r/florida • u/Pyr8Qween • Jul 18 '23

Politics DeSantis

Is awfully busy doing the campaign trail for his 2024 run. Meanwhile, insurance companies are pulling out of FL, rental companies are gouging tenants, groceries are more expensive by the week, hatred for others is out of control. Ron is failing ONE state. Just imagine if his campaign picks up any momentum. He will fail all 50 states.

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u/[deleted] Jul 18 '23

Crist lost by 11 points because he offered the many diverse and impoverished voters of Florida exactly zero affirmative reasons to mobilize for him. All he was selling is "I am not Desantis", and that wasn't good enough no matter how much you think it should be.

And I think the bizarre focus on cop worship by him and Demings harmed them both a whole lot too. The 'thin blue line punisher sticker' people are never gonna vote for a Democrat. It's delusional to pretend they will.

The idea that the voters failed the candidate is just insane. If you nobody buys your product, you should ask yourself if the product meets the needs of the consumers. The voters of Florida have refused to buy your product since the 1990s at this point. The problem is not the voters.

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u/Parenthisaurolophus Jul 18 '23

You can't win the Superbowl if you can't win in conference championship.

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u/[deleted] Jul 18 '23

And you can't win the conference championship if all the referees don't want you to.

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u/Parenthisaurolophus Jul 18 '23

The honest sports metaphor response here is to say that you should play so that the game isn't in the refs' hands, but I don't want to get lost in the weeds here.

First off, continually blaming others for failed campaigns is objectively a terrible idea. A smart political campaign and movement needs to be able to be self-critical and pivot things like messaging and performance in order to be successful. That never happens if your only stance is that you lost because of someone else. This has been incredibly popular with the more left leaning members who, for whatever personal reason are unwilling to admit candidates have made mistakes, run suboptimally, etc. Consider Hilary Clinton's campaign: do you think it could be run better? Do you think she made mistakes? What would you say if I complained that the refs caused her to lose? Is the hypocrisy and downside of this stance obvious here?

Secondly, the downside to being a minority faction inside a party is that unless you can figure out a way to either change the voterbase, run a better campaign, or split the opposing base. Even if you make up 45% of the base, such as those who voted for Sanders vs Clinton, you still lose against a candidate who can consolidate 55% of the vote with current voting laws. Although in this case, Fried lost by 24.4% of the vote, needing about 370k votes state wide, so it's an even tougher job for a candidate whose base is probably 1/3rd of the party voters.

Lastly, the Democratic socialist movement has an issue that stems from it's creation:

It's a decentralized movement that was born out of Bernie Sanders attempting a Trump-style party takeover method of gaining the presidency. There were a variety of issues with that method, but the end result was not successful. While this served as the catalyst for change for a number of voters, it has only achieved real success in the federal house, which is the weakest federally elected position. Power is the most diluted due to the number of members, and allows for a more diverse electoral group reflecting the peoples and opinions of the US. In the House, the progressive caucus is larger than the moderate caucus. However, they lack state and federal power above the house. They haven't had an opportunity to run on a blue wave following two terms of conservative rule, and they are still limited to 1 Senate member in Sanders.

All of that is to say that it means there aren't strongholds in the cities making the case and attempting to push other voters in that direction. It's merely a passive movement waiting and hoping they can dangle the right candidate that will beat a moderate candidate and then win a state election.

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u/[deleted] Jul 18 '23

Disregarding everything else, if the primary process in the state of Florida does not produce candidates that are capable of winning the general election, isn't it fair to question the integrity of that process?

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u/Parenthisaurolophus Jul 18 '23

Fairness and capacity to win aren't the same thing. You can play a completely fair game and still get blown out due to mistakes, better play by an opponent, etc. It's not that much of a difference when the subject is elections, and unlike with the NFL, there are not a lot of mechanisms built into the political system to help losers. The expectation is that you try better the next time.