The Disappearance of the The Emerging Democratic Majority: The Failure of a Thesis (Updated)
In 2004, John B. Judis and Ruy Teixeira wrote an acclaimed and seemingly prescient book, The Emerging Democratic Majority. Their thesis was based on a demographic analysis, which led them to predict the end of any future Republican ascendancy. As Judis summed up their thesis after the Obama landslide of 2008, Obama’s “election is the culmination of a Democratic realignment that began in the 1990s, was delayed by September 11, and resumed with the 2006 election. This realignment is predicated on a change in political demography and geography. Groups that had been disproportionately Republican have become disproportionately Democratic, and red states like Virginia have turned blue. Underlying these changes has been a shift in the nation’s ‘fundamentals’–in the structure of society and industry, and in the way Americans think of their families, jobs, and government. The country is no longer ‘America the conservative.’ And, if Obama acts shrewdly to consolidate this new majority, we may soon be ‘America the liberal.’” Therefore, those commentators who argued that the United States was still a center/right nation were dead wrong.
The realignment, according to the two authors, took place reflecting “the shift that began decades ago toward a post-industrial economy centered in large urban-suburban metropolitan areas devoted primarily to the production of ideas and services rather than material goods.” And living in these areas were the three main groups that composed the new Democratic majority: professionals, minorities, and women. With Obama’s victory, Judis predicted, a national crisis would produce “popular willingness to entertain dramatic initiatives.” And, moreover, President Obama would not “face the same formidable adversaries” that had faced Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton in previous Democratic administrations.
As for Judis’ advice to the new president, he argued Obama should not move slowly and opt for incremental reforms but move forcefully to a full-fledged commitment to the kind of fundamental transformation of America he promised his left-wing base.
Skip ahead to the present — a scant two years later. The reality today is precisely the opposite of what John B. Judis predicted. His permanent Democratic majority has turned out to be illusory. As a front-page story in The New York Times explained, the coalition that gave Obama his electoral majority in 2008 is fraying apart at the seams. As the story noted, “Republicans have wiped out the advantage held by Democrats in recent election cycles among women, Roman Catholics, less affluent Americans and independents. All of those groups broke for Mr. Obama in 2008 and for Congressional Democrats when they grabbed both chambers from the Republicans four years ago, according to exit polls.”
Moreover, 57 percent of voters surveyed preferred to vote for inexperienced and untested candidates rather than cast their ballot for any Democrat. The shift was also reflected geographically. “Among poll respondents from the Western United States, more said they expected to vote for Republicans this year than said they expected to vote for Democrats; majorities of voters from that region voted for Mr. Obama in 2008 and for Congressional Democrats in 2006, according to the exit polls taken in those elections.” So, contrary to Judis and Teixeira, geography is evidently not always destiny.
In an accompanying story in the same day’s Times, a reporter for the paper found that even in the UAW stronghold of Defiance, Ohio, many of its union residents were drifting over to Republican ranks. This was occurring despite the stimulus and the extension of unemployment benefits that were welcomed by a town where 13 percent of its populace had lost their jobs.
As reporter Erik Eckholm wrote, “bonds to the Democratic Party seem to be loosening here in northwest Ohio, after two years of hardship and a growing sense that many children will be financially worse off than their parents. Skepticism about big government has hardened, especially among the small-business owners who are an increasingly dominant civic voice.” A woman who ran an insurance agency and supported Obama protested that “he rammed health care down our throats,” and she was furious at the bail-outs of AIG and the big banks. The town’s mayor, who worked at GM back when it hired many of the town’s residents, put it this way: “I don’t hear a lot of support for Obama in this area.”
I also have a thesis. I call it the Inversion Narrative.
It is this:
The post modern leftist is nothing that he pretends to be.
EDUCATION
The leftist pretends to be open to new and different ideas, new ways of approaching issues, rational, and tolerant.
Nothing could be less true. In reality, the academician leftist is a closed-minded, dogmatic, intolerant, shrew. They blackball anyone who has a divergent point of view, indoctrinate those in their charge and adhere with a ferocity of a cult to a pre-masticated doctrine from which there is zero diversity.
