“It really is nothing new, but you are watching it happen in your own time and not in a book.” Writers and thinkers on where the denial of reality can lead.
There is data on why the Democrats lost, and it was not because the NYT did not shout "Orange Man Bad!" loudly enough.
Post election, the Democrat-aligned PAC Blueprint 2024 interviewed 3262 national and swing-state voters as to the importance of 25 different "Reasons to not choose Kamala Harris". (*sigh* on the grammar, kids these days!)
For swing voters (see definition at the site), the #1 issue was "Kamala Harris is focused more on cultural issues like transgender issues rather than helping the middle class".
For all voters, this was #3 behind "Inflation was too high under the Biden-Harris administration" and "Too many immigrants illegally crossed the border under the Biden-Harris administration".
For comparison, "Kamala Harris would allow abortions in too many circumstances" was #21 for both categories.
I can add the personal note that the Democrats' enthusiastic obliteration of women's sex-based rights and their full-throated support for the ongoing crime against humanity of sterilizing and mutilating gay kids on the basis of pure medical quackery were the reasons I did not vote for the Democratic Party nominee for the first time ever in my 50 years of being politically active.
On your question: This is something we were actually dealing with when writing the book. We did the writing in the first six months of 2017 — ie, in the beginning of Trump's first time around. By a large margin, most of the places we wrote about voted for Trump in 2016 — and I assume this time as well. There was a structural reason for that: We were writing about smaller communities, and the urban/rural divide in national politics was one of the clear signs in that election (as with the divide by education level.)
The short version of what we said then, and now, is that when it comes to **NATIONAL politics and policy,** every division has become tribalized and embittered. The Eastern seaboard example would be Yankees-v-Red Sox. You're on one side or another. Cubs v White Sox. USC vs UCLA. The potential for this kind of tribal division is ever present in human nature. But, for reasons including those in this piece, it has been inflamed and ramped up in recent years. Same with the fury over Brexit, which was raging at the time we wrote our book.
Our experience is that when you talk with people about *local realities*, they still have some sense of shared realities. Two weeks ago, voters in the Dayton region went for Trump — but also passed a new bond-increase levy to reinvest in their public library. (Deb told a similar story about Charleston WV in our book.) I expect we're about to see the same thing when it comes to immigrants: The GOP has whipped up an immigrant-menace consciousness, but (in our experience) for most people in most communities, *especially* farming communities that have been losing population and depend on immigrant labor, "our" immigrants are fine! And when they start getting shipped out.
One positive outcome of this horrible election for me would be a renewed focus on rebuilding decimated local news organizations.
I stopped subscribing to the Cincinnati Enquirer a long time ago. Once it was bought by Gannett and turned into a local version of USA Today, it increasingly wasn't worth the money. Over the years I've been able to piece together my state and local news from a combination of news sources -- local NPR station (which has a really good reporter on City Hall); the local business daily; and the nonprofit Capital Journal News. And occasionally printed versions of stories carried on local news (I don't watch televised news; I prefer to read it).
I keep thinking of Heather Cox Richardson's remark at a fundraising forum for Sherrod Brown with journalist Connie Schultz in October. She said the single most important element behind who votes for Donald Trump in every place in the country she's been traveling through is Fox News. It's a misinformation fire hose.
I don't know how we fix the national news media but it sure seems to me that finding a way to fund and support scrappy local media is a good place to start. I'd certainly support that effort in Cincinnati.
Thank you, James, for this thoughtful post and for sharing the Dayton Literary Peace Prize and the powerful words of some of these authors, and especially Josh Carter. It was a quiet but strong reminder of what we must all continue to fight against: the denial of reality. I’m so weary of the post-mortem, the agonizing by my own party, the panic happening already, months before inauguration. I know you will continue to help us see things “as they really are.” And we will continue to support your work.
I'm glad that you are putting your energy into reviving local news. We are seeing spreading news deserts in the Pacific Northwest. You may be interested in the work of Seattle Times columnist Brier Dudley, who is covering the troubled state of local news in our corner of the country.
So Jim – You are right, of course, about Trump and Kennedy and the rest of that crew.
But I have young friends who remind me that in our days of youth we wanted to blow up the rotten system and now we are older and defending the status quo. One of them just wrote to me: “I know old age tempers that fire in your bellies, I can feel it myself, creeping in on me. Why make waves when my days are numbered. Let me just settle down and enjoy these last few years in peace and harmony.
He continues: “But it still bothers me. If you don't keep fighting til your last breath, then what was it all for? I look at Bernie Sanders, who is in his 80's….. he just keeps on fighting the good fight. I hear now he is working with Trump to massively cut credit card interest rates. That guy just never gives up. … The larger truth of the world is not what you will hear on the main stream media. I had no idea how much I was being lied to, or propagandized to. It was scary and fascinating at the same time.”
