The left is badly losing the interpretive war over the 2020 results among Dem politicians & interest groups. But the liberal online & social media that elevated the squad as the future (& is therefore implicated in Dems’ assumed mistakes) is stronger now in its insular bubble

conservative media & politicians have not even conceded the race, much less decided the party needs to change. Given congressional overperformance, I don’t expect them to see 2020 as a rejection of their message. They’ll likely see Trump’s coverage & COVID as temporary problems.

The left’s deflection of responsibility to tactical mistakes is unconvincing. But the right has often successfully forwarded similar interpretations. The Democratic coalition has long been both more constrained by electoral evidence & more open to focusing on the center to gain

moderates do better & national party ideological images matter. But those effects are small compared to long trends like sorting by density, ideology, & education. Tactics are even lower on the list. But electoral interpretations amplify some factors & change how parties evolve

Yes: the academic evidence is clear that moderates are advantaged (though by a declining amount):
https://www.niskanencenter.org/if-moderates-are-electable-why-are-ideologues-winning/

But the effect is ~symmetric across parties; it is the interpretation & attention to that evidence that has long been asymmetric:
https://www.amazon.com/Asymmetric-Politics-Ideological-Republicans-Democrats/dp/0190626607