It's very simple. As Paul Krugman says, it takes a party.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/13/opinion/it-takes-a-party.html
Bernie Sanders is not a Democrat. He is on the record at least in the past though maybe not recently for attacking Democrats as Tweedle Dee to the GOP's Tweedle Dum.
So why does he get to use the Democratic party? Why not run from the Socialist party? Because no one else is in it? Well maybe if he cant get anyone else to join it isn't as viable politically as he wants to think.
But more expansively, if you are familiar with my Twitter page I quote the great Radical Republican Thaddeus Stevens: Principles indeed! Betray your principles and stand with your party!
https://twitter.com/evilsax
This is really about the core of my political philosophy. Anyone can get up there and make all kinds of promises on a stump speech. But how do you achieve these things without a party? You don't.
Understand, my goal is a governing Democratic majority that lasts as long as is possible. And don't kid yourself: one party rule should be the goal and only aspiration and history has shown it can be achieved and for a long time.
The political scientist John Sides has some interesting books out on elections.
http://www.amazon.com/Political-Polarization-American-Politics-Sides/dp/1501306278/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1441368182&sr=8-1&keywords=john+sides
http://www.amazon.com/Gamble-Choice-Chance-Presidential-Election/dp/0691163634/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1441368182&sr=8-2&keywords=john+sides
But I kind of take issue with Sides-and his co-authors. I don't think they understand what polarization is. At it's basic, it just means that there are deep political divisions among Americans.
In saying that one party rule is the goal some may raise their eyebrows. There are many who want a third party, or even a fourth and a fifth. They think more parties mean more democracy.
In a way perhaps but a lot of parties also indicates even less political and social consensus and more conflict and disagreement.
Having one party dominate on the other hand shows that there is a much higher level of political and social consensus. So in the New Deal era we were a much more unified society-or least among white folks. That was the Achilles Heel ultimately of that coalition.
When the Democratic party finally bit the bullet and supported civil rights they lost their oldest voting bloc in the country.
But the dominance of the Democratic party between 1932 and 1968 was because Americans were largely in agreement.
We've been a lot more 'polarized' since then but what this means is that we disagree much more sharply today.
In some ways this is what Trump trades on. He's not against the welfare state-which had large support among whites and to the fraught issue of race burst onto the scene in the late 60s.
Trump plays to xenophobia and nativism but is much less critical and even supportive of the welfare state.
But the New Deal era is still remembered well by Americans in general-not just liberal Democrats like Krugman but even conservatives. After all if pace Trump America isn't great anymore, then when was it great? The New Deal era.
Conservatives don't put it this way but this era-pre civil rights is what they look back on.pa
A dominant party and a minority party seems foreign to us because our frame of reference is the last 48 years of bipartisanship and polarization, but this is actually a misnomer historically.
America has had basically four distinct partisan epochs and the first three were times of largely one party rule.
1. After defeating the Federalists the Dems dominated from 1800 to 1860. Now one party rule ends when there are big political events that end the consensus and scramble the coalition. Obviously the huge elephant in the room was slavery.
It was such a big elephant it led to the rise of another big elephant-the GOP.
2. Starting with Lincoln, we had a 72 year period of GOP dominance where the Dems were only a regional party-the South and certain big immigration cities in the North. This GOP dominance lasted almost three quarters of a century again underscoring that seeking an emerging majority is not unrealistic.
Even if as Sides points out there have been many false flag emerging majorities in recent years and even if each time a party wins it claims that it is here.
If the Dems paid the price for the Civil War, the GOP would pay the price for the Depression.