So he is sure that in supporting Kennedy and Trump he is helping to blow up a corrupt dead system. We were trying to do that when we were young (maybe me a bit more than you in 1968…) We knew that the three network / Boston Globe (mainstream) media was not telling our truth, so we created alternate media in the press and radio.
As you wrote “If nothing matters, if everything is terrible, if elections are just about swapping one liar for another, why not just shake it all up? Or burn it all down? At least it will be entertaining along the way.” But to my friend, it matters very much. Maybe something new can arise from those ashes. Though that may take many years....
I agree with you about the corruption, misinformation and proto-fascism that has arisen to win the election. But that does not convince this young friend, and others who worked for Kennedy and then for Trump. One is developing white papers for Kennedy for changes to the school lunch program to make it more healthy and free of corporate Ag. She is absolutely right in this. I don’t trust Kennedy or his egregious judgement, but in something like this he is right.
As Paul Lynch said: “What used to be considered truth is no longer truth to many. How are we to know the world?… we belong to a tradition, but tradition is nothing more than what everyone can agree on.” We fought and broke traditions when we were young. Is that what is happening now again? (Of course, we got Nixon in 1968).
So how do we talk to these folks. My son says the people who voted for Trump are “just stupid”. But it ain’t that simple. So I am conflicted in my upcoming Thanksgiving family discussions. Do I say we need to fight the creeping fascism (though that is not a productive word to use) every step? Or See how Trump screws it all up and finally they can see how wrong they have been? Or hope that something good comes out of it, that maybe the system and the Democratic elites needed it to get blown up and maybe, with a lot of luck, something new and better may come?
Change is very much needed, and it will only come from the younger folks. All we can offer is advice and perspective.
I so appreciate your perspective, you enrich my day in dark times....Randy Foote
Randy, thank you. I have no comprehensive answer (to your comprehensive questions), and wish I did. And of course what sounds like a cliche is very vividly true right now. It's up to the next generation(s).
I'll just say also the generational point: When I was in high school and college and thereafter, the "blow it all up" sentiment was about the ongoing Vietnam war, the still-violent civil rights struggle, and the dawning environmental movement. These days: I *disagree* with the usually-Democratic groups in PA or MI who worked against Biden/Harris because of Gaza, in the (insane) belief that Trump would be tougher on Israel. (Reuters had a big feature on these people a day or two ago. Most of them now saying, "What were we thinking? We got played.") But I recognize that an a genuinely major, first-tier issue.
But the people who want to blow it up because "have you seen the price of eggs"? Arrgh.
I think all of us, including me, are expressing our uncertainty about what could possibly be a constructive step forward.. Thank you for laying this all out.
I'm still processing (or digesting, if you prefer) the circumstances we face but will always appreciate your efforts that often anticipate my own thoughts if sometimes only partially...
I read most of the other comments up to midnight last night and will catch up today, but I don't have much to add beyond these tidbits:
1) I read Ian Bogost's piece in The Atlantic entitled "The Bluesky Bubble" and appreciated the play on words, but I particularly noted his suggestion that "People just aren’t meant to talk with one another this much."
2) Bluesky (and and other alternatives to X/Twitter) are neither good nor bad a priori, but they reflect more another form of fragmentation (as compared to polarization) which troubles me.
3) I'm struck by the inadvertent contrast between the imagery of "Xitter" and "Bluesky". The latter may be an echo chamber, too, and I'd rather listen to the complexities of harmony and rhythm and counterpoint from on high than the shouting of demagogues and sycophants and the frightened from their imagined ramparts...
... or maybe it was not an accident and both Musk and Dorsey acted consciously whether in concert or not? (I'm assuming that Jack made that choice, but we can be confident that Elon made his...)
PS: I feel very sad for two Georgians, Jimmy Carter and Ted Turner, who have essentially left this world in body and/or mind if not yet physically... or so I presume from news reports. I had a fantasy the other day that someone put their writings and thoughts into parallel LLMs and that they would be 'awakened' upon their ultimate passing to give us a powerful message... but would anyone listen? (and that said, I've been reading technical articles about the barriers to improvements being reached by AI... which may be the oldest story in modern science alongside controlled thermonuclear fusion).
First, about the Georgians. I didn't quote a part of Josh Carter's speech when he talked about whether his grandfather was "aware" of the election outcome. He said, "No one has told him. But he is Jimmy Carter. He would have figured this out." He *was* aware of the significance of casting his vote for K Harris — 76 years after the first vote he cast, for Harry Truman in 1948. (In 1944 he was of age to vote for FDR, under Georgia's voting age at the time, but he was off at submarine-training camp or something and had no time to do so.) I get the impression that he has not been able to absorb or discuss the news of the past ten days. You can imagine what it would have meant to him to get news of other results.
Then, on the Bluesky bubble: I like most articles by this guy. I did not think that one was very good or very well thought out. It seemed like the old "Slate pitch" — contrarian for its own sake. But we'll see.
