Having a moderately favorable view of socialist policies does not mean you necessarily want the party to move in that direction. They can be mutually exclusive. I have a modestly positive view of democratic socialism but I also don’t think the party needs to or should move in a socialist direction on the whole. I believe winning elections is more important and we need to let local politicians take positions that might be unpopular with national democrats in order to win seats.
Likewise someone can believe that the party needs to move to the center to win elections, believe the current party platform is properly in the middle of the left and right wings of the party for their own personal belief system, and still have a favorable view of socialism. None of these things are mutually exclusive like the headline would like you to believe.
Perhaps a more interesting poll would be to ask independent or centrist voters of all parties who voted for republicans instead of democrats in 2024 what would the Democratic party have to have looked like in order to have won their vote.
Is it possible respondents to these polls conflate cultural issues with economic ones? I, for example have grown increasingly populist on economic issues but really wish Democrats would jettison a lot of their culturally progressive positions in favor of much greater tolerance for a broad range of viewpoints.
Excellent piece, GEM. Thank you for pulling back the curtain on pollsters' questions.
While I don't understand statistics at all, I have a little experience with "polling" in the sense of formulating college-level course evaluations. I used to write/edit the ones that our Social Sciences department used, and getting any meaningful info out of the students' responses was really tricky.
Your statement that most informed people (elites in your words) would have a consistent understanding of socialism is not likely. The Republicans throw around the term to describe Democracts, but what does it really mean in the US context today? Government run programs like social security and medicare as we have today? Or more programs run by the government? How much more? Does it mean progressive taxation; more progressive taxation? Or does it mean more the Marxian definition of government control of the means of production? I think asking what people mean by socialism is meaningless because everyone has a different idea or it is just a catch word that has a negative connotation. It is the policies these polls need to ask about - and how to pay for them.
I hope that at some point soon you take on how the Dems should take on the issue of the exploding US fiscal deficit and national debt. The utter hypocrisy of the Republicans on this issue is staggering and an increasing number of Dems are parroting tax-cut schemes that will deepen the problem. So it feels like a tricky trap electorally. But interest on the debt is already over $1 trillion per year and 15 percent of all spending. We have little fiscal space to manage a recession or serious health care needs and shoring up Social Security is critical. This poll mentions a middle class tax cut as a policy preference….but federal income taxes need to go UP for many Americans….not-just the “over $250,000” crowd…to start to stabilize things. Would a brave, Clinton-style tax increase be viable?
Well, when the very wealthy pay almost no taxes and get big tax breaks, there will be a deficit. I don't know of any Democrats parroting tax-cut schemes.
Absolutely, Marliss. The top .00001 percent are all borrowing against their assets (largely stock portfolios) at low interest rates to fund their conspicuous consumption. A few Democrats, largely in the Senate, are proposing bills that would lower middle class taxes while raising taxes on the $1 million and up income crowd. What's annoying is that without a wealth tax (which is fiendishly difficult to implement) the really top plutocrats will skate along while continuing to oppose any tax increases. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/tax-cuts-are-hot-new-idea-democrats-candidates-2026-2028-rcna264454
I think they should definitely take it on, but in a very pro-active way. The fact is, the debt crisis is a crisis artificially manufactured - by greed. The deficits exist because the ultra rich have been taking all the money in tax cuts while waging war on the idea of government that does things for its constituents (FDR style). The tax cuts create deficits THEN the Rs have used those deficits AS AN EXCUSE to attack every single social program that helps people. It's been an outrageous con job. I think the American people are starting to understand it now, and are ready for straight talk about attacking greed head on. So if the Democrats take this tack, we can erase the deficit and have the social services we need. But a lot of the ultra wealthy will have a lot less money.
Wait! That's not fair! (you may cry). Sure it is. The social contributions of billionaires are way overblown. Example: Amazon. Jeff Bezos will say he's created 850,000 jobs. But none of those workers can live a decent life - or in some cases, at all - on what he pays them. Why? Because he pays them as little as he can get away with - minimum wage. And as minimum wage has suppressed for the last 3 decades (until the recent jump, which is modest). at the same time billionaires have gotten more and more and more and more tax cuts.
