My favorite data point, Andy beshear, in support of your argument. He’s shown moral leadership on a supposedly losing cultural issue and won in a red state. Dems need more clear policies too, like “free bus” is easy for the uninformed to understand whereas a “credit that is refunded on your taxes if you work full time and have children” is so indirect as to never give credit to Dems. Losing the enhanced child tax credit killed Biden because people all of a sudden lost something direct and tangible and they blamed Biden. (Scaring polling also showed maj blamed Biden for loss of roe abortion access which points to comms problems) His progressive policies were long term and we needed short term/direct benefits. ( not his fault manchin and sinema killed bbb reforms that would have been direct wins). Eg in AZ? Universal free childcare, or free school lunch
I have long railed against “radical centrists.” Your term—“reactionary centrists”—is a serious upgrade. Thanks!
I find it’s impossible to distinguish the behaviors and choices of the reactionary centrist from those of the capitulator and collaborator. They serve to empower the wrong by denigrating the good. In politics, they manifest in the Dems’ cult-like devotion to polling: “Allow me to consult the oracle before I choose a tie to wear.” That’s one reason Mamdani was so appealing. He didn’t seem poll-tested.
The readiness to abandon vulnerable trans people was especially galling. Centrists would act as if "compromising" on trans kids in sports or gender affirming care for minors would magically restore a "balance," while Republicans were actively trying to erase trans people from existence.
A perceived crappy economy cost Democrats the election, but rather than address that -- either due to poor messaging, bad policy or just lousy luck because of post-covid conditions -- they seized on the easiest scapegoat. It was appalling to watch.
I usually hate broad critiques of "the left". But to your point I think it's valid to point out that Biden/Harris didn't win after being arguably the most progressive admin since LBJ or FDR. What the wide, disjointed and ill-defined left needs to learn how to do is take a victory lap while not becoming complacent. I'm not saying touting Biden's achievements would've had electoral success. We might have been too far gone in terms of the media/information environment for it to have worked then. But going forward, and even outside of electoral concerns, we have to learn how to take a W and use it as a springboard to even more. Part of proving our stuff works on the merits is showing its success, and that sadly doesn't happen on its own in this awful media environment.
I'm not sure that Democrats do themselves favors by claiming the administration was the "most progressive" since LBJ or FDR. It often feels like "be satisfied with what Manchin/Sinema let you have," which is hardly motivating. Manchin/Sinema delivered some PUBLIC losses on progressive policy.
LBJ and FDR failed in a lot of ways too! Like, FDR never really even tried to deal with Jim Crow; LBJ largely abandoned the war on poverty for Vietnam, and also was himself involved in a lot of the initial backlash to the civil rights movement he also supported.
So I think the problem is as much retroactive nostalgia as overhyping Biden.
Sure, but FDR has the New Deal and beating Hitler, and LBJ has the Civil Rights Act/Voting Rights Act. Biden has an infrastructure deal he was desperate to gain GOP support for. I know it's more complicated than that, but there really is no big grand achievement that you'd see in a move.
My issue with centrism is that it's not an actual set of consistent beliefs. It just shifts based on what is perceived to best win elections and not antagonize center-right swing voters. Yet they piously attack the so-called "extremists" on the left and right who dare actually believe in something -- even if those beliefs aren't *good,* the fact that they are passionate about them isn't the problem. Instead, reactionary centrists seem most focused on gaining power and holding it but never daring to do anything that might cost them that power.
I kind of think reactionary centrists do believe in reactionary policy. Like, I think Yglesias and Newsom sincerely believe that trans people are weird and maybe dangerous and should be excluded from society to some degree. I think the claims that it’s all pragmatic are disingenuous, at least to some degree.
That's a good point. It probably explains why they seized on that excuse after Harris's loss. It reminds me of how Spanberger blamed the left for Dems' underperformance in 2020 (actually losing House seats instead of gaining). She linked it all to "defund the police," which wasn't actually a policy anyone in those districts ran on! There was a lot of evidence that there was backlash to covid mitigation measures, but centrists still believed in those policies so simply blamed the policies they loathed.
Reactionary centrist is a great term for that type of political hack. On the national level, you need to be in the middle of the field, but I’d argue that Spanberger, Sherrill, and Beshear securely in the middle. Democrats aren’t going to win on by campaigning culture war issues. But when Republicans start throwing around culture war red meat, there’s no need to throw anyone under the bus. Just remind people that “minority being attacked by Republicans” are Americans trying to live their life and that you are working to make life better for all Americans. James Carville is years past his expiration date.
Thinking about Fetterman- I actually donated some to his first Senate campaign. Imagine the betrayal I feel now. If the republicans have a good idea, and I’m still waiting to see one, we should back it. Otherwise, I don’t see how throwing in with the right and furthering their goals is going to do anything but alienate your base, as you have clearly shown.
