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One of the more basic concepts in linguistics is that of thematic relations. These are categories we give to various words based on the role they play in a described event. The agent is the person doing the primary action. The patient is the thing the event is happening to 1/x
Those are the most common, but there are a couple dozen of them. An act of nature is called the force or cause, a thing which causes a sensation is the stimulus, and so on. But the agent is almost always a person, because the agent by definition is a thing with free will.
If you look at the way headlines report on congressional clashes between Democrats and Republicans, Democrats are always the agents. Republicans are always a force, if they appear in the headline at all.
Let's look at one of the biggest fights from earlier this year: DACA. What was the ubiquitous phrase used? "Democrats cave on DACA." What thing is metaphorically pushing DACA down on them? We don't know, it's implied to be a force, like gravity.
Democrats are the agent in that sentence, the presumption is that they can choose to resist this unknown downward force. DACA would be the theme, the thing being moved but with no possible agency in the event.
This happens over and over. Republicans are barely present in congressional fights. The question is always what action they'll perform in a circumstance with an ever-present but non-deliberate force.
The result is that protesters end up wasting valuable time and resources protesting the leadership of he minority party, who have only a sliver of power in the senate. But they've been taught repeatedly by the media that it's this minority which controls the action.
What's the cause of this? Hard to say. but it's persistent, and it will only depress Democratic enthusiasm as voters are unable to see Republicans as human beings with free will who can choose to stop trying to destroy the country whenever they want, but never do. /end
