In a previous diary entry I wrote a while ago, I outline how the systemic nature of our federal parliamentary procedures favors the republican party. I never fully expanded on that idea, but I should probably do so now in light of the results of the 2014 midterms.
That idea is, Americans are apparently not entitled to liberalism.
Mr. Sanders says what I want to say about voter turnout much better than I can. So here it is:
“We should not be satisfied with a ‘democracy’ in which more than 60 percent of our people don’t vote and some 80 percent of young people and low-income Americans fail to vote,” Sanders said in a statement Friday. “We can and must do better than that. While we must also focus on campaign finance reform and public funding of elections, establishing an Election Day holiday would be an important step forward.” --Bernie Sanders
At the end of the say,
only 37% of the electorate turned out; or 63% of the electorate
didn't. Because those who show up get to decide, this 37% got to reelect
some of the worst governors in the nation. Some of which have very clear, failed policies that have brought quite the disaster to the states they represent.
But there's also an inverse of this, which is that an enormously successful state (California), which has turned deficits into surpluses, will no longer have the liberal supermajorities that allowed them to accomplish such a feat. California, which was set on the right track by liberal supermajorities and a lukewarm moderate governor, will now have to start capitulating to get things accomplished again.
It was also with liberal supermajorities on the federal level that democrats were able to get very modest reforms (affordable care act, dodd-frank, etc.) at a federal .
I've written the term "liberal supermajority" a few times now, and that should be kind of appalling. That's what it takes for America to try out liberalism: Nobody in the way to say "No". It is not enough to just have a majority. The moment the supermajority is broken, they have to start making concessions to a very small amount of people. The more of those people there are, the more concessions they have to keep giving. That is, until they retake whatever legislature is in play.
Because once that small amount of people become the majority (republicans), they don't feel compelled to give anything to the now minority (democrats). And apparently all that takes to do that is 37% of the electorate.
The only conclusion one can draw from this: America is not entitled to liberalism.