James "Snakehead" Carville, the loathsome but successful Democrat operative who gave us Bill Clinton in 1992, had a few words for Democrats on their failing fortunes.

Speaking with leftist Vox, he generally warned that Democrats had better do what he did when their party was in disarray and falling apart 25 years ago -- scrap the crazed leftwingery and tack center.

What's more, they'd better focus on electing more Democrats, if they want to get what they want, rather than bullying the ones they've got now (although he made an exception for Sen. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona). He even defended Joe Manchin, who's basically what Trotsky was to Stalin in the fevered minds of far-left Democrats.

Carville argued:

Look, I’m a liberal Democrat. Always have been. But some of these people bitching about Manchin can’t see political reality straight. Six percent of adults in this country identify as “progressive.” Only 11 or 12 percent of Democrats identify as progressive. So let’s just meet in the middle and say something like 7 or 8 percent of the country agrees with the progressive left. This ain’t a goddamn debate anymore. Someone like Manchin is closer to the mainstream than a lot of these people think, and pretending like he isn’t won’t help the cause.

Sean Illing

The issue with Manchin (well, one of the issues) is that we’re not even talking about ultra-progressive policies. Manchin is blocking widely popular, mostly centrist policies and that’s what pisses people off —

James Carville

Okay, fine, but I’ll go back to my earlier point: If we want to pass more liberal policies, we need to elect more Democrats. Period. End of story.

Two things stand out here from that passage: That Democrats have swung way too far left, and have gone overboard to become the party of Reps. Ilhan Omar, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and the rest of the socialist "squad," crazed communist leftists with the most third-world of third-world Chavista views, who view America as a sort of place to harvest for resources and then use their power to achieve the communist dream of control. That may go over well in Mogadishu, Caracas, Karachi, or any other place full of aggrieved fourth-world intellectuals and subliterate voters, but it's never been the voting pattern in the U.S. Even immigrants from such places usually come here to better themselves with the American dream of a house, a job, and a rung up. But the elites in those hellholes chronicled by V.S. Naipaul stand shoulder to shoulder with the Squad and all its grievance-tinged ways.

Second, if Democrats want to get what they want, they need to elect more Democrats. That's a tall order now that the Democrat "brand" stinks of socialism to voters. It's even taller now that Democrats have come to rely on election-stealing as a substitute for selling ideas. That may be one reason why they have tacked left. State legislatures have moved to check them and all their gamy practices, and now they've got to rely on selling ideas, not ballot-harvesting, to win with more voters.

How do they elect more Democrats? Carville says it's by tacking center. The only reason he can say this is that he knows that Democrats know they are in for a shellacking come November. He's suspecting they might listen to him now that they are out of ideas. Move center. No center orientation, no big majority of Democrats who can move legislation in Congress. In fact, no legislation at all. It's kind of circular, but they will need to master it or watch their party circle the drain. Up until now, they haven't actually cared that they never had more than a razor-thin majority. Wasn't Nancy Pelosi's political muscle enough? 

Carville is stating the obvious, based on his own experience. And it's likely that Democrats are going to ignore him -- unless they hit rock bottom. Like drunks who have a 'Come to Jesus' moment, they are going to have to wake up and start putting out positions and plans that don't stink with voters and can win elections, which means moderate, not overweening proposals. Lots of midnight basketball, no more takeover of people's health care with mendacious claims about cutting costs. Funding, not demonizing, cops. Tax incentives for greenie energy, not mandates for things that don't exist. Double-entry bookkeeping, not a full takeover of the economy.

It's a tall order, but now it's out there. Carville is likely to be demonized for a while for it or dismissed as an old fossil, but that's what's on offer. Will they take it and maybe win yet not quite get all the power they like? Or will they keep thinking it's 2020 and they just need to get more extreme in a bid to beat America's voters into submission?

Image: The Office of James Carville, via Wikipedia // CC BY-SA 3.0