politics
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October 18, 2024
By not identifying those responsible for the economic woes that still plague working Americans, Democrats lack a credible story about what they are trying to change and who is to blame.
When I was a criminal defense attorney, I learned that if you’re trying to get a conviction overturned, it’s important to make a strong case for why your client didn’t do it. But the strongest argument so far, even if it’s even remotely possible, is to claim that: someone else actually did it. Having another culprit is ten times better than an alibi.
Who caused this disaster? Who stabbed that man sprawled out on top of the car with a knife? Who stole the money? When something terrible happens, humans’ desire to blame is so fixed that when my first graders stumble and fall, they sometimes look at me with an accusing look and say that I caused them to stumble on purpose. Sometimes I cry out. The human brain wants to tell us that really bad things aren’t random. Because it means the same thing could happen again and we are not safe. Apparently it’s better for your parents to hurt you on purpose than to live in a world full of random horrors.
Trying to understand why Kamala Harris still struggles to achieve her goals despite having many attractive traits. break through boldly For voters who lack confidence in such a flawed opponent, the basic human desire to identify the culprit helps explain it.
Harris Good for abortionFor example, she has a clear story about who is responsible for women’s current lack of access to health care: the Supreme Court and Donald Trump. It was Trump who caused that woman. bleed in the back seat of her car Because he appointed judges who made abortion dangerous. That Harris doesn’t actually have a clear path to restoring abortion rights, given the makeup of the Supreme Court and likely the makeup of Congress, is no better than the way her explanation makes recent events understand. The past turned out to be unimportant to people.
However, when it comes to the economy, Harris takes the opposite position. she suggests policy after policy big speech-Many of them are progressive and pragmatic, and never say who is to blame for the problems that have made such policies so desperately needed. And when she tries to blame Trump for people’s economic hardship, her story doesn’t match people’s experiences. That’s because the 2016 election and the coronavirus were hardly the beginning of the problem.
recent harris waltz Examples of rural policy development This problem for me. While it included some good elements (supporting local pharmacies, protection from land consolidation, etc.), the overall story lacked a villain. “I have a great idea!” This policy suggests, “For a problem that no one caused!” So this article doesn’t directly address local anger at the big agricultural monopolies that stole farmers’ wealth or the CVS and Walgreens chains that destroyed locally owned pharmacies. The same policy, enveloped in righteous and well-targeted outrage, will move forward further. Because it would tell rural voters that Ms. Harris understands where their suffering comes from, and therefore understands what it takes to help.
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The campaign’s apparent desire to win this election with plans for the future without talking about why so many people’s lives are so poor seems foolhardy. Of course, Trump’s bigotry, racism, and mean-spiritedness are rooted in his cancerous approach to accountability, but the best rebuttal is not to ignore the travesty of his past, but to lie about it. Tell the real story, not the story.
When it comes to the economy, one of the main reasons is the lack of transparency regarding the culprit. many voters prefer Mr. Trump. Orwell was right about political expression. There is a tendency for expressions to be developed in which words are strung together like sections of a prefabricated chicken house. When we ignore who did what to whom, we lose the building blocks of politics. The words “we will fight for you” only sound confusing without mentioning the opponent’s name. we fight [somebody] for you? Do we drive a sword into the fog and hope it hits the Nameless One?
The good news is that Harris still has time to add a villain other than Trump to her closing argument. she can talk about Violation of NAFTA and China’s trade rules. She can talk about Big Agriculture and Big Oil. She can talk about how big donors and dark money have taken over so much of our democracy. She can tell the public that stagnant wages and soaring house prices are not just natural phenomena, but the result of greedy profiteering corporations.
While stories like this may sound depressing, the reality is that recognizing cause and effect provides a much deeper source of hope than not recognizing it. According to academic research Regarding optimism and “explanatory style”, people who identify “external, temporary, specific causes” are much more likely to feel hopeful than those who think the problem is permanent or not permanent. will be higher. understand why they were hurt. In Harris’s words, identifying villains other than Trump can be a source of joy.
On the other hand, if Ms. Harris cannot identify the culprit, it will be difficult for her to gain further confidence on the economic issues that matter most to voters. This fact may be frustrating to those of us who recognize all the economic progress made by the previous government. My sense is that Joe Biden is the best president we’ve had in the last 50 years when it comes to the economy, and I rattle off his numbers on jobs, small business, and labor as if I were working in his pressing shop. I can say it. However, “the situation is gradually improving” is not a winning argument. Because this discussion still doesn’t address the 40-year stagnation of wages (thanks to hyperglobalization and monopoly power) or the soaring price of eggs.Caused by corporate concentration and greed), the collapse of small and medium-sized enterprises (Ichicken meat” retail, food production, etc.). Yes, things are starting to look up — look. Over 18 million new small businesses Since Biden took office, we are still not ready to stop blaming.
About 10 years ago, I was at a conference with a very flashy and well-respected Democratic strategist, and someone in the crowd asked him why the pay was bad. He said that was the wrong question. The question is, what were we going to do about it, or what were Republicans going to do about it?
This attitude is why what should have been a landslide election is now too close to a decision. There are certainly bad questions in our political life, but “Who is this?” is not one of them.
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