Agreed on both points with two tidbits of precision, if I may:
On Carter and Turner, I meant to emphasize their seminal roles in a multitude of ways at the beginning of what I will call the "current era" without elaborating other than to channel Robert Burns on "the best laid plans..." that can still have been laudable (imho).
As for the Bogost article, I agree 100% and can disclose that I did not finish it for exactly the reason you cite (without thinking of Slate that I never read that much anyway...). I did like his point about "us all talking to each other all the time" and I also think that the fragmentation of information integrity is problematic, but I do not think that is a problem of echo chambers unless someone or something is maliciously manipulating the content that gets amplified and the audiences at whom the loudspeaker is directed.
"unless someone or something is maliciously manipulating the content that gets amplified"
That is exactly what people harping on algorithms are on about. Makes no difference to a program designed and coded to favor - push more of the same - to increase engagement whether the content is true, false, fair or anything else. It gets pushed because it keeps people online, engaged. Because of our evolved human nature we pay more attention to, stay more engaged with, 'material' that is sensational, salacious, threatening, fear and anger producing than information that is factual, measured, and contextualized.
In this piece I did not quote them (including Tania, a colleague from our days in China)—nor the four other introducers, nor Victor Luckerson, nor Jason Carter, nor the overall emcee, nor the Irish ambassador, nor Richard Holbrooke's wife, nor the president of Dayton's own Sinclair Community College, nor the head of the DLPP, nor myself in my own presentation—because I wanted to talk about the thread that connected the remarks by Fountain, Lynch, and Carter.
I’m only beginning to roust myself from a deep depression over the election results, and I’m doing my best to interpret what it all means. What just happened? Why, using the widest possible angle lens, did it happen? And now what?
There’s been a lot of discussion about how happy Kamala became fear-mongering Kamala, about how the right spews non-stop inflammatory falsehoods, about sane-washing and news editors not rising to the moment, about the consequences of Biden’s tardy departure, and about various other possible contributory explanations of Harris’ loss. One could speculate, perhaps rightly, that if the Right had been more righteous, or the left had better executed, Kamala would have won. Perhaps so. But the GOP had its own boat anchor, too: it had to convince a plurality of our generally decent, well-intentioned electorate to vote for Trump, despite Trump being possibly the most ethically and personally flawed candidate either major party has ever nominated. This, despite there being no possibility whatsoever that the electorate was somehow hoodwinked. As you said, we knew exactly who we were getting.
So I think the center/left needs to look past oppositional messaging, campaign execution, and the weather reports of the day, and take a sober look at what exactly the donkey party is selling, and how it competes in the marketplace of ideas with what the elephant guys have for sale. My conclusion is that the People have given the left a thumbs-down, and no amount of post-campaign finger-pointing will change that. It is arrogant of those of us who consider ourselves well-educated, well-read, and, well, smart, to think half the country has somehow been induced to vote in a way not in their best interests. The reason the GOP won is, IMO, because they claimed the populist agenda that the left abandoned. What we care the most about - say, Trump’s threat to democracy - just isn’t what most of America cares about - such as, perhaps, how much more a dozen eggs costs than it did a year ago.
Democrats won when they stood for good jobs, dignity, and safety. They won when their leaders’ messages of “we know you, and we care about you” were strong and genuine enough that they couldn’t be drowned out by party definition projection from the right. They lost when voters felt that they’ve been talked down to by “arrogant liberals” with whom they have nothing in common (like Clinton), when they don’t trust the candidate is genuine (like Harris), when the candidate can’t or won’t prosecute their otherwise viable case vigorously enough to shape the national discourse (as was Biden’s trajectory).
My notion is that the Democratic Party needs to stop blaming the voters and blaming the Republicans, and start listening very closely for who the American people really are. And then select leaders who are of that, understand that, and can communicate that. Rather than embracing self-congratulatory identity politics so strongly. I don’t think the GOP has necessarily permanently co-opted the Democrats’ historical populism, because I think their version is calculated and not genuine. Trump cares about nobody but himself, and his political acolytes care about nothing but leveraging Trump’s popularity. Add decency to a genuine, vigorous, of-the-people leader, and you’ve got the basis for another swing of the pendulum.
"It is arrogant of those of us who consider ourselves well-educated, well-read, and, well, smart, to think half the country has somehow been induced to vote in a way not in their best interests."
Arrogant perhaps, but still true. I suspect that we've all made shoot from the hip bad decisions. Been mislead. And had buyer's remorse after the act realizing I should taken a beat and thought this through. Many have been seduced into voting against their self interests. Happens all the time in every election because mostly people vote their feelings not their interests.
Christopher - you make a good point. Allow me to reframe. We all form opinions and make decisions based on our own unique perspectives. When we conjecture that others are making decisions not in their best interests, that conjecture is made far more convincingly through our own frames of reference than theirs. The arrogance is in not understanding that the different frames of reference exist.
