Is It Still the Economy, Stupid? Carville on Messaging, Mamdani, and Learnings from 2024

Dan Koh: Is it still the economy, stupid? And how did Democrats get better at messaging in general?

James Carville: It's always the economy stupid. If you can't reengage, there's something wrong with you. You better go reevaluate your life. Because, frankly, you're not a very good person. If you want to run in people in primaries, get out of being vice chair, the DNC, do whatever the fuck you want to do till you understand what people critique of the Democrats is. You can't fix it. And it's old. We urban, we were all for the cities. We have let ourselves be defined from the outside more to be willing to define ourselves from the inside.

Dan Koh: James Carville, welcome to The People's Cabinet.

James Carville: Well, okay. I'm glad to be in any cabinet. Maybe locked in the cabinet or something.

Dan Koh: There you go. You know, 33 years ago, a sign hung in the Little Rock, Arkansas election of Bill Clinton for president. And point number two, was the economy stupid? It seems like even today, there's still debate about communications, the Democratic Party. It still seems today that the Republican Party sometimes or oftentimes gets the best of Democratic messaging. So my question to you is, is it still the economy, stupid? And how do Democrats get better at messaging in general?

James Carville: Okay. First of all, it's always the economy, stupid. Why count the number of economic transactions that an average human being has in a day? I mean, there's no way you can get away from it. You get gas in your car, you know, just groceries, leisure time, transit fares. I mean, so thus it was. Thus it is. And thus it forever shall be. You remember, of course, the first one was. Thank you for pointing out it was. Second was change versus more the same when people go in a change mood. But. And Republicans traditionally do better. Which party do you think is better for the economy? Republicans or Democrats? Republicans generally come out more in the margin of error ahead on that question. Now, there is not a single positive economic indicator that has not done significantly better under Democrats and Republicans. And when. Let me talk about positive economic indicators. Yes. GDP growth. Yes. Job growth. Right. Yes. Corporate profits. All right. Yes. Deficits. Okay. And it's not even close. A guy did a paper in a in a title of it. It's not even close. So not only do we have a case to make, we have a slam dunk historical case. It's not close.

Dan Koh: Then why is it that we still struggle with this?

James Carville: Uh, because we look constipated. So. All right. In. So if a party looks constipated and it looks like Biden is too old to do anything, well, he didn't have anything to do with it. And we have let ourselves be defined from the outside more to be willing to define ourselves from the inside.

Dan Koh: Do you see elected officials now at least starting to heed this, especially after the kind of autopsy of 2024? And I'm curious on your perspective on Danny's recent nomination with with a focus. Obviously, there's some debate about his policy proposals, but with a focus on affordability in the economy. Right.

James Carville: So let let's first let's go to that. Because this kind of question today, where did he run up that Now 85% was affordability. I cannot imagine what it's like to be a lower middle class, a middle class person living in New York. I mean, I just just, you know, I go to I go to LaGuardia, I get in a sedan and I go to the east side of Soho or some shit like that, but I'm not oblivious to what I'm seeing around me, uh, in. But I think that people are going to maybe read too much into this. I'd like to see a another confirming event, but what I do think is underneath, I don't think ideology is now the prime predictor of voting behavior, which has not been the case ever since I can remember. In fact, there is there's an in in the sense that we think of conservatives, it doesn't exist anymore. But actually, as Thom Tillis and Don Bacon and they can't even run again. Um, on on the Democratic side. You know, it looks like we're trying to learn the lesson, and then we get yanked back into to some other discussion. I think the Trump presidency, this time of the Trump presidency is 90% the fault of the Democrats. Why do I say that? First of all, there was a semi embrace of identity language, which is the worst possible thing we could have done. It it just set us back decades. Yeah. Of course, now no one uses that. In fact, I'm told even AOC scrubbed her website of any pronoun stuff, but it it got out there and people noticed it. It was really stupid. I mean, it was a level that we can't even imagine. It was politically stupid. Secondly, Only 80% of people weren't buying, not to run, and we absolutely refused to give them that. And just you could see it in the polls. It was. I'm talking about prior to to June the 27th, you know, that catastrophic night and I guess it was Atlanta. And then not only so Biden says, I'm not running, but you're going to pick my vice president, and she's not going to be able to say she would do a single thing that I didn't do. And when 75% of people wanted something different, okay, they wasn't looking for a genocide, they weren't looking, you know, to for segregation. They weren't looking for something. They were just looking for something different. And he gives her the keys. She takes the headquarters to campaign manager, the strategist, the furniture, the phone number, everything. And then she goes on the view and says, I wouldn't change a thing. Now we know that she was a well, we almost forced people to vote against us. Conscious people. If 80% of people were saying, we want something different and the Democratic Party says, no, that's not good for you. You're going to you're going to eat what we serving you and you're going to like it. And you know what? They didn't like it. And it was it was our fault.

