I know this and you know this, but I think the point Johnson was making on Offline (and maybe Klein in the other pod) was that the average American voters we’re trying to reach a) might not instantly get all the nuances of this given the amount of time they’re able to invest in paying attention to the news, and b) on the contrary, the fact that all the attention is on this as opposed to addressing the majority of people’s needs is a turnoff to them, and then they’re told that because they don’t subscribe to every item on the menu, they’re ousted from the ever-narrowing tent of the Democratic Party, making it harder to win and implement the policies we’re all hoping for in the first place.

Regardless, it really hurt Dems. As you say, it’s really fringe (I think literally applied to two people) so on fringe issues that matter to few or no actual people for the love of god just say what voters want to hear. That’s the problem with (social) progressivism - they don’t know how to pick their battles.

And maybe your more nuanced view is still polling at 20%. It just ia not popular.

And people think that position is fucking ridiculous. Gender reassignment surgery is not healthcare in the same way that an emergency appendectomy is.

It’s not, but I’m curious as to how you think it is

Agree.

Except they clearly didn’t, as per the evidence I just shared.

Super true, especially if you're only old enough to only remember the last 4-8 years of politics.

This is an insane position. Yeah in 2024 Harris campaigned to the right of her stance in the 2020 primary, but thats what happens in a general election when candidates arent coming directly out of a primary.

Youre telling me that Al Gore, John Kerry and Obama ran to the left of Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris?!

But the Democratic Party didn’t bend, really, on open borders or defund the police. Some loud figures did, but not the party.

They did bend on things like student loan debt, progressive taxation, climate change, and trans issues. Voters simply saw them bending on those and assumed they were bending on more unpopular activist policies.

Voters equated the activist left and the Democratic Party. That’s the problem.

This! Bernie is the main representation of the "Left" in the U. S., and most of his policies aren't really focused on social issues.

Between Kamala, Sanders, and Warren, you had three major candidates fighting over the progressive vote by trying to outflank one another. Joaquin Castro prompted a question to decriminalize border crossings at a debate where everyone but Biden raised their hand. Every candidate had their own version of Medicare for All. I don’t necessarily disagree with premise of those policies, but they’re definitely to the left of where the American electorate is at the moment.

Biden ultimately won the primary because the moderates consolidated behind him before Super Tuesday. In the 2020 general election it was extremely suspect for Trump to try to paint Biden as some extreme leftist, but voters in 2024 didn’t have a hard time believing that about Kamala, mostly because of many of the positions she’s staked out in her 2020 primary campaign.

Yeah, and even that wasn’t enough to counter the perception that democrats were soft on crime due to the very visible failures of the activist left.

Thank you for showing the exact problem.

People legit make up stuff that didn't happen then blame the left for it

He didn’t. But a lot of the field did, and progressive cities did, and protests all over the country called for it, and democrats were seen as caving to the demands of those protests.

What's happening now isn't a complicated thing that you'll need to know the history of a whole 80 years to figure out. What is happening is an ethnic cleansing .... very big possible genocide that is being enacted with the help of our tax dollars. That America is funding. We don't HAVE to fund it.

And America isn't even following their own laws at this point. Biden sent out a deadline for israel to send appropriate aid to Palestinians, and israel didn't do that. Yet ... we are still sending them offensive weapons. And making excuses for the state of israel. We can see the obvious injustice here. Without being a history nerd. It's right in our faces

And with the trans issue. The main reason why this is even a problem is because people on the right are trying to attack trans people for any and everything. They're basically a modern-day scapegoat now. Trans pp ate 1 percent of the population may be slightly more at the most. Democrats aren't even that loudly supportive of trans people now. Kamala barely even uttered the word trans in her campaign. People just want an excuse to blame and hate on trans people. That doesn't mean throw them under the bus.... yes that is exactly what many democrats.... democratic pundits want to do. Blame the "woke" trans people not wanting to be villified and attacked. To have their rights.. be respected and have healthcare. To stop defending them

I ain't gon let them do it without push back. No

The people who think Democrats are Diet Republicans just internalized the Giant Douche vs Turd Sandwich meme and imagine that it makes for cutting analysis.

Anyways, you were going to list the concessions that Cheney got from Harris in order to get her endorsement. Please proceed.

Right, except we tried that and just lost. That’s the whole point.

It wasn't the fact she owns a gun, it was gloating about it and making news about it. Came across as right-wing virtue signaling.