But I think the point is moot. We live in a democracy, and fools, if that's what they are, still have the right to vote. Whatever Team Red said won, and whatever Team Blue said lost, in a free and fair election. Voters made their decisions however they made them, whether we agree with their decision making processes or not. But this shouldn't have even been a close election, because Trump is SUCH an awful person and the populist aspects of the GOP platform are SO ingenuine. But for all that, it still resonated more strongly with America than did the Democratic Party's platform. We're complaining that they're being duped by Republican messaging when we don't understand why that messaging resonates, much less offering our own messaging that is better. Which leads once again to my thesis: the Democratic Party needs to ground itself. Less Elizabeth Warren, and more, I dunno, Sherrod Brown.
In addition to modifying the message - less school yard spat more George Orwell Politics and the English Language, less ideological rigidity more common man sense - Democratic candidates need to speak more frequently and effectively in today's information spaces.
The legacy media, whose economic model has collapsed and from which I suspect this audience draws most of its information, just doesn't reach enough people including voters to win elections.
I think the Harris campaign knew this. But starting from scratch and as a newbie they didn't have enough time to 'play' in those social media and pod cast channels.
All I have to add is: As you suggest at the end, it's one thing to think / argue / imagine / recommend what a party "should" do. How it should present itself, what it should stand for. But in reality (as you know) whether that works usually comes down to finding or happening upon a *specific person* who via bearing, record, explanatory power, etc etc represents those different values.
All of these tasks are hard. Finding the right person is the hardest, and most luck-dependant.
Carl Sagan in 1995: “I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time - when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness. The dumbing down of America is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30-second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance.” The Demon-Haunted World, p. 28
You left out one category and it would be the one I'd point to as primary. You described how there was no interest in what Harris was selling, but you didn’t talk about what there would have been interest in, where none of what you talked about would have lost Harris the election if she had been a good candidate.
Listen to 5 minutes of Marianne Williamson about how Harris could have been different: https://mariannewilliamson.substack.com/p/at-last-the-final-stretch. I say “could” because Harris's weakness as a leader might have sabotaged her no matter what her positions or attitude.
One more thing, though, is that I thought no one but Trump's hardcore base was going to vote for such a reprehensible person, and you make that comprehensible – sort of.
Thanks. I have stayed entirely out of "what Harris could/should have done" debates, because at this stage it's not clear that anything would have "made a difference." At least to me.
Virtually every person who took the time and trouble to vote knew who and what Donald Trump is. And enough of them voted for him.
I am so grateful for your posts. My husband, George, and I are retired newspaper reporters and read your "Breaking the News," not long after it came out. My husband believes so strongly about telling the truth, I wouldn't be surprised if he one day came home wearing a "Truth Teller" t-shirt. We would like to join a group that fights misinformation. Can you suggest any?
As you probably know, some of the best centers of that fight faced considerable harassment and defunding (Stanford Internet Observatory comes immediately to mind.) Poynter has an International Fact-Checking Network. When I want to see what's going on in fact checking, one of the things I do is search the term at Erkan's Field Diary, the site of a Turkish anthropologist who has an ongoing interest in the topic.
I don't know of any one anti-misinfo group. But the main focus for my energies in the next while is going to be the ever-growing array of groups and individuals working to resuscitate the local-news model and find ways to build from the local level outwards. I'll be writing and reporting about that.
The conundrum is how to reach voters who pay no attention to the MSM. That number is huge and will only get larger as time goes by. As much as I like the NYT and WaPo, they are largely irrelevant as the voters the Democrats need don't read those papers.
During my working days in the pharma industry, I was a principal spokesperson on drug safety issues. It was not particularly fun to go on the radio or TV to debate those that thought pharma companies were hiding data or manufacturing vaccines that caused autism and other ill effects. Once people believe something, the effort needed to show them they are incorrect is 10 times that of the original message that their child was harmed by an MMR vaccine. One needs to be sympathetic and acknowledge that the parents are sad that their child has an affliction for which there is no real explanation.
It's the same thing with politics. You have to go where the voters are and relate to them. Perhaps the best example of this is the Gallego Senate campaign in Arizona where the Senator elect ran 8 points better than VP Harris. The Democrats cannot afford to give up on any state and if the present trend continues, they are toast. In 2030 a number of Democratic states will lose electoral votes while Texas and Florida will pick up between 3-4 apiece. Howard Dean was the only DNC chair in my memory that vowed to mobilize all 50 states. The national party needs to return to this get the message out. Truth ultimately wins out but not easily.
One of the things that Gallego did was to avoid the pitfalls of the progressive wing's redescriptions of reality. Adam Jentleson wrote a column on the subject in the Times today.
Thank you very much for this.
There is data on why the Democrats lost, and it was not because the NYT did not shout "Orange Man Bad!" loudly enough.
Post election, the Democrat-aligned PAC Blueprint 2024 interviewed 3262 national and swing-state voters as to the importance of 25 different "Reasons to not choose Kamala Harris". (*sigh* on the grammar, kids these days!)
For swing voters (see definition at the site), the #1 issue was "Kamala Harris is focused more on cultural issues like transgender issues rather than helping the middle class".
