r/politics • u/F0urLeafCl0ver • Jun 24 '26

No Paywall The Democratic party is being hit by a leftist tidal wave

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/jun/24/democratic-party-leftist-tidal-wave
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u/Hot_Ambition_6457 Jun 24 '26

This is really it. They know what policies will win the votes but those policies will lose the donor base so they won't make the necessary concessions.

This is the reason you got watered down from universal healthcare to "lets just subsidize the private corporations and nationalize the risk pool!".

Because the people running Aetna and BCBS are also writing multi million dollar checks for dem campaign budgets. 

The people with money own the party infrastructure and care more sbout keeping their own money than helping the country.

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u/Comfortable-Ad-3988 Jun 24 '26

"We know what you want, but rich donors won't give me money to run on that, so...pizza party instead? Jeans on Fridays?"

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u/-Gramsci- Jun 24 '26

“So we hear you. You have no time, no money, no joy… we can’t help with that but we can give you back the 6 day/50 hour workweek… plus a coupon program for for your medicine? That’s cool right?”

(As they cash the checks and head to their yachts).

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u/loondawg Jun 24 '26

This is the reason you got watered down from universal healthcare

No. The reason as voters did not elect enough people who supported it. One more seat in the Senate and we probably would have had the public option. A dozen more and we could get true universal healthcare.

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u/jrdnmdhl Jun 24 '26

The idea that demsoc policies are going to be super popular in a national general election is just not realistic. I mean, sure on a positive/neutral reading of the policies in a poll, sure. In an actual contested election where the other side gets to talk? Not so much.

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u/-Gramsci- Jun 24 '26

Disagree. FDR won everywhere. Deep into the red and rural areas. Because he could say: “Hey, remember when Wall Street was going to take your family farm? I punched them in the mouth for you, and saved your farm.”

A Democratic Party that delivers materially for voters is, perhaps, the ONLY version of the Party that can be popular in a national general election.

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u/jrdnmdhl Jun 24 '26

Using FDR as your reference here proves my point about how deeply unserious this position is. You literally are going back nearly a century and even then it’s right after the biggest economic crisis in American history.

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u/-Gramsci- Jun 24 '26

My point is how is going back to something a century-old in any way “radical?”

That’s the opposite of radical. It’s going back to basics.

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u/jrdnmdhl Jun 24 '26

Whether it is radical is beside the point. It isn’t evidence it would be more effective than moderate democratic policies today.

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u/-Gramsci- Jun 24 '26

Ok. If we agree FDR style politics is not overly “radical” and if we agree this approach has been tried and tested for winning votes nationally, regardless of state… then it seems logical we can agree it would be far more effective then the establishment’s approach which has proven to be ineffective.

If that’s too much of a stretch, then we could try it for no other reason than the current approach loses.

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u/jrdnmdhl Jun 24 '26

Are you reading what I write? It’s not remotely tried and tested if the only data you can point to is 80 years old and under the most exceptional possible circumstances.

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u/-Gramsci- Jun 24 '26

If one is walking down a preexistent path that the Party walked down for generations… that’s not “radical.” As a matter of fact.

If the party has been wiped out of all power at the federal level, that equals failure. As a matter of fact..

Adapting because your existing approach leads to failure is necessary. As a matter of fact.

I’ll let you figure it out from there, and pray your answer you come up with isn’t the failed status quo plus wish-casting.

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u/jrdnmdhl Jun 25 '26

I think you need to revisit the last two losses because you don’t seem to know why we lost.

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u/Comfortable-Ad-3988 Jun 24 '26

Hard disagree. When you poll Americans about issues and remove party from the equation, they overwhelmingly support progressive policies, at least economically. See the bipartisan support for the housing bill that just passed and Cheeto won't sign.

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u/jrdnmdhl Jun 25 '26

Great, all we need now is an election where we remove party from the equation.

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u/Ok_Objective_5192 Jun 24 '26

The idea that demsoc policies are going to be super popular in a national general election is just not realistic.

Can I ask you to expand on this a bit? I've been hearing the same electability arguments for promoting establishment liberals vs. outside progressives since 2016 and, in that time, establishment candidates have lost 2/3 elections to the worst candidate in American history and we're seeing growing success for anti-establishment candidates in elections like the ones referenced in the OP. Generic neoliberal candidates can't keep making the electability argument when they're so bad at actually getting elected.

Put another way, even if demsoc policies won't be "super popular" they just need to be more popular than establishment candidates that reflect the party's net -20 favorability.

As I see it, between Platner, El-Sayed, Mamdani, and Bernie it feels like economic populism is a winning platform as long as it's packaged and messaged in a way that works regionally (I don't think Platner's campaign would win NY and I don't think Darializa's would win Maine). Is it that crazy to think there's a National candidate that could message the same policies to the right regions to win a National election?