Is anyone else bothered by the fact that this article defines working class as non college? I'm pretty sure a lot of people with college degrees work for a living, many of which work jobs that don't require a degree. Do their voices not count as working class?
He's already failing on the first bullet point and that one alone will cost him the election:
"Shut up and listen
Nearly every expert I interviewed for this article said some version of the following: If Democrats want to win back the working class, they have to go out and ask working-class people what they need."
We can see how well he's doing on that:
"A majority of Americans ā 55% āĀ said in the recent CNN pollĀ that they believe Bidenās policies have worsened economic conditions in the country,Ā whileĀ just 26%Ā believeĀ his policies have improved conditions. The presidentās approval rating for handling the economy hasnāt broken the 40% mark sinceĀ December 2021, and it currently stands at 37%."
The problem is, the metrics he's talking about aren't the same metrics normal people use on a day to day basis.
Clinton nailed this 32 years ago...
"It's the economy, stupid!"
"I feel your pain!"
But it's easier to run on that message when you aren't the incumbent.
Yes, things would have been demonstrably worse under 4 more years of Trump, but that's a hypothetical staring at the reality of $5 and $6 gallons of milk.
Intelligent people don't like being talked down on. This article is just another example of that, "oh you're sad about not being to afford the same basic items you had two years ago? Here are four charts to prove that your feelings are invalid and things are better than ever." That logic works on the anti-intellectual right who pride themselves on subservience (when the people in power tell them what they want to hear), but not on the side that polls better-educated and more capable of critical thinking in almost every metric. No, the IRA, CHIPS, and any other acts this article mentions have not been a success and their failures are evident in voter sentiment
I don't like the doctors talking down to me. I don't want to see a bunch of charts and figures, I know Ginny wasn't right after she got her vaccine. That stuff might work on the liberals, but not on me.
See you're doing it again. You're insulting the intelligence of critics and saying they are too daft to read charts or understand the benefits of vaccines. Instead of focusing on the actually problematic stuff.
A politician with the same level of knowledge and experience as a Doctor? Surely you know those two things are different.
How much are you scared about Trump being in office that you will bash people for criticizing democrats?
I'm insulting the intelligence (or, the education / choice of worldview) of someone who wants to look at a large analytical and hard-to-understand problem through an ancedotal lens, and actively rejects someone who wants to talk about the numerical aspect as "talking down" to them. I feel comfortable insulting that way of being because to me it's very wrong. It's not done out of hatred or anything for someone who does that, but they are making a mistake yes, and it's a deceptively infectious mistake in a way that makes it worthwhile to call out. In my opinion.
How much are you scared about Trump being in office that you will bash people for criticizing democrats?
Pretty sure I posted an excerpt elsewhere in this thread that was highly critical of most Democrats' strategy, and earlier today I posted a video of Biden fucking up the response to a question about "anti-Semitic" protestors, and briefly talked about how he fucked it up and why. Criticizing Biden or Democrats I think is great. If I think the criticism is wrong (or particularly if I think the pattern of thinking behind it is wrong) then I'll "bash" the person doing it, yes.
Iām insulting the intelligence (or, the education / choice of worldview) of someone who wants to look at a large analytical and hard-to-understand problem through an ancedotal lens
Most people don't care about broader economic trends when they're deciding which bill to not pay this month. Democrats have forgotten how to speak to that.
Nope, but calling people who are suffering antivaxxers because they don't slap on a big doofy fake grin and pretend that Biden is their fucking savior is insulting.
Why are you so hostile to the idea of objectively trying to determine what is and isnāt working, and who is and isnāt helping the situation?
And I didnāt call anyone suffering an antivaxxer. I sort of called PP_BOY an antivaxxer, but that was specifically because he used antivaxxer style arguments.
Okay. Letās try the other part, then. Why are you so hostile to the idea of objectively trying to determine what is and isnāt working, and who is and isnāt helping the situation?
I already explained what I meant by what I said about antivaxxers.
If you're up for talking based on me being the absolute 100% authority on what I am claiming, and what I meant when I said something, then let's rock. That's productive conversation. I'll extend the same courtesy to you. If you're wanting to engage back and forth with me to any extent on either of those topics or say that I didn't really mean or believe something, I actually meant something different that you picked out, then you need to find someone else to talk to.