For all voters, this was #3 behind "Inflation was too high under the Biden-Harris administration" and "Too many immigrants illegally crossed the border under the Biden-Harris administration".
For comparison, "Kamala Harris would allow abortions in too many circumstances" was #21 for both categories.
https://blueprint2024.com/polling/why-trump-reasons-11-8
I can add the personal note that the Democrats' enthusiastic obliteration of women's sex-based rights and their full-throated support for the ongoing crime against humanity of sterilizing and mutilating gay kids on the basis of pure medical quackery were the reasons I did not vote for the Democratic Party nominee for the first time ever in my 50 years of being politically active.
James thank you as always for your many insights. Looking to you to help keep us sane in the perilous times ahead.
I do not mean to be snarky, but have you determined the percentage of Our Towns who went for Trump?
Thanks very much. Appreciate it.
On your question: This is something we were actually dealing with when writing the book. We did the writing in the first six months of 2017 — ie, in the beginning of Trump's first time around. By a large margin, most of the places we wrote about voted for Trump in 2016 — and I assume this time as well. There was a structural reason for that: We were writing about smaller communities, and the urban/rural divide in national politics was one of the clear signs in that election (as with the divide by education level.)
The short version of what we said then, and now, is that when it comes to **NATIONAL politics and policy,** every division has become tribalized and embittered. The Eastern seaboard example would be Yankees-v-Red Sox. You're on one side or another. Cubs v White Sox. USC vs UCLA. The potential for this kind of tribal division is ever present in human nature. But, for reasons including those in this piece, it has been inflamed and ramped up in recent years. Same with the fury over Brexit, which was raging at the time we wrote our book.
Our experience is that when you talk with people about *local realities*, they still have some sense of shared realities. Two weeks ago, voters in the Dayton region went for Trump — but also passed a new bond-increase levy to reinvest in their public library. (Deb told a similar story about Charleston WV in our book.) I expect we're about to see the same thing when it comes to immigrants: The GOP has whipped up an immigrant-menace consciousness, but (in our experience) for most people in most communities, *especially* farming communities that have been losing population and depend on immigrant labor, "our" immigrants are fine! And when they start getting shipped out.
But thanks for reading, and thanks for asking.
Powerful.
One positive outcome of this horrible election for me would be a renewed focus on rebuilding decimated local news organizations.
I stopped subscribing to the Cincinnati Enquirer a long time ago. Once it was bought by Gannett and turned into a local version of USA Today, it increasingly wasn't worth the money. Over the years I've been able to piece together my state and local news from a combination of news sources -- local NPR station (which has a really good reporter on City Hall); the local business daily; and the nonprofit Capital Journal News. And occasionally printed versions of stories carried on local news (I don't watch televised news; I prefer to read it).
I keep thinking of Heather Cox Richardson's remark at a fundraising forum for Sherrod Brown with journalist Connie Schultz in October. She said the single most important element behind who votes for Donald Trump in every place in the country she's been traveling through is Fox News. It's a misinformation fire hose.
I don't know how we fix the national news media but it sure seems to me that finding a way to fund and support scrappy local media is a good place to start. I'd certainly support that effort in Cincinnati.
Yes, agree. I have written about this sporadically over the years and will dig down into it more systematically.
Terri Ring, many thanks for your kind response. Are you interested in this issue?
Thank you, James, for this thoughtful post and for sharing the Dayton Literary Peace Prize and the powerful words of some of these authors, and especially Josh Carter. It was a quiet but strong reminder of what we must all continue to fight against: the denial of reality. I’m so weary of the post-mortem, the agonizing by my own party, the panic happening already, months before inauguration. I know you will continue to help us see things “as they really are.” And we will continue to support your work.
I am very grateful, on all fronts. Thank you.
I'm glad that you are putting your energy into reviving local news. We are seeing spreading news deserts in the Pacific Northwest. You may be interested in the work of Seattle Times columnist Brier Dudley, who is covering the troubled state of local news in our corner of the country.
Thank you. I have not known of Brier Dudley's work and will check it out
So Jim – You are right, of course, about Trump and Kennedy and the rest of that crew.
But I have young friends who remind me that in our days of youth we wanted to blow up the rotten system and now we are older and defending the status quo. One of them just wrote to me: “I know old age tempers that fire in your bellies, I can feel it myself, creeping in on me. Why make waves when my days are numbered. Let me just settle down and enjoy these last few years in peace and harmony.
He continues: “But it still bothers me. If you don't keep fighting til your last breath, then what was it all for? I look at Bernie Sanders, who is in his 80's….. he just keeps on fighting the good fight. I hear now he is working with Trump to massively cut credit card interest rates. That guy just never gives up. … The larger truth of the world is not what you will hear on the main stream media. I had no idea how much I was being lied to, or propagandized to. It was scary and fascinating at the same time.”
