Writes Nate Silver, purporting to read the collective mind of Democrats, in "Is America ready for a gay president? Kamala Harris and a subscriber have questions about Mayor Pete, and I have annoyingly nuanced answers."
I've already blogged about what Harris said in her book about not picking Pete for VP — here, 10 days ago — and I don't want to redo that. I'm blogging Silver's piece because of the idea of "Demthink" and I liked these examples of how wrong it can go:
[W]ho thought it would be a good idea for Congressional Democrats to pose kneeling while wearing kente cloths when announcing police reform legislation? Who gave a thumbs up to Tim Walz playing Madden with AOC and then nonsensically tweeting out afterward that “@AOC can run a mean pick 6”? Meanwhile, Democratic messaging on the shutdown is already predictably lapsing into incoherence because of Demthink, with people like Sen. Chris Murphy wanting to check every box to appeal to different parts of the donor class rather than settle on one message.
"Demthink" is inherently incoherent. There is no one mind there, nobody to be coherent. Meanwhile, the Republicans have Trump. They didn't want him, but through the people they got him. And he is one person, who brought along his one mind and who takes responsibility for everything. He is, of course, susceptible to the accusation that he's incoherent. He's crazy, stupid, evil, etc., on and on. We've heard it a million times. But he is a real person, not a concoction of a group mind.
| Aspect | Marketplace of Ideas | Group Mind | Hive Mind |
|---|---|---|---|
| Structure | Decentralized, competitive arena of diverse voices. Individuals or groups pitch ideas; no single "mind" dominates. | Collaborative, semi-unified consciousness from group interaction. E.g., Demthink’s consultant-driven narrative. | Highly unified mindset; individuals sync to a central signal. E.g., MAGA’s loyalty to Trump’s voice. |
| Individuality | High: Individuals retain distinct voices, competing openly (e.g., moderates vs. progressives on X). | Moderate: Individuals contribute but align toward consensus (e.g., Demthink’s risk-averse VP pick). | Low: Individuals act as extensions of the leader/ideology (e.g., MAGA echoing Trump’s fraud claims). |
| Coherence | Intentionally diverse, often chaotic, as ideas clash to refine truth. | Can be incoherent due to competing inputs, like Demthink’s fragmented messaging. | Hyper-coherent in aligning to a single vision; Trump’s “incoherence” unified by persona. |
| Purpose | Truth-seeking via competition; bad ideas ideally lose out. | Consensus-building for action or identity (e.g., Demthink’s liberal values). | Unified action or belief, often dogmatic (e.g., MAGA’s “America First”). |
| Accountability | Diffuse: Ideas are judged, not people. No single owner of outcomes. | Diffuse: Blame spreads across the group, as with Demthink’s flops. | Centralized: Leader (e.g., Trump) owns wins/losses, giving a human face. |
AND: Assume the Democratic Party would be best off to find, as their next presidential nominee, an individual who would operate in the Trump mode — that is, with an individual mind and authentic beliefs and accepting full personal responsibility. 1. Who is out there who could function like that? and 2. Who is in the party now who would powerful obstruct the party moving to that format?
Grok's answer to question #1: John Fetterman, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Josh Shapiro, Gretchen Whitmer.
Grok's answer to question #2: Chuck Schumer, Hakeem Jeffries, "Big Donors & Consultants," "Interest Group Lobbies."
ALSO: What I'm seeing as "Trump mode" — an individual mind, authentic beliefs, and accepting full personal responsibility — is what Democrats have been calling "autocratic."
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46 comments:
I’m old enough to remember when they were pushing Pete hard, all those millions to the media for the tongue baths, Annie Leibovitz trailing around like a groupie. Who gave a thumbs up to the AOC/Madden line? They ALL did…
Even though they push Pete because they think he’s the most palatable it’s AOC who is the mist likely cult figure. A dictator’s lobotomized hot wife is their best bet…
Nate Silver could improve his punctuation.
The discrimination against gay people is done by Democrats on behalf of their own voters who are assumed to be too homophobic to vote for a gay man.
