Posted on 06/20/2012 9:25:53 AM PDT by Kaslin
Is it time to start talking about the inevitable demise of the Democratic Party?
Since the 1990s there's been a thriving cottage industry of doomsaying about the Republican Party. The gold standard of the genre is undoubtedly 2002's "The Emerging Democratic Majority" by Ruy Teixeira and John Judis, which argued that the Democrats were destined to become a majority party because demographic and cultural trends were on their side. The increasing cultural liberalism of professionals, the dramatic growth of Latinos and the increasingly liberal attitudes of (single) women were celebrated by Teixeira and Judis as proof that time was on the Democrats' side.
And they may have been right, had all the trends they identified or took for granted continued to move in a straight line.
But that pretty much never happens, as Sean Trende brilliantly argues in his book "The Lost Majority: Why the Future of Government Is Up for Grabs -- and Who Will Take It." For instance, Trende recounts how the late Arthur Schlesinger Jr. wrote in the summer of 1972 that George McGovern was "the leader of a coalition of citizen participation, a coalition for change, as broad as FDR's in 1932."
McGovern lost in a massive landslide (61 percent to 38 percent).
The problem for the Democratic Party is that its core philosophy and mechanisms are increasingly ill-suited to our times.
In an essay for National Affairs titled "The Politics of Loss," Jay Cost recounts how the entire edifice of post-World War II politics is starting to crumble under the weight of debt and impending austerity. "The days when lawmakers could give to some Americans without shortchanging others are over; the politics of deciding who loses what, and when and how, is upon us," Cost writes. He's undoubtedly right when he adds, "Neither party yet fully understands the implications of this shift, which means both parties risk being caught unprepared when the economic slowdown forces profound changes in American politics."
But there's a key difference between the parties. The Democrats tend to be more traditionally coalitional: If everyone sticks together, everyone gets paid. In the age of austerity, however, zero-sum politics become more of the norm. When one constituency's victory is another's loss, the payoff for solidarity diminishes.
Already, across the country, there's a growing rift between unions in the public sector and the private sector, perhaps not in official statements but clearly in terms of rank-and-file voters and popular perceptions. Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker got 37 percent of the vote from union households in his recall fight, in part because private sector union members understood how much the private sector needed a healthy state economy.
More broadly, the old system of rewarding liberal elites on cultural and environmental issues while paying off the working class with economic spoils will be increasingly hard to sustain. Obama's positions on gay marriage and the Keystone XL pipeline fuel donations from celebrity millionaires, but they don't help with middle- and lower-class voters. And if those voters get no payoff from voting Democratic, what's the point?
Consider Obama's decision to grant work permits to perhaps 1 million young illegal immigrants. In a booming economy that would be a lot easier. Instead, the White House must tell millions of unemployed blacks that the competition for jobs has just gotten tougher because Obama needs more Latino votes.
Ironically, the last time America experienced the politics of austerity, it was a great boon for the Democratic Party. Franklin D. Roosevelt cobbled together his great coalition in the 1930s by doling out patronage and spoils to various constituencies.
But here's the difference. Roosevelt could target his pandering without too much fear of spillover. He could tell blacks he was on their side and Southern racists he was on theirs. In Oval Office meetings, he would mollify members of his coalition by blaming other members for holding up progress.
I don't actually think the Democratic Party is doomed (nor did I ever believe the GOP was). But the way politics is done has to change for the simple reason we cannot afford it. Maybe I'm wrong, but the Democrats seem far less prepared to deal with that reality than the Republicans.
As long as the 8th and 10th commandments are relevant, there will be a democrat party.....alas
Don’t take anything for granted. One third of voters are ignoramuses and another one-third twists with the winds. If Bill Clinton and Barack Obama can be elected then stupidity still reigns the electoral process. Not to mention as the article says, changing demographics along with voter fraud and increasingly biased, water-carrying “media”
As long as the govt. “goodies” keep flowing don’t expect the rats to flee en mass.
Liberalism is the political expression of humanism,
and it will continue to exist and have to be contended with
until its author is banished to the Pit forever.
