What Happened? (w/ Eric Levitz and Dan Sherrell)
Added 2020-11-14 22:04:37 +0000 UTCA 2020 election recap with two brilliant friends of the pod: Eric Levitz, a senior writer at New York magazine, and Dan Sherrell, the outgoing director of the #VoteTrumpOut campaign (and a wonderful writer, too). We discuss: What do the election results mean? What role did turnout, persuasion, and polarization play? How wrong was Matt? Will the GOP's decision to flatter Trump's post-election delusions blow up in their face? And what is the role of the left under a President Biden?
It's a dense and meaty slice of punditry and insight (at least from the guests). Enjoy!
Readings:
Eric Levitz, David Shor's Postmortem of the 2020 Election, NYmag
Eric Levitz, A Nightmare COVID Winter Could Force a GOP Awakening on Stimulus, NYmag
Daniel Sherrell, Hunters in the Snow, Passages North
Comments
Coming late to the party. This was a great conversation, but still overlooked a lot of the domestic geopolitics that drive voting patterns. Why do rural whites overwhelmingly vote Republican? Look at what happened to them over the Obama years — beyond literal decimation, economically speaking. Trump’s trade war with China has opened a door to forcing more democracy and human rights into our trading partners... unions should push hard here. What can activists do now? Focus locally and run/help friends get elected to city, township, and county offices from drain commissioner to township council. That gets popular buy-in, and was used by the GOP for decades to own the states. Also, we need to remember how New Deal and Great Society victories work: Social Security and Medicare don’t just sap the rich to redistribute their wealth downward. Everyone pays in. It creates buy-in, so even the GOP claims to be defending the long-term viability of the programs. Lastly: the left needs to focus on good governance. Alaska just passed the most important and comprehensive voting reform system that forces politicians to represent MORE PEOPLE. That’s what democracy is and it will help to break the power of the institutionalized parties. That’s needed to overcome partisan blockades to progress.
Chad Bailey
2020-12-13 20:05:16 +0000 UTCThe guest list convinced me to subscribe, well worth it!
joe
2020-11-16 22:01:14 +0000 UTCthanks duuuuude
Know Your Enemy
2020-11-16 21:41:59 +0000 UTCThis was very good
Aaron Thorpe
2020-11-15 17:29:30 +0000 UTC
