Democrats will keep failing until they do their own autopsy Why have a serious examination of what’s gone wrong when you can keep tweeting #Resist, marching in pink hats and cheering on Alec Baldwin?

Mary Kate Cary | Opinion contributor

Roughly 80% of us now live in states either partially or totally controlled by Republicans. Two-thirds of our nation’s governors are now Republican — tying a 94-year-old record — and an all-time high 69 of 99 state legislatures now have Republican majorities. In half of our 50 states, both the state legislature and the governorship are controlled by Republicans. And that’s aside from the fact that Republicans control Congress and the White House and have appointed a majority of justices on the Supreme Court.

After four straight losses in recent special elections for congressional seats, on top of more than 1,030 seats lost nationally by Democrats in state legislatures, governorships and Congress since 2009, the Democratic National Committee needs to figure out the cause of what can only be called the party’s slow death.

It’s time for the DNC to perform an autopsy.

The Republicans did the same thing in 2012 when they published the Growth and Opportunity Project — affectionately known around Washington as “The Autopsy.” And while not everyone agreed with its recommendations, the authors were well-respected GOP leaders who called for changes to the party’s messaging, demographic outreach, use of new technology and data, number of debates and primary schedule. The guy who ordered the autopsy is now White House chief of staff.

Sally Bradshaw, one of the co-authors, said in 2012, “We have become expert at how to provide ideological information to like-minded people but, devastatingly, we have lost the ability to be persuasive with or welcoming to those who don't agree with us on every issue.”

Say what you want about Donald Trump — who was not a fan of the report’s recommendations and disagrees with many traditional Republican policies — but he brought millions of new voters to the GOP. He knew how to connect with the people he called “forgotten” Americans, many of whom had never voted Republican. Republican turnout in the primaries set a new record.

The massive loss of Democratic seats across the nation has meant the left is now without a pipeline of quality candidates. Exhibit A: Jon Ossoff, the progressive candidate in the Georgia special election, didn’t even live in the district in which he was running. Apparently, there was no one in the district to recruit. Exhibit B: Rob Quist, the Democrat in May’s special election in Montana, was a banjo-playing songwriter who has performed at a nudist camp. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

The Democrats also have a policy problem. In an era of vicious attacks by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, staggering national debt and menacing actions by North Korea, they only seem to want to talk about abortion rights, transgender bathrooms and gun control. Rich Lowry observed in Politico that if Democrats had to choose between opposing an actual coup against Trump and endorsing a ban on abortion after 20 weeks, “they’d probably have to think about it.” I think he’s right.

While 58% in a recent Washington Post-ABC News poll say Trump is “out of touch with the concerns of most people,” an even higher percentage — 67% — say Democrats are. That includes 44% of Democrats themselves.

Here’s another disconnect: The average age of the Democratic leadership in the House is 76; for Republicans, it’s 49. A recent headline from the liberal Huffington Post: “Democratic leadership looks like old Soviet Politburo.” That headline has the added benefit of being true: The average age of the Politburo before its collapse was only 70. Having California Rep. Nancy Pelosi as the face of the Democratic Party is not a great strategy for winning the youth vote.

But I have a feeling there won’t be any autopsy from the DNC. Instead, New Mexico Rep. Ben Ray Lujan, head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, predicted in a staff memo last week that Democrats would take the full House back in 2018. I am not making this up.

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Why have a serious examination of what’s gone wrong when you can keep tweeting #Resist, marching in pink hats, and cheering on Alec Baldwin? The left will keep Pelosi and New York Sen. Chuck Schumer in charge, they’ll keep widening the disconnect with the middle class by fighting for policies that expand government and slow the economy, and they’ll keep whistling past the graveyard.

The longer it takes for Democrats to call the coroner, the better for Republicans.

Mary Kate Cary, a former White House speechwriter for President George H.W. Bush, is a senior fellow for presidential studies at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center. Follow her on Twitter: @mkcary

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