At the end of the day, centrism = stagnation and protection of the establishment. If government is to provide services for the people in exchange for taxes, I think the masses have finally—FINALLY—realized that seat-warming is not the same as governing, and voting blue no matter who is not resulting in policies that work for everyone. And characterizing Democratic Socialism as “extreme” is patently laughable, when pretty much every wealthy country in the world has some form of it.
Maybe a way to reframe tactical concerns regarding electoral politics comprises not as much arguing policy merits, but demonstrating — demonstrating! — leadership, leadership in service of policy. We might benefit generally from considering policy nuances the province of managers, who aren’t implicitly leaders. My casual observation is that managers have some — limited — electoral success in blue states (think MA or MN, but red and purple states respond more to leadership traits, ones that abide in a more visceral, less technocratic plane.
This goes to the problem of swing voters; they simply don’t engage much with policy, if at all, we’re finding. The people (like us and like our maga/RW/gop counterparts) who do engage with policy, in the vast majority of cases, have their minds made up most firmly regarding tribal affiliation and won’t deviate therefrom, and will reliably vote accordingly, virtually every time. The energy costs required to move the few marginal exceptions to this model wouldn’t seem to be worth expending.
In contrast, politicians who succeed in capturing the imaginations, and consequent votes, of swing voters are the ones whom swing voters (and habitual non-voters) empirically see, hear, and feel actively fighting, passionately and courageously. Period. This means committing, putting aside fear of alienating one’s target audience, and standing up forthrightly, without palpable calibration, against institutionalized dysfunction and cynicism: “I might not agree on all the issues, but I like the cut of that one’s jib.” Or something?..
This isn’t to propose that leaders needn’t concern selves with policy, only that they need only select, for rhetorical purposes, one to three key problems to solve, have one to three reasonably credible tactics to describe how they envision achieving those solutions (including maybe giving a good sense of who the managers are to whom they’ll delegate policy nuances), and to maintain a posture of steadfastness, confidence, and good cheer, that is to say “leadership.”
The argument that Mamdani couldn't win in "purple" districts/states is a popular centrist narrative, even though Mamdani ran on *affordability,* which would apply anywhere. Often the less than subtle implication is that Mamdani himself -- a Muslim -- would struggle to win in those areas.
do you make a distinction between "reactionary" centrists and non-reactionary ones. I support pretty much all progressive GOALS but not necessarily their time frames. For example, I think universal health care is where we need to go, but we aren't there yet--the increasing popularity of the ACA means we are getting there, but it's too soon to push it on people who think it is bad for some reason (Open question about whether end of the subsidies will push people away from the ACA or make them pay attention to the fact that the tax rise needed for may be less than they fear.)
But I'd never cave on culture war issues. You don't have to be "progressive" to be anti-bigotry.
"Biden did in fact enact a lot of left goals—cash payments to families to slash child poverty, a ton of student debt forgiveness, the most vigorous antitrust enforcement in decades, a huge stimulus package centering green energy.
"None of that won Biden the 2024 election."
That's because most on the Left were waiting for the other shoe to drop, for Biden to rip off his dime-store Bernie Sanders Mask, and show us He Truly Was The Last Bigoted Sleazy Two-Faced Papist Dixiecrat!!!!! That he DIDN'T, except maybe on giving Bloodthirsty Bibi a blank check for too long to commit his Gaza Genocide Tour (and that was as thanks to Biden following Ye Olde Cold War Playbook not wisely, but too well), still stuns me to this day, and convinces me that just maybe Old Uncle Joe was either turning over a new leaf—or realizing that the increasing Far Right shift of "Centrism" was no longer winning elections.
It's just too bad the Corporate Media and Chattering Class decided they LIKED Far Right Centrism (and all that sweet, sweet inequality that made them rich!) and slammed Biden (who was never exactly the most eloquent public speaker) as "senile" while eagerly sanewashing The Blatantly Senile Donald Fucking Trump. Biden stepped down and offered Kamala Harris as a younger substitute (while succeeding at The Art of the Deal better than Donnie Pantload could ever hope to!), and the Chatterers turned on her while she was running as good a campaign as anybody could given she was thrown into the Shark Tank headfirst.