"Gay" isn't the issue -- competence is. Buttigieg was so incompetent that he's the first Transport Secretary anyone can remember. Before that, mayor of a dinky-shit little city near Chicago. Yip-yip-yip-Yahoo!.
Compare to Richard Grenell, as one example. Presidential material? Maybe Yes, maybe No, but Buttigieg is a crushingly obvious No.
I don’t know why certain Whites in the Dem party think Pete is a good candidate. He polls at zero with Blacks. Zero.
Nominating Pete would be incoherent. It might well kill the Democrat party.
The Democratic Party was taken over by consultants and data analysts during Bill Clinton's triangulation phase. When the Party's early ideology-driven support for Hillarycare went down in flames, and when the Crime Bill (1994) resulted in losing the House plus numerous other unintended consequences, Democrats shifted to polling and cynical calculations to scare soccer moms (then others).
Those in power focused on manipulating their own supporters rather than representing their supporters. This resulted in throwing out the working class in favor of big global (donor) businesses, throwing out bio women in favor of unstable transgendered people, and throwing out blacks in favor of gaming electoral votes through unchecked immigration.
Harris, famous for word salads and loving wine, couldn't come up with this strategy if her life depended on it. "Demthink" is what happens when a million narrow data points receive action with no sense of the bigger picture and no integrity and no vision. This is what ends with 80% vs. 20% polling numbers.
The Dems skip over the competence issue with Pete because he is gay.
And no one ever talks about his work translating for the academic journal devoted to the Italian commie Gramsci.
""Demthink" is what happens when a million narrow data points receive action with no sense of the bigger picture and no integrity and no vision..."
...I'm not convinced this is always a losing strategy. It might work if the narrow data points weren't so intent on killing and imprisoning their opponents...
...in that order...
"Nominating Pete would be incoherent. It might well kill the Democrat party."
Where do I donate?
Is it a group mind or a hive mind? Democrats these days are more and more like the Borg, only with blue haired men in dresses instead of cybernetic drones.
It doesn't help that Demthink sounds like Themthink (as in identity pronouns). When even the supposedly neutral medium -- language -- seems to conspire against you.
Demthink is an American English translation of the German "Kaput".
@rehajm: I'm not convinced this is always a losing strategy.
No, not at all. It works very well when there's a salient wedge issue. The key is that the policy change results in a net gain versus no action. Problems happen when the gifts/bribes/handouts are so finely calculated that any action will be worse than the current state of affairs.
I'd hold that the Democrat's recent high water mark of unity happened during Obama's first two years. They were serving too many masters started when the cowards wouldn't vote and "deemed passed" the Obamacare bill. That began the backroom gifts to major donors (i.e., insurance and medical providers) and guaranteed that state-managed health care wouldn't save a penny. They took big business support from the Republicans, but in doing it they stole from their own voters.
As if to dispel the notion that leftists have a hive mind, they go ahead and create a brand for their hive mind: "Demthink".
Which...if you give it 2 seconds is doomed to failure and soon to become the new moniker by everyone outside of late night show hosts: "Dumbthink".
On the gay President thing- we will see a gay President before we will see a Jewish President in this country. (I had previously correctly predicted a Black President before a Jewish President). Pete being gay isn't the issue. The issue is his mindset (Demthink) coupled with his actual nothing of note being achieved. Unless you make someone President for going to school. Or riding in a huge vehicle to within a quarter mile of his speech location where he then takes out his bike and rides that to the podium to talk about saving the planet.
A well accomplished, smart thinking, well presented gay person could absolutely be elected President in this country. Say...someone like a Richard Grenell.
A thought experiment : Imagine Pelosi was a Republican being asked if she hated Obama. Doesn't Pelosi come across like a panicking Republican being accused of hating Obama (when Obama was president) The cult of Obama maintained the Democrats (Themthink) as long as Obama was president. Which, could very likely happened to the GOP's (Trumpthink) once Trump is no longer president.
Is America ready for a gay president?
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again - Trump should just go gay.
