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As one of those leftists, it's sad but understandable for people to be skeptical at this point.
I have a lot of issues with the Democratic party, but its because I don't have another party to vote for. I could waste my time critiquing Republicans, but they're so far off the map of rationality that it feels silly and pointless. Democrats are still at least offering positions that can be critiqued outside "that was an outright lie" which is all you can say about Republican "policies."
I try to frontload those comments to make clear nothing could ever convince me to vote Republican or withhold my vote when they're trying to fucking roll over democracy into autocracy.
I do find it interesting that the Overton window in the US has now shifted so far to the right that there’s a clear space for moderate leftists with no overlap with the Democrats. But until the Republicans aren’t any sort of a threat, actually trying to build a leftist party will go nowhere due to the risk that Republicans can still get more of the vote than any single party to their left.
That could be coming if the Republicans get hammered enough this election. I can only hope.
They are "dying," demographically, and to stay relevant it requires the party to start casting a wider net and getting more people on their side, which naturally means becoming less extremist and way less racist. They've hitched their destiny to white supremacism, and we're on the verge of them mostly becoming so marginal than it might actually be time for the growth of a real left party. They're unwilling (and probably unable) to change the trajectory of their own party, so that's why they are going for broke with as much cheating as possible, because it may genuinely be one of the last elections where they matter at all, electorally.
Further, we also have Democrats who think we need a "strong Republican party," like Nancy Pelosi, are finally retiring and are being replaced by people like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who are a lot less sure we need a Republican party... because in their eyes the Democrats are already right-wing as it is.
This doesn't mean the Republicans will disappear, but there might be enough room electorally for a real leftist party to grow in the space left behind.
Personal opinion, but it stands as part of why I'm willing to put myself down for the "lesser evil" here. Long-term, we might have a less evil lesser evil to choose from if we can successfully kill the Republicans demographically so that no amount of gerrymandering can save them as a party.
I wish I could share your optimism. They’ve hitched their cart to a number of horses; white nationalism, conservative US Christian fundamentalism (which isn’t conservative, Christian or fundamentalist except in name), and the conspiracy camp. There’s overlap between those three, but they each have separate non-negotiable items they’ll always vote for.
And the problem with chasing those groups is that if Republicans attempt to court more moderate conservatives, those groups will do whatever they can to burn everything down.
So the party won’t just fade out as people leave; it is stuck where it is and won’t die until all its supporters (current and future) have died.
Yeah combined with the disproportionate representation that the small population/empty states get, and the electoral college, they’re likely to remain a threat unless and until we can get rank choice voting and interstate popular vote compact working.