An underlying realization that the Democratic party's politburo — Obama, Pelosi, Schumer, Jeffries, and their courtiers of elected official and consultant sycophants — sold voters a bill of goods: the gaslighting of the public on President Biden's decrepitude; the false idol of the Kamala Harris "campaign of joy" as a smart last-minute stand-in; and the repeated cowering to the far left whose wokeness and moral condescension turns off most voters.   

In a just world, one might expect a formal no-confidence vote on this leadership failure. 

After all, this is the kind of recall we see with Western European heads of state, in House speakership races, and soon, in Canada. That recall may not happen, but the undeniable trouncing may signal the end of what we can call the Obama Era.    

Simply put, the Obama Era is characterized by a set of ideas and tactics directly linked to the Democrats' loss. The first is the "Demography is Destiny" delusion — a kind of manifest destiny of the left, adopted in the second Obama term, that promises an ever-diversifying electorate would inexorably vote Democratic and must therefore be patronized with cartoonish appeals to identity and big government wardship. 

This proved to be not only deeply un-American but politically foolish.   

Upon taking office, Biden mandated race preferences and DEI rules across 90 different federal agencies — what leading race theorist Coleman Hughes refers to as the neo-racism of the left. 

Open borders were supposed to buy Hispanic votes. Green New Deal wars on oil and gas industries that most of the big players on the global stage would reject were supposed to buy young voters.

Validating the rhetoric of pro-Hamas activists was supposed to buy votes in Dearborn and the anti-Israel and often antisemitic left. 

Democrats ignored all the polls warning against these identity politics which never had broad voter support — including among black and brown Americans. But it was too late to turn back.

This post-modern religion had spawned the second pillar of the Obama Era: a new industry of NGOs, consultants, activist groups, foundations and donors, public unions, and the increasingly politicized state and city bureaucracies in Democratic-run cities underwritten with gobs of COVID-relief and federal taxpayer dollars.

They were what writer Michael Lind refers to as the Shadow Government — for whom the liturgy of identity politics became the central organizing principle to expand organizational bloat, fundraise, and earn social credit scores within the party.