It's time for the Democrats to look for a party leader. That's what happens every time a party loses an election. It's a great opportunity to turn a losing franchise around, as they do in sports. So far it does not appear that the Democrats understand why they lost everything between San Francisco and Washington D.C.

Let's see what's happening. This is the story:

A fresh start under a new leader could help turn the floundering Democrats’ fortunes around, insiders fervently hope.

But that’s not likely, whoever wins the battle -- be it Wisconsin state chair Ben Wikler, Minnesota state chair Ken Martin or one of their long-shot rivals -- because the party’s problems are ideological, not technical.

The DNC, like its Republican counterpart, sounds more important than it is. It does not select candidates for office, establish the party’s platform or set legislative priorities at any level of government.

The national committee isn’t even the leading campaign fundraising entity in presidential, federal or state races.

While the DNC raised an impressive $652 million during the 2024 campaign cycle, the Kamala Harris campaign alone raised over $1 billion.

The race for DNC chair could matter if the party’s woes were purely a matter of campaign mechanics: The central party helps to maintain voter contact databases and provides technological infrastructure that all its candidates can access.

If the Democrats’ November defeats were due to poorly maintained databases or outdated voter modeling software, the new chair could fix those and propel the party to victory.

That, however, is clearly not the case: Democrats are losing because of their message, not their tactics or techniques.

They’ve got money and lots of party offices. What they don't have is a message that attracts voters.

On immigration, they still think that the solution is immigration reform, or something that fell off the charts when the border was opened under the Biden administration. Reform won’t change a thing when the problem is people across the border.

On education, the party is too close to the teachers unions rather than the parents. On cultural issues. they are out of the mainstream, whether it's men playing on women's sports or late-term abortions.

So who will be the new party leader? We will see, but the party has a message problem and I don't think that they understand yet.

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Image: DNC