Compassionately Euthanizing an Obsolete Democratic Party
The devastating 2024 Republican sweep has occurred for one reason and one reason only: the establishment Democratic Party itself. The responsibility lies entirely at their feet.
It’s time well-meaning American liberals accept what progressives have known for a long time: the Democratic Party is obsolete. It has been for at least a decade, though they have been out of touch for much longer than that — perhaps since the emergence of the Green Party and Ralph Nader, which they went out of their way to attack. When exactly they lost the script is irrelevant; what matters is that it is now clearer than ever that they are The Party of Utter Failure.
If they were truly the “adults in the room” they so snidely LARP as, they would acknowledge this truth. But since they are thoroughly in the pockets of anti-progressive interests — sewn into its very hem, as it were — they cannot. Admitting this would require not only a backbone but the motive to do real progressive good, both of which are entirely lacking.
Instead, they will blame racists, sexists, non-voters, and other “stupid people” rather than look in the mirror and admit that their own obstructionism and echo chamber have allowed such painful, humiliating misadventure. They chose to ally with Liz Cheney rather than Bernie Sanders.
The Democrats peaked (in terms of sheer optics) with Obama. They will never reach that level again. Charismatic establishment Dems have been nonexistent since.
The Democratic Party will never deliver universal healthcare, nor end genocide, nor effectively tax the super-rich, nor create a better world. These are simply not their true agenda and it arguably never has been. Their aim is to uphold the status quo; meanwhile, they’ve lost their base, their credibility (among those liberals who still gave them the benefit of the doubt), and power. From here on, they will continue to lose, and in doing so, they will continue to enable the Right. And if they ever win again, they will simply perpetuate the “soft fascism” of neoliberalism, which has become their bread and butter. They are now little more than a relic fit for a museum — a reminder of what aimless political destitution truly looks like.
In recent years, the Democrats have accomplished little besides enabling the Right while supporting genocide and squelching true progressives, even within their own ranks. They have done nothing to win over the poor and working people in America’s flyover states — which should’ve been easy. At best, they resemble what Republican centrists once were in the 20th century.
Yes, we can call the Republican Party ugly, but not in the same way we can call the Democratic Party corrupt, lost, and a collective failure. Right-wingers are what they are everywhere — authoritarian, statist, callous, xenophobic, sexist, and so on. But the Democrats are demonstrably more insidious and ineffectual because they masquerade as progressives while denying that they are just another arm of the Right. This is more odious than the Republican Right, which at the very least makes its intentions crystal clear. The Democratic establishment is the true toxic force of against the American people, again, because the ape as if they are the good guys. The reality couldn’t be further from the truth.
The Democrats believe they are engaging in some kind of mature realpolitik. If they were, they wouldn’t be so bad at the political game. Instead, they represent the professional managerial class: accomplishing nothing while bureaucratizing everything into a paralyzing standstill that benefits only themselves, as the room fills with bodies around them — at the cost of their base and their ability to oppose a more zealous Right that has effectively taken their jobs out from under them.
For now, this is a democracy. When you lose your job in a democracy, you can not blame such a widespread, overwhelming loss on anything other than yourselves. You can try, but it will only serve as a balm to help you sleep at night. “I’m not wrong. They’re wrong!” It’s the last gasp of a loser before drifting into fitful sleep.
I am reminded of the avowed anarchist Terence McKenna, who said, “We are led by the least among us — the least intelligent, the least noble, the least visionary.” This may apply to the Right, but at least they have a vision to enchant their base and charismatic, media-savvy talking heads to carry the message. The same cannot be said for the Democrats who operate with a playbook from a pervious century.
They careened into this election like a car without brakes or steering, running a doomed campaign from the moment Biden announced another run, and suspended the primary. The instant they cast aside the democratic process of the primary, they abandoned their base, choosing a virtually unknown vice president who contradicted her own record, couldn’t speak off-script, and had no play beyond “I’m not the other guy” — all while Bernie, who was once projected to beat Trump by a 17-point margin, waited in the wings. That is why they lost.
How could it be that the Democrats had such a huge chance for victory, and yet buried it so thoroughly? The answer is simple. Bernie is a progressive, and they are simply against progressivism. They would rather lose and lose this badly than the alternative.
But this has always been the Democrats’ platform. Their vision is, “I’m not that guy.” Vote for us, or else it’s that guy. It’s a threat. The only play they have is threat. They’ve coasted on this for decades, with no visionaries and no sense of purpose. For those who work within the Democratic Party, it’s just another job, like climbing the corporate ladder at Walmart. Nothing miraculous will happen with this party.
Well-meaning liberals, understand: the Democratic Party is the enemy of real progress. They make progress impossible by insisting it’s unachievable. While making life easier for the deep Right, they have no idea how to fight a 21st-century political battle in the realm of American spectacle media. They cannot compete with figures like Trump and long-form podcasts. They are trapped. They are destitute. They are obsolete. And they are doomed.
Thanks to the Democrats we have mass deportation, dangerous back-alley abortions, assaults on trans rights, a general aura of thuggery and gangsterism in the air, a more precarious climate, a possible theocratic ethnostate, and national and global embarrassment to look forward to for at least another four years. Possibly longer. Centrists enable fascists.
When you lose this completely, you can not continue to claim relevancy without insulting your own intelligence. You cannot blame it solely on “crazy white nationalists”, or non-voters, or some other group. It is your failure as a party to align with progressive populist issues while catering to your lobbyists, “think” tanks, corporate masters, and other status quo interests.
This is why you failed again, and why you will fail again. You lost because you are as morally bankrupt as you are spineless.
The only question left for well-meaning Democrats and liberals is: how much more humiliation will you tolerate? How much worse must things get? How many times must you burn your hand on the stove? If this is you at your best, I’d hate to see you at your worst. At your best, you’ve handed this entire country to the Right — the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches. You’ve lost in a way that’s difficult to fathom.
If you want to do good with whatever time you have left, step aside (or evolve) and accept the progressive will of the people. Or keep going, and enable an even darker future for us all. With the game you’ve been playing, you wouldn’t know how to win hearts and minds if you owned the world’s cutest baby animal petting zoo and actually paid guests to visit it.
If there is any silver lining to the Democrats’ utter humiliation, it is the hope that this failure of a party will finally dissolve entirely. That’s the one thing we have to look forward to: the end of a party that has long worn out its welcome.
Stay tuned.
