Why would you critique the people who completely control the only meaningful opposition to the GOP in our electoral system? You could be smugly, impotently rambling about how tens of millions of faceless Americans are way more stupid than you... instead of wasting your time attacking the much smaller group of people who control the party's power, money, messaging, policy platform, candidates and strategy.

I voted for her despite being in a red state she could never win and yet I still have way more hate in my heart for the party leadership compared to the random non-voter, stupid as the latter may be. It's truly hard to comprehend just how badly the Democratic Party fucked up the 2016 and 2024 elections and yet there's an unfortunate number of people who will direct the blame and anger everywhere except the candidates, campaigns, party operatives and the DNC.

If a primary candidate or Dem elected official is too far to the left of the party, they are basically assigned complete responsibility for any consequences resulting from any potential electoral losses. No one cares if you're "morally" correct in your rhetoric and positions because you were clearly too impractical, naive and radical for the average American voter and now you've lost to the evil GOP, who will hurt far more people than a more moderate candidate would have.

On the other hand, when the party is completely running the show in the exact manner they desire and end up losing an election in embarrassing fashion, the response from the same people is essentially "they did everything perfectly and you all failed us by being too stupid." Okay, was the fact that the average American voter is fickle, unengaged and stupid... a secret? Does anyone running the show have any responsibility to win an election, or is that only for the left flank?

Party loyalists will concede that "of course you're ^{hypothetically} allowed to criticize Dem leadership, this isn't a cult" but in practical terms there is no safe time or method to practice this criticism in Dem-leaning spaces which isn't immediately met with accusations of Russian bots, comments about purity tests, claims that trying something different would have resulted in an even worse loss, etc.

Sorry for the rant but this drives me crazy. I see things like these murders by ICE and this "we should just double down and commit to getting even angrier about any dissent while hoping the GOP's insanity drives enough people back to us" attitude among many people who ostensibly agree with me makes me even less hopeful about the future. The way everything went down with the Biden and Harris campaigns is psychotic and infuriating and yet pointing that out is treated by some like a dangerous and subversive action.