Ch 4.3 | 🐴Today's Democratic Party

Jul 30, 2023

At the outset, I want to level-set that I have never been a fan of the Democratic Party. It has been my observation that the Democratic Party has been incompetent when it comes to leading, governing and achieving its political agendas. I attribute it to Democrats’ constant waffling and overthinking issues and their lack of clear policy alignment, as well as infighting amongst the disparate caucuses within the party. Almost 90 years ago, Will Rogers said:

I am not a member of any organized political party. I am a Democrat.

Sadly, I feel that description still rings true today.

Just look at the run-up to the 2022 midterms.

🙈The 2022 midterms

Democrats were hilariously pathetic. While the red wave that had been predicted after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade didn’t happen, the Democrats once again fell prey to the GOP’s relentless execution. During that cycle, I didn’t see a single Democrat point out that inflation in the U.S. was slightly lower than other parts of the world mostly because our economy was still going strong (in part due to the treasury printing money like drunken sailors) and actually grew with exports up and unemployment still low. The GOP hammered crime in liberal cities, and Democrats refused to point out that red states can have the same issues with crime — crime and sometimes be worse.

In 2022 alone, Republicans voted against: (a) funding baby formula during the shortage, (b) lowering the cost of insulin, (c) expanding veterans’ health care benefits and (d) investigating price gouging at the gas pump. Yet every Republican rants about high gas prices and blames it on Biden. Meanwhile oil companies are reporting record profits, and the GOP refuses to investigate. And when the GOP took control of the House, the new majority was focused on political retribution, Hunter Biden's laptop and the culture wars — not governing.

Think about the context: As Americans headed to the polls on Nov. 8, 2022, Biden had an approval rating of 40%. Conservative media was hammering Democrats over the violent crime rate (which was actually stable, if not declining). The nation was experiencing the worst inflation in more than 40 years. Americans in poll after poll expressed deep dissatisfaction with the direction of the country after a pandemic that crippled it. And yet the anticipated red wave didn't come.

The common outcome in midterms is that the electorate votes against the incumbent president’s party. It’s what happened in the four preceding midterm cycles — 2006, 2010, 2014, and 2018 — all of which were “wave years” featuring the out-party making dramatic gains in Congress, winning key statewide contests and pulling off surprising upsets. Only very dramatic developments in U.S. politics, such as the impact of the 9/11 attacks on the 2002 midterms, seemed to be able to shake up this pattern. Despite that, Republicans won a narrow majority in the House, giving them far weaker control than polls predicted. The Democrats retained control of the Senate. And governor's mansions across the country are occupied by about as many Democrats as Republicans.

Why?

In large part it's because of Trump and the GOP's efforts to transform the Supreme Court.

Most of the data I've seen seems to indicate that the deciding factor for many voters was the Dobbs decisions overturning Roe v. Wade. Check out this from Vox. But, while Democrats outperformed expectations and historical norms, the election was not a landslide win for their party. Republicans still won the House. Red-leaning states where Trump won in 2020 like Ohio, Florida, and North Carolina still went red. And many of Trump’s preferred candidates were not overwhelmingly rejected by voters, instead losing by only a small margin. In total 15 out of 41 election deniers won their bid for office.

The Democratic Party poured millions of dollars into the primary campaigns of election deniers in the hopes they would be on the ballot and be easier competition for the Democrats’ own candidates. It’s pretty interesting to see the Democrats fight that dirty. Sincerely, I'm not exactly sure how I feel about it. And, let’s never lose sight of the fact that Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party actually played a significant role in getting Trump elected, as did the liberal media establishment.

Most polls show Trump leading, with voters concerned about Biden’s age and the economy. It should be clear to him by now that he was merely an “anti-Trump” vote for many and not the “right” candidate to meet this moment in history. While he is a centrist and a “good” politician, it’s apparent (at least to me) that he doesn’t have the strength to coalesce his party in the middle and reject some of the forces pulling him too far to the left. Biden has tried to appear tough on the border lately, but the party is fractured over the Israel-Hamas war and other critical issues.

Contrast that with how the GOP has historically operated. Republicans stay on message and rarely break rank. They know how to unify their base.

😰Our worst fears ... not actualized

I would like to reflect on the Biden presidency and see if all the fears about a turn toward socialism have come true, as the GOP had warned. While Trump failed to live up to his campaign promises, Biden actually made good on some of his and he did so with the thinnest of majorities. So what have Biden and the Democrats done with their majority?