3. Which leads us to the New Deal era where the Dems' dominated 1932-1968. But as Garry Wills puts it 'the Center cannot hold' at least it didn't in 1968. With civil rights the South left the Dems as the post civil rights riots further polarized and divided the country.
http://www.amazon.com/Nixon-Agonistes-Crisis-Self-Made-Man/dp/0618134328/ref=sr_1_9?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1441371223&sr=1-9&keywords=garry+wills
http://www.amazon.com/Confessions-Conservative-Garry-Wills/dp/0385089775/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1441371346&sr=1-1&keywords=garry+wills+confessions+of+a+conservative
4. The current bipartisan era beings with Nixon's election in 1968 and goes through to 2016 at least. It works out neatly as for the first 24 years the GOP dominated the Presidency but the Dems maintained control of Congress; but in the early 90s this reversed and the Dems became the Presidential party and the GOP the Congressional party.
In some ways Dick Cheney's hatred of Congress and elevation of the Presidency shows that his formative years were an era when the GOP was the Presidential party and the Nixon White House that Cheney started out in was brought low by a Democratic Congress.
But during this period the ongoing sentiment is that our politics is broken. Yes, but that's because we don't agree. What we miss is the consensus. That's what a new majority would bring.
So this is why I'm not a Bernie man-he's not a Democrat and I don't see our salvation as the Jane Hamsher playbook of electing the most liberal candidate you can find but rather the most liberal electable Democrat.
http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2015/08/what-does-failure-of-firegoglake-tell.html?showComment=1440602043157#c327957105008123554
For me I'm liberal Democrat which means I want to elect Democrats not just liberals. It takes a party. This is not understood. The Emoprogs just think 'Get the guy who talks about blowing up the banks and if he's elected we will have streets paved with gold.'
But no candidate without a party can achieve anything. And a party is about support. What makes the two party system what it is is both these parties represent broad constituencies.
If there is a desire for a third party it would develop But the long term effect of that would probably mean the eclipse of one of the other two parties.
P.S. Look at it this way: if Bernie really represented a large constituency as opposed to white liberals in certain states there would be more members of his Socialist party. That there isn't tells us that he doesn't have much natural support out side of the white liberal niche.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/13/opinion/it-takes-a-party.html
Bernie Sanders is not a Democrat. He is on the record at least in the past though maybe not recently for attacking Democrats as Tweedle Dee to the GOP's Tweedle Dum.
So why does he get to use the Democratic party? Why not run from the Socialist party? Because no one else is in it? Well maybe if he cant get anyone else to join it isn't as viable politically as he wants to think.
But more expansively, if you are familiar with my Twitter page I quote the great Radical Republican Thaddeus Stevens: Principles indeed! Betray your principles and stand with your party!
https://twitter.com/evilsax
This is really about the core of my political philosophy. Anyone can get up there and make all kinds of promises on a stump speech. But how do you achieve these things without a party? You don't.
Understand, my goal is a governing Democratic majority that lasts as long as is possible. And don't kid yourself: one party rule should be the goal and only aspiration and history has shown it can be achieved and for a long time.
The political scientist John Sides has some interesting books out on elections.
http://www.amazon.com/Political-Polarization-American-Politics-Sides/dp/1501306278/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1441368182&sr=8-1&keywords=john+sides
http://www.amazon.com/Gamble-Choice-Chance-Presidential-Election/dp/0691163634/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1441368182&sr=8-2&keywords=john+sides
But I kind of take issue with Sides-and his co-authors. I don't think they understand what polarization is. At it's basic, it just means that there are deep political divisions among Americans.
In saying that one party rule is the goal some may raise their eyebrows. There are many who want a third party, or even a fourth and a fifth. They think more parties mean more democracy.
In a way perhaps but a lot of parties also indicates even less political and social consensus and more conflict and disagreement.
Having one party dominate on the other hand shows that there is a much higher level of political and social consensus. So in the New Deal era we were a much more unified society-or least among white folks. That was the Achilles Heel ultimately of that coalition.
When the Democratic party finally bit the bullet and supported civil rights they lost their oldest voting bloc in the country.
But the dominance of the Democratic party between 1932 and 1968 was because Americans were largely in agreement.
We've been a lot more 'polarized' since then but what this means is that we disagree much more sharply today.
In some ways this is what Trump trades on. He's not against the welfare state-which had large support among whites and to the fraught issue of race burst onto the scene in the late 60s.
