Before the Rethink 08 discussion kicks off, I thought I'd kick in my own two cents on the topic. And I'll start with a quote from Markos Moulitsas:
A look at key Democratic constituencies shows how demoralized the party's base currently is. Among African-Americans, just 34 percent are likely to vote, versus 54 percent unlikely to do so. Republican-leaning white voters clocked in at 66-29. Only 41 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds, a key constituency for Democrats in both 2006 and 2008, are likely to vote, compared to 49 percent likely to sit things out.
If these numbers hold for the next year, it won't matter what those generic congressional ballot questions say, nor will it matter whether Democrats can increase their performance with independent voters. If base Democratic voters don't turn out, like what happened in New Jersey and Virginia this year, Democrats will suffer at the ballot box.
Moulitsas attributes the drop in the base's enthusiasm to the moribund policies of Democrats, the endless wrangling in Congress over a less-than-stellar healthcare reform bill, the Afghan escalation, etc & co. I think he's right on - up to a point. Let's face it: the majority of voters have only a passing familiarity, say, with the details of healthcare reform, and it's likely most support the president's decision about increasing troop levels in Afghanistan. Nor is the administration's foot-dragging on DOMA or DADT probably even familiar to most of the electorate. In short, I don't think it's policy alone that's dampened Democratic voters.
To understand the current mood of Democrat-voting citizens, I think you have to go back to Obama's campaign and its rhetoric. It was bold, and hopeful. A campaign for change! And while the hope and change were worded in vague terms to allow voters to project their own values onto the campaign, the overriding sense was that Obama's election would usher in a new post-partisan government, with mature, reasonable men and women working soberly to solve the country's most pressing problems: climate change, Iraq, the economy. We were - are - in a time of crisis, and Obama's election was meant to be a signal for maturity and action.
Obviously that hasn't happened.
I don't think voters necessarily blame the president. He still has high approval ratings, given the low scores voters give to, say, the direction the country's moving in, or the attitude towards healthcare reform. Instead, I think many Obama supporters look at DC, hear the rabid Beck-ian insanity on the lips of Republicans, see the gridlock in Congress and the paucity of legislation, and grow discouraged. We worked our *sses off to elect Obama and usher in a new era of politics - and nothing happened. Nothing's happening.
Not that Obama has helped much. It's easy to forget after the bold proclamations of the campaign season and the magnificence of the campaign itself in the way it was organized and run that Obama is essentially a legislator. Instead of a bold push for a legislative slate from the White House, we see the president hand over critical reform to Congress, letting Congressional committees draft tepid, overly compromised bills. Where's the Green New Deal? What happened to single-payer healthcare?
Now, I'm not saying this wasn't the best way to get something done, that it isn't realistic or pragmatic. But it's also discouraging, ineffective reform. The president - and a lot of Democrats - seem completely unaware they can drive the media narrative, not just react to it with paranoia and skittish, scuttling side-steps to the right. The Bush administration got it. They were an inept, amoral, egoistical bunch whose policies were national disasters, but they understood how to control the narrative and push through an ambitious agenda. Why can't the president do that - but with good policies and ideas? Answer: he's a legislator, as is his CoS, Emmanuel. They think in terms of intra-legislative compromises and negotiations, of committeework and votes.
But we want to be inspired. We want to work for tangible and beautiful goals. |
