The media is pushing the narrative that the progressive, Berniecrat wing failed, so the Dems should tack right again.

I have several ways to prove this wrong.

I'd like to start with Lucy McBath.



Georgia Democrat challenger Lucy McBath has defeated Republican Rep. Karen Handel to be elected to Congress, CNN projects.

Handel conceded the race for Georgia's 6th Congressional District early Thursday morning in a statement posted to Facebook.

Who is McBath?

McBath is a former flight attendant turned gun control activist, and who wants to expand Medicaid and Medicare. In other words, too progressive for Georgia.

So, why does she matter?

Because Georgia's 6th Congressional District is the very district that centrist establishment candidate Jon Ossoff lost in just last year.

A lot of progressives lost in this election, like Beto O'Rourke. So does that mean that voters don't want progressive candidates.

My response to this is Paul Sadler.

Who is Paul Sadler?

Sadler lost to Cruz by 15 points in 2012, while O'Rourke lost by less than 3 points.

While O'Rourke was somewhat progressive, Sadler opposed gay marriage, supported the death penalty, 3-strikes laws and the War on Drugs.

Interestingly, establishment candidate Sadler barely beat a completely unknown retired school teacher in the primaries named Grady Yarbrough.



Having eyed the Senate seat for several years, Yarbrough paid a $5,000 filing fee to join this year’s fray. Eschewing contributions, he said he’s spent about $20,000 in retirement savings on billboards, mail and travel — mainly to target minority voters.

...

“I am doing selective campaigning. When there is a heavy Hispanic and African American population in those counties, I go directly to those places. That’s how I’ve gotten to where I am now,” he said, adding that he’s campaigned in Kingsville, Laredo and Brownsville.

Do you think that Yarbrough might have stood a better chance? I do.

The close (and possibly rigged) losses by southern progressives does not prove what they say it proves.



Yet Gillum won the highest percentage of the vote of any Democratic candidate for governor of Florida since 1994, and Abrams outstripped any Democratic candidate for governor of Georgia since 1998. Meanwhile, in Texas, Beto O’Rourke’s emphatically progressive Senate campaign won the highest percentage for any Democratic gubernatorial or Senate candidate since 1990.

Many of the biggest losses of the night were center-right Democrats. Senator Joe Donnelly of Indiana, Senator Claire McCaskill of Missouri and Senator Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota were just some of those so-called "moderate" losers.

It's hard to claim victory by the center-right wing, when most of the center-right Senators are gone.

Then there are the issues.

One clear takeaway from the election is that voters prefer progressive stands on the issues.



For years, the people of Idaho, Utah and Nebraska watched their legislatures stubbornly refuse to widen Medicaid coverage as Obamacare proposed — forfeiting, in the process, billions in federal aid. On Tuesday, they took matters into their own hands, passing ballot initiatives to end the nonsense. In three more states — Maine, Kansas and Wisconsin — voters elected Democratic governors who promised to push for the same.

Voters in red states clearly want more government provided health care.

This happened in an election in which Trump and the GOP was yelling "Scary Socialism!"



what it means for health care as a political issue. A big night for Medicaid means a big night for Medicare-for-all.

Medicaid expansion was big, but not the only progressive winner.



Voters raised the minimum wage in Arkansas and Missouri...In Florida, they restored voting rights to over 1.2 million convicted felons ― a civil rights victory that will transform the state’s electorate of 16 million. Utah ― Utah! ― legalized medical marijuana. Most of these initiatives weren’t close.

Now compare that to the Democratic candidates in those same states.

Missouri: Center-right Claire McCaskill lost her Senate re-election bid by more than 140,000, while the voters raised the minimum wage to $12 and said "yes" to medical marijuana.

Florida: Center-right Bill Nelson lost his Senate election bid, while the voters banned offshore drilling and restored voting rights to over 1.2 million convicted felons.

The problem isn't progressive ideas.

The problem is that Democratic candidates usually suck, and the reason they usually suck is because the Democratic Party establishment almost never supports progressive candidates.