> The Democrats (in the US) of the 1980s did very little to stop or to slow down the big threats to working-class economic power of the 1980s, namely automation and offshoring (then called "globalization").

Wasn't that the 90s? IIRC, globalization was mainly a Republican big-business project, and the Democrats of that era were the biggest source of opposition, and it only got passed because of some defections.

Also globalization was sold as a bill of goods. IIRC, it was claimed (probably by many economists) that it would increase domestic manufacturing, but when that was shown to be a lie, there was no course-correction, and the sales pitch was changed to "but you got cheap stuff." I hope people have learned their lesson from that, to not trust economists.

But that wasn't really my point. My point was they were better able to handle divisive culture war issues, so you had lots of Democratic representatives from "red" states, even with popular Republican presidents. Today, the only way Democrats can hope to win those seats is if they're handed them through abject Republican incompetence.