Posted on 11/06/2006 4:29:09 PM PST by SJackson
The Democrats will likely not do as well in the November elections as the pundits expect.
The party will fall short of expectations because over the last several decades it has placed a filter of race, sex, gender and political correctness through which public inquiry must pass, a filter that is viewed by evangelicals as secular and immoral.
This filter has distorted public inquiry and has prevented the Democrats from developing a coherent message about the role of government and a broad general economic message that can win national elections. This filter has become so dominant that many traditional Democrats have been read out of the party unless they, in their public discourse, pay homage to race, sex, gender and political correctness. This filter has been a major contributor to breaking our politics and civic discourse.
The "melting pot" ideal dominated the nation's culture until the death of Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968. His civil rights movement was a noble expression of that ideal. It was inclusive. The basic rightness of the cause touched the soul of Americans. It resulted in the enactment of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the law that finally put "Jim Crow" on the run.
After King's death, many groups - including women, gays and urban blacks - claimed ownership of the remnants of his movement without understanding the heart and soul of it. These groups wanted what they viewed as justice - now, today. They failed to realize, as did King, that inclusive causes like King's required public nurturing and the building of public support within a context of basic religious and civic values.
Rather than building public support, these largely secular groups turned to the courts to impose on American culture the "rightness" of their causes.
These groups, in their impatience for justice, were eventually successful, but at the price of breaking the middle of our politics. They changed the "melting pot" culture to one of "diversity."
This change in America's basic ideal to one of celebrating the differences and divisions among us, politically, set off the religious "right," broke the center of our national politics and changed the Democratic Party from a national party standing for a set of positions based on the role of government and the economy for all Americans to a party insisting on viewing the "public square" through a filter of race, sex, gender and political correctness.
To survive, let alone meet the expectations of political pundits, the Democratic Party must change and again become a great broadly based political party based on a set of propositions about the role of government and economics in the best interests of all Americans. American democracy can prosper, but it must restore unfettered public inquiry and a "public square" maintained by two great political parties that share a set of political values about America - a center right and center left going at it over programs for the future expressing, once again, the cultural "melting pot" ideal.
The Democrats need to come back to the "public square" that worked so well and included so many Americans.
James Jung is a lifelong Democrat. He is the retired president of the Great Lakes Higher Education Corp. A graduate of the University of Wisconsin, he lives in Madison.
I doubt the author and I would agree about the role of government and economics in the best interests of all Americans, but he's on target about the Democratic Party, which essentially condemns dissent from their positions. Credit to the Capital Times for publishing this.
Well, what can you say. This is a life long Democrat who wrote this? He deserves our respect and appreciation for giving out what is good constructive criticism to the Democratic leadership.
One could almost say that the Democratic party is run like a plantation, and you know what I'm talkin' 'bout!
What these groups want is vengeance, and to hell with the consequences for society.
Their view of a melting pot is a salad bowl. Everyone equal but not losing their uniqueness.
Diversity causes divisiveness. Back to the melting pot.
The socialist party that was the democratic party does not believe in our Constitutional Republic, heck they do not even believe in democracy.
They love the idea of "for life dictators or presidents".
They will whine and moan about Saddam and will really cry when their favorite commie "Fidel Castro" dies.
Or: King (James' version).
"Diversity causes divisiveness. "
And a house divided against itself will fall.
Wrong! It was an INVENTION of late 19th/early 20th century Progressives as a response to the nativists of the time. Let's not forget that their "melting pot" didn't include blacks or Asians, nor the fact that even white folks remained segregated by ethnicity and religion until quite recently.
This writer's heart is in the right place, but he is IGNORANT of historical realities.
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