Democrats Need A Person Who Knows About Politics

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Would you please help me improve the following paragraph? Thank you.

To beat Trump in the 2020 election/elections, Democrats/The Democrats need a person who knows about politics. Someone who hails from ordinary people. They don't need someone who comes from the establishment/star system/jet set such as Oprah.

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@paok1970,

paok1970 wrote:

Would you please help me improve the following paragraph? Thank you.

To beat Trump in the 2020 election/elections, Democrats/The Democrats need a person who knows about politics. Someone who hails from ordinary people. They don't need someone who comes from the establishment/star system/jet set such as Oprah.

Looks pretty good. I might substitute something else for "who knows more about politics." Some possibilities:

1. a candidate with more political insight...
2. a candidate more attuned to the attitudes of the working class....
3. a candidate with more populist views....

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@layman,

Should I say, "To beat Trump in the 2020 election,....." or "To beat Trump in the 2020 elections,....."?

Is it "Democrats need a candidate....." or "The Democrats need a candidate....."?

Thanks again for the help.

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@paok1970,

paok1970 wrote:

Should I say, "To beat Trump in the 2020 election,....." or "To beat Trump in the 2020 elections,....."?

Is it "Democrats need a candidate....." or "The Democrats need a candidate....."?

Thanks again for the help.

1. Trump will (presumably) be running for only one office, so it would be "election" (of a President). If you substituted "'republicans" for Trump, then it would be "elections."

2. Typically, in that context, "the" democrats, but Democrats (without "the") would also work in certain contexts. For example, you might say "Democrats need a strong candidate." In other contexts, "the democrats" is really just short for "the democratic party." It depends on what your intended referent is, the party itself, or individuals within that party.

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@paok1970,

To beat Trump in 2020, Democrats need someone who knows politics, who hails from ordinary folk, not who comes from the establishment/star system/jet set like Oprah.

0 Replies

@layman,

In the sentence "The democrats need a strong candidate", should I capitalize "democrats"?

Again, many, many thanks for your kind help.

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@paok1970,

paok1970 wrote:

In the sentence "The democrats need a strong candidate", should I capitalize "democrats"?

Again, many, many thanks for your kind help.

I wouldn't, but I suppose most people would, seeing as how it's a "proper noun." But again, it might depend on how you're using it. A "democrat" is not a particular person, but the Democratic Party is a specific organization. Still, most would probably capitalize Democrat, I suspect. I wouldn't, and I wouldn't capitalize republican either, unless the context required it.

For example, the phrase "a republican government" is different than "a Republican government" and you might need to specify which you were referring to.

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@layman,

Should I capitalize "democrats" if I want to refer to the Democratic Party?

1 Reply

@paok1970,

paok1970 wrote:

Should I capitalize "democrats" if I want to refer to the Democratic Party?

Yeah, in my opinion you should.

Quote:

prop·er noun

a name used for an individual person, place, or organization, spelled with initial capital letters, e.g., Larry, Mexico, and Boston Red Sox.

Quote:

A proper noun is a noun that in its primary application refers to a unique entity, such as London, Jupiter, Sarah, or Microsoft, as distinguished from a common noun, which usually refers to a class of entities (city, planet, person, corporation), or non-unique instances of a specific class (a city, another planet, these persons, our corporation).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proper_noun

You can't always tell. Would a corporation that named itself "Corporation" be a proper noun, or a common noun. It could be referred to in either context.

Would you say Red Sox fan, or red sox fan? I'm not sure if there are any strict rules about it. You're talking about a "fan," not the Red Sox, per se. The red sox part could be seen as an adjective which qualifies the kind of fan he is, I suppose.

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@layman,

If 10 guys, all democrats, go out to a bar would you refer to them as "a group of democrats" or as "a group of Democrats?"

Given the definition above, which says that a "common noun" includes "non-unique instances of a specific class," I would use a small "d" in the same way you might refer to a "group of cities" (which might include New York, Los Angeles, etc.). Each one is a city, and all are also unique cities (proper nouns), if referred to alone.

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@layman,

layman wrote:

..... in the same way you might refer to a "group of cities" (which might include New York, Los Angeles, etc.). Each one is a city, and all are also unique cities (proper nouns), if referred to alone.

Would you please explain the above part further?

Again, thanks a lot for the help.

1 Reply

@paok1970,

Well, I can try. Let's say you live in a suburb of Atlanta (notice the cap--it's a proper noun). You could also refer to Atlanta more formally as the City of Atlanta (caps again).

People in the suburbs might say they are going into the City, and the context implies that Atlanta is being referred to, albeit indirectly. But normally, the word "city" standing alone, would not refer to a particular, unique place, and you would not capitalize it.

You might say something like "Once we got off the backroads, we were driving through the city," but in this case you are not really referring to any PARTICULAR city, just "a city" (as opposed to the country). So no caps there.

See the distinction?

With respect to the "group" thing. If you are trying to refer to ALL democrats, then you are, effectively, referring to the Democratic Party. On the other hand, if you are just referring to some subset of democrats, that's not "the Democrats" (the Democratic Party). It's just a group of people who happen to be Democrats. They are a group of "democrats" (small "d"). It serves as more of an adjective than a noun in that case. Or, if it is a noun, it's a common noun, not a proper noun.

Once again, the wiki article I quoted said:

Quote:

a common noun...refers to... non-unique instances of a specific class (a city, another planet, these persons, our corporation).

That's just the way I would interpret it. I could be wrong.

1 Reply

@paok1970,

Quote:

Would you please help me improve the following paragraph?

To beat Trump in the 2020 election/elections, Democrats/The Democrats need a person who knows about politics. Someone who hails from ordinary people. They don't need someone who comes from the establishment/star system/jet set such as Oprah.

Quote:

Thank you.

To beat Trump in 2020 the Democrats need a person who knows about business and cares about people.

Someone who is of the people and for the people.

That person is Oprah Winfrey.

0 Replies

@paok1970,

This an opinion piece published in the Guardian that says pretty much the same thing. It may help.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jan/12/oprah-winfrey-v-donald-trump-2020-dreams-nightmares

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@layman,

If only you would talk this way in political discussions...

1 Reply

@maporsche,

maporsche wrote:

If only you would talk this way in political discussions...

What does "would" mean in the sentence above? Does the meaning of the sentence would have changed if he had written, "If only you talked this way in political discussions..."?

2 Replies

@paok1970,

paok1970 wrote:

maporsche wrote:

If only you would talk this way in political discussions...

What does "would" mean in the sentence above? Does the meaning of the sentence would have changed if he had written, "If only you talked this way in political discussions..."?

Most people would read them as meaning basically the same thing, I think (I would). But technically they are different. "Talked" is past tense, "would talk" is future (hypothetical) tense.

0 Replies

@paok1970,

Paok, which of these two propositions are you more in agreement with?

1. It's not what you say that's important, but rather how you say it.

2. It's now how you say it that's important, but rather what you say.

I'm not asking you if you completely agree with either.

Democrats Need A Person Who Knows About Politics

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