Introduction
Welcome to the hit show “So You Want to Defeat (impeached) Donald Trump." In round one, candidates must first win the nomination of the Democratic Party. This is no small feat. The Democratic party is diverse with many coalitions including liberals, leftists, and moderates; Black people, Latinos, Asians, and Native Americans; LGBTQ people, working class people, young people, and women.
If this sounds like a long-term winning majority to you, it is! In fact Democrats have won 6 of the last 7 presidential elections by popular vote. And yet, due to the electoral college, which advantages rural, redder, and whiter states, America got served George W. Bush in 2000 and a BasuraSwampMonster in 2016.
It’s almost certain Trump will lose the popular vote in 2020 and likely by an even wider margin (thank you California). The question is will Democrats carry the swing states that’ll decide the election. And if we do, are Democrats prepared to enact voting rights and electoral college reform on Day 1? Inquiring minds want to know.
In general, Republicans win national elections after taking the intro course "Lies, Half-Truths, and Dog-Whistles: How To Scam a Voter-Suppressed Electorate and Win Elections.”
Democrats, on the other hand must take “Winning Everybody Everywhere – the Democratic Guide to Beating an Electoral College System, which Devalues The Votes of Your Core Constituencies: A History.”
The Democratic candidates have to speak to diverse groups with different concerns. Understandably this can be challenging, but that is the point of a primary. To force candidates to hone their message, build coalitions, and make an impassioned pitch for their vision of the country’s future. The race is Darwinian, and the outcome (we hope) is the survival of the fittest candidate who can defeat the wannabe emperor with Russian clothes.
Every good evolutionary biologist knows that (genetic) variation is a key ingredient for natural selection. For the primary, we started with a healthy amount of variation aka a large number of candidates. The field started off wider than the distance between Trump and Melania. Seemingly everybody threw their hat into the ring. We had senators, a former vice President, Congressmen, an elusive Congresswoman (Tulsi “Shego” Gabbard), governors, big city and small city mayors, entrepreneurs, billionaires, and even a spiritual healer who called out the dark psychic force that undergirds our country - racism (Thank you Marianne Williamson). For a second we even thought Secretary Clinton would join the race.
A note on Hillary Clinton: I can only imagine how devastating it must feel to get so close to being the first female President, technically win the popular vote, and lose the electoral college by 80,000 votes across 3 states. I would be petty till the very last molecule of gas departs my lungs. And when it does, I’d instruct my family to put my popular vote total on the tombstone in bold Helvetica Size 500 font, so no one ever forgets. Still, I’m glad she didn’t run in 2020 because 1- she would certainly lose. And 2 - her eventual Oscar award winning biopic (starring Meryl Streep) works with one general election surprise loss. Two losses?! That’s just anti-climatic.
So right away we know Hillary isn’t the right person to take on Trump. But from the 8 Democrats currently running for president, who is? Who do we think can defeat Donald Trump?
The short and un-satisfying answer is I don’t know. I don’t think anyone does, including the pundit class who told everybody in 2016 there was no way Trump could win. Well fast forward to 2020, and America is looking real crazy with an impeached President Trump running around flagrantly committing crimes.
Hence, the key lesson I take away from 2016 is focusing on who can beat Trump is the exact wrong question. Here’s why.
Electability, The Elusive Chanteuse
On November 8th 2016, in a stunning, heart-wrenching, earth-shattering loss, Democrats lost the 2016 election. Dreams of our first female President were crushed and the media spent 2 years writing think pieces on the whims, wishes, and wants of white working class Midwesterners. The ‘Obama-Trump’ voter became the belle of the ball while the millions of people who stayed home, voted third party, or voted Romney-Clinton were relegated to the sidelines of the political conversation.
Hillary Clinton’s loss was a defeat we did not see coming. And I believe it left the Democratic electorate in a state of perpetual second-guessing and vetting. If everyone believed Hillary Clinton would beat Trump, including the Trump campaign, do we risk being blind-sided again? 2020 is a new election, a do over, but the mission is the same.
Defeat Donald Trump.
(And take back the Senate and keep the House.)