Dan Koh: So how would you have what would what would have in retrospect, obviously, what would have been the thought process that would have made sense for you in 2020?

James Carville: As I said in the New York Times on the 7th of July, 2024, let President Clinton and President Obama host for regional town halls. Let them invite six, seven, eight people to participate. You know what the audience level would have been for that? God. All right. Let them go to Chicago. Let's have some excitement. I mean, some people say, well, you know, it could have ended poorly. What? Couldn't couldn't anymore pull it and end it now. How do you get any worse than losing a goddamn election? All right. And just think, if you would have done that and you would have had people up there from other places, you know, 15 miles away from salt water, who could string a sentence together, you would go, shit, I didn't know they had that. Jeez, I thought they were all old and lived in cities and living in the past. That's what people you know, until you understand what people. Critique of the Democrats is, you can't fix it. And it's. We're old. We urban, we. We're all for the cities. And that's the way huge numbers of American think. And if we kind of give them every reason to think that way.

Dan Koh: So how do we balance the the messaging and thinking about how we approach the social issues part of it? I understand what you're saying about some of the language that people didn't buy into some of the social language that people don't buy into. But then also as as you well know, the Democratic Party is the party of civil rights, and we take pride in that and sticking up for minorities. So how do we strike that balance? 

James Carville: All right. So we had the great equality struggles. I guess we'd start with Seneca Falls in women's rights. Then we had civil rights. We had Selma just, you know, then we had Stonewall. And it was exciting. And, you know, that's the reason I became a Democrat because of, you know, because of civil rights. I mean, I grew up everything where I grew up was nothing but racial. The whole there was just no other politics. And, uh, and I think people thought that trans rights was going to be the next frontier. This was going to be groundbreaking. We were going to, you know, we want we want to make history, too. And the public never viewed it that way, ever. And we got hung up on Sports competition, which is a stone ass losing argument for us and the people. Understandably said, look, everybody was against civil rights when it started. They overcame the same thing. You know, it took us from the origins of Seneca Falls to the passage of the suffrage was, you know, x number of years. But the the march of progress was, was marching on, and they got to go back to the drawing board and think of a different way to, to frame this, because the framing they use was massively unsuccessful.

Dan Koh: Do you think that there's a better way to approach this? Because obviously many people on this podcast, as well as obviously conversation in the country, I think there are many people who, you know, in their communities want to understand how, um, you know what? Whoever is a decision maker, right, whether it be a school system or an academic institution, is thinking about rules and regulations around this. But then there are a lot of people who do believe in trans rights and want to make sure that minority communities are protected. Right. And so I feel like, at least in my opinion, there's been a little bit of a hijacking of the narrative around transgender rights to focus purely on sports and most extreme examples versus what it should larger be, which is like this is a minority class that that has rights like every other community.

