Democrats see hope in women's marches - but wonder what comes next

[DonViejo]

By David Weigel and Jenna Portnoy January 22 at 7:46 PM

Alex Ellison, a senior at Boston’s Emerson College, was thrilled by what she saw at the women’s marches. She called her uncle, and Rep. Keith Ellison listened as the niece he’d struggled to get involved in the 2016 campaign described how inspiring it was to be surrounded by women, fighting for a cause.

“I was like — oh, now you’re interested?” Ellison (D-Minn.) remembered with a laugh.

The scale of Saturday’s marches, in Washington and elsewhere, surprised even the most optimistic boosters. Democrats who had tried and failed to generate enthusiasm for Hillary Clinton saw crowds conquering cities, as well as small towns she’d badly lost. But after a day of massive protest, the party, and liberals more generally, are left to wonder what comes next.

Just as Republicans once adapted to the emergence of the tea party movement, Democrats are trying to figure out what a new — and much larger — mobilization will mean for the fights against Trump and congressional Republicans. Saturday’s marches, which featured speeches from many leading Democrats, were not explicitly Democratic events. Ellison, like all but one leading candidate to run the Democratic National Committee, spent the hours around the march at a donor meeting in Florida.

more
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/democrats-see-hope-in-womens-marches--but-wonder-what-comes-next/2017/01/22/577bf2e6-e0ee-11e6-a453-19ec4b3d09ba_story.html?utm_term=.c7bc41796dd2&wpisrc=nl_headlines&wpmm=1

[Bill Fishlore]

1. The Marches Sure Mean Something

Simultaneous, gigantic protest marches all over the country and around the world mean that there is skilled, centralized, well-funded organization at work. From what he has said about his future projects, I would guess that Obama and his core team are among the producers of these spectacular demonstrations, providing coordination and expertise as part of a long-range strategy to rebuild the Democratic Party after its shocking and totally unexpected defeat in November.

President Trump got elected after losing the election in an echo of Dubbya's victory in 2000. Black folks despise him. Latinos fear him. Fifty-three percent of white women voted for him. That latter demographic is perhaps the most vulnerable component of Trump's voter coalition. The Democrats are off to a good start.