Thread by @matthewstoller

The Democratic Party insider culture is weird, creepy, and super out of touch. It's basically the annoying people in College Democrats from the 1980s and 1990s who look down on others for not obsessing over Roberts Rules of Order. politico.com/story/2019/01/…

Unless you've worked on the Hill, it's hard to convey just how weird these people are. It's not that they are vanilla and lie to the grassroots, it's that they are incredibly proud of doing so and just loathe and distrust anyone who doesn't.

The culture is changing very quickly, but it was a fight - and people won't believe me when I say this - but it was a fight in 2008 to convince Democratic staff and members that Fox New wasn't an actual news channel.

The Democratic #BigLaw, Hill, and nonprofit space is like a set of incredibly meek loser mafia families. There are a few key people that control all the money and the blacklists are ridiculous. Read the article and you'll see how insular this culture is. politico.com/story/2019/01/…

People think Dems are wonks but the truth is they hate debate and ideas.

--> “I’m sure Ms. Cortez means well, but there’s almost an outstanding rule: Don’t attack your own people,” said Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-Mo.). “We just don’t need sniping in our Democratic Caucus.”

“She needs to decide: Does she want to be an effective legislator or just continue being a Twitter star?” said one House Democrat. --> Yeah, like Democrats have been super-effective. This is so absurd.

“Washington is a political animal where a lot of the work that you want to accomplish depends on relationships within the Democratic Caucus,” said Velázquez <-- This is exactly what voters hate.

“The honeymoon between the voters that you represent and yourself could be a short one. People want to see results.” <--- This is just insane. Establishment Dems think they have just done a bang-up job for decades and that @AOC is popular just because she has a Twitter account.

“I think she needs to give herself an opportunity to know her colleagues and to give herself a sense of the chemistry of the body before passing judgment on anyone or anything,” said Rep. Yvette Clarke <-- Why should anyone have opinions about anything?

Of course there's sniping she hired @saikatc as her chief of staff, because controlling staff culture is incredibly important. In 2009 Dems couldn't believe that my boss hired me because I had *no hill experience.* Which is code for 'he doesn't know tolerating bribery is fine.'

“It totally pissed off everyone,” said one senior House Democratic lawmaker of the campaign. “You don’t get picked for committees by who your grass-roots [supporters] are.” <--- Dems have institutionalized hatred of their external supporters. Party of the people!

I don't want to contribute to the @AOC obsession in the media, and of course she and her people have things to learn. Writing law isn't simple. But she's a great touchstone to show how so many Dem establishment people are just wildly out of touch. There need to be mass layoffs.

There are a lot of staffers and ex-staffers who have stories about this and know exactly what I mean. This is particularly true for the post-2008 period, when the Dem leadership fully embraced the bailouts and the GOP did not.

And to a large extent this isn't the fault of most of these people. It just messes you up psychologically to have to write law as a member of the Party of the People while also doing so without disturbing anyone who is powerful. It turns you into someone angry at all non-liars.

There's this insane conflict-aversion. You only get to have an opinion if you are a 75 year annoying weirdo who obsessed over model UN in high school and is surrounded by yes-men eager to become lobbyists. Otherwise you don't understand the GOP are bad.

https://twitter.com/retheauditors/status/1083735319495745536

This isn't just a corporate donor thing, it's a culture. People like @sethmoulton and Tim Ryan were in part rebelling against Pelosi as a statement that it is just annoying to have so many out of touch thin-skinned dork weirdos as co-workers. Remember, this is their job.

Yup. It's not just the House, though that is the most infected part of the party. It extends down to more than half of Dem voters. Older Dem voters despise intraparty conflict and see themselves as personally left-wing while voting against left-wingers.

https://twitter.com/Sofonisbe/status/1083737416094048256

Even today lots of Democratic voters just do not believe you when you say Obama's policy was to have a foreclosure wave and not prosecute top Wall Street bankers. It's not that they disagree, they just cannot even imagine it. Cognitive dissonance is profound. Super weird.

Dem members are outraged anyone would see anything wrong with this.

https://twitter.com/matthewstoller/status/980879759998640131