(And, more broadly, I would say that you should stop doing that as a general rule, if your goal is anything other than creating pointless bickering and wasting both participant's time.)
I already explained what I meant by what I said about antivaxxers.
You walked back what you said about people who have the temerity to be less than ecstatic about being poor. I didn't buy the walkback.
You want to be able to hurl insults at people whose very existence runs contrary to the current centrist narrative about the economy, while still being able to act put upon when someone calls you on it and doesn't accept your excuses.
If hearing from me regarding your dishonesty and your callousness toward the poor is such a burden, you can always block me.
"No, I don't like them, so they haven't been a success and voter sentiment is the measurement by which policy is determined to be a success or failure."
Holy shit, that's literally feels over reals
That logic works on the anti-intellectual right who pride themselves on subservience (when the people in power tell them what they want to hear), but not on the side that polls better-educated and more capable of critical thinking in almost every metric.
Fucking right out of "I DO MY OWN RESEARCH".
Don't mistake the fact that the right is anti-intellectual for the idea that the left can't be anti-intellectual. Considering you're saying that being given data is being 'talked down on', I might not be throwing stones in your place.
Data collection isn't an objective process, sorry to break it to you but real people with real biases make errors (whether intentional or not) when collecting and presenting data. It's worth considering that maybe if that data conflicts with the sentiment of the overwhelming majority of the people you're trying to win over THE DATA COLLECTION PROCESS IS FLAWED. These people are experiencing real hardship that's being handwaved by charts made for, and exclusively for, a reelection campaign.
You apply that standard evenly? If so, I have some great policy and reality-oriented questions to fucking ask you.
Itās worth considering that maybe if that data conflicts with the sentiment of the overwhelming majority of the people youāre trying to win over THE DATA COLLECTION PROCESS IS FLAWED.
This is literally the same Boomer shit that dribbles out of right-wing Facebook chuds. Like, word for fucking word.
I noticed that similarity, too. And I'm sure you have a fairly good idea of what is the ultimate source where those right-wingers on Facebook picked up a lot of their arguments from? And why the arguments tend to be very emotionally persuasive even though they're wrong?
And Iām sure you have a fairly good idea of what is the ultimate source where those right-wingers on Facebook picked up a lot of their arguments from?
Nah, this is an old-one. Inherent to the human condition, you might say. You see it everywhere, just in different doses.
And why the arguments tend to be very emotionally persuasive even though theyāre wrong?
Because they appeal to tribalist instincts rather than rationality.
I didnāt interpret your argument as right wing - I interpreted it as based on emotion and anecdote and overt rejection of analytical thinking, and packaged up in this forceful presentation that would be perfectly at home in a campaign commercial. I can see the end where the lady looks right at the camera and says, āWell let me tell you something, Joe Biden. Me and my family are hurting. And this November, weāre going to let you know exactly what we think of all your facts and figures about how things are oh-so-good off in Washington.ā
My argument is based on the fact that people's opinion of the economy is more pessimistic than ever. This fact is/has been reinforced through almost every relevant poll of the past four years.
Do you believe that these people are making up hardship? Or maybe it's some sort of conspiracy against our Glorious Leader by those damn MAGAt scum? The reality is that people are actually suffering in a way that contradicts what studies are reporting to a near-unprecedented extent. That gap is unexplainable in any way other than concluding that the studies are fundamentally flawed and the charts showing how great things really are do not accurately reflect reality.
This is a fascinating little construction that Iām just gonna let speak for itself
more pessimistic than ever
Are you under the impression, also, that we should measure vaccine effectiveness by asking people whether they feel optimistic that their vaccine is working?
Thereās a fascinating little window into the flaws of this type of analysis, to be had in that the same people who report the nationās economy doing badly, also report by quite a large margin the incorrect idea that their own state and their own family are doing much better than the nation as a whole. So theyāre doing okay, but theyāre still convinced that the nation as a whole is fucked and Bidenās definitely responsible.
