Not really a political pundit here so just expressing an observation. I know a lot of Democrats who ferar the far left and socialism, I also know a lot or republicans who are not fans of Donald Trump. If someone like Bernie Sanders were to win the nomination I suspect it could be the beginning of a major divide in the Democratic Party. There would be a big shift right now from republicans to Democrats if they were leaning not so far left.
Not really a general question, but given the numbers, it’s unlikely an influx of Democrats into the Republican party would have any effect.
Moved to Politics and Elections.
Colibri
General Questions Moderator
Even “moderates” have principles they don’t want to give up, so you can expect an argument between moderates and conservatives on everything from abortion to right-to-work to school vouchers to the idea of a Palestinian state.
Over the last 50 years the political parties have tended to fall under the control of their conservative/progressive wings, forcing the moderates to pick and choose the faction they agree with more. That’s how you end up with anti-tax but pro-labor Republicans and anti-tax but pro-choice Democrats.
Sanders isn’t going to enact any programs that are even mildly socialist unless he has support in Congress. The Democratic Party as a whole is still pretty moderate so I don’t see it happening.
You won’t see socialism under a Sanders presidency. At most, you’ll probably see a new federal college aid program and some environmental regulations.
Define ‘takeover.’ USA parties aren’t like European ones, so it’s not like Jeremy Corbyn’s takeover of U.K. Labour.
Did George McGovern take over the Dems in 1972? Not much of a takeover since Jimmy Carter was the next nominee.
It’s more likely the R party needs to go away forever.
WHy would anyone with a clean rep join them? To take over the infrastructure of the party, and just forget the antidemocracy they have been promoting, as if it’s a new slate?
Parties change over time, so certainly if the Democratic party went further to the left and some faction of the current Democratic party that’s more economically well off decided they’d rather be Republicans, you might see a shift. But I doubt they’d become dominant.
It’s possible you’d see a realignment of the parties that looks a bit more like they did in the 1980s. The Republicans would (maybe) regain the suburbs and be a little more pro-status-quo and a little less nationalist reactionary, and the Democrats would make more inroads with the white working class and be a little less woke and a little more focused on labor rather than coastal urban identity politics. It’s a really big maybe, though.
But how about a takeover like un-indicted co-conspirator Donald John Trump of the U.S. Republican Party? That is, someone who marshals their supports from the bully pulpit to put the fear of being primaried if they fail to follow orders.
For example, imagine a candidate who is against abortion and gun control but otherwise follows the Democratic party line. In favor of unions, healthcare, welfare, housing, education, environment, racial diversity, gender diversity, moral character, etc, and against corporations, free trade, prejudice, bigotry, corruption, etc. That candidate could split the Democratic and Republican bases. Would the single-issue voters who always vote against abortion and gun control combine with enough former Democrats to win Republican primaries?
I don’t know, but I think there’s probably some combination of issues that would. I feel like the Democratic coalition is becoming too big while the Republican is shrinking.
Not unless that Republican party reduced below 1/3 of the electorate.
Proof:
In order for Moderate Democrats to take over the Republican party there would need to be more Moderate Democrats that there are Republicans. There also has to be more far left Democrats than there are moderate Democrats, otherwise the Moderate Democrats would control the Democratic party and there would be no reason to move.
So you have Republicans < Moderate Democrats < Far left Democrats. The only way that can happen is number of Republicans is less than 1/3 to the total.
You also have a large group of far right republicans that a lot of conservatives would like to shed but can’t. I would suspect that the 1/3 most moderate republicans and the 1/3 closest to center democrats would be happier with each other than their current parties.
Any “takeover” must necessarily be bottom-up, starting at local levels. GOPs went grassroots by quietly taking control of school boards, city councils, public agencies, etc. Moderates would need to infiltrate county commissions and similar boring shit. Patience is needed. Nothing happens fast. Cranks win when they wait out the reasonable opposition.
From polls I would estimate that moderates are about 20% of Republican voters. Very far from being able to take over the Republican party. If moderate Democrats moved in significant numbers to the Republican party, moderates might become 30% of Republicans. They would be a bit more powerful but still far away from being able to take over.
Perhaps some people have a fantasy scenario where Democrats can continue to drift merrily leftwards and the Republicans become more moderate but this would probably involve a still pretty conservative Republican party winning most elections. The problem for the Democrats is that they cannot move left on both economic and social issues which is what they seem to want to do. If they move left on Economics, with issues like Medicare for all, they will alienate suburban moderates who like their private health insurance just fine. If they keep moving left on social issues like reparations they will continue to lose working-class whites.
If Democrats were willing to move left on Economics and moderate their stances on social issues like immigration, abortion and guns that could be a viable strategy but there is no hint that this is likely to happen.
Judging by what I’ve seen of his supporters, if they get New Deal Liberalism they’ll be happy to call it Socialism, badmouthing Liberals all the while.
It’s the inverse of what the Republicans did in the 1980s: “So the Nordic Model is Socialist? Well, I’m a Socialist and don’t you dare say otherwise!”
No.
SATSQ.
Something like 70-80% of the democratic party is liberals and minorities at this point.
I think 55% of democrats identify as liberal now. Of the remaining 45%, a lot are minorities who are turned off by the white nationalism and hatred of democracy proposed by the GOP. Of those two groups, I doubt either would vote for Trump.
I think most moderate democrats will vote for Sanders the same way most moderate republicans voted for Trump.
In that case, People of Color (including African-American voters) as well as young liberal whites would probably leave the Democratic Party to form a new one - or at least try to push the Democratic Party to once again care about issues of race, gender, and sexual orientation.
Not exactly; what I’ve seen around here (Texas) is that cranks win when they can mobilize a small army of fellow cranks to outvote everyone else in elections with low voter turnout. (emphasis on the low voter turnout part)
I’m concerned with PoCs leaving the Democratic party to form one concerned with race, economics, and traditional family values, by which I mean homophobia and transphobia as dictated by traditional Christians.
In short, a Christian Democrat party like exists in chunks of Europe.
This is possible. A considerable number of Hispanic and African-American voters hold conservative views on family values, etc. A considerable number of first-generation immigrants from places like China and South Korea feel similarly, too.