For extra credit, he can go trans, too. Giuliani can give him crosssressing tips from his SNL sketches.
Melania can talk about how she’s so proud to help Barron’s other mom on this next chapter of her life.
It would be an NYT feature come to life. CC, JSM
"Is it a group mind or a hive mind?"
What's the difference (other than an insect metaphor)?
Other similar expressions: groupthink, collective consciousness, mob mentality, echo chamber, swarm intelligence.
Less similar, but worth comparing: the marketplace of ideas.
The problem is that the democratic party has become incredibly bizarre. It isn’t demthink, it is just plan weirdness that doesn’t resonate with most voters. Men in girls bathrooms and playing women’s sports - check. Thinking Walz would appeal to most white male voters - check. Thinking Kamala is remotely qualified to be president merely because she is a black woman - check. Letting violent criminals out with no bail -check. Giving free healthcare and welfare to foreigners who enter the country illegally- check. Not helping ICE remove illegal immigrants who have committed crimes in this country-check. These are all batshit crazy ideas to most voters but democrats will defend them to the death.
There is obviously a hive mind at the core, and 30 years of hearing Rush and Hannity play those supercuts of Democrats in Media or politics all saying the exact same phrase of the day all the same all day long or week or now decade in the Trump phraseology, has only reinforced that obvious conclusion.
I added a chart to the post, distinguishing hive mind and group mind and contrasting both to the marketplace of ideas. Check it out.
Tim Walz comes off as more gay than Pete Buttigieg.
As a retired teacher, I think of them in those terms. Walz is the teacher that grabs the microphone at pep rallies, and thinks that the students adore his antics. Pete is the English teacher who is occasionally interesting and helps out with the theater productions.
Both men aren't competent enough for national politics.
Which Party is always trying to change and distort the language in the most Orwellian of ways? Think about that Nate! The list of obfuscatory terms is endless: birthing persons, undocumented, mostly peaceful, anti-fascist, horse paste, drink bleach, latinx, anti-Zionist, our democracy, cisgender, voter ID is racist, inability to ID an ICE agent is racist, genocide, authoritarian...
Harris' comments about Buttigieg are simply another version of "deplorables". She is blaming the voters. Once again, a non-winning strategy. Also, notice the systematic differences among the examples in the Grok chart.
I have a dream
The AI is stupid because it was raised on what the Uniparty believes. Using Trump as an example of setting the hive mind agenda severely misreads the order in which strong belief in conservative values and government arose vs Trump adopting those as campaign and governing ideas and DOING it after years of prior presidents disappointing us.
"Echoing Trump's fraud claims" LOL okay boomer. Again with the severe misunderestimation of the order of operations. As if we didn't know they cheated prior to 2020! Talk about dwelling in a bubble.
@Mike (MJB Wolf): The Party in power is the only one with the potential to manipulate language that way. The Parties out of power promise rainbows, lollipops, and heaven on earth -- "If only we can take power from the evil and corrupt tyrants!"
The statist language games are tiny little symbolic gestures to hang on to votes and reward those who are impressed by pompous job titles and certificates of achievement (i.e., every DEI supporter, and everyone who got ahead through nepotism).
I LOVE the chart. Shall we return to Silvers original analogy? "What is Demthink? It’s what you’d end up with if you trained a large language model solely on the inner monologue of people who either work in Democratic politics or watch MSNBC for eight hours a day."
Here, illustrated literally.
I'm assuming the prompts have something to do with that, as Grok, in my experience, hasn't been as Demthinky as Chat.
It's interesting that Grok gave MAGA examples for the hive mind. In the past several years, when I've read/heard "hive mind" it has most often been in the phrase "reddit hive mind".
Ann I think your last paragraph is missing a crucial element of what’s really going on here. The contrast isn’t just between a messy Democratic group mind and Trump’s singular “real person” mind. It’s that many people have given up on sorting through complexity altogether.
That resignation — the “I don’t care anymore, maybe a king would be better” mentality — is what makes people so easily played. If politics feels too complicated, the fantasy of one man who can “fix it” becomes irresistible.
