A lot of debate is going on between the radicals and centrists on this site, provoked by a certain post on Friday. It seems that a central question the Left needs to confront is: what kind of electorate have we got in America today, and what is possible for Democrats to fashion from this clay?
I keep getting reminded of
Billmon's post on the war-porn website nowthatsfuckedup.com. Choice quote:
There was a time when I would have argued that the American people couldn't stomach that kind of butchery -- not for long anyway -- even if their political leaders were willing to inflict it. But now I'm not so sure. As a nation, we may be so desensitized to violence, and so inured to mechanized carnage on a grand scale, that we're psychologically capable of tolerating genocidal warfare against anyone who can successfully be labeled as a "terrorist." Or at least, a sizable enough fraction of the American public may be willing to tolerate it, or applaud it, to make the costs politically bearable.
This is the same electorate that failed to work itself up to any degree of outrage over the Abu Ghraib torture scandal. There's news reports of child-rape videos out there, and there's websites peddling pictures of exploding Arab heads. None of this elicits more than a yawn and a shrug from the heartland - indeed, it takes the sight of blacks floating face down in the floodwater to shake a few of them out of their torpor.
I'm guessing a large number of people out there are indifferent EVEN NOW. Bush's latest poll numbers (~45%) simply cannot be justified by his recent performance. In any other place with any other people, this guy would have been in free-fall, floundering in the low 20s. It is only in America 2005 that he can float comfortably above 40%. One more person out of every 10, and he's got back the support of half the country.
I tend to agree with Billmon that the electorate in general is (or has become) callous, simple-minded and gullible, easy to manipulate, and blindly jingoistic. They are more responsive to militarism and violence than to peace and justice. The demonization of the "other" has been done very expertly, whether Arab or homosexual or Muslim or black or even French.
A party selling fear, hate and prejudice to this crowd cannot lose, or at least cannot lose by very much. A party endorsing selfishness and greed to this crowd cannot go far wrong. We have to admit now that torture in Iraq will never be a serious issue in this country, and perhaps even more wars in the Middle East could have been easily sold, if the occupation of Iraq had been fractionally better-managed.
It's easy to pile on centrist politicians. But even after the horrors of Katrina, I think Democrats are working with quite unpromising material. Everyone loves Bill Clinton today. We call him Big Dog. But it took Bill Clinton all his silken charms, two colorless old gits as opponents, AND Dick Morris's strategy of triangulation, to persuade the electorate to give him two terms as president. (And yes, Bill Clinton was chair of the DLC too in 1990-91.)
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A big part of the problem, I believe, stems from the people's blind belief in American exceptionalism and the vague sense that theirs is a supremacy not only in decline, but even under attack. Americans have always thought of themselves as extra-special. The basic values pounded into the culture are individualism and self-reliance. "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness" is the dominant mythology, the Promise made to all. Ideals like Justice, Equality, Compassion, Community are poor cousins by comparison.
Take Liberty. "Government off my back" is a knee-jerk phrase burnt into people's brains, as if Government were akin to the weight on Atlas' shoulders. Even the poorest rube believes in this empty slogan. In most other countries, an activist can argue in favour of more government intervention without automatically courting pariah status. But not here.
That promise in the Declaration, the American Dream (TM) translates itself now into a house in the burbs, two cars and two kids, TV and barbecue on weekends, leave me and my wallet alone. I doubt that it is possible to achieve the American Dream without possessing a measure of greed and selfishness, if indeed it ever was. People harbour a passive indifference to the problems of their society as long as "I got mine", and as for the world beyond, far too many people are contemptuous (if not openly hostile) towards other cultures, their beliefs and their way of life. "American insularity" could very well be a tautology.
As for the feeling of being a hegemony under attack, it is obvious now that Osama Bin Laden has been George Bush's best friend, electorally speaking. It is an overused phrase, but 9-11 did change everything for them. A lurid, yet compelling justification for the war in Iraq, especially in militaristic right-wing blogs like Belmont Club, is that the war was necessary to save the Muslims from themselves! Another attack like 9-11, the argument goes, will have the American population baying for blood, making nuclear strikes in the Middle East mandatory. The memorable phrase was "turning the Middle East into glowing glass". And I fear the wingers are not wrong at all; they know just which buttons they'll need to push if they want to whip up the people to a frenzy.
Maybe the Right has helped to mould the electorate's values and identity with their patient 30-year project, and 9-11 merely finished the job. But it was always going to be an easier task for the right to mould such an identity, given the myths of the republic itself, and the propensities of the people. As Obama hinted, it is a harder task for the Left to rally the American people to the banner of justice and equality than it is for the Right to urge them towards fear and greed and racial prejudice. They appeal to the baser instincts, we appeal to the more noble - and theirs is the much easier task.
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Much has been made of the effect of Katrina. However, I can appreciate Obama's circumspection - he is a deliberate man and probably is not convinced that a seismic shift has happened, or is in the process of happening. I'd be a bit skeptical too. One storm doesn't overturn 30 years' worth of momentum or 2 centuries of myth-making.
Or maybe it's simpler than that. Barack Obama is a black man in today's America, and I'm sure he understands better than anyone else what that means. In 1996, Colin Powell declined the Republican nomination because his wife feared for his life. I cannot blame Obama for being cautious in public. If he does not want to be a divisive figure, if he chooses not to engage in red-meat rhetoric, if he wishes not to get branded with the slur "uppity ni&&er" in the red states - then I can't hold it against him.
Still, it's possible that Katrina does signal some kind of shift in the public mind, and a greater receptivity to our ideas. In which case, yes, this is the time for the Left to grab the narrative, to try and shape the next 30 years with a long-term project of our own that will redefine the national set of priorities. Obama probably isn't the fearless leader we need for that.