Drink up, all you communists....I mean Liberals...so sorry..."Progressives!"
Posted on 03/15/2008 8:22:52 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
The increasing vitriol of the Democratic presidential WrestleMania shouldn't distract from the opportunity before progressives. The election this year has the potential to be not simply a change election but a sea-change election, one that marks the end of the conservative era that has dominated our politics for nearly three decades. It could be the progressive equivalent of the conservative triumph of 1980.
In 1980 Ronald Reagan, the self-described "movement conservative," took the White House from incumbent Jimmy Carter while Republicans picked up thirty-four seats in the House and gained control of the Senate, sweeping out liberal stalwarts like George McGovern and Frank Church. The Democratic majority in the House stood aside as Reagan slashed taxes and doubled the military budget in peacetime. He fired striking air-traffic controllers, declaring open warfare on unions. He surrendered the war on poverty, pushed to deregulate finance and rolled back environmental, consumer and workplace protections. Government, he announced, is the problem, not the solution.
Despite his subsequent deification by conservatives, Reagan was hardly a flawless candidate. He was widely scorned as an "amiable dunce," in the words of Clark Clifford, while primary opponent George H.W. Bush branded Reagan's supply-side ideas "voodoo economics." Nor did voters experience a wholesale shift of attitudes against liberalism. Pluralities of Americans opposed Reagan on civil rights, abortion, the Equal Rights Amendment and military spending. Polls showed no dramatic increase in self-identified conservatives. Voters were repudiating Carter and throwing the bums out of Washington, not embracing conservatism. Key to that was a dismal economy--double-digit inflation, high unemployment, soaring gas prices--plus troubling events abroad, including the Soviet Union's invasion of Afghanistan and Iran's seizure of American hostages.
While voters hadn't turned right, the right was on the march--and driving the debate within the Republican Party. The Moral Majority mobilized evangelicals; the Committee on the Present Danger trumpeted the mythic "window of vulnerability" in the face of the alleged Soviet threat. Corporations had been gearing up their offensive against government regulation and unions. The Heritage Foundation and other conservative think tanks were leading an attack on liberalism. At the same time, liberal movements seemed exhausted. Stagflation confounded liberal economists. Carter was embracing deregulation, military buildup, covert war in Afghanistan. His retreats and failures split Democrats, leading Ted Kennedy to challenge him in a bitter primary battle. The country was looking for change.
As this year's election approaches, the parallels to 1980 are striking. The economy is in a recession. Gas is headed to $4 a gallon. Incomes aren't keeping up with the cost of basics. Housing prices are cratering. Once again, the economy is the number-one issue. The failure at home mirrors the Iraq debacle abroad, which consumes $10 billion a month while alienating us from allies and eroding our security. The Bush Administration simply ignores the clear and present danger of catastrophic climate change. The public has turned against the Administration. Gallup polls show that only 27 percent of Americans are satisfied with how things are going.
Progressives are driving the Democratic presidential candidates to bolder positions against the war, for universal healthcare, for investment in new energy, against corporate trade and tax strategies. MoveOn.org and the blogosphere have brought new energy, resources and volunteers into the process. An embattled and divided labor movement has revitalized its political program. New voters are mobilizing in the Democratic primaries.
And conservatism is exhausted and divided. The neocons are discredited, and the country clubbers disdain the fundamentalists. Main Street conservatives are appalled by the corruption and incompetence of the Bush Administration. Declining wages and the housing bust confound conservative economics. As in 1980, people are looking for change.
There are, of course, major differences between 1980 and 2008. Bush is not on the ballot, as Carter was, although John McCain seems intent on continuing Bush's policies--on the war, on taxes, on trade and on deregulation. Conservatives are in disarray, but the corporate lobby isn't. We're likely to see hundreds of millions spent by insurance companies, drug companies and others in the fall elections. Perhaps the largest difference is that neither Barack Obama nor Hillary Clinton is a movement progressive the way Reagan was a devoted movement conservative. If voters once more decide to throw the bums out, neither may be as bold as Reagan was in claiming an ideological mandate and defining a fundamentally new course.
