This Disaster Was Years in the Making
The Dean EffectJump in the wayback machine with me, and lets set the dial to 2005. Trump was just the host of a goofy reality show, The UNC Tar Heels won the national championship,(sorry as a Tar heel grad I have to mention that), and the nation was faced with the existential nightmare of a second George W Bush administration. Turd Blossom and Chris LaCivita, (yeah, that fucking guy), had successfully swift boated Kerry , and W unleashed the horror of Samuel Alito.
Much like today, Democrats found themselves living out the SNL, Gingrich skit from 1998 What the Hell Happened? Enter, or re-enter Howard Dean. For those if you too young to remember Howard Dean, ( A sentence that is very depressing for me to write), Dean started a movement with his opposition to the Iraq War, and his Im running to represent the Democratic Wing of the Democratic Party. If not for an unfortunate yelp, and non-stop media analysis of it, his campaign fizzled out. Rather than take the Davy Crockett route. Dean decided to capitalize on the momentum of his campaign, and created a movement
The 50 State Strategy
Following the election, and the requisite house cleaning at the DNC, Dean was elected head of the DNC, with the promise to build up the party in all 50 states. At the time the strategy was received with a lot of skepticism in the media and with laughter by the GOP. Funny thing was, Dean knew what he was talking about. By going to the states rebuilding local parties, investing in party building activities, and targeting local and state elections, the Democrats were able to build an apparatus that led to overwhelming Democratic victories in the 2006 and 2008 elections. The Democrats seemed poised to dominate for decades to come, BUT Then
What the Hell Happened Part 2
Obama won the 2008 election in a landslide and the Democrats expanded majorities in the House and Senate. The good times lasted less than 2 years. After Obamas election, all the serious peope in DC were spouting gibberish about post racial America and Demography is Destiny. They conveniently ignored all of the racist dog whistles and fog horns the GOP kept blowing during the campaign, and passed off Sarah Palin as little more than an amusing buffoon, okay that was technically true, but they totally discounted the energy behind her rise, which was very much real and the embers that led to the Trump forest fire.
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/11/12/2285608/-This-Disaster-Was-Years-in-the-Making
GPV
(73,068 posts)stillcool
(32,790 posts)with each passing Presidential election. I can't imagine how many votes Obama must have gotten.
dutch777
(3,501 posts)...the intelligence at hand and it seems to have been way off. And even if she had the straight dope, Joe et. al. should have been course correcting back in 2022 or earlier. She was handed the ship's controls way too late. We as Dems have a great array of good causes but if we aren't focused where the majority of the voters concerns and cares are, this is the result. Welcome to the Loyal Opposition Cabin in the wilderness. You can try and sell things during a Presidential term but if a cause falls flat and isn't bringing the majority of the electorate along readily, no matter how just or right in our minds, we have to learn to drop it.
dalton99a
(84,463 posts)lees1975
(6,009 posts)I mean, we just take the media's word for it.
FakeNoose
(35,800 posts)... and several other ultra-wealthy, ultra-conservative families who managed to stay out of the headlines. But they've all been working (some conspiring) to bring down our government and destroy our freedom and way of life.
Billionaires have the resources buy a lot of lawyers, politicians, media consultants, newspaper publishers and cable channels. That's apparently what it takes to destroy America. But nobody will ever convince me that they needed to conspire with our enemies to do it. They only did that because they're assholes.