Post-mortem analysis season has begun for not only career Democrats, but everyone who has despised the illegitimate Bush regime over the last few years. Over the last week I've read a lot of the analyses and rants, and nearly all of them can be summed up by the following general arguments:
1. Bush win fairly, so the game of politics isn't completely corrupt yet. Find a way to destroy the Borg from the inside.
2. Bush won unfairly, so the game of politics is so corrupt that people who still believe in anything other than "power for it's own sake" are hopelessly naive. Win by any means possible. Hey, it works for Rove.
Both arguments miss the point.
The basic electoral advantage of the conservatives is that they are bred from the cradle to talk, think, eat, and dance in lockstep, and that liberals and moderates are brought up to second-guess themselves and each other on every issue under the sun. Second-guessing is the nature of this moron thing we do called thinking. It makes us hesitate and analyze at the moment of action, and it gives an immediate advantage to conservative tactical politics right out of the gate. It means that even when we are organized, the conservatives will always operate more efficiently because they don't have the overhead of continually communicating nuanced positions between them.
"You are either for us or against us." is the operational code that has been insinuated into the mind of every conservative since the day they were born. Beyond that, there is no need for communication, just vote and cheat for the guy that says the right code phrases. If you don't, you'll be cast out of the social circles you depend on. Liberals and moderates have more heterogeneous social circles - if you're rejected by one, you often find another who shares your particular philosophical nuances.
The neoliberal Democrats who have operated under Argument 1. above still don't fully understand this distinction, even if most of them are aware of it on an abstract level. But I guarantee that underneath every sly smirk of a conservative this week is an intimate knowledge of this advantage. This is why they have no regard for the fact that liberals and conservatives can argue them into the ground any day of the week. They "know" that arguments don't win elections - social solidarity does.
The conservative cultural advantage does not mean that America is a conservative nation, as Ruy Teixeira and his analysis of census data demographics have shown us. As the fact that Republicans now have to rig every election to get their operatives in has shown us.
Contrary to the constant propaganda that we're now being targetted with by the mainstream media, real political power isn't served by the conservative agenda. Real political power only uses the conservative agenda as a front. Obviously, if you're a fascist looking to overthrow democracy, you're not going to do it with a voting bloc that may always be ready to second-guess themselves and you. They know that fascism works best under the guise of a representative democracy, so they aren't going to give themselves the big media bullhorn. They're going to give it to the dwindling number of conservatives in an attempt to make them appear more numerous than they are, and they will do it until the absolutely last possible moment.
The people that sign on to Argument 2. above are aware of this conservative tactical advantage in electoral politics, but don't realize that intelligent, responsible people cannot operate this way in the two-party system we are forced to operate in for the moment. The structure of a two-party system is inherently mirrors the black vs. white conservative way of operating and thinking, and works against any kind of nuanced political philosophy.
If these basics were understood instead of just known by DLC Democrats, we would have had a serious opposition party over these last four years. The Democrats would have chosen a Howard Dean-style, purely populist message that most liberals, moderates, progressives, and social conservatives can agree on. They would have chosen a candidate that could express that message without being tied up by their own politically-expedient-at-the-time votes.
Instead, as with Clinton, Carter, Johnson, and yes, even St. JFK, the Democrats had a message as tortuously nuanced as the liberals, moderates, and corporate centrists they've struggled to fully represent. Since Robert Kennedy, the Democrats have never had a Presidential candidate that has passed the populist smell test. Clinton faked populist with a completely compromised health care proposal, then rammed NAFTA down our throats. And Democrats are still deifying him as a brilliant triangulator. It seems the best the DLC can offer these days is a politician whose best moves are cribbed from Henry Kissenger's political playbook.
It's time for progressives, liberals, and moderates to understand the heretical truth that tactical politics is fundamentally a losing game - an addictive game that keeps players always trying one more tactic (a la Conclusion 1 above), more more fix, for a smaller and smaller percentage of additional voters.
Populist principles are what motivate people, not political tactics.
