Every political party, movement, or faction has its crazies, on that much we should all agree. Some are mostly made up of crazies. The goal is to make sure that your side doesn't have as many crazies as the other, and that they're kept at a long arm's length from the levers of power in the party.
The modern Democratic Party has been mainstreaming its crazies for a quarter of a century now. Don't be pedantic and try to pick some date from the 20th century, Y2K is a perfectly valid starting point for the purpose of this conversation.
In speeches and writing as far back as the early aughts, I kept saying that the Democrats were dragging their party so far leftward that its highly relative center was now somewhere left of Cuba. This is one of the huge reasons that I am not a fan of bipartisanship in Congress. Once the Republicans are where the Democrats believe to be "half way," they're already miles over the center line into leftism. It's a fool's game that needn't be indulged just for a few positive words from The New York Times or The Washington Post. Having written that, I will admit that some valuable bipartisan bills are occasionally written and passed — the "Take It Down Act" is a recent example — but they're so rare they are practically unicorns.
The Dems' loons have succeeded not with ideas or a bold vision for the party, but by simply being louder than everyone else. America's Dumbest Bartender, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, is the poster girl for the open mouth/closed mind movement in the Democratic Party. When she and her antisemitic mean girl pals began their "Squad" antics in 2019, it was obvious that the geriatric elites in the party had no idea how to handle them. Nancy Pelosi had just solidified her place as one of the most powerful figures in the history of Congress by reclaiming the Speaker's gavel after a period in the minority that would have ended the careers of most politicians. It was obvious from the get-go that AOC and Co. were going to be a problem for her.
There were a few attempts at putting the Squad in its place in the early going, but Squeaky's perpetually open mouth eventually wore down the elders of the Democratic village. Now, according to many, she is the future of the party.
AOC's ascendance opened the door for the Dems to really amp up the crazy, electing people like Jasmine Crockett in Texas and Dan Goldman in New York, just to name a couple.
Related: I'm Waiting for the Jasmine Crockett/AOC Congressional Dumb-Off
It also emboldened some of the unstable types that had been in the party for a while. I've long thought that Connecticut's Chris Murphy was one of the dumbest people in the United States Senate. Well, now he's one of the loudest, too. The guy never saw a rake that he didn't want to step on, and he keeps finding as many as he can.
Things have gotten so weird on the Dem side that AOC has reinvigorated octogenarian commie Bernie Sanders, who has almost as many bones to pick with the Democratic National Committee as the Republicans do:
WATCH: Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) admitted that the Democrat Party is a “threat to democracy,” as some argue they have not had a fair primary election since 2008, conceding this point during an appearance on Andrew Schulz’s Flagrant with Akaash Singh.
— 🇺🇸⭐️OUR-VOICES⭐️🇺🇸 (@iswho) May 19, 2025
BERNIE "NO ARGUMENT HERE"… pic.twitter.com/Ud6uD9eJIx
The AOC/Bernie alliance is sending the not-so-subtle message that younger Democrats think that the party hasn't gone far enough to the left yet. She's encouraging Dems to follow the extreme progressive off of the leftist cliff, where he will then anoint her as the queen of whatever the party ends up being when it takes the big plunge. Their barnstorming "Fight the Oligarchy" tour has stuck to deep blue areas and has targeted audiences full of people who were already voting for Democrats. The "you can hate America and capitalism even more" theme is getting a lot of play, though.
We are deeply into "inmates running the asylum" territory with the Trump Derangement Syndrome Democrats. Worse yet, the inmates want to keep on rioting even though they're in charge over there now.
The possibility of a huge course correction for the Democrats remains, but it's diminishing by the day. The only way it can happen is if the Dem money people decide they've had enough and start flexing a lot. Unfortunately, one of the biggest money people is prog whack-job George Soros, and he's worth a cool seven or so billion. He's also got his heirs carrying on his radical leftist financial activism.
Recapping: a multi-billionaire is helping to fund the rise of a younger Democrat who is traipsing about the country in private jets with an old commie so they can rail against oligarchs.
We may have a few crazies on our side, but things have never gotten that weird.
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