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JosephWongKS
Apr 4, 2009

by Nyc_Tattoo
From the time that Obama took office in January 2009 to the time that he stepped down in January 2017, the Democratic Party lost:

(a) 39 House seats (233 to 194);

(b) 3 Senate seats (51 to 48);

(c) 12 state governorships (28 to 16);

(d) more than 900 state legislative seats.


As he was the President and therefore the most visible and powerful member of the party during that period, surely Obama must bear at least part of the responsibility for that decline. What political mistakes did he make during this period? Some of the ones I can think of are:

(i) Appointing James Comey (a Republican) as Director of the FBI, in a naive attempt at bipartisanship.

(ii) Appointing the incompetent Donna Brazile as chairperson of the DNC.

(iii) Generally neglecting the DNC and down-ballot campaigns during his Presidency.

(iv) Supporting Hillary's 2016 primary campaign despite her well-known flaws as a national campaigner (many of which were revealed during her primary campaign against him in 2008, no less).


What other political mistakes had Obama made during his Presidency? And why is he still so personally popular in the Democratic Party despite bringing them to such ruination?

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Sir Tonk
Apr 18, 2006
Young Orc
It's been happening since the 70's, Clinton's third way-ism only slowed the tide.

He's popular because "the left" doesn't identify as part of the Dems, so they aren't as viscerally upset by OFA's lack of support for the party.

I'd blame Hillary just as much at this point. Her campaign did nothing to help candidates like Feingold in races they could have easily won. We should have taken the Senate back last year, but she hosed up so badly that we lost it all.

Sir Tonk fucked around with this message at 01:00 on Apr 10, 2017

RaySmuckles
Oct 14, 2009


:vapes:
Grimey Drawer
i don't think obama is personally responsible for the decline of the democratic party, as that's something that's been going on for far longer than he was on the scene for.

in my brief political experience the "death of the democratic party" has been its worthlessness since 9/11. its couldn't put together a meaningful anti-war position and seemed to lose ground every election until 2006, by which time the only reason they were looking good is because bush had done such an excellent job of looking terrible. they were a powerless party that increasingly liked to talk the talk of change but never actually did anything to bring about any good change and more often than not were caught with their hand in the cookie jar, supporting legislation that was making things worse.

this should start sounding familiar because obama is basically the avatar of that systemic problem brought to life.

he is a product of the modern democratic party, its entire modern policy made flesh. he spoke of hope, yet things look just as bad, if not worse than anything else recently. he was an anti-war candidate yet expanded all the wars. he talked about getting money out of politics and keeping wall st out of the white house and then filled his cabinet and other appointed positions with insiders. he spoke of change yet his presidency is marked by its inability to get things done.

he didn't personally ruin the democratic party, rather he is the greatest extension of it. hundreds or thousands of incredibly well off, out of touch people who want the status quo and think that the realities of their tiny bubbles extend throughout the country, that everyone shares their way of thinking and ideals. they think, no, they know they are so correct that there is no room for dissent amongst the ranks. the donors love this new democratic party and millionaries billionaires are jumping ship to it. the press supports and reinforces all their (mis)behavior. the only indicator that their technocratically perfect policy is flawed is the fact that they can't get loving elected for poo poo and no one likes/trusts/believes in them.

so in short, did obama create this problem? no. he certainly exacerbated it, and by way of actions supported it, but certainly is "responsible for the plight of the party." forces larger and older than him are responsible for the democrats current condition. sure he bares culpability, but nothing significantly more than that afforded to him by his station as president. he still talks the talk. people still think he stands for numerous positive things they've projected on to him which can be leveraged by others trying to make real change. he certainly made numerous errors during his presidency, but by the end of it, we must ask ourselves whether they were truly errors or whether we all just misinterpreted his intentions from the beginning.

Confounding Factor
Jul 4, 2012

by FactsAreUseless
This country lacks a real opposition political party. Both of our parties are still in the back pockets of the corporations and extol the "values" of capitalism. One is just more socially liberal than the other. But this has been the trend when Democrats moved away from FDR's New Deal, are there any New Dealer Democrats left? Now the party is made up and positioned to cater to highly educated professional class and has abandoned the working class.

Democrats lost a lot of seats but I almost want to say that has less to do with themselves but rather how complacent voters get under a Democrat president. Not only the presidency matters.

