By Robert Laurie ——Bio and Archives--December 27, 2016
American Politics, News | CFP Comments | Reader Friendly | Subscribe | Email Us
"The greatest gift that Michelle and I have received over the last eight years has been the honor of serving as your president and first lady. Together, we fought our way back from the worst recession in 80 years, and got unemployment to a nine-year low. We secured health insurance for another 20 million Americans, and new protections for folks who already had insurance. We made America more respected around the world, took on the mantle of leadership in the fight to protect this planet for our kids, and much, much more. By so many measures, our country is stronger and more prosperous than it was when we first got here. And I’m hopeful we’ll build on the progress we’ve made in the years to come."I'm surprised he didn't command the nation to send him personal thank you notes. The interesting thing is that Obama - and Democrats in general- spent the previous week doing exactly the opposite. Their 2016 election post-mortem is in full swing, and they've started to notice that they're in deep trouble. After spending 8-12 years alienating much of the country, they're in dire electoral straits. You know it's bad when Obama admits he's fallible. From the Washington Examiner...
The House and Senate majorities that existed on his way into the Oval Office are gone, and so are more than 900 seats in state legislatures across the country. Obama said Democrats have to do a better job of showing up in local communities, no matter how Republican in their voting patterns, and deliver a strong pitch for Democratic values. "It's been something that I've been able to do, successfully, in my own campaigns," Obama said during his final year-end news conference from the White House. "It is not something I've been able to transfer to candidates in midterms and sort of build a sustaining organization around. That's something that I would have liked to have done more of, but it's kind of hard to do when you're dealing a whole bunch of issues here in the White House." Over Obama's eight years, Democrats went from controlling 28 governor's mansions to 18. They also went from 25 state legislatures to 12; 60 Senate seats to 48, and 257 House seats to 194."I can win but I can't drag my party across the finish line" is a bit of a humble brag, but the fact remains: Obama has acknowledged that his brand of winning has done extensive damage to Democrats nationwide. The party is out of touch, openly hostile to the Constitution, and consumed by obscure far-left social issues. ...But don't take my word for it. The few remaining Rust Belt Dems know it too. From the Toledo Blade...
Support Canada Free Press
A month after the election, U.S. Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D., Toledo) said former first lady, secretary of state, and U.S. Senator Clinton missed opportunities to drive home the economic message that might have won voters’ confidence. “I think the Democratic Party has some soul-searching to do. On the economic front it fell short,” Miss Kaptur told The Blade. She sent to her Democratic House colleagues a packet of graphs, political cartoons, and articles that portray a “bicoastal” bias on the part of the Democratic Party leadership. Miss Kaptur said the industrial heartland feels “squeezed out, overshadowed, marginalized, ignored.” And the representative doesn’t think the national Democratic Party is in touch with those voters, seeming to prefer its leadership come from the coasts. “I think that they are sympathetic but they really don’t understand,” Miss Kaptur said after House Democrats again elected California U.S. Rep. Nancy Pelosi as their leader in the House, over Rep. Tim Ryan of Ohio.It's true that the radical base they court in New York and California remains loyal, just as it's true that they've lost much of flyover country, but it's a mistake to diminish the left's problems by claiming they're somehow based in geography. I've made this point before, but it bears repeating: The Democrat Party isn't simply bi-coastal, it's bipolar. The Dem machine is currently controlled - lock, stock, and barrel - by the far left. That might not be such a problem if they were willing to alter things, but that brings us to a bigger issue. Such influence isn't diminishing; it's increasing. As Rep. Kaptur says, the re-election of Nancy Pelosi as leader is a strong indicator that they have no intention of changing. The fact that they'd even consider a radical like Keith Ellison for DNC chair means their problems are going to get much worse before they get better. They can't change their agenda because they'd risk support on the coasts - and they can't court middle America without changing their agenda. In short, they spent decades painting themselves into a corner by supporting far-left causes and personalities, while assuming they could win without the "deplorables" that make up much of the country. It's amazing that they were, and probably remain, incapable of understanding that their problems lie not with the voters, but with their own unalterable, unpopular, and unworkable goals.
View Comments
Robert Laurie’s column is distributed by HermanCain.com, which can be found at HermanCain.com
Be sure to “like” Robert Laurie over on Facebook and follow him on Twitter. You’ll be glad you did.