Erik Loomis on how Republicans dominate local political ecosystems

Kamala Harris’s loss to Donald Trump came as a huge surprise to many Democratic Party loyalists, especially since Republicans had a number of serious defeats in elections in 2018 and in 2022, and abortion rights ballot initiatives prevailed in every state where the public had voted on them since the Republican Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.

So what happened? The short answer is that Democrats do not have a political ecosystem the way that Republicans do. We've talked on this program at length in several episodes about how Democrats do not have a left-wing media to the degree that Republicans do. But a political ecosystem isn’t just about national media advocacy, it’s also about how things work at the local level as well.

And in that regard, the Republican Party is very superior to Democrats in many ways. Working together and individually, fundamentalist religious organizations and local talk radio hosts are constantly explaining Republican viewpoints to the public, taking the message to Americans who don’t follow politics closely and may not care a lot about the policies.

While they may not understand the particulars, these low-information voters believe that there are people in their communities who are looking out for them. Republican-leaning voters can go to their supermarket and bump into their local talk radio hosts, and they can attend religious services where a trusted person tells them about all the terrible things they imagine Democrats will do.

Within the Democratic Party, however, these types of local political institutions are sometimes regarded as antiquated or absurd, but that isn’t how things used to be. In fact, unions were the centerpiece in many ways for the Democratic Party, the way that people were taught why they should vote for the left—to preserve past gains and to promote new ones.

One person who understands how all of this worked in days of yore (which weren’t so long ago) is our guest on today’s episode. His name is Eric Loomis, and he's a labor historian at the University of Rhode Island. He’s written several different books, including A History of America in Ten Strikes. And he’s also a writer at the blog Lawyers, Guns, & Money.

TIMECODES
00:00 Introduction
06:55 Democrats only talk to their voters for three months every two years
12:02 The decline of unions and local organizations
15:53 How the decline of unions and liberal religion has hurt Democratic party
26:32 How social isolation increases reactionary viewpoints
32:23 Why reproductive freedom didn't save Democrats in 2024
36:18 The need for new Democratic strategies
38:40 AOC and Trump voters
40:11 Biden's communication failures made it so no one knew about his policies
44:06 Democrats must admit that the system is rigged against most people now
46:22 Republicans hate social solidarity, but they practice it obsessively among themselves, unlike Democrats
50:23 Why social and economic justice need each other
52:37 The labor movement's role
55:46 Republicans' cultural populism is only powerful because Democrats refuse to use economic populism
59:35 Cultural populism works also because most people vastly overstate the size of social minorities
01:03:14 Democrats have failed to realize that messaging requires listening
01:08:18 Conclusion and final thoughts


MEMBERSHIP BENEFITS
This is a free episode of Theory of Change, but in order to keep the show sustainable, the full audio, video, and transcript for some episodes are available to subscribers only. The deep conversations we bring you about politics, religion, technology, and media take great time and care to produce. Your subscriptions make Theory of Change possible and we’re very grateful for your help.

Please join today to get full access!

Substack:
https://theoryofchange.show/

Patreon:
  / discoverflux  

If you would like to support the show but don’t want to subscribe, you can also send one-time donations via PayPal:
https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/theor...

If you're not able to support financially, please help us by subscribing and/or leaving a nice review on Apple Podcasts. Doing this helps other people find Theory of Change and our great guests.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast...


GUEST INFO
https://web.uri.edu/history/meet/erik...
https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com
https://bsky.app/profile/erikloomis.b...

A History of America in Ten Strikes
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1620976277?...


ABOUT THE SHOW
Theory of Change is hosted by Matthew Sheffield about larger trends and intersections of politics, religion, media, and technology. It's part of the Flux Community, a new content network of podcasters and writers. Please visit us at flux.community to learn more and to tell us about what you're doing. We're constantly growing and learning from the great people we meet.