One fear that I have going forward is that the Democrats, once they are back in power, will completely misunderstand the job before them. They will do everything they can to try to woo the MAGA voter, people who have little desire to vote for them, and turn off key parts of their coalition.

This leads me to Keir Starmer. When he was elected in 2024, moderate Dems like Third Way folks declared it a clear victory for centrism, and demanded that Democrats follow Starmer’s lead. They continued this after Trump won.

And here we are, just under two years later, with Starmer stepping down in disgrace. This sums up Starmer nicely:

I don't feel sorry for Starmer. I feel for the Palestinians whose slaughter he enabled, for the trans people and refugees he's victimised, and my colleagues who've had their careers wrecked by Labour's assault on universities. A record to be ashamed of.

— Phil Burton-Cartledge (@philbc3.bsky.social) 2026-06-22T08:40:40.261Z

Starmer’s deeply centrist-minded approach failed miserably because he basically became a watered-down Torie. I would argue he became more center-right than anything resembling a centrist. I partially blame Tony Blair, who, despite burning much of his good reputation by becoming Dumya Bush’s lapdog during Iraq, was viewed as a guy who reformed Labour by running to the middle.

Starmer did indeed win in 2024 by a landslide, but there were warning signs. The far-right Reformist party, led by Trump with a Fancy Accent Nigel Farage, made some gains. In some ways, Labour underperformed despite the historic incompetence of a parade of Tory prime ministers.

Starmer did the British version of a Third Way Democrat. He embraced, more or less joined, the right-wing anti-trans movement in Britain and its unofficial leader, JK Rowling, overseeing a ban on gender affirming care for trans youth in the National Health Service, and he jumped onboard with right-wing policy on immigration, consistently appearing to be a champion for racist Brits. He did not, in fact, win over any of Farage’s voters.

Because of course he didn’t. This is something that the people now running CBS News don’t seem to get: the right doesn’t want Right Wing Light, they want the full experience. So if you do harm to parts of your own coalition and not get any votes for it, then why in the fuck are you doing it? It’s fair to ask whether you actually mean it, and hold disdain for immigrants and trans people.

This is the recurring story for Starmer’s tenure and a big lesson for Democrats. Centrist PACs, pundits, and organizations spend millions, produce a lot of media content, and pay advisors a lot of money to tell party leaders that right-wing voters can be won by adopting hot social issues like trans rights and immigration.

So, some party leaders during the early part of the second Trump term punched left and made more conciliatory overtones to the GOP, talking about “bipartisan solutions” at a time when the Republicans wanted nothing to do with working together, but instead were focused on domination. As 2025 wore on, Democratic core voters became more and more frustrated with a lack of fight coming from leaders, especially Chuck Schumer. Things shifted from “left v. center” to where they are now, more “fighter vs. non-fighter.”

The Democrats must view any election win not as a statement of the power of centrism but instead as a demand for action. We absolutely cannot go back to the time of “we must reach out to our friends across the aisle and let bygones be bygones” and fret about whether following through on the rule of law for the many examples of Trump corruption is polarizing or not. There is going to be one chance given after 2028 if indeed the Dems win back power, and if they don’t hold Republicans accountable, we will become Britain. Our two-party system would be in a lot of trouble as people begin to look at other options.

So far, we have noticed a lot of reluctance among the most institutionalist of the institutionalists to defend said institutions, due to some strange, almost cult-like dedication to comity. That America is as gone as the old East Wing of the White House. There has to be a very large effort of rebuilding and reforming that likely would force many in the old guard outside of their comfort zone.

No amount of yelling “you better vote” at disgruntled Dem base voters will solve the problem if we find ourselves in a mess where establishment Democrats won’t take the necessary steps and begin to target vulnerable groups in an effort to win over MAGAs.

The last word goes to Fleetwood Mac.