This is a fascinating little construction that Iām just gonna let speak for itself
Please don't. I want to hear your real rebuttal here. "Official reports of the economy disagree with the polled sentiments of the majority of Americans" is an indisputable fact.
Are you under the impression, also, that we should measure vaccine effectiveness by asking people whether they feel optimistic that their vaccine is working?
False equivalency, but if every official body said that the vaccinated were much less likely than the unvaccinated to fall ill, yet every relevant poll showed that the vaccinated became ill at a rate similar to the unvaccinated or said that they or most people they knew were vaccinated yet had become ill, and that every person felt like their vaccines were ineffective, the sane thing to do would be to question the premise.
Your last bit is a rebuttal for an argument that I'm not making; strawman.
I can't explain it any different way than what I already said in quite a few messages now. If you want to measure economic performance, then you should measure people's wages, inflation, housing costs, and other concrete numbers.
Asking people whether they feel like the economy is good is also relevant, for a few different reasons, sure. And you need to make sure you're measuring the right metrics (e.g. wages at particular percentiles and not the stock market), sure. But you obviously shouldn't let how people feel things are going, override the actual numbers of how things are going, when you're talking about how to make economic progress.
You can disagree with that if you like (and it seems like you do), but I don't feel like going back and forth with you about it any further.
You apply that standard evenly? If so, I have some great policy and reality-oriented questions to fucking ask you
My entire point is that no one can be entirely objective, but I try to be, so sure, "fucking" ask me anything.
This is literally the same Boomer shit that dribbles out of right-wing Facebook chuds. Like, word for fucking word.
I seem to recall a pretty big guy in the conservative circle make it pretty big off the whole "facts don't care about your feelings" argument that you're peddling here... I'm blanking on his name.
The reality is that millions of people are feeling more pessimistic about the future than ever. Work backward from that. Do you think that they're all part of some conspiracy against you or that maybe, just maybe, these feelings are real, are justified, and that there's some sort of gap in the data collection process that's accounting for the discrepancy.
You are not a member of the intelligentsia, shepherding the uneducated prolies towards something they don't know they want; people aren't dumb. If things were actually as good as the current administration says they are, every single poll of the past four years wouldn't show such a large discrepancy between real and perceived conditions.
That lack of anything Isreal related is fucking frustrating. There's so much assumption that "working class" means completely ignorant about international policy.
Some of these points are good but the one that would knock it out of the park is increasing tax and spend - especially if accompanied by an increase to the range of tax exempt income (raising the floor of the bottom tax bracket).
That lack of anything Isreal related is fucking frustrating. Thereās so much assumption that āworking classā means completely ignorant about international policy.
If you assumed "American" meant completely ignorant about international policy, you'd be correct more often than not - and this is coming from an American who does follow foreign affairs. So why would "American working class" be an exception?
Given how many people are upset about those polices, to the point of using armies of police to harass college students for being against those policies, it seems that it is an important issue to a lot of Americans and its not exactly a secret how unpopular current international policy is. They might not be average Americans, but those who are likely to vote democrat are those people they're using violence to silence.
Are people upset? This started out defining working class as non-college. I see protests at colleges and technical people (like youād see on Lemmy) are more likely to be college educated than the general population is.
I mean, Iām asking seriously, I have no idea. This elitist coastal college educated libtard has no clue what the racist gullible uneducated flyover people who falls for Trumpās BS think
He is as anti Israel as he can be. Usually anything less than full throated support would lose the election for a candidate of either party. And heās still managed to condemn them a little bit, and is building a pier for aid delivery to Palestinians so fucking hmas canāt steal their aid. Like there really isnāt much more you can ask of a us politician without basically asking them to forfeit the election.
That lack of anything Isreal related is fucking frustrating.
Not really...the average person doesn't care. It's two bullies throwing rocks at each other in a sandbox halfway around the world. If anything, the Palestinian protests of late made the US care even less about it. IMO, just pull out of that whole shit show and let them sort it out on their own.