So he is sure that in supporting Kennedy and Trump he is helping to blow up a corrupt dead system. We were trying to do that when we were young (maybe me a bit more than you in 1968…) We knew that the three network / Boston Globe (mainstream) media was not telling our truth, so we created alternate media in the press and radio.
As you wrote “If nothing matters, if everything is terrible, if elections are just about swapping one liar for another, why not just shake it all up? Or burn it all down? At least it will be entertaining along the way.” But to my friend, it matters very much. Maybe something new can arise from those ashes. Though that may take many years....
I agree with you about the corruption, misinformation and proto-fascism that has arisen to win the election. But that does not convince this young friend, and others who worked for Kennedy and then for Trump. One is developing white papers for Kennedy for changes to the school lunch program to make it more healthy and free of corporate Ag. She is absolutely right in this. I don’t trust Kennedy or his egregious judgement, but in something like this he is right.
As Paul Lynch said: “What used to be considered truth is no longer truth to many. How are we to know the world?… we belong to a tradition, but tradition is nothing more than what everyone can agree on.” We fought and broke traditions when we were young. Is that what is happening now again? (Of course, we got Nixon in 1968).
So how do we talk to these folks. My son says the people who voted for Trump are “just stupid”. But it ain’t that simple. So I am conflicted in my upcoming Thanksgiving family discussions. Do I say we need to fight the creeping fascism (though that is not a productive word to use) every step? Or See how Trump screws it all up and finally they can see how wrong they have been? Or hope that something good comes out of it, that maybe the system and the Democratic elites needed it to get blown up and maybe, with a lot of luck, something new and better may come?
Change is very much needed, and it will only come from the younger folks. All we can offer is advice and perspective.
I so appreciate your perspective, you enrich my day in dark times....Randy Foote
Randy, thank you. I have no comprehensive answer (to your comprehensive questions), and wish I did. And of course what sounds like a cliche is very vividly true right now. It's up to the next generation(s).
I'll just say also the generational point: When I was in high school and college and thereafter, the "blow it all up" sentiment was about the ongoing Vietnam war, the still-violent civil rights struggle, and the dawning environmental movement. These days: I *disagree* with the usually-Democratic groups in PA or MI who worked against Biden/Harris because of Gaza, in the (insane) belief that Trump would be tougher on Israel. (Reuters had a big feature on these people a day or two ago. Most of them now saying, "What were we thinking? We got played.") But I recognize that an a genuinely major, first-tier issue.
But the people who want to blow it up because "have you seen the price of eggs"? Arrgh.
I think all of us, including me, are expressing our uncertainty about what could possibly be a constructive step forward.. Thank you for laying this all out.
Good morning, all... and thanks as always, Jim...
I'm still processing (or digesting, if you prefer) the circumstances we face but will always appreciate your efforts that often anticipate my own thoughts if sometimes only partially...
I read most of the other comments up to midnight last night and will catch up today, but I don't have much to add beyond these tidbits:
1) I read Ian Bogost's piece in The Atlantic entitled "The Bluesky Bubble" and appreciated the play on words, but I particularly noted his suggestion that "People just aren’t meant to talk with one another this much."
2) Bluesky (and and other alternatives to X/Twitter) are neither good nor bad a priori, but they reflect more another form of fragmentation (as compared to polarization) which troubles me.
3) I'm struck by the inadvertent contrast between the imagery of "Xitter" and "Bluesky". The latter may be an echo chamber, too, and I'd rather listen to the complexities of harmony and rhythm and counterpoint from on high than the shouting of demagogues and sycophants and the frightened from their imagined ramparts...
... or maybe it was not an accident and both Musk and Dorsey acted consciously whether in concert or not? (I'm assuming that Jack made that choice, but we can be confident that Elon made his...)
PS: I feel very sad for two Georgians, Jimmy Carter and Ted Turner, who have essentially left this world in body and/or mind if not yet physically... or so I presume from news reports. I had a fantasy the other day that someone put their writings and thoughts into parallel LLMs and that they would be 'awakened' upon their ultimate passing to give us a powerful message... but would anyone listen? (and that said, I've been reading technical articles about the barriers to improvements being reached by AI... which may be the oldest story in modern science alongside controlled thermonuclear fusion).
Ed, thank you. Briefly on two points:
First, about the Georgians. I didn't quote a part of Josh Carter's speech when he talked about whether his grandfather was "aware" of the election outcome. He said, "No one has told him. But he is Jimmy Carter. He would have figured this out." He *was* aware of the significance of casting his vote for K Harris — 76 years after the first vote he cast, for Harry Truman in 1948. (In 1944 he was of age to vote for FDR, under Georgia's voting age at the time, but he was off at submarine-training camp or something and had no time to do so.) I get the impression that he has not been able to absorb or discuss the news of the past ten days. You can imagine what it would have meant to him to get news of other results.
Then, on the Bluesky bubble: I like most articles by this guy. I did not think that one was very good or very well thought out. It seemed like the old "Slate pitch" — contrarian for its own sake. But we'll see.
