There has been debate in recent years about which direction the Democratic party should go. The Deaniacs advocate taking the party to the left, and their line of thinking usually expains previous hard times on poor marketing on the part of the Democrats. On the other side, we have the Clinton camp, which says we should go to the right and as far as I can tell just capitulate to conservative demands.
I would suggest that going straight left and straight right aren’t our only options, and we actually should go in different directions on social and economic issues. For social issues, like our most important anti-poverty programs, and debates about governance and the role of religion in society, I think we can play to the base. For economic issues, though - basically everything else, including corporate law, relations with labor unions, and federal subsidies that aren’t targeted towards the very poor - we will have to get out and move right. If we really want to keep other programs, like research for alternative energy or chemical sniffers for homeland security, we should look for ways to stimulate them through tax cuts rather than outright cash. There is a large segment of the population that votes with their pocketbooks, and we will have to learn how to please them in a way that doesn’t involve throwing away everything we stand for.
This stategy is kind of opposite to what most proponents of the centrist school of thought of the Democratic party have been doing. Witness the whole flap about ‘moral values’ following the 2004 election. Many people were saying that we needed to talk about God more in order to appeal to ‘middle America.’ The problem is, if we do that we are basically jettisoning our platform, and there will be nothing we can do better than Republicans. The group we need to be appealing to now is the (small ‘l’) libertarians. There are a whole bunch of them in the Republican party right now that are willing to switch parties if the price is right, and they’re our best hope for a (relatively) permanent power shift.
What we have to do is to corner the Republicans into becoming the party of religious conservatism and short-term fiscal fixes. Individually, economic conservatism and social leftism aren’t the most popular policy positions, but when you put them together you get a coherent platform, based on political and economic freedom, which is worth much more important. It’s a long term strategy, and, unfortunately, maybe a little bit more elitist than I would like, but before we even talk about marketing and such, we have to have a coherent party philosophy.
How different is what you’re proposing from what Bill Clinton ran on? Isn’t that the struggle that the Dems are going thru right now-- the DLC vs the Deaniacs?
Overall, I do pretty much agree with your analysis, although I’d have to see the details before I’d commit my vote.
I think David, God of Frogs mostly has it backwards. The best strategy for the Dems is what worked for them in the 1930s: move left on economics. As a caveat however, I consider social spending to be an economic issue. What opponents mostly don’t like about it is the spending. The Dems can not outwhore the GOP with the corporations because it would destroy their base. Hell, even the social conservatives that make up the base of the GOP aren’t happy with the kowtowing to the corporations. They just put up with it because the social issues are so important to them.
What the Dems need to do is try to downplay controvertial cultural issues such as abortion and gay rights and regain their traditional position of standing up for the little guy. It seems to me that the major issue neither party is on the proper side of is border security. The borders are weak because illegal immigration drives down wages and saves corporations trillions of dollars. The Dems could ride that issue to the top though it would hurt them in terms of corporate donations and with the Mexican-American community. By putting their opponents on the other side of the issue they could paint the GOP as standing against American workers and in the way of protecting America from terrorism.
Not that I think that is likely to happen, mind. I figure the Dems will just muddle along until the next Great Depression slaps some sense into them again. Luckily that prolly ain’t far off. At least, I hope not. The sooner the nation returns to fiscal sanity the less painful the correction will be.
As far as I can tell, whenever the Clinton camp talks about moving to the center, it’s on social issues, not economic.
I wouldn’t say we should “outwhore” them. The depth of Republican corporate support - including the Mexican immigrant issue you raise - goes beyond what can be considered free market. All I’m saying is that, except for issues that directly affect the very poor, we should be closer to being free market than they are.
Well, if the conservatives can pull that off, we definitely can. Philosophically, religious conservatism has nothing to do with free markets. Despite all the spin about freedom being a ‘God-given right’ and whatever, their alliance is one of convience. Capitalism actually fits much better with the goals of the left, of bringing people out of poverty, than those of the right, of bringing people to’salvation,’ even if it’s not the traditional means.
The lower your income the less likely you are to vote so it makes more sense politically to stand up for the working poor and the middle class. Unless the plan is to turn the working poor and the middle class into the abject poor who will then support the Democrats. Somehow I doubt they are going to be grateful that you didn’t stand up for good jobs because you were waiting until things got so desperate that they needed direct government assistance.
Yes it is and it is also based on the calculation that the Democrats aren’t offering anything better. Which is why the Dems should offer something better. If they move to the Left on economics and downplay or move to the Right on social issues then religious conservatives would find them more attractive. They could have a party that is both attentive to their economic needs and, if not in favor, at least not hostile to their social agenda.