Well, they have:

Made sure that all COVID tests and vaccines were completely free.
Passed funding for the first upgrade of our infrastructure in our lifetimes.
Begun the process of installing EV charging stations across the United states.
Passed the biggest climate investment in the history of the world and passed the CHIPS Act, which together resulted in an avalanche of companies announcing investments in the United states. That list includes Toyota, Corning, LG, Honda, Micron, Qualcomm and Intel just to name a few, which means fewer supply chain disruptions, lower supply costs, lower product prices and more jobs.
Negotiated lower drug prices by capping out-of-pocket costs for seniors at $2,000 a year and insulin costs for Medicare recipients at $35 a month.
Attempted to forgive student loan debts for 43 million American borrowers. In this case, regardless of how I feel about the merits of student debt cancellation, I tend to agree with the Supreme Court that Biden did not legally have the authority to implement his debt forgiveness plan. But he is taking another stab at it in an election year. (An aside: I will rarely say a kind word about Ron DeSantis, but as a part of his presidential bid he has a really good idea: DeSantis wanted to make student loan debt dischargeable during bankruptcy — like any other loan — except he would put universities on the hook for it. Progressives who advocate for student debt forgiveness argue that the government should do it all. On this issue, DeSantis is right. Free the student debtors. Raid the endowments. Make schools make their students employable, or at least, you know, functional.)
Passed the first gun safety bill in three decades that will keep guns out of the hands of domestic abusers and expand background checks for those between 18 and 20 years old. (It’s not nearly enough — but it’s a start.)
Started the process of removing cannabis as a schedule one drug.

I know it’s hard to get past the rhetoric sometimes, but can you see how these are all tangible benefits for Americans? Biden ran on these issues and, without a single vote to spare, he got them done. I’m curious — which one of those things would you consider as “pandering to the far left” (as the GOP wants us to believe) or promoting socialism?

Biden and the Democrats made health care affordable for seniors. Is that for leftists? They invested in renewable energy, creating hundreds of thousands of new jobs and bringing additional investments into our country. Is that for the leftists? They are working to upgrade our nation’s crumbling infrastructure. Is that for leftists?

If you look beyond the GOP sound bites that we are fed as propaganda on a daily basis, you might be able to see that the GOP likes to rail against the “far left” and yet when they’re asked to cite any specific examples of democratic policies that pander to the extreme of the party, they can’t. All the GOP’s leadership does is yell about vague leftist policies that sound scary but don’t actually exist.

Before I go on, let’s be clear — I do not agree with “defunding” the police nor do I agree with insane policies like decriminalizing petty theft that I’ve seen in New York and San Francisco. But we can’t ignore the fact that decriminalizing petty theft (while abhorrent to me) is actually a direct response to the wealth gap here in America. Either way, we can agree that the farthest extremes within the Democratic Party need to be marginalized and stripped of their influence.

Crime is a purple issue

A Gallup poll found that only 28 percent of Americans are very or somewhat satisfied with the nation’s policies to reduce or control crime, and that 69 percent were dissatisfied. That’s a big change from 2020, when 47 percent were satisfied and 49 percent were dissatisfied.

While I find it heartbreaking to see our inner cities struggle, the talking points on the right are hypocritical, counter-productive and, frankly, nonsensical. Instead of working on ways to solve the problems we face, the GOP loves to paint crime as a distinctly blue state issue. Republicans blame Democratic policies for homelessness and violent crime. But the cause is housing affordability and not the social policies of the Democratic Party.

Don't get me wrong. I've been appalled at the lack of leadership in the San Francisco Bay area that has led to the collapse of one of my favorite metropolitan areas. It does feel like a descent into anarchy.

Leading up to the midterm elections in 2022, GOP candidates and committees spent $64.5 million on ads focused on crime — nearly one-quarter of all the money they spent on ads over that period, according to a CNN analysis of AdImpact data. Many of those ads accused Democrats of supporting the ending of cash bail or efforts to defund the police. As such, Democrats have been working to defend themselves — running all over the country featuring former law enforcement officials touting their credentials on crime, and insisting that they would never defund the police. Democrats aired a significant amount of crime-related ads as well, dropping $58 million during that same period, accounting for 15% of their total ad spending.

Today, Americans are more worried than ever about being murdered, sexually assaulted or otherwise attacked. With campaigns like those described above, is it any wonder? And, the biggest surge in concern is having a child “physically harmed” while at school. Also, no surprise given the number of mass shootings on campuses.

