There's a lot of truth in this little piece (though implying that the number of people who decline to identify themselves as Demos are therefore Repubs isn't valid. Where I live, the huge majority of people consciously avoid aligning themselves with either party. Most Americans vote for candidates, not parties. Neither party commands a majority's support, while their individual candidates may).
There is a lot of truth in here, though, and I post it on this "party" thread because I can't imagine a party I'd less like to attend. Talk about boring. I'd much rather go down to the local tavern for a few. Lot cheaper, too.
From NYT today:
Rescuing the Democrats
October 21, 2003
By DAVID BROOKS
NEWTON, Iowa — In the current issue of The Weekly
Standard, Fred Barnes argues that we have seen the birth of
a Republican majority. In 1992, Barnes points out,
Republicans held 176 House seats. Today, they hold 229. In
1992, the G.O.P. controlled 8 state legislatures; now it
controls 21. In 1992, there were 18 Republican governors;
now there are 27.
But the really eye-popping change is in party
identification. In Franklin Roosevelt's administration, 49
percent of voters said they were Democrats. But that number
has been dropping ever since, and now roughly 32 percent of
voters say they are. As Mark Penn, a former Clinton
pollster, has observed, "In terms of the percentage of
voters who identify themselves as Democrats, the Democratic
Party is currently in its weakest position since the dawn
of the New Deal."
The Democratic presidential candidates wending their way
through Iowa, New Hampshire and the other primary states
are offering theories about the party's decline, and what
can be done about it.
Howard Dean argues that the Democratic Party has lost its
soul. If it returns to its true fighting self, instead of
compromising with Republicans, it will energize new and
otherwise disenchanted voters.
Dick Gephardt argues that the party has lost touch with the
economic interests of working men and women. Instead of
offering bread-and-butter benefits to lower-middle-class
workers, it endorses free trade policies that destroy job
security.
Joe Lieberman argues that the party has become too liberal
and too secular. It has lost touch with the values of the
great American middle.
John Edwards has the most persuasive theory. He argues that
most voters do not place candidates on a neat left-right
continuum. But they are really good at sensing who shares
their values. They are really good at knowing who respects
them and who doesn't. Edwards's theory is that the
Democrats' besetting sin over the past few decades has been
snobbery.
Edwards came by this outlook autobiographically. On the
campaign trail, Edwards will mention - every five minutes
or so - that his father worked in a textile mill and his
mother retired from the post office. He didn't grow up
poor. But he does say that his parents were not treated
with the respect and dignity they deserved.
Edwards's father rose to become a mill supervisor, but with
only a high school degree, he was perpetually
underestimated by the college grads around him. Edwards
seems to have been raised by folks who know what it feels
like to be condescended to.
His campaign is based on the argument that the Democrats
need to nominate a person from Middle America, not from the
coastal educated class. "My campaign is a different
Democratic campaign," Edwards said in his announcement
speech. "Not only will I run for the real America, I will
run in the real America. . . . Democrats too often act like
rural America is just someplace to fly over between a
fund-raiser in Manhattan and a fund-raiser in Beverly
Hills."
Edwards draws an implicit contrast between himself and
Howard Dean and John Kerry by pointing out that he worked
for everything he has. He loaded trucks to pay for college.
"It didn't hurt me at all," he says.
He draws an explicit contrast with George Bush, arguing
that the Bush administration rewards wealth and punishes
work. This is not about economics, he says; it's about
values. The Bush administration disrespects working
Americans. It lowers taxes for people who sit around the
pool and collect capital gains, while shifting the burden
to people who wake up early, work hard and hope to get
rich.
Obviously Edwards's campaign has not caught fire. (Although
it is far too early to count him out. One thing I learned
last week in Iowa is that voters are far more interested in
Gephardt, Kerry and Edwards than we in the national media.)
But that doesn't mean Edwards's theory is wrong, or that
Democratic primary voters accurately understand their
plight. When I interviewed people during the 2000 campaign
I found many voters preferred Democratic policies to
Republican ones. But they didn't trust Al Gore because they
thought he looked down on them. They felt Bush could come
to their barbershop and fit right in.
Except for Bill Clinton, Democrats have nominated
presidential candidates who try to figure out Middle
American values by reading the polls, instead of feeling
them in their gut. If they do it again, the long, slow
slide will continue.
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/21/op...4f3ebfe88db980
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