The Left's New Majority

The problem is, the left doesn't have a majority, and isn't likely to get one if they keep thinking in those terms.

"Something vital, exciting, and underreported is happening across the United States," reports Colin Greeg, in The Left's New Majority. "Marginalised groups in the poorest communities are joing forces to improve their condition and win local electoral victories."

Sigh. So much about what's wrong with the perspective, and the performance, of the left and the Democrats is embodied in just the first sentence. Who are the all about? The poor, the marginalized, the victims of the world. From their perspective, those are the only people that deserve a voice, and everybody else is just the evil non-poor, non-victims, who need to be taxed and regulated to make things better for the poor. And that's not a winning, vote-getting strategy with anybody but, as Ann Coulter so accurately describes the American left, "the extremely rich and the extremely poor, neither of whom have much of a stake in society".

And plenty of people in the middle vote. And even some of the super poor and super rich don't see the point in voting for the finger-pointing, blame-finding, victim-making, entitlement-creating politics of the Democrats.

More perncious is the iea that people "improve their condition" by who gets elected in their community, and beyond. The problem with their condition is not, fundamentally, who is in office (although that can help or hurt, in ways big and small, and I would disagree with that author about which political side does more damage), but the problem with their condition is what they are doing. They are responsible for their condition, and they are responsible for changing it, and if the only thing they can be bothered to do to imrpove their condition is elect one more self-serving local politician from a different party to office, then their condition will not improve appreciably. Thus, after forty years, the War on Poverty still has not been won--because it's not a fight the government can win through bureaucracy and largesse.

The next line is also telling:

This is the America of Latinos, African-Americans, religious progressives, union members, young people, and single women.

Assuming that religious progressive means far-left Unitarians, Wiccans and Satan Worshippers and dogmatic atheists--which it almost certainly does--who is it not the America of? Why, it's not the America of white people (still the majority of the population, duh!), mature adults, religious conservatives (i.e., traditional Christians), people who work and aren't in unions (the majority of working Americans, and even many union members don't like the unions these days)and married women, families, and parents! Holy crap! They've got the angry disenfranchised Latino and incense-burning Wiccan vote locked up, though, so screw the white guys and married adults with kids.

Which is pure fantasy, like this:
Combined, these mostly progressive groups of the left constitute an actual and significant national majority.

Come on! While polls, on average, show people split down the middle on most partisan issues, the test of "a signficiant national majority" in a democratic society is whether they are winning, and Democrats (and liberals) don't even enjoy a majority in terms of those willing to self-identify as Democrats or liberal. And this shows up in the polls, as Democrats continue to lose ground in the house, the senate, and governerships.

Since the 2004 presidential election, the fashion on the American left has been to look at what the right did and try to do the same, as though the right have won a major victory in American consciousness. Even the second wave of progressive critics, who complain we obsess too much over Republican strategy, end up using the right's supposed victory over hearts and minds as an axis from which to build their arguments. But George W Bush never won a public mandate.

As it relates to the author's argument, the relationship of the above isn't clear, but I will note that the fasion of the American left has been to mischaracterize what the right did, and certainly almost nobody on the left is advocating they do the same . . . and completely, as always, ignores the policies generally advocated on the right as being a potential election advantage! Oh my gosh, could a lot of people actually think tax cuts were good for the overall economy? The possibility doesn't even seem to enter their thinking.

And as far as having a national mandate--if you win, you had a mandate. The mandate comes from being in charge. While there is both accountability and the rule of law, the mandate of the presidency is inherent in victory, no matter how slim. But I think the author is arguing that it means that people really don't agree with the Republican agenda, or that they keep electing Republicans by accident, so the the fact that strong Republicans running on a strong conservative agenda (ala, Contract With America) almost always win has nothing to do with the repeated Republican victories that the Republicans have, so far, enjoyed. Hmmm.

