I don’t think that’s true at all. The Democratic party of today is the conservative wing of the Democrats of 20-30 years ago. Or maybe even the Republicans of that time. Outside of abortion, which is a binary issue with no real middle ground, Democrats have been moving right just like the Republicans have. Where are the champions of truly progressive policies like single-payer health care, guaranteed minimum income, universal early childhood education, breakup of risky financial institutions, automatic weapon bans, and so on? They’re not in Congress on either side of the aisle.
As for the gerrymandering, that’s a big problem, but not the only one. There’s also the issue of low voter turnout, and the lack of open primaries in many places. The parties control the system to such an extent that real change is pretty much impossible. And of course, there’s the big money coming in to overwhelm the voting public with whatever spin they want.
You keep saying that, but I honestly can’t understand how you think this would work.
Say you’ve got Deep Red District 9, a congressional district full of (mostly) hard-right Republicans. A Democrat decides to make a serious fight of it and does… what? Moves so far to the right with her positions that she’s indistinguishable from a moderate GOP candidate? Moves far to the right with some positions and stays Leftish on others but hopes the voters don’t find her out?
Say she wins. How does she caucus in the House? How does she vote when one of the issues she moved to the right to win on comes up? If she votes with the GOP (whose positions she shares), she pisses off her party and negates any hope of a leadership position. If she votes with her party, she all but guarantees that she’ll be voted out of office in the next election, making her a flash in the pan.
Are you saying that the moderate Republicans became Democrats? In New England, that’s true. That’s not true elsewhere though, look at how poor whites abandoned the Democratic party in the south. Or rural voters in general. You can still appeal to those voters on economic policy, provided you downplay the religious and social issues.
[edit] I missed your point the first time around.
I would disagree. The Democrat party may have gotten away from the economic policy of the Mondale years, but look at the social policy they’ve embraced. Right now the administration is pushing to open up combat arms positions to women, we are the only country in the world to seriously consider that.
*and before someone mentions the IDF, they confine their one female infantry battalion to non-combat roles.
It may sound counterintuitive, but partisan competition at the state level is a good thing. Competitive general elections result in more moderate caucuses. Ceding those districts creates the problem that was identified up thread. You end up with these low turnout primaries where only the most devoted (ie the radicals) show up.
To solve this problem, you have to find a way to appeal to those districts. And that would mean shifting right on certain issues.
You’re right when you point to the difficulties though. You’d have to give your party members more leeway, you’d have to accept it for the good of the party. This is how it used to work, back before we demanded rigid party uniformity.
The Democrats actually DO allow this to a greater extent than the GOP. You can find Pro-Life Democrats much more easily than Pro-Choice Republicans. There are a slew of pro-gun Democrats and very, very few gun-control Republicans. Hell, you can find lots Democrats that are in favor of shrinking the government.
I think you are holding on to this idea that a Democrat candidate could actually compete in a deep-red district simply by shifting a little to the right because that’s the way it ought to work… but it doesn’t in reality. If you meaningfully slide to the Right, you lose your liberal die-hards and maybe a few Dem moderates to boot. They’ll either stay home or vote for the Green party. You’re unlikely to sway enough centrist/moderate Republicans to your side to make up for those losses.
Let’s take the Virginia 7th district. It’s not a deep-Red as some places in the country (say Alabama’s 1st district), but it IS the district that thought that Eric Cantor was too liberal.
This is a fairly typical conservative district. Mostly rural and suburban; a few towns but no cities other than a residential chunk of Richmond. 74% white, 17% black. 70% of the populace self-identifies as “Conservative”, while less than 5% will admit to being “Liberal/Progressive”. The voting for the GOP vs. Democrats has been about 60/36 in most recent midterms, but in years where Obama has taken the state, it drops to 58/40.
The people of the 7th have slightly skewed priorities relative to the country at large. 30% believes that government spending and the debt is the most pressing issue facing the country (8% nationwide); 25% said that repealing Obamacare was the #1 priority for 2014 (9% nationwide); 21% said that the economy was the big thing (34% nationwide); and 9% thought that illegal immigration was the overwhelming issue (7%).
So you, Inflammable Citrus, have been hired as the new head of the DNC for the fightin’ 7th and you really want to win. You’ve been given some leeway with your choice of candidate and they don’t need to be Bernie Sanders, but who ever is elected needs to vote with their Democrat colleagues on the “big” national issues. Hell, I’ll make it easier - this isn’t a midterm, it’s the 2016 election; all you have to do is sway 10% of the GOP electorate to your slate without losing any Democrats. What’s your candidate’s platform?
