The following post, written as a follow-on to part 1 in this series from yesterday - and with a nod towards Kid Oakland's excellent diary from last night - considers the institutional and voting bloc foundations of future victories. Poll focus groups, "protecting social securirty and medicare," a "prescription drug benefit," and the like are all stop gap solutions that don't properly consider the historic moment and the current ideological landscape as it is. Running a southerner in 2008 does not solve the problem, although it certainly wouldn't hurt. Rather, we need to start viewing America in broader terms. The New Deal legacy and the Civil Rights legacy are not what will win elections for us in the future.
Firstly, I don't want to imply that recognizing the end of the New Deal and Civil Rights legacy should be discarded. Just that we need to recognize that the issues that drove our coalition through these years are no longer good enough, and haven't been for a good since at least 1980.
I - Rove's success
With this said, where does a new majority lie? Well, lets analyze what Rove achieved in 2004 for starters. I think his success in this campaign occurred primarily on two fronts. First was his effective campaign against John Kerry, which successfully neutralized a good chunk of moderate conservatives from switching to Kerry, even though they disliked Bush and many of his policy decisions. I don't know how many of these voters existed, but I would venture to guess their were enough of them to swing the election to John Kerry if Rove's defamation campaign hadn't been successful, if right track/wrong track and Bush's job approval ratings are to believed. And I know people personally who voted for Bush, even though they disliked his policies - on Iraq, on NCLB, on the deficit, on gay marriage - to give some anecdotal substantiation to this point. These are the new swing voters.
Which leads me to my second point, Rove's remarkable ability to mobilize "values" voters through things like gay marriage. And as a corrollary, that the Thomas Frank's and James Carville's of the world are wrong when they think it is culturally conservative voters who "vote against their economic interests" on "values" that Democrats need to woo in order to be successful in the future. Wrong. The problem with this analysis is that it is still trying to revive the New Deal order, when the New Deal order has been dead for years. Those Evangelicals who turned out in droves for W this year are not going to vote for Democrats, no matter how "value-laden" our rhetoric becomes. This is not to suggest that having politicians and a party that respects, lives, and speaks the language of faith is not important. It is, but not for the reasons folks like Carville and Frank suggest. To think that this is the fundamental problem for Democrats misreads the historical moment. Carville-style campaigns can work as short term stop gaps with good candidates, but their focus is too narrow. The voters whose parents voted for Democrats but who now vote Republican in states like Missouri and West Virginia are not coming back.
II - William Gladstone's lessons for us
I've said elsewhere (and I'll say more on this below) that a reinvigorated labor movement is key to future Democratic success. If you don't believe me, go to the AFL-CIO's website and see the percentage of union members who voted for John Kerry - up by at least 5% from Al Gore's number in 2000. But I've also said that fiscal conservative moderate Republican are the new swing voters, who want low taxes and a pro-business environment. Aren't these two constituencies mutually exclusive, you say? Not if you look at the world like a late Victorian Liberal. Gladstone's Liberal Party was pro-union and in favor of small government. Small government does not mean anti-union, however. It means non-intervention in the right to organize. Big government as currently understood by the GOP means the right to favor various important corporate "blocs" - like agribusiness, real estate, energy, and military contractors - through massive government subsidy and union busting. The new American liberalism will align itself with business, against corporate welfare, against tariffs, against unfair competition, but in favor of worker's rights. All of these policies would generally be popular and make sense, as they position the party as one of a "level playing field," fair business competition, and anti-corruption. The Big government Republicans can thus be labelled as corrupt and bloated. Also, by cutting wasteful government subsidy, it enables deficit reduction and government spending in areas vital to the overall national interest, infrastructure, healthcare, and transportation. The Democrats align themselves with the national commonweal and thusly the Republicans with the "special interests."
William Gladstone's second lesson can be found in terms of religion and individual liberty. No church should be established. But pragmatically, if a local school board overwhelmingly wants to institute voluntary school prayer, it should be allowed to. The same goes to public posting of the ten commandments. These should be issues determined by local constituencies. As to abortion and gay rights (not marriage, but gay civil rights), the Dems need to stand firm. But we should also accept pro-life members in our party openly, unless they are Tom Coburn-crazy on the issue. After all, pro-choice means on can be pro-life personally - that is their choice. To go on, freedom of speech, press, religion, and expression should be strongly upheld. So should the Bill of Rights - all amendments included - and this means the Second Amendment. Their is absolutely no reason the Democrats should not become the party of liberty, since the Republicans have really opened themselves up to attack on the issue in numerous ways.
III - Antonio Gramsci and a plan of action
So now we have the issues defined. But how do we mobilize the constituencies we need? Take a look at Mr. Gramsci, just as you need to look at Mr. John Stuart Mill. Of course, Gramsci was a revolutionary Marxist - we are not. But Gramsci's observations about hegemony and "historic blocs" are vital, and the brightest conservative strategists "get" Gramsci, if only implicitly. The James Carville's of the world do not. This is what I mean when I suggest that many of the Dems strategists don't see the big picture in a way Karl Rove does.
What does this mean in real terms? Well, for one, it is vital that the union movement move forward. Cynically, the best - but perhaps most dangerous - industries to unionize are those that are vital parts of the current GOP establishment - military contracting, agribusiness, energy, real estate. This cuts right at the heart of their ability to operate with impunity, receiving corporate welfare at will. I would also suggest that organizing the big boxes - Wal-Mart in particular - is vital. By doing so, we create vital social bonds to a new Democratic majority, while at the same time weakening the GOP coalition. Don't kid yourself that this task will be easy. It will not be. Some of these industries are viciously anti-union, and will stop at nothing to prevent a dimunition of their power. But it is also here that a vital connection can be made with churches, particularly churches in minority communities that provide such a large portion of the minimum wage work force. In Britain, "fundamentalist" non-conformity was a vital force in facilitating the construction of labor unions. And churches have been vital forces in the American labor movement as well, not to mention the various Civil Rights movements. Often the kind of faith and hope religion provides is key to enabling workers to march forward in the face of daunting odds. Do not underestimate the power a labor-church alliance can have.
But a second vital "historic bloc" exists, and that is of the corporate/business world that is not in cahoots with the GOP. Largely, this bloc includes those who work in international financial institutions - and who see the damage W's destabilizing "bull in a china shop" routine is doing to American business interests and long term financial security - they know what the rest of the world thinks. It is no accident the Economist endorsed Kerry. And it is no accident the dollar plunged after Bush was reelected. Secondly, I think of knowledge/entertainment industry concerns. For example, why has California become such a solid Democratic state? People tend to assume it is because of Mexicans. Partly. But look at the county by county breakdown of returns from the recent elections. Bush won 4 of the 6 counties in SoCal: Riverside, San Bernadino, Orange and San Diego. Where Kerry won his rout is in the Bay Area, but especially in Silicon Valley, America's New Economy prototype. Not so long ago, Contra Costa country was in the GOP camp. No more.
Also consider the example of Las Vegas, which is the future of America and the seedbed of the new Liberal majority of which I speak. A town run on the entertainment industry, with high levels of unionization, and high minority populations. That Kerry got within 2% of Bush this time out is good, and in the future, Nevada will become the bellweather state in Presidential elections. He did especially well amongst the state's young voters. I predict that whoever wins the state in 2008 will win the Presidency.
To be continued - more in Part 3