A lot more accurate predictor of who will vote for Republican-fascism than when they shower is certainly WHAT MEDIA THEY CONSUME

I CERTAINY AGREE with the idea that Democrats should have been doing more to address issues of the working class and poor than they have been doing but they don't do more because of the pressure that the media puts on them when they do it.   And they have to do it because todays Republicans will stop them doing it at all costs.   And by "media" I don't mean just what supposedly constitutes the "news" I mean the entire media and what they choose to put on.  I remember when the greatest advance in helping the working and poor since LBJ, the ACA was passed, the media gave hour after hour of coverage to the phony billionaire financed, Republican astroturf "Tea Party" which was largely responsible for disastrous 2010 election which elevated a Republican majority in Congress, continuing on a road to insanity which leads directly to the present Republican Caucus in both House and Senate, a product of the media coverage of Joe Biden, THE PRESIDENT WHO TRIED TO DO MORE FOR THE WORKING CLASS THAN ANY PRESIDENT SINCE LBJ.  

Michael Sean Winters published an article in which he takes up the typical media criticism that the trouble with Democrats is that they're too "elite"  

In a recent interview with Ezra Klein, Democratic pollster David Shor argued that "the most important political trend of the last 30 to 40 years, both here and in every other country in the world — at least in Western countries with elections — has been this story of education polarization. Basically, we've seen highly educated people move to the left, while working-class people have moved to the right." 

Shor argued that the competing narrative — that Donald Trump's ascent was really a continuation of the GOP's "Southern strategy" after the Civil Rights Act, motivating white voters with racist dog whistles — was wrong. White voters did not shift very much in 2024. Trump's biggest gains were among Hispanic and Asian voters, especially immigrant voters.

"There's a very clear correlation between how many immigrants there were in a county and how much Trump's vote share increased," Shor said. "In counties like Queens, N.Y., or Miami-Dade, Fla., Trump increased his vote share by 10 percentage points, which is just crazy." 

How crazy? "Our best guess is that immigrants went from being a Biden plus-27 group in 2020 to a group that Trump narrowly won in 2024. This group of naturalized citizens makes up roughly 10% of the electorate." 

Michelle Cottle recently profiled Rep. Jason Crow of Colorado. "A lot of communities divide the world between when you shower: before work or after work," he told her. The problem for too many Democrats is that they do not know anyone who showers after work.  

To start with, I don't know who Jason Crow knows but most of the Democrats I know are either of the lower middle-class or they are working class to poor, even most of the college educated Democrats I know have blue collar jobs or their equivalent.  And if they have a white collar job, their families are full of those who don't. 

IF HE WANTS TO ARGUE THAT TOO MANY TOP POSITIONS IN DEMOCRATIC ADMINISTRATIONS AND WITHIN THE PARTY APPARATUS GO TO THE AFFLUENT, I WOULD NOT ARGUE WITH THAT.  I have railed against the tyranny of the Ivys and Ivy equivalents and their product since at least Obama's administration - I remember an early brawl that started when I noted neither he nor his Secretary of Education had ever been a student in a public school or university or had children in public schools or universities.   

If that's his point he should have made it more accurately.  

In saying what he did he props up a Republican-fascist narrative that, unfortunately, Barack Obama and previous Democratic Presidents have not seemed to mind being made.  That Obama and Bill Clinton were products of Ivy League - Ivy equivalent schools, Georgetown, Oxford, Yale, Columbia and Harvard may have something to do with that perception.   Though that was never a media created problem for the Bushes.  They surrounded themselves with the same and, in all cases, appointed the same to their administrations and to the Supreme Court.  I will also note they are Ivy Law trained lawyers.  Since I've been addressing the inherent corruption of the legal profession due to its golden rule of servicing the interests of those who can pay the best, that Jason Crow as well as way too many Democrats in office and in power have been from that profession.   I don't know too many lawyers who are best friends with members of the great unwashed, except when they have them as pro-bono clients.  I'll bet you one of the more widely held opinions of the working class and the poor are that lawyers charge way, way too much.  Probably a lot more than think that "the Dems" are too elite. 

Of course, the big irony here is that what Crow, Winters, etc. say about Democrats being too elite is said about the party which has served the elite far less than the only alternative.    Why that isn't widely perceived is because of the media lying about it, distorting reality in favor of a narrative that benefits Republicans, in the past and Republican-fascists today.

I would ask Michael Sean Winters and, while I'm at it, Jason Crow which of the minority groups who Democrats support - their championing the rights of LGBTQ+ people is often implied as a problem in these kinds of articles, their support of Black People is hinted at tacitly -  is to be tossed aside in order to attract the kind of voters who are so fickle that they'll go from voting for an Obama or a Joe Biden to voting for Trump - so easily forgetting that when Republicans held power THE WORKING CLASS, THOSE WHO "SHOWER AFTER WORK" WERE GETTING SHAFTED BY THEM.  Jason Crow has an excellent record of voting for the Democratic agenda, he had a 100% record of voting with Joe Biden and is given top grades by a number of groups which give such ratings.  I think he's a good Democrat.   It is a plain fact that the most reliable group which most consistently votes Democratic are Black Voters, who are also largely NOT PART OF THE ECONOMIC ELITE.   It's one of the facts of this that it is exactly the Republican-fascists,  especially those of the Ivy League rank who are trying to resegregate the most elite institutions and schools,  the ones on the Supreme Court have certainly made that one of their higher priorities.    It is the Republicans who want to go back to 1950s era policies that allowed all levels of American life to be able to serve a restricted clientele. 

I think this boils down to the real unmentionable fact that our media has lied us into a situation when the party of, by and for the billionaires and for impoverishing those who aren't get into power gain power.   And, after their policies and practices destroy the economy too much for the media to lie about and Democrats fix it, they  lie about Democrats in order to put the billionaires' party back into power.  That is a pattern that has held since 1964 when the "civil liberties" industry and the Warren Court made media lies about politicians a part of the First Amendment.  It has gotten steadily worse as subsequent Courts have built on that decision to make money equal speech and to overtly hand our government over to the highest bidder, whether that billionaire be domestic or foreign or a freakish illegal immigrant from Apartheid South Africa. 

Sean Micheal Winters as a journalist has a professional self-interest that all the rest of the journalists have in covering up that fact, of never admitting that the legal permission they are given to lie or get it wrong has a direct result in the media owned by millionaries and billionaires to lie their servants, Republicans and now Republican-fascists into power.  The lawyers have an interest in this, too, which, as I point out, is likely not unrelated to their means of making as much money as they can and the professional culture they are trained in and go along with to get along.   It is far easier for a journalist, or, in fact, a blogger or podcaster to just repeat the old like that Democrats are elite than to tell the truth about the decisive role that media lying on behalf of Republicans and the class who owns their media - apparently it is a habit that even those in the independent, non-millionaire owned media just repeat out of professional habit. 

A lot more accurate predictor of who will vote for Republican-fascism than when they shower is certainly WHAT MEDIA THEY CONSUME. 

That has entirely more to do with why Joe Biden was forced out of the race and why Harris and Walz lost (even more how Hillary Clinton lost the election that she won)  and how Trump got the chance to wreck everything and steal everything this time.  The journalists and the lawyers are at the bottom of this, not Democrats who favor equality for hated minority groups.