The media takes this mission and morphs it into a question of ‘who is the most electable?’ I dislike the term ‘electable’ because it distracts from the real challenge at hand. I summarized my thoughts on ‘electability’ in this tweet:
Electability, like Mariah Carey, is an elusive chanteuse. People like to ascribe big electability energy to certain candidates, but in reality it’s an ephemeral metric that in practice limits our imagination for what leadership can look like. We should apply electability to people who WIN elections. You’re electable if you win. Full stop.
Instead of obsessing over the ephemera of electability, we should evaluate candidates on whether they have an effective strategy and the necessary skills to beat Donald Trump. In short, I am arguing that WHO can beat Donald Trump is less important, than HOW we plan to do so.
So You Want to Defeat (impeached) Donald Trump?
Okay, so real talk.
How exactly do we beat a BasuraSwampMonster?
I have some ideas.
1- Clearly Articulate a Bold, Inspiring Vision
The winning Democratic candidate needs to propose a bold, uplifting, inspiring vision for the future. And they need to beautifully articulate it. This to me is the most important criteria of a candidate. We aren’t going to beat Trump by offering Republican-lite visions. Nor will we win by calibrating our agenda based on imagined Republican backlash. These strategies project weakness and do not offer a stark enough contrast with Trump.
Offering a strong contrast against Trump’s vision and record should be easy. Democrats need to ask voters, straight up what has Trump done to help provide a 21st century education to our students? What has he done to expand healthcare to the underinsured and uninsured? What has he done to keep us and American children safe from gun violence? The answer is absolutely nothing. And any claim by him and his batallion of sycophants know as the Republican Party is false. What we do know is all Trump has done since entering office is:
Lie, cheat, tweet, and steal.
For himself. And his billionaire friends.
The message is that simple. Trump is a fraudster who is defrauding the United States. And you.
But it’s not enough to extol the criminality of Trump. The Democratic nominee has to offer a positive vision, a reason to vote blue. Voting for the Democrat in 2020 should feel like the dawn of a new era, where we center the working class and not just the ultra-rich and privileged few. A vote for the Democratic candidate, should be a vote for a future where world class education is a dignity we afford all our students and not just the families who can afford it. Where healthcare is a right afforded to Every. Single. American. Regardless of their station in life. Where feeling safe from gun violence in our malls, classrooms, and places of worship is a given. Because regardless of how people feel about gun rights, we all have a right to life.
These messages will excite the base and bring independents and moderate Republicans who are disappointed with their party to our side. The underlying theme here is the Democratic vision of the future is one where every citizen’s potential can be achieved. For Democrats, true freedom means the freedom to live your best life, to dream big, and be supported, not hindered by your government. A Democratic administration will work towards our freedom by dismantling the barriers that get in the way.
Whether we achieve this vision via moderate or progressive policies is a separate conversation. Ultimately, I’m advocating that to beat Donald Trump, the Democratic nominee has to lay out a Democratic vision and make it feel visceral, real, and attainable. A candidate who can paint a bold, uplifting, inspiring vision will galvanize the American people to believe once again that the point of politics is to improve our lives. A candidate who can inspire Americans to believe once again in government made up by the people, for the people, I believe will win the most votes of the people.
The choice in 2020 could not be more different, but the Democrat has to make that choice crystal clear. Describe the Vision. Make it bold. Uplift the people. Inspire a country. In that order.
2-Speak plainly. Speak truthfully. Speak with that hot Targaryen fire
Trump is a deeply flawed and troubled person. But if I’m under extreme, like civilization-ending pressure and was required to say something nice about him to save the human race, I’d say “Trump is an effective messenger to his base.” (I’d then immediately rinse my mouth with bleach).
We see this with his immigration rhetoric, attacks on kneeling athletes, even his nicknames. I hate to say it but Crooked Hillary and Sleepy Joe are good. Juvenile, sure and unbecoming of a President definitely, but the nicknames are good. Trump is an effective messenger because he speaks his truth (which are lies) without sugarcoating or hedging. As a result, he comes across as authentic.