Most notably Kennedy was a champion of real universal health care, and not reheated Romneycare. (Which is a bit unfair to Pelosi; as Speaker, selling reheated Romneycare was part of her job, whether she liked it or not.)
A more accurate way of putting it, though, is that on economic issues today’s Democrats are vastly more conservative than the Democrats of the 80s. Someone like 1985 Dick Gephart would be gobsmacked to learn that Democratic presidents were behind NAFTA and TPP, for example.
Whereas on social issues broadly defined today’s Democrats are more liberal than their 80s counterparts. (But not entirely: Bill Clinton dismantled welfare, for example.)
That’s well stated. I tend to pay more attention to economics than social issues, which is one reason I was talking about the Democrats of today being much less liberal than the past. Having said that, I think you say that almost everyone is more liberal socially than their counterparts were in the 80s, including most Republicans. There are a few outright racists and homophobes in the Republican ranks still, but most of them at least attempt to hide it. 30 years ago, a lot of them wouldn’t have bothered.
Of course I believe that the Republicans have brought their gruesome predicament upon themselves and that they richly deserve their fate, although they have certainly been nudged toward the precipice by Democratic cowardice and incompetence. Some degree of liberal Schadenfreude is irresistible, and I too cackled when Nancy Pelosi was asked why nobody wanted to be speaker and responded, “You’ll just have to ask nobody.”
But this ugly spectacle could have dire consequences for the country, in the near future and for a long time to come. Whoever the GOP shoves to the podium, whether it’s Ryan or Darrell Issa or Jason Chaffetz or someone even dumber than them, will either have to default on the national debt in November and shut down the government in December or face yet another enraged right-wing revolt. Either way, this Congress (and most likely the next one too, regardless of who is elected president) is a lost cause, and the future viability of bipartisan politics is very much in doubt.
It’s going to wreck that much damage either quickly or slowly. The longer things like this fester, the nastier unraveling it becomes. At this rate we’re headed for a legit Constitutional crisis.
I used to think, OK, there’s no way that Washington will allow stupid people to do something as disastrous to the global economy like allowing the U.S. to default. After all, the markets crashed on things as much less significant (like the Greek issue, the not surprising softening of the Chinese economy, etc.) Someone will have to step in and stop the wreck.
But now I realize there is no reliable emergency brake on this mess. If the GOP crazies decide it would be good for the U.S. to default, it could happen. They would then blame the resulting recession on the Dems. And their followers would support them, even as the stock market plunged to 7000. How many times have we seen the GOP do stupid things recently, everyone wrote Well, the GOP shot themselves in the foot this time, article everywhere including the WSJ talking about how the GOP has severely hurt themselves - and now they have the Majority.
You might be right, but right now the market is anticipating they won’t let the US default. But every day that passes without clear leadership in the House probably raises the risk. At some point Wall Street will start making calls to their favorite congresspeople to voice their concerns. The only question is if Boehner will orchestrate a vote before he leaves.
Eh, I don’t trust the market these days; it’s pretty much a game the insiders/major trading houses use to make a gazillion dollars, with their millisecond based computer trading systems, on any movement up or down in the market. I mean, really, with all the research the high end investment houses had, they were caught by surprise when China’s markets showed softness? Enough to move the market that much? It seems like every few weeks there’s something they jump on to move the market - the market is afraid the fed will move rates - they don’t, the market drops anyway because it shows the fed lack confidence in the economy (and they would have dropped if they HAD raised rates.) IMO the market is just a manipulated casino, I wish I had a better place to put my 401K. :(
Again, when the GOP caused all kinds of grief back when they were refusing to pay the bills they had already approved (excuse me, raise the debt ceiling - we need to rename that, and get rid of the need for a vote to pay the bills Congress has already approved) everyone said the Tea Party had overplayed their hand, this is what the Dems needed, etc. And the GOP still won majorities. Ugh Ugh Ugh. I’m more conservative than many here, but the GOP is the party of idiots.
This isn’t a real threat though is it? This sort of brinksmanship has been going on for it seems like a decade in one form or another. I can’t imagine the rest of the Republican party won’t pull out their canes and trash the ‘Freedom Caucus’ members if it comes to it. I read dire predictions every week about what the Republicans might or might not do, and they do waste a lot of time in Congress but generally accomplish nothing.