I urge you to take a look at the cost of living in any of the top 20 US markets and see if you could live there on $15 an hour. It's impossible. A FT job should be a job you can live on. A minimum wage that reflects that inthe top 20 markets would be anywhere from $35-50 an hour.
I do agree we should dramatically reduce the deficits, and it's better long-term for the country that it be much smaller. But let's reduce the deficit by taking back money that never should hve been stolen from the American people in the first place.
George, I agree. The “starve the beast” strategy has been around since the Reagan era. But it has morphed into something more toxic with R’s championing incessant and destructive tax and program cuts (OBBB in particular but also the TCJA of Trump’s first term) while D’s tolerate massive borrowing and exploding deficits to try to preserve what’s left of our weak safety net. We are setting ourselves up to destabilize the global market for US Treasuries…a massive own-goal. The politically driven “ no tax on tips” and tax cuts for seniors provisions are two additional toxic traps for Dems…both will sunset after 2028. And it’s worth noting that this is a worldwide problem…big deficits are common across the countries of the G-12, even those with high taxes. There’s a route out of this mess but it will take a shift in how voters see the salience of deficits as a fundamental threat to our prosperity. And the days are gone when Reagan and Tip O’Neill could hobnob a bit and cut a deal to RAISE taxes.
It's always "Dems need to move to the center." Meanwhile, we have a pro-autocracy party. is it being advised to move to the center, be more moderate? Fvck no! Pundits & msm are so freaking worthless.
You touch on a number of important points that bear more exploration. One is the "why" question. Do Democratic voters (defined how) who say that they want the party to move to a non-existent center say so because they are opposed to what they see as the current direction of the party, or because they fear that more right-leaning voters will be? Another, is that it's hard to parse the numbers because no position has a majority, only a plurality. It would be valuable to know what percentage of respondents saying they were in favor of socialism also wanted the party to move more to the center, and might help answer the first question.
However, I'm not sure that in practical terms, all of this is not a canard. Unless we believe that Mills voters who have their doubts about Platner will really not turn out in November or will vote for Collins, in the present circumstance, people calling themselves Democrats will vote for the Democratic candidate. The only really important positions are those of the largest group, the unaffiliated. And here, as you point out, the questions need to be put concretely, in policy terms, rather than as vague concepts. i.e. taxing the rich and corporations; funneling money from the social safety net to DHS and the Pentagon; engaging in discretionary military actions around the world; aggressive and violent enforcement of immigration policy, etc.
As the writer certainly knows, the concept of making sure your measures measure what you want them to is called experimental or construct validity. It is good to see a political writer pay attention to this for once. I have been following politics since the 1980s and pundits have been beating Democrats over the head with the "left or center" question since at least that time. As far as I can tell, the whole argument has never done Democrats any good. Stop working about bullshit labels and start focusing more on what people what, like affordability, ending corruption ( and be specific. Trump gives lots of concrete examples), reducing debt, staying out of stupid wars etc.
"Finally, nearly a third of the Democratic supporters couldn’t tell the Times what they thought about socialism — a concept considered pretty basic among most elites."
I would venture that most people don't know how to define the trigger word "socialism" especially if you are modifying it with "Democratic": Democratic socialism is just capitalism + regulation + a strong social safety net, as they do in Nordic countries.
It's not even really helpful to use "left", "right", and "center", unless you clearly define those terms before asking poll participants to rate themselves based on those terms.
I am a believer in your analysis of where we are as an electorate. What do you make of the CA Governor election? It appears Dems went safe with a politically moderate candidate, funded by large corporations. I realize that 61 candidates on the ballot had to have an impact, but I wonder about the centrist winning. Enjoy being a Dad!
"Based on focus groups, anecdotal data, and common sense, it seems like people are pissed at the party for losing the 2024 election and not doing a better job of standing up to Trump. This is why Democrats are simultaneously telling pollsters that their party sucks and then voting for that same party at every opportunity like their lives depend on it (and they may)."
