Thought experiment – a new scale
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez noted that our swing voters are not “the middle” but people who never voted before. Makes sense, but what does that really look like? What would it take for Democrats to stop chasing the mythical “center” and start putting some real energy into activating voters who would be inclined to vote for Democratic candidates on election day? My sense is that instead of “left, middle, right” we’d end up with a scale that looked something like this*.
0- Anti-Interested
1- Clueless Affinity
2- Passive Interest
3- Light Voter Level Interest
4- Semi-Regular Voter
5- Engaged Voter
6- Activist
The key would be to nudge everyone up one notch on the scale. This has happened in the past, but it has always been ad hoc. The Obama campaign, for example moved scores of voters on or two notches on the scale. [Likewise, the horrible Clinton campaign kicked millions of Ds down two notches.]
Also, Trump has worked to turn Dem 4’s (Semi-Regular Voters) into 5’s (Engaged Voters) and 5’s into 6’s – but is the pipeline being fed? Or are Dems like Carper, Pelosi and Schumer intentionally stopping up the wide end of the pipe with garbage?
We can’t afford to continue to rely on ad hoc events to move people up the scale. It needs to be an ongoing program.
*I know that campaigns use a 1-5 scale for GOTV efforts and when canvasing. This is similar but more interested in likelihood of voting, not a gauge of feelings about a particular candidate.
I’m buying into this.
It’s the opposite of the Chuck Schumer approach of doing everything possible not to upset the white suburban Republican “3s” or “4s”. This turns off almost everybody and, as you said, droves millions of Democrats down one or two notches.
Let’s try something that may work!
If you just look at the turnout results of our recent primary, it is obvious that many 2s & 3s were moved to take part in a primary for the first time.
Not stated is that Bernie, for all his flaws, moved many voters more than a few steps up the ladder. He dared to say the “S” word and to the surprise of every Coons & Carper on earth Americans loved it, Socialism now dares to speak it’s name. You don’t motivate people by placating groups that have no intention of supporting the party, a lesson lost on Schumer, the DNC and far too many others. Speaking of motivation I got my sorry old ass up and voted in the Dem primary for the first time, Kerrie and hatred of all things Carper are what did it. Ready to repeat the process for Coons.
True. Bernie won all of West Virginia’s 55 counties.
For a second I thought #5 said “enraged voters,” which we certainly have lots of this year. That’s my category right there.