Towards A New Progressive Majority

This blog was born on election night 2004. That night the prospects for progressive politics in the United States looked dim indeed. The most regressive, reactionary president in modern American history was reelected by a comfortable margin. His party gained seats in both legislative bodies, and as several Supreme Court justices seemed eager to retire, the judiciary was in his hands as well. There was little hope for progressive Americans.

Yet strangely this Republican domination of the three branches of government was possible despite the fact the electorate was almost equally divided between the two parties. The populace was not overwhelmingly Republican. The domination of the House was made possible mostly by partisan redistricting following the 2000 census. The domination of the Senate was made possible by the structure of the American constitution which grants disproportionately representation to smaller, rural states (where Republicans are strong) than to bigger, urban states (where Democrats are strong.) The Presidency was largely determined not by resistance to progressive ideas, but more by the extraordinary events of September 11 which gave President Bush a huge following he kept throughout the election. Had the election in 2000 been by popular vote, and Gore was President on September 11 that following would have been his and 2004 would have been his election to win.

So for progressives there is perhaps reason to hope after all. The results of the 2004 election were made possible mostly by the institutional bias in our electoral system. Without redistricting, we have the House. Without affirmative action for small rural states we have the Senate. Without the electoral college, we have the Presidency. With the presidency, we have the judiciary. Even further, without the winner-take-all electoral system we have no Nader spoiler effect, and more progressive third party choices.Many "pundits" will tell we progressives that the Democractic party has lost its soul and the 2004 election proves that progressive politics have lost its values and its orientation. They may be right. But remember, this is a 50/50 nation. And 50 percent ain't bad for a party that has lost its soul. Truly, this election's most enduring legacy for the Democratic party is that electoral reform is needed NOW. We need Instant Runoff Voting. We need to abolish the electoral college. We need to consider other electoral systems such as mixed member districts and proportional representation. These reforms, more than any "soulsearching", should be the Democrat's top priority in the years ahead.

But much soulsearching does need to be done. Certainly something is wrong when the party of Roosevelt and Truman looses the working poor to the party of Hoover and Nixon. Certainly something is wrong when most voters make their electoral decision s with "moral values" in mind, yet amongst Democratic canidates, talking about morality is taboo. Certainly something is wrong when an unpopular incumbent President who mistakenly took the nation into war, allowed the largest attack on American soil to take place, and presided over the worst economic conditions since the Great Depression wins by a comfortable margin over our canidate because his unanswered negative attacks sowed enough doubt into the American electorate to scare them into believing that a Kerry presidency would be even worse. It is partly the strategy of the campaign. It is partly the decision made in the primary process. It's partly the money in politics. . It is partly the Christian renaissance. But as I said,, the largest reason why Election 2004 went against the Democrats was because the election system was rigged. That is pretty straightforward. The second largest reason why the Democrats lost the 2004 election is more complicated.

After Barry Goldwater's massive loss in the 1964 presidential election, a conservative movement was born among his followers. These people, Ronald Reagan among them, decided that rather than focus their efforts on the next election (which they won anyway, thanks to Vietnam) they would lay the groundwork for future conservative victories. A handful of very wealthy conservative families, among the Mellon-Scaifes and the Coors, were brought on board to fund new conservative institutions, to be staffed by the young supporters of Goldwater .
The big idea behind these institutions was to win elections before the actual campaign begun. Instead of trying to change people's minds every four years, with all the variables of different candidacy and changing times, these institutions were going to change how people thought, not just how they voted. Doing that, converting the nation's thought-patterns from largely liberal and progressive(even among Republicans) to largely conservative and reactionary was the key to building a built-in base of support for Republican causes. It was an extraordinary bold goal for a nation that just elected Democrat Lyndon Johnson and his bank-breaking "Great Society" and was soon to elect a man from the opposition party who favored nationalized healthcare.

