Chief Clinton Strategist: Democrats Should Abandon the Left

"In an op-ed in the New York Times Thursday, Mark Penn and Andrew Stein argue that the “path back to power for the Democratic Party today, as it was in the 1990s, is unquestionably to move to the center and reject the siren calls of the left, whose policies and ideas have weakened the party.”

"Their Democratic party credentials are not in question, and yet they all but call for an explicit repudiation of “Bernie Sanders, Senator Elizabeth Warren and a host of well-funded groups [that] have embraced sharply leftist ideas”

Dems will keep losing as long as they allow socialists to run their party. JFK would be considered a conservative compared to Sanders, Warren, Ellison or Perez.

HRC was a bad choice. Anyone left of her will insure a Republican in the WH until at least 2024. Most likely Trump.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/chief...crats-should-abandon-the-left/article/2008717

http://observer.com/2017/04/moderate-democrats-progressives-senate-2018/

 

It's too late now for the dems to run back to the middle after purging the party of anyone even remotely a centerist.

They made a foolish choice and now they have ceded the entire middle ground in a centerist nation to the republicans.
It's like deciding it was a bad move to take in a wolf pup once it has grown up and begins to attack your family. Too late.

 

Democrats abandoned their Progressive roots and became "Republican lite". THAT is the problem. Bernie Sanders certainly was not in the center or right of center leaning now was he?

 

He isn't President either. You don't understand your own party's problems very well.

 

Who knew that slavery and genocide were progressives roots.

TIL.

 

It is not an incorrect analysis, and being a progressive, I would welcome them keeping their tainted toes out of our watering hole. The only reason they went left was because they wanted to neuter the growing Green Party movement.

 

Hey... my wolf never attacked anybody.. it was one of the more docile four legged creatures I've encountered. (Pure bred, got him before captain ass hat shot himself in the wig holder and realeased all of his exotics into a suburb, forcing a law to be made against people like me who actually take care of our animals, but **** us because he made a mistake.)

I was hoping they would be looking for sanctuaries for some of those larger four legged creatures he set free, I would've happily adopted the tigers or the lions, I also have the facility required to maintain the care needed for them. Nope, LEO's shot all of them. Every single one.

 

Bill Clinton would be considered a conservative compared to the Democrats of today.

This is great.

Either way, progressives lose.

 

The thing is neither major party is liked. Only 36% of all Americans have a positive of the Republican Party and 38% of the Democratic Party. Both parties negatives are at 50% or a bit above. As one party moves right, the other left they leave more and more Americans without a political home. This can be seen in the rise of independents from approximately 30% in the 1990's to 44% today give or take depending on the poll.

Look at the positive and negative views of America at the two party's leaders.
Trump 38% positive 52% negative
Pence 40% positive 41% negative
Ryan 31% positive 48% negative
McConnell 23% positive 43% negative
Pelosi 28% positive 47% negative
Schumer 26% positive 36% negative
Democratic Party 38% positive 50% negative
Republican Party 36% positive 51% negative

There's no love there for either party or any of their leaders. Now I agree, the party that moves more toward the center will draw a lot of the more middle of the road ideological independents into their party. But keeping on move further left and right will only cause more folks to abandon the two major parties. According to Gallup only 27% of the electorate identify with the Republican Party, 30% with the Democratic Party.

 

Funny thing about Bernie, it was his fellow progressives that rigged the primaries against him. Whatever direction lefties move, corruption appears to be only a heartbeat away...

 

True there are extremes in both parties. I don't think one needs to actually be a registered republican or democrat to know which way your going to vote, at least for president. Your stat for independents seems rather high. There are only aa couple of independents in congress (for example) but they are aligned with democrats and vote democrat on nearly every bill.

 

Personally I think the left went way to far on the social front. Plus they just run off bare emotions, if you don't agree with them you're a nazi.

 

Dems can certainly thank Bernie for splitting their party. No different than the never Trump faction except there were many more dems that got Berned.

 

Actually its completely different. Clinton and the DNC rigged the primaries against Comrade Bernie. Nobody on any planet is going to say the RNC rigged the primaries in favor of Trump. The never Trump folks were the establishment, they were slapped down. The exact opposite happened on the left. The establishment slapped down everyone else and put Hillary on the road to hilarious defeat...

 

Actually, they embraced Progressive ideologies, but no one wanted to follow where they were going. How far can you progress before you've gone over the edge? You've already gone round the circle and come back to join the neo-con left-overs from decades ago.

The real problem is that if Dems reverse back to center, they will run smack into the people who are already occupying the center: ex-republicans and ex-democrats that really love our country, respect our culture, applaud what Trump is trying to accomplish, and who actually feel pretty good about themselves (a big prog no-no). If you want to oppose that, you have to keep to the hate our contry, disrespect our culture, resist Trump, and roll around in self-loathing.

