Former NBC “Meet the Press” host Chuck Todd expressed concern on Monday that the Democratic Party didn’t get a big enough “shellacking” in 2024 to get the message that it must change course.
“A question that haunts me is, I don’t know if the Democrats have lost enough,” Todd told former Associated Press reporter Ron Fournier, who appeared as a guest on “The Chuck Toddcast.” “To me, when you lose as close as they lost, there’s too many – it’s too easy to tactically talk yourself into ‘Well, if we just do this, this or this.”
“The last time the Democrats had a real fight about its direction,” Todd argued, was after former President Ronald Reagan beat Michael Dukakis by 49 states in 1988.
“The shellacking of Dukakis in ’88 gave breathing room for Bill Clinton to make a counterargument. An argument that the [moderate Democratic Leadership Council] was trying to make before ’88 – was making progress but not quite getting there – and then really made progress after the shellacking,” he added.
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But today, Todd said, “I wonder if Democrats have lost enough to have the conversation they need to have.”
“No, they haven’t. They should have. I mean, losing once to Donald Trump should have been enough. They lost to a clown,” Fournier said.
Todd argued that Democrats convinced themselves their losses were the “fault” of the media, which he refers to as the “referees.”
“Hillary Clinton ran a sh—y campaign, and she shouldn’t have been close enough where the refs could make a difference,” Todd said.
“The Democrats have been running a sh—y campaign, playing a sh—y game for 25 years, Chuck,” Fournier responded, though both agreed that former President Barack Obama was an exception.
When Democrats did win, Todd argued, “They were running as different types of Democrats; they haven’t done that since.”
Fournier argued that one key factor over the years is Democrats slipping into “intellectual bubbles.”
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“The other big thing has changed since [Bill] Clinton’s time was back then Democrats had to hear from people who told them, ‘You suck.’ Now they don’t,” Fournier argued. “Now they’re able to walk around in their intellectual bubbles and tell each other ‘We only lost by a little, little much’ and ‘It’s the referee’s fault.’”
Todd agreed, mocking Democratic insider rhetoric, “’Oh, if Kamala Harris just had 90 more days.’”