Yet as bold as their goals were, they were able to achieve them. Reagan was the first step, but they couldn't persuade those older depression-era voters who saw Government lend a helping hand that Government was the root of all evil. With those voters largely passed by 2000, they finally achieved, 40 years later, what Barry Goldwater had attempted to do in 1964. A conservative majority at all levels of government, with the right wing of the Republican party holding the reins.

How did they do it?

Mostly it was through their institutions that, unlike canidates, lasted beyond the elections,win or loose. With money from a few wealthy families, the Heritage Foundation, the Cato Institute, the Brookings institution and others began to dominate the war of ideas in American political discourse. The last refuge of Progressive thought was in academia, but even academia could not compete with the institutions who offered big salaries and media exposure. Eventually even academia was attacked by the conservative movement, with groups like Accuracy in Academia complaining about the lack of conservative bias in our schools. The politics of a few wealthy families became the politics of half a nation thanks to an amazing decade-long propaganda campaign.

True, one could agonize about how Democrats don't support gun rights strong enough, or they're anti-values, or they're uncomfortable with religion, they love to tax, or they're too pro-gay and pro-minority for the "mainstream" voter. They're too "liberal", to use the recently minted slur. But it would be more accurate to say that the "mainstream" has been shifted by the conservative institutions and who are out to change the hearts and minds of America. These institutions thought up the strategy of using these wedge issues to divide and conquer the American electorate with issues only marginally related to politics. Forty years ago, progressive taxation was popular, America didn't have a gun problem, and minority rights were supported by everyone who didn't live in the south. It wasn't the Democrats who've changed, it's the people who have changed. And the answer to the Democrats' electoral problems isn't to court the voters that the Conservatives created for themselves, its to create new Progressive voters by imitating the Conservative's methods. We need our Heritage. We need our Cato. We need to win the war of ideas against the conservatives before we can win the war of votes.

We also need to win the battle to distribute those ideas. Despite the promise of the internet, the media has steadily become more conservative over the last forty years. Dan Rather used to be centrist. Now he's seen as a communist. Opinion on television broadcasts was long taboo in America, after the horrible misuse of opinionated propaganda broadcasts in fascist states made opinionated news in a democracy unthinkable. Then came Fox News and Rush Limbaugh. Without these conservative news networks the "Republican Revolution" of 1994 and Bush's victory in 2000 would have been unthinkable. Unbiased information would have made Gore a clear favorite. Biased information clouded the judgment of voters, and the results have been clear.

That's it. That explains why the Democrats are loosing out there. Agonize all you want about the "issues" or "values". But three things: 1. The bias of the electoral system 2. The influence of conservative institutions 3. The superior distribution of conservative ideas, largely account for the deficit in Democratic voting, which after all, is only a few percentage points fewer than the Republicans. Any revival of Democratic and progressive politics in this nation must take into account these factors. We must press for electoral reform, beginning at the local level. We must build our institutions and think-tanks to take on the conservative advantage in the war of ideas. And we must find a way to distribute these ideas to the public through the mass media.
Many Democrats realize this already, and this plan of action has already started. The Center For American Progress is seeking to become the Democratic think-tank giant and several progressive attempts have been made to break into the mass media. Electoral reform, however, is the most crucial aspect of this plan, and it is the most neglected among Democrats. Sadly, because of the boring technocratic nature of the topic many Democrats aren't aware that their opinions are underrepresented because of the flawed design of the electoral system. This is our most pressing concern. The adoption of Instant Runoff Voting(IRV) with Mixed Member Districts (and a consideration of proportional representation) would give Democrats control of government once again. Progressives, educate yourselves on electoral reform and demand it at a local basis!! State ballot proposals can change the way the President, Senators, and house members are elected. We don'tneed federal legislation! There is reason to hope in this election, but we must focus on the right things. This blog will be dedicated to this effort. I hope you will join me in rebuilding the Democratic party to represent the New Progressive Majority.