Joe Biden did what a good leader in a crisis is supposed to do—put his head down and get to work straightening out the mess his psycho predecessor left him. Maybe he should've hired a celebrity impersonator to go out and behave like a trained seal for the Chatterers while he worked, or put Harris out there a LOT sooner as his public pit bull attacking Trump at every turn.... 😮💨
My favorite data point, Andy beshear, in support of your argument. He’s shown moral leadership on a supposedly losing cultural issue and won in a red state. Dems need more clear policies too, like “free bus” is easy for the uninformed to understand whereas a “credit that is refunded on your taxes if you work full time and have children” is so indirect as to never give credit to Dems. Losing the enhanced child tax credit killed Biden because people all of a sudden lost something direct and tangible and they blamed Biden. (Scaring polling also showed maj blamed Biden for loss of roe abortion access which points to comms problems) His progressive policies were long term and we needed short term/direct benefits. ( not his fault manchin and sinema killed bbb reforms that would have been direct wins). Eg in AZ? Universal free childcare, or free school lunch
Nice.
Nicer to read if no acronyms or shorthand.
Well said!
I have long railed against “radical centrists.” Your term—“reactionary centrists”—is a serious upgrade. Thanks!
I find it’s impossible to distinguish the behaviors and choices of the reactionary centrist from those of the capitulator and collaborator. They serve to empower the wrong by denigrating the good. In politics, they manifest in the Dems’ cult-like devotion to polling: “Allow me to consult the oracle before I choose a tie to wear.” That’s one reason Mamdani was so appealing. He didn’t seem poll-tested.
The readiness to abandon vulnerable trans people was especially galling. Centrists would act as if "compromising" on trans kids in sports or gender affirming care for minors would magically restore a "balance," while Republicans were actively trying to erase trans people from existence.
A perceived crappy economy cost Democrats the election, but rather than address that -- either due to poor messaging, bad policy or just lousy luck because of post-covid conditions -- they seized on the easiest scapegoat. It was appalling to watch.
I usually hate broad critiques of "the left". But to your point I think it's valid to point out that Biden/Harris didn't win after being arguably the most progressive admin since LBJ or FDR. What the wide, disjointed and ill-defined left needs to learn how to do is take a victory lap while not becoming complacent. I'm not saying touting Biden's achievements would've had electoral success. We might have been too far gone in terms of the media/information environment for it to have worked then. But going forward, and even outside of electoral concerns, we have to learn how to take a W and use it as a springboard to even more. Part of proving our stuff works on the merits is showing its success, and that sadly doesn't happen on its own in this awful media environment.
I'm not sure that Democrats do themselves favors by claiming the administration was the "most progressive" since LBJ or FDR. It often feels like "be satisfied with what Manchin/Sinema let you have," which is hardly motivating. Manchin/Sinema delivered some PUBLIC losses on progressive policy.
LBJ and FDR failed in a lot of ways too! Like, FDR never really even tried to deal with Jim Crow; LBJ largely abandoned the war on poverty for Vietnam, and also was himself involved in a lot of the initial backlash to the civil rights movement he also supported.
So I think the problem is as much retroactive nostalgia as overhyping Biden.
Sure, but FDR has the New Deal and beating Hitler, and LBJ has the Civil Rights Act/Voting Rights Act. Biden has an infrastructure deal he was desperate to gain GOP support for. I know it's more complicated than that, but there really is no big grand achievement that you'd see in a move.
Also, there is 50+ years of the invention of Fox News after Watergate.
A television station invented to present only the zero-sum views of the right has done its job.
As we used to stay in Canada, “A steady rain soaks…“
My issue with centrism is that it's not an actual set of consistent beliefs. It just shifts based on what is perceived to best win elections and not antagonize center-right swing voters. Yet they piously attack the so-called "extremists" on the left and right who dare actually believe in something -- even if those beliefs aren't *good,* the fact that they are passionate about them isn't the problem. Instead, reactionary centrists seem most focused on gaining power and holding it but never daring to do anything that might cost them that power.
I kind of think reactionary centrists do believe in reactionary policy. Like, I think Yglesias and Newsom sincerely believe that trans people are weird and maybe dangerous and should be excluded from society to some degree. I think the claims that it’s all pragmatic are disingenuous, at least to some degree.
That's a good point. It probably explains why they seized on that excuse after Harris's loss. It reminds me of how Spanberger blamed the left for Dems' underperformance in 2020 (actually losing House seats instead of gaining). She linked it all to "defund the police," which wasn't actually a policy anyone in those districts ran on! There was a lot of evidence that there was backlash to covid mitigation measures, but centrists still believed in those policies so simply blamed the policies they loathed.
Reactionary centrist is a great term for that type of political hack. On the national level, you need to be in the middle of the field, but I’d argue that Spanberger, Sherrill, and Beshear securely in the middle. Democrats aren’t going to win on by campaigning culture war issues. But when Republicans start throwing around culture war red meat, there’s no need to throw anyone under the bus. Just remind people that “minority being attacked by Republicans” are Americans trying to live their life and that you are working to make life better for all Americans. James Carville is years past his expiration date.
