Subject: Re: I changed my mind
The 2024 election was a simple (i.e., simple-minded) rejection of the incumbent party because "inflation." It doesn't matter that inflation was a global phenomenon. It doesn't matter that the US economy was doing fine comparatively. It doesn't matter that Kamala Harris was the candidate. The economic-based election models that have predicted Presidential election outcomes quite accurately going back to 1952 show that, if anything, Harris-Walz outperformed the forecast slightly--probably not because they were so terrific but because Trump-Vance was so awful.

Heck, I thought this was pretty much your view, also.

Not entirely. In every election, economics is always the most important issue. But the Democratic brand overall is in the toilet, which is a big part of why the Democrats lost so much ground underneath that topline figure. Trump-Vance outperformed in a lot of areas that they shouldn't, and a big part of that was not just the Democratic base feeling unloved, but also because a lot of voters have negative associations with the Democrats.

One can't have it both ways. One can't believe that the Republicans are going to alienate moderates and independents if they cave into their base and stake out positions the base likes but that are unpopular overall (abortion, for example) and simultaneously believe that catering to the Democratic base on issues that progressives want but that are unpopular overall won't have the same effect. One can't argue that the American people will reject the minority party "taking the government hostage" by effectuating a shutdown because they don't like what the majority wants when it's the GOP doing it, but then claim that it won't damage the Democrats when they're the ones holding the hostage.

Trump won, in part, because he was able to tell so much of his base to eff off when they wanted him to prove he "had their back" in the election on issues that were political losers. He told the anti-abortion right to basically pound sand - he knew what they wanted was political poison in the general election, and so they had to suck it up and deal with the fact that he wasn't going to "have their back" in those fights. Same thing with the anti-entitlement small-government wing (kiss off, Chip Roy, we're not cutting Social Security).