Agreed on both points with two tidbits of precision, if I may:
On Carter and Turner, I meant to emphasize their seminal roles in a multitude of ways at the beginning of what I will call the "current era" without elaborating other than to channel Robert Burns on "the best laid plans..." that can still have been laudable (imho).
As for the Bogost article, I agree 100% and can disclose that I did not finish it for exactly the reason you cite (without thinking of Slate that I never read that much anyway...). I did like his point about "us all talking to each other all the time" and I also think that the fragmentation of information integrity is problematic, but I do not think that is a problem of echo chambers unless someone or something is maliciously manipulating the content that gets amplified and the audiences at whom the loudspeaker is directed.
"unless someone or something is maliciously manipulating the content that gets amplified"
That is exactly what people harping on algorithms are on about. Makes no difference to a program designed and coded to favor - push more of the same - to increase engagement whether the content is true, false, fair or anything else. It gets pushed because it keeps people online, engaged. Because of our evolved human nature we pay more attention to, stay more engaged with, 'material' that is sensational, salacious, threatening, fear and anger producing than information that is factual, measured, and contextualized.
Did the two women authors not speak?
They did speak.
In this piece I did not quote them (including Tania, a colleague from our days in China)—nor the four other introducers, nor Victor Luckerson, nor Jason Carter, nor the overall emcee, nor the Irish ambassador, nor Richard Holbrooke's wife, nor the president of Dayton's own Sinclair Community College, nor the head of the DLPP, nor myself in my own presentation—because I wanted to talk about the thread that connected the remarks by Fountain, Lynch, and Carter.
I’m only beginning to roust myself from a deep depression over the election results, and I’m doing my best to interpret what it all means. What just happened? Why, using the widest possible angle lens, did it happen? And now what?
There’s been a lot of discussion about how happy Kamala became fear-mongering Kamala, about how the right spews non-stop inflammatory falsehoods, about sane-washing and news editors not rising to the moment, about the consequences of Biden’s tardy departure, and about various other possible contributory explanations of Harris’ loss. One could speculate, perhaps rightly, that if the Right had been more righteous, or the left had better executed, Kamala would have won. Perhaps so. But the GOP had its own boat anchor, too: it had to convince a plurality of our generally decent, well-intentioned electorate to vote for Trump, despite Trump being possibly the most ethically and personally flawed candidate either major party has ever nominated. This, despite there being no possibility whatsoever that the electorate was somehow hoodwinked. As you said, we knew exactly who we were getting.
So I think the center/left needs to look past oppositional messaging, campaign execution, and the weather reports of the day, and take a sober look at what exactly the donkey party is selling, and how it competes in the marketplace of ideas with what the elephant guys have for sale. My conclusion is that the People have given the left a thumbs-down, and no amount of post-campaign finger-pointing will change that. It is arrogant of those of us who consider ourselves well-educated, well-read, and, well, smart, to think half the country has somehow been induced to vote in a way not in their best interests. The reason the GOP won is, IMO, because they claimed the populist agenda that the left abandoned. What we care the most about - say, Trump’s threat to democracy - just isn’t what most of America cares about - such as, perhaps, how much more a dozen eggs costs than it did a year ago.
Democrats won when they stood for good jobs, dignity, and safety. They won when their leaders’ messages of “we know you, and we care about you” were strong and genuine enough that they couldn’t be drowned out by party definition projection from the right. They lost when voters felt that they’ve been talked down to by “arrogant liberals” with whom they have nothing in common (like Clinton), when they don’t trust the candidate is genuine (like Harris), when the candidate can’t or won’t prosecute their otherwise viable case vigorously enough to shape the national discourse (as was Biden’s trajectory).
My notion is that the Democratic Party needs to stop blaming the voters and blaming the Republicans, and start listening very closely for who the American people really are. And then select leaders who are of that, understand that, and can communicate that. Rather than embracing self-congratulatory identity politics so strongly. I don’t think the GOP has necessarily permanently co-opted the Democrats’ historical populism, because I think their version is calculated and not genuine. Trump cares about nobody but himself, and his political acolytes care about nothing but leveraging Trump’s popularity. Add decency to a genuine, vigorous, of-the-people leader, and you’ve got the basis for another swing of the pendulum.
"It is arrogant of those of us who consider ourselves well-educated, well-read, and, well, smart, to think half the country has somehow been induced to vote in a way not in their best interests."
Arrogant perhaps, but still true. I suspect that we've all made shoot from the hip bad decisions. Been mislead. And had buyer's remorse after the act realizing I should taken a beat and thought this through. Many have been seduced into voting against their self interests. Happens all the time in every election because mostly people vote their feelings not their interests.
Christopher - you make a good point. Allow me to reframe. We all form opinions and make decisions based on our own unique perspectives. When we conjecture that others are making decisions not in their best interests, that conjecture is made far more convincingly through our own frames of reference than theirs. The arrogance is in not understanding that the different frames of reference exist.
