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On Tuesday, on US election night, David Axelrod, Barack Obama’s chief political strategist for two campaigns, told CNN that Democrats lost so much because they had lost touch with ordinary people.

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“We approach working-class voters as if we were missionaries. And our message to them is: “We want to help you become like us. »

Canada’s Liberals and New Democrats have exactly the same problem. Indeed, “progressive” parties in much of the Western world have ceased to be factory parties; they became the college club parties.

The typical American Democratic voter, like his Canadian Liberal or New Democratic counterpart, has above-average income, above-average education, and does “brain” rather than “manual” work.

A higher proportion of them also have secure jobs in the public sector.

Their social status, economic security, and higher educational level have led them to believe that they possess superior civic morality and social values. This is where Axelrod’s missionary imagery comes into play.

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“Progressives” think they have to proselytize like evangelicals sent to a foreign country. They must convert their fellow citizens to their way of thinking or, failing a voluntary conversion, adopt laws that impose their values ​​on everyone.

They recognize this attitude when they see it in Christian conservatives, but they never recognize it in themselves. The cancel culture of the left is the equivalent of the culture of rejection of religious fundamentalists.

I think the biggest issue in the US election was the cost of inflation over the last four years. And even the effects of inflation reinforce part of this “progressive” detachment. Inflation has hit middle- and lower-income voters hardest. The pandemic too.

Trump voters were less likely to work from home, so they either went to work in the middle of the COVID pandemic or saw their jobs disappear. Laborers and service sector workers were five times more likely to be laid off than civil servants, technology workers and public sector employees.

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Because Democrats tend to be less affected by inflation and economic downturns, they voted for the party that promised to safeguard their advantages.

With a few minor adjustments, the same is true for Liberal and NDP voters in Canada. They are more likely to be unionized bureaucrats and teachers than unionized tool salesmen.

And because center-left voters in both countries have fewer economic concerns, non-economic issues have become more important to them. Examples of this include transgender rights, open immigration, systemic discrimination/white privilege/“settler colonialism,” support for Palestine, and the spread of climate alarmism.

And because their opinions belong to the elite of the moment, “progressives” consider any message that does not correspond to theirs as misinformation or disinformation that should be banned from the Internet and public debates.

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This is why Democrats in the United States and liberals here support online censorship laws.

Their social awakening and smug “progressivism” have caused the Kamala Harris campaign and Democrats in general to lose touch with ordinary voters. Some exit polls have shown that half of Trump’s voters don’t really like him, but see his views as closer to their own.

Democrats have also suffered from the perception among many voters that the U.S. economy is bad. The situation is nowhere near as serious as that in Canada. But inflation makes people everywhere feel like prosperity is slipping away.

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In Canada, our gross domestic product per capita has declined in seven of the last eight quarters. Meanwhile, U.S. GDP per capita increased for the eighth time in a row. Yet working-class Americans in the private sector voted for Trump because they feel their economy is not working for them.

Democrats also relied heavily on abortion rights to get women to the polls and on asserting Donald Trump as a threat to democracy — a dual strategy that hasn’t worked well.

There are already signs in Canada that the Liberals intend to use the same strategies: abortion rights and claiming that a Pierre Poilievre government would be a threat.

Don’t expect these strategies to work much better here.

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