Crime is something in which perception often matters more than reality. If the local news is packed with reports of violent crime, it doesn’t really matter to people what the national statistics say. They feel threatened — and fear is a very powerful motivator for voting.

In the 2021 article "Americans Are Worried About Crime, But That Doesn’t Mean They’re Blaming Democrats," FiveThirtyEight reported:

For starters, Americans are actually pretty divided on what the best solution to stopping crime is. In a YouGov/Yahoo News poll from May 24-26 [2021], 32 percent of adults said that law enforcement is not tough enough on most offenders — but about the same amount, 27 percent, said law enforcement is too tough on most offenders. (Eighteen percent thought law enforcement’s level of toughness was about right, while 22 percent weren’t sure.)
The public is also pretty sharply divided on whether Democrats or Republicans are better on the issue of crime. When asked whether Biden or former President Donald Trump has done a better job handling crime, 34 percent of respondents to the YouGov/Yahoo poll said Trump, while 32 percent said Biden. (Fifteen percent thought the two were about equally good on crime.) Of course, this just mirrors people’s existing partisan preferences — a majority of Republicans preferred Trump’s handling, while a majority of Democrats preferred Biden’s — but that just bolsters the theory that crime isn’t an issue that’s changing anybody’s mind.
Similarly, in elections so far in 2021, it also doesn’t look like crime is driving voters toward more conservative candidates. True, this week’s Democratic primary for mayor of New York City focused heavily on crime, and the winner was most likely Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams, arguably the race’s most pro-police candidate. But there are plenty of counterexamples: In the Democratic primary for Philadelphia district attorney, incumbent Larry Krasner — the George Washington of the progressive criminal-justice movement — handily defeated a moderate who attempted to tie Krasner’s policies to Philadelphia’s rising crime rate. And in this month’s special election for New Mexico’s 1st Congressional District, the Republican candidate ran what was virtually a single-issue campaign on crime and policing issues; Democrat Melanie Stansbury ended up winning by 25 percentage points, exceeding the district’s D+18 partisan lean.

But let's look at the data to see how the duopoly manipulates data to fit its narrative.

The left will point out that the murder rate in the 25 states that voted for Trump has exceeded the murder rate in the 25 states that voted for Biden in every year from 2000 to 2020. They state that for the past 21 years, the lists of 10 states with the highest murder rates have been dominated by reliably red states, namely Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Missouri. Since 2000, murder rates have increased 39.4% in red states and just 13.4% in blue states. States that voted for Trump exceeded states that voted for Biden in every year since 2000, according to an analysis of CDC mortality data by Third Way ("The Two-Decade Red State Murder Problem.”) It's worth noting that Third Way is a left-center think tank that points to higher poverty and gun ownership and lower education and social spending in red states as possible explanations.

But, while that macro analysis might be statistically accurate, like all issues and how the parties spin them, crime (and its causes) are complicated, nuanced and neither red nor blue.

So where is the data published by Third Way vulnerable to criticism? Well, common sense should lead anyone to see the fact that there are many blue cities that exist within red states and can therefore influence the data. In fact, most of us live in large urban centers. The urban population in the United States, constituting only 3% of land area, accounts for about 80.7% of the total population, significantly outnumbering the rural population. In contrast, rural areas make up 97% of the land area but house only 19.3% of the population. This concentration of population in urban areas can have a substantial impact on state-level data, especially in red states with large, densely populated blue cities.

In response to the Third Way study, the Heritage Foundation published a report, "The Blue City Murder Problem," that puts the right’s spin on the crime data. It states:

Those on the Left know that their soft-on-crime policies have wreaked havoc in the cities where they have implemented those policies. It is not hard to understand why “reforms” such as ending cash bail, defunding the police, refusing to prosecute entire categories of crimes, letting thousands of convicted felons out of prison early, significantly cutting the prison population, and other “progressive” ideas have led to massive spikes in crime—particularly violent crime, including murder—in the communities where those on the Left have implemented them.
Unfortunately, however, the 25-plus year drop in crime since 1992 has ended for many cities across the United States. The rise in crime, especially violent crime, started taking place around 2015 after the confluence of a series of events that took place over the course of a few years. Those events include police-involved shootings of black community members, the defund the police movement, the election of rogue prosecutors funded or inspired by George Soros and other elitist billionaires, and the “Ferguson/Minneapolis Effect” by which unwarranted public scrutiny of police resulted in police drastically reducing proactive policing. Crime was rising in select cities across the country before the global COVID-19 pandemic struck in March 2020, but it rose even more significantly after the death of George Floyd on May 25, 2020.
The cumulative effect of these events contributed to and in large part set the conditions for increased crime across much of the country, especially in cities where the toxic trio of rogue prosecutors, defund the police zealotry, and demonization/demoralization of the police existed. In those cities and others with some mixture of this toxic trio crime has exploded across most categories, including but not limited to murder.

