I'm not surprised that Democrats in Congress have an even worse job approval rate, 26%. Of course, Republicans in Congress are doing about the same, maybe a little worse, because they are slowly realizing they are being made responsible for Trump's abysmal job performance and accountable for his failures. But for all the talk about the midterm elections of 2026 being the best chance to put a stop to the Trump insanity, Democrats are doing surprisingly little to change the perception of themselves. At a 26% job approval rating, hopes of winning a majority in both houses during the midterms is not running very high.
The party leadership is protecting its own turf, rather than making some bold moves, requiring personal sacrifice and risk. That sends the wrong message. They can say that Trump is an existential threat to American democracy, but until they do something that shows this is an urgent priority for them, rather than just electioneering and campaign sloganing, those miserable job approval ratings will continue, as they are even as this is read, and will get worse.
Do the Party Leaders Know Why Their Own Constituents are Frustrated?
Getting on message and getting it out is a chronic problem for the Democratic party. As the opportunity to win the 2024 election slipped away in weeks of panic and confusion mostly caused by the reaction of big donors to Joe Biden's debate performance, the same inability to read the crowd, so to speak, created a season of doing absolutely nothing to stop the threat to democracy, or even to create a sense of urgency that Trump was such a threat.
That's why the level of frustration is so high, and the job approval is so low.
There is a huge amount of frustration over the fact that an inept and incompetent Merrick Garland could not use the power of the Presidency to get the insurrectionist, document thief into a courtroom for trial. That was simply inexcusable. Nor would Democratic leadership, Biden included, do everything they could to make sure it happened. They could have revised the judiciary act, broke the filibuster, packed that damn, corrupt court, expidited Trump's insurrection trial, and saved Roe while overturning Citizens United. There were plenty of Democratic members of the House and Senate on board with that. And it all would have worked, except the old school leaders wanted to protect their turf, their seats, and play the game the old way, which their opposition abandoned 30 years ago.
What Hogg wants to do is find enough Democrats to replace those who held back, and wouldn't take those risky, bold steps to make sure Trump was ineligible to run, and went to prison for his crimes. I'm 100% for doing exactly that.
When it became pretty clear that Biden's Presidency should have been a transitional one, two years before the election, we needed bold party leadership to go to him and convince him that it would be best for both the party and the country if he did not run again. Few political experts doubt that Democrats would have won the 2024 election had they held a regular primary to select a new nominee. They might well have picked Harris, but they would have picked someone who was willing to take some risks, who could have distance him or herself from the issues that affected the Biden adminstration, and who would have had two years to run a campaign, keep an eye on Republican tactics to suppress and steal votes, and very likely have won the election, especially if Democrats had taken the neccessary steps to make sure Trump couldn't run again.
Hogg is looking for Democrats willing to tell the truth and make the country a priority over political careers and long term occupation of seats that should be term limited anyway.
Democratic senate leadership had the opportunity to put an early roadblock up in Trump's way by blocking the continuing resolution with all of the things Trump wanted in it, early in his term. Yes, it would have shut down the government, but who gives a damn? Trump would have been blamed for that, and Democrats would have kept him from getting the means to make his damaging DOGE cuts right off the bat. But nine Democrats, nine of them, caved in and voted for cloture, and let him have what he wanted. Nine.
And that's why David Hogg is doing what he's doing. It's needed, and thank goodness we have him at the DNC. I know his boss there doesn't like it, but Democrats won't succeed by hanging on to the status quo, old school way of doing things, and the old line leadership is all about paying homage to the big donors and long time traditions, which have cost us an election and have opened the door to what we have in Washington right now. Ken Martin had better side with progress, and separate himself from the old guard, and move the party where the action is, get caught up to the Trump resistance that is running far ahead of where they are, and sit down and listen to his vice-chair, or he's going to be another ineffective, "who cares?" leader in a long line of ineffective, "who cares?" leaders at the DNC.
The party needs fresh faces who understand the seriousness of this threat enough to be bold, and take risks to protect our democracy, instead of protecting their own turf, traditions, and feathering their own nests. Look where the momentum is, and who the people are following. It's clearly not about age, since an 83 year old Senator is one of the most energetic, and crowd-drawing attractions in the anti-Trump movement. It's about priorities, and while a lot of lip service was given to the "Trump is an existential threat to democracy," mantra, the party's actions spoke louder than its words, and proved, with irresolute cowardice, that was not what they believed. Hence the current frustration and tanking job approval ratings.
My Senator, Dick Durbin, has a long and distinguished career in the United States Senate, but Senator Durbin passed is prime about 5 years back and his failure to be up on the front lines taking risks, being bold and protecting democracy means that it is time for him to step down, and let someone else with more energy and willingess to take a risk step up and take his seat. I feel the same way about Senator Schumer. Retire, Senator, and let Governor Hochul appoint Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to your seat. Let's get Bernie in position as Senate Minority Leader and position ourselves to win in the midterms and then erase every vestige of the failed Trump presidency.
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