In the age of social media, the distance between person and celebrity, voter and politician has all but disappeared. Voters look for authenticity and a feeling that a politician is real and gets it. Of course, authenticity can be gamed, but still, communicating plainly and without restraint are key ingredients to authenticity. A candidate who speaks like a consulting memo come to life isn’t going to cut it against a candidate like Trump who is out here saying “Democrats are America hating socialists who will ban cows.” The statement is a flagrant lie, but the language? Evocative. The message? Clear.
Our candidate’s language has to be equally clear and just as evocative if it’s to compete with Trump’s. That’s not to say we engage in an arms race of bombastic unfounded claims. But when running against a master bullshitter, we need to be bullish about clearing the shit. And that means not speaking like every adverb and noun you use was poll tested.
Instead, Democrats need to speak with that hot Targaryen fire. How hot should the speech be? Hot. Hot enough to burn the Trump campaign to the ground and use the charred remains as fertilizer for a 2024 re-election campaign. This is all metaphorical of course…But in all seriousness, for too long, Democrats have spoken around issues, between issues, and in place of issues instead of discussing problems head on.
In the end, I want to see Democrats on the linguistic offense. The point of politics, the whole point of a party seeking the power of the presidency is to use the power for good. Strength is a sign of strength. To win, your opponent must lose. A successful candidate must understand these maxims and effectively wield the powers of language and storytelling to win. The Right does this extremely well. They succeed in painting any prominent Democrat into socialist boogeymen out to steal their guns and force conservatives to gay marry in Spanish.
Democrats and a successful Presidential nominee need to borrow some of this energy. For instance, how we describe villains like Mitch McConnell should in plain and no uncertain terms describe the existential threat he is to the lives and livelihoods of millions of people. And yes, I do mean existential (see the power of language). If we think Donald Trump is a criminal who sells out the country for personal gain, speak on it as if you personally have been victimized by his behavior. That is to say with the righteous fury of a 1000 burning suns. If we believe climate change is a grave threat to life on Earth, describe the effects of 2 degrees of warming as if it’s happening right inside people’s living rooms. Democrats need to wield the power of language, own the storytelling, and take control of the narrative. It’s how to successfully combat Republican propaganda and inspire millions to come out and vote.
I am inspired by the Ida B Wells quote:
“The way to right wrongs is to turn the light of truth upon them.”
In 2020, let there be light, brought to you by fire language.
3-Be The Stunt Queen Who Lives for the Drama
The 45th President of the United States is a stunt queen who lives for the drama. Full stop. I hate to say it, but facts are facts. This is the one true constant about Donald Trump. He is a stunt queen who lives for the drama. He manufactures it too.
Some of you may be wondering what exactly does this mean?
A stunt queen is an individual who’s not afraid to do the most, be extra, exist perpetually on level 1000. Their motive? Attract attention, all of it. They do this by leaving people shook, flummoxed, perplexed, bamboozled. There is no moral judgement to being a stunt queen. It’s just a way of life or an ethos. Stunt queens simply act outside the boundaries of what we expect as normal and by doing so center themselves in the conversation. In the case of Trump, this means acting outside the bounds of democracy, the rule of law, and the norms set by the preceding 44 presidents.
The Democratic nominee needs to understand that their opponent is a shameless stunt queen who lives for the drama. And he is a damn good one too. I reference his recent ‘State of the Union’ where he engineered not 1, not 2, but 3 ready for TV moments. His MAGA rallies are really comedy shows where he roasts people and offers outlandish cultural takes.
The problem is the media loves Trump’s stunts. The drama is clickbait and good for business. From the day Trump descended that elevator like an off brand dementor and announced his candidacy the media fawned over him like moths to a flame. The drama, the tweets, the spats and controversies spurred traffic and made money, causing the media to cover Trump even more. And so the cycle continued till now we can’t turn on any major news network without hearing Trump’s name multiple times an hour. This earned media helps him by not only keeping him in the conversation, but also preventing his opponents’ message from breaking through.
Trump is news and makes news. It’s a power that Trump adeptly wields. He purposefully sows confusion, engineers scandals, and is needlessly incendiary, which all function to distract the people and worst yet, cause people to check out and stop caring.
