What's that sound? A lame duck and time slipping away. I have to say the Democrats did a great job of getting into position. I personally lament the losses of Tammy Duckworth, Harold Ford and Ned Lamont. But here's the theme of my urber-thought for today: time is slipping away quickly, and Democrats haven't yet figured out how to turn the attitudinal tide that is leading us into a new Dark Age.
WHAT? Haven't Democrats just demonstrated how to turn the tide?!?!?
No. I think it's quite fair to characterize the gains made evident yesterday as a repudiation of Republican incompetence and management style, not necessarily a repudiation of conservative Republican values.
Take Montana, where I live.
Jon Tester narrowly defeated one of the most inept, unlikable, and possibly corrupt (but probably simply criminally cluelessly inept) politicians at the national level.
Look at the numbers and the split (http://www.sos.state.mt.us/...) between rural Montana counties and more "urban" (if you can say that we have urban areas here in Montana) counties. The rural vote still solidly, resoundingly, in favor of Burns.
Over the past 7 years, I've spend a goodly portion of time in parts of Montana that tourist drive by and fly over, (mostly looking for good hunting spots and just driving around to enjoy this state), and frankly, I don't get it. There is virtually no Democratic organizing presence in these areas, and the local media and social gathering spots are if not hostile to Democrats, then they are actively ignorant of Democratic sensibilities. In any bar you paint a target on your back as soon as you bring up Republican mistakes, (e.g. energy deregulation, Iraq, Afghanistan, war on terror, war on drugs). But that's not the worst of it. That can be worked around.
The worst of it is that Democratic organizers from urban/suburban environments are actively hostile to the values of rural voters. I like the neuvo-Testerista's, but my god they stick out like a cow turd on a wedding cake once they leave the city.
I see the same thing everytime we get visitors from the coast and I take them to places where people are plain spoken and there's just not a lot of window dressing to what's important in people's lives (family, work, church, country). The first reaction is typically, incredulity and disbelief, then wonder, then condescention and snark (usually involving inbreeding jokes). Montanans are particularly sensitive to snark and pretense, can smell it a mile away, and will disappear at the first whiff of it, (kind of like deer at daybreak).
Urban organizers can't get anywhere near close to folks in these areas to engage them in dialogue: their presence/attitude are enough to queer the deal (2nd law of thermodynamics anyone?)
I'm afraid this election may set this divide in stone, and I think it's something that Republicans, thinking strategically, will count on to exploit in the next 24 months. And will be a problem that will bite us all in the butt unless D's can figure out:
a) An approach to this divide that is not immediately patronizing and hostile,
b) Language that is both pragmatic and inspiring, appeals to the hard middle, yet doesn't compromise core values,
c) How to deliver its promises without asking the middle class and working poor to shoulder more financial burdens while taking it in the shorts through job losses (declining wages, job insecurity), health care increases, pension/long-term financial insecurity, and perceptions in growing economic and social inequalities between people who do work and produce stuff, and people who broker, sell and talk about stuff.
If the Democrats can't figure out how to crack this nut in pretty short order, their ability to retain and act on the gains achieved last night will be short lived: they will be a speed bump in the downward path to a declining America.
I don't know what the answer to this is, other than sublimate your first instincts and don't gloat. This election wasn't about you: it was about your opponents. You've been given a short-term lease on power. Sharp knives and plain talk will go a long way to establish credibility and open doors. Showboating and playing to the crowd will result in Republicans keeping the presidency in '08. Guaranteed.
Democrats have an extraordinary opportunity right now. But they have to be very careful about next steps, being mindful of the gulf between people who have no choice but be committed to working for a living and people with "mobile lifestyles", and understanding that this divide has not been bridged with this election.
I think there are lots of people, myself included, that hope that Democrats will take this divide seriously, and make attempts to address it. Many of us feel that Clinton and Gore blew the opportunity to take the most favorable economic and political conditions in this nation's history and move this country ahead. Instead, he set the stage for the rise to power of Bush Jr., a delusional mini-Franco who in 6 short years has set the United States back 20. (Why Franco, not Hitler? Well, I lived in Spain when Franco was alive and saw the deep connection he had to a large segment of Spain. They approved of the garroting of protesters; disappearances of political opponents, and draconian drug laws...but that's another story. Lets leave it at: Bush and Franco have a lot in common).
Democrats have worked very hard to get this opportunity back. Don't blow it by not acknowleging this critical divide in our nation, and addressing it in a substantive way.
Can it be done with a lame duck opposition president with time running out? I don't know. But I think a lot of people want to find out if something can be done in the short amount of time there is to transform transient discontent into concrete progress.