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Reports of our demise are greatly exaggerated. [1]

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Date: 2024-11-13  

To be clear, Trump did not win in a landslide. It was not a blowout.

Our Electoral College requires that we treat the presidential election like a board game and each state like a game piece. In that respect, when looking at the final electoral count map, painted red throughout, we’re looking mostly at rural counties and states without many people living in them.

Of course, sadly, candidates must work to win the electoral votes. And, sadly, for the first time in 20 years, the Republican candidate won the popular vote.

But, by no stretch of the imagination have we lost the country when 50 percent of the voters voted for the Republican presidential candidate and 48 percent of voters for the Democrat. Two points! Again, that is not a blowout, and we should not behave as though one election was a permanent restructuring of voting blocs.

This was one election, it’s a dead heat, and electoral politics is a lifetime endeavor. We know that the majority of Americans agree with Democrats on issue after issue. The problem is that, inexplicably, Democratic campaigns haven’t figured out how to communicate that fact.

Close election after close election, in my humble, reflects malpractice on the part of the Democratic campaigns. Democratic candidates frequently show up unprepared for debates, their commercials are beyond awful, and they’re not as prepared as they should be for interviews. Messaging is unfocused and undisciplined, our candidates seem incapable of advertising their own accomplishments and their opponents’ failings, they don’t play offense, and they don’t work the refs.

A lesson learned from this election is that voters care about issues more than they care about candidates. So run on the issues.

Democrats should tell the electorate what they’re running to accomplish. Higher minimum wages so that all workers have a living wage? Say that. Higher taxes on millionaires and billionaires to secure Social Security? Say that. Protecting the planet from water and food shortages caused by climate change? Say that. Stronger regulations to keep our food safe to eat, water safe to drink, and air safe to breathe? Say it. Stronger gun laws to reduce gun violence? Say that too.

While they’re at it, candidates should tell the voters what the other guys have done and will do. For example, my opponent wants to eliminate regulations that keep our food safe to eat, our water safe to drink, and so on . . .

If Democrats run on the issues competently and consistently, they’ll win every time.

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