It's early, but I'm still very optimistic the Democrats are going to learn from the failure of 2016. Perez and Sanders are going on some tour across states that went to Trump so I think the future is encouraging there. They need to get behind a bold progressive vision.

But I think doing so requires Democrats to detach from centrism and effectively casting Obama's presidency in a mediocre light. I know it's very early but this is going to be a pretty big challenge to Perez and other Dems on how they are going to message the next election. It's not enough to be anti-Trump but how do you say the 8 years under Obama were largely mediocre without somehow damaging your own credibility as Democrats?

It might easier to message that after 4 years of Trump, which if it truly turns out to be one of the worst shitshows ever, then it should be easy to do. Democrats can look past the "consensus" that plagued the Obama years and focus on how horrible Trump's policies are to working people and here's our ideas on to make it better.

Seriously I have a lot of sympathies for Perez and whatever the new makeup of the DNC will be, they have a lot of work to do. Trump gave the Left, whatever exists of it in America, a gift and they need to take full advantage of it. Don't miss this opportunity like progressives missed it when the 2008 financial crisis hit.

If you were to ask me the single biggest mistake Obama made was easily how he handled the Recession. He had the perfect chance to make real structural changes to our economic system but totally blew it. And now you had a growing anger of a weak recovery which created the conditions that allowed Trump to ascend (although arguably this could be traced back decades ago).

Had the recovery not been to the benefit of the rich then we probably wouldn't be dealing with Trump. But again Obama wasn't really going to do much for a lot of Americans that don't have the education because the class he is from buys into meritocracy, so inequality in a society is totally natural.

I don't think Sanders is the panacea but he's absolutely the direction the Democrats should go into. The American people are desperate for a change and another white collar Democrat isn't going to do it.

Also I want to say that I do think, and I'm optimistic about this, the era of bipartisanship from Dems is over. Gorsuch was the nail in the coffin IMO. Good riddance.

Calibanibal
Aug 25, 2015

obama is more symptom than cause, OP. chicago democratic politics ruined him. in a kinder world, he would have actually been the tender young idealist he sold to us in 2004

Shbobdb
Dec 16, 2010

by Reene
Obama's failure was not creating a new coalition. He was the last gasp of the Kennedy's but rather than create a new coalition he was fine using the very same Clinton coalition he won against.

He's bad and should feel bad. More culpable than the Clintons because he could have been either a neo Kennedy or something new.

Typo
Aug 19, 2009

Chernigov Military Aviation Lyceum
The Fighting Slowpokes
as much as I rip on obama for a whole bunch of poo poo like not throwing a bunch of goldman sucks ppl off a cliff he wasn't to blame much for it, the reason why the dems had so many governorships/state legislators/house seats was cuz of 1) ppl voting for them because of how badly bush hosed up and 2) blue dogs who were basically republicans with a D next to their names. Obama was still in the era of Reagan which we are only now beginning to see the end of and conservatism was the natural governing ideology of America.

Also on Bill Clinton: people forget that he tried to govern as an old school left-liberal 1992-1994 and the result was that the democrats lost the house for the first time in like 50 years: left-wing economic policies were simply unpopular from the 1980s all the way up until a few years ago

Typo
Aug 19, 2009

Chernigov Military Aviation Lyceum
The Fighting Slowpokes

Confounding Factor posted:

This country lacks a real opposition political party. Both of our parties are still in the back pockets of the corporations and extol the "values" of capitalism. One is just more socially liberal than the other. But this has been the trend when Democrats moved away from FDR's New Deal, are there any New Dealer Democrats left? Now the party is made up and positioned to cater to highly educated professional class and has abandoned the working class.
the democratic party has being moving left since 2004 or so: bernie is the future and clinton the past

Badger of Basra
Jul 26, 2007

JosephWongKS posted:

From the time that Obama took office in January 2009 to the time that he stepped down in January 2017, the Democratic Party lost:

(a) 39 House seats (233 to 194);

(b) 3 Senate seats (51 to 48);

(c) 12 state governorships (28 to 16);

(d) more than 900 state legislative seats.


As he was the President and therefore the most visible and powerful member of the party during that period, surely Obama must bear at least part of the responsibility for that decline. What political mistakes did he make during this period? Some of the ones I can think of are:

(i) Appointing James Comey (a Republican) as Director of the FBI, in a naive attempt at bipartisanship.

