Democratic pandermonium is a pander trap

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Rejoice! The Bulwark has produced another version of Democrats must stop appealing to Democratic voters and pander to some other voters. I think this makes the hundred xillionth offering. Since the last election. This iteration is titled “The Hard Calls Dems Must Make to Regain Power.” But “Warning: Unoriginal long-form shitposting ahead,” would also work.

If you are not familiar with the genre, congratulations. It isn’t too late to stop reading.

At any rate, they all go a little something like this:

• Democrats in disarray!!! BE CONCERNED!!!!
• WOooOoOOo tRumpublicans gonna getcha!!!
• Quick! Enlarge the Democratic Big Tent!!
• To enlarge the DBT, Democrats must shove some people out of the tent. And perhaps under a bus. Because the tent isn’t that big.
• Did I mention WOooOoOOo tRumpublicans gonna getcha?

There is near-universal agreement among Democrats that the party needs to expand its tent and appeal to more moderate and independent voters.

Some data that backs up this assertion sure would be nice, ha ha. However, I did find a Gallup poll that shows 45% of Democrats think the party should become more moderate.

What’s far less clear is what exactly they are willing to do to make the Democratic label more palatable to those types of voters.

Already a semi-clued in reader can guess where, or rather who, this is headed for.

But first, Matt Yglesias doesn’t approve of elected Democrats’ current efforts. Oh no, time to JAQ off.

All of this raises a larger question: What policies, if any, is the party prepared to sacrifice, or at least put off to the side?

Now, the weirdos who usually recycle this article like to frustrate the reader with detailed and impractical plans for what Democratic politicians must do to begin the winning of moderate/independent/centrist voters. And who they must do it to. I think the most common example is some version of “Democrats must welcome voters who are against bodily autonomy. Sometimes to the point of committing acts of terrorism.” But in this instance the writer frustrates the reader by stating a problem, writing at length about the problem, and then failing to suggest some concrete solutions to the problem.

However, they do drop hints about topics that are unpalatable to moderate/independent voters:

1. Reinstating the 1994 assault weapon ban. The writer cites Matt Yglesias’ belief that Democrats shouldn’t try to pass legislation that is necessary, extremely popular with Democrats and has 50% approval from independent voters because it will not help Democrats running for the Senate in Texas, Iowa or Ohio.

And they go a bit further.

But, then again, no ban is going to pass in the current GOP-run Congress, let alone be enacted while Trump is president. What will happen is Democrats running in red states and districts will be put on the spot.

That appears to warn against introducing any legislation Republicans are unlikely to pass and could use to put Democrats in Republican-leaning areas on the spot until Democrats control Congress and the White House. In other words, any bill a Democrat introduces, because no matter what is in the bill, Republicans will shriek that the bill will shove Woke right up everyone’s asshole.

And incurring Republican ire isn’t automatically a bad thing if the goal is to attract moderates and/or independents or even centrists. Rather than say, people who identify as such because they know the party has become synonymous with a clutch of ignorant grifting perverts, but consistently vote Republican. When they bother to vote. At any rate, I also wonder if Democrats in Congress are still allowed to vote against Republican legislation, or is that too spicy?

2. Reflected-sound-of-underground-spirits.

Rahm Emanuel, who is reportedly considering running for president in 2028, has spent weeks warning Democrats that it’s risky to focus just on an economic agenda while ignoring thornier subjects such as crime and immigration.

It’s not the economy, stupid?

Perhaps Emanuel doesn’t know that Democrats are not focused just on an economic agenda because Democrats don’t talk to him. But to name one example, Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) recently addressed immigration and crime by going to El Salvador to check on Kilmar Abrego Garcia, one of tRump’s kidnapping victims. And I do recall various pundits pummelling Democrats for chasing after silly issues like freedom and liberty and justice woke mind virus culture war I am not a crank issues because voters were deeply concerned about all those reports that the economy was in the shitter.

3. Finally, in the third to last paragraph: Protecting transgender people from discrimination. And the second to last, and the last paragraph. There is even a remarkably insincere call to Think of the Transgender Children. It’s as subtle as a wet fart in a packed elevator and much nastier.

The article also contains the mandatory general dismissal of issues important to Democratic voters.

That’s been an uncomfortable exercise for Democrats, in part because Democratic-aligned interest groups genuinely believe (and can produce their own data to argue) that their pet projects do poll well and can energize voters.

The pet project language is more evidence that every person who writes this article would have a stroke if an original idea got very lost and wound up in their brain. But it does reinforce the idea that Democratic politicians shouldn’t take Democratic voters too seriously. Better to focus on the legitimate concerns of centrimoderpendent voters. Like the ability to own weapons that civilians absolutely do not need. Or the genitals of complete strangers. You know. Real American Kitchen Table Stuff.

This approach also avoids the inconvenient topic of math, which stubbornly insists that to win a congressional election, a candidate must get more votes than their opponents. And unless they’re an incumbent running unopposed, they have to do it twice.

No matter what the various authors of this article say, the one weird trick for Democratic Dominance isn’t simply pandering to whatever group a writer wants them to chase: In this article it’s centrimoderpendent voters who won’t vote for a Democrat. Unless the politician is sufficiently tough on transgender people, undocumented immigrants and certain types of crime. But very gentle on assault weapons. And talks just the right amount about the economy? Apparently.

This cunning plan cannot work unless the Democratic pandidate gains enough votes from the target group, preferably without losing any Democratic votes, but at least maintaining enough Democratic votes to get the most votes. And they must be very cunning indeed or voters and opponents of all political persuasions, pundits, including the previously pro-pandering ones, babies and intelligent housepets will hammer the candidate flat for pandering, and it will be off to history’s landfill with them.

And if it does work? That is, if enough Democrats convince enough centrimoderpendent voters that they are against things centrimoderpendents are against and for things centrimoderpendents are for, and they gain a veto-proof majority in Congress. And then those Democrats can say “Psyche!” and pass some laws that contradict what they told voters, then what?

I will admit that as a way to make sure Democratic members of Congress serve one term and generally fuck the party, the plan is so cunning you could stick a tail on it and call it a weasel. Those centrimoderpendent voters will not be back any time soon and Democrats running in Republican-leaning states would really be on the spot. In part because we’d be up to our necks in articles about The Perfidy of Democrats for the next dozen decades.

If a candidate wants to run that sort of con more than once they need to run as a Republican.

Instead the next batch of received opinion (not to be confused with the essential Received Opinion) from outlets like The Bulwark will be that Democrats must maintain the kayfabe, as the youths say, because they need those centrimoderpendent voters, tRumpublicans, be afraid, and so on.

And then the opinionators can spew reams about the mysterious lack of enthusiasm among Democratic voters.

In short, this crap is a trap and should be avoided. A candidate who can’t see that should be avoided too.