Reply #40: Talk positions, not labels.

[RaleighNCDUer]

This is an overwhelmingly LIBERAL country - if you poll people on their stands, without asking if they are 'liberal' or 'moderate' or 'conservative', the liberal positions have the clear majority.

The right has poisoned the label of 'liberal' so people disavow the label, even while supporting equal rights, government regulation of the workplace and the markets, brakes on unfettered capitalism, entrepreneurship, public schools, restraint of militarism - all the classic 'liberal' positions.

Most moderate independents are LIBERALS. Hell, more than a few republicans are liberals. And I would be surprised if any less than 75% of Democrats were liberals.

Even here, most the denizen of the Gungeon are liberals - they may deny it, and figure that because they own guns they CAN'T be liberals, and so call themselves 'moderate' or 'centrist', but line up a list of 25 policy questions and they will come down firmly on the liberal side - so self-identification is bullshit.

And, at the same time, even using YOUR definition, when elections turn on the votes of 5% of voters, having a solid core of 12% does determine the base - take that 12% of 'self-identified liberals', and another 12% of self-identified moderates who ALWAYS vote Democratic, and you have the app. 25% who are the base, without which Democrats CANNOT win.

So how is insulting 50% of the people who do the party's legwork a winning strategy?