But here’s the catch: they didn’t really choose Trump the man. His actual résumé is riddled with bankruptcies, scams, failed ventures, and public admissions that would sink almost anyone else. What they chose was the character he played — the billionaire boss from TV who always wins, the outsider who talks like a tough guy. It’s as if voters cast their ballots for a movie hero, forgetting they were electing the actor behind the role.
That’s why pointing out contradictions or failures doesn’t land. For many, Trump isn’t supposed to be fact-checked like a president — or Demthinked or Repthinked. He’s performing a role they’ve already bought into. And once you’re invested in the character, admitting flaws in the man feels like breaking the spell.
The difference seems obvious to me. First of all it shouldn't be called group of mind it should be called group of think. Groupthink is the result of quote unquote consensus. The hive mind is where the many are controlled by a centralized Commander EG the queen bee.
In practice I believe that hybrids of these two systems are commonly deployed to control whatever narrative is being pushed by leadership.
Just thinking out loud here therefore I conclude that the groupthink is really a cover for the hive mind where are the queen is actually an inner sanctum cabal of several powerful entities and then they determine what the quote unquote consensus needs to be and bullies the group into agreeing to it.
Someone in power figured out though that the hive mind is much easier to change if you can remove the queen bee.
Althouse's punctuation is impeccable.
..."Grok's answer to question #1: .... Gretchen Whitmer...."
Gretchen Whitmer, the politician so craven that she hid her face behind a folder rather than the photographed in the Oval Office meeting with Trump, is an 'independent thinker', Group #1? She has the mindset of a freakin' ostrich ! I would caution against the mistake of treating A.I. as if it's coherent; it's only ever coherent accidentally, as a product of statistical probability.
The "hive mind" examples from Grok are nonsense. The queen bee/ant in a hive does not direct the actions of the other insects but is rather served instinctively by the all the others. The whole point of a 'hive mind' is not direction from a single individual but the hive members work towards a singular goal without any open direction from a single source.
Also called Cult-think and lie-buy.
Tried Demthink. Came up with X'40'.
A Hive Mind leads to Insect Politics?
Temujin said:
"Pete being gay isn't the issue. The issue is his mindset (Demthink) coupled with his actual nothing of note being achieved."
yes & It's all about loyalty to the grand scheme/lie and check box identity "firsts!".
I’m having a hard time accepting Grok, when it suggests Gretchen Whitmer as “authentic beliefs and accepting full personal responsibility”.
I think a good answer would have been Tulsi Gabbard, but they keep pushing her away from the party.
Lots of words boils down to two salient points.
1) The Dem establishment doesn’t like the country or the people and their policies reflect that.
2) Dem policies like unfettered illegal immigration make law abiding citizens suckers
Christopher B, I don’t see much comparison between how a hive operates and how a dictatorship takes over. A hive mind is decentralized — no bee or ant is issuing commands, they simply act on instinct to sustain the hive. A dictatorship, by contrast, is the ultimate centralization: one individual consolidates authority and directs others.
If anything, the danger in politics isn’t people acting like hive insects but people surrendering their individual judgment to the will of a single leader.
This idea of a collectively trained LLM is an interesting idea. You could imagine a debate between 2 such LLMs, hashing out the relative virtues of the major parties platforms.
“Will an increased mix of renewables make energy more affordable?”
“Who pays in the end for tariffs?”
“Are transgender members of the military effective soldiers?”
“Don’t we need to eliminate the debt by some combination of taxes and massive reduction in spending? And who would feel the pain of each?”
I’m looking for questions that would find the contradictions and myths of each side.
Silver's description of "Demthink" is very reminiscent of the famous 'dances' done by worker bees to transmit information about pollen sources. We know what is going on but have no way to actually translate the language.
As Dave Begley noted, Mayor Pete gets roughly zero black votes, and would go down in flames as the Dem nominee for President or VP.
All the more reason for us to support him.
"Too bad Kamala was too bigoted to pick a gay guy. We think he deserves a chance."
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