I like the article and I appreciate the points of all 7 comments before mine. Problem is that "protecting their chief" is exactly what happened with the Dem establishment and Biden in 2024, no? Mainstream Dems were protecting their chief even when he couldn't communicate and it became obvious to the entire country it was a cover-up and we were all being lied to.
I think the Dems' coalition problem, which is being described so clearly by everyone above, is actually bigger than the United States; it's a structural problem for liberal democracy and constitutionalism everywhere. It's a problem that never goes away and, thus, it's a fatal weakness for a liberal democracy when a far right populist movement arises. The remaining political liberals in the country are too divided to form a coalition strong enough to fight a protracted battle against illiberalism. We see this happening in Hungary and the UK very clearly right now. Carney's solution to it in Canada is to just default back to neoliberalism while ignoring the populists on both sides. He's doing what mainstream Dems have tried to do for twenty years in the US: just wait and hope the populism on both sides eventually goes away.
There's illiberalism on the far left too, but the illiberal right is far bigger. Which means that when they form an authoritarian movement the center left is structurally too divided and weak to fight back much. There are potential solutions to this situation but I'd have to write a book on it all. We actually need a new theory of radical centrism and a civic paradigm for liberal democracies, what academics call "deliberative democracy."
So, centrists cannot get out of the mess they are in without radically improving the functioning of liberal democracy and strengthening the center-left coalition beyond anything done before. And yet, asking centrists to be radical is a tall order. They think they already know what "radical centrism" is but they don't.
Platner is the perfect ‘wedge candidate’ for the same reason Israel is (right now) the perfect ‘wedge issue’ - the downsides and counterpoints are so legible that full-throated support becomes an unassailable ‘costly signal’ to commitment to The Cause. The difference is that Israel might prove to be a winning issue, whereas Platner (as across the arc of his life) is destined to take the L.
If the Democrats are going to attempt to position themselves as the new version of the party of American Values, then they are going to have to do a lot more house cleaning. I am not from Maine and have no particular interest in which candidate the Dems field there other than the basic qualification of being able to win. However, I note that if the Dems want to start fielding candidates that actually appear to have classic "presidential" qualities, then they had better start doing a better job of vetting, and recruiting. Of course, the other side of this calculus is the debacle that was the 2016 campaign, when Hilary Clinton, who was unequivocally one of the most qualified persons to ever run for the presidency, was nonetheless seen as being on a coronation tour, rather than a primary campaign. Repeat in 2024, with another supremely qualified candidate, who was nonetheless seen as being forced on Americans due to her boss's bad judgement. So there is a balance and the Dems have been getting it wrong.
As usual I find myself homeless in a Dem factional dispute. I am not a fan of Platner’s base of support at all. Like, REALLY not a fan. And yet I also believe that a lot the instantaneous judgement in the party was driven by the fact that Platner critics were themselves gleeful to finally have the goods on a candidate they already hated, and had zero interest in any possible alternative explanation or mitigation.
I love it how people are pretending that in an era where the president is a convicted rapist and the world's richest man is an open racist, it's the most condemnable thing in politics to fail to assume a guy is guilty of an alleged rape before it's even alleged.
>This failure to see clearly that someone with Platner’s track record was probably a rotten guy was rooted in another impulse.
So...the failure to apply character evidence to assume they're guilty of more? This is a totally indefensible notion except when Monday morning quarterbacking.
Let’s think of it this way: An election is a large, public job interview. Let’s go through an example: you are interviewing a job candidate with a great resume and rockstar level skills. However, some rumors have followed the guy at every company he goes to, and you notice that he leers at young ladies in the office and makes inappropriate comments. But nothing that would “prove” guilt to the satisfaction of a criminal court. In this case, the question becomes not “is he guilty” and more “is he going to be a liability for the organization”? The party has correctly decided he’ll be a liability.
In this onion to be peeled, the first layer is neither MAGA nor DSA belong on Democratic party tickets. Neither extreme really has anything supportive to say about Democrats do they? If a MAGA politician tried to run on a Dem ticket, what would happen? If MAGA wants to skewer Dems, who do they lump in - DSA which does include Marxists as well as social Democrat-like partisans who should take one for the Dem team against MAGA.
