Democrat Follies

You may recall that in the aftermath of the 2012 presidential election, the Republicans engaged in soul-searching. The demographics were turning against them yeah that seemed they needed some sort of intellectual revival if they wish to be in the running for the 2016 presidential spot. They have a kind of Asian the hole because with the 2010 redistricting that they largely controlled there majority in the House of Representatives was pretty much bulletproof. What the Republicans came up with was the notion they needed to tell their story better. In other words, put some lipstick on that pig. Did that work? Was that how they one the 20 16th presidential race. No! The Republicans didn't win in 2016, Donald Trump did and he was not delivering a Republican message. Trump promised more of everything to everyone including tax cuts. There would continue to be Medicare, Medicaid, social security, better and less costly healthcare, increased military spending, new infrastructure and jobs for everyone. He would revive manufacturing in the Midwest and the coal industry among other things. He also promised sweeping changes in Washington and have the luxury of running against an unpopular candidate who had a badly managed campaign. What he promised was preposterous but it was a winning strategy. The Democrat who raised enthusiasm was not Hillary Clinton Bernie Sanders who also made extravagant promises that were more than somewhat impractical in the short or medium term.

Now the Democrats are engaged in soul-searching. Right now they seem to be concentrating I'm choosing a chairman of the Democratic National Committee. Just do it. Get a bullshit artist to be done with it. Then, if you want to start winning again adopt large parts of the Trump strategy. Trump is not going to be able to deliver anything close to what he promised and the Democrats need to be harping on this. The Democrats also need to have their own tax reform program. The Republicans will come up with some mixture of tax cuts for the wealthy and a" border strategy" which is somewhat similar to a VAT tax in many respects. The hallmark of the border strategy is no taxation of goods exported. There would be a tax credit to the exporters. It will claim that this will increase exports which it will not. In its simplest form it doesn't decrease the price of exported goods, only the profits at home. The Democrats should propose that any tax cuts at the top, including corporations, he accompanied by a requirement of increased capital expenditures, hiring and research and development. There should be restrictions on stock buybacks and acquisitions. To revive the Midwest, the government should support and subsidize the building of new manufacturing plants in that area to manufacture such things as electric cars, solar panels, wind turbines and the like. They should also adopt Milton Friedman's proposals of sometime ago of a negative income tax for those below certain levels. In other words, they should focus on putting money in the hands of those at the bottom to increase aggregate demand. They should propose robust plans of government private partnerships to create apprenticeships and internships to provide new skills to displaced workers. The Democrats also need to concentrate on progress at the state legislature and Statehouse level looking towards 2010 redistricting. They also need to eliminate the bridge between low middle income blacks and white sthat the Republicans have exploited.

In other words, the Democrats need to quit focusing on why they lost and think about how they can win.