[alabastervlog]

> 2. Drop the radical anti-gun stance and embrace the 2nd Amendment as being just as important as every other part of the Bill of Rights.

I agree, but also they mostly do and Republican voters still come out to the voting booth because they're sure—seriously, this is a real thing—that Biden's going to take their guns, and they mean literally, ban guns and try to round them all up.

> 6. Go more in the direction of the Blue Dog[1] Democrats in general.

Here, I cannot follow you. They need to go far more left-populist on the economy and taxation. They're badly out of sync with their own voters on that, in much the same way Republicans were before Trump came along and started campaigning on the exact same messages you'd hear talking to actual Republican voters in diners ("Why don't they just build a wall?", "NAFTA is unfair and we trade too much with China", "the whole world's taking advantage of us", et c.)

[AnimalMuppet]

I don't think the average voter is in favor of more taxation. The average voter is afraid that "tax the rich" will turn into taxing me.

[alabastervlog]

I think there's more stomach for it than you do, but do agree some large subset of the population thinks that e.g. they ought to oppose the so-called "death tax" because it'll apply to them or anyone they know (it won't).

There's also the issue of a large proportion of the population not even understanding how progressive income tax rates work.

[disgruntledphd2]

Well to be fair, the Democrat's contortions on the SALT deductions certainly didn't help them (but if the only people you talk to are affluent coastal liberals then I could see why you'd support such a regressive policy).