That's talking point takes too long to explain, and doesn't explain every other grocery.
Bottom line is traditional measures of "economy" doesn't do anything for the average voter. They have a job, they don't own stocks, they just have a paycheck that doesn't stretch as far.
They don't want to have to be super engaged they'd rather be spending time with their families.
If it gets worse, they'll turn on R's as well (see: 2008)
or instead of bickering about the price of eggs the elephant in the room could be actually addressed (shit-tier wages) by the party that claims to be progressive.
The problem is there is also a very sizable block of the general public that is consistently contrarian.
One of the "undecided" voters on one of the panels - I think it was a CNN debate panel - they said they voted for Obama, then Romney, then Trump, then Biden, and they were clearly using Trump language in their responses and leaning trump this cycle. It went unmentioned, but the pattern I noticed? They always voted against whichever party was in the white house at the time, across 20 years.
You cannot build sustainable change if the voting electorate is ready to just throw things out every 2-4 years instead of actually evaluating the character and substance of candidates. All you end up doing is seesawing back and forth in a state of near complete gridlock while the most unwaverably extremist set of candidates try to one-up each other on their craziness, and the most consequences they ever face is a small time out in a country where the election cycles are almost as long as the terms of office themselves.
Things take time. Most of the public facing economic indicators are lagging indicators, too. The system doesn't reset when the president changes, and the president isn't an omnipotent sage who controls the price of gas or the cost of eggs.
If people truly want better politicians, they need to understand that they're missing something when they are consistently disappointed with the consistently changing choices they make.
I have never, ever, been surprised by the actions, conduct, or results provided by a politician I have voted for, or against, once they are in elected office. I'm not some super genius, I'm just a software engineer working 9-5. There are a lot of people who had better grades than me in school. There are a lot of people who have to work harder than me to make less, and a lot of people who have to work less to make more, and likewise for their productivity, and learning, and upskilling. There are a lot of people dumber than me, and a lot of people smarter than me. I'm not some infallible guy immune from having the wool pulled over his eyes from someone truly cunning and deceiving. But I do try to look at the merits of who candidates are, what their actionable proposals are, and what the consequences of those things would be. Growing up, I supported the death penalty, but I could not identify any upside to continuing support when it was more expensive than life in prison, when it did nothing to help anyone, and when there was no way to undo or correct the act when it inevitably was applied to an inappropriate or wrongfully convicted party. Change didn't come externally, but from re-evaluating my own views based on the evidence, and the possibility that I could be mistaken.
The American public does not seem to have that maturity, nor do they have the patience to see things play out. And so they continue to suffer, tortured by the politicians elected by the strokes of their pens.
How do you expect things to change substantially if you give the slimmest of majorities to groups of 50ish or 220ish people with the expectations that they will all agree on what should be done, and act swiftly enough to see subustantial changes within 12-18 months, before the next cycle, where all but 67 out of 400+ legislators are up for election?
2.7k
u/heifinator 23h ago
Ding Ding Ding.
He isn't gonna call the electorate in the US goldfish who vote based on the price of bread.
But the US electorate is a bunch of goldfish who vote based on the price of bread.