TOLERANCE
There is not a more intolerant group in America than the post modern leftist. They are intolerant of Middle America. They are intolerant of the Tea Party. They are intolerant of blacks or Hispanics who are not leftists. They are intolerant of Fox News, talk radio and Evangelical Christians. They are intolerant of the South. They are intolerant of Kansas. They are intolerant of Sarah Palin. They are intolerant of Joe Lieberman. They are intolerant of Israel, AIPAC and more frequently these days, Jews in general.
It is so easy to put them in high dudgeon, you simply have to disagree with any position they take. It will be the swiftest comparison to Hitler you have ever experienced.
INTELLECTUAL
Nothing screams anti-intellectual more loudly than announcing that an unworked thesis is “settled science” and then screeching that anyone that doesn’t agree is a member of the Flat Earth Society. Leftists are all emotional dogma, all the time. They cannot stand to have ANY of their pet theories debunked, or even tested. The maintain the air of erudition, but live the life of intellectual grifters.
RACIAL HARMONY ADVOCATES
This is among the most insidious of the fabrications. “Southern Man” was a Neil Young song that stereotyped a region of the country, but it is Leftist Man that is the real, raging racist in this country. Leftism withers and dies without class and race victims. The New Black Panther case has shown just how deeply the racism runs throughout the leftist inner circle.
And don’t dare be black and cross a leftist threshhold. Just ask Clarence Thomas, Juan Williams, Condi Rice.
Leftists are consumed by race and they use it as a sword and a shield with impunity. They not only have zero interest in being a race neutral society, they are permanently invested in making race “wedge” issues each and every opportunity they can.
Pro-Troops/Anti-War
The “peace, love, dove” image is a total fraud. And the seething hatred of our troops is always bubbling just beneath the surface. Bill Ayers was perfectly willing to to explode nail bombs at Ft. Dix to kill young men in uniform and their dates. Michael Moore sees the sworn enemies of America as “minutemen”. Leftists aren’t anti-war, they are anti-AMERICAN in conflict settings.
When is the last time you heard a leftist make a pointed attack at the violent, war-mongering enemies of the West, most especially America or Israel? That’s right…you haven’t.
Our civilians murdered are “little Eichmans”, and they are victims of “our chickens coming home to roost”.
The inversion narrative can go on, but this is probably about the limit of this forum. Suffice it to say…sometimes, things are just not what they appear to be.
Ron really nailed it and so did you! Kudos!
Delia-
I second that motion. Very succinct article and reply.
There are 4 spheres of thought in the GOP right now – Tea Party, Libertarian, Conservative, and the Religious Right. Yes there is overlap but we need to focus on the principals that most all embody – lesser government, far less regulation, more rational regulation, economic growth, and better tolerance for those that are within a general bounds of conduct. But that also requires enforcement of laws for the major violations of conduct such as violent crime, theft, illegal immigration, and fraud.
We now often persecute those of minor offenses if it is PC to do so, and let off with nary a warning if not PC.
Excellent. I especially liked “pre-masticated doctrine.” That there is teh brilliant.
Nicely done CF and Ron. Just so!
Brilliant points. I concur!
Just so.
I would add that for the Left, the priniciples of science are exactly reversed.
The Left does not develop a theory to explain reality; then test it to see if it can be disproven; and use the information to create a better theory.
They proclaim a theory to be true, fight to prevent any effort to disprove it, and disparage all evidence that arises in spite of their efforts to deny the truth. No matter what the evidence, the initial theory is never abandoned.
Well, at least no abandonment of any theory so long as there’s big money to be made by their favored friends.
“They maintain the air of erudition, but live the life of intellectual grifters.”
Intellectual grifters, that is the best turn of phrase I have heard in a long time.
Now I will always say: they are, as CFBleachers called them “intellectual grifters”
You have made a great contribution!
Excellent, cf!
Bullseye! Liberalism is a dishonest doctrine.
“It is so easy to put them in high dudgeon, you simply have to disagree with any position they take. It will be the swiftest comparison to Hitler you have ever experienced.”
