The Democratic Party lost Bernie voters to Trump in 2016. No matter how much the Democratic National Committee would like to ignore this fact, some people who voted for Obama in 2012, voted Trump in 2016.
Those were all previously independents, many who were forced by state rules to join the party to vote for Bernie in the primaries. They owed nothing to Clinton or the party she purchased outright with her endorsement of Obama in ’08. The party leadership is singularly to blame for pushing away those votes in an arrogant assumption that their known corrupt neoliberal candidate had the election “in the bag”. After all, they did “pick” Trump to run against with the help of the corporate media willing to ignore Bernie and lavish a billion dollars of free exposure on Trump.
It also cannot be ignored, as much as the DNC leadership would like it to be, that Trump ran and won well to the left of Hillary’s record on every issue except immigration. Had he felt any compulsion to keep his campaign promises he could have restored the GOP as a moderate right of center party as it was before the TEA party and religious radicals usurped serious politicians with their uninformed nonsense.
Ya, he lied, but progressives had just endured eight years of lies, albeit more smoothly delivered (lube is also smooth and for similar reasons) by Obama, culminating in his complicity in pushing Hillary on them and completely rolling over to Republicans on a highly qualified moderate SCOTUS nomination.
Biden simply does not have the power to unify the Democratic electorate. His progressive bona fides, after a long and illustrious career in public service, have been foolishly rendered null by a party that has moved too far left.
Those “bona fides” can only be claimed if one is comparing them to Trump. They certainly aren’t in line with most of the voters in America who now understand just how socially conservative Biden is with no discernable economic direction except anything that opposes Bernie’s policies. With a “long and illustrious career” of undermining every fundamental platform the DNC claims to support, openly displaying his racism, warmongering, and misogynism, it is completely disingenuous to claim that the “party” has moved too far left.
Biden was instrumental in the party’s move to the right that left progressive voters with no valid options for their policy preferences that poll very well when separated from the personality and party identification that drives American politics currently.
The genius of Joe Biden, and perhaps his purpose in this race, is to test the relative mettle of the other candidates. It could even be an attempt by the DNC to hedge its bets, making sure none of the candidates can make the game a runaway.
The media began including Biden in its polling long before he announced his intention to run. Without Biden, that polling showed a clear and dominating advantage for Bernie, often doubling the numbers of his next closest rival. The initial polling that included Biden split Bernie’s lead and made him appear less of a runaway winner.
The other contenders have had time to assimilate the success of Bernie’s policies in polling while Biden gave them room to maneuver to the left. Warren has “come around” more often than a merry-go-round horse in her transition from a former Republican capitalist to pandering faux socialist.
The “party” has moved left because its potential candidates have moved toward the will of voters as much as possible without losing donor support, often backtracking on progressive policies within days of supporting them after their donors spoke disapproval. They can thank Hillary for the stress involved with being a neoliberal shill with “public and private” positions. To think that the voters are missing this disingenuous chaos would be a mistake.
Michelle Obama could announce her intent to run and pull the party back to the middle ground, with steady rather than overnight progress towards a liberal progressive utopia, which is legislatively impossible at this juncture in any case.
“The party” doesn’t need any pull to get back to the middle, unless it would be a pull to the left. The failed Clinton dynasty and Obama have already moved it well to the right of either RayGun or Nixon, resulting in the current infestation in the White House.
The hunger for some return to a government that benefits the people over the donor class has resulted in a populace fervor that is wound tighter than an eight-day clock on day one. Trump took advantage of that in his completely dishonest campaign but has done nothing to unwind the spring, if anything winding it tighter.
The potential for passing progressive legislation has never been higher in America as Trump destroys conservative credibility every day. All that is missing is a party that represents the will of the people. The DNC can, and probably will, oppose such legislation and the politicians that could be winning back all of the lost seats since its betrayal of the people with Clinton’s neoliberal damage. All of its party rules and finances are aimed at just that opposition.
Or, it could return to its roots as the party of the working class and defender of the poor and disadvantaged in the mold of FDR’s New Deal, while also taking on the very real threat of climate change now facing the world. Its choice will quickly become evident in this primary and will determine its future as a serious political force. One of the two current major parties is about to be sent into the woods for a generation, but only the DNC has the ability to pick which.
