David Hogg Tells Moderate Democrats to Kick Rocks After Radical Abdul El-Sayed Wins Nomination

David Hogg saying moderates have no place in his party isn't a gaffe, it's the plan out loud. He's been running a PAC aimed at primarying sitting Democrats he considers insufficiently pure, and now that Abdul El-Sayed has knocked off a more centrist candidate, Hogg's telling Kaitlin Collins the quiet part on national television. This isn't a activist venting. This is a guy with money and a platform announcing that the Democratic coalition is going to get smaller and angrier on purpose.

What's funny, in a grim way, is that this is exactly the strategy Republicans got lectured about for a decade. Remember when purity primaries were supposed to be the death of a party? When RINO-hunting was going to shrink the tent until it collapsed? Hogg is running that same playbook, just with different jargon, and cable news is treating it like a bold generational statement instead of the same old factional bloodletting.

The people who should be paying attention are the Democrats who actually have to win in Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania. Those aren't districts where "moderates can kick rocks" plays well at the ballot box. Hogg doesn't have to win a general election in a purple district. He has to win Twitter and cable hits, and by that metric he's doing fine.

We'll just say this: a party that decides its moderates are the enemy is a party that's decided winning is optional. Fine by us. Every seat El-Sayed's wing purges from the center is a seat that gets a lot more competitive for everybody else.