(ii) Appointing the incompetent Donna Brazile as chairperson of the DNC.

(iii) Generally neglecting the DNC and down-ballot campaigns during his Presidency.

(iv) Supporting Hillary's 2016 primary campaign despite her well-known flaws as a national campaigner (many of which were revealed during her primary campaign against him in 2008, no less).


What other political mistakes had Obama made during his Presidency? And why is he still so personally popular in the Democratic Party despite bringing them to such ruination?

The bolded one is the only one that is actually relevant to the decline of the Democratic Party nationwide as opposed to the single event of Hillary losing in 2016. He is popular because he won (twice) and seems like a cool and likeable guy as opposed to a boring functionary or terrifying monster. Joe Biden is popular for the same reason, even though he's not that different from Hillary politically. Also like Sir Tonk said, a lot of his voters aren't interested in the Democratic Party. They're interested in Barack Obama.

The main thing that has stuck with me as Obama's Big Mistake is an anecdote from a Politico story late last year about how Obama believed in policy before politics. According to the story, there was a division in the early Obama White House between the wonks and the politicos. When they were putting together the stimulus (or something else involving a tax cut for normal people, I don't remember), the wonks said it would be best if they just marginally cut tax rates for working people. That way they would get a tiny bit more money in each paycheck, adding up to say $500 in a year. The wonks said this because if you do it this way people are more likely to spend the money, which would help pull the economy out of recession. So elegant!

The politicos said this was dumb - the federal government should send out a single $500 check to whoever you want to decide gets the checks. The checks should say COURTESY OF BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA AND THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY, HERE IS $500. His face should be on the envelopes. Have Obama hand out some of the checks to people! This is actually not as good for the economy - if you give someone a large sum of money at once, they'll probably spend it to pay down bills or something, which doesn't really help anyone buy more stuff and bring us out of recession. The politicos had the right idea imo, because no one ever knew that Barack Obama gave them $500 and probably didn't even notice that they got the $500 at all.

Obama chose the wonk option because he believes that good policy is good politics. That's his problem.

I can't find that story which is really bothering me but if I do find it I'll come back and post it later.

e: Here it is! It turns out it was from January 2016 and not about what I thought it was about, but it does contain the anecdote I remembered:

quote:

The stimulus also offered an introduction to Obama-ism. Purity was not a priority. He needed three GOP senators to avoid a filibuster, so he caved to their demands, including an $800 billion cap and the removal of a $10 billion initiative to renovate America’s schools. But popularity was not a priority either. He constantly browbeat his policy advisers to tell him what would work and leave the politics to him. He expected his wonks and hacks—what Emanuel dubbed his Aspen Institute and Tammany Hall—to stick to their respective knitting.

But Obama’s guiding political assumption—that data-driven, evidence-based policy, at least in its center-left form, would inevitably turn out to be good politics—ended up being seriously flawed. A stark example from the stimulus was Making Work Pay, an $800 tax cut for most workers. His economists wanted to dribble out the cash to recipients a few dollars a week in their paychecks, because studies showed they would be less likely to spend the windfall if they realized they were getting it. His political advisers argued that it would be insanity to conceal middle-class tax cuts rather than send Americans fat envelopes with Obama’s name on them. But Obama sided with his policy team, and later surveys showed that less than 10 percent of the public had any clue he had cut their taxes.

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/01/obama-biggest-achievements-213487

You can see the same thing with Obamacare, where people say Obamacare is terrible but love the Medicaid expansion or whatever. The stimulus also had this problem, although they did have a few signs for projects that said they were paid for with the stimulus.

Badger of Basra fucked around with this message at 03:19 on Apr 10, 2017

mcmagic
Jul 1, 2004

If you see this avatar while scrolling the succ zone, you have been visited by the mcmagic of shitty lib takes! Good luck and prosperity will come to you, but only if you reply "shut the fuck up mcmagic" to this post!

Shbobdb posted:

Obama's failure was not creating a new coalition. He was the last gasp of the Kennedy's but rather than create a new coalition he was fine using the very same Clinton coalition he won against.

He's bad and should feel bad. More culpable than the Clintons because he could have been either a neo Kennedy or something new.

Obama did create a new coalition. They were just an Obama Coalition, not a Democratic Coalition.