But will the centrist, corporatist Democrats learn this now? No, because liberals, moderates, and progressives have not yet decided on their common populist principles, and therefore they haven't motivated the Democratic Party to operate according to any principles other than the acquisition of bigger and bigger war chests. Most progressives I know don't know what fundamental principles they have in common with liberals and moderates, and they don't want to think about such basic issues - they're too distracted by tactical issues like "electability". However, until liberals, moderates, and progressives can start to agree on a clear, concise, and consistent list of populist principles, how can we expect the Democratic Party - or any party - to serve as a clear, concise, and consistent voice for us in government?
This foundational work is something that we should have been doing decades ago because of the conservative advantage, but now with the Internet, we have the ability to make up for lost time. The only thing we can expect of the current, centrist Democratic Party is to remain in panic mode, always thinking about how far they are behind to the neo-conservatives, and always trying to appease the unappeaseable corporatists who, for the tactical reasons I've mentioned, are always going to side with the lock-step conservative voting bloc in the end.
The conservative's lack of self-analysis is a short-term advantage, but it can also be a long-term disadvantage if we make it one. To illustrate this, think of the fate of the Neanderthal versus the Cro-Magnon. The Neanderthal were far better suited physically for the last Ice Age than the Cro-Magnon were, although the Cro-Magnon had the tools, clothing, and technology to survive in sufficient numbers alongside the Neanderthal. What changed? The climate. The Neanderthal were one-trick ponies that couldn't adapt, couldn't come up with alternate living styles fast enough, while the Cro-Magnon did. And over time, the Neanderthal died out.
The ability of the Cro-Magnon to reassess the game at all stages is the same short-term disadvantage and long-term advantage progressives, moderates, and liberals have. The conservatives have had a lot of success with brute-force tactics such as creating and appealing to the imaginary fears of their own voting bloc. But the world climate has changed in many ways, and the Democrats have yet to fully seize the advantage. It can be a decisive advantage for us, because the conservative voting bloc is hamstrung by its own fear-based, anti-analytical mindset, and the Roves and Norquists of the world cannot fully control the toxic political and social environment they've created.
While discussing our philosophical nuances, the emerging populist progressive voting bloc needs to develop a strong personal solidarity with people who agree on the core populist principles. When it comes to elections, the Republican Party doesn't care whether you live in a trailer park or a mansion - if you agree with the agenda you're fully on the team, and even when you're welfare is worked against you are still spoken for.
Unfortunately, the elitism that conservatives accuse liberals of is in fact a part of the daily workings of the Democratic Party. There was less of it during this election due to the greater sense of threat, but solidarity and the putting aside of petty differences about income, social status, or political "in-ness" shouldn't just be a response to a threat like the Bush regime, it should be standard operating procedure for progressive populists.
This is why discussing principles rather than tactics is so crucial. Talking about tactics inevitably pits the abilities of one soldier against another, and it all becomes a matter of who is "in" and who is "out" and not about who is the best positioned to do what at a particular point in time. You end up thinking about the qualities of the person too much and not about the raw determination they have to the cause. It is an inherently anti-populist, regressive way of operating and thinking.
With few exceptions, conservatives have proven that they understand the advantage of strengthening the weak among them. They rarely slammed on Bush the Elder when he lost, or Nixon when he got impeached (and even when they did it was in subdued tones), but Al Gore is still being openly and self-righteously vilified by liberals and conservatives alike for being stiff and weak in 2000. (Let's hope people remember that "weak" Al Gore got >500K more votes and fought for a month-and-a-half before throwing in the towel, as opposed to "strong and electable war hero" John Kerry.) If the past is any indication, Kerry will be getting the same treatment. Democrats have a long tradition of eating their own, and Republicans have a long tradition of laughing at Democrats while they do it. Karl Rove doesn't need to divide-and-conquer - he knows that liberals will gladly do it to each other.
This doesn't mean that we shouldn't discuss the weaknesses of Kerry's campaign, but we should adopt our version of the conservative advantage and discuss them as the weakness of the populist movement, not just Kerry's or Gore's or McAuliffe's. Making McAuliffe the new "odd man out" of the Democratic Party is just continuing the losing ways of the centrist DLC. The neo-conservatives don't deserve that encouragement.
Unfortunately, even after two clear opportunities to deny an incompetent corporatist despot the Presidency it looks like centrist Democrats still aren't ready to see the limits of tactical politics. They will continue to try to appease the unappeasable.
http://watchingthewheels1.blogspot.com/2004/11/limits-of-tactical-politics.html
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