The subheadings alone won't give you a very good idea about it; they honestly don't really indicate much on their own. If you are trying to get a sense of what the article says in TL;DR form, you could do a lot worse than this little excerpt:
Two months after the 2022 midterms, a poll by the nonprofit American Family Voices asked 600 likely voters living in industrial counties across six Midwestern states to name the top issues. āThe rising cost of livingā led, with 37 percent, because at the time the Consumer Price Index was twice what it is today. But ranking second was ājobs and the economyāāwhich Democratic candidates had avoided in the election.
Donāt blame President Joe Biden, who has lavished more attention on working-class issues than any president since Harry Truman (and considerably more than Bidenās three modern Democratic predecessors Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, and Jimmy Carter). Blame Bidenās fellow Democrats. Only half of the Democratic-candidate websites surveyed by the Center for Working-Class Politics bothered to mention Bidenās $1 trillion infrastructure bill. Only about one-quarter mentioned Bidenās Inflation Reduction Act, or IRA, which is spending another half-trillion on technologies to reduce climate change. And only 15 percent mentioned the CHIPS Act, signed into law three months before the election, which will spend another $53 billion to boost domestic manufacture of semiconductors. The combined effect of these three bills has been to nearly triple the construction of manufacturing facilities since Biden took office.
Part of the Democratic reticence was perhaps attributable to Bidenās low approval rating, then stuck around 40. Still, however unpopular Biden was (and remains), Bidenās policies are very popular, especially among working-class votersāon those rare occasions when they hear about it. The IRA, for example, was favored in a March 2023 poll by 68 percent of people earning between $50,000 and $99,999. But these working-class people needed the pollsters (from Yale and George Mason) to first explain what the Inflation Reduction Act was. A 61 percent majority had no idea.
And it lays out a bunch of specific prescriptions for what to do about that weird disconnect.
I mean I read it before I posted that, I was just picking it out because I think it warrants dissection.
Whats interesting is that they associate the 'brahmin left' with issues that I largely associate with RW issues projection (moral panic over transrights/ dont say gay/ book banning/ immigrant crime/ border crisis/ you fucking name it).
Like its only being brought up and defended because some RW pr firm trotted it out as a new talking point, and there is always some one willing to write an article on why the RW moral panic is stupid. But the term is pretty fucking perjorative, and dismissive of the fact that without the progressive left of the left-wing of the Democratic voting block, they don't get elected, period. Its this kind of weird, anti-activist performative centrism.
Like this class of individuals exists mostly as a response to RW moral panic, then the RW touts them around as having made those arguments in the first place. Its a kind of circular straw man where you engage in a moral panic, some one speaks out in defense, then you project the arguments you want them to have made onto them. Its what the right does, and its what the author is doing to.
This one is a 'leave' in the take it or leave it of the authors bullets.
Hm... I actually 1,000% agree with you on this part:
Its a kind of circular straw man where you engage in a moral panic, some one speaks out in defense, then you project the arguments you want them to have made onto them.
I don't think I see this discussed nearly enough -- Sometimes the left picks up some strawman the right has come up with and actually runs with it, which I'm sure delights the right. It's a common enough pattern to have a big impact and I basically never see it discussed, so yeah.
Whats interesting is that they associate the 'brahmin left' with issues that I largely associate with RW issues projection (moral panic over transrights/ dont say gay/ book banning/ immigrant crime/ border crisis/ you fucking name it).
Did they list all these things? I thought it was just trans rights and "defund the police" mostly. I could have missed it?
I think the author is talking about more of performative leftist stuff. "I put my pronouns on my Starbucks nametag but I have no appetite for starting a union there" style of left that I would also be critical of. But, on the other hand, police reform is a grey area arguably in the core leftist category and the author puts it in the "Brahmin left" category... so yeah, maybe you're right, and the author is throwing out some stuff that shouldn't be thrown out (even if it would tactically a "good idea" for appealing to not-politically-conservative-but-not-real-leftist working-class voters.)
Pretty much the only thing I would add to its list (and overlapping with some of its detail recommendations) would be to hire some younger people and some more present-day-media savvy people. Trump's whole operation works because it's full of people who know how to effectively influence public opinion, and I feel like Biden's campaign is still relying very heavily on the path to failure that is the DC political-consultancy elite.
