A short diary, but liberalism in modern America is doomed to failure for one very simple reason: Americans do not trust their government.
The lynch-pin of liberal policy is to have government be more active, which works if Americans had the faith they had in their government prior to Watergate.
I'm 36. I grew up around adults, who for whatever reason had some sort of deep psychological trauma that Watergate caused. No American President has ever been able to heal this damage. Under Reagan, the Republicans played into this mistrust of government by declaring "government is the problem".
Unfortunately, liberals have not made a case to counter the fact that the government is good at providing some services the private sector cannot do as cost effectively. That taxes can return more money back to you by providing good infrastructure, such as schools, roads, etc.
Until the American people feel government has their best interests at heart, the liberal agenda is doomed to failure. Americans are not ready to embrace a liberal agenda.
Americans didn't get to this level of distrust overnight, but impatient liberals seem to think only if Americans realized how much better they'd be with government run programs, such as single-payer healthcare system, they'll come around, so lets push for something people philosophically are not ready to embrace - a bigger government role in things.
I really don't know how to change the prevailing sentiment of Americans, but the fact is the Right benefits from this mistrust of government. They benefit from an angry, bitter electorate, as the 2010 mid-terms show. They will do everything in their power to make sure people stay resentful towards government.
Whatever needs to be done cannot be accomplished overnight. Whatever very minimal liberal tilt Obama had pushed overwhelmed the trust-factor of many Americans.
The problem facing the Left is two fold: (1) how to convince Americans the government can be the solution and (2) how to be patient in fighting, what will take years of work in changing the prevailing sentiment of people in this country.
The lack of an adequate media presence makes the first point much harder, which leads to frustration on the Left, which makes the second point that much harder, because any leftward drift by government is seen as not going far enough, fast enough.
The Right, for whatever differences they may have, has settled in the post-Reagan world, on some very simple unifying principles "taxes bad", "government is the problem", and "abortion bad".
If Liberals really want to regroup after this election and swing things back their way, they need to understand that changing people's views will take time and they need to be willing to be patient, while they work to push a unified message out that "government is the solution", "greed is not good", etc.
Not everyone will agree as to how much government is the solution, but right-now people aren't arguing that. They are arguing that government has no business trying to solve the problems its citizenry faces. Until that changes, I think liberalism in America is doomed to failure.