James Carville: So pre-pandemic I flew in Amsterdam, but the airport is exactly I think it's big, it's efficient, it's clean. It's, you know, think of dance as you know what, it doesn't have gender based bathrooms. And you know how much it bothered me try to zero or anybody else who's walking, you're going to stall. Whatever you gotta do, you do it. You go out, wash your hands, go about your business. All right. But it became, the issue became a bathroom issue and it became the 400m in the girls state track. And to somebody like me, this is a very cavalier thing to say. But this is not a winning issue for us. The number of people it affects is is very small. You. See, when you do politics, activists say the politicians need to do the right thing. They need to step in there. Okay. This is an injustice. The people have no sway over this. They're discriminated against. They're beaten up. They don't have a place where they feel safe in. I agree with all of that, this evidence. But remember, you have to build political support for an idea before you tell a politician. You go out and do this because this is courageous. So when the unions went to Franklin Roosevelt and wanted to establish a minimum wage, you know, his answer is good. Now go out and make me do it. So Martin Luther King and Ed Young are flying back from Oslo. After King won the Nobel Prize. And so King tells young, tell the pilot, I want to stop at Dulles. I want to go see the president stops. King and Andy go to the White House. Goes. Johnson makes him wait six hours. He comes in and King said, Mr. President, we appreciate all the works that you've done on civil rights. But if we don't have voting rights, this is not going to be for naught. The two are incompatible. You can't have one without the other. And Johnson says, Martin, let me tell you, I've expended all our gas I got in the tank getting the civil rights bill through. I mean, I've been twisting arms. I've spent all my energy. I just don't have the power to do this now. What a current left wing activist would say. You piece of shit. This is justice. You need to stand up right now. This is what you must do. So to get back on the plane, King looks at Andy and says, the president needs more power. Let's go out and get him some. Ergo, Selma. All right. He didn't say, look at that cracker racist son of a bitch, you know, won't even stand for us for for for voting rights. No, he said he didn't have the power. Let's go get himself. So if if I'm advising, I don't know. Everything's a community. I hate the word, but. Okay, if the trans community, I'd say build support for what you're trying to accomplish. Give politicians some cover. But to say you have to vote for this because it is a issue of fairness and justice. You know, assume you get a politician that feels that way. He's not going to be in politics very long, or she's not going to be in politics very long. You follow what I'm saying build support for your idea.

Dan Koh: Well, speaking of support, you had had an article in the New York Times in February about the Republican Party where you made allusions this already, but that the Republican Party, quote, flat out sucks at governing. And one of the advice you gave was to roll over and play dead and kind of let them walk into it. Do you still believe that today? And what's your opinion on this big, beautiful bill, for example?

James Carville: So what I the example I use is rope a dope. I got news for you. I'll lead through punches after six rounds. Okay. It. But sometimes what I do is do things. Say things that are really provocative to make a point. If you remember in the times in March of 24, I said I thought we were doing terrible with male bodies. And they said, why do you think that? I think because there's too many preachy females in Democratic campaign culture. You know what? No one has told me since Election Day? You're wrong. Not a single person. Right. Because I was, I knew that that would cause an eruption. I wanted it to cause an eruption. It caused an eruption, but no one did anything about it, so. No. You know, like I didn't say this. Oh, my God, the guy's living in the 50s. He's living in, you know, the. 18th century a shit. I don't know what I was living in.

Dan Koh: But what you're saying is, this is not the version that you you think that people. There should be some punches being thrown right now.

James Carville: Well, I'm saying there's rope a dope. All right. And so what I'm going to do in a little under a little over two weeks, I'm going to go to Gettysburg and I'm going to do a video on how the Battle of Gettysburg informs today's politics. So there's a, you know, in politics that I was saying, just if you're not going to get anywhere just starting with Massive resistance, throwing your hands in the air, screaming, you know, yelling and stuff like that. Let them in. All right? Don't mind. Fall back to the high ground, stake your position. And you know, the Battle of Gettysburg was not one on aggressiveness. It was won on the high ground and making the other side make mistakes. And I think that's exactly what's going on now. I obviously don't think we should be playing possum. In late June or early July, that that would never be what I'm saying. But I'm, I wasn't ever I was trying to do is say, calm down. Let them come. All right. They're going to. There's no chance they're going to get this right. None. And that didn't get it right. And they are now stuck. I was watching this guy. He's like pretty smart. He's a little bit animated. Harry Eaton Ian tense. Yeah I'm saying he was like blown away how unpopular this thing was. He was just like, I can't believe this. He was like, the guy was like, it was -28. And he said, I think he's pretty good at what he does. He strikes me as, you know, one of these kind of guys, but he seems to be, you know, the better side of, of that kind of. And so now they're in, do you realize how bad they're going to lose in Virginia? They're pretty bad. It's not gonna look good. It's it's okay. And of course, you don't see Spanberger, you know, see Mikie Sherrill out for arms. And they were defeating the evil empire. And we're doing this. They're winning by. I have Background as a CIA agent. As a Navy pilot, I know how to make lives better. We're going to do these kinds of things, and that's the winning formula. Time and time again, if you do it 100 times, it comes out to 100 times a winning formula. Somebody still wants to try something different. That's nothing new. I always get the question, James. What? What's new in American politics? Nothing. Nothing.

