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Jeffrey Baron's avatar

Ben,

Forgiving college student loans was another dumb program. The majority of voters do not have a college degree and I suspect they have credit card debt, mortgages and auto loans that are not being forgiven. I sense there was a backlash that hurt the Democrats.

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Ben Compaine's avatar

Jeff, That was just bad policy as well as politics. I agree it fed into this notion of grievance. The billions that this would have cost the government could have been spread around more broadly and fairly.

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Peter D. Jacobson's avatar

Nothing less than full repudiation of the language police will suffice. Without question. defund the police was the dumbest political slogan in our life time, but there are some contenders. For example, I met with a health law colleague who was editing an article already accepted in the New England Journal of Medicine. He used the phrase pregnant women and the journal editorial staff insisted he change it to pregnant people. Nonsense. As you point out, culture is an important aspects of voter preferences. Democrats need to speak directly to average Americans without using jargon or woke language. Bury the woke language in the ash heap of history.

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Ben Compaine's avatar

Peter: I guess this means we agree.

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Peter D. Jacobson's avatar

Sure does!

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