Politicians are in info cocoons, just like we all have a tendency to be these days, and they’re not listening, or maybe not hearing enough from enough of us.
The reason is because to become a politician, mostly you have to have some measure of wealth, at least stability, maybe independent wealth, maybe own a business where other people are doing the largest share of the work that brings in their income, or are otherwise connected to people with money willing to bankroll the effort. The system is NOT set up to allow ordinary people entry into this system. When such people get in, they are an exception.
Politicians need to hear from people outside the beltway and from somewhere besides their country clubs.
MAGA Can’t Run the Country To Save Its Life! (w/ Jonathan Martin) | Bulwark Podcast – The Bulwark Jan 3, 2025 Tim Miller: “Democratic strategist Chris hail tweeting this right now “it’s remarkable how my party has ditched the Trump is a threat to democracy argument Agular didn’t mention the word democracy once in his nomination of Hakeem Jeffries”. it is true I mean it sucks but it’s true I as what maybe the biggest kerfuffle ever created on this podcast was when Ezra Klein was on and he said that his private convos with Democrats were that they didn’t believe the Democracy message that they were pushing forth that they didn’t believe that Trump was that great of a threat – this was last summer he said that – that seems to be bearing out in a way that’s a little alarming for me.” Jonathan Martin: “If they thought he was a real threat to democracy then would the mayor of DC be taking meetings with him to talk about getting employees back five days a week into their cubes?”
I saw how these Democratic Party politicians were completely unprepared for this moment.
Spectrum News – Maine U.S. Rep. Jared Golden predicts Trump victory, says he’s not a threat to democracy By Susan Cover Maine PUBLISHED 12:49 PM ET Jul. 03, 2024 “Biden’s poor performance in the debate was not a surprise,” Golden wrote. “It also didn’t rattle me as it has others, because the outcome of this election has been clear to me for months: While I don’t plan to vote for him, Donald Trump is going to win. And I’m OK with that.”
These politicians have made it clear they didn’t see a problem.
Trump Would be PISSED if Dems Took the Spotlight Away Like This! (w/ Ezra Klein) | Bulwark Podcast The Bulwark – Jul 10, 2024 Ezra Klein: “I think it is clear like people are like weighing the set of things like it’s you know it would be quite unpleasant for me personally to come out against the president um as a elected official Democratic party and weighing what will happen if Donald Trump wins and saying you know in a revealed preference way I can live with Donald Trump winning um and I’ve had people say that to me off the record to be fair I’ve had I’ve had top Democrats say to me basically something like – I don’t know why all these Democrats who think Donald Trump is an existential threat to democracy or acting the way they are but the reason I’m acting the way I am is because I don’t think that Tim Miller: “Who the __ is this – who are these people out your sources Ezra, I’m in I’m about to be in leaking text mode over here myself like that is crazy I guess it’s consistent but it’s maddening no?” Ezra Klein: “I find it maddening but I do find it consistent right I do find it to be a look you you can say this is true in a lot of things right it’s a it’s a charge Republicans always uh throw at liberals which is that if they really believe climate change was such a problem they wouldn’t fly on planes and I think that people’s means ends are less connected than this but I do think one I I’m I’m just I will.” Tim Miller: “we’ve only had one coup attempt though we really we’ve only had one coup attempt recently and it was the person that is on the ballot right now so I mean there’s something to be said for that Ezra Klein: “if I were hearing from Top Democrats saying um listen I think our best path to winning is still Joe Biden I think that unfortunately Harris is a weaker candidate and I think that an open convention or a blitz primary would leave us in a worse place and you know these are all bad options but Joe Biden is the least bad option fine that is I I just want to say this because it is I don’t think you can understand what I’m saying if I don’t that is not what I am hearing from anybody like nobody says that nobody says Joe Biden’s best chance of winning nobody even says they think Joe Biden can win I have not had one top Democrat say that to me nor has Joe Biden come to any of them with a plan for how to win.”
And now they are caught with their pants down, and completely ineffectual, and saying stupid things like that they’re going to “find common ground” and signing onto GOP garbage instead of acting in opposition.
You know why people came out to vote for Republicans? Because they see someone who’s fighting for them. You may complain that they’ve been lied to, but it counts. When Obama was elected, Mitch Mcconnell didn’t tell republican voters “We’re going to find common ground with Obama.” Democratic Party politicians tell their base to go pound sand. What did you think was going to happen?
The New Republica – Jason Linkins / February 1, 2025 Trump’s Abuse of Power Comes as No Surprise Somehow, Democrats got badly caught out by the president doing all the things he spent the past two years saying he was going to do if reelected. Nevertheless, D.C. Democrats seem to be some of the last people to learn that there is nothing left to learn about Trump. Trump’s first week back seems to have caught them off guard, so much so that they’ve largely spent the last few days tiptoeing around as multiple crises unfolded. They’ve been careful, circumspect, cautious—and they’ve gotten absolutely banjaxed as a result. It wasn’t until Trump tried to turn off the entire federal government that they recovered a bit of fighting spirit, vowing to escalate the conflict with the GOP into a “street fight.” It’s great that they got there in the end; I look forward to this street fight, but I’ll believe it when I see it. Still, one of the Democrats’ big problems is the sheer number of times you can use the word “belatedly” to describe their reactions. It might have been better if Democrats had actually used the time between Trump getting reelected and Trump getting inaugurated to prepare to confront the things that Trump spent over a year saying he was going to do.
I’ll believe it when I see it. And we will not see it until enough people are, as Chuck Schumer described it, “aroused” to hold them to account. That involves telling them what you want, and doing all the things, not just shouting into the void of social media where they can just say it’s “just some people online” and ignore you.
“The liberals were outraged at Trump. But they expressed their outrage in cyberspace so it had no effect. Because the algorithms made sure that they only spoke to people who already agreed with them. Instead ironically their waves of angry messages and tweets benefitted the large corporations who ran the social media platforms. one online analyst put it simply — angry people click. It meant that the radical fury that came like waves across the internet no longer had the power to change the world. Instead it became a fuel that fed the systems of power making them ever more powerful.” — Adam Curtis, Hypernormalisation, 2016