Thinking about Fetterman- I actually donated some to his first Senate campaign. Imagine the betrayal I feel now. If the republicans have a good idea, and I’m still waiting to see one, we should back it. Otherwise, I don’t see how throwing in with the right and furthering their goals is going to do anything but alienate your base, as you have clearly shown.
At the end of the day, centrism = stagnation and protection of the establishment. If government is to provide services for the people in exchange for taxes, I think the masses have finally—FINALLY—realized that seat-warming is not the same as governing, and voting blue no matter who is not resulting in policies that work for everyone. And characterizing Democratic Socialism as “extreme” is patently laughable, when pretty much every wealthy country in the world has some form of it.
Maybe a way to reframe tactical concerns regarding electoral politics comprises not as much arguing policy merits, but demonstrating — demonstrating! — leadership, leadership in service of policy. We might benefit generally from considering policy nuances the province of managers, who aren’t implicitly leaders. My casual observation is that managers have some — limited — electoral success in blue states (think MA or MN, but red and purple states respond more to leadership traits, ones that abide in a more visceral, less technocratic plane.
This goes to the problem of swing voters; they simply don’t engage much with policy, if at all, we’re finding. The people (like us and like our maga/RW/gop counterparts) who do engage with policy, in the vast majority of cases, have their minds made up most firmly regarding tribal affiliation and won’t deviate therefrom, and will reliably vote accordingly, virtually every time. The energy costs required to move the few marginal exceptions to this model wouldn’t seem to be worth expending.
In contrast, politicians who succeed in capturing the imaginations, and consequent votes, of swing voters are the ones whom swing voters (and habitual non-voters) empirically see, hear, and feel actively fighting, passionately and courageously. Period. This means committing, putting aside fear of alienating one’s target audience, and standing up forthrightly, without palpable calibration, against institutionalized dysfunction and cynicism: “I might not agree on all the issues, but I like the cut of that one’s jib.” Or something?..
This isn’t to propose that leaders needn’t concern selves with policy, only that they need only select, for rhetorical purposes, one to three key problems to solve, have one to three reasonably credible tactics to describe how they envision achieving those solutions (including maybe giving a good sense of who the managers are to whom they’ll delegate policy nuances), and to maintain a posture of steadfastness, confidence, and good cheer, that is to say “leadership.”
The argument that Mamdani couldn't win in "purple" districts/states is a popular centrist narrative, even though Mamdani ran on *affordability,* which would apply anywhere. Often the less than subtle implication is that Mamdani himself -- a Muslim -- would struggle to win in those areas.
do you make a distinction between "reactionary" centrists and non-reactionary ones. I support pretty much all progressive GOALS but not necessarily their time frames. For example, I think universal health care is where we need to go, but we aren't there yet--the increasing popularity of the ACA means we are getting there, but it's too soon to push it on people who think it is bad for some reason (Open question about whether end of the subsidies will push people away from the ACA or make them pay attention to the fact that the tax rise needed for may be less than they fear.)
But I'd never cave on culture war issues. You don't have to be "progressive" to be anti-bigotry.
"Biden did in fact enact a lot of left goals—cash payments to families to slash child poverty, a ton of student debt forgiveness, the most vigorous antitrust enforcement in decades, a huge stimulus package centering green energy.
"None of that won Biden the 2024 election."
That's because most on the Left were waiting for the other shoe to drop, for Biden to rip off his dime-store Bernie Sanders Mask, and show us He Truly Was The Last Bigoted Sleazy Two-Faced Papist Dixiecrat!!!!! That he DIDN'T, except maybe on giving Bloodthirsty Bibi a blank check for too long to commit his Gaza Genocide Tour (and that was as thanks to Biden following Ye Olde Cold War Playbook not wisely, but too well), still stuns me to this day, and convinces me that just maybe Old Uncle Joe was either turning over a new leaf—or realizing that the increasing Far Right shift of "Centrism" was no longer winning elections.
It's just too bad the Corporate Media and Chattering Class decided they LIKED Far Right Centrism (and all that sweet, sweet inequality that made them rich!) and slammed Biden (who was never exactly the most eloquent public speaker) as "senile" while eagerly sanewashing The Blatantly Senile Donald Fucking Trump. Biden stepped down and offered Kamala Harris as a younger substitute (while succeeding at The Art of the Deal better than Donnie Pantload could ever hope to!), and the Chatterers turned on her while she was running as good a campaign as anybody could given she was thrown into the Shark Tank headfirst.
Joe Biden did what a good leader in a crisis is supposed to do—put his head down and get to work straightening out the mess his psycho predecessor left him. Maybe he should've hired a celebrity impersonator to go out and behave like a trained seal for the Chatterers while he worked, or put Harris out there a LOT sooner as his public pit bull attacking Trump at every turn.... 😮💨