 

"Easy: It’s time for Democrats to embrace and run on their party’s core values, the kind of values represented by people like Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Lyndon Johnson..."

Most Democrats still share their partys core values... thats the problem.

 

I agree about HRC and DNC rigging the primaries. It does seem though that Bernie did have what appeared to be quite a bit of support. I don't think they voted for HRC so I guess they didn't vote at all in the general elections. Might be another reason dems lost so many governor and congressional races.

 

I dunno if that's doable at this point. Political nature abhors a vacuum and the GOP has moved in to fill that. Trump, as hated as he is on the left, is the most socially liberal Republican President ever. The Democrats victory on the social issues means that to continue they have to go further into crazy land. It's not just gay marriages now, they have to move on how transgender bathrooms and other nonsense issues.

The Democrats are stuck with the left. Their best bet is to cherry pick a few lefty positions that they think are either popular or can become popular with enough news media saturation, like single payer, but try to ignore the social crazy PC issues. If they're lucky, the left might leave them alone long enough to win some races and not attack them if they try to sound like normal people.

 

They sure have been a disaster for the party.

 

The only reason to care is that it is bad for the country to be so divided. Socialists funded by the likes of Soros need to be gone.

 

At his age he should be. I'm sure there's a special place in Hades for anyone who assisted the Nazi's in any way during WWII.

 

So go the way of Bill and Blair? Focus on the neoliberal policies that pissed everyone off and empowered the radical left and right in the first place?

 

And the quote should have gone on to say: "Doesn't matter how your parents vote, kid. Their voices will be drowned out by illegals"

 

Sanders and King are independents in name only. You're very much correct. Republicans and Democrats have all the money, have automatic ballot access, have the organization, they even write our election laws as a mutual protection act. An independent or third party candidate going against all of that and more really doesn't stand a chance. Look at the presidential race. Clinton spent 1.4 billion dollars, Trump 957.6 million. Gary Johnson was in third place money wise spending 3 million. That is being outspent and organized 2.4 billion to 3 million.

What I was talking about is several polls who ask what party you either affiliate or identify with. Not which one you are registered. Here in Georgia one just registers to vote, not by party. You can divide independents up into three categories, independents who lean Republican, independents who lean Democratic and independents with no leans, pure or true independents. According to the June 11th information 26% of the electorate identify themselves as Republicans, 30% Democratic and 42% independent. Of that 42% who stated they are independents, 40% lean Republican, 45% lean Democratic while 15% are pure independents with no leans.

Those numbers are very dynamic. They change constantly. As do the voting habits of independents. Here some voting history of independents:

2006 independents voted Democratic by a margin of 57-39 over Republicans. Democrats received 52% total congressional vote vs. 44% for the Republicans.


2008 independents voted for Obama by a 52-46 margin over McCain. Obama won 53-46 over McCain. Independents voted 50-48 for Democratic congressional candidates. Total congressional vote was 53-43 Democratic.


2010 independents voted 57-41 Republican over Democrat and the total congressional vote was Republican 52% Democratic 45%


2012 independents voted for Romney by a 51-48 margin, close to a wash. Obama won the election 51-47. Independents voted 52-47 for Republican congressional candidates. Total congressional vote was 49-48 Democratic.


2014 independents voted 54-44 for Republican congressional candidates and the total vote was 51-46 Republican.


2016 Independents voted for Trump 46-42 with 12% voting third party. In congressional election independents voted Republican 51-47. Total congressional vote was 49-48 Republican.

What stands out for me is that 57% of all independents voted for Democratic congressional candidates in 2006, yet only four years later 57% of independents voted for Republican congressional candidates. That's quite a swing that could happen only with independents. Historical averages with those who identify or affiliate themselves with the two major parties will vote for their party's candidate regardless of who he is 90% of the time. The leans close to 80% and of those who are pure independents, who knows how they will vote. They swing wildly back and forth depending on the hot issues and a host of other things.

 

PREPARE YOURSELF FOR MORE “HONEST MISTAKES:” Uh Oh. Pollsters Are Screwing Up Again.

Most national pollsters are back churning out biased and misleading poll numbers after recovering from their shock over President Donald Trump’s 2016 election victory, according to The Daily Caller News Foundation Investigative Group analysis.

“I do know inherently there is a Democratic bias in the polls. And most of them will deny it” says Raghavan Mayur, an independent pollster who is president of TechnoMetrica, which leads the polling operations at Investor’s Business Daily.

A national financial news organization, IBD was one of the few polling organizations to predict a Trump victory, and it has accurately called the last four presidential elections.

“Typically, the mainstream media and the major polling companies will never admit their bias to you,” Mayur said. “This is like an alcoholic not admitting to using alcohol. They are in denial.”

Democratic pollster Patrick Caddell agreed with Mayur, saying “there was a couple of days of shock. And then they moved on because what they could not do is to get to the bottom of their own polling bias.”

Funny how the “honest mistakes” all seem to go the same way.