People of the left, can we learn some lessons from Trump's win please?

[Outandinbout]

And other things, like Brexit, the disaster that was Jeremy Corbyn and his campaign.

Whilst there will be multi-factorial reasons for the way all these votes went, one of the reason, imo, is that far too many people on the left think anyone who disagrees with them is thick and racist. Do you remember that mock advert for Labour during JCs campaign? ' You are thick and racist - Vote Labour!'. That raised laughs because it resonated with how people felt about the Left.

Just stop being so bloody certain you are right and everyone else is wrong and start bloody listening to people who voted the way you don't want them to. Figure out why that is. Realise they actually have some legitimate concerns. Find ways to address these.

Because, and I can't believe I actually have to point this out, insulting people is not the way to win them over. Addressing their concerns is.

Because its not smart to sit there smugly thinking you are always right, even when voters are repeatedly disagreeing with you. It feels nice to think that, yes. But all that means is that you lack the courage to move yourself out of your psychological comfort zone. Its lazy, not smart. And it shows a distinct lack of intellectual curiosity.

I'm pretty pissed at Trump winning as I support Ukraine. I think the Left in America needs to look pretty hard at itself as to why a candidate such as Trump has won. And the left in the UK has lessons to learn too.

Well said OP

So did I. It was disgraceful and she still
hasnt been held to account.

Dawn Butler I mean

Wasn't Lammy the one who accused women on being rights hoarding dinosaurs? Women who are paid less because they are women, who are more likely to have jobs rather than careers, whose different bodies are ignored and dismissed medically and scientifically, women who are thought of as non-men? Yeah, he's not that intelligent is he?

I agree with you OP. It's hurting all of us if questions regarding failures are just brushed under the carpet.

The number of serious mistakes the Democrats made is staggering. They misjudged so much. I did think Harris was going to win, but that is because, as I would readily admit, I am in quite a left-wing news bubble (and I am not American nor in America). Surely the Dems had clever analysts and people who could see that she was a weak candidate under the specific circumstances and that sticking Beyonce and Lady Gaga on a stage and calling Trump a Nazi did not constitute a winning election strategy? I am not paid to know this but I imagine some people were.

@INeedAnotherName Lammy is also the one who thought that a man can grow a cervix. I have no time for him.

It's the venom from the left that shocked me, here and elsewhere.
"I want all bad things to happen to Americans now." What all 365,000,000 of them?
Very different to Ukrainians who are saying basically, we know we are done for, but still grateful for all the help you gave us.

I didn't vote Labour in the GE, but my thinking was if they can get us out of the mess from the past few years, I'll be happy.

The left are very intolerant of anyone who may have a different political opinion to them. Not very liberal at all.

That’s the one.

Diplomacy doesn’t seem to be a gift he was born with.

Oh yes I'd forgotten all about that one!

I think Race and being a woman. Democrats would have won with a white man saying all the same things as Harris. Or even a black man or a white woman. Just not a black woman. This is of course incredibly incredibly sad but it's the truth.

the democrats got enough of the vote the extras would have come through.

What lessons do you think we should learn?

That nobody gives a shit about the environment and we should just burn as much oil and gas as we can?
That foreigners are sub-human and should be treated as such?
That humans shouldn't try to work together, we should instead put up barriers to other countries and have as little to do with them as possible?
That humans are essentially tribal and we should think this is a good thing?
That women should be told what they can and cannt do with their own bodies by men on the basis of some bonkers religious justification?
That every decision should boil down to whatever makes the most money and nothing else?

I haven't read any of the rest of the thread, so forgive me if I repeat what's already been said, but IMO the reasons the Dems lost are:

1. The number one issue for most voters is how much money they have in their pocket and they feel much poorer now than they did four years ago;

2. Huge numbers of Americans hate identity politics and Joe Biden has been utterly beholden to ridiculous, fringe interest groups. The majority of Americans are straight and white and many are Christian and they don't want to be told that men can be women, that they have 'white privilege', or be discriminated against and told they're 'garbage' by their own president;

3. Five million illegal immigrants have poured across the southern border since Joe Biden took office, after Trump closed the border and almost totally stopped illegal immigration during his first term. These people are highly visible all over the US, sleeping on the streets of big cities, putting huge pressure on public services, and the issue has been reported on ad nauseam by US broadcasters;

4. The cover-up and lying by senior Democrats of Joe Biden's physical and cognitive decline. He should have committed to step down at the end of this term long ago to allow a proper primary process take place to select his successor. His refusal to do this and to hang on as long as possible while his party faithful lied and blustered and covered for him is nothing short of shameful;

5. Kamala was a poor candidate, a failed presidential candidate from four years ago who she only got made VP because of her sex and her racial identity. She absolutely did not get that job on merit - and people know that. During the campaign she avoided the media and when questioned provided word salad answers to perfectly straightforward questions she should've been able to answer easily and clearly in plain English;

6. Kamala was given responsibility for the southern border - she blew it totally and utterly. This was Trump's big issue all along - building a border wall, controlling immigration, protecting America from gangs, drugs, etc - and the Democratic failure on that front couldn't be greater if they'd tried to make it so. She tried and failed to disassociate herself from the administration that she has been part of for the past four years and failed.

