For the first time in my life, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer got my hopes up. He then immediately dashed them to the floor and had Nancy Pelosi pee on them for good measure.

I know, I know — I should have known better. But what’s a girl to do? He pushed all my buttons, like a salsa dancer with a Communist Manifesto between his teeth.

“When you lose to somebody who has 40 percent popularity, you don’t blame other things — Comey, Russia — you blame yourself,” Schumer told the Washington Post in an interview yesterday.

Oh God. Melt. Maybe I’ve been wrong about this guy? Maybe this could work out? Maybe my whole life has been one big mistake up until this point! I’m sorry for all those times I called you “Amy Schumer’s creepy uncle,” Chuck!

But then he kept talking.

“So what did we do wrong?” Schumer continued. “People didn’t know what we stood for, just that we were against Trump. And still believe that.”

Ouch.

In the context of the article — wankily titled “Trump had ‘The Art of the Deal.’ Now Democrats say their economic agenda is ‘A Better Deal’” — Schumer was responding to a new poll which shows that most Americans believe his party stands for nothing other than opposing the current administration. Given that they just ran a presidential candidate whose entire campaign platform consisted of not being Donald Trump, and given that their current McResistance vanity politics parade has consisted of nothing other than resisting Trump, this is a highly understandable perception for Americans to have.

But according to Amy Schumer’s creepy uncle, the problem isn’t what the Democratic party did, it’s what you thought about what the Democratic party did. Their party isn’t in the worst shape it’s been in since the Civil War because they’re the slightly more photogenic conjoined twin of the GOP, who promulgate the exact same soul-crushing neoliberal and neoconservative policies as the Republicans but slap a rainbow flag bumper sticker on it for appearance, who deliberately sabotage progressive candidates and who are now contesting the DNC fraud case on the grounds that they have no obligation to provide real party primaries. No, their party is in the worst shape it’s been in since the Civil War because you’re just not thinking the correct thoughts about them. You refused to support the Democratic party because you don’t know enough about them, not because you know so much about them that you hope they lose party legitimacy soon and get flushed down the toilet where they belong.

If that wasn’t clear enough, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi added that the change the Democratic party will be making “is not a course correction, but it’s a presentation correction.”

Are you getting this loud and clear, America? The undisputed leaders of the Democratic party are telling you with their own face holes that they are not changing course at all — they are only going to change the way that they have been speaking to you. Because the problem is in you, not them. They’re infallible; you have just failed to see this thus far, so the only adjustment they need to make is in their presentation. The WaPo article mentioned some speculation about possible shifts in policy, and there’s been some placating talk about single-payer being “on the table”, but when you ask the party’s leaders what they’re actually doing, they start babbling about presentation.

I think they’ve made themselves abundantly clear by now, don’t you? They’ve had nine months to admit they’ve been doing everything wrong and make the massive, sweeping changes they’d need to make to earn back support and trust, but they have not, and they will not. The trajectory of the Democratic party will not change at all. If you don’t like it, too bad, because Trumpy Trump Trump Trumpetty Trump Putin.

One of the most exciting developments in our society over the last couple of years has been a greatly expanded mainstream understanding of the concept of gaslighting. Plainly unaware of this, ol’ Chuck and Nancy are calmly holding your hand and telling you that you imagined the whole thing, that it was all that sweet, precious little imagination of yours getting you all confused again. They haven’t been fucking you over your entire life and deliberately obstructing all grassroots efforts to give you the same basic social safety nets accorded to everyone else in every other major country on the planet — you only thought that in your silly little mind.

But you know better than this. By now you’ve come to understand the textbook abuse tactic of gaslighting, and you can see through the fog of their manipulations. Something very drastic is going to have to happen on a grassroots level, America, and the Democratic party’s leaders have just told you in no uncertain terms that they’re going to fight you with every weapon in their arsenal if you try to do it anywhere near them.

Stop being polite about this. Stop being quiet. Stop worrying about offending your liberal friends. Start pushing in wildly different directions. Start making a ton of noise and creating lots of movement. If anything’s going to change, things are going to have to get loud, and we’re going to have to start shaking this machine from every possible angle. You will not be able to control the outcome of this upheaval, so it will be unpredictable and frightening, but the alternative is letting the Republicans control your country while the Democrats slyly subvert you as our species hurtles toward extinction by way of climate chaos or nuclear war with Russia. They’ll keep gaslighting, distracting and sedating us all until the US oligarchs have lost all hope of continuing their rule.

This cannot continue. Something’s got to give. Let’s make something happen right now.

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