Typo
Aug 19, 2009

Chernigov Military Aviation Lyceum
The Fighting Slowpokes

Badger of Basra posted:

The politicos said this was dumb - the federal government should send out a single $500 check to whoever you want to decide gets the checks. The checks should say COURTESY OF BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA AND THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY, HERE IS $500. His face should be on the envelopes. Have Obama hand out some of the checks to people! This is actually not as good for the economy - if you give someone a large sum of money at once, they'll probably spend it to pay down bills or something, which doesn't really help anyone buy more stuff and bring us out of recession. The politicos had the right idea imo, because no one ever knew that Barack Obama gave them $500 and probably didn't even notice that they got the $500 at all.


iirc (being a wonk myself) one time "windfalls" goes into savings if it exceeds a certain amount of $ but if the $ is small enough ppl just spend it

but holy poo poo that's a funny story

Shbobdb
Dec 16, 2010

by Reene

FTFY.

Badger of Basra
Jul 26, 2007

Typo posted:

iirc (being a wonk myself) one time "windfalls" goes into savings if it exceeds a certain amount of $ but if the $ is small enough ppl just spend it

but holy poo poo that's a funny story

Yeah Obama was right about the economic effect of the thing and that's why he did it. But good policy isn't always the best politics!

mcmagic
Jul 1, 2004

If you see this avatar while scrolling the succ zone, you have been visited by the mcmagic of shitty lib takes! Good luck and prosperity will come to you, but only if you reply "shut the fuck up mcmagic" to this post!

It had more to do with the dems nominating a poo poo candidate in 2016, not racism.

Main Paineframe
Oct 27, 2010

Badger of Basra posted:

The bolded one is the only one that is actually relevant to the decline of the Democratic Party nationwide as opposed to the single event of Hillary losing in 2016. He is popular because he won (twice) and seems like a cool and likeable guy as opposed to a boring functionary or terrifying monster. Joe Biden is popular for the same reason, even though he's not that different from Hillary politically. Also like Sir Tonk said, a lot of his voters aren't interested in the Democratic Party. They're interested in Barack Obama.

The main thing that has stuck with me as Obama's Big Mistake is an anecdote from a Politico story late last year about how Obama believed in policy before politics. According to the story, there was a division in the early Obama White House between the wonks and the politicos. When they were putting together the stimulus (or something else involving a tax cut for normal people, I don't remember), the wonks said it would be best if they just marginally cut tax rates for working people. That way they would get a tiny bit more money in each paycheck, adding up to say $500 in a year. The wonks said this because if you do it this way people are more likely to spend the money, which would help pull the economy out of recession. So elegant!

The politicos said this was dumb - the federal government should send out a single $500 check to whoever you want to decide gets the checks. The checks should say COURTESY OF BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA AND THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY, HERE IS $500. His face should be on the envelopes. Have Obama hand out some of the checks to people! This is actually not as good for the economy - if you give someone a large sum of money at once, they'll probably spend it to pay down bills or something, which doesn't really help anyone buy more stuff and bring us out of recession. The politicos had the right idea imo, because no one ever knew that Barack Obama gave them $500 and probably didn't even notice that they got the $500 at all.

Obama chose the wonk option because he believes that good policy is good politics. That's his problem.

I can't find that story which is really bothering me but if I do find it I'll come back and post it later.

e: Here it is! It turns out it was from January 2016 and not about what I thought it was about, but it does contain the anecdote I remembered:


http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/01/obama-biggest-achievements-213487

You can see the same thing with Obamacare, where people say Obamacare is terrible but love the Medicaid expansion or whatever. The stimulus also had this problem, although they did have a few signs for projects that said they were paid for with the stimulus.

That's an excellent example of why Politico should be taken with a grain of salt. It's a real stretch to assume that a $400 tax cut for two years would make a significant impact on someone's voting decision six years later. In the first place, $400 isn't really all that much, particularly when you've lost your job because the biggest recession in eight decades has spiked the unemployment rate over 10%. It's not surprising people didn't notice such a small amount, and it's absurd to argue that the administration should have prioritized cheap political gain over actually fixing the economy.

The reason the Dems didn't get credit for Obama's policies isn't that he didn't advertise them enough, it's that the entire party couldn't be expected to coast on half-assed measures passed six or seven years ago that they didn't even bother to campaign on.

