Reasonable people are baffled by victories achieved by Conservative politicians whose policies generally hurt the masses, and enrich the privileged few.
They can not understand how they achieve victory.
They do not understand why reasonable even conciliatory policies that have been advanced by Democrats such as the President in the Health Care debate -he adopted the Heritage Foundation's plan- are met with vitriol.
To put it simply, the Conservative party has adopted the political tactics, and political positioning which has traditionally been held by the liberals amongst us, while the Democratic Party has retreated to the traditionally losing position of the conservatives, adopting the LEAST radical change.
In the past, when faced with an issue, the liberals in America have believed with moral certainty and superiority that their position is correct, and that any concession is failure.
This is notably found in one of the rallying cries at the founding of the American nation, "give me liberty, or give me death." There was no middle ground.
The conservatives in the first Continental Congress urged conciliation with Parliament and the British crown, the liberals urged independence and open rebellion, and held their ground until their position won the day. They conceded nothing, but MOST IMPORTANTLY, they were prepared to lose. Today's conservatives, probably because of their ties to the business community where 9 of 10 enterprises fail, have adopted the position that failure is okay, failure ultimately leads to victory, and this has served them well.
In the 1840s, and 1850s the abolitionist movement in America was prepared for failure and once again held fast to their righteous belief that their cause was just and moral, and their enemies were wrong or evil. The abolitionists failed in the Supreme Court with the Dredd Scott decision, and they failed repeatedly within the Whig party to change the platform, which was the more liberal of the two parties at the time. When the liberals failed to change the Whigs, rather than surrender those goals to centrists, they broke away and formed the Republican Party. The liberals held fast to their positions, and conceded nothing, and they were willing to lose. They were so willing to lose that they formed the first successful third party in American politics and brought an end to the conciliatory Whigs.
During the 1930s, the liberals in the Democratic Party held fast to liberal policies. Ideas to ease the economic suffering of ordinary Americans advanced by labor unions, the two socialist parties in America, and the American Communist Party -who threatened open rebellion if Roosevelt didn't adopt their positions- which was not an idol threat at a time when those three parties had several million members forced Roosevelt's hand against the wealthy. Roosevelt and the Democrats stuck with these policies even when the Supreme Court was striking down laws as unconstitutional. Roosevelt went so far as to threaten a court packing plan, which was likely the kick in the pants the Supreme Court needed to find Social Security a valid use of constitutional authority, after having ended several of the Administration's more liberal economic policies a year earlier. The liberals were not afraid to lose in the 1930s because there was no plan on the other side which offered even the slightest glimmer of hope. The liberals of the 1930s literally had nothing left to lose.
Strengthened by the resolve they built in the 1930s, the liberals continued to win into the mid-1960s by holding firm to the notion of the moral superiority of their causes and by taking a stance which would not accept compromise. The NAACP, the ACLU, and millions of protestors supporting their causes took an absolute stand against segregation and Jim Crow, and pushed back those forces of repression with the Voting Rights Act and the Civil Rights Act. President Johnson signed those bills into law conceding that it meant that his party, the Democrats, would lose the south for at least a generation. That's conviction in your beliefs right there.
The power of conviction and political courage comes with a willingness to lose everything, and not concede an inch. The reason liberals have traditionally won the political battles and arguments in America is precisely because they have not feared losing.
Losing a battle as a liberal has traditionally been part of the long struggle to achieve ultimate victory, BUT THAT ALL STARTED to change in the mid-1960s.
With Barry Goldwater as their standard bearer in the 1964 Presidential election a new kind of conservative emerged onto the American political stage, an American conservative who firmly believed that their solutions and their policy positions were not only right, but were so right that they would prefer losing a fight to conceding even an inch of ground to their opponents.
The Republican Party took a step backwards in the elections of 1968 through 1976 with Nixon and Ford, but the idea, the spark of recognition, that ultimate victory goes to those who concede nothing was firmly planted in the political ideology of American conservatives in 1964. Of course the greatest problem is that the seeds and strength of this idea were planted into the minds of a political force which had long had little concern for fair play. Notice that Nixon's campaign was responsible for the Watergate break in. When you believe you are right, unwilling to concede an inch, and willing to cheat to win, this does not bode well for your opponents.
