Meditations on a populist message
Wed Feb 23, 2005 at 11:05:30 PM PDT
After reading [bhurt's diary http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/2/23/134320/464]and the ensuing threads debating liberal "elitism" and exactly how angry we can be at people like "Roy" who is detailed there (he's the plumbing guy at Home Depot, or the mechanic who fixes cars that cost more than he makes in a year), I've come to something of a conclusion. We're just not alike in a lot of ways, and the only way we'll ever get their respect is to show them that at the end of the day, we're more alike than we think.
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The idea of academic liberalism is tangible to me. I just graduated from college myself, and I think back to the time I was reading Richard Wright's "Native Son" and discussing America's race problem with a room full of rich, white, suburban kids. To a certain extent, I feel like that class was a microcosm of the Democratic Party.
John Kerry's alleged "flip-flopping" wasn't the problem. It wasn't moral issues, although Rove and the gang did a fine job of antagonizing wingnuts into the voting booth. Those were symptoms of a larger problem with the Kerry campaign (and one that they are far from alone in), which is our party leadership losing or dropping the messages that inspire "ordinary" people. To their credit, at least they replaced it with rhetoric to which most "intellectuals" comprehend and subscribe, but that doesn't excuse the fact that we have unequivocally abandoned the populist, class-generated idealism that fueled our success through the majority of the 20th century. Where was the "Two Americas?" Where was Obama's "no red states, no blue states, but the United States of America"? After the primaries crowned Kerry the nominee early, those messages were marginalized in favor of a blase centrist, semi-provocative foreign policy campaign that never really impressed people. Kerry had his moments (the first debate being his best), but he never put the right words together to give most people the "aha" moment where they realize "this guy really does understand my problems."
This time around Edwards and Dean came close- Edwards the closer, even though I'm still a proud Deaniac- to a message defining why Democrats can and always will best represent the working class. To quote the good doctor, we are a party of the people, by the people and for the people. And, in my humble opinion, John Kerry and his brain trust never came close to expressing that. In fact, largely they allowed BushCo to paint Kerry as the opposite, albeit in a round-about sort of way, with the Swift Boat and flip-flopper issues.
After the election, I, like many of us, was ready "to cut the red state umbilical cord" and say screw you to anyone making less than $50,000 a year who voted for Bush. The very idea made me so mad I could scream, and at many points, I did. Now I realize it was this underlying antagonism of the "uneducated" or "redneck" or "white trash" was there all along, and we showed it- badly. Not through outright cynacism or bigotry, but by ignoring their concerns altogether. And aside from selecting Dean as DNC chair, I've seen very little in either the blogosphere or the party establishment in addressing this.
I can no longer support a liberal ideology that leaves out the issues of class economic and social structure, equal access to a good education and affordable health insurance for all. It isn't about Iraq. It isn't about abortion. It isn't about gay rights. We will disagree as a society about these kinds of things until the end of time. That's the nature of social issues. They burn very hot, but are quickly snuffed out when the next big thing comes along. It's about the issues that make us alike; it's about what makes us Americans.
We will always have strong opinions on social and foreign policy, and we should vigorously defend them. I would never suggest we run and hide from them, that would be immoral and cowardly. But the focus, indeed the centerpiece to any revamped message, has simply got to be about how the Democratic ideas and ideals are without doubt beneficial to "average Roy's" everywhere.
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