While it's appealing to buy into Heritage’s narrative because those policies run contrary to my beliefs (and may run afoul of your sensibilities as well), I remain suspect because the largest cities in the country are blue cities in blue states, including:

New York, N.Y.: The largest city in the United States, New York has a population of approximately 8.3 million and is led by Democratic Mayor Eric Adams.
Los Angeles, Calif.: L.A., with a population of around 3.8 million, is governed by Democratic Mayor Karen Bass.
Chicago, Ill.: Chicago's population is approximately 2.7 million, and the city's mayor is Democrat Brandon Johnson.
Phoenix, Ariz.: Phoenix, the capital of Arizona, has a population of around 1.6 million and is led by Democratic Mayor Kate Gallego.
San Diego, Calif.: San Diego has a population of approximately 1.4 million and is governed by Democratic Mayor Todd Gloria.
San Francisco, Calif.: San Francisco, with a population of about 800,000, is led by Democratic Mayor London Breed.

So bottom line, if we want our elected officials to actually address the problem, we have to move past the partisan finger pointing and align on common sense policies to address violence and crime (especially hate crime) in America.

So rather than focus on the politics, let's agree that crime and gun violence are a "purple" issue that require leaders interested in finding common sense solutions to the problems we face as a nation.

Let's end with some good news from the FBI.

The FBI’s crime statistics estimates for 2022 show that national violent crime decreased an estimated 1.7% in 2022 compared to 2021 estimates:

Murder and non-negligent manslaughter recorded a 2022 estimated nationwide decrease of 6.1% compared to the previous year.
In 2022, the estimated number of offenses in the revised rape category saw an estimated 5.4% decrease.
Aggravated assault in 2022 decreased an estimated 1.1% in 2022.
Robbery showed an estimated increase of 1.3% nationally.

🗣️GOP talking points about the Democratic Party

I will be the first to admit that for decades I too have fallen prey to GOP propaganda that the Dems will inevitably lead us to communism and/or socialism. I’ve also bought into the narrative that the GOP is better for the economy. The GOP has demonized the Democrats to the point that they have become the “evil” that must be defeated.

As I’ve researched this issue, I have come to conclude that there is little evidence to support this irrational fear and it’s truly all a matter of (1) your individual perspective and (2) your desire to remain in an echo chamber that reinforces your beliefs.

If you think about it, in reality the Democrats and Republicans are two sides of the same coin, backed by mostly the same corporate sponsors. When you get past the superficial perspective that the Kochs control the right and Soros the left, you’ll see that an incredible quantum of dollars flows to both parties from the same large corporate donors.

We desperately need to coalesce in the middle and drag the duopoly along for the ride. We need a viable mainstream centrist/common sense political party that believes in my definition of liberty (whether that’s the Democrats, the Republicans or a new party), or election reforms that enable independents to compete. This goes beyond integrity and moral character for me. I believe America is having an existential crisis caused by the two parties embracing the farthest extremes.

Here again, if you’re willing to be thoughtful and nuanced, you’ll see that the GOP has been relentless for decades in its vilification of the Democrats. But you must remember that both parties are cut from the same cloth; two sides of the same coin backed by the same corporate sponsors. So, let’s look at some of the “vilified” policies of these “left-wing radicals.”

Before we begin, I want to level-set by stating that being “illiberal” is not strictly an issue with the right — it is also a problem on the left. I’m a huge fan of Bari Weiss. I don’t always agree with her, but she is a bright light. After resigning from her position at The New York Times, she started publishing her Common Sense blog in which she covers a wide range of topics including, in her words,

… we have covered the ongoing saga of how America’s most important institutions have been transformed by an illiberal ideology—and have come to betray their own missions. Medicine. Hollywood. Education. The reason we exist is because of the takeover of newspapers like The New York Times. Ok, so we’ve lost a lot. A whole lot. But at least we haven’t lost the law. That’s how we comforted ourselves. The law would be the bulwark against this nonsense. The rest we could work on building anew. But what if the country’s legal system was changing just like everything else?”