Dan Koh: And so how do you think? You know, obviously you were you had a famous debate with David Hogg. I think afterwards you came to the conclusion you said that the DNC needs him. There's obviously been a lot of discord with the leadership of the DNC. What's your current feeling about DNC leadership and where we need to go?

James Carville: I've talked to this guy is bright. He's energetic. You need people like this. He's also massively stupid. All right. And so I was trying to say, look, man, just the people that are on the DNC, these are people that work precincts for 35 years. All right. These are. people. They may not be the most savvy people in the world, but most of them have, like, given their lives to the Democratic Party and the idea that you are part of an organization and you're going to run people against your own organization is to. All right. So maybe I'm old fashioned. I don't get it. It's anathema to me in my critique of how was is and ever shall be. Can't if you if you want to run in people in primaries, get out of being vice chair at a DNC, do whatever the fuck you want to do, but don't do it while you're working for it. And the members and I thought he would have enough sense to say, but now he say he's not running for for for vice chair. So my is as long as he does that I don't have a big issue with him. But I've got a huge issue if he is a member of an organization that he's trying to undermine, and the people in that organization don't like it at all.

Dan Koh: It's not a question do we need generational change or not? Is who drives it, and from what position. Do you think that there is a problem with people staying too long in their seats? Would you endorse something like a term limits for non-presidential elections?

James Carville: The answer to the first question is yes. To answer the second question is no. But you and I think that Biden just reinforced that. That was the headline and that everybody conscious about the the the conversation now.

James Carville: I would ask this question to you and, you know, your viewers are very informed people. Is it possible that we're entering maybe some ideological stage in American politics. And those are generational divides, the new ideological divides. I'm not willing to proclaim that, but I'm willing to open the discussion.

Dan Koh: I look, I think there is. Right. Like, I think, I think the whole notion of labeling far left versus centrist versus all that. I mean, I'm curious a little bit more on your thought process because, you know, his focus. There isn't a person in New York, as you point out, who doesn't think the rent is too high, who would like cheaper groceries, who would like transportation to be more affordable and work better. Right. And so, you know, some people are obviously there are other policies that he has that are far more controversial than that. But I think the crux of why he was he is elected to where he is is because of that mentality of affordability that's not dissimilar from what you've been espousing for 35 years.

James Carville: Yeah. And look, he did it. Well, the other thing is, you know, one of the big changes is Israel just doesn't hold much sway with younger Jewish voters. We did. I mean. I mean, he was. I mean, I. The fact that he won't deny the global. Yeah. I mean, come on, that's a concern. Just get it out your mouth.

Dan Koh: Why do you think he won't do that? I mean, that seems to be a pretty noncontroversial thing to condemn, right?

James Carville: I think. He is. His father is an academic. And I think in Nevada has different meanings to different people. All right. Some it means kind of opposition to most people myself. It means, you know, violence. But you should realize there's someone. I think so. Look, I'm just. I'm just befuddled, as you are. And he's been given every opportunity to walk it back. Okay. So I am I. Am quite befuddled by it. And people that I, that I have enormous amount of respect for. John and Hakeem Jeffries are both like. Come on man. Shit, this ain't this hard. I mean, you could just see the angst in their voice. It is troubling.

Dan Koh: What do you think that his model of affordability and the policies therein. Do you think we will see more democratic socialist candidates winning across the country? Do you think this is something specific to New York?

James Carville: Let's start over interpreting this. This is the city of New York. This is a Democratic primary, and he didn't get to 50%. So before we take this show to Sheboygan, we might want to think about it. All right. I think clearly there was a message in here, but it's easy to overinterpret the message in here. And he's going to have I mean, the way the first Andrew, By any stretch of the imagination ran a terrible campaign. And whoever there, if it is Andrew, I don't I'm not familiar. They get they're going to they're going to settle on some opposition candidate. And the question that they should ask, can this guy really run a railroad at the end of the day? Do you think this you know, we have transit system, a police department with the Port Authority. We have airports, we have national security, we have the UN, we have street cleaning, we have garbage pickup, toilets flush. I mean, they're sitting around here. And I think when they come after him, it's going to be can he really run this railroad? Because the ideological attacks have seemed to be absorbed. I mean, he was hit hard, right? So a. Lot of money spent against. Him. I mean, no one that didn't know to speak of his positions, but the one thing they didn't ask is the fundamental question can he run this railroad?

