It Would Be Fair To Ask If I Think The Democratic Party Sucks, Why Am I A Democrat-- But I'm Not One

The receipts and expenditures are still being tallied, but the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee (DLCC)-- the state legislative version of the DCCC or DSCC-- took in $32,203,180 in the 2018 cycle and was on track to spend $50 million this year to help flip state legislative chambers in Arizona, Georgia, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Texas. They didn't get much for all that money. They lost all 9 chambers they targeted and the Republicans gained control of both New Hampshire chambers and the Alaska House.

This morning Trip Gabriel reported on the debacle for the NY Times. Even with Biden winning many of the suburban districts the DLCC targeted with their generally conservative, status quo-oriented candidates, they failed and failed and failed-- everywhere. "Across the country," wrote Gabriel, "suburban voters’ disgust with Mr. Trump-- the key to Mr. Biden’s election-- did not translate into a wide rebuke of other Republicans, as Democrats had expected after the party made significant gains in suburban areas in the 2018 midterm elections. From the top of the party down to the state level, Democratic officials are awakening to the reality that voters may have delivered a one-time verdict on Mr. Trump that does not equal ongoing support for" the corporate conservative policies that Gabriel stupidly referred to as "center-left policies."

Emily Skopov, is a conservative Democrat who ran for the state House in a suburban Pittsburgh district that Biden won and that she lost and her anti-progressive message lost. Her campaign manager's interpretation of what happened is partially correct: "There’s a significant difference between a referendum on a clown show, which is what we had at the top of the ticket," and partially confused: "and embracing the values of the Democratic ticket. People bought into Joe Biden to stop the insanity in the White House. They did not suddenly become Democrats." In Skopov's case they didn't get the choice to embrace the values of the Democratic Party-- unless you define the values of the Democratic Party as the values of the Eisenhower-Nixon era GOP. Here platform sounds a lot more like Conor Lamb's than AOC's.

Gabriel wrote that "In the aftermath, moderate Democrats [ conservatives but Gabriel is very old skool NY Times and doesn't understand the difference] are feuding with progressives over whether policies that excite the party’s base, such as higher taxes to pay for social programs, policing overhauls and a rapid move away from fossil fuels, are a losing message with swing voters. Progressives have responded that moderate candidates aren’t offering voters an affirmative program to improve their lives.

He noted that Skopov sounded an awful lot like Republican-lite Blue Dog Abigail Spanberger (VA), who nearly lost her seat because of her confused, anti-progressive record in Congress and then had the gall to rant and rave on a private House Democrats conference that all the shitty Blue Dogs and New Dems who lost, lost because of progressives and progressive ideas. No progressives lost, not even in districts Trump won. A whiny Skopov blamed her own defeat on "offensively poor messaging" rather than her own inability to give anyone a reason to vote for her. Yet she told everyone who answered a door she knocked on "I’m a fan of our police; I’m not looking to defund police," as though to imply other Democrats do. Not one Democrat ran on defunding the police except in the minds of Republicans and the Blue Dogs and New Dems from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party (i.e., the Democraps).

Skopov's campaign manager told Gabriel that "A lot of the suburban districts that you’re trying to flip, you can’t win by just turning out your base. We could get every Democratic vote in those districts and you’re still not going to win. You have to be able to turn out independents and Republican voters for your message." She never imagined that independents might want to vote for a candidate with a cohesive progressive agenda that includes issues garbage candidates like Skopov don't understand-- from Medicare-for-All to a Green New Deal and equality for the working class. It isn't easy to persuade someone to back policies you don't get yourself. The Democratic Party is doomed if they keep running candidates like Skopov-- not to mention the sad sack congressional losers of 2020:

Look what happened in Orange County, California. The Democrats flipped 4 seats in 2018. This year the two progressives (both moderates in the true sense of the word, not the way Gabriela nd his ilk distort it) won and the two conservatives lost. Pointless and completely uninspiring waste-of-seat New Dems Gil Cisneros and Harley Rouda failed-- predictably-- while Mike Levin and Katie Porter won, Katie now so popular for her strong, intelligent politics that she's being considered as a long-shot replacement for Kamala Harris in the Senate.

CA-39 (even PVI)

• Young Kim (R)- 173,857 (50.6%)

• Rep. Gil Cisneros (New Dem)- 169,731 (49.4%)

CA-45 (R+3)

• Rep. Katie Porter (D)- 221,843 (53.5%)

• Greg Raths (R)- 193,096 (46.5%)

CA-48 (R+4)

• Michelle Steel (R)- 201,738 (51.1%)

• Rep. Harley Rouda (New Dem)- 193,362 (48.9%)

CA-49 (R+1)

• Rep. Milke Levin (D)- 205,179 (53.1%)

• Brian Maryott (R)- 181,027 (46.9%)

Note also that Porter and Levin inspired the most enthusiasm-- albeit both running in red districts-- while Cisneros inspired no enthusiasm whatsoever and couldn't even turn out the Democratic base.

And as long as we're on California, it looks like T.J. Cox, another Democratic incumbent-- another worthless New Dem who had no business running to begin withother than having thrown around half a million dollars of his own and his family's into the race-- lost his seat to the Republican he beat in 2018, David Valadao in a D+5 district where Trump just won 39.7% of the vote in 2016. The race isn't called yet but it doesn't look like there are many-- if any-- more votes to count and Valadao lead Cox 85,373 (50.5%) to 83,619 (49.5%) in one of the lowest turn-out, uninspiring congressional elections of 2020. Imagine if Cox had backed and run on Medicare-for-All, forgiving student debt and the Green New Deal. He probably would have come close to doubling his support.