Time for the Dems to Centralize, around a Centrist

dudalb said:
SO all Republicans are evil..including those who left the party because they can't stand Trump?
And I am not sure the soul of the Democratic Party is as far to the left as you thnk it is...
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Not evil, just incompetent and negligent. People have been warning them for years about their dog-whistling to racists.

Never Trumpers are already committed to not voting Trump. There's no reason to court their votes.
 
dudalb said:
I think you mean 2012 instead of 2016.
But point well taken.]
I just think, even with the dislike of Trump, the Americans are ready to go as far to the left as the Berniebros think it is....
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They also weren't ready for Al Gore, John Kerry and Hillary Clinton. Would they be ready for Joe Biden?

Who then?
 
angrysoba said:
They also weren't ready for Al Gore, John Kerry and Hillary Clinton. Would they be ready for Joe Biden?

Who then?
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There is an argument that the less moderate candidate has won every presidential election since 1980.

Reagan X 2 (ldo)
Bush (four more years)
Clinton (Bush raised taxes and reverted to being a moderate)
Clinton (This is at best unclear... Clinton was GOP light at this point but so was Dole, really)
Bush ( how could you out moderate Gore?)
Bush (ADAM AND EVE NOT ADAM AND STEVE; SUPPORT OUR TROOPS OR THE BABY JESUS WILL CRY)
Obama (McCain's whole trip was reasonableness, except his VP choice was maybe so bad as to flip this one)
Obama (Romney is like mayo, only without all the spiciness)
Trump (JFC)

I'm not sure trying to drift back to the center is a winning move.
 
A better way to put it is this:

In every election since 1980, imagine the two candidates (lol Perot) having this exchange:

Candidate A: Here, smell my finger.
Candidate B: That is just sick. Why don't you grow up?

Every election has been won by the candidate that would be more likely to be candidate A.

I mean, it is hard to imagine Reagan being on that side of it, except it is harder to imagine Carter or Mondale. Bush manages to be on both sides in consecutive elections, but, again, Dukakis was so meek that he wouldn't refer to himself as a liberal without qualifying the crap out of it. Clinton obviously did do this in a real non-symbolic way at some point so he's clear.

Uptight centrism is poison. Warren before she drifted center could have been candidate A. Bernie no doubt. The rest are too busy trying real hard to be likable and see how offended they can be by Trump having his finger under their noses without giving it right back. Bloomberg just maybe, but his finger would smell like money so Trump would like it...

Maybe I just need some sleep.
 
The latest Quinnepac poll shows the entire Democratic field beating Trump in an honest election. Which is the problem. It won't be an honest election.
 
Suddenly said:
There is an argument that the less moderate candidate has won every presidential election since 1980.

Reagan X 2 (ldo)
Bush (four more years)
Clinton (Bush raised taxes and reverted to being a moderate)
Clinton (This is at best unclear... Clinton was GOP light at this point but so was Dole, really)
Bush ( how could you out moderate Gore?)
Bush (ADAM AND EVE NOT ADAM AND STEVE; SUPPORT OUR TROOPS OR THE BABY JESUS WILL CRY)
Obama (McCain's whole trip was reasonableness, except his VP choice was maybe so bad as to flip this one)
Obama (Romney is like mayo, only without all the spiciness)
Trump (JFC)

I'm not sure trying to drift back to the center is a winning move.
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Both Clinton and Obama reflexively governed from the center, the latter even when he had a functional supermajority in the Senate backing him up. You'd be hard pressed to name anything they did which even resembles the massive structural changes being put forward by AOC and the other DSA-flavored nominal Democrats.
 
d4m10n said:
Dems won with a centrist unifying figure in 1992, 1996, 2008, & 2012.

In my entire adult life, they have never won any other way.
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If that's what you call Clinton and Obama, then what would you call the ones who've lost? (Mondale, Dukakis, Gore, Kerry, Other Clinton) It seems like you're describing a situation where only one approach has even been tried, and it's both won and lost.