A party platform should, in theory, appeal to a reliable plurality of active voters. If it becomes too large you risk internal fissures, and you drive down turnout. Following that - you can choose any number of issues, and slice the apart the American electorate in any number of ways. It’s a problem with multiple, and perhaps equally valid, solutions.
In this case you’re trying to avoid regional blocks, because they result in partisanship and gridlock. That means finding a way to appeal to rural voters, and southern rural voters in particular.
Changes in tone and platform are critical - it’s not enough to shift positions, it’s vital that you change the way you talk about them.
These sorts of statements are murder. It indicates a fundamental failure of understanding, it suggests that their concerns are in no way valid, and finally - it’s disrespectful. That last point is incredibly damning, because many of these voters live in honor cultures. The statement poisons the well for otherwise viable candidates. Republicans can tie a Democratic challenger to these quotes, and thus ruin their credibility.
To address this issue, you would have to dial back on gun control and what these voters perceive as religious issues. That means giving candidates room to oppose the party on something like gun control - and using different language when you discuss the issue on the national stage. Rather than blaming guns, steal a line from the Republicans and blame our “broken laws.” Guns aren’t the problem, it’s how we regulate them. This would put gun owners at ease, more so at least, while allowing you to achieve some of your goals - like expanded background checks for example. The blame guns language may motivate some voters (and it may very well be right) but it also drives opposition, and gets in the way of creating effective solutions.
Religious issues are admittedly complicated, but you could borrow a line from Rand Paul. Rather than push for gay marriage, for example, argue that we should “Get government out of marriage.” Religions would be able to define it as they see fit, and it would be a right enshrined by law, but everyone would also have access to a civil ceremony. This of course wouldn’t be getting government out of marriage, not really, but it would mollify hardline critics while preserving the rights of homosexual Americans. It’s a bastard solution, but it at least dignifies the complaints of the faithful. That respect is important if you’re trying to find ways to cooperate on other issues. It would anger homosexual activists, but that’s the price.
These moves would make it safer for Democratic candidates. Southern and rural voters wouldn’t feel as threatened by Democrats, and it would allow Democrats to pickup up many of their old supporters who agree with them on issues like the economy and education - but opposed them over perceived cultural issues.
[I] * Republicans and Democrats spend a lot of time arguing about whether guns are the problem, or if people are the issue. It’s a fruitless debate, but also an unnecessary one. If what you’re trying to do is not abolish guns (which is constitutionaly difficult), but change how we regulate them, then why not concede the point? What do you have to gain from it? Wouldn’t blaming the existing law be a more effective tack? It would certainly be more logical. Talk about preserving access for law abiding Americans, and ensuring that criminals and terrorists can’t get their hands on them. Don’t blame the guns, blame Osama bin Laden.
The problem with blaming guns is that, logically, all firearms are by nature deadly weapons and so only a ban would be effective. This is one why gun owners leap to conclusions whenever new regulation comes up.[/i]
It’s a real threat. You have to consider you’re not dealing with rational people, but devoted crusaders of The Cause. These are the people politicians have been warning everyone about for decades. They’re not especially bright and they only know how they think things work, not how they actually work. They think defaulting would be a good thing. Because… reasons, balanced budget, gold standard, whatever.
After the Conservatives overwhelmingly won the UK elections, I read a long piece by the English writer Paul Kingsnorth, and although much of his essay deals with Britain and its identity in the face of rising global capitalism, his insights are in many ways parallel to yours IL:
Whatever the origins of this pathology, the English left should understand that if you’re going to take a people’s story away from them, you need a better one to replace it with. Attacking that story as the “parochial” offerings of a “Little Englander” is not going to help your cause. Quite the opposite: this tendency to dismiss or condemn feelings of attachment to place, nation and identity simply means that those things become associated instead with the political right, and when people feel those things are threatened, it will be the right they turn to. This goes a long way to explaining the rise of Ukip. The left’s response to that rise – to mock its supporters or call them fascists, or both – shows that at least some of Orwell’s England is still with us.
The missing piece here though and especially in the US is the role that right wing media play. If the RWM continues to be unmoored from reality so to will those who follow it to the exclusion of all other sources. Until and unless that changes it won’t really matter how the left (or in our case Democrats) change their story - it will simply remain ignored.
That said, something worth trying because clearly what’s happening now isn’t working.
And speaking of RWM, Drudge et al are now screeching that Paul Ryan is too liberal.
In short, anyone who deigns to compromise with Democrats is too liberal.
