Jim Newell has an omnibus piece on how the Democratic Party is going to be adapting its messaging and the DNC to respond to the groundswell of demonstrations and activism that have been sweeping the country:
It is much easier to harness energy than it is to be tasked with mustering energy where there is none. The DNC isn’t going to come up with “the message” any more than House Democrats are, or any more than Chuck Schumer is. The message is going to be determined on the ground and filter up to its politicians, and some of the best messaging in years is coming out from these packed town halls. The video of Jessi Bohon’s Christian defense of universal health coverage at a Tennessee town hall for Republican Rep. Diane Black has exploded. The clip of a Republican official in Florida being instantly jeered to silence after saying “death panel” was the most effective rejection of that lie since Sarah Palin first invented it eight years ago. Official Democrats don’t need to come up the message. They just need to get out of the message’s way.
I finally got a chance to listen to three of the candidates for DNC Chair on Josh Marshall’s podcast. As Newell points out in his piece, the characterization of this as a horserace between the “Bernie faction” (Keith Ellison) and the “Establishment faction” (Tom Perez) is silly. Both have a similar plan for Democrats: running races up and down the ballot, channeling the energy of recent protests, and re-building state and local party organizations. Either would be a good DNC leader. My only concern about Ellison was that DNC chair in 2017 is a full-time job. Since he’s committed to resigning his seat if he’s elected, that’s a non-issue.