Dear god, why would you think that? Capitalism tends to serve the interests of the wealthy. That’s why the wealthy tend to be such devout capitalists. It doesn’t naturally bring people out of poverty. Just the opposite. That’s why it needs to be carefully regulated.
Quite frankly, I think a great long-term strategy would simply entail being sane. You know, don’t spend so much money you can’t pay it off. Use what money you do spend wisely. Never start a land war in Asia. Keep your discussion of so-called truth in the evidence-based realm, and leave the other stuff to individuals to decide amongst themselves. Oh, and tell the truth about really big issues for a change, as lies, besides being wrong, tend to have really messy consequences. The sanity angle, which the Republican party apparently has largely abandoned for the duration of the Bush years, needn’t be a losing strategy, and appears to appeal to both leftist and rightists ideologies. No need for the Dems to be terribly radical, unless lunacy is the new mainstream.
“Securing the borders” (love that formulation) will only impoverish the country, 2sense.
Two points:
1 - I’ve done a lot of work on the relationship between demographics and wages (strictly for my own purposes as an investor, as in, I was looking for ways to make money, was therefore highly motivated, and found…nothing), and I’ve never seen any evidence that immigration affects anything at all.
2 - What is true is that higher levels of immigration will positively impact the Social Security program. See the Trustees Report for 2005, net immigration’s impact on costs section.
To quote, for those who don’t go to the link:
…where the cost rate is the percent of payroll needed to cover Social Security costs. Given that by 2010, the number of people aged 18-24 will be less than the number of people 55 to 64 (see tables 11 and 12 here and add up the figures) , or to put it more bluntly, the number of people leaving the workforce will be greater than the number of people entering, opposition to immigration is kind of silly. Who’s supposed to do the necessary work, then? Martians?
I suppose we could outsource it all, but of course workers in India don’t pay US Social Security taxes, don’t spend any money on food, clothing, housing, or medical care in the US, and so on and so forth. I hope you get the picture.
This just might be the reason why neither party is up for trashing immigration. For once, they just might be guilty of rational analysis.
Well, ideally, it’s to turn them into wealthy capitalists, who will then support the Democrats…
If we move to the right on social issues, then we don’t have anything there that we can’t do better than Republicans.
As for economics, that just isn’t the conventional wisdom anymore, if it ever was. Capitalism gives people the greatest amount of choices that they actually want, and therefore the greatest opportunity to lift themselves out of poverty. That’s not to say that they actually will - that’s why will still need antipoverty programs - but it gives them the best chance of any system. And of course, that’s the rule; and there are exceptions - I just said that we have to get better than the Republicans.
The Republicans have economically abandoned the middle class as well as the poor. They TALK a big game about caring about the middle class, but if you look at the fiscal policies they actually enact, they all tend to benefit corporations and the rich and to hurt the middle class and the poor. The Dems just have to say they favor the middle class and will actually enact fiscal policies that help the middle class, and incidentally, will help the poor as well. (Any policy that helps the middle class will tend to help the poor, because for many poor people, the difference between poverty and middle class status tends to be having a halfway decent job, something that’s much more likely to occur when the middle class is economically healthy.)
There are a lot of fucking idiots in the middle class and the lower class who will ignore these facts because the GOP does such a fine job of appealing to their social prejudices (“Kill them gays! Make them women have children whether they want to or not!”) but we don’t need (and can’t get) (and don’t want) the whole of this demographic. We just need to peel off enough of them to win a few elections, and thanks to the Bush Administration’s habit of sticking America’s dick in the pencil sharpener, that may just be possible next year.
Just to be clear, I really do mean “making the borders secure” and not “halt immigration”.
I have not looked into it. I just assumed that millions of illegal workers willing to work for less than minimum wage would tend to lower wages for lowskilled ( legal ) workers. It seems simple supply and demand to me. Are you challenging this assumption? Because if so I will go off looking for a cite.
I did follow the link and read the chart but it confuses me. How do illegal workers help support Social Security? I assumed that since they are off the books they don’t pay in.
I would also point out that I said nothing about opposing immigration. So long as it is legal. If we need 10 million more workers then by all means, bring them in. But let them come in and work and gain citizenship under the law.
In that case I would suggest pursuing fiscal policies which will support the middle class and the poor. Things like ending the abomination of free trade, mandating a living wage, stop forcing them to shoulder more and more of the tax burden of the superwealthy, and the like.
Sure you will. You will have one of the most important things of all: pocketbook issues.
