POLL: 52 Percent Of Americans Think Democratic Party Just Stands Against Trump

According to a new poll by The Washington Post and ABC, over half of Americans believe the current Democratic Party doesn’t stand for anything besides resisting President Trump.

The poll asked 1,001 Americans, “Do you think the Democratic Party currently stands for something, or just stands against Trump?”

Only 37 percent of respondents believed that the Democratic Party “stands for something,” while 52 percent of respondents said the party “just stands against Trump.”

The apparent messaging problem was even starker among registered voters, of which only 35 percent felt the Democrats stand for something while 54 percent felt they only stand against Trump.

The poll was taken between July 10-13 and surveyed more Democrats than Republicans. 35 percent of respondents identified themselves as Democrats, 23 percent as Republicans, and 35 percent as Independent.

Some Democrats are starting to sound the alarm bells, warning their party that the anti-Trump messaging isn’t attracting voters.

http://dailycaller.com/2017/07/17/poll- ... nst-trump/

Democrats split over core message to voters as 2018 midterms loom

NEW YORK -- House Democratic Caucus Chairman Joe Crowley hesitated when asked about his party's core message to voters.

"That message is being worked on," the New York congressman said in an interview this past week. "We're doing everything we can to simplify it, but at the same time provide the meat behind it as well. So that's coming together now."

The admission from the No. 4 House Democrat - that his party lacks a clear, core message even amid Republican disarray - highlights the Democrats' dilemma eight months after President Donald Trump and the GOP dominated last fall's elections, in part, because Democrats lacked a consistent message.

The soul-searching comes as Democrats look to flip at least 24 GOP-held seats necessary for a House majority and cut into Republican advantages in U.S. statehouses in the 2018 midterm elections. Yet with a Russia scandal engulfing the White House, a historically unpopular health-care plan wrenching Capitol Hill and no major GOP legislative achievement, Democrats are still struggling to tell voters what their party stands for.

Some want to rally behind calls to impeach the Republican president as new evidence indicates possible collusion between Trump's campaign and the Russian government. Democratic leaders are reluctant to pursue that approach as it only energizes the GOP base. Others want Democrats to focus on the GOP's plans to strip health insurance from millions of Americans. And still others say those arguments can be fashioned into a simplified brand.

"The Democratic Party needs to up its game," national Party Chairman Tom Perez said in a speech this week. "What I hear most from people is, 'Tom, we not only need to organize, but we need to articulate clearly what we stand for.'"

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/democrats-s ... erms-loom/

proudfootz wrote:It appears Al Gore came out for single payer health care.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/al- ... b3d0f3ec88

I suppose it makes it easier to take a stand when you aren't standing for election.

“I think we’ve reached a point where the entire health care system is in impending crisis,” Gore said at an ABC News panel at the time. “I have reluctantly come to the conclusion that we should begin drafting a single-payer national health insurance plan.”

As congressional lawmakers feuded over the fate of the nation’s health care system, insurance giant UnitedHealth Group reported stellar second-quarter earnings, which included more than $15.8 billion in revenue for a business segment at the roots of multiple class-action lawsuits against the company — and one that many blame for skyrocketing drug prices in the U.S.

The company faces three class-action lawsuits, one of which is a combination of two earlier class-actions, alleging that it violated the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, or ERISA, which mandates that the insurer and its pharmacy benefit managers act as fiduciaries — that is, act in the interests of their customers. The accusations outline a system of drug price-gouging, in which the pharmacy benefit manager — in UnitedHealth’s cases, OptumRx — allegedly forced pharmacies to charge fraudulent premiums for prescription medications and pocketed the difference.

http://www.ibtimes.com/political-capita ... laims-have

Clinton Strategist Mark Penn Pushes Democrats to Move to Center — And Quietly Profits From GOP Victories

Democrats would do best if they abandon broad economic reforms and a more leftward political program, argued Mark Penn, a strategist known best for advising Bill and Hillary Clinton, in the pages of the New York Times Opinion section. Penn wrote that the Democratic Party must “move to the center and reject the siren calls of the left.”

https://theintercept.com/2017/07/06/mar ... publicans/

proudfootz wrote:To be sure, if the Democratic moved toward the center that would be 'leftward' of their most recent tack.

"A member of Congress told me Democrats big 2018 slogan, which is set to be released Monday. It's: 'Better Skills, Better Jobs, Better Wages'" tweeted Vox congressional reporter Jeff Stein on Thursday. He later deleted that tweet and corrected it by noting the full slogan was actually "A Better Deal: Better Skills, Better Jobs, Better Wages."

http://www.newsweek.com/democrats-steal ... 018-639904

After Health Care Victory, Senate Democrats Seek Compromise on Tax Plan

Senator Chuck Schumer, the minority leader, and Senator Ron Wyden, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, organized the drafting of the letter, which lays out their priorities. Three Democratic senators who are up for re-election next year — Joe Donnelly of Indiana, Joe Manchin III of West Virginia and Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota — did not sign the letter. They could be ripe targets for Republicans looking for Democrats to get on board with their tax plan.

Despite the outreach, bipartisanship will not come easy.

On taxes, Democrats tend to favor raising taxes on the rich to pay for cuts that would reduce tax rates for middle-income families. The parties are in closer agreement on changes to the corporate tax system, but Democrats argue that the cuts Republicans are proposing are far too deep.

In the conditions laid out in their letter, the Democrats insisted that changes to tax laws not increase the tax burden on the middle class and that the wealthiest 1 percent of taxpayers not see their tax bills shrink.

They also insisted that Republicans return to “regular order” and not try to push a tax bill through Congress using budget reconciliation rules that require only a simple majority in the Senate.

Finally, they want a rewrite of the tax code that does not add to the deficit and is not paid for with cuts to programs such as Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.

For much of this year, Democrats have criticized the proposed tax policies of Republicans as giveaways to the rich. It was clear on Tuesday that Republicans are not eager to let Democrats meddle with their plans for a tax overhaul, even if they would welcome a few of their votes.

“We will need to use reconciliation because we have been informed by the majority of the Democrats in a letter I just received today that most of the principles that would get the country growing again, they’re not interested in addressing,” Mr. McConnell said, leaving the option for Democrats to support a Republican-led tax plan. “So I don’t think this is going to be 1986 when you had a bipartisan effort to scrub the code.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/01/us/p ... -plan.html