In the opening scene of Aaron Sorkin’s “The Newsroom,” three panelists are asked, “In one sentence or less, why is America the greatest country in the world?” The show’s lead, a famous news anchor named Will McAvoy, attempts to dodge the question but eventually blurts out “It’s not the greatest country in the world … that’s my answer.” He continues, “You know why people don’t like liberals? Because they lose. If liberals are so fucking smart, then why do they lose so goddamn always?”
I hear the phrase “X/Y is why liberals always lose” constantly. It saturates the news; it’s tossed around in Dartmouth Political Union meetings — I have even heard professors slip into such rhetoric. I understand it. Liberals do lose, often and humiliatingly. Yet the phrase is a cop-out and distraction from the American societal conditions that have created such an aversion to liberalism.
In former First Lady Michelle Obama’s speech at the 2016 Democratic National Convention, she exclaimed what has become a defining aspect of the Democratic Party’s psychology over the past decade: “When they go low, we go high.” It was declared with a righteous passion — the idea that Democrats should never sink to the level of our political opponents; that if we continue to embrace kindness and morality, eventually, some day, we will succeed and it will all have been worth it. I used to love this quote. Now I can’t help but feel deeply frustrated by it and the false hope it gave to many across the nation.
It has proven entirely ineffective to “go high” by being passive and self-righteously non-confrontational. The right way to “go high” when the other side “goes low” is to return to real people and issues that impact day-to-day lives. The “low” ad hominem attacks that debase politics into schoolyard bullying cannot be combatted by a simplistic and pacifist but partisanly charged approach. Liberals win when they address people and their daily lives with passion, emphasizing both innovation and tradition. I believe that the Democratic Party has finally begun to understand how to both go high and win.
When Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear visited campus in March, he said that he spends 80 percent of his time talking about and addressing issues that affect 100 percent of people. A Democratic governor from a decidedly Republican state, Beshear won his most recent gubernatorial election by 5 percent. In the 2024 presidential election a year later, President Donald Trump won the state by over 30 percent. During his visit, Beshear acknowledged that Democrats have not shown enough “urgency” to institute “immediate change … for people who are crying out.” His outlook on politics emphasizes “nonpartisan” issues rather than bipartisan ones. He is a Democrat who wins.
When Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., came to campus in February, he emphasized his recent bipartisan efforts to release and investigate the Epstein files. He has formed an unlikely partnership with his colleague Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., to push for the full declassification of the files and accountability for those involved. Khanna attributed the success of the bill — which was passed on November 19, 2025 — to the “incredibly courageous” survivors of Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse. By highlighting the people that power and empower the movement, bipartisanship becomes far less daunting.
In our current political landscape, identifying as either a Democrat or a Republican is pretty much meaningless. Once you identify as a Democrat, the question becomes if you are a moderate or progressive. By identifying as a Republican, the question becomes whether you are simply “fiscally conservative” or “MAGA.” But maybe it’s for the best that we are drifting away from party identity as the default political identification.
Liberals do have a bad habit of losing. It’s a vicious cycle in which the more liberals lose, the more people hate them, and the more they lose again. But no matter if you are a Democrat or a Republican, a liberal or a conservative, it is undeniable that we are in a fundamentally different American political era than we were in 10 years ago. Michelle Obama gave her speech at the precipice of American democratic decline and chasmic political polarization. It’s taken a decade, but liberals are finally beginning to learn how to correctly use her sentiment to forge a stronger American people.
Opinion articles represent the views of their author(s), which are not necessarily those of The Dartmouth.