I’m not anti-markets. I’m an anarchist not a socialist. But capitalism, by its nature, favors those who start with capital. Thus the need not just for antipoverty programs but for government regulation so that the have’s don’t use their market power to exploit the have not’s.
Yes, you did. But you seemed to be saying that we should get better by moving to the Right on fiscal policy which is really a bad idea. As Evil Captor points out, we already have a party that has abandoned the lower and middle classes on economics. Competing with the GOP to see who can destroy what’s left of the middle class first is not a prescription for electoral success. Whether you find a debt peonage society desirable or not.
I’m not sure I buy that argument that we just have to wait and let the Republicans mess up. Certainly they are in the process of doing so, and we don’t want to distract them from doing that for the time being, but as a long-term strategy, no sports coach will ever tell you to just count on the other team making mistakes. Sam Stone had some good advice for Republicans in GD - Has the conservative movement run out of steam?:
Unfortunately, I think if they take his advice and get a round of new faces in the next two elections, they will have made up for a lot of the present damage, and we’ll be in basically the same spot we are now.
We do only need a small number of people out of the “helped by Democrats, brainwashed by Repubicans” crowd, but unfortunately I think they’re deceivingly easy to get. Anything that we could do for them would have us cannibalizing larger parts of our agenda. I think our best hope for them is to win their bosses over so at least they have an alternative source for their brainwashing - the other way around just doesn’t work as well.
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Making standards for employers generally just makes it harder to them to offer jobs. That money has to come from somewhere, and blocking it just doesn’t help the poor. I’m not seeing how its worse to have 2 people working at $3 an hour than one at $6 and one unemployed, if that’s what the market dictates.
Ah, yes. Show a lot of raw hatred for the people who didn’t vote the way you wanted them to, and accuse them of being ignoramuses and racist, homophobic monsters. That’s always a good way to get them to change them minds and vote your way. Surely they’re going to listen to you with a sympathetic, open mind after you’ve figuratively spat in their faces, right?
Unfortunately, an awful lot of lefties talk like you in plenty of other places than the SDMB.
Liberals must learn tolerance and open-mindedness for people who don’t entirely share their political views. Once they’re able to understand that opposing gay marriage and supporting the war in Iraq is not the moral equivalent of Nazism, once they understand that Michael Moore and Al Sharpton cost the party more votes than it gains from them, then the party will be in a much better position to connect with tens of millions of voters.
If I can’t disagree with you without being called a fucking idiot or a monster–even if it’s behind my back–I’m not going to vote for you. It’s that simple.
I think their best hope for this is if Hilary runs for President in 2008. They will have to come up with some kind of rationale* for overlooking the statements she has made about the war in Iraq, for instance.
Didn’t work with Kerry, but maybe they have learned something.
Regards,
Shodan
Some rationale other than BushLiedBushLiedBushLiedBushLiedBushLied, I mean.
There was a good interview with Dean on Meet the Press yesterday, and Russert basically read him the riot act about making sure the Dems outline a clear agenda. After all, the Pubs (or at least Bush) are sinking lower every week in the polls, but that isn’t automatically giving the Dems a boost. Dean promised that we’d see the new, clear agenda fleshed out “soon”. Russert asked if it would be this year, and Dean replied that it would be before the 2006 election.
LIberals don’t have to do any such thing. I think it’s appropriate to recognize that there is a large bloc of voters out there who are unlikely to be won over by appeals to reason, because their reasoning ability is very limited and they don’t rely on it. They “go with their gut” when they vote. A lot of them have been voting Repubican lately, but that can change because the same shallowness that leaves them impervious to reason means they are easily swayed. Thinking such people are solons of virtue is dumb and will lead you to make poor decisions wrt how to sway them. As the PIPA poll showed, many of them still think Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9/11. If the Dems want to win, they must not ignore this stupidity, they must deliberately pander to it, just as the Pubbies now do.
You know I’d call you a fucking idior or a monster to your face if I thought either was the case. I’m nice that way.
Is this going to be an agenda for the 2006 elections, or for the 2006 Congressional session as well?
ISTM they have a chance at building some credibility with fiscal conservatives by outbidding the Republicans on spending cuts. Show they can be responsible by showing they can actually cut more than the lousy $5B per year the Republicans are dickering over. If they try that “raise taxes and spending now; reduce spending and cut the deficit after the elections” line, or if they try to change the subject every time it comes up, they can forget it.
Always nice to see the impartial press giving the Democrats free political advice
It was not made clear. The **impression **I got was that it was geared toward the election, since that was all Dean referenced in terms of dates.
Mehlman (GOP national chairman) was on as well. In fact, he was first up. If this had been a thread about Republicans, I would’ve given a summary of that exchange.
