Run it back the other way: after Republicans impeached Clinton over a blowjob and had the Supreme Court steal an election – and then swung much farther to the irrational right – it could not have been possible for any sentient human being to think that they were going to go post-partisan with any Democrat. The campaign rhetoric responding to media-driven voter ignorance – “I hate the partisan wrangling in Washington” – was fine, but Obama and team appeared to actually believe it was possible. Indeed, on many days, they still seem to believe so.
All of the Chicago School economic crap of the ’80’s, ’90’s and ’00’s – the magic of the marketplace, the tax cuts for the wealthy leading to higher investment in the domestic economy, greater worker productivity automatically leading to higher wages, etc. – led the nation and the world to economic disaster. January, 2009 was a very teachable moment. But almost no one was putting the lesson up on the chalkboard for everyone to see, certainly not the President. Indeed, I see very little indication that anyone has learned the lesson to this day, Republicans, Democrats, business people, or academics. So, plan for more economic disasters not too far down the road.
I just will not accept the idea of a President elected in a landslide – after another landslide two years earlier – and with a solid Democratic majority in both houses as being helpless because of a handful of Senators. On the stimulus bill, pro-stimulus Democrats had the national Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers on their side. Snarky remarks about the “overwhelming support he had in the Senate to double the size of the stimulus” don’t cover up the fact that the coalition in favor of an effective stimulus could have been used to break the back of opposition to an effective stimulus not only from Democrats but from Republicans too. This was not tried. Instead, a one trillion dollar maximum was immediately imposed, and then negotiations with one or two Republicans cut the actual stimulating part of ARRA in half, with a bunch of tax cuts. And no one was left afraid of what a President with a massive mandate and the power of the Presidency could and would do to little politicians who got in the way of what the nation needed. And then they insisted on pay-go, just to make sure everyone’s hands were tied against any further action.
The fact is, any President has tremendous power to accomplish all sorts of things with horse trading, and administrative and executive action without Congressional approval. But no one is afraid of this President. I say again, a leader does not begin policy formulation with what current estimates say would sell now, then compromise that down to half, and then chop it up trying to pass it, and hope it kind of works better than the status quo ante. A leader begins with a policy that is fairly sure to work and then figures out how to make it happen because it is the right policy. This necessitates a coalition with the voters – AS THEY WILL FEEL ON ELECTION DAY – not with the corporations. Obama and the Democrats rejected this path. But now an election is looming and they want prime Dems to come rushing back to them to stave off the loonies on the right – i.e. the Republicans.
But social democrats – FDR Democrats – are no longer welcome in the Democratic Party, except at election time and when their ‘aye’ votes for some dubious piece of legislation are taken for granted on the House and Senate floors. The actions and accomplishments of both Clinton and Obama show the truth of this statement. The center of the Democratic Party has swallowed the Chicago School crapola as fully as the Republicans have – or they have been too intimidated by the mega corporations to say that they reject it and act accordingly. So, actually, in that they are well to the right of Eisenhower, who never believed the proto-Chicago School foolishness of his day.
Massive civil liberties violations under Bush formed another teachable moment, right at the political juncture where the attention of a lot of Ron Paulites could have been gained. Instead, Obama DID ignore his soothing campaign rhetoric here, and so these violations now have the bi-partisan seal of approval, which means they are forever. So, plan for a government which obeys the Constitution if it feels like it, and courts that think that’s OK. Idiots think civil liberties caprice will always be confined to Mohammad and Fatima, but it’s just a question of time now before Hunter and Heather sense the G-men watching them too. Certainly, President Palin will be very grateful for these expanded powers.
The fact is, this nation has been on a seriously wrong track since the 1970’s. We coasted along on the residue of the social democratic post-war boom while undercutting it at every step. It was a crisis of sustained bad policy enabled by greed, incompetence and gutlessness which led to Obama being elected. Everyone sensed the moment: Whew! Another Lincoln, another FDR, just when we need him. Everyone, that is, except Obama and his people. They determined he would be another Buchanan, another Hoover.
So, yes, many prime Dems will probably turn out this election. But after the double dip has been around for a few quarters and 9.5% / 19% unemployment becomes something “we just have to accept,” because those mean Republicans won’t help us, just remember that Obama and the Democrats had a once-in-a-century chance to change the politics of this country by bringing a whole, eager new generation into the Democratic Party, teaching everyone policy rights and wrongs, and enacting policies which demonstrated that government really could fix some things – and then utterly failed to do so.
Those young people who were finally convinced to show up at the ballot box in 2008, convinced of Obama’s progressive politics, will not now transform American politics for the next generation, because most of them will drift into apathy or bitterness at a political system which has no room for real solutions, but plenty of room for whiny excuses. It doesn’t matter whether this opportunity was botched out of conviction, incompetence or fear: a certain level of leadership was required and given what it needed to succeed, and it failed to do so.
But more broadly, social democrats cannot long stay in junior partnership with the Eisenhower Republicans who run the Democratic Party. It simply does not leave the nation with enough policy options which will actually work. Indeed, the coalition may already have lasted too long, and this may have been our last chance to avert the long-term national disaster the Republicans have in mind for us. Staying home isn’t going to avert the disaster. But going to the ballot box doesn’t seem to do much good either. Even when we win, we act as if we had lost.