Meanwhile, on the liberal side of things, the 1968 and 1972 elections convinced a younger generation of Americans that losing a battle while sticking to your principles was not a winning strategy. The seeds of triangulation and the Democratic Party's abandonment of principle in favor of short term victory were sown in the wake of the deaths of Martin Luther King, Jr., Bobby Kennedy, and in the campaigns of Eugene McCarty, Hubert Humphrey, and George McGovern. The rumors of the death of American idealism began with Bobby Kennedy's impromptu eulogy of Dr. King in Indianapolis and made very real with his death at the Ambassador Hotel.
The final nail in the coffin of the traditional liberal positioning which adopted the fearless pursuit of ideals and goals, without regard to the potential for short term loss, came with the failed primary campaign of Senator Edward Kennedy for the nomination of the Democratic Party against siting President Jimmie Carter in 1980. Long shot candidates have continued to participate in Democratic Party politics, notably Jesse Jackson, Jerry Brown, Howard Dean, and Dennis Kucinich, but triangulation, and a pre-occupation with "electability" has overwhelmed the thinking of the Democratic Party throughout most of the last 40 years.
In the interim, candidates who most people with an education about economics, politics, or diplomacy find laughable have become the perennial favorites amongst the conservative Republican crowd. When "electability" has swung their thinking with candidates like Mitt Romney, the losses only confirm for the right wing echo chamber a need for ideological purity amongst their candidates. This has proven so effective that the leadership of the House of Representatives changed last election cycle not because a Democrat unseated a Republican, but because a more ideologically pure Republican defeated Eric Cantor in a primary.
The conservatives in America have adopted the mindset which was long held by the liberals in America, that they are right, the other guys are wrong, and there can be no compromise with evil, which is how the other side is viewed by the conservative politicians and their voters. Liberals like you and I are evil incarnate and we deserve no say in anything. You must remember the mindset of your enemy.
The courage of your convictions, and a willingness to lose a fight to win a war has always served the forces of good, and the forces of American liberals well. Conciliatory policies which seek to put the breaks on or slow change have always worked poorly for the forces of evil, and the forces of American conservatives.
By adopting a moral certainty in the correctness of their convictions, and a fearless pursuit of their goals, the conservatives in America have been handily beating the liberals first in the 1980s in Presidential politics, then since the 1990s in Congressional politics where the majority of electoral power is vested.
Unless and until American liberals resume a stance of moral superiority, and unwavering conviction in their position, and their candidates, they will continue to lose the war, if not the battles. Of course, the fact that many of the battles at the Congressional level have been lost is why the war is going so badly.
In terms of todays elections, it is a mistake for Democrats to support candidates who accept campaign contributions from the moneyed interests. This principle organizing tenant for Congressional campaigns would serve liberals well. How can you beat money in politics by relying on money in politics?
in 1992, Jerry Brown adopted a self-imposed campaign contribution limit of $100, which would likely serve Democratic congressional candidates well. Campaign finance is low on the priority list of voters, but it doesn't need to remain a low priority. By focusing on that one issue, and showing their courage of their convictions on this issue with self-imposed limits the Democratic Party could use this issue to explain gridlock in Congress, and the unresponsiveness of government to the needs of ordinary Americans.
With proper framing, and conviction, this issue which enjoys universal support could become an important wedge issue to drive Republican voters to the Democratic Party.
Are there issues which are more controversial which liberals should stand up for unequivocally? Yes! Which ones? All of them, but that is the point. Liberals and Democrats need to walk their talk, and need to be prepared to do what liberals in the past have done when and if the party fails to respond to legitimate calls for change. Liberals need to be prepared to start an alternative third party that will not concede an inch on the issues.
If the Democratic Party does not adopt these positions when faced with a conservative party which has adopted the successful political tactics of liberalism in the past, it is doomed to failure, and liberalism is doomed as well.