Guaranteeing Trump’s Reelection

This is an important article on how Democrats can manage not to help Trump in 2020. The problem is that it fails to address the problem in a way progressives can really grok. Let me take a shot at it.


Progressives! I wish you (apologies in advance to those who reject the "you" pronoun) good morning! Let me sum up what Never-Trump Republican Charley Sykes is saying here in his desperate, panicked desire to assist you in helping to rid America of its current blight. He wants you to perform three acts of kindness and tolerance into the election season. He asks you to recognize that:

1. There are dyed-in-wool liberals outside your cosmopolitan bubble who don't buy into all the boutique issues you deem self-evidently right. Don't alienate them. Broaden, don't narrow.

2. There are moderate Democrats who live VERY different lives from you. Don't alienate them. Broaden, don't narrow.

3. There are Trump-repelled moderate Republicans, former Republicans, and Centrists living in an entirely different universe than you. Don't alienate them. Broaden, don't narrow.

You know how you talk around squares? Talk like that!

You know how in certain social situations (e.g. with your parents' friends) you do your darndest to find common ground, keeping your more doctrinal urgings to yourself? Do that!

And keep it going into the 2020 election. Don't assume Democrats (much less Centrists and apostate Republicans) in Pennsylvania or Michigan, who drive pickup trucks with gun racks, share your lifestyle and your tribal inclinations. Assume that many/most of your potential allies are creepily, disconcertingly, maddeningly behind re: attitude trends you and your friends synch up with via social channels, and maybe decline to eat their flesh for their failure to diligently update.

Tolerate. Embrace. Build a coalition. And, for godsakes, WIN.

At least, do this if you want to defeat Trump. If that's NOT your top priority, then, by all means: as you were.