Two can play at that
As Digby reported yesterday, Sen. Chuck Schumer, one of several Beltway Democrats past their expiration dates, is catching shit from a half dozen Democratic governors. They are mad as hell at Donald Trump’s newest reality show, the Project 2025 Demolition Derby, and they’re not going to take it anymore. They insist somnolent Democrats on Capitol Hill — how did Trump put it? — fight, fight, fight.
Paul Krugman concurs in his newsletter, offering similar political advice he normally eschews:
Today, however, I’m going to make an exception, and offer three words of advice to Democratic politicians and MAGA opponents in general: oppose, oppose, oppose. And make noise. A lot of noise. Don’t make conciliatory gestures in the belief that Trump has a mandate to do what he’s doing; don’t stay quiet on the outrages being committed every day while waiting for grocery prices to rise. I can’t promise that taking a tough line will succeed, but going easy on Trump is guaranteed to fail.
Trump and his MAGA minions deserve no quarter and certainly no deference. Republicans gave Obama and Biden none and Democrats should respond in kind.
Democrats’ first mistake is assuming that he won because his “issues” held salience for voters who somehow missed his being morally and intellectually bankrupt while being sanewashed by the press. Other pundits Krugman’s read, as I have, seem to be drinking their own Kool-aid. If only Democrats had paid more attention to this (pundit’s pet) issue and less to that one, etc. Oh, the price of eggs!
But Democrats can’t just sit around waiting for Trump’s promises to fail. They need to constantly challenge him on the issue, keep reminding voters that he lied about it all through the campaign, and hang rising prices around his neck every step of the way.
Nor, as I see it, should they narrowly focus on kitchen-table issues. One reason low-information voters may have believed Trump’s nonsense claims about being able to reduce prices is that some of them really thought he was the brilliant manager he played on TV. The reality, however, is that the Trump administration has made a complete shambles of its first 10 days, especially with their it’s on, no it isn’t, yes it is spending freeze that is both destructive and clearly illegal, and has itself been frozen by the courts. It would be political malpractice for Democrats not to make an issue of Trump’s raging incompetence.
The Attention Age
What’s it going to take, Democrats? A high school cheerleading squad to chant it in front of the U.S. Capitol? Actually, the spectacle will get them more press than another caucus presser. Sure, they’ll be condemned by the right. But as Chris Hayes points out in “The Sirens’ Call,” Donald Trump dominates the messaging battlespace because in his mind any kind of attention is good attention, even the worst kind. This is something Democrats don’t get.
Hayes told Anand Giridharadas, “Democrats have been conflict-averse and conflict draws attention, and have also not understood how important it is to get attention, even if you run the downside risk.”
That’s not exactly Krugman’s message, but it rhymes:
So Democrats and MAGA opponents shouldn’t hold their tongues and try to make nice with Trump in the belief that he represents the will of the people. Americans are just starting to find out that they guy they elected and his policies aren’t at all what they thought they were voting for. And we should do everything we can to accelerate their awful journey of discovery.
One Democrat who gets it is AOC, as Digby pointed out. Hayes does as well:
And the one person who gets it is someone who figures prominently in your last book, who you profile, is AOC, who is the best at this of Democrats. Whatever you think about her, whether you agree or disagree with her politics, as an attention age politician, she is by far the most gifted.
The Schumers are living in the past and past their primes. Their seniority is a liability in the attention age.
UPDATE: Go on narrative offense.