But the more important point is that your depiction of those campaigns is far off. Maybe that's how they actually governed once they were elected, but it's not what they presented themselves as in their campaigns. They campaigned about how they were going to radically change everything. The word "change" became a cliché of Democrat/lefty campaigning from how much they kept blathering about it. In their campaigns, they pretended to be Bernie before Bernie was famous. And the campaign version of a candidate, not the future actual governing version, is the one voters have available to decide on.
 
Galaxie said:
Official GOP List of Commie-Socialist Dem Presidents:
1) Every single Dem since 1932
2) Ronald Reagan (as of 2016 rules amendment)
3) George H. W. Bush (see no.2)
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You forgot Nixon. Or maybe he gets a pass from the GOP because of Kent State or whatever.
 
Suddenly said:
There is an argument that the less moderate candidate has won every presidential election since 1980.
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A few things to keep in mind:

- The idea that moderates do better than extremists is not some sort of law. Statistically it appears to be the case, but there are exceptions. Sometimes external factors will come into play that will harm a candidate's chances regardless of how moderate/extreme they are. Or sometimes the candidate will just run a bad campaign.

- When deciding whether a candidate is moderate or extreme, you have to look at most/all of their policies, rather than just focusing on one element and labeling them moderate/extreme based on that. You also have to consider their position in relation to ALL the other candidates and party members. Just because a republican candidate doesn't hold the same positions as a democrat does not make him 'extreme'.

- The claim that we are making is that a moderate has a better chance than an extremist. If both candidates are moderate or both extreme, then the argument becomes irrelevant.

- There are certain aspects of the American political system that put Democrats at a disadvantage. (Electoral college, voter suppression). That means that even if being a moderate is an advantage, it could mean that they still lose because of those other disadvantages.

So lets look at your list....
Reagan X 2 (ldo)
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Reagan first came to power after Jimmy Carter (a.k.a. "History's greatest Monster"). Carter had to deal with the Iranian hostage crisis and the invasion of Afghanistan, both factors that would have harmed any candidate.
Bush (four more years)
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While the presidency of Bush Sr. was often seen as a continuation of Reagan's term, Bush himself was actually more moderate. Remember, he at one point labeled Reagan's plans 'voodoo economics'. And as president he supported stronger environmental protections and increased rights for people with disabilities.

So, I'd say overall Bush Sr. was a moderate, even before he was elected.
Clinton (Bush raised taxes and reverted to being a moderate)
Clinton (This is at best unclear... Clinton was GOP light at this point but so was Dole, really)
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I'd say Clinton was a moderate in both of his campaigns.
Bush ( how could you out moderate Gore?)
Bush (ADAM AND EVE NOT ADAM AND STEVE; SUPPORT OUR TROOPS OR THE BABY JESUS WILL CRY)
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Yes, Bush 'won' against Gore. But he lost the popular vote. Now, you could argue that 'a loss is still a loss', but the problems of the electoral college will impact ANYONE the democrats select as a candidate.
Obama (McCain's whole trip was reasonableness, except his VP choice was maybe so bad as to flip this one)
Obama (Romney is like mayo, only without all the spiciness)
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Obama was pretty much a moderate as a president. His 'health care reform' was an improvement over what existed before, but wasn't anywhere near as radical as "medicare for all". He brought in new financial regulations, but he didn't go as far as breaking up the banks. He was generally on the left when it came to social issues (abortion and gay rights), but his actions on gun rights were limited. (He wanted more regulations, but certainly didn't call for an outright ban.)
Trump (JFC)
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Again, another case where a candidate lost the popular vote, but still won thanks to the electoral college (not to mention voter suppression and Russian collusion.)
I'm not sure trying to drift back to the center is a winning move.
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Well, given the fact that some of the 'extremists' you listed were actually closer to being 'moderates', and that some of the 'extremist' victories were questionable at best, I'd say seeking out the political center is a good idea.

