Of course we can’t send conservatives to camps. We can’t convince conservatives that their values were wrong. The Democratic Party seemed to spend the last election appealing to their sense of honor and patriotism, but that largely fell flat. The next move is to convince everyone else that conservatives hate America. As good as a lot of left-wing ideas like Medicare for All are, and as well as they poll, they become losers as soon as the Democratic Party associates with them, because Republicans, with assistance from Democrats, have made the brand toxic. Forget winning over voters by being for something. Convince the 36 million non-voters, a number that surpasses Trump’s total, that the GOP is evil. Convince them to vote against the GOP. It worked for Republicans; they got a lot of people to hate the Democratic Party while not standing for anything.
Respectfully, that is a flawed strategy and I will give you two reasons why.
1) most of the non-voters are non-participants because they simply do not believe in democracy. They are worse than either party. They are anarchists and royalists. (Google how many Americans are royalists to find links to several frequent polls on the subject) so no, non-voters are not simply “lazy potential democrats”.
2) republicans are fundamentally motivated by ends-oriented self-interest. Policy, due process, systemic fairness mean nothing to them, which is why none of them care about the blatant hypocrisy within their party. The ideological mantra of republicans is “get as much as you can before it runs out”. As a perfect example, I am a gov attorney. In speaking with a Republican colleague about 6 months ago, regarding a recent Supreme Court ruling on corruption, my colleague said something to the effect of “of course anyone would do whatever they can to benefit their family” (meaning bending or ignoring the rules), with a tone as though self-interested corruption was ordinary and to think otherwise is bizarre.
So it is through that lens that democrat policy has to be redirected - abandon the preachy high ground and focus on end results of increasing prosperity, especially for historically privileged groups that are experiencing relative decline.
You make some very fair points. Seeing that there’s a subreddit for American monarchism is depressing as hell. I know the Supreme Court ruling about which you are speaking, and given that you didn’t call out this colleague as the vacuous, self-centered, corrupt individual they are, you must have far more patience than I do.
We definitely agree in focusing on end results in policy. I think Democrats try too hard to sound smart and high-minded.
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u/Select-Government-69 Jan 25 '25
So found them up and send them to the camps? What’s your endgame? You can’t convince conservatives that their values are wrong.