Editordude: The following is but the beginning of a more longer piece by Peter Bohmer, a good friend of the Rag and former OBcean who now lives in Olympia, Washington.
by Peter Bohmer / November 21, 2024
Trump’s victory is a serious loss for most people in the United States and globally. I disagreed before the election and now, that it didn’t matter who won the Presidential election. Let us mourn and grieve but not give up. Elections matter and this one certainly does but being political means building and gaining power, being active to further what you believe in, much more than voting or supporting a candidate.
I don’t know if any campaign would have caused a Kamala Harris victory. However, her pro-Israel, anti-Palestinian positions, her pro fracking and promoting more oil and gas production by the U.S., and especially her promotion of neoliberal economic policies and not promoting raising the minimum wage, or making unionizing easier or advocating for universal, quality and affordable health care for all was wrong morally and tactically (to win).
Racism and certainly, sexism were a big factor in Trump’s victory, more below. It is hard to measure its influence on the election, but a proportion of the U.S. population is not willing to vote for a Black and Indian woman with immigrant parents for President. The Republicans also stoked and played into transphobia. Support for Trump’s toxic masculinity contributed to his growing support from 2016 to 2024 among young men; this was most pronounced among the non-college educated.
Perhaps most significant is the defection of working class and non-college educated households and individuals to Trump and the Republicans, first primarily along whites and increasingly among Latin@, Asian American and African-Americans. Among African Americans, the decline was primarily among men. Some of this was manifested in non-voting. Nonvoting increased significantly from the 2020 Presidential election. Nonvoting should not be exaggerated but my guess is that three million less will have voted in 2024 than in 2020 in spite of a voting age population that grew by four million. Much of the decline in voting was in areas that have been the most strongly Democratic, e.g. Chicago, New York, Detroit, Philadelphia, Los Angeles.
The recent election was not a landslide for Trump and the Republicans. They will continue their small majority in the United States House of Representatives and flip the Senate from 51 who vote Democratic to 49 Republicans to, 47 Democrats to 53 Republicans. Trump gained about three percentage points in the Presidential race, compared to 2020, from 47 to slightly below 50% of the vote, and Harris lost about three percentage points compared to Biden in 2020, from 51 to 48 per cent of those who voted. Including votes for third party presidential candidates, almost three million, Trump will have received slightly less than ½ of the votes of those who voted.
Even if Harris had won by a small margin much of the following is still relevant. In this period, where the threat of fascism must be taken seriously and combated, the concept of non-reformist reforms or reform and revolution is still applicable.
The idea is to organize, develop campaigns to have victories that at least partially meet people’s felt needs, that can’t be fully met in a capitalist society, leading to further demands, that build political consciousness and power from below. An example would be winning a campaign for free public transportation with worker and community control of the transit company. A challenge and priority today are the need to prevent further declines in all forms of justice and programs, e.g., Medicaid, and stop attacks on the most vulnerable while organizing to go beyond the status quo.
Key is building and furthering social movements, organizations, developing ongoing campaigns with a focus on the struggles we need to take up. Victories, even partial victories and substantial reforms will be more difficult with the Republicans rather than the Democrats controlling the Presidency, U.S. Senate, the House of Representatives and the Supreme Court but still possible. Hopefully this control will be temporary but let us not put most of our energy and limited resources towards getting Democrats elected in 2026 and 2028.
The results of California’s 2024 elections should be a wake-up call for the Democratic Party. While California remains under Democratic control, the election outcomes reveal an undeniable shift in the electorate. Voters are increasingly rejecting the progressive policies that have dominated our state and are clamoring for more pragmatic, results-driven solutions—many of which are traditionally associated with the Republican Party.
On critical issues like crime, public safety, and affordability, Californians have sent a clear message: they want effective governance that addresses their everyday struggles. The overwhelming support for measures like Proposition 36, which reversed parts of Proposition 47, shows voters’ desire for stronger enforcement of the law. Likewise, the rejection of rent control and minimum wage increases demonstrates a preference for policies that empower small businesses and ease the cost of living, not exacerbate it.
The Democratic Party must listen to this shift. The voters are not rejecting the principles of fairness or compassion; they are rejecting policies that have failed to deliver on those promises. If the party continues to push ideologically driven agendas that ignore the practical needs of working-class families, it risks losing the trust of voters who, though not yet identifying with the Republican Party, are increasingly leaning toward its common-sense solutions.
This is a critical moment for the Democratic Party to reassess its approach. To remain a viable force in California, Democrats must champion policies that prioritize public safety, economic opportunity, and fiscal responsibility—values that are essential for the future of our state.
I will add that I have emailed the San Diego County Democratic Party twice with comments and suggestions following the election and have not heard back from them at all.
As a result, I have changed my party affiliation from Democrat to Republican. If you can’t beat them, join them! At least they return emails, at least so far. If the Democrats do not want to hear from registered Democrats, then I guess they would prefer to lose the next several elections as well.
You switched parties because Democrats wouldn’t return your emails and now have registered Republican, a party that hasn’t won a state-wide election in how many years?
You switched parties because the Dems aren’t listening to the people, the voters. Well, the Republicans in California haven’t been listening to the voters for a couple of decades now.
At least California Republicans are not nearly as bad as Republicans here in Texas. An awful lot of California Republicans move here because they get fed up with California politics. Some of them fit right in. Others are freaked out at just how evil the Republicans are here. Texas is turning purple , but I just don’t see that happening in California.
I had to read the last sentence of this article several times to make sure I understood correctly what was being stated. What’s notable is that it appears to be written in future tense when, in reality, it’s been in practice already in past tense