alt Hacker NewsNo, the message was that winning was about “overcoming a shameless demagogue and enablers who have no problem blatantly lying about everything to everyone,” plus shallow pandering to diversity, rather than delivering tangible benefits to Americans. In both 2016 and 2024 the Dem message to voters was that everything was fine, no radical economic change was needed, vote against orange man and all would be well. This was a losing position against a populist. Biden called on his long record of support for labor and proposed investing in American manufacturing, which was a winner in swing states especially since the economy was hurting due to the pandemic.
I didn't say that should be the message.
I said that there's no "pragmatic, positive message" that overcomes simply lying and having an entire media and political apparatus that supports it.
Biden's primary advantage was running against a guy who was demonstrably a complete shit show as an actual incumbent. That was memory-holed by the same shameless lying (e.g. ask Republicans who they think "locked people down" during COVID).
Biden (and Harris) then had a similar disadvantage going into 2024.
It's extremely, extremely silly to act like voters were looking for pragmatic messages lol. Simply no evidence for that.
They were primarily looking to get rid of the incumbent, as was the trend across all democracies during a period of extreme inflation.