I like the article and I appreciate the points of all 7 comments before mine. Problem is that "protecting their chief" is exactly what happened with the Dem establishment and Biden in 2024, no? Mainstream Dems were protecting their chief even when he couldn't communicate and it became obvious to the entire country it was a cover-up and we were all being lied to.
I think the Dems' coalition problem, which is being described so clearly by everyone above, is actually bigger than the United States; it's a structural problem for liberal democracy and constitutionalism everywhere. It's a problem that never goes away and, thus, it's a fatal weakness for a liberal democracy when a far right populist movement arises. The remaining political liberals in the country are too divided to form a coalition strong enough to fight a protracted battle against illiberalism. We see this happening in Hungary and the UK very clearly right now. Carney's solution to it in Canada is to just default back to neoliberalism while ignoring the populists on both sides. He's doing what mainstream Dems have tried to do for twenty years in the US: just wait and hope the populism on both sides eventually goes away.
There's illiberalism on the far left too, but the illiberal right is far bigger. Which means that when they form an authoritarian movement the center left is structurally too divided and weak to fight back much. There are potential solutions to this situation but I'd have to write a book on it all. We actually need a new theory of radical centrism and a civic paradigm for liberal democracies, what academics call "deliberative democracy."
So, centrists cannot get out of the mess they are in without radically improving the functioning of liberal democracy and strengthening the center-left coalition beyond anything done before. And yet, asking centrists to be radical is a tall order. They think they already know what "radical centrism" is but they don't.
Platner is the perfect ‘wedge candidate’ for the same reason Israel is (right now) the perfect ‘wedge issue’ - the downsides and counterpoints are so legible that full-throated support becomes an unassailable ‘costly signal’ to commitment to The Cause. The difference is that Israel might prove to be a winning issue, whereas Platner (as across the arc of his life) is destined to take the L.
If the Democrats are going to attempt to position themselves as the new version of the party of American Values, then they are going to have to do a lot more house cleaning. I am not from Maine and have no particular interest in which candidate the Dems field there other than the basic qualification of being able to win. However, I note that if the Dems want to start fielding candidates that actually appear to have classic "presidential" qualities, then they had better start doing a better job of vetting, and recruiting. Of course, the other side of this calculus is the debacle that was the 2016 campaign, when Hilary Clinton, who was unequivocally one of the most qualified persons to ever run for the presidency, was nonetheless seen as being on a coronation tour, rather than a primary campaign. Repeat in 2024, with another supremely qualified candidate, who was nonetheless seen as being forced on Americans due to her boss's bad judgement. So there is a balance and the Dems have been getting it wrong.
As usual I find myself homeless in a Dem factional dispute. I am not a fan of Platner’s base of support at all. Like, REALLY not a fan. And yet I also believe that a lot the instantaneous judgement in the party was driven by the fact that Platner critics were themselves gleeful to finally have the goods on a candidate they already hated, and had zero interest in any possible alternative explanation or mitigation.
I love it how people are pretending that in an era where the president is a convicted rapist and the world's richest man is an open racist, it's the most condemnable thing in politics to fail to assume a guy is guilty of an alleged rape before it's even alleged.
>This failure to see clearly that someone with Platner’s track record was probably a rotten guy was rooted in another impulse.
So...the failure to apply character evidence to assume they're guilty of more? This is a totally indefensible notion except when Monday morning quarterbacking.
Let’s think of it this way: An election is a large, public job interview. Let’s go through an example: you are interviewing a job candidate with a great resume and rockstar level skills. However, some rumors have followed the guy at every company he goes to, and you notice that he leers at young ladies in the office and makes inappropriate comments. But nothing that would “prove” guilt to the satisfaction of a criminal court. In this case, the question becomes not “is he guilty” and more “is he going to be a liability for the organization”? The party has correctly decided he’ll be a liability.
So if you’re less politically dogmatic you’re less tribal? Uh, I don’t think so.
In this onion to be peeled, the first layer is neither MAGA nor DSA belong on Democratic party tickets. Neither extreme really has anything supportive to say about Democrats do they? If a MAGA politician tried to run on a Dem ticket, what would happen? If MAGA wants to skewer Dems, who do they lump in - DSA which does include Marxists as well as social Democrat-like partisans who should take one for the Dem team against MAGA.