A successful Democratic nominee needs to not only understand the current media landscape that acts as a megaphone for the stunt queen-in-chief, but also thrive in it. We need a candidate who is willing to be the Democratic version of a stunt queen who lives for the drama and shines light on the truth. This means our candidate should operate outside the bounds of how previous nominees behaved. Acting like a pre-2016, pre-social media nominee against Trump means that your message will be sidelined by his chaos.
A few Democrats are stunt queens and have successfully beat Trump and the conservatives in the media oxygen wars. AOC in particular does a fantastic job breaking through by describing a clear vision for what she stands for (Strategy 1) and articulating it in a way that’s digestible and punchy (Strategy 2). During the shutdown of 2019, when Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell, refused to hold a vote to fund the government, AOC and a bunch of freshmen Democrats went on a mission to find Mitch. The stunt was effective and highly satisfying as someone from the Bronx who loves the BX energy. Importantly, it drew attention to Mitch McConnell’s total abdication of his responsibilities during the government shutdown. In short, it made the news.
Recently, after Trump delivered his “manifesto of mistruths” aka the State of the Union, Nancy Pelosi ripped up his speech on national television. She effectively communicated to the base and the American people exactly how she felt about his address (🗣TRASH). We can argue about whether the action was civil and compare it to Trump’s decades of debauchery and crimes, but what we can not deny is that her simple action dominated the coverage, siphoned attention from an otherwise strong SOTU general election pitch, and projected strength and resistance from the Speaker. The base loved the stunt and the resulting gif immediately entered the GIF Hall of Fame.
“Madame Speaker, what is your response to the President’s Address?”
Speaker Pelosi
Ultimately, the Democratic candidate needs to not only directly communicate with voters through paid advertising, but also generate earned media by taking the microphone away from Trump and communicating the Democratic message. To do so, the candidates need to be well-versed in being a stunt-queen aka generating news.
What does this mean in practice? Some ideas include hosting a rally at a closed factory site, highlighting Trump’s failed promise to bring jobs back to America. Or maybe you organize a big speech when you know the president will be golfing. Coordinate the coverage so that the audience gets the split screen of the Democratic looking presidential and Trump wasting tax payer money. Trump has lots of bankrupt casinos and defunct businesses. Set up a campaign field office at one of them. Release footage of world leaders laughing at Trump while you are graciously welcomed by our allies. Trump has so many serious weaknesses that the media frankly does not report. There’s simply too much news. So it’s up to the candidate to creatively showcase them, shine a light on them, and stunt.
There are many ways to generate news that fits into a 2020 media ecosystem. A winning candidate should intuitively know how. We won’t need to play defense against Trump if we are on offense. And what makes for a good offense? A nimble, savvy, stunt queen candidate who lives for the drama.
Winning Everybody Everywhere with Everybody Everywhere
Defeating Donald Trump will not be easy. BasuraSwampMonsters are as resilient as they sound. But they are not invincible. We can fire the first reality TV show president with a nominee who can:
1) Articulate a bold, inspiring vision for the future
2) Speak plainly, truthfully, and with that hot Targaryen fire
3) Be a stunt queen who lives for the drama
Lastly, there is a fourth factor that’s absolutely essential to the Democratic nominee’s success.
Us. You and me. We are the secret ingredient here. Democracy is not a spectator sport. It requires us to stand up and use our voices to demand the change we wish to see in the world. In 2020, Democrats all across the country need to do what we can to support whoever the nominee is. From donations, to volunteering, to having tough but necessary conversations with family and friends. We are stronger together. Truly. The real answer to the question who can beat Donald Trump is us.
And so for the naysayers out there, pessimists, cynics, and enemies of progress who believe Democrats can’t win, I’ll leave you with three winning words:
Yes we can.
And will.
Sincerely,
Wahala Jr.
PS: If you’re disappointed that I didn’t state who I’m supporting, just know that I would vote for a block of expired tofu over Trump :).
If you like what you read, be sure to check out my other blog posts and follow me on Instagram @wahalajr
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