It’s the rightward drift of supposedly ‘left’ parties that sets all this up. The actual left ends up turning on itself and going down identity politics rabbitholes because they lack the power to challenge anything real. The faux left start a new programme of PFI deals and don’t do anything to improve people’s quality of life. So then the right can become increasingly populist and hardline as people see that voting ‘left’ does fuck all and seems full of sniping. And although the right worsens inequality and degrades public services even faster than the faux left, they also offer someone else to blame - immigrants, Muslims, ‘the left’, public sector workers, the old, the young… and disenfranchised people can at least get a little sense of power and superiority and fee like they’re on the ‘winning side’.

Corbyn didn’t do everything right but the corruption inside the Labour party machinery in briefing against him, slowing down disciplinary procedures on purpose, and channeling money to safe seats of his opponents within the party, and the lack of impact of that on public discourse with hardly any ripples in the media, shows how little democratic choice we actually have. We can’t vote in genuine social democracy of the kind that built the NHS and would offer an alternative to endlessly decaying services and endlessly widening inequality.

100% OP. I find it so difficult to engage left wing friends in a proper debate so I don't bother any more.

You see, Aaron, that kind of thinking and emotive language and blaming and implying that people who don't agree with you are bad or stupid is exactly what's caused the problem. Black and white thinking. One side all right and good, the other side all bad and wrong. People — even people who didn't go to college, even people who live in the mid-west — aren't stupid and see the world in a far more complex way. I'm a Labour voter, always been on the left, yet even I can see how badly things will turn out unless Labour drops a lot of the dogma and starts understanding the world through the nuanced eyes of ordinary people — which they lost sight of 20 years ago.

@EasternStandard

@caringcarer
Stopped the ridiculous hysterical laughing all the time would have been a start."

I think Private Eye commented that Kamala Harris reminded them of "a slightly stoned Aunt behaving inappropriately at a formal family gathering ".

What lessons do you think we should learn?

To start listening.

What lessons do you think we should learn?

Obviously how to get a strong candidate and a set of policies that the electorate they actually have will vote them into power so they can do something about well anything.

It's like movie studio making product for the modern audience that just never shows up so they keep losing money.

Trump is a poor a candidate by any measure but he won - so working out why and why voters weren't picking democrats is fairly basic requirement. Maybe they just need to wait for economic changes - maybe they can tweak their polices or sell them better - what they really shouldn't do it blame the electorate as that will get them no-where.

Sorry did you miss the UK's GE result?

I never heard Starmer call anyone thick, i did hear & read plenty of Tories call anyone one in the centre - left thick/stupid and many other slurs.

Democracy already died @Outandinbout when people are prepared to vote for wholly unsuitable people to lead, criminals, liars and the like. When people are so easily manipulated and whipped up into a frenzy by social media it becomes whoever carries the most cash and influence with contacts who will win the vote to lead. In this case Trump, he'd already built his influence in the last term, we know he has cash, and all he had to do was say were you better off now or then. It's a compelling argument but it doesn't take much common sense or wherewithall to figure out it's nothing to do with him and more to do coincidence and the wars, COVID and other economic factors which have happened since! But keep chanting the same things and people who are blinkered will fall in line. The question now is...will they be better off this term?

So yes you are right, you can't tell ignorant people they are stupid as that won't win them round, you just tell them a load of crap they want to hear instead and they will swallow it hook line and sinker as they lack the critical thinking skills or have a 1D view. That's a bit difficult if you hold any morals though, henceforth all the parties who lack morals and are prepared to tell people anything they want to hear will lead. Is that the right and just way to do things? No it is not. But here we are. No way for people to separate fact from fiction any more, it's pure hunger games. It's nothing to do with left and right anymore really because the 'left' could easily employ such tactics.

Sorry what now? The right allowed their entire governance structure to be corrupted over a period of many years such that extremely unhinged and unqualified candidates were being selected for the ticket, to the exclusion of moderate voices. They actively promoted the pollution of the information sphere by self-interested billionaires and moron billionaires and self-interested moron billionaires.

But it's the left's fault for not being exciting enough or having the temerity to run a female candidate. Yep sounds legit.

Sorry did you miss the UK's GE result?

Did you miss Starmer/ Labour's 40-point plunge in popularity within days of the election? Everyone who backs Labour needs to understand that the result was, down to how much voters wanted to punish the Tories. I am one of millions of women who had to hold their nose when voting Labour because of Labour's adherence to gender ideology. I won't be voting Labour again unless they take note of what's happened in the US and change their stance on gender and women's rights.

Completely agree. Social media algorithms have a lot to answer for....

He is a horror show.

Its so not the truth. Honestly, if this is the analysis the Democrats settle on then they can expect this result to repeat in four years time, as they will have learnt nothing.

Harris was just a weak candidate who ran an dreadful campaign. A white man of her calibre who ran her campaign would have lost too. She sold herself on 'not being Trump', she spoke in vague positive sounding platitudes that had no substance and didn't really mean anything, no-one really knew what she planned to do. She insulted the people she really needed to get to vote for her, both directly as Hilary Clinton did (and even Hilary admitted later that had been a mistake in her own campaign) and indirectly thought campaign adverts that managed to insult the people they were targeted at, with the Democrats being so oblivious that they didn't even seem to realise they were insulting the people they were targeting.

Trump had a clear message and people who liked that voted for him. Harris did not do that.

As one commentator said, Harris spoke about Trump. She did not speak to Trump voters. She needed to do that to win.

Trump has won the electoral college and the popular vote. I really hope this gives Democrats the wake up call they so badly need and they own and learn from their mistakes instead of repeating their failing strategy of simply blaming Trump voters.