On Vox, Matthew Yglesias has some interesting reflections on the popularity — or lack thereof — of various “progressive” proposals.
A new Marist poll testing the popularity of a bunch of progressive ideas leads to a slightly tedious truth: Some are popular and some are not popular, and there’s not much of a pattern determining which are which.
The latest progressive activist fad on immigration policy, changing unauthorized entry from a criminal to a civil offense, for example, is badly underwater. But the old progressive standby of offering a path to citizenship for millions of undocumented residents of the United States polls very well. Massive investment in clean energy polls very well, but taxing dirty energy is much less popular. Free college is in between.
And he offers some advice on what he believes would be a winning strategy for the Democrats in the next election.
The worry that committing to unpopular ideas will somehow guarantee Trump’s reelection is silly (he has lots of unpopular ideas of his own). But what is true is that popular ideas are better than unpopular ones for winning votes, and precisely because many progressive ideas are popular, there’s no good reason to let the unpopular ones drag them down.
I hope the Democratic candidates are listening.
ProfJerry's Weblog 