The Roots of Dems in Disarray?

One thing that strikes me about the Biden deadenders is the clear trauma they feel about the Democratic Party screwing things up, assuming they would again.

This is a very real trauma, clearly, but I am wondering why.

What are some good examples of Democrats fucking something up because of incompetence?

Now, there are plenty of examples of bad Democrats and there’s plenty of examples of Democrats having large majorities and not getting stuff done.

But aren’t most of those issues really based not around disarray but ideology? I mean, the Democrats were, until quite recently, a very politically diverse party. And the whole post-civil rights period until the recent past has been a slow realignment in American history that happened differently in different states but has largely stabilized finally. So naturally, what being a Democrat meant could and did mean very different things to different people.

The best example I can think of Dems really being in disarray was the Kennedy primary challenge to Carter in 1980. But even there, the problem wasn’t so much the primary per se. After all, Carter was a really bad president who governed far to the right of his large Democratic majorities in Congress. The problem was Ted Kennedy not being a serious human being who would do the work to pull it off. Interestingly, that was the moment when Teddy finally grew up and during the Reagan years and then for the rest of his life he became one of the best senators ever.

This also doesn’t mean I am saying there aren’t incompetent Democrats. I mean, just take a look at the governor of New York. But I am not convinced there are more screwups on our side than the Republicans. I also remember the many utterly lunatic candidates their voters have chosen for the Senate over the years. What’s Christine O’Donnell doing these days?

And again, most of the disagreements within the party have been ideological more or less. And now with this historical phase of realignment basically over, the party is naturally much more functional and disciplined than when it had to incorporate not just Joe Manchin, but like 8 of them, though mostly less personally detestable than he.

So despite the media narrative about this, I am not sure I see the evidence for the entire Dems in Disarray idea. But it’s also very clear many of you believe in this. So I am wondering, am I missing something here?