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A schism is opening up between two hyper-networked cohorts of millennials over how to steer the Democratic Party. | Bryan Anselm for POLITICO | Two self-proclaimed socialists walk up to a bar in Manhattan. They order the most popular cocktail, then the second most popular. The topic of conversation? How to save the Democratic party. Let's back up: Before they were sipping those drinks in NYC, data science prodigy David Shor and activist-turned-2020-Biden-campaign-adviser Sean McElwee used to sound unimpeachably progressive. Shor still keeps a rose emoji in his bio, and the extremely online among you will recognize McElwee as the guy who almost single-handedly tweeted "abolish ICE" into litmus-test status. But the two have blown up their reputation with big factions of the progressive left, joining a counter-revolution in the Democratic Party that advocates for what they consider a pragmatic, winning approach. The basic idea: hammer the most broadly favored goals — like legalizing marijuana, statehood for D.C. and raising wages — and lay off the so-called identity issues college-educated elites prioritize but that fail to win over a majority of voters. More talk about "tax the rich," and less about police violence and ensuring trans women can play sports that match their gender identity. "People say, 'Oh, Democrats are the party of eggheads, they don't talk about values, they talk about issues,'" Shor said, imitating a whiny Democrat. "The reason we don't talk about values is that our values are really strange and weird. Only 20 percent of the electorate cares about our values." But many of their fellow millennials on the left argue that approach is essentially a middle finger to the party's most loyal and long-suffering voters. "David works very hard to steer the party toward a neoliberal way of doing things and towards a fight with large parts of our coalition," says former Harry Reid aide Adam Jentleson. "This inevitably means punching down, usually at Black and brown activists." This intra-party schism among a generation that increasingly staffs Democratic campaigns and organizations is widening — and how it's resolved will determine the future of the Democrats. David Freedlander has the booze-soaked story.
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| "I never attacked him on his looks — and believe me, there is plenty of subject matter there." Can you guess who said this about Sen. Rand Paul in 2015? Scroll to the bottom for the answer.**
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The destruction of the city of Lawrence, Kansas, and the massacre of its inhabitants by the Rebel guerrillas, August 21, 1863. Quantrill's Raid. | Wikimedia Commons | America the Bloody … The recent attack on Paul Pelosi is a stark reminder that violence is a feature, not a bug, of our politics. In particular, the violence of today bears a striking resemblance to the 1850s, when conservative, pro-slavery Southern Democrats wielded violence to subvert the will of the majority. How that majority came to respond with force of its own carries important lessons for the present, writes historian Josh Zeitz .
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| 60 percent … of Republican women voters are skipping the World Series on TV, along with 55 percent of Democratic women, 38 percent of Republican men and 43 percent of Democratic men.
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These Michigan voters don't agree on abortion — but they do agree it's the No. 1 reason to vote next week. | Sarah Rice for POLITICO | Portrait of an Abortion Voter … When the Supreme Court overturned Roe, it also upended American politics. But the abortion debate is particularly explosive in Michigan, where voters are considering a referendum to protect the right to abortion and facing a governor's race that has put reproductive rights front and center. In this photo essay by Sarah Rice, Alice Miranda Ollstein talks to nine voters who might disagree with each other on abortion but agree that it's the No. 1 reason to cast a ballot next week.
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| Next week's midterms could be a final referendum on several political archetypes that might go the way of the dodo. While your friends argue about about the likely "red wave" in the House or who will control the Senate, show off your granular political knowledge by analyzing the midterms' possible effect on these politically endangered species: - Your first topic of conversation: Texas' 28th, where Republican Cassy Garcia is going after Rep. Henry Cuellar, the last House Democrat to oppose abortion rights. A Cuellar win would make all that Democratic campaign messaging about Dobbs hit a little different. - While your friends watch the Georgia Senate race, you'll be watching the 13 Democratic House candidates running in districts the party controlled in 2022 but Trump won in 2020, like Wisconsin's 3rd, Maine's 2nd or Tennessee's 5th. Will split districts ever become as common as they were in 1984, when 43.7 percent of districts went mixed? Or are you betting 2020's 6.2 percent will drop toward the harsh divisions of 1904, when only 1.6 percent of districts split their tickets? - Could we be so far removed from 2018 that the rising stars of that long-ago year are already burning out? Keep an eye on Democrats who won the limelight four years ago but now face serious Republican threats, like Virginia's Abigail Spanberger, and especially those who took a hit in redistricting, like Susan Wild in Pennsylvania or Cindy Axne in Iowa. - Of the 10 Republicans who voted to impeach Trump, only two remain standing, and they could fall in the midterms. The fates of David Valadao — who's in a highly competitive race in California — and Dan Newhouse — who's predicted to hold on in Washington state — will determine whether the House GOP keeps the Never-Trump light just barely alive or snuffs it out entirely.
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POLITICO illustration/Photo by Meiying Wu | Nobody's 'Good Girl' … This past year, says UN Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield, someone told her: "When you were selected for this position, we thought you were going to be a good girl." "Whoa!" replies ONE Campaign CEO Gayle Smith. They sat down for an unfiltered and wide-ranging conversation about women in politics, policy and activism , covering everything from the protests in Iran — "We need to applaud those women" — to why women would have handled the pandemic better — "I tend to think women are pretty good at process, and managing a global pandemic is a lot of process." Their takeaway: Today's young women are building a better world.
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kemtiques/eBay | Everyone knows that politics is a game of chess. Sometimes literally. Fifty years ago, during the excitement of the 1972 election, a chess set was created by a firm called "The Contemporary Game" that saw a market in chess pieces modeled after political operatives. Frankly, it's hard to know which side looks scarier, the Democrats (with the pawns designed to look like ominous donkeys), or the Republicans, a strange combination of heavy jowls and angel wings. As we celebrate the 50th anniversary, you can own this, um, unique piece of political history for $49.95 on eBay . (From historian Ted Widmer.)
| | | **Who Dissed answer: Who else but Donald Trump? He dropped this zinger during the second Republican primary debate. politicoweekend@email.politico.com | | | | Follow us | | | | |
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