Political Autopsy
The following is the Executive Summary of a report authored by Democratic Party activists titled "Autopsy: The Democratic Party in Crisis." On a quick read of the summary, one is left with a mishmash strategy that seems to try to be all things to all people (except for those Republicans, that is! The stated goal is "to end Republican rule and gain lasting momentum for progressive change.")
That would be the starting point of my critique. What we've learned over the past 16 years is that most voters in the US are tired of partisan posturing and could care less about which party wins elections if only their elected representatives would be accountable and serve voters' interests. Voters are far less partisan than party activists and the media. With Trump's election, roughly half the population across 85% of the county landscape voted a pox on both their houses. So, let's start with that inconvenient fact.
Specific comments in red below:
Executive Summary
The Party’s Base
• Aggregated data and analysis show that policies, operations and campaign priorities of the national Democratic Party undermined support and turnout from its base in the 2016 general election. Since then, the Democratic leadership has done little to indicate that it is heeding key lessons from the 2016 disaster.
• The Democratic National Committee and the party’s congressional leadership remain bent on prioritizing the chase for elusive Republican voters over the Democratic base: especially people of color, young people and working-class voters overall. [Yes, but that's because in a country where whites comprise 70% of the electorate, identity politics based on race and ethnicity have a ceiling of support that is insufficient to win national elections. Identity politics that is based on preferences also leads to zero-sum games over who gets what.]
• After suffering from a falloff of turnout among people of color in the 2016 general election, the party appears to be losing ground with its most reliable voting bloc, African-American women. “The Democratic Party has experienced an 11 percent drop in support from black women according to one survey, while the percentage of black women who said neither party represents them went from 13 percent in 2016 to 21 percent in 2017.”
• One of the large groups with a voter-turnout issue is young people, “who encounter a toxic combination of a depressed economic reality, GOP efforts at voter suppression, and anemic messaging on the part of Democrats.” [The problem with young voters is that they cynically perceive "politics as usual." Sanders appeal seems to have transcended that, but the question is whether "socialist" policies can. The historical record is not promising.]
• “Emerging sectors of the electorate are compelling the Democratic Party to come to terms with adamant grassroots rejection of economic injustice, institutionalized racism, gender inequality, environmental destruction and corporate domination. Siding with the people who constitute the base isn’t truly possible when party leaders seem to be afraid of them.” [Politics against "injustice, racism, gender inequality, environment and corporate malfeasance, etc." must be based on some unifying principles in order to filter out subjective grievances that merely favor narrow interests. The party has not made those tough distinctions.]
• The DNC has refused to renounce, or commit to end, its undemocratic practices during the 2016 primary campaign that caused so much discord and distrust from many party activists and voters among core constituencies. [Yes, there is internal discord.]
• Working to defeat restrictions on voting rights is of enormous importance. Yet the Democratic National Committee failed to make such work a DNC staffing priority. [Empirical data and the appeal of voter ID laws discount this grievance strategy. Thus, deploying it is not likely to have positive effects. Better to advance GOTV efforts.]
Populism and Party Decline
• The Democratic Party’s claims of fighting for “working families” have been undermined by its refusal to directly challenge corporate power, enabling Trump to masquerade as a champion of the people. “Democrats will not win if they continue to bring a wonk knife to a populist gunfight. Nor can Democratic leaders and operatives be seen as real allies of the working class if they’re afraid to alienate big funders or to harm future job or consulting prospects.” [There's a difficult choice for the party highlighted by the Perez-Sanders split: identity politics or class politics? The mishmash of this manifesto results from trying to pursue both. To do this the party advances an implicit assumption that 'white' voters are only virtuous if they are poor. This is blatantly hypocritical to middle class whites.]
• “Since Obama’s victory in 2008, the Democratic Party has lost control of both houses of Congress and more than 1,000 state legislative seats. The GOP now controls the governorship as well as the entire legislature in 26 states, while Democrats exercise such control in only six states…. Despite this Democratic decline, bold proposals with the national party’s imprint are scarce.” [So, trying to pursue a triangulation strategy while paying lip-service to identity racial and ethnic grievance groups for the past 8 years has led to defeat across the spectrum. Yet, this new party manifesto really refuses to make a choice. So, it's more of the same: trying to appeal to white middle class voters while implying that the party is really for social justice that disfavors them because they are white. This is a losing contradictory strategy.]
