I am Sick and Tired of Hearing this "Coastal Party" Bullshit

[kebob]

Every fucking time Democrats lose an election, we go through a Rending Of Garments ritual, where we'll never---never!---win again.

Now, I readily acknowledge that, with Donny Boy, we actually MIGHT never win another election, 'cause there may not BE another election, because Orange Julius Caesar maybe starts World War III. But, in the unlikely event that doesn't happen, of course we'll win again! Demography is destiny, jadies and lentlemen!

Oh yeah, as for this "coastal" nonsense, a six-pack of beer to anybody who can tell me what oceans Nevada, Colorado, New Mexico, Minnesota, Illinois and Vermont border on.

[JHan]

1. I supported HRC, apparently I'm a rich coastal elite type...

yeah right.

[democrank]

2. Theres a lot of red on that post-election national map

and a lot of red in the House, Senate, and Governorships. We`ve lost a lot, a real lot, and we can and should do better.

[musicblind]

5. That's where most of the people live.

You could just as easily say that Republicans are a regional party, a rural America party, because they only won 4 coastal states and did poorly in parts of the country with large populations.

Hillary won by a significant popular vote margin and if 100,000 more people had voted for Hillary in the Rust Belt then we would be singing about how everything is peachy.

100,000 votes may cost a single election, but they do not indicate that we are doomed forever any more than Al Gore's close loss meant we were doomed forever.

Should we pay more attention to the rust belt? As long as we do not neglect our social issues and minorities, I'm okay with it. The obvious answer is to actually campaign there more often. Very little advertising was put into Wisconsin and Michigan was left out of the first round of ad buys. Clinton didn't campaign in Wisconsin. Why? Polls miscalculated our odds. Now we know better. We now know to focus more GOTV efforts and campaign time in the rust belt.

Anyone who is trying to make this look like the end of the Democratic party has an agenda. Just a month ago we were talking about the end of the Republican party. Reality doesn't change that fast. The truth is, neither parties were really at their end. It's all hyperbole.

[malchickiwick]

4. I'll take that six-pack; PBR will be fine.

Those states you mentioned all border on the "Red" Sea.

[WhiteTara]

7. Very Good and

it borders the State of DeNial

[kebob]

12. No Six For You!

Remember, the requirement was naming an ocean bordered on by one of the states I listed.

[TwilightZone]

6. Binary thinking is a shortcut. We're drawn to labels, stereotypes and easy answers.

In reality, every state in the country is purple to some degree, but we insist on labeling everything blue or red.

That leads to the assumption that places like Texas, where there are a lot of population-dense areas that are very blue, is uniformly red. And, places like California that have large swaths of conservative voters (much of inland CA) are uniformly blue. I'm not sure why so many make those assumptions, but they're very common. We then use those erroneous assumptions to bash people over the head.

We also tend to forget that politics is cyclical. We'll win future elections, because that's just how it goes in politics. We'll also win future elections in part because the GOP is quickly getting outnumbered demographically, which is why they rely so heavily on voter suppression and mind games. If we could find a way to increase and then stabilize turnout, while countering voter suppression tactics, we'd be tough to beat on a national scale for the foreseeable future.

Of course, those are harder to accomplish than they sound.

[Buckeye_Democrat]

9. If there's a generalization that's pretty accurate, it's that...

... cities tend to vote for Democrats and rural areas tend to vote for Republicans.

[TwilightZone]

11. Generally, yes, though as with everything, there are exceptions.

Reservations, for example, usually vote heavily Democratic and are generally quite rural, especially those in the middle third of the country.

Solidly-conservative South Dakota demonstrates this in your map: it has some bright blue spots. Several other states show similar results.

Of course, much of the urban/rural split itself is due in part to demographic differences.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

8. Thank you!

Getting tired of it as well. The early 2000s were pretty miserable for us (Republican and GWB probably only got to hold on a little longer because of 9/11 though), but then we won and held Congress for 4 years (2007-2011) and held the WH for 8 years (2008-2016). It's also pretty rare in modern times for a party to hold the WH for more than two consecutive terms, though I really thought that this year would be an exception with Trump running on the GOP side. I simply didn't give his campaign, nor the desperate zeal by some Americans to get a WASP male back into the WH, the proper seriousness until it was too late. There WILL be more elections and Democrats WILL win again. The American public will remember and (re-)learn to hate the Republican Party all over again. The governing party is always easier to criticize and attack and gin up votes against.

[RobinA]

10. I Stopped Being

annoyed by "coastal elite" when I realized it means "people who have some clue, even a small one, as to what's going on." If it's "elite" to read a paper daily than I'm an elite. Actually, some days I'm a double elite, because in addition to the Philadelphia paper daily, I get the NYT three days a week. Sue me.