MaxedOutMama
Saturday, February 19, 2005
A British Call To Blog
At RealClearPolitics this morning I found a link to this column by Iain Duncan Smith in the UK's Guardian Unlimited. The column's header is "Beat the metropolitan elite with the tactics of US conservatives." Iain Duncan Smith was leader of the Conservative Party in the UK for several years. He writes:
Pep rallies have their place, but you have to get back into the classroom sooner or later, and for a brief period in history the Democratic leadership seems to have forgotten all about that step. I'm hoping Howard Dean's sojourn as DNC Chair will refocus the party on policy instead of rhetoric. Lancelot Finn has observed that Dean seems to display an odd syndrome that gives him doubts as to whether he will succeed:
But this will fade. Right now the most vivid political split in America is not between the Republicans and the Democrats, but between the coastal/urban/leftist/strident wing of the Democratic party and the centrist/populist/ red-state wing of the Democratic party. How this conflict is resolved is what will determine the outcome of the 2008 race. Bush can and will fight for the solutions he believes possible and effective, but whether the Republican party emerges as the victor depends on whether the Democrats start permitting real debate about implementable solutions.
All the big issues of the day do play to traditional Democratic strengths. If they choose to abandon populism, then the Republicans inherit by default. But if the huge mass of Democratic-leaning people in this country choose to fight for their version of the Democratic party, then the debate shifts to the realities of vastly increasing Medicare/Medicaid costs over the next 25 years, the need to cut Social Security benefits within the next 15 years, and the need to restructure most of our social programs, all forced upon an unwilling electorate by inescapable demographic realities.
These are areas where the huge mass of the public would be generally more trusting of the Democrats' priorities and fairness. To claim their birthright, however, the Democratics (who have focused upon more benefit programs given to an ever-expanding base of people) must shift their focus to fairness and innovation to ensure the pain of the inevitable cuts is spread with minimum adverse effect across society. The question is whether they have the wisdom to undertake this revolution from within, and only the party leadership can answer this question.
Mr Knowledgeable (and it is usually a Mr) of Smallville, Wyoming can, via his PC, transmit thoughts across the world. Mainstream TV can no longer say what it wants without fear of correction. Online diaries, written by teachers, soldiers and numerous other people with real knowledge of subjects, are fact-checking ill-informed broadcasters. The bloggers have already toppled two of American TV's biggest names.He also thinks that the internet has harmed the Democratic party, writing:
You would also expect this electronic revolution to be good for the Democrats, but the American left's relationship with the internet has been disastrous. The internet has sunk a knife into Bill Clinton's moderate Democratic party. Mainstream business people were Clinton's principal funders, simultaneously approving and driving his centrism. But the Democrats' new paymasters are the 600,000 computer users who, in 2004, supported Howard Dean's bid for his party's presidential nomination.I am not sure whether that is true or not. I think the Democrats' current troubles stem from a long history, and that the internet is just exposing the nature of those troubles. The voters in the United States don't really change that much, but new problems constantly arise in the country. The problem in the Democratic party is that, for the most part, those who are interested in developing new solutions to the new problems have been permitted to die a quiet publicity-free death by the MSM and/or whacked over the head by the party leadership, which has concentrated on "energizing its base".
Pep rallies have their place, but you have to get back into the classroom sooner or later, and for a brief period in history the Democratic leadership seems to have forgotten all about that step. I'm hoping Howard Dean's sojourn as DNC Chair will refocus the party on policy instead of rhetoric. Lancelot Finn has observed that Dean seems to display an odd syndrome that gives him doubts as to whether he will succeed:
Howard Dean seems to display a sort of anti-conservative bigotry which gives him doubts:Iain Duncan Smith is also struck by the negative Democratic rhetoric:
Dean's attitude to Republicans is close to analogous to racism. There is the visceral resentment, the unshakable conviction of one's innate superiority, the habit of treating the Other as an enemy. Dean almost sounds like he is denying that Republicans are American. I can't see how this will work as a party-building strategy.
The Democrats' problem has only worsened since. The dailykos.com site of a Democratic consultant gets 500,000 hits a day. That site's memorial to four American contractors murdered in Iraq was "screw them". Hatefulness also pours out of the popular websites of Michael Moore and MoveOn.org.The question, to me, is how did this pattern of speech and thought emerge? In the long run I think the solid core of the Democratic party will be greatly strengthened by bloggers and internet forums, but it does seem as if some extremely strident voices have temporarily shouted down the vast centrist mass of the Democratic party. My guess is that most of this was spawned by Terry McAuliffe, who understood the power of the spin cycle but didn't realize that it can only be effective for a few short minutes. This caused him to stress myth over fact (the 2000 stolen election, e.g.), and abruptly biased the public voice of the party towards those who like causes and are not too worried about effects.
But this will fade. Right now the most vivid political split in America is not between the Republicans and the Democrats, but between the coastal/urban/leftist/strident wing of the Democratic party and the centrist/populist/ red-state wing of the Democratic party. How this conflict is resolved is what will determine the outcome of the 2008 race. Bush can and will fight for the solutions he believes possible and effective, but whether the Republican party emerges as the victor depends on whether the Democrats start permitting real debate about implementable solutions.
All the big issues of the day do play to traditional Democratic strengths. If they choose to abandon populism, then the Republicans inherit by default. But if the huge mass of Democratic-leaning people in this country choose to fight for their version of the Democratic party, then the debate shifts to the realities of vastly increasing Medicare/Medicaid costs over the next 25 years, the need to cut Social Security benefits within the next 15 years, and the need to restructure most of our social programs, all forced upon an unwilling electorate by inescapable demographic realities.
These are areas where the huge mass of the public would be generally more trusting of the Democrats' priorities and fairness. To claim their birthright, however, the Democratics (who have focused upon more benefit programs given to an ever-expanding base of people) must shift their focus to fairness and innovation to ensure the pain of the inevitable cuts is spread with minimum adverse effect across society. The question is whether they have the wisdom to undertake this revolution from within, and only the party leadership can answer this question.