• “After a decade and a half of nonstop warfare, research data from voting patterns suggest that the Clinton campaign’s hawkish stance was a political detriment in working-class communities hard-hit by American casualties from deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan.” [Yes, but they point with pride to their sacrifices for country. Disrespecting their patriotism by implying they're dupes is not a winning strategy.]
• “Operating from a place of defensiveness and denial will not turn the party around. Neither will status quo methodology.”
Recommendations
Party Operations and Outreach
• The Democratic National Committee must make up for lost time by accelerating its very recent gear-up of staffing to fight against the multi-front assaults on voting rights that include voter ID laws, purges of voter rolls and intimidation tactics. [As explained above, not likely to be productive.]
• The Democratic National Committee should commit itself to scrupulously adhering to its Charter, which requires the DNC to be evenhanded in the presidential nominating process.
• Because “the superdelegate system, by its very nature, undermines the vital precept of one person, one vote,” the voting power of all superdelegates to the Democratic National Convention must end.
• “Social movements cannot be understood as tools to get Democrats elected. The ebb and flow of social movements offer a rising tide in their own right that along the way can lift Democratic Party candidates — if the party is able to embrace the broad popular sentiment that the movements embody.” [Both parties have willingly dragged their constituencies into cultural conflicts that are largely unresolvable. Thus, the parties gain by making compromise untenable: Vote for us or else!]
• “This is about more than just increasing voter turnout. It is about energizing as well as expanding the base of the party. To do this we must aggressively pursue two tracks: fighting right-wing efforts to rig the political system, and giving people who can vote a truly compelling reason to do so.” [Enthusiasm based on negative opposition (i.e., anti-Trump or anti-liberal) is not very durable.]
• “The enduring point of community outreach is to build an ongoing relationship that aims for the party to become part of the fabric of everyday life. It means acknowledging the validity and power of people-driven movements as well as recognizing and supporting authentic progressive community leaders. It means focusing on how the party can best serve communities, not the other way around. Most of all, it means persisting with such engagement on an ongoing basis, not just at election time.” [Yes, but to do so successfully requires an appeal beyond the particularistic identity of the individual. How can I be part of something bigger if it's all about who I am?]
Party Policies and Programs
• The party should avidly promote inspiring programs such as single-payer Medicare for all, free public college tuition, economic security, infrastructure and green jobs initiatives, and tackling the climate crisis. [Here we get into the problem of the viability of socialist policies - when they fail, it discredits the bigger goal.]
• While the Democratic Party fights for an agenda to benefit all Americans [Does it? What about those Trump voters?], the party must develop new policies and strategies for more substantial engagement with people of color — directly addressing realities of their lives that include disproportionately high rates of poverty and ongoing vulnerability to a racist criminal justice system. [And then there is an immediate turn back to biological identity. This is not to deny the problems of disadvantaged communities, but merely questions the best way to empower them.]
• With its policies and programs, not just its public statements, the Democratic Party must emphasize that “in the real world, the well-being of women is indivisible from their economic circumstances and security.” To truly advance gender equality, the party needs to fight for the economic rights of all women. [Better to let the economy and the demand for labor sort this out. It works.]
• The Democratic Party should end its neglect of rural voters, a process that must include aligning the party with the interests of farming families and others who live in the countryside rather than with Big Agriculture and monopolies. [Agree. But these are not people looking for pity or hand-outs or victim status. They want to be able to take care of themselves.]
• “While the short-term prospects for meaningful federal action on climate are exceedingly bleak, state-level initiatives are important and attainable. Meanwhile, it’s crucial that the Democratic Party stop confining its climate agenda to inadequate steps that are palatable to Big Oil and mega-players on Wall Street.” [The trade-offs the majority of voters are willing to make here are not clear. It's not a choice between clean air or the death of the planet, but clean air at what price?]
• “What must now take place includes honest self-reflection and confronting a hard truth: that many view the party as often in service to a rapacious oligarchy and increasingly out of touch with people in its own base.” The Democratic Party should disentangle itself — ideologically and financially — from Wall Street, the military-industrial complex and other corporate interests that put profits ahead of public needs. [Yes, welcome to the corruption of 21st century American party politics. Why do you think Americans of all stripes voted for Trump?]