Why Are Democrats Having Such a Hard Time Beating Trump? https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/02/upshot/democrats-trump-election.html
The national political environment just isn’t as conducive to a Harris victory as many might imagine. ..

In the United States, post-pandemic disillusionment and frustration took a toll on Democrats. The party championed a tough response to the virus, including mask and vaccine mandates, school closures and lockdowns. It had backed the Black Lives Matter movement, argued for a more liberal border policy, sought to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and spent trillions on stimulus. As the pandemic ended, all of this quickly became a liability...Democrats are playing defense on the issues. They’ve moved to the right on immigration, energy and crime. They de-emphasized the traditional liberal push to expand the society safety net, which was eclipsed by the urgency to reduce prices....On issue after issue, Democrats have responded by moving to the right. Most obviously, Ms. Harris had to back away from positions she took when the progressive cultural ascendancy was near its peak in 2019 — a ban on fracking, Medicare for all and so on. But the Democratic shift isn’t simply about backing away from positions taken during a Democratic primary...In her speech at the Democratic convention, Ms. Harris didn’t mention the unfinished business of Obama-Biden era liberalism: paid family leave, an expanded child tax credit, student loan forgiveness, universal pre-K or free community college. Instead, she promised a conservative-sounding tax break for small businesses. The liberal policies she does advocate on the campaign trail tend to be far smaller than the Affordable Care Act or those contained in Build Back Better... 

A Carnival of Hope: Trump, Harris and the Death of Liberalism  https://beiner.substack.com/p/a-carnival-of-hope-trump-harris-and    For progressives, the MAGA insurgency heralds the end of democracy. As a consumer, it doesn’t matter which you choose, as long as you choose.  Capitalism will happily take your rejection and sell it back to you. Don’t like extractive consumerism? No worries! We have a shampoo just for you.

Modern elections are no different. They are consumer culture’s attempt to sell the most sacred gift in the human soul back to us: hope. At the heart of every election is the promise that things will be new. In a polarised society like the US, this newness looks radically different depending on the tribe you belong to.

These tribes are no longer defined by ‘left’ or ‘right’, but by pro or anti-institutional. For those in the Trump insurgency, the political establishment represented by Kamala Harris is an existential threat. For progressives, the MAGA insurgency heralds the end of democracy. As a consumer, it doesn’t matter which you choose, as long as you choose.

Can democracy survive now the world’s richest man has it in his sights? https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/nov/02/elon-musk-donald-trump-us-presidential-elections George Monbiot ..  Democracy is the problem capital keeps trying to solve. Why? Because it ensures that workers have rights and fair wages; that the living world has some (though never enough) protections; that we cannot be ripped off, poisoned and robbed without restraint.

Capitalism has used two powerful tools to try to solve its problem: fascism and neoliberalism.  For decades now, the centrist pact with capital has worked as follows: we might seek half-heartedly to improve the lives of people at the bottom, but we will do almost nothing to hold down those at the top. As a short-term tactic it worked: .. appeasement makes your opponents more powerful. But our governments claimed they were simply being “pragmatic”: it didn’t matter how rich some people became, as long as the lot of the poor improved..... “pragmatism” prevailed, and turned out not to be pragmatic at all. The slippage from democracy to oligarchy should surprise no one.