Should the Democratic Party disavow identity politics?

[Person Man]

Semi troll opinion:
The Dems should adapt to include white working class as an identity in identity politics.

Not living in a gated community and not having what you need was the original identity politics. Politics is identity based. Otherwise, who has the grievances? I guess the main issue is what RINO Tom said is something like people lose when they have a platform that is to percieved of having nothing to offer the majority of voters and when those voters just think they are looking out for very poor, the very rich, or crazy people. It is that simple.

In liberal areas, I knew a guy in urban Florida who made $400000 a year and had 3M in the bank.  He said it only makes sense to vote Republican if you make more than a million a year or have 15M in free and clear in assets.

I know in places like where I worked in Arizona and Missouri or went to school in Wyoming where people thought the same about Democrats. They said "I make 40 a year and work 3 jobs. Democrats have are only for people who make 20 a year and you really have to be lazy to only make that!"

[Person Man]

Not only would it be healthier for the Dems to abandon the practice, but the nation's health would rise substantially too. Identity politics destroys American identity and turns everyone into tribal clans too paranoid of the other clans.

But the Republican Party depends on them too. They go overboard whenever they try to use the Feds to interject themselves into things like the Schaivo case or use the DEA to bust medical marijuana dispenseries. They feel the same way when Democrats do when they are trying to bust the cops for killing black guys who were acting up or when they try to get people to use the bathrooms they want.

Other people think that they are just pandering to unhinged weirdos but to them, it is part of their greater mission of making the world either a more hierarchical, robust, and stable one on one hand or a more just, peaceful, and equitable world on the other.

I am trying reiterate my point that identity politics aren't the problem for the parties, it is just that they need to have enough people as part of their clientle.

[Person Man]

The question (and answer) is obviously too simplistic, but I do think 2016 showed that Democrats can't win elections by "picking" the groups that are *worthy* of being in their coalition and disavow those they find undesirable.  Great work standing up for LGBTQ and women's rights only means so much if out of the other side of your mouth you're spewing hatred toward rural people because of the actions of a few of them.  For Christ's sake, even Republicans avoid saying things about all Black people after there's some random bad event involving Black people.

It's easy to demonize those who vote solidly against you, but it's foolish.  Coalitions change, swing states change and parties need to have foresight.  The White working class used to vote for liberals, now they vote for conservatives.  They can be swayed, just as can almost any group of people.

We comically talk about some Populist Democrat going to Casper or Fort Smith asking "What do you have to lose?" but it can happen.

[Person Man]

Yes, the GOP is beating them at that game now. Working-Class White has transformed into the single largest political identity of them all.

You mean the Southern Strategy?

[Person Man]

Yes, the GOP is beating them at that game now. Working-Class White has transformed into the single largest political identity of them all.

You mean the Southern Strategy?

It has expanded to rural white voters across this country, not just the South.

Yeah, not like Republicans ever won rural Whites in the North before now or the Southern Strategy!!

"Southernization"? Agrarian Populism?

[Person Man]

Didn't Obama come within 3 in Montana and 8-9 in the Dakotas when he said rurals cling to guns and religion? And now Democrats lost because of the hinterlands in the states that contain Miami, Philidelphia, and Detroit?

Democrats need to strengthen the base without causing mobilization on the other side. If anything, they need dog whistles that do exactly that. The problem with Republicans during Obama is that they didn't know how against him. Now democrats don't know how to squeak a fart past Him.