By Dan Nelson
Don’t blame the weather for GOP victory
Last Tuesday’s elections were a bit disheartening for me. Not only did Democrats choke locally (Conway failed with 48% of the vote), but they also lost the Senate and a number of House seats as well. I had to wake up the next morning to find President Bush’s jubilant face plastered on every portal on the Internet; a nauseating spectacle that threatened to make me lose my Rice Krispies.
So who is to blame? The president’s incessant campaigning probably had no small effect. Like his Democratic predecessor, Bush found it necessary to put his job on hold during election week while he ran across the country rallying his party’s voters in a presidential trend that is probably here to stay. The crappy weather surely didn’t help the Dems out either… or maybe the party has only itself to blame. Perhaps the best thing the Democrats can do right now is emulate their victorious opponents.
By emulating the Republicans, I do not mean copying their agenda. Today’s Democratic Party is already mired in moderate politics and fails to offer any clear alternative to the GOP’s planks. I earn no originality points for saying that the Democratic Party has been suffering from an identity crisis. It has for some time, and this observation has become trite. What is surprising is how little the party leadership has done to combat this. What Democrats need to copy is their opponents’ strong foothold in their ideological roots. Democrats need to shift left.
Unlike last week’s congressional races, presidential elections should always be a showcase for moderate politics. Both parties know that in order to secure the necessary votes to get a presidential candidate elected, they have to nominate a politician whose appeal can span across party lines. Congress, on the other hand, is a much more ideological battleground. Congressional Republican leaders such as Trent Lott and Dick Armey are too conservative to ever find themselves vying for the presidency; soon, though, they will both be in command of a Republican majority in their respective realms on Capitol Hill. By comparison, Democratic leadership is rather toothless, with Southern Democrats largely at the reigns. Out of their fear of alienating voters with any sign of solid liberalism, the Democratic Party has given its leadership posts to its most conservative wing. The result is a party without a banner under which to rally.
While it is true that the last few Democratic presidents have been Southern Democrats, last Tuesday’s election disaster should be a sign that their leadership is inadequate on Capitol Hill. Luckily, things are changing. Democrats will soon be choosing their new House leader, and the top contender right now seems to be Nancy Polesi, a liberal from left-wing haven San Francisco. This is exactly the kind of leadership that the party needs. While Polesi’s leftist views aren’t shared with all Democrats, she may at least provide the party with a face, much as Republican leadership has managed to provide for theirs.
Those who warn against this leftward shift believe that doing so would further alienate voters from the Democrats and make the party even more unpopular. However, such logic has been mostly promulgated by right-wing editorial writers; people who have the most to lose from the Dems reorganizing and succeeding. If America is becoming more conservative, then it is because of the lack of new ideas being backed by good Democratic leadership. Hopefully, Democrats will take heed from last week’s elections and rediscover their soul before they are pushed further to the Washington sidelines.