Dan Koh: Do you think. Voters. Took that? Do you think voters took that into account when they were voting?

James Carville: I don't think it was really brought to the attention. It was if you're pissed off about the cost of living and you're struggling every day and you have these bloviating on television telling you how good your life is or how low unemployment is, and you go, what is that guy talking about? And so what he said, I see you. It is so much of life is showing up or seeing people at least you know. Trump did that with these rural whites or small town whites screwed him. But he acknowledged that they exist. It was nothing. Well, you're a communist or you're socialist or, well, you're the Yes. But he he was hitting people and talking about, uh. What? Everyday life. So you get there, you live, you. Maybe you're a sous chef at a Manhattan restaurant. God damn. You got to get, you know, you go, your kids go off to school, you got to pay for daycare, whatever it is, and you got to get on the subway. They raise the subway fare $0.75. Either way, it cost you a fortune. You get to work, you get a job, you got to wait. You got to worry about crime. You got there's a thousand things you got. You got taxes up going up every day. The rents are going up every day. And somebody comes along and says, I see you. You know what I say? I like that guy. And and it just piles up on people.

Dan Koh: How much do you think it there is a certain rejection of, uh, maybe the traditional or stereotypical Democratic donor class. This notion that, like so many Democrats had historically been elected on schmoozing, you know, Democratic Wall Street donors, what have you, and a Mamdani who's image at least is one of of grassroots donations, etc., is a more compelling model for the future.

James Carville: Yeah. I got to tell you, the number of people I'm not going to name names, most of them you would have heard of, but I don't that have said, you know, that guy's got something, James, and I'm talking about friends of mine, Wall Street friends of mine, or Republican side. I'm talking about Democratic friends of mine that are, you know, go back a long way with me. And I am kind of surprised at the number of people that I would not expect to say, this guy's got real talent. You need to watch him a little closer. And that impresses me because I would have thought any number of these people, uh, would have liked. This is appalling. What are we going to do? And they're like, you look at the guy's got. He's really he's very articulate. He's got a real way to connect. ET cetera. ET cetera. So I'm I'm impressed by that. And these are not the usual suspects. This is not the faculty lounge kind of people. These are pretty hard and political people. Some of them pretty important business people, some of them pretty hard. And Republicans, and they all kind of, I don't know, maybe so.

Dan Koh: So what? So how do you think about the larger Democratic, uh, representation right now in their opposition to Trump? Obviously, Mamdani is one formula of that. You know, the polls consistently, as you know, show 27% approval rating for Democrats right now. And fight is the number one issue that people seem to say they aren't doing enough of. Do you think they're doing enough? And what could we do better?

James Carville: Well, I'd like to see more of is opposed to just how bad the bill is, You know tell people discuss veterans, rural health, health care. It cuts the weather service, social security. Oh, by the way, it's going to cost you $4 trillion. That's what you're going to get for all of this. All right. So you got to pick out the to talk about everything is to talk about nothing. And I was really surprised at this. But Della Volpe the guy does the Harvard Youth poll, which is a good poll. Okay. I've come to understand this is a well taken poll among 18 to 30. You know what the the issue in that that made them the most angry cuts the veterans. I you know, as rabbi, I've been saying for 5000 years. Go figure. All right. But I think that people look at it like, if they would a veteran, they're not telling what they do to me. I don't have anything. I mean, this is all veterans. We got to take care of our veterans. This is sacred contract the nation has. I mean, our heroes and, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. If they're going to cut a veteran, they're going to kill me. I think. And I think that's just a sense of fairness on that. Well, you can't do that. You know, you don't pay. I was in the military myself and unfortunately I got shot at, you know, you go in, we don't pay you very much. You know, I was a shitty you might get hurt more than most people, but when you get out. So I get out. You got to understand, in 1971, I went to law school. I got $300 a month, got tax free, do whatever I wanted to. That's 319, $71 a month. If my tuition was $140 a semester, if we could do that now. No one in the same poll or other polls that John has done.

Dan Koh: It also shows a particular shift with men, particularly younger men. Do you think the Democratic Party has a problem communicating to them?

