“I Dare You” by Al Sikes

It is interesting, and then not, to read election postmortems. In this case, Democrats, with some success on their resumes, earn calls from people who do postmortems. Read on, I am only going to cite one as prologue.

Axios AM ended its summary of all that went wrong for the Democrats with this: “In a 50-50 country, how do they articulate a theory of the case to win back voters and power?” Pardon my repetition of a word salad suggesting a failing statistics grade.

James Carville, the Democrat’s uber-political operative, is colorful. Colorful enough to be a candidate and not just an operative. He noted in the Bill Clinton days, “It’s the economy stupid,” and then more recently, “It’s winning stupid”. Carville’s anecdotes, pithy remarks and irreverences have even been converted to a movie. It’s title: “Winning Is Everything Stupid”. Persons who hunger for the White House should first talk to Sir James (my elevation).

My takeaway from the campaign, and to borrow from Carville, is, “It Is The Voter Stupid.” All voters. We all or at least most of us suffer from inflation. We all have to figure out and pay for the assimilation of millions of people who come across our southern border. We all have to pay for our excesses—whoops, we don’t because our excesses are funded by debt. Take a look at our $37 trillion dollar gap. Of course, ultimately, all of our children will have to shoulder that outrage.

In other words, the operative word in my political vocabulary is ALL. Sure, demographers tell us about economic, ethnic, and gender differences and on and on, but when the Democrat Party transitioned to the Identitarian one, it found that promising one group something to win their allegiance often angered other groups. Assembling a majority out of promises to an array of demographic targets is hard math.

Many, including me, thought the President-Elect had lost Evangelical Christians some number of times. And it is certain he lost some. But, his appeal on the issues that crossed many lines resulted in this sub-group remaining mostly loyal. Even as he waffled on what is thought to be their defining social issue, abortion, he remained relatively popular. My guess is that most people of faith found the President-Elect far from an admirable person but then concluded that certain character traits are extinct in the ambitious regions of politics.

I am also sure the Democrat pathologists, as they study the body politic, find it almost inexplicable that significant numbers of the stupidly called “people of color” seem to be moving to the Republican Party. People of color are so varied that the thought they are a homogeneous group is laughable.

Again, identitarian strategies are largely a losing proposition. ALL is the constituency. If you look at a United States map colored in Red or Blue it is awash in Red. I would suggest a postmortem in the Dakotas. Those who probe for opinions in South and North Dakota will find that a small state senator from Vermont, Bernie Sanders, does not capture what they expect from the ultimate government leader. While I am giving geographical advice take the convention to Kansas City.

David Brooks, in his New York Times column summing up, noted: “There’s something off about an educated class that looks in the mirror of society and only sees itself.” Brooks was politely noting the class divide. And,  assuming the educated mostly voted for the Vice-President.

Yes, America is awash in people that do not need to worry about inflation. It is awash in people who have protected and lucrative sinecures, there are also  people who have figured out how to live off of government support systems. But, even if a good job is done turning out the self-satisfied, the sum of them will not defeat those who worry from paycheck to paycheck regardless of their class position or ethnic grouping. Or, education; take a look at the number of young people with sterling credentials who find this job market baffling or fear losing their jobs to artificial intelligence.

As noted before, I am an independent. I am not a member of a political party although I was a Republican for some decades. I would like to have more political choice. America’s two parties have passed so many laws to protect their political duopoly that it is hard for other points of view to organize and get voter traction. Robert Kennedy Jr, who started with a great last name, spent millions to start a third party, then gave up and joined Donald Trump.   

America is a citadel of diversity, but diversity of opinion has to be filtered and presented by one of two all-powerful political groups. Too bad! When the Federal Trade Commission finds two companies dominating a market they sue.

Finally, another word on the Red/Blue state dichotomy. Those on the Left should be worried that most States are Red, especially in a country of mobility. And that the chances of changing the way we elect a President through the electoral college, not the popular vote, is in the class of things that won’t be changed.

Andy Kim, New Jersey’s new Democrat Senator after winning on Tuesday, held a probing session with voters. He found a deep disgust in politics while noting that “there was a clear belief that Trump was different.” So even though Vice-President Harris was much more persuasive with billionaires and raised a great deal more money than Trump, he won.

I am fortunate. When I began being active in politics, I lived in Missouri. It was, in many ways, still Harry Truman’s Missouri. Democrats were elected to statewide offices. But Truman was right when he and all Missourians took pride in citing the State’s motto: “Show Me.” And because the emerging Republican Party led by John C Danforth was prepared to do just that, we began winning. Danforth’s motto was “I Dare You.”

Al Sikes is the former Chair of the Federal Communications Commission under George H.W. Bush. Al writes on themes from his book, Culture Leads Leaders Follow published by Koehler Books.