But I think the point is moot. We live in a democracy, and fools, if that's what they are, still have the right to vote. Whatever Team Red said won, and whatever Team Blue said lost, in a free and fair election. Voters made their decisions however they made them, whether we agree with their decision making processes or not. But this shouldn't have even been a close election, because Trump is SUCH an awful person and the populist aspects of the GOP platform are SO ingenuine. But for all that, it still resonated more strongly with America than did the Democratic Party's platform. We're complaining that they're being duped by Republican messaging when we don't understand why that messaging resonates, much less offering our own messaging that is better. Which leads once again to my thesis: the Democratic Party needs to ground itself. Less Elizabeth Warren, and more, I dunno, Sherrod Brown.
Well and persuasively reframed.
In addition to modifying the message - less school yard spat more George Orwell Politics and the English Language, less ideological rigidity more common man sense - Democratic candidates need to speak more frequently and effectively in today's information spaces.
The legacy media, whose economic model has collapsed and from which I suspect this audience draws most of its information, just doesn't reach enough people including voters to win elections.
I think the Harris campaign knew this. But starting from scratch and as a newbie they didn't have enough time to 'play' in those social media and pod cast channels.
Again very well put.
All I have to add is: As you suggest at the end, it's one thing to think / argue / imagine / recommend what a party "should" do. How it should present itself, what it should stand for. But in reality (as you know) whether that works usually comes down to finding or happening upon a *specific person* who via bearing, record, explanatory power, etc etc represents those different values.
All of these tasks are hard. Finding the right person is the hardest, and most luck-dependant.
Carl Sagan in 1995: “I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time - when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness. The dumbing down of America is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30-second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance.” The Demon-Haunted World, p. 28
Sadly, I remember this!
Being a huge Sagan nerd I read that book the instant it came out. I thought he was exaggerating. My mistake.
You left out one category and it would be the one I'd point to as primary. You described how there was no interest in what Harris was selling, but you didn’t talk about what there would have been interest in, where none of what you talked about would have lost Harris the election if she had been a good candidate.
Listen to 5 minutes of Marianne Williamson about how Harris could have been different: https://mariannewilliamson.substack.com/p/at-last-the-final-stretch. I say “could” because Harris's weakness as a leader might have sabotaged her no matter what her positions or attitude.
One more thing, though, is that I thought no one but Trump's hardcore base was going to vote for such a reprehensible person, and you make that comprehensible – sort of.
Thanks. I have stayed entirely out of "what Harris could/should have done" debates, because at this stage it's not clear that anything would have "made a difference." At least to me.
Virtually every person who took the time and trouble to vote knew who and what Donald Trump is. And enough of them voted for him.
And many, many people didn't take the time and trouble.
I am so grateful for your posts. My husband, George, and I are retired newspaper reporters and read your "Breaking the News," not long after it came out. My husband believes so strongly about telling the truth, I wouldn't be surprised if he one day came home wearing a "Truth Teller" t-shirt. We would like to join a group that fights misinformation. Can you suggest any?
As you probably know, some of the best centers of that fight faced considerable harassment and defunding (Stanford Internet Observatory comes immediately to mind.) Poynter has an International Fact-Checking Network. When I want to see what's going on in fact checking, one of the things I do is search the term at Erkan's Field Diary, the site of a Turkish anthropologist who has an ongoing interest in the topic.
Thanks so much. I appreciate it.
I don't know of any one anti-misinfo group. But the main focus for my energies in the next while is going to be the ever-growing array of groups and individuals working to resuscitate the local-news model and find ways to build from the local level outwards. I'll be writing and reporting about that.
The conundrum is how to reach voters who pay no attention to the MSM. That number is huge and will only get larger as time goes by. As much as I like the NYT and WaPo, they are largely irrelevant as the voters the Democrats need don't read those papers.
During my working days in the pharma industry, I was a principal spokesperson on drug safety issues. It was not particularly fun to go on the radio or TV to debate those that thought pharma companies were hiding data or manufacturing vaccines that caused autism and other ill effects. Once people believe something, the effort needed to show them they are incorrect is 10 times that of the original message that their child was harmed by an MMR vaccine. One needs to be sympathetic and acknowledge that the parents are sad that their child has an affliction for which there is no real explanation.
It's the same thing with politics. You have to go where the voters are and relate to them. Perhaps the best example of this is the Gallego Senate campaign in Arizona where the Senator elect ran 8 points better than VP Harris. The Democrats cannot afford to give up on any state and if the present trend continues, they are toast. In 2030 a number of Democratic states will lose electoral votes while Texas and Florida will pick up between 3-4 apiece. Howard Dean was the only DNC chair in my memory that vowed to mobilize all 50 states. The national party needs to return to this get the message out. Truth ultimately wins out but not easily.
Yes, well and wisely put.
One of the things that Gallego did was to avoid the pitfalls of the progressive wing's redescriptions of reality. Adam Jentleson wrote a column on the subject in the Times today.