Everybody knows that Democrats are in a pickle, which I suppose is better than outright rotting. At least pickles are being preserved for later consumption.
Even without all the doubt about Trump’s policies and the unrelenting attacks on the president by the media and his opponents–who include almost every major culturally significant figure in the country–the Democrats have it much worse. Even people who dislike the president are forced to admit that Democrats have discredited themselves so much that regaining credibility is a tough assignment.
So far, their strategy has been to double down on criticizing Trump. However, after a fairly steep decline in Trump’s popularity in the weeks preceding “Liberation Day” and for a few weeks afterward, Trump’s approval is creeping up again. The failure of disaster to hit immediately when tariffs kicked in and the pummeling the Democrats are taking in the wake of Alex Thompson’s and Jake Tapper’s book, they are scrambling to come up with a strategy to recover.
POLITICO shares an idea first proposed by Michigan Senator Elissa Slotkin and decided to go one better: create a “shadow cabinet,” as is often done in parliamentary systems. The idea behind a shadow cabinet is to have one figure who speaks for the opposition on a particular issue. A shadow Secretary of State, a shadow Secretary of Defense, and so on. Instead of having many voices drowning each other out, pick one for each issue–presumably your best.
If this the best the Dems can do we’re in great shape
The Shadow Cabinet That Can Help Democrats Win Back Power – POLITICO https://t.co/qJi38JfnMt
— Sean Spicer (@seanspicer) May 27, 2025
It is a stupid idea–it’s one virtue being that transnationalists love the idea of committees, parliaments, and copying European ways of doing things. Even the average European on the street doesn’t think that way, and Americans would be hard-pressed to name more than two or three cabinet members, but people who admire technocracies gravitate to just this sort of thing.
Slotkin suggested ranking members on Congressional committees for the role (the ranking member is the lead person from the opposition party on any committee; in this case, they are all Democrats because they are in the minority), which is an even more stupid idea. Nobody has a clue who they are and couldn’t care less, so Bill Scher came up with his own list.
It’s a winner, for many reasons. Democrats will probably like it because it includes celebrities and pseudo-intellectuals, and Republicans would love to see it implemented because it is yet another stupid idea that will move the needle not at all. Not one of these individuals could possibly fix what ails the Democrats, which is less any one particular policy idea than an unmistakable contempt for the ordinary American. See Ed’s piece from this morning on the real problem Democrats have, and it ain’t that they haven’t communicated well enough on the importance of investing in electric vehicles or transit in Blue cities.
So, who are the leading lights of the Democratic Party, according to Scher?
How about Bill Nye, The Science Guy? Or Gisele Fetterman?
My favorite is Letitia James as shadow Attorney General. What could be more genius than putting up the face of corrupt lawfare and self-dealing from the all-too-popular State of New York as the face of Justice? Her qualification, of course, is winning her ridiculous civil fraud case against Donald Trump for a transaction that everybody made money from. It turns out that she is credibly accused of committing much more egregious acts herself.
Samantha Power–the face of incompetence in foreign policy and outright corruption at USAID–is Scher’s nominee for shadow Secretary of State. John Stewart would be the Veterans Affairs guy for some reason. Mark Cuban can be the Commerce guy.
There are 15 others that Scher proposes, but the idea is clear. Just the sort of people who liberals like, but few others would gravitate to.
This is, apparently, the best the Democrats have. And I have to admit that Scher’s list is at least better than Slotkin’s idea. Nearly anonymous Congressmen are hardly likely to be saviors of the Democratic Party.
More than in most democratically elected governments, the American system of government and the temperament of our citizenry tend to define political parties by their leaders. Donald Trump defines the Republican Party, and during his term, Joe Biden (or his avatar) defined his.
Various contenders are vying to take over the Democratic Party, and are carving out “lanes,” which are alternative visions of where the party goes and among which the party base will choose. Are the Democrats the AOC/Sanders party? The Gavin Newsom party (Newsom is now running as–I kid you not–the “conservative” Democrat). The Pete Buttigieg party? Gretchen Whitmer or J.B. Pritzker?
Nobody cares about a “shadow cabinet,” and they never will. Or rather, political geeks care, but nobody who matters when it comes to creating the party’s brand.
The only thing that unites Democrats right now is hating Trump, which is the only issue that has united Democrats other than DEI and grabbing every available dime from taxpayers. And since neither of those is especially popular right now, Democrats remain riven by internal battles and have no way to change the subject from the fraud they perpetrated on the American people by pretending Joe Biden was president.
After four years of a Politburo running the country into the ground, Slotkin and Scher are proposing that the next Politburo be named and promoted.
Brilliant.
