Notes From the Middleground

He accomplished a partisan realignment that’s been in the making for nearly a decade

I have an op-ed in The New York Times today, giving my first-cut take on why Kamala Harris lost the election so decisively. That’s a gift link, so you don’t need to be a NYT subscriber to read it.

But the decisive defeat of the Harris campaign strategy has its own dimension — and it is not just the consequence of a fleeting bad vibe in the country or the world. For years and even decades, overwhelming majorities of Americans have been telling pollsters that they are unhappy about the direction of the country and much else besides. By portraying herself as the defender and champion of the country’s governing establishment against Donald Trump’s anti-system impulses and diatribes, she placed herself, fatally, on the wrong side of public opinion.

Many Americans have lost their trust in government. Democrats need to be at the forefront of helping to earn back that trust. The first step toward doing so, like an effort to overcome an addiction, must be admitting there’s a problem. If this week’s painful drubbing at the polls has that effect on the party, it may well prove to have a salutary effect.