Could Sanders have beaten Trump in 2016? I do not know. Clinton had problems with her campaign that had nothing to do with her position on the political spectrum that Sanders would have avoided. But, the issues of voter suppression, Russian interference and the electoral college were still there, and he would have been impacted by them too.

And I am not discounting Sander's chances should he become the nominee in 2020. Its possible that Trump's problems will finally catch up to him. Its possible that his personality will be convincing enough to people. Its possible that republican actions (the tax plan, attempts to kill Obamacare, etc.) will be seen as a hard-shift to the right, so that it will be a case of far-left vs. far-right.

I'm just saying that statistically there are reasons that moderates do better on average than extremists.
 
The whole centrist=electable stance looks like a post hoc fallacy to me, usually promulgated by people who simply prefer centrist candidates.

Favorability ratings are generally a better predictor of who will get elected. Both Clinton's and Trump's were poor in 2016, which probably has something to do with why she merely won the most votes. Corbyn's were abysmal for at least a year prior to the UK election (if this tells us anything about US elections).

But in general, electability is a murky concept, certainly not something for voters to worry about.

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/youll-never-know-which-candidate-is-electable/

Political scientists study electability, but electability ain’t no science. Instead, researchers say, it’s basically a layer of ex post facto rationalization that we slather over a stack of psychological biases, media influence and self-fulfilling poll prophecies. It’s not ********, exactly; some people really are more likely to be elected than others. But the reasons behind it, and the ability to make assumptions based on it, well …

“[Electability] is this vague, floppy concept,” said Nichole Bauer, a professor of political communication at Louisiana State University. “We don’t know who is electable until someone is elected.”
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SuburbanTurkey said:
Not evil, just incompetent and negligent. People have been warning them for years about their dog-whistling to racists.

Never Trumpers are already committed to not voting Trump. There's no reason to court their votes.
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Could double their impact by getting them to vote blue.

Simply not voting for Trump is not the same as voting for the Dem.
 
mumblethrax said:
The whole centrist=electable stance looks like a post hoc fallacy to me...
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There have been studies into the area.

From: https://www.vox.com/2019/7/2/20677656/donald-trump-moderate-extremism-penalty
The hoary old chestnut that moderate candidates do better at the polls than relatively extreme ones is well supported in the academic literature. In 2002, for example, Brandice Canes-Wrone, David Brady, and John Cogan found that the more an incumbent House member breaks with party leadership on roll call votes, the better he does on Election Day. Andrew Hall in 2015 looked at very close congressional primaries and found that moderate candidates who narrowly win the nomination do better in the general election than extreme candidates who narrowly win the nomination. A follow-up paper he wrote with Daniel Thompson suggests this is because certain folk theories about base mobilization are mistaken, and extreme nominees “fire up” the other side’s base and increase opposition turnout. A new paper by Devin Caughey and Christopher Warshaw extends this literature by looking at races for state legislature and governor as well as Congress and finds, again, that ideology matters.
 
Instead of a "Returning to the Norm" theory of politics, maybe a " pendulum swings in the opposite direction" theory is more appropriate.
The Obama Presidency was portrayed by the Right as radical left (and too darkskined), which would explain the Trump nomination.
And Trump is such an extreme that Democrats might not be satisfied with a mere Centrist and would instead prefer a racial leftist to restore equilibrium.
After all, Obama started at the Center and was dragged to the Right. With Bernie starting from the Left, actually moderate policies might be achievable.
 
mumblethrax said:
There have been studies into the area.
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Oh, there have been lots of studies. But they all stand on shifting ground. 2020 just isn't very much like 2002, or 1992, or 1972.
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I see. So when your response when provided with data is to basically hand-wave it away, with a "well I'm sure things are different NOW".

By the way, at least one of the paper includes data from the 2016 election, so its not like the researchers were only dealing with decades-old data.

