I like E.J. Dionne. I think he’s on to something in his latest column. He’s basically saying that President Obama is creating a center-left liberal establishment in Washington that is reminiscent of what we saw in the glory days between 1933-1968. Here’s where I think Dionne is wrong. It’s not really Obama who is creating this.
What’s going on is that the Democratic Party is expanding to include people who have been Republicans all their lives. This mainly involves ordinary citizens, but it also includes politicians. The Republicans are losing scientists and internationalists and people that have moderate views on social issues. They’re losing secular people and they are hemorrhaging anyone who isn’t white. The Republicans are polling terribly in every region of the country outside of the South.
The Democrats have a growing number of people that are moderate or even right-wing in their outlook. Because of this, they have to juggle a lot of balls to keep everyone happy. Managing the party becomes a center-left affair even though progressives make up the single biggest bloc of Democrats.
Obama has pushed hard for progressive aims in certain areas and had tacked towards the center in others. Where Dionne is right is that Obama has consciously moved to do two things. He’s used his appointments to lock in as big of a governing majority as possible. He retained Robert Gates as Secretary of Defense, appointed Ray LaHood as Secretary of Transportation, and tried to appoint Judd Gregg as Secretary of Commerce. He lured Arlen Specter into the Democratic Party. He let Joe Lieberman keep a committee chair and his seniority. He appointed his chief rival as Secretary of State. He courted the endorsement of Colin Powell and wooed Dick Lugar and Chuck Hagel into soft support for his presidency. He quickly moved to make up with John McCain.
Essentially, Obama was making it safe for moderate, reasonable Republicans and right-wing Democrats to embrace his presidency and become part of his coalition. This inclusiveness disarmed the Republicans and seduced the Democrats. Obama’s tent is so large that it isn’t reasonable to refuse to sit within it. The second thing Obama did was to match centrist messaging with centrist policy is some key areas. Other than on some civil liberties issues, Obama hasn’t abandoned any campaign promises, but he hasn’t tacked hard to the left either. His challenge is to moderates. He’s taking away arguments for opposing him.
To some degree, Obama has faced opposition from the right-wing of the Democratic Party. But he hasn’t faced unhappiness. He hasn’t seen any schisms. His harshest critics on the left have been on the far left. Yet, even they do not oppose him.
It might sound like I am agreeing with Dionne. It certainly appears that Obama is responsible for creating a new center-left consensus. But he is merely navigating something that was created all on its own. The country hasn’t so much become more left-wing as the Republicans have failed to represent people of a centrist mind-set. There is an upside and a downside to Obama’s approach.
To understand this we need to look back at George W. Bush. Bush was (s)elected without winning the popular vote or the Electoral College. He initially had narrow majorities in Congress. Yet, he governed as if he had won a giant mandate. He pushed as hard as he could to make as much change as he could and he pushed a hard-right agenda. This polarized the country and ultimately led to failure in every major field of endeavor. Yet, Bush did move the country to the right on regulatory policy and in the courts. He did get his war in Iraq and he did win reelection. Bush’s philosophy seemed to be that he needed to push to get things done with the limited time he had and damn the consequences for the prospects of a lasting Republican majority.
Obama has a bigger mandate and he has much bigger majorities in Congress. There is no question that he could push through really progressive changes if he didn’t care about maintaining his coalition or polarizing the country or re-empowering the Republican opposition. If he fails to do so, the opportunity could slip by. Large Democratic majorities only come along every so often and its important to make good use of them before they disappear.
What is the point of power, after all, if you don’t use it when you have it? That’s one side of the argument. The other side is that the Democrats can do more good in the long-run by building a ruling coalition. In beating the Republicans down to a tiny rump party, the Democrats ensure that we won’t be faced with periodic Republican resurgencies that cause serious and lasting damage to the Republic.
Obama didn’t create the center-left Establishment, but he is doing everything he can to protect and consolidate it. Whether his efforts bear fruit depends in large part on two factors. He must create a national health care system that fundamentally changes the contours of debate in this country by moving it far to the left. And he must avoid letting Afghanistan become this generation’s Vietnam.