From 2006 until 2010, the Democrats were king of the hill....two years later a prediction of their demise....although that would be great they are not going anywhere. They are hitting a bump in the road like we did in 2006 until 2010....politics is TOTALLY cycles. We should not be arrogant like the Democrats were in 2006 especially when they thought the Republicans were dead forever.
If you ask me, the combination of Marxist/Socialist strategies and the organized crime of the Democrat Party has been wildly successful. The libs largely run the show and continually advance the ball down the field to their goals.
It’s the GOP that is in deep trouble, especially with minorities beginning to overrun the white natives. The Democrats have a never-ending stream of illegals and immigrants to reinforce their voting numbers. The GOP constituencies are slowly dying off.
Is the Dem party doomed?
Can you eradicate cockroaches?
The dem party will just do what cockroaches do when you turn on the light. Scurry for the cover of darkness inside the walls, under the floors... Biding their time for when you’re not looking.
In the age of austerity, however, zero-sum politics become more of the norm. When one constituency’s victory is another’s loss, the payoff for solidarity diminishes.
I disagree. There will be solidarity on the Democrat side as long as one constituency (Democrats) victory comes at the expense of another’s (Republicans) loss. If there is one coherent message from the Occupy movement, it is this one. As long as there are rich people, poorer people will hate them. Democrats will play up that hatred and translate the hatred into votes. That’s why they practice such divisive politics.
Rich v Poor.
Black v white.
Straight v gay.
Man v. woman
etc...
By picking these “battles”, democrats create votes for themselves.
There has been a Dem party since Cain slew Able in Biblical times.
The Dems influence may wain for awhile, but history tells us it will never go away.
Once I heard about this party named the Whigs.
Wonder what ever happened to them?
Why should anyone be concerned? Americans are on the verge of electing a Republican president whose political record is literally, demonstrably, the same as a Democrat. Romney's record is one of willfully advancing global warming cap-and-trade, government-run health care, activist judges, abortion on demand, and the homosexual agena to deprive people of their right to refuse to accommodate open homosexuals. What's NOT Democrat about that? And what is "Republican"?
Romney is a functional Democrat on the verge of becoming a Republican president. Talking about the demise of the Democrat party under the circumstances we face is more than ironic. It's tragic and hilarious at the same time.
You know, sadly, the Whigs were actually awesome. They really understood capitalism in its emerging form in the US, and they understood the nature and extent of the Union, and they understood traditional morality.
(And what could, incidentally, be more profoundly conservative than to long for a Party which has been defunct for like 160 years?).
The MOB should get pointers from the DEMS...(and the SEIU)
The Democrat Party consists of a balkanized set of self-interest identity groups, and they have promised each of them they will be first up at the teat. Except the milk is about to run dry, and open warfare is about to break out among the groups.
Blacks vs Hispanics will be the one that blows apart the core. They can’t both be #1 Most Favored Minority.
The problem with the demoKKKrat party is that they never learned any new skills coming out of the depression and WW-II. All they even claim to be good at is representing victims and when nature fails to provide victims in sufficiently large numbers,they seek to create or import them. Needed is some sort of a voters' bill of rights including a half dozen or so major reforms, the most major of which would be runoff or instant runoff elections for all public offices, i.e. nobody should ever need fear to vote their first choice at least on a first ballot and nobody should ever hold a public office with less than 50% of the vote.
THAT would allow some third party to rise up and supplant one of the major parties which had become disfunctional, which I assume would be the dems.
That sounds strangely like something I have heard before.
As long as the grass grows, and the rivers flow......
That party's finished.
“Neither party yet fully understands the implications of this shift, which means both parties risk being caught unprepared when the economic slowdown forces profound changes in American politics.”
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It occurred to me many years ago that much of the utter foolishness of our government at all levels but especially at the national level could not possibly have existed a few generations back because the current level of participation in the workforce would not have produced the necessities of life. When farmers used mules we could not have supported millions of people who depend on government for their existence. The huge increase in productivity in recent decades has made this insanity possible.
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