Badger of Basra
Jul 26, 2007

Main Paineframe posted:

That's an excellent example of why Politico should be taken with a grain of salt. It's a real stretch to assume that a $400 tax cut for two years would make a significant impact on someone's voting decision six years later. In the first place, $400 isn't really all that much, particularly when you've lost your job because the biggest recession in eight decades has spiked the unemployment rate over 10%. It's not surprising people didn't notice such a small amount, and it's absurd to argue that the administration should have prioritized cheap political gain over actually fixing the economy.

The reason the Dems didn't get credit for Obama's policies isn't that he didn't advertise them enough, it's that the entire party couldn't be expected to coast on half-assed measures passed six or seven years ago that they didn't even bother to campaign on.

Of course the single thing of $500 in 2009 didn't make a difference in 2016. That's an example, not the explanation. But Obama did consistently believe that good (as he perceived it) policy was all that was necessary, and that the politics would work themselves out when Americans saw how amazing whatever policy he had constructed was. That isn't something you can rely on.

mila kunis
Jun 10, 2011

Badger of Basra posted:

Yeah Obama was right about the economic effect of the thing and that's why he did it. But good policy isn't always the best politics!

Bad policies can also be bad politics, and Obama had plenty of those.

Main Paineframe
Oct 27, 2010

Badger of Basra posted:

Of course the single thing of $500 in 2009 didn't make a difference in 2016. That's an example, not the explanation. But Obama did consistently believe that good (as he perceived it) policy was all that was necessary, and that the politics would work themselves out when Americans saw how amazing whatever policy he had constructed was. That isn't something you can rely on.

Good policy with positive results works okay-ish. There's just two problems. First of all, it has to be good policy, whereas Obama preferred mediocre policy which the Dems would either run screaming away from or would steadfastly refuse to admit was anything less than perfect. Second of all, it has to be ongoing - once the measurable improvements in people's lives start to stall or plateau, there won't be much lasting effect, and even when things are still actively improving that'll just cause people's priorities to shift to some other issue.

Alienwarehouse
Apr 1, 2017

It's hard to fault Obama for much when the opposition he had was a party full of subhuman Ayn Rand aficionados, racists, and neocon warmongers (sometimes still referred to as republicans).

However, I can never forgive him for refusing to endorse single-payer (and more progressive policies in general) towards the end of his Presidency. He had nothing to lose.

Axetrain
Sep 14, 2007

Don't forget refusing to prosecute Wall Street bankers responsible for the 2008 financial crisis!

bedpan
Apr 23, 2008
Probation
Can't post for 16 hours!

Alienwarehouse posted:

It's hard to fault Obama for much when the opposition he had was a party full of subhuman Ayn Rand aficionados, racists, and neocon warmongers (sometimes still referred to as republicans).

When I read this I thought you said:

Alienwarehouse posted:

It's hard to fault Obama for much when the party was full of subhuman Ayn Rand aficionados, racists, and neocon warmongers (sometimes still referred to as republicans).

And thought you were talking about the Democratic Party.

bedpan
Apr 23, 2008
Probation
Can't post for 16 hours!

Axetrain posted:

Don't forget refusing to prosecute Wall Street bankers responsible for the 2008 financial crisis!

Do you think a single one would go down for anything worse than a misdemeanor?

Majorian
Jul 1, 2009

Inverted Offensive Battle: Acupuncture Attacks Convert To 3D Penetration Tactics Taking Advantage of Deep Battle Opportunities

Main Paineframe posted:

Good policy with positive results works okay-ish. There's just two problems. First of all, it has to be good policy, whereas Obama preferred mediocre policy which the Dems would either run screaming away from or would steadfastly refuse to admit was anything less than perfect. Second of all, it has to be ongoing - once the measurable improvements in people's lives start to stall or plateau, there won't be much lasting effect, and even when things are still actively improving that'll just cause people's priorities to shift to some other issue.

To be fair, when Obama did back good policy (like the public option), lovely Democrats still ran away from him screaming, so that didn't help. I agree with the rest of what you're saying, though.

A Buttery Pastry
Sep 4, 2011

Delicious and Informative!
:3:

bedpan posted:

Do you think a single one would go down for anything worse than a misdemeanor?
Obama gave himself the authority to assassinate American citizens, and had the entire US military at his command. Had he but the will...

