After more than 30 years as a Democrat, I submitted a voter registration application with my county today. I changed my political party affiliation to “NONE (NO AFFILIATION).” I am truly horrified at the fact that Trump and the Republican Party won the 2024 election. While I can rattle off a list of what I perceive as the flaws of Trump and the Republicans, the one idea that keeps returning to me is that the Democratic Party has failed. It hasn’t simply failed to win an election, it has failed the American people.
If the Democratic Party had programs and policies that met the needs of Americans, Trump and the Republicans wouldn’t have anywhere near the audience they have. The results of the election clearly indicate that large swaths of the electorate believe this country isn’t working for them.
It isn’t that I don’t want to be on a losing team. Every team has losses. It’s that I don’t believe in the team I was on. I can’t shake the sense that the Democratic Party is too invested in the status quo. I believe the Democratic Party is too fond of the ideas that speech is money and corporations are people. Trump had his billionaires but so did the Democrats. I do believe the Bernie Sanders critique that the Democratic Party has abandoned working class people. Their lack of attention to the needs of the people is evident in the fact that the party hasn’t aggressively supported ranked choice voting, a voting method that would truly allow each person’s vote to count.
I’m fearful that I am not seeing things clearly while looking through the lens of a Democrat. I’m stepping outside the Democratic Party framework to clear my head and develop an independent understanding of the issues facing this country.
2024-11-09