I find it ironic that you would complain about the electability of moderates being some sort of post-hoc fallacy, when your whole argument seems to be based on nothing but your own biases and hand-waving away data.
 
Segnosaur said:
I see. So when your response when provided with data is to basically hand-wave it away, with a "well I'm sure things are different NOW".
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Do you think things are not different now?

By the way, at least one of the paper includes data from the 2016 election, so its not like the researchers were only dealing with decades-old data.
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Like I said, there have been lots of studies, often coming to different conclusions depending on the years they're looking at.

I find it ironic that you would complain about the electability of moderates being some sort of post-hoc fallacy, when your whole argument seems to be based on nothing but your own biases and hand-waving away data.
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Well, no, my argument is based on the fact that 'electability' is not something that we can do anything useful with. Did you read the article I posted?

If I'm tempted to handwave anything, it's Yglesias' contention that Trump ran as a moderate. He didn't. And he'd have to explain why Clinton then lost, given that she did.
 
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The Great Zaganza said:
After all, Obama started at the Center and was dragged to the Right. With Bernie starting from the Left, actually moderate policies might be achievable.
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That's pretty much how I see it. For all the weeping and wailing about "extreme leftists" in the Democratic party, the US is currently so far to the right, that it would take decades of such extremists being President to move the US even to the center.

I mean really, the Democrats have been trying to reform the US healthcare system since Clinton was President, and yet, they still have an uphill battle just to convince a large portion of the US electorate that their current system even has a problem that needs to be fixed. And healthcare reform is the easiest part of the program to sell.
 
Minoosh said:
You forgot Nixon. Or maybe he gets a pass from the GOP because of Kent State or whatever.
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Well, he's a tough call, but ultimately he ends up getting a pass.

Pros:
Watergate - nothing illegal there
Carpet bombed those Commies in SE Asia
Supported Bay of Pigs - can't have Commies in our neighborhood
War On Drugs - only hippies do drugs ya know
Moon landings - Kennedy who?

Cons:
Visited those no good Commies in China
Wage and price controls - that's bad capitalism
The EPA - 'nuff said
Proposed health insurance reform - oh no, socialism!
 
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mumblethrax said:
I see. So when your response when provided with data is to basically hand-wave it away, with a "well I'm sure things are different NOW".
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Do you think things are not different now?
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I think the data that researchers used in their analysis (which included at least up to 2016) is recent enough that the results should be relevant. (i.e. I doubt very much would have shifted in such a limited time).

I also think the underlying psychology (i.e. that people will act in their own self interest, and opposition will be stronger with bigger differences between parties) probably hasn't changed much.

Like I said, there have been lots of studies, often coming to different conclusions depending on the years they're looking at.
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But I have not yet seen any studies that contradict the ones that I posted. Not one study that shows that "extremism is more successful in an election than moderation". Not one.

Maybe they exist. But if they do exist, then by all means, show me.
Well, no, my argument is based on the fact that 'electability' is not something that we can do anything useful with. Did you read the article I posted?
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Yes I did.

Your article covers a lot of areas... candidate's gender, race, even their voice. I have no problem that those probably all feed into a candidate's chances of success, and may even overwhelm whether a candidate is moderate.

As I have said before, it isn't a law that "moderates always win". Its one factor. Its just a statistical thing... if all other factors are the same, the moderate will usually win.

The article you referenced does talk about moderation (even admitting that it was an advantage in the past). Its only evidence that it was not an issue was when it stated:
Abramowitz’s analysis of the 2018 House elections turned up evidence that an incumbent candidate’s past voting record — whether they were more moderate or not — didn’t really make much of a difference in whether they won or lost...
Even there its not completely discounting the effect of moderation... it says it "didn't make much difference" rather than "it made no difference".