Progressives must learn what conservatives came to understand after 1980: that a sea-change election doesn't take place on election day. Conservatives were frustrated as Reagan ignored their social agenda, abandoned Social Security privatization and negotiated with Gorbachev. They found it necessary to sustain an independent movement capacity, to push ideas and to hold politicians, Democrats and Republicans, accountable.
Like 1980, 2008 is likely to be a close, bitterly contested presidential election. But if the economy continues to decline and the costly war continues, Democrats will have a chance to capture the White House and greater majorities in both houses with a mandate for change. Then progressives will find, as conservatives found under Reagan, that the real struggle begins. For that, progressives will have to expand the agenda, build grassroots and netroots power independent of the Administration and the party, and organize to hold politicians of both parties accountable for supporting the changes this country so desperately needs.
Drink up, all you communists....I mean Liberals...so sorry..."Progressives!"
The only thing that can lose the election for McCain is a total economic collapse between now and November.
Unfortunately, that turn of events is not beyond the realm of possibility.
While voters hadn't turned right, the right was on the marchRather, the philosophical underpinnings of the left had been entirely demolished...
The reason the voters are so disenfranchised with the current batch of Republicans is because they've been voting like Democrats.
Locked in Leftist Optimism. Nothing relevant to see here.
IMO, this election proves nothing. It is just in a holding pattern for 2012, no matter which side wins. Movement conservativism isn’t dead, it just lacks leadership.
Well I think it is a mix, the thrust of the article is that the Nutroots have to become organized enough to force policy changes in DC the way they think the Moral Majority did in the 80’s.
As to the sea change, we have to admit that this is not looking like a good year for Congressional Republicans, we are behind in fundraising, we don’t seem very organized even at the grassroots, and our Opinion Leaders like Rush and even lesser guys like Boortz are not in love with Mad John, so there will be no general consensus to lift spirits out in America.
Hastert’s loss should not be overlooked, there are many many Conservatives and just moderate Republicans who are disenchanted with the DC Republicans and that has sort of spread...:
Nicely put.
btt
This mediot misses a big point.
If the Dim campaign continues its self-destructive path to a bitter, divided end, there will be no coattails, no pant suit hems to share with Congressional wannabe’s to grab onto. Pubbies in Congressional races may benefit nicely.
“Drink up...I’m a f%*&ing steamroller”
Hastert’s loss is no loss. He’s gone on to the big Pork Barrel in the sky, er I mean Illinois. http://www.illinois.gov./. If he was doing what was expected of him the majority would still be his.
The usual "talking points", mostly. About halfway through it becomes clear that this was more or less written by the DNC:
"the Iraq debacle abroad, which consumes $10 billion a month while alienating us from allies and eroding our security...conservatism is exhausted and divided...The neocons are discredited...the country clubbers disdain the fundamentalists...Main Street conservatives are appalled by the corruption and incompetence of the Bush Administration...Conservatives are in disarray..."
They assume (wrongly) that they don't need to provide any proof or even a single anecdote that backs up any of these assertions.
Notice, not a word about illegal immigration, border security, getting America to be more energy independent, or tax relief — NOT minor areas of concern to many Americans.
(One cannot overemphasize how much hangs on the Heller Case (pending) before the SCOTUS: it will define our future as a Republic more than we know.)
Communism has never been so healthy as it has been after being proclaimed "dead", mainly because it is an idealogy, not a specific face or place, and idealogies can creep into and pollute other trains of thought one molecule at a time--especially with willing standard bearers who will infuse those thoughts into the young in the guise of education.
We may have reached the place where two parties may be meaningless, except for window dressing. The advancement of the Globalist agenda, The New World Order, whatever you call it, is nearing the point where differing parties are no longer needed to maintain the illusion of countervailing philosophies, and in fact, they have been converging in their apparent philosophies, at least as expressed in their actions, whether through the cumulative effects of small corruption of idealogies or design.
If someone like Soros is backing both sides, our horse never made it out of the gate.
Notice the writer fails to mention that Reagan won re-election in 1984 by one of the biggest landslides in history.
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