We risk over-complicating things here.
People are unhappy with our party because WE ARE OUT OF POWER.
Simultaneously, it's a lot harder to "stand up to Trump" when he has the House, the Senate, the Whitehouse, and the Supreme Court to weaponize for the interests of his MAGA cultists and tech billionaires.
The real meaningful polls will begin in January of 2027, when we regain the House and Senate. Then it will be critical for Dems to have priorities that will MAKE LIFE BETTER for their voters ASAP.
Reverse the tariffs. Reverse the Medicaid cuts. Renew the ACA subsidies. Release the rest of the Epstein files. (Trump can't veto that one.) That will get us started.
Then promise to tackle Citizens United, so we can put power back into the hands of the PEOPLE, and out of the greedy hands of the Epstein class.
IMO, this is Elliott’s “weak/strong” axis writ large. Folks care less about policy specifics than they do about a party that fights with tools a whole lot more forceful than Chuck Schumer’s now infamous “strongly worded letter.” The Republicans understand that they’re fighting an existential struggle for the future of the country—and are behaving accordingly. The Democrats…not so much. That’s my single biggest concern. Next to it, all the fussy policy questions fade into insignificance.
Why isn't the right answer that "move to the center" is referring to hot button culture war issues, while the "be more socialist" and "we like the left" stuff is talking about economics and Bernie issues?
Exactly. This is why we should poll individual issues. “Left”, “Right”, and “Moderate/Center” labels are not only individually subjective, they’re also being interpreted categorically.
Totally. I feel like the thing we should tentatively conclude is just that the party is doing *something* unpopular that could conceivably be described as being"too far from the center."
Having a moderately favorable view of socialist policies does not mean you necessarily want the party to move in that direction. They can be mutually exclusive. I have a modestly positive view of democratic socialism but I also don’t think the party needs to or should move in a socialist direction on the whole. I believe winning elections is more important and we need to let local politicians take positions that might be unpopular with national democrats in order to win seats.
Likewise someone can believe that the party needs to move to the center to win elections, believe the current party platform is properly in the middle of the left and right wings of the party for their own personal belief system, and still have a favorable view of socialism. None of these things are mutually exclusive like the headline would like you to believe.
Perhaps a more interesting poll would be to ask independent or centrist voters of all parties who voted for republicans instead of democrats in 2024 what would the Democratic party have to have looked like in order to have won their vote.
Is it possible respondents to these polls conflate cultural issues with economic ones? I, for example have grown increasingly populist on economic issues but really wish Democrats would jettison a lot of their culturally progressive positions in favor of much greater tolerance for a broad range of viewpoints.
Next, ask the respondents what they think socialism means. And then, ask them whether they think there is socialism in the US today.
Twice the wrong year is given: 2024 instead of 2026. Fix it.
When every pundit spends 16 months saying Democrats should tack to the middle to win in 2024
------------------------------------------
One such organization is the Times itself, which by my count has published a dozen articles arguing the party should run to the center to win in 2024
Excellent piece, GEM. Thank you for pulling back the curtain on pollsters' questions.
While I don't understand statistics at all, I have a little experience with "polling" in the sense of formulating college-level course evaluations. I used to write/edit the ones that our Social Sciences department used, and getting any meaningful info out of the students' responses was really tricky.
Your statement that most informed people (elites in your words) would have a consistent understanding of socialism is not likely. The Republicans throw around the term to describe Democracts, but what does it really mean in the US context today? Government run programs like social security and medicare as we have today? Or more programs run by the government? How much more? Does it mean progressive taxation; more progressive taxation? Or does it mean more the Marxian definition of government control of the means of production? I think asking what people mean by socialism is meaningless because everyone has a different idea or it is just a catch word that has a negative connotation. It is the policies these polls need to ask about - and how to pay for them.
