I volunteered for Bill Bradley in 2000. I thought it was absolutely critical that he deny Al Gore the nomination. I believe history has vindicated that appraisal. I know Gore has legions of fans these days, but he still lost to Bush (or won…whatever). In Bill Bradley’s new book, The New America Story, he has a chapter called Why Democrats Don’t. The following excerpts are on the trauma of Reagan’s presidency and the rise of the DLC in response. It shows that Bradley understands the roots of our current problems.
After Reagan won in 1980 and nine Democratic senators were defeated, giving control of the Senate to the Republicans, Democrats lost not just their confidence but some of their convictions as well. Indeed, their pro-government stance of the previous forty-eight years was said to be the cause of the party’s defeat. Ronald Reagan had tapped into the anxiety that many taxpayers felt about the nature of the federal bureaucracy, portraying it as too big, too intrusive, and too wasteful. A kind of Democratic panic ensued. It was as if ‘government’ had become a bad word. Republicans had successfully defined the political moment, and we Democrats increasingly sought to be Republican lite. At the time, few of us seemed to understand the depth of our party’s problem. “In politics,” the late political scientist David Green wrote in The Language of Politics in America: Shaping Political Consciousness from McKinley to Reagan, “real intellectual victory is achieved not by transmitting one’s language to supporters but by transmitting it to critics.” When you adopt your opponents’ definition of the situation, including their premises and even some of the substantive analysis, effective opposition becomes difficult. By 1984, when former vice president Walter Mondale ran, Democrats were no longer in control of the dialogue.
Do you feel like we are in control of the dialogue today? We’re constantly battling a phantom war on terrorism, which is clearly a proxy for a war for influence and resources. Moreover, look at the media. Bradley continues:
The Democratic Party’s reaction to Ronald Reagan shaped a generation of Democratic politicians, as we sought to differentiate ourselves from both Reagan and FDR- Reagan because he was a Republican and FDR because he was a “big spender.” Instead of creating something new that was true to our origins, we tried to split the difference between the legacy of FDR and the political potency of Reagan. The key to doing this was public relations- managing and targeting the message. We became the party of intentions, not results- intent on proclaiming that one or another initiative would improve people’s lives; whether it actually did or not was never determined. If you couldn’t admit the importance of government, then you couldn’t talk about the big things government could do- just talk about a lot of small things important to different segments of the electorate, but don’t risk talking to the electorate as a whole.
In today’s terms, this means tinkering around the edges of the Global War on Terror, but never questioning the underlying premises. It means not asking for single-payer health care, but trying to just enroll more children in some kind of HMO.
One of the early efforts to distance ourselves from the FDR legacy was the Democratic Leadership Council, formed out of discontent with the Democratic National Committee and the perceived necessity to move to the middle- far away from FDR. It started with only a few people. It’s activities consisted primarily of holding conferences that gave politicians a platform to espouse middle-of-the-road positions and generating research papers that sought to bridge the gap between FDR and Reagan. The DLC solicited Democratic officeholders as members and rich, business-friendly Democrats as contributors.
And not only Democratic contributors. It quickly became a way for business-friendly people to hedge their bets and play both sides of the system.
The organization has been run for some twenty years by the same man, Al From, a bright, aggressive former Democratic staffer in the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives. From its beginning, he positioned the organization as the anti-DNC and its members as the new Democratic conservatives. Above all, the DLC has sought to move the party to more eclectic policies that embody modest aspirations. That way, Republicans couldn’t attacks us as big spenders. The DLC attempted to ingratiate itself with business by supporting deregulation in areas of the economy, such as utilities, that had been under government regulation since the 1930’s. It advocated welfare reform, along with an assortment of experimental policies that wouldn’t cost very much. These new Democrats took positions on Social Security and Medicare, on pension policy and health care, elementary and secondary education, and tax reform, but most shied away from using government as a tool to make the country stronger and more just. Sometimes the DLC seemed more anti-liberal than anti-Republican. It was a haven for younger politicians who wished to distinguish themselves from the Old Democrats of the DNC, the custodian of what remained of the old coalition.
Bradley’s analysis is spot-on. The Clintons rose to power on the back of this non-ideological ideology. And Hillary Clinton remains their standard bearer. Above all else, it is this timid political philosophy that is responsible for the Democrats inability to stand up to Bush.
Also available at Taylor Marsh where I am guest posting this week.
My dear friend, you have forgotten the Southern Strategy and the appeal of Reagan to southern (and northern bigots like the Reagan Democrats), who were piqued by the Democratic (Kennedy-Johnson) fight for racial equality, and the loss of white supremacy, than big government or Reagan’s talk about the need to return control of the government to the corporations and rich men, who will make us all rich.
Government increased in size under Reagan as it has under Bush, giving credence to the fact that Republicans are less concerned with conservatism than they are with increasing wealth inequality. Why would any Republican corporate or wealthy donor be concerned with the size of government, when social security funds and the National Debt is there to absorb the deficiency resulting from taxcuts.
Capitalism uber alles.
Bradley discusses the southern strategy on pages 228 and 230.
And on to Reagan:
Three pages devoted to THE critical issue in the ascendency of Republicanism is hardly giving it the credit it deserves.
When reporters searched and searched for that “welfare queen in Chicago who drove around in Cadillacs” and couldn’t find her, it meant nothing, nothing, that is, until Clinton saw his big move: “changing welfare as we know it.” Welfare is a codeword for lazy Black freeloader, and whatelse would one need to convince a racist society that you are their president.
Johnson knew what the cost of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 would be and his prediction of downfall was accurate. It happened. Not even the Republicans needed conservatism any longer to get into office. For that matter, it is doubtful that most Republicans understand conservative principles, because it would constitute voting against their own best interests, given that most Republicans are not rich white men.
