Blue Rose Research, the firm led by Democratic establishment darling David Shor, produced a memo earlier this month digging into the effectiveness of various messages related to Trump’s takeover of Washington, D.C. The firm advised that messaging around Trump’s “rising authoritarianism” was “highly unconvincing,” while messages that say Trump wants to “distract” from his damaging tariffs or horrifying Medicaid cuts were more effective. Meanwhile, Republican messaging about how Trump is clamping down on gang violence tested through the roof.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) was asked Sunday on CNN what the party’s plan is to fight the president sending troops into Chicago. He only offered that Trump has no authority to do this, and that he supports the men and women working in law enforcement. He also, as the Blue Rose memo suggested is effective, cast the federal takeover as a “distraction” from Trump’s unpopular policies. Jeffries didn’t seem too worked up about any of this, delivering his talking points with a complacency that certainly did not bely that the United States is currently experiencing a militarized dismantling of representative democracy.
As someone who followed the russian “opposition” relatively closely, the similarity with the current US opposition (perhaps not all of them) is striking.
The russian opposition wanted to have their cake and eat it too. Allegedly opposing putin, but still supporting russian imperialism (supporting the annexation of Crimea). Why would the average russian choose them over the real deal?
They were simply unwilling to deal with reality and admit that at this point the only options remaining is violent resistance. there will never be a Disney style outcome in russia where magically it will become democratic and the opposition will win.
US opposition is also unwilling to tell their constituents that if they are truly opposed to the current oligarchic regime, they will have to make sacrifices. It’s just how the world works, nothing comes easy.