If I'm tempted to handwave anything, it's Yglesias' contention that Trump ran as a moderate. He didn't. And he'd have to explain why Clinton then lost, given that she did.
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Actually I have also made the claim that Trump ran as a moderate.

Yes, Trump was a bigot back in the 2016 elections (as he is now). And yes, he is a well-known liar, and many of his policies were poorly thought out (if not outright contradictory). But, a willingness to believe in lies is not always a left wing/right wing/centerist thing. And if someone was gullible enough to believe in Trump, what would you see? A republican politician who: claimed he opposed the war in Iraq (it was a lie, but again, I'm not talking about Trump's honesty but his political positions), would not touch medicare/social security, would provide a "great" health care plan, and although he was often vague about things like gay marriage, he said he would "protect" LGBTQ people.

Compared to your average republican at the time, an anti-war candidate who would protect your social security and provide health care would be seen as quite moderate.

And even if you assume Trump was extreme, remember that he still lost the popular vote, and only became president through a combination of the Electoral College, Russian interference, and voter suppression. (Even if being a moderate provides some advantages, sometimes it may not necessarily be enough to overcome other disadvantages.)
 
But I have not yet seen any studies that contradict the ones that I posted. Not one study that shows that "extremism is more successful in an election than moderation". Not one.
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No one is arguing for extremism.
 
Read Segnosaur's italicized quote above carefully, one sentence at a time. The introductory sentence's assertion is not supported by the subsequent sentences.
 
Segnosaur said:
I think the data that researchers used in their analysis (which included at least up to 2016) is recent enough that the results should be relevant. (i.e. I doubt very much would have shifted in such a limited time).
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That doesn't really follow--if they're including data from 1980-2016, for example (and it happens that they are), we wouldn't expect a sea change to be represented in their results.

I also think the underlying psychology (i.e. that people will act in their own self interest, and opposition will be stronger with bigger differences between parties) probably hasn't changed much.
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I'm afraid I don't know what you mean here.

But I have not yet seen any studies that contradict the ones that I posted. Not one study that shows that "extremism is more successful in an election than moderation". Not one.
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Well, I don't need to do that, do I? I'm not claiming that extremes do better than moderates. I'm withholding judgment--I don't see anything like good enough information to conclude that a non-moderate would be unelectable, or even significantly less electable. What data we do have indicates generally weak correlations--the authors of most of the studies caution against exactly the conclusion that Yglesias draws.

My opinion is that electability is just not worth talking about. It's junk punditry. For the most part, people should just vote for the candidate they prefer.

As I have said before, it isn't a law that "moderates always win". Its one factor. Its just a statistical thing... if all other factors are the same, the moderate will usually win.
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And all other things being equal, the most attractive candidate will usually win, and the effect is far stronger. I don't see that as a reason to get strategic about attractiveness. So why the focus on nominating moderates?

The article you referenced does talk about moderation (even admitting that it was an advantage in the past). Its only evidence that it was not an issue was when it stated:
Abramowitz’s analysis of the 2018 House elections turned up evidence that an incumbent candidate’s past voting record — whether they were more moderate or not — didn’t really make much of a difference in whether they won or lost...
Even there its not completely discounting the effect of moderation... it says it "didn't make much difference" rather than "it made no difference".
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I'm not claiming that it makes no difference. I'm saying that the strong link implied by the conventional wisdom is simply not there.

Actually I have also made the claim that Trump ran as a moderate.
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Trump wasn't coherent enough to pin down on most policy issues (he certainly wasn't an anti-war candidate, for example--he just wasn't especially a pro-war candidate, either), but his signature issue was building a wall between the US and Mexico. That was an extreme and unpopular position (unpopularity being Yglesias' proposed mechanism by which extremists do worse).
 
Culinary union in Las Vegas declines to endorse a candidate...

That's one step closer to a contested convention and Trump's reelection.
 
mumblethrax said:
The whole centrist=electable stance looks like a post hoc fallacy to me, usually promulgated by people who simply prefer centrist candidates.