Well, by comparison, he devotes one page to the DLC. The book isn’t a history book.
True, but it should be relevant and accurate. It could be argued that the DLC is a compromise between liberal-socialism and Republican racism and pseudoConservative principles. Isn’t it interesting how Clinton was concerned with reducing the size of government and government waste, whereas the Republicans from Reagan onward were not, except rhetorically.
Reagan spent the government out of any possibility that the Democrats had leeway to advance FDR liberal-socialism, like providing universal health care.
Compared to Sweden or Canada, we pretty much suck at taking care of our own people. If you are not a rich white man, you might as well be dead.
Bradley’s philosophy…which he shares with Cuomo and Feingold if actions are any indication of “philosophy” whatsoever…seems to be something on the order of think but do not do.
The fact that none of these men actually put their asses on the line to make a serious run…or else did so halfheartedly at best….eliminates their thoughts from any possible practical political consideration as far as I am concerned.
They were in position…and then dithered OUT of position.
So it goes.
Sheakespeare would have understood. Some Roman Senators and other secondary characters were much like this in his plays.
His TRAGEDIES.
That is why I so admire Dean.
He actually made the move.
He failed…but ’twas a noble failure, and it put hilm into a position of real political power which resulted two years later in the essential defeat of some of the very forces that offed him.
These other guys?
Do as I write, not as I act.
Pifflesticks.
Fuggedaboud’em.
So Hillary and Bill actually lowered themselves enough to get their hands dirty in real, nasty Rove-type dominated national politics.
And succeeded.
And now the above-it-all left thinks that they are the ENEMY!!!???
The left is its OWN enemy.
Bet on it.
BRADLEY FOR PRESIDENT!!!
Right.
Go ahead.
HOLD your breath.
I dare ya.
AG
Add to this, that we is right on the issues.
He quit.
He gave up.
He waffled.
He did not fight.
He did not TAKE IT TO THEM.
He disappeared.
He gave up.
He essentially disappeared from active political power.
He was wrong on THAT issue.
And as I have been saying here to all a’ you Hlillary naysayers…without power it does not make the slightest bit of difference HOW “right on the issues” you may be.
You are OUTTA here!!!
So…is Rep. Kucinich as “right on the issues” as was Senator Bradley?
Personally, on all issues EXCEPT the attainment of power I think that it would be hard to fault him.
Gonna back him?
The hell with whipping a dead horse…that would be like trying to RIDE one.
Sorry, Boo…I’m through with the “Clean for Gene” shit.
Hell…I knew he didn’t have a chance THEN.
Remember that old saw “If you are not part of the solution you are part of the problem”?
Well…REAL world…
If you are not part of the accumulation of power, then you are part of its subject.
Tired of losing.
That’s all.
TIRED of it.
And…you should be, too.
Later…
AG
We won’t let the media tell us our candidate is done this time. Nothing could save Dean after the scream. But most candidates have more basic common sense than Dean. I had him pegged as a screamer after witnessing him at two early rallies in ’03. I knew he would blow it. I never got on that train, even though I agreed with him. Bradley’s mistake was that he didn’t try to bury Gore, come what may.
But he didn’t give up, he was suffocated.
Only because he was too much of a gentleman to accrue power with a certain..ruthlessness.
Having BOTH characteristics…then you get Lincolns and Churchills and FDRs.
You can’t grow into the office if you cannot win it.
AG
You want a man (or woman) like this.
Barbara over at the Mahablog makes a similar point in The Road to Serfdom. She uses Paul Krugman’s column to say that “We are all New Orleans now”:
Everything Bradley says in the excerpt is correct, but I think most of us — including Gore — already figured it out around 2-3 years ago if not earlier …
Reagan wasn’t produced in a vacuum. Judging by your excerpts, Democrats embraced Reagan’s anti-big-government stance simply because of Reagan’s persuasiveness and popularity. But all of this occurred in a changed economic environment.
Johnson’s anti-poverty, Great Society programs were made possible by an unusual period of high economic growth following the end of World War II that has been called the Golden Age. With high growth, corporations could maintain acceptably high profits while there was enough of an economic surplus left over to finance relatively generous social welfare programs. After 1972, high economic growth ended, never to return.
With the economy no longer achieving performance that people were used to, the ideology arose that that was due to economic regulation and “high taxes”. Though those had nothing to do with it, the new neoliberal ideology that arose became the conventional wisdom, due to a concerted propaganda campaign financed by corporations and the wealthy and carried out by right-wing think tanks and the corporate-controlled media. It was this that made the “Reagan revolution” possible.
Economic deregulation in America began not with Reagan but with Carter, when he deregulated the airline industry.
It wasn’t we Democrats, it was those Democrats.
AND, although the economy changed, the damned Democrats didn’t. They stayed in the great society and left their working/middle class high and dry and stranded in the middle of the eternal Great Society and Morning in America. Just as the Dems are driving people away from them now, they drove them away back then. Those Dems did it to themselves just like they are doing it to themselves now. They are anything but responsive and reflexes, and I don’t know how they manage to stay so isolated and stupid. This is the heart of the Democratic Party’s problem.
Great post BTW, I haven’t gotten around to reading the book so this was a great summary.
What would the world be like if Bill had been made SecState or SecTreas under Clinton like had been rumored or if he won the nomination in 2000 (or ran in 1988)
Wow.
A whole BUNCH of ’em.
Saaaaay…you got any pull w/Kucinich?
I’m voting for the first Dem who comes to a debate dessed in Arabic drag.
Yesaram!!!
Ag
A Rasta in a kaffiyeh…singing about African freedom…gotta respect that. Tosh just dominated, even if he couldn’t inspire the way Marley did. Look at tall Tosh was compared to Marley.
Ever see this live?