Given the fact that we are on the eve of yet another national election, and given further the election's potential consequences, I've spent a great deal of time thinking about politics. Not just the current political scene, but national politics over the course of the 40-plus years that I've followed it. Obviously, in that much time, many things have changed. Leaders have come and gone (and, occasionally, as in the case of such diverse figures as Richard Nixon and Jerry Brown, come back again). Policies have changed in most cases for the better and, in some cases, for the worse. But two things have seemed to remain constant. And each of them is a problem that afflicts our national political parties--the Republicans in one case, and the Democrats in the other.
Let's start with the Republicans. Coming into the post-1960s era of politics, the GOP was divided into two large factions, a moderate wing focused on collaboration, and a reactionary wing focused on control. The two candidates fighting for the Republican presidential nomination in 1976, Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan, highlighted and exemplified that philosophical divide. What united them as Republicans, perhaps as much as anything, was a sense that American society and its government in particular had grown fat and decadent, and needed a measure of discipline to get it back on course.
The moderates were willing to work within the existing system, with Democrats, to make that happen. The reactionaries hated the system itself, especially since it occasionally permitted outcomes they didn't like. They saw the system as something to be either destroyed or subverted. If you look at our current political landscape, and compare it to the early 1970s, you can see that the reactionaries have won, first by taking over the Republican Party, and then by bullying the Democrats into submission. Everything after that was just a question of using the Republican money advantage, maximized by Reaganomics, to buy out anything that even looked like it might be opposition, especially in the media.
How did this happen? Well, there is no doubt that the events of the 1970s--Watergate, stagflation, the oil shocks and the rise of fundamentalism both here and abroad--set the stage for it in terms of public opinion. But the key asset that Republicans had was the Democratic Party itself, and its commitment to process--a commitment that has, over much of the last 40 years, allowed it to be yoked into voting for bad compromises with Reagan Republicans for the sake of "bipartisanship."
A complete list of such compromises would go not only beyond the scope of this post, but perhaps the bandwidth permitted for this blog. Perhaps it's best summed up in one word: Iraq. Our rush to invade that pseudo-country to destroy non-existent weapons of mass destruction was enabled by Democrats afraid to make our system look "weak" by standing up for the truth, the one that that should matter most. As a result, as "Iraq" has morphed into ISIS, our invasion has launched a nightmare for us and the entire world that may have no end, except the end of us all.
One occasionally reads or hears some pundit or posting mourning the loss of moderate Republicans who were willing to put America ahead of conservative politics. Likewise, one occasionally read or hears someone else mourning the absence of tough-minded Democrats like Franklin D. Roosevelt or Lyndon Johnson, leaders who were willing to push the process to its limits--and, sometimes, beyond them--to make the country better.
I think that hoping for the resurrection of moderate Republicanism is a lost cause. Almost all of the moderates have been chased out of elective office; the tiny handful that are left, including Susan Collins, have been battered into submission by the fear of being "primaried" by the Tea Party. And, in a democracy, I think there's an inherent problem in expecting national discipline to be a top-down process. In the post-1989 world, it's a big mistake to think that any political movement can truly be top-down. The Soviets tried to use Communism to contain the individual desires of millions and failed, just as the Tea Party is now failing here, from stopping Obamacare to stopping gay marriage.
And, speaking of Obamacare, here's where today's Democrats can learn a lesson from their recent past. House Democrats, lead by Nancy Pelosi, used the budget reconciliation process to make the ACA a reality. In other words, Obamacare happened because Pelosi was willing to steal a page from the GOP playbook. The GOP, of course, paid her and her colleagues the compliment of describing it as "dirty politics," not realizing that, in the process, they were covering themselves with their own soil. Nancy Pelosi, in effect, conceded a matter of principle that the opposition in effect had already trashed, and lost her Speakership in the process. But she showed, in the process, that true leadership does not consist of sitting in your office, soaking in bourbon and cash.
So, to my Republican friends, I would say the following. Don't try to use government, the thing you allegedly hate, to hammer away at your goals. Learn the lesson that all of us need to exercise self-discipline, on the left and on the right. And, in your case, a key part of self-discipline means refusing to save democracy by trashing it completely. You will find that it inspires a greater willingness on the other side to buy into your ideas, and turn the into a reality that enjoys popular support.
And, to my Democratic friends, I would say this. The process is not a straightjacket. The other side doesn't treat it that way, and neither should you. In a democracy, it should always have enough flexibility to respond to the changing needs of the people. And, when the other side gives you an opening, don't be afraid to get your fingernails a little dirty--especially when the other side has already forfeited that argument.
In either case, I'm not arguing for extremism. I'm arguing that both sides need to relearn some basic principles, if they want democracy to function. I want it to function. Badly. And I'm very sure that I'm not alone.
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