The days of boycotting the people who broadcast to the nations Right is over….
Fox News is booking Democrats…
It’s even got Donald Trump pissed…
Democrats have figured out a basic…
They need to go into the homes of those on the right….
Getting past Donald Trump and HIS media efforts….
There is an unlikely new hot spot for Democratic candidates: Fox News.
President Trump’s favorite network is increasingly playing host to hopefuls from the Democratic presidential field, eager for exposure to the vast Fox News audience — even as they risk a backlash from others in the party who view the network as an ideological menace.
The expedition into what many liberals consider enemy territory picked up this week after Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont appeared at a town hall on the network, drawing the biggest television audience of any 2020 Democratic candidate so far — more than 2.5 million people — while pitching himself to Trump-leaning viewers who may be willing to cross party lines next year.
On Wednesday, Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota said she had agreed to a Fox News town hall-style event next month. Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Ind., is in advanced talks with the network. Julián Castro, the former housing secretary, is close to signing on, and Senators Kirsten Gillibrand of New York and Cory Booker of New Jersey say they are open to the idea.
The debate over whether to appear on Fox News reflects in some ways a larger divide in the party as it ponders how to retake the White House: Should Democrats focus on expanding and mobilizing the various coalitions that make up their base, or seek inroads with the millions of Americans who supported Mr. Trump in 2016?….
image….buringtonfreepress.com
Re: “Should Democrats focus on expanding and mobilizing the various coalitions that make up their base, or seek inroads with the millions of Americans who supported Mr. Trump in 2016?”
Clearly the answer is that you must do both; concentrating nearly everything on just one approach has been shown to assure weakness if not defeat. Hillary Clinton seemed in 2016 to fail in both regards (although she did win a clear plurality of the votes): she relied on identity coalitions (especially those glass-ceiling smashing women) without rousing the base, and she failed in her appeal to the middle who either stayed home, voted 3rd party, or voted for Trump (e.g. in the Rust Belt).
But candidates who lose their identity (what distinguishes them from the GOP) and their enthusiasm for the base can also fail (e.g. Dukakis, Kerry, Mondale), as do James’ bêtes noires, ideologues who (consciously or not) fail to appeal to the middle and only succeed with the left-liberal-progressive base (e.g. McGovern).
Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter, southern governors whose agendas were very vague and unspecific (“I’ll never lie to you”) might seem exceptions to my hypothesis, but I think that they benefitted from Republican predecessors (Nixon & G.,H..W. Bush) who managed to incite the Democratic base (“Anyone but…”) and alienate disillusioned voters in the middle.
On the other hand, I think Barack Obama (apart from beneffiting from disillusion with Geo. W. Bush’s economic and national-security policies) was able to appear progressive enough to the base (especially those who backed him against Hillary Clinton) at the same time that he seemed non-threatening to the middle.
Yes indeed my friend….
Your reasoning is why I believe that warts and all?
Joe Biden IS the best hope for Democrats, American and the World to unseat Trump…
He IS a salesman like Trump…
He brings within himself vestiges of his 8 years as Barack Obama’s VP…
And he can appeal to the Black vote and white working class voters….
If he gets the nomination based on the black and moderate vote in the party because the left v one is split?
He should be able to fix the problems Clinton had in her lacking campaign…
I’m betting on ole’ Joe….
The point is for Joe Biden, if nominated, to keep the positive support of the many people in the progressive wing who (even if they supported Bernie Sanders in 2016 &/or 2010) are not so die-hard that they act and vote as if they were indifferent to Trump’s re-election.
Of course, if Bernie Sanders wins the nomination, he has roughly the opposite challenge (although he’s already shown his support among the white working-class voters in the Rust Belt). He needs to reassure not only Democratic moderates and liberal-moderates, but also the ever-shrinking swing voters at large that his policies are not utterly extreme and unrealistic.
Yup…..
There are TWO distinctly different races too run….
Either one has a advantage Hillary did NOT have….
Trump’s record IN Office…