Thank you for writing this. This was exactly the point I raised yesterday in a comment to another post
I hope that at some point soon you take on how the Dems should take on the issue of the exploding US fiscal deficit and national debt. The utter hypocrisy of the Republicans on this issue is staggering and an increasing number of Dems are parroting tax-cut schemes that will deepen the problem. So it feels like a tricky trap electorally. But interest on the debt is already over $1 trillion per year and 15 percent of all spending. We have little fiscal space to manage a recession or serious health care needs and shoring up Social Security is critical. This poll mentions a middle class tax cut as a policy preference….but federal income taxes need to go UP for many Americans….not-just the “over $250,000” crowd…to start to stabilize things. Would a brave, Clinton-style tax increase be viable?
Well, when the very wealthy pay almost no taxes and get big tax breaks, there will be a deficit. I don't know of any Democrats parroting tax-cut schemes.
Absolutely, Marliss. The top .00001 percent are all borrowing against their assets (largely stock portfolios) at low interest rates to fund their conspicuous consumption. A few Democrats, largely in the Senate, are proposing bills that would lower middle class taxes while raising taxes on the $1 million and up income crowd. What's annoying is that without a wealth tax (which is fiendishly difficult to implement) the really top plutocrats will skate along while continuing to oppose any tax increases. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/tax-cuts-are-hot-new-idea-democrats-candidates-2026-2028-rcna264454
I think they should definitely take it on, but in a very pro-active way. The fact is, the debt crisis is a crisis artificially manufactured - by greed. The deficits exist because the ultra rich have been taking all the money in tax cuts while waging war on the idea of government that does things for its constituents (FDR style). The tax cuts create deficits THEN the Rs have used those deficits AS AN EXCUSE to attack every single social program that helps people. It's been an outrageous con job. I think the American people are starting to understand it now, and are ready for straight talk about attacking greed head on. So if the Democrats take this tack, we can erase the deficit and have the social services we need. But a lot of the ultra wealthy will have a lot less money.
Wait! That's not fair! (you may cry). Sure it is. The social contributions of billionaires are way overblown. Example: Amazon. Jeff Bezos will say he's created 850,000 jobs. But none of those workers can live a decent life - or in some cases, at all - on what he pays them. Why? Because he pays them as little as he can get away with - minimum wage. And as minimum wage has suppressed for the last 3 decades (until the recent jump, which is modest). at the same time billionaires have gotten more and more and more and more tax cuts.
I urge you to take a look at the cost of living in any of the top 20 US markets and see if you could live there on $15 an hour. It's impossible. A FT job should be a job you can live on. A minimum wage that reflects that inthe top 20 markets would be anywhere from $35-50 an hour.
I do agree we should dramatically reduce the deficits, and it's better long-term for the country that it be much smaller. But let's reduce the deficit by taking back money that never should hve been stolen from the American people in the first place.
George, I agree. The “starve the beast” strategy has been around since the Reagan era. But it has morphed into something more toxic with R’s championing incessant and destructive tax and program cuts (OBBB in particular but also the TCJA of Trump’s first term) while D’s tolerate massive borrowing and exploding deficits to try to preserve what’s left of our weak safety net. We are setting ourselves up to destabilize the global market for US Treasuries…a massive own-goal. The politically driven “ no tax on tips” and tax cuts for seniors provisions are two additional toxic traps for Dems…both will sunset after 2028. And it’s worth noting that this is a worldwide problem…big deficits are common across the countries of the G-12, even those with high taxes. There’s a route out of this mess but it will take a shift in how voters see the salience of deficits as a fundamental threat to our prosperity. And the days are gone when Reagan and Tip O’Neill could hobnob a bit and cut a deal to RAISE taxes.
Good idea!
It's always "Dems need to move to the center." Meanwhile, we have a pro-autocracy party. is it being advised to move to the center, be more moderate? Fvck no! Pundits & msm are so freaking worthless.
You touch on a number of important points that bear more exploration. One is the "why" question. Do Democratic voters (defined how) who say that they want the party to move to a non-existent center say so because they are opposed to what they see as the current direction of the party, or because they fear that more right-leaning voters will be? Another, is that it's hard to parse the numbers because no position has a majority, only a plurality. It would be valuable to know what percentage of respondents saying they were in favor of socialism also wanted the party to move more to the center, and might help answer the first question.