Favorability ratings are generally a better predictor of who will get elected. Both Clinton's and Trump's were poor in 2016, which probably has something to do with why she merely won the most votes. Corbyn's were abysmal for at least a year prior to the UK election (if this tells us anything about US elections).

But in general, electability is a murky concept, certainly not something for voters to worry about.

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/youll-never-know-which-candidate-is-electable/
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I think Corbyn tells us very little about Sanders. He was loathed by most people including most of his own party. This is not necessarily for his policies but rather his individual style, his ineptness at holding the government to account, his dithering on the major issue of Brexit which nobody could explain.

The Tories, on the other hand, had a simple single message which was “get Brexit done”. They just repeated this over and over agin regardless of what the question was.
 
By contrast, I think it is Sanders who has a simple and easy message to understand, and the other candidates whose policies are complicated or nuanced. The former tends to be more successful in my opinion.
 
angrysoba said:
I think Corbyn tells us very little about Sanders. He was loathed by most people including most of his own party. This is not necessarily for his policies but rather his individual style, his ineptness at holding the government to account, his dithering on the major issue of Brexit which nobody could explain.
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Yeah, exactly. When I say "abysmal", I mean underwater by like 60 points in some polls. People just hate the guy. The idea that we can infer a 'test' from this applicable to American politics is not really worth taking seriously.

Sanders, meanwhile, had generally better favorables than Clinton in 2016, and they're still relatively high today. That's not to say he would have won in 2016 or will win today, but Labour's plight under Corbyn tells us nothing useful about what's likely to happen in November.
 
rockysmith76 said:
They need an Electable Candidate, as well to marginalize the Lefties to their own party where they can fade into irrelevance with their outdated and uninspired platform.
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Nice try, rockysmith76. Tbf, I would have been disappointed had you NOT tried that.
 
These threads are so funny to watch. You point to an aggregate of polls showing Sanders winning vs trump in the general and people complain it's about the battleground states.

You point to an aggregate of polls in key battleground states showing Sanders beating Trump and people complain it's really about getting the independent votes.

So you show polling that Sanders is the most preffered by independents so they complain it's too early or all polls unreliable.

You ask then what measure should be used and why it's any better than actual polling and you get nothing.

Until two days later when they go right back to their original alt-facts that Sanders isn't electable but centrist candidate X is because they say so.

And I'm not saying the candidate has to be Sanders so everyone must get on board, (though that's a favorite strawman of some here), as that same polling shows multiple other candidates beating Trump too.

But let's stop pretending Sanders can't win just because he's not your preffered candidate.
 
Sometimes a candidate comes along who has that way of quickly accumulating so much national support that his/her election is all but certain.

But most of the time, there are several good candidates and it just takes a while to for them to get national support that is needed to win the election.

In short, just because it is taking a while for the Democrats to settle on one candidate, that does not automatically mean that the eventual Democrat nominee will loose the election.

For example, there was a great deal of consternation when it was Obama/Clinton running. But once Obama got the nomination, then many of the Clinton supporters soon became Obama supporters.
 
Crossbow said:
For example, there was a great deal of consternation when it was Obama/Clinton running. But once Obama got the nomination, then many of the Clinton supporters soon became Obama supporters.
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I really don't think we can expect Sanders supporters to line up behind a centrist this time around, especially since they tried it last time and seem very confident that they deserve the nomination this time.

If (gods forbid) the superdelegates vote their consciences and that somehow tips the balance, I hesitate to imagine how ugly things will get.

Sent from my SM-T560NU using Tapatalk
 
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Random said:
He was viewed as "unelectable" in the matchup with Clinton, with poll after poll telling us that he was doomed and the American people would never elect an unelectable person like him. And he was elected.
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The scary part is that the polls weren't wrong and weren't what you remember. Polls at the very end were showing a close election with the battle ground states being within the margin of error for the polls.
 
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