James Carville: They do. And if you ever want to know. Understand the problem. We have younger men who listen to NPR for five minutes, four times a day. And you will understand. Them. I've had plenty of other people, so they were told the future is female. You must always believe the woman is never wrong. Hashtag me too. All right, Tara Reid. All right. And men are like shit. Do I count? What about my life? I mean, we're only 48% of the voting population. And every time you would see an election, it's all coming down to suburban Women. James, this is going to be. It's, you know, it's an uprising. Oh, it's going to come up women of color forming a, you know, the basis of this. And if you just get this repeatedly over a period of time. And so, you know, as I tell people, so let's say you work in a car shop nine, ten hours a day, you're changing tires, you pick a car up, you work in the asshole, it's hot. Okay. You go home, you want a cold beer, you want a hamburger, and you want to watch the football game? No, no, you can't do that. Not football. No. No hamburgers. How many calories that has? Do you know what the what that does beer? No. You should be drinking a nice fruit spritzer or something and like, oh, get off of my back. Right. And then if you have sex, you must wear a condom And yeah, I mean, we just never communicated with him.

Dan Koh: So how do we fix that?

James Carville: By just talking like people, right? It's just like using language that other people use. And quit sticking your finger in everybody's face about personal behavior. And we just come across that way and it's no. And you got to. It used to be and I understand we've had tonic societal shifts, demographic shifts in this country, but then no television shows about these people anymore. There's no they've been erased from the culture. Just taking 48 particularly, you know, 48% of the population, males, which are a part of those 68 and have 3,030% of the total population, maybe 31. We've just erased them. You don't exist. No one sees you. No one cares about you. You've had it made all your life. And a lot of these people say I got it made. What are you talking about? And we. We just lecture people too much. And as opposed to say, man, you, you know, you work hard. You look at male weight, you look at male wages compared to growth. Not understand males don't make more than females. Just shut up and don't bother me with that. But look how much the gap is closing. And what we do know is loss of status really irks people. Now, if you have a you have $110,000 in a bank, you do. And I got 90. Yeah, okay. But. But if we both started with 100 and I lost ten, you made ten. We have an entirely bigger range of feelings about the way that we feel. And we haven't shown any the Democrats. I think Harris was like trying with Waltz. I gotta give her some credit because he did. He did scream. He was masculine. It wasn't enough to overcome everything else. But we do have a, a, a male problem, and a lot of it is urban culture. It really is. And when I say urban, urban, left wing kind of NPR culture, it's really, really hurt us.

Dan Koh: My last question to you is obviously, um, there's a lot going on with stuff on Capitol Hill. President Trump seems to be doing something more extreme every day. There are a lot of people who, after the election, uh, felt incredibly disappointed. Disaffected. Um, you have a very famous scene in the war room where you talk about, you know, 33 before you came to Washington, New York, 42 before you won your first campaign. You got very emotional about that. I think there are a lot of people who got very involved in 2024, are incredibly disappointed with the outcome and still haven't really plugged in. I think there's a lot of people who voted for Trump who didn't think that this would happen and are feeling just wanting to check out and not be involved again. My last question to you is, uh, what advice would you give people who are listening right now who go out and try to reengage those people and give people a little hope. You know?

James Carville: All right, get over it. We lost. It happens in every election. And if you look at what's going on in the country, what are we doing to to rural hospitals? What are we doing to veterans? Not cutting hurricane predictability. Whatever. If you see everything that's going around, you see the way we treat people, the way we treat each other. Man, if you can't reengage, there's something wrong with you. You better go reevaluate your life. Because, frankly, you're not a very good person. I mean, I can understand you get in the race, you put everything in it. You know what a creep that Trump is? You lose if you feel like the party's let you down. It did. It let you down? No doubt about that. But you got no choice but to pick it up. I everything that you say I agree with. But your willingness to sit on the sidelines or in it and discuss. I don't respect that opinion. I don't like it. And I really don't like people who continue to think that.

Dan Koh: James Carville, thank you for coming to the People's Cabinet.

James Carville: Thank you, I enjoyed it. It was a good, thoughtful questions. Thank you very much. Enjoyed it.

Dan Koh: I'm Dan Koh and that's it for the People's Cabinet today. Follow us on social media. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and see you on Tuesdays for new episodes. Let's Go.