Trump plays to xenophobia and nativism but is much less critical and even supportive of the welfare state.
But the New Deal era is still remembered well by Americans in general-not just liberal Democrats like Krugman but even conservatives. After all if pace Trump America isn't great anymore, then when was it great? The New Deal era.
Conservatives don't put it this way but this era-pre civil rights is what they look back on.pa
A dominant party and a minority party seems foreign to us because our frame of reference is the last 48 years of bipartisanship and polarization, but this is actually a misnomer historically.
America has had basically four distinct partisan epochs and the first three were times of largely one party rule.
1. After defeating the Federalists the Dems dominated from 1800 to 1860. Now one party rule ends when there are big political events that end the consensus and scramble the coalition. Obviously the huge elephant in the room was slavery.
It was such a big elephant it led to the rise of another big elephant-the GOP.
2. Starting with Lincoln, we had a 72 year period of GOP dominance where the Dems were only a regional party-the South and certain big immigration cities in the North. This GOP dominance lasted almost three quarters of a century again underscoring that seeking an emerging majority is not unrealistic.
Even if as Sides points out there have been many false flag emerging majorities in recent years and even if each time a party wins it claims that it is here.
If the Dems paid the price for the Civil War, the GOP would pay the price for the Depression.
3. Which leads us to the New Deal era where the Dems' dominated 1932-1968. But as Garry Wills puts it 'the Center cannot hold' at least it didn't in 1968. With civil rights the South left the Dems as the post civil rights riots further polarized and divided the country.
http://www.amazon.com/Nixon-Agonistes-Crisis-Self-Made-Man/dp/0618134328/ref=sr_1_9?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1441371223&sr=1-9&keywords=garry+wills
http://www.amazon.com/Confessions-Conservative-Garry-Wills/dp/0385089775/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1441371346&sr=1-1&keywords=garry+wills+confessions+of+a+conservative
4. The current bipartisan era beings with Nixon's election in 1968 and goes through to 2016 at least. It works out neatly as for the first 24 years the GOP dominated the Presidency but the Dems maintained control of Congress; but in the early 90s this reversed and the Dems became the Presidential party and the GOP the Congressional party.
In some ways Dick Cheney's hatred of Congress and elevation of the Presidency shows that his formative years were an era when the GOP was the Presidential party and the Nixon White House that Cheney started out in was brought low by a Democratic Congress.
But during this period the ongoing sentiment is that our politics is broken. Yes, but that's because we don't agree. What we miss is the consensus. That's what a new majority would bring.
So this is why I'm not a Bernie man-he's not a Democrat and I don't see our salvation as the Jane Hamsher playbook of electing the most liberal candidate you can find but rather the most liberal electable Democrat.
http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2015/08/what-does-failure-of-firegoglake-tell.html?showComment=1440602043157#c327957105008123554
For me I'm liberal Democrat which means I want to elect Democrats not just liberals. It takes a party. This is not understood. The Emoprogs just think 'Get the guy who talks about blowing up the banks and if he's elected we will have streets paved with gold.'
But no candidate without a party can achieve anything. And a party is about support. What makes the two party system what it is is both these parties represent broad constituencies.
If there is a desire for a third party it would develop But the long term effect of that would probably mean the eclipse of one of the other two parties.
P.S. Look at it this way: if Bernie really represented a large constituency as opposed to white liberals in certain states there would be more members of his Socialist party. That there isn't tells us that he doesn't have much natural support out side of the white liberal niche.
Mike for a second there I thought that Brad Delong had linked to your blog:
ReplyDeletehttp://nomoremister.blogspot.com/2015/09/peggy-noonans-hilarious-effort-to-peek.html
The comments there though made me think: what WOULD Trump do if he were president and the job stopped being fun for him? Call a press conference, fire America, and quit... going on to bigger and better things, like perhaps a new reality TV show?
Yeah Tom, sometimes I think it started out as a joke for him but then it really got legs so he figured he might as well go for it.
ReplyDeleteTurns out he's better at running for President than real candidates.