther movement).

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_camp...


I like the tone of condescension. Makes it easier.

Lets work with what you said, what caused those issues in turn? If we get stuck at congress being deadlocked, or bad democrat leadership - please see "dems are always wrong". Where the converastion comes to whoever we blame (always the Dems), and then we sit on our hands.

You raised the question of trump running 4 times. I found that instructive, since the first time was in 2000, and it went no where. the other 3 times were the current 3 presedential races.

He was not a political force that decimated the anointed ones of the Republican inner circle. Nor was social tolerance for his behavior this high. What changed.

How did someone, an American who instigated an insurrection, A felon, A person who said he will grab women by the pussy - not only unsinkable in politics, but was able to tell everyone what Harris' campaign was?

Trump wanted to build a wall across a border. This wasn't a president in some banana republic.

This was in America. And this was tolerable, if not welcome.

Over an over again, we use normal measures (other candidate should message better), as if Trump is NORMAL.

That if someone else did a better job he would lose.

Its the other way round - America had a problem when he got to the ballot box, and did that twice.


Do please share your conclusions with the rest of us?


I'm more curious what questions or potential different issues people can see if they start from this point.




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