We should probably start making a distinction between Dem candidates and the DNC. You probably mean the latter. As for the Dem candidates, that’s far less certain and here’s why.

Outside a minority running as establishment candidates (mostly incumbents) the DNC is struggling to maintain influence. Even the non-DSA wins have shifted heavily to local issues in their campaigns and distanced themselves from DNC priorities. Mainly this is because DSA has been on a big winning streak with that strategy, and D candidates want to win. But it’s also because the DNC blew a huge amount of its warchest on several key primaries that they lost.

In other words, the DNC has not only tried and repeatedly failed to secure wins for its candidates (a bad losing streak that doesn’t inspire confidence) but now the DNC has even less money that it might have otherwise proffered to keep candidates in line. Of the funds remaining, much of it has been marked toxic by candidates in key races, meaning even if the DNC offered it for free they couldn’t accept it.

Candidates are the ones campaigning. They have the mic and can choose whether to share it with the convention leadership by towing party lines. Since the DNC has less to offer this year, and in many races might hurt more than help, there may be far less mic sharing than usual.

Valid.

I see this correction a lot around here. I think it misses the point, because in a Red vs Blue system, whichever party replaces old Blue, in part or whole, is still called Blue. Obviously that is OP’s intended meaning.

For example, tea party libertarians, Christian nationalists, and MAGA populists basically took over the GOP, replacing old school Neo-cons fiscal conservatives etc, but everyone still calls them Republicans. Likewise, the DSA candidate Zohran Mamdani ran in the primaries as a Working Families / Democrat candidate, and in the general election as a Democrat.

When someone refers to future Dem strategy on Lemmy IME you can safely assume they agree that old Dems suck, and they need no additional reminders, as if they haven’t been paying attention for over 20 years. They’re referring to what happens next, the new party we elect to replace the old do-nothing status-quo controlled-opposition Democratic Party. I hope that makes sense.

Also, a separate but very important thing to bear in mind, if any of the groups I mentioned, including tea party, Christian nationalists, and even Trump, had tried to run third party instead of taking over the GOP from the inside, each would have fallen flat on its face, and the Republican Party today would still be fielding candidates like John McCain and Mitt Romney.

The same applies to the Democrats. Voting third party or not voting at all in general elections won’t fix the Democratic Party. The primary way to do that is voting in primary elections or pestering your existing representatives who aren’t up for reelection this year.