She recently published an article by Aaron Sibarium that explores how the legal system in America, as one prominent liberal scholar put it, is at risk of becoming “a totalitarian nightmare.”

As a lawyer, I struggle when reading the article. I can see both sides of this issue and can only conclude that sometimes the proverbial pendulum swings too far to either side of the spectrum. My only answer is that we need to bring these issues to the center and find common sense solutions that don’t require extreme and toxic cultures on either side of the aisle.

Our greatest enemy continues to be the loss of liberalism and a failure to coalesce in the middle to find common sense solutions.

👈How far left is the Democratic Party?

Alan Dershowitz spoke to conservative Dennis Prager about the relative dangers of the "hard left" vs the right:

As a liberal, as an American and as a Jew, I far more fear the left than the right.

While I do understand what Dershowitz is saying — and in fact we should be fearful of the increasing authoritarian leftism of today’s college students (and many of our university professors), I still believe that the GOP, the MAGA movement and their continued fanning the flames of the culture wars are far more injurious to America than any conceivable Democratic administration could be in the near term.

Defund the police

Even a cursory look at statements by Democratic leaders and radical backbenchers opposed to increased funding of police explains the party’s dilemma. As Roll Call reported:

On Feb. 13, 2022, George Stephanopoulos raised the issue of Rep. Cori Bush’s statements calling for defunding the police during an interview with Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
“With all due respect in the world to Cori Bush,” she replied, “that is not the position of the Democratic Party.” Pelosi then declared, “Defund the police is dead.”
Two weeks later, in his State of the Union address, President Biden called for increased funding for police:
“We should all agree: The answer is not to defund the police. The answer is to fund the police. Fund them. Fund them.”

While the far left of the Democratic Party has not abandoned their stance on this issue, it is not a part of the party’s platform.

Black Lives Matter

I made my position abundantly clear in my chapter on race in America. And, in the aftermath of the horrific attacks by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, Black Lives Matter has shown the world that its organization does not have a moral compass. So I will not reiterate my foundational points on the issue. However, I will state unequivocally that we must come to grips with the issue of race in America.

Politicizing race is an anathema to me, but it is hard to dispute the fact that the Democratic Party embraces a more liberal and inclusive approach to governing. And when it comes to race relations, Democrats have stood with the African American community in the struggle for equality. The Democratic Party continues to fight against bigotry and discrimination in order to advance the issues that matter most to African Americans, from civil rights to economic opportunity.

With respect to BLM, I will merely point out that this organization has been mired in hatred, antisemitism and allegations of fraud and, as a result, support for the Black Lives Matter movement has dropped considerably from its peak in 2020 following the murder of George Floyd. At that time, supporters donated a staggering $90 million to Black Lives Matter.

The National Desk reported:

The nonprofit ended [the 2022 fiscal year’ with a $9 million deficit. Sadly, federal filings from 2020 to 2022 show just a third — $30 million — went to other charitable organizations, with $22 million going to expenses. This includes $1.6 million that went to the father of BLM, co-founder Patrisse Cullors, for security services. Another $2.1 million went to BLM board member Shalomyah Bowers for consulting.

In 2023, 51% of U.S. adults said they support the Black Lives Matter movement, a decrease from 56% a year ago. The share who say they strongly support the movement dropped from 26% in 2022 to 22% in the new survey. Across racial and ethnic groups, it’s not a surprise that Democrats are more likely than their Republican counterparts to say they support the Black Lives Matter movement.

But the claims that Biden treated the BLM violence any differently than the Jan. 6 violence is a distortion of reality. In fact, on May 30, 2020, Biden said in a statement about Floyd:

Protesting such brutality is right and necessary. It’s an utterly American response. But burning down communities and needless destruction is not. Violence that endangers lives is not. Violence that guts and shutters businesses that serve the community is not.

My goal in authoring Fairness Matters is to form a coalition of people to work together to reform our current system to allow for a migration away from extreme dogma and back towards common sense so that we can elect leaders interested in finding solutions to the problems that we face as a nation. Until we've accomplished that goal, we have to make informed decisions about the GOP and the Democratic Party to assess the risks of their dogma.

In the absence of a deeply motivated centrist movement, the Democratic Party continues to lean further and further to the left and as a result continues to pander to the extreme left in order to maintain its cohesiveness. The divide is real on these issues and are causing a deep rift in our country.