What the New York Times Missed (On Purpose) About Seth Moulton
The Times tried to cast Moulton as an exciting younger candidate running to unseat a geriatric Democratic incumbent but voters don't want youth, they want solutions
The Times tried to cast Moulton as an exciting younger candidate running to unseat a geriatric Democratic incumbent but voters don't want youth, they want solutions
I realize I'm late to this analysis, I apologize for that. I was laying on a gurney getting rolled into an operating room at Salem Hospital at the time I normally would have sat at my desk to write this.
I thought perhaps I missed the chance to break down the dominating win by incumbent Senator Ed Markey over primary challenger Rep. Seth Moulton in Massachusetts last week, but having read much of the coverage of the race in the last week while I've recovered, everyone seems to be missing something important.
The Democratic base doesn't want youth for youth's sake, they want progressive politicians who will stop the perpetual uselessness of Democratic elected officials in Congress and fight back against the far right.
In the run up to last week's primary election for my home state's Senate race, I watched as the New York Times ran multiple opinion pieces on Moulton's behalf. Mostly the paper took great pains to paint Moulton as an exciting young outsider compared to the 80 year old Markey. The Boston Globe, one of the two major Boston papers, also took a similar tack as they endorsed Moulton in the race.
The Times, of course, defended Moulton's previous statements about trans issues (which were originally made to the Times itself), claiming that he represented the median American voter's view of the issue. But the problem is that Moulton was running for Senator of Massachusetts, not Senator of median voters.
And Moulton got absolutely drilled, losing by 30 points. He carried like 2 or 3 towns outside of his home US Congressional district. He lost my town by over 65%.
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Look, Massachusetts is not like the rest of the country. We were the first to legalize gay marriage in the early 2000s. My town is so full of out trans women that I see more than one every time I leave my door. As a deep blue state that's home to both Provincetown and Northampton, we are bearing the brunt of the internal trans refugee crisis that has seen hundreds of thousands of trans Americans flee red states for safe blue states.
It's me and my friends welcoming these desperate trans people into our communities, not Seth Moulton. It's our networks trying to find them housing and jobs. These formerly red state trans people vote.
Moulton's questioning of trans rights went over like a lead balloon in Massachusetts. I mean, Markey literally wrapped himself in a trans flag to address the No Kings protest in Boston while Moulton got booed. His biggest applause line in every speech was about trans people. The New York Times (and its Globe counterpart) couldn't be more disconnected from the people of the Commonwealth on trans issues if they tried.
But it wasn't just trans issues that lost it for Moulton. The guy is the epitome of centrist Dem establishment hacks. I mean the guy ran for president for chrissakes.
In 2020.
He's the blue-est of the bluedog Democrats. He has long styled himself as next in line for party leadership, but he's utterly unremarkable. There's not a brave stance to be seen in his policy priorities. It's all meek and weak and the Democratic party voters of Massachusetts easily sniffed it out.
Markey might be 80 years old but the motherfucker still puts up a fight. He's still a progressive stalwart in a Democratic Senate caucus that desperately needs fighters. Massholes understood this, and essentially sent Markey back to the Senate to continue being our bulldog.
It's not just the trans issues, though i think that a lot of blue state moderates should take careful note of how that issue in particular sank mealy-mouthed Moulton of Massachusetts and avoid his mistake.
The Democratic base sees the wildly far right turn that the Republican party has taken and has rightly judged that compromise is impossible. Centrism is on the outs and blue voters are desperate for fighters, no matter the age. They understood Markey is a fighter and Moulton is squishy.
The way forward for Democratic party leadership is not younger, but further left.
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