Edible Hat
Jul 23, 2007

by FactsAreUseless
Wouldn't you find around the same number of seats being lost during the span of any two-term president? (Wikipedia doesn't have a concise article about the number of state legislative seats by party or governorships by party during Eisenhower's time.)

Bush:

(a) 43 House seats (221 to 178);

(b) 9 Senate seats (50 to 59);

(c) 8 state governorships (29 to 21)

Clinton:

(a) 46 House seats (258 to 212);

(b) 7 Senate seats (57 to 50);

(c) 9 state governorships (30 to 21)

Reagan:

(a) 17 House seats (192 to 175);

(b) 8 Senate seats (53 to 45);

(c) 1 state governorship (23 to 22)

Eisenhower:

(a) 46 House seats (221 to 175);

(b) 13 Senate seats (49 to 36);

icantfindaname
Jul 1, 2008


obama postponed dems finding a stable economic basis for their political platform for 8 years, which is a very long time that won't be gotten back

Badger of Basra posted:

Of course the single thing of $500 in 2009 didn't make a difference in 2016. That's an example, not the explanation. But Obama did consistently believe that good (as he perceived it) policy was all that was necessary, and that the politics would work themselves out when Americans saw how amazing whatever policy he had constructed was. That isn't something you can rely on.

obama didn't enact good policy, at best he proposed good policy and was unable to enact it. he thought that simply proposing good policy was all that was or should be necessary, and the country as a whole should simply see that it is good and vote for him

botany
Apr 27, 2013

by Lowtax
Isn't the loss in house seats mostly due to Republicans gerrymandering the hell out of congressional districts in 2010?

Dead Cosmonaut
Nov 14, 2015

by FactsAreUseless

botany posted:

Isn't the loss in house seats mostly due to Republicans gerrymandering the hell out of congressional districts in 2010?

And low voter turnout. The more recent elections might point to a public that is increasingly tired of having a two party system.

Obama’s mistakes come in two fold: He sold himself rhetorically as a progressive in 2007/2008, and then subsequently disbanding his own movement and appointing Geithner thereafter. He did nobody any favors by cozying up to the banks at a time when they were universally reviled.

Ardennes
May 12, 2002
Obama deserves a share of the blame, but the rest of the Democratic Party doesn't deserve a pass either especially since so many of their candidates at the congressional/state level have been terrible and their messaging has been completely tone-deaf. Remember the "recovery summer" of 2010?

Of course, he did ultimately undercut himself at very opportunity by taking a moderate technocratic approach to policy when the country was crying out for the opposite. I remember the health care debate and watching week by week his message inching more and more to the right and a public-option only becoming more of an after-thought.

I don't see anything changing either. At this point, they are pretty much hoping that the economy/Trump craters enough so they can ride into victory in 2020 without changing a single thing.

QuoProQuid
Jan 12, 2012

Tr*ckin' and F*ckin' all the way to tha
T O P

botany posted:

Isn't the loss in house seats mostly due to Republicans gerrymandering the hell out of congressional districts in 2010?

It's a combination of things, but I would note that 2008 was a high-water mark for the Democratic Party and it managed to win in districts that it would normally not have any chance of winning. Growing polarization also led to the rapid collapse of the "Blue Dogs" in places like the South, which further undermined Democratic electoral victories. Gerrymandering played a role, but it is not the only issue.

As for the OP, I was unimpressed by the president's level of engagement with the Democratic Party. I will need to dig up some old articles, but my sense is that he funneled most of his efforts into his campaign and shunned the Democratic Party leadership because they represented everything he disliked about politics. These feelings might have been justified, but it created a self-destructive cycle that cause the party to atrophy further.

I think the issue is more logistical than ideological, but I am not a progressive so I am in the minority here.

botany
Apr 27, 2013

by Lowtax

QuoProQuid posted:

It's a combination of things, but I would note that 2008 was a high-water mark for the Democratic Party and it managed to win in districts that it would normally not have any chance of winning. Growing polarization also led to the rapid collapse of the "Blue Dogs" in places like the South, which further undermined Democratic electoral victories. Gerrymandering played a role, but it is not the only issue.

As for the OP, I was unimpressed by the president's level of engagement with the Democratic Party. I will need to dig up some old articles, but my sense is that he funneled most of his efforts into his campaign and shunned the Democratic Party leadership because they represented everything he disliked about politics. These feelings might have been justified, but it created a self-destructive cycle that cause the party to atrophy further.