Interestingly, the author attributes Bush's four millionvote victory in 2004 to "the withdrawal of Democratic campaigns from most states, in a flawed strategy to focus on 'swing states'." Given that the Republicans did much the same thing, except on the grass roots where both the Democrats and the Republicans had workers doing the hard, door-to-door work of getting people to the polls, how would that have singularly failed the Democrats?

Poll after poll has found American citizens largely in support of progressive solutions to public problems, even as Democratic Party support for these ideas has dwindled.

I note, despite all these polls, that the author mysteriously fails to cite a single one. And I expect that might have something to do with the fact an indepth analysis of any such poll would reveal a more complicated picture. But I think there is a lot of truth to this particular assertion: lots of people do believe big government is the solution to intractable social ills, and they certainly don't see any harm in another social program designed to help women, children, or the disenfranchised. And most people like the idea of receiving some new "free" entitlement. But the Democrats rarely find a moderate, fence-straddling, entitlement-dolling position to take. IN fact, what the author fails to note is that what was replaced Democratic Party support for expanding the welfare state (what "progressive solutions" basically means) is hating Bush, and Republicans. They've taken the Republicans failed impeachment/Lewinski strategy and multiplied it times 10. Sure, they hated Clinton, but we _really_ hate Bush! Really, really bad. So vote for us.

After talking about the interesting statiscal fact that ever city with a population over 500,000 went for John Kerry in 2004 (hmmm . . . and what does that tell us?) and that more than half with populations for 50,000 went for John Kerry, and noting Arnold Schwarznegger's crushing defeat of his right-wing special election issues by (contain the laughter, please) "community-based grass roots organizations", he says this:

True, the right itself has effectively organised base constituencies of fundamentalist evangelicals, and disaffected and frightened working Americans. But the progressive work on the local frontline has not been about trying to "do something the right does", but rather about drawing effectively on old progressive organising traditions.

See, that's who votes for conservatives! Fundamentalists evangelicals (read: Bible Thumpers) and frightened and disaffected working Americans. Any plain decent folks in there? I wonder, who else votes for Republicans in large numbers? Rural communities? Farm communities? Small towns? Church-goers? Married women with kids? Our American military men and women? Policemen? Firemen? Come on now, I think some details are being left out.

But the last sentence is the kicker, just more evidence that they don't get it: "drawing effecitvely on old progressive organising traditions". It's still the thirties! It's the Great Depression! It's the Sixties! Iraq is Vietnam! Just follow that template, and we'll win, win, win.

And now, the sort of curdled pabulum that makes me want to barf:

Today's Republican call to black and Hispanic voters is very different from their calls for segregation and immigration quotas in the past. It is to the credit of social-justice activists that Condoleezza Rice, a black woman, is secretary of state; and that a Hispanic man, Alberto R. Gonzales is attorney-general.

The first part (calls for segregation) is simply false: the Democrats were the "white man's party", and most notorious souther segregationists were ALL Democrats! But, more to the point, it's a credit to social justice activists that Condoleeza Rice (a black woman, in case you didn't know) is secretary of state? Who was it who appointed Condoleeza Rice secretary of state? Your progressive friends? No, sorry, it was progressive cartoonists drawing her as Aunt Jemima and as Butterfly McQueen from 'Gone With The Wind'. Do the progressives take credit for Clarence Thomas, who they lined up against (and they weren't exactly friendly to Alberto Gonzales, either, or Bush's judicial appointment of Miguel Estrada). To take credit for things they either opposed or had no hand in is pure sophistry. It points to the tendency on the left to confuse amrophous good intentions with concrete, measurable action, and to dismiss the concrete, negative actions of their own historical progeny (Bull Conner, hmm?) by the amorphous good intentions, held at the time they are sure, by good progressives and northern Democrats with no practical power at the time.

And there's a lot more to the article, more than I have time to get into. But it's more complete and utter cluelessness on the part of the political left as to what wins elections. And, for bonus points, it you go read the article, read the comments from the good leftists who patronize AlterNet. Some of them are very englightnening.