However, I'm not sure that in practical terms, all of this is not a canard. Unless we believe that Mills voters who have their doubts about Platner will really not turn out in November or will vote for Collins, in the present circumstance, people calling themselves Democrats will vote for the Democratic candidate. The only really important positions are those of the largest group, the unaffiliated. And here, as you point out, the questions need to be put concretely, in policy terms, rather than as vague concepts. i.e. taxing the rich and corporations; funneling money from the social safety net to DHS and the Pentagon; engaging in discretionary military actions around the world; aggressive and violent enforcement of immigration policy, etc.
As the writer certainly knows, the concept of making sure your measures measure what you want them to is called experimental or construct validity. It is good to see a political writer pay attention to this for once. I have been following politics since the 1980s and pundits have been beating Democrats over the head with the "left or center" question since at least that time. As far as I can tell, the whole argument has never done Democrats any good. Stop working about bullshit labels and start focusing more on what people what, like affordability, ending corruption ( and be specific. Trump gives lots of concrete examples), reducing debt, staying out of stupid wars etc.
Very incisive piece, Elliot. Keep them coming.
"We'll use your tax dollars to expand access to affordable health care, not coat a horse statue in gold."
"Finally, nearly a third of the Democratic supporters couldn’t tell the Times what they thought about socialism — a concept considered pretty basic among most elites."
I would venture that most people don't know how to define the trigger word "socialism" especially if you are modifying it with "Democratic": Democratic socialism is just capitalism + regulation + a strong social safety net, as they do in Nordic countries.
It's not even really helpful to use "left", "right", and "center", unless you clearly define those terms before asking poll participants to rate themselves based on those terms.
I am a believer in your analysis of where we are as an electorate. What do you make of the CA Governor election? It appears Dems went safe with a politically moderate candidate, funded by large corporations. I realize that 61 candidates on the ballot had to have an impact, but I wonder about the centrist winning. Enjoy being a Dad!
From the Dan Pfeiffer newsletter:
"Based on focus groups, anecdotal data, and common sense, it seems like people are pissed at the party for losing the 2024 election and not doing a better job of standing up to Trump. This is why Democrats are simultaneously telling pollsters that their party sucks and then voting for that same party at every opportunity like their lives depend on it (and they may)."
We risk over-complicating things here.
People are unhappy with our party because WE ARE OUT OF POWER.
Simultaneously, it's a lot harder to "stand up to Trump" when he has the House, the Senate, the Whitehouse, and the Supreme Court to weaponize for the interests of his MAGA cultists and tech billionaires.
The real meaningful polls will begin in January of 2027, when we regain the House and Senate. Then it will be critical for Dems to have priorities that will MAKE LIFE BETTER for their voters ASAP.
Reverse the tariffs. Reverse the Medicaid cuts. Renew the ACA subsidies. Release the rest of the Epstein files. (Trump can't veto that one.) That will get us started.
Then promise to tackle Citizens United, so we can put power back into the hands of the PEOPLE, and out of the greedy hands of the Epstein class.
IMO, this is Elliott’s “weak/strong” axis writ large. Folks care less about policy specifics than they do about a party that fights with tools a whole lot more forceful than Chuck Schumer’s now infamous “strongly worded letter.” The Republicans understand that they’re fighting an existential struggle for the future of the country—and are behaving accordingly. The Democrats…not so much. That’s my single biggest concern. Next to it, all the fussy policy questions fade into insignificance.
And don't forget to 86 the E.C.!
Why isn't the right answer that "move to the center" is referring to hot button culture war issues, while the "be more socialist" and "we like the left" stuff is talking about economics and Bernie issues?
Exactly. This is why we should poll individual issues. “Left”, “Right”, and “Moderate/Center” labels are not only individually subjective, they’re also being interpreted categorically.
That might be true! But this poll doesn’t tell us either way.
Totally. I feel like the thing we should tentatively conclude is just that the party is doing *something* unpopular that could conceivably be described as being"too far from the center."