I think the issue is more logistical than ideological, but I am not a progressive so I am in the minority here.

As far as I understand it, low turnout was the cause for the republican take-over from 2008 to 2010, but after that the republicans consistently got less congressional votes than the dems but ended up with 234 -- 201 seats in 2012. They use that majority to stack redistricting commissions and draw districts designed to make sure they don't lose that majority again. Then in 2016 they lose the popular vote but win the presidency. This is more than a logistical problem, your whole political system is bad.

temple
Jul 29, 2006

I have actual skeletons in my closet

Ardennes posted:

I remember the health care debate and watching week by week his message inching more and more to the right and a public-option only becoming more of an after-thought.
I do too and I feel like the only one.

Calibanibal
Aug 25, 2015

i remember obama first promising not to drone strike weddings and watching week by week as his messaging inched toward drone striking weddings

Main Paineframe
Oct 27, 2010

botany posted:

Isn't the loss in house seats mostly due to Republicans gerrymandering the hell out of congressional districts in 2010?

To some extent, yes, but parties always try to gerrymander. The fact that the Republicans were in a better position to gerrymander states than usual owes a lot to the Democratic Party abandoning Dean's fifty-state strategy in favor of Obama's style of data-driven laser-focused spending on only the most competitive areas for national-level races (while writing off everything else and ignoring state-level races altogether).

Rent-A-Cop
Oct 15, 2004

I posted my food for USPOL Thanksgiving!

Calibanibal posted:

i remember obama first promising not to drone strike weddings and watching week by week as his messaging inched toward drone striking weddings

I remember anti-war, anti-Guantanamo, anti-crazy invasive spying, anti-torture, pro-transparency Obama and watching 8 years of more wars than ever, the Guantanamo detention operation changing not at all, even crazier invasive spying, continued torture, and reckless and punitive prosecution of whistleblowers while his administration leaked everything and anything that they thought might look good on the news.

Basically Obama ran progressive and the Democrat media establishment built him a Magical Negro narrative and then he did Bush 2.0 but with more healthcare and more drones.

redneck nazgul
Apr 25, 2013

Really not sure what you expected a Democratic president with both parts of Congress controlled by Republicans to accomplish, honestly.

Fame Douglas
Nov 20, 2013

by Fluffdaddy

redneck nazgul posted:

Really not sure what you expected a Democratic president with both parts of Congress controlled by Republicans to accomplish, honestly.

Obama was a great Republican. He manage to pass a Heritage foundation right-wing health care plan through a fully Democrat controlled Congress. He also managed to promote right-wing ideas for gutting public education.

redneck nazgul
Apr 25, 2013

Fame Douglas posted:

Obama was a great Republican. He manage to pass a Heritage foundation right-wing health care plan through a fully Democrat controlled Congress. He also managed to promote great right-wing ideas for gutting public education.

So the solution for Democrats not being able to leverage their position is to become even more like Republicans by eating their own and forcing out moderates?

Eggplant Squire
Aug 14, 2003


Republicans only controlled both houses starting in 2015.

I think Obama was as fault partially because the Democrats mistook his personal popularity for widespread support of his party and policies. It was pretty clear they thought they were going to coast into the Presidency in 2016 and they didn't put a whole lot of effort into the 2014 races. The whole idea of "well no one votes in the mid terms so why bother" is a self defeating strategy much like their mentality of blaming voters for not coming out or telling them their votes aren't needed because they don't believe enough in the party or aren't the right type (middle class suburbanites) of voters.

Eggplant Squire fucked around with this message at 18:06 on Apr 10, 2017

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KomradeX
Oct 29, 2011

Maybe the problem is people are tired of democrats being 90 percent Republicans. Like that's the poo poo that fuels people claiming both sides are just as bad.

But no it was all those evil Republicans why Obama was so willing to bargin away the social safety net. Or the rotating cast of villianous democrats being the reason why we couldn't get a better healthcare deal.

Radish posted:

The whole idea of "well no one votes in the mid terms so why bother" is a self defeating strategy much like their mentality of blaming voters for not coming out or telling them their votes aren't needed because they don't believe enough in the party or aren't the right type (middle class suburbanites) of voters.

That's not true the Democrats would love more than anything else too have their base made up of White Middle Class "Moderate" Republican Suburbanites.

KomradeX fucked around with this message at 18:06 on Apr 10, 2017

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