Yes, it’s breath-taking. They often don’t attempt any form of persuasion or logic, skipping straight to name calling and labeling.
They live (and seek to live) in an echo chamber where there is no challenge to their wacky viewpoints. I recently had a long-time liberal friend tell me to stop emailing him non-liberal articles “in the interest of our friendship.” I did, and haven’t heard from him since. (My personal NPR moment.)
Great post.
I think you need to start a blog on blogspot to collect all this stuff. Do you mind if I reprint your thesis to leave in the coffee shops and plaster all over the college that I attend?
For the last 50 years most (if not all) the intolerance and violence has come from the left. The left tries to demonise others by calling them ‘extreme right’ and ‘ultra conservative’.
They have moved so far to the left that anything in the centre looks extreme right to them.
You will find that most of the fascist these days can be found on the left.
Will this be an equally fading fad for the Right? My buddy and I discussed this today. I opined that it will be lasting, because people are taking the time to read the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights.
This reassured him that things can be set to right, because this is not just a one-off thing.
The Constitution is a great bulwark against the Leftist agenda. It protects us, if we protect it.
A lot will depend on the elected Republicans.
Ths “shift to the left” that the book talks about starting in the 90′s was really a deflation of the center right when the Republican majority started to show its spinelessness.
Beginning with the inability to defund National Endowment for the Arts and continuing with Bob Let’s Make a Deal Dole’s pulling the rug out from under Gingrich and the House during the Budget Battle, Betrayals eroded the confidence and enthusiasm for the “Conservative” party.
All of that accelerated under Bush’s “Compassionate Conservatism” better described as Leftist Light.
I am sincerely hopeful that the Tea Party is here to stay, and will serve as a gatekeeper on the Republican Party. The message to the New Republican Majority has to be “Act Like You Mean Business, Or We’ll Find Someone Who Will!”
That means Repeal Obamacare, and let him Veto It.
Put the Democrats in the Senate ON RECORD by attempting a Veto Overide.
Don’t quit just because you think you cannot succeed.
The Tea Party isn’t looking for Success in all legislative areas, just politicians who really mean it and won’t wimp out before they even try because the NYT, CBS, NBC, and ABC say some nasty things.
I agree re wimpy and non-confrontational Republicans. I often tell people “I vote for Republicans, but I’m not a Republican. I’m an anti-Democrat.” What’s exciting about the TEA movement is it gives me something to vote FOR, without throwing away the vote on a hopeless candidacy. Limited, non-intrusive government…and no pork trough feeders please. If so, you have my vote.
People voted against Republicans in ’06 & ’08 not because they were conservative but because they were not. The majority of Americans came to see them as phonies with regard to big government and spending. Remember how Bush defended affirmative action and racial setasides?
I think a lot of people voted for Obama to punish Republicans and because they didn’t think he could be any worse.
The moral to take away from those elections and the one on Tuesday is don’t support big government and don’t spend what you don’t have.
I find it fascinating that books like Judis’, which advocate (in fact, demand) “progressive” solutions and sanguinely predict hegemony for the “truly enlightened”, are always described as “acclaimed”, usually by the New York Times book review column.
By comparison, books that dare to say “wait a minute” where the progressive agenda is concerned probably couldn’t get published in this country if it weren’t for Henry Regnery & Co. And curiously enough, those books tend to end up on the NYT best seller list in spite of the appalled reaction to their very existence by the NYT’s book reviewers.
It makes you wonder if progressives are even capable of processing thoughts not handed down to them by their “thought leaders”. Or, indeed, if they are even capable of creative, independent thought at all.
(FTR, I had a conversation with a friend who is a hard-core progressive last night. During his two-hour rant, he proved impervious to simple logic. So I have objective proof of my thesis, so to speak.)
clear ether
eon
Political theses are all very nice, but they make the assumption that those who govern will do a good job. What happens if they just screw up?
I’m a big believer in the public. In the end, no amount of spin will hide reality. In 2006, the war was going badly and the voters threw out the people who’d promised to win it. In 2010, the economy is going very badly and the voters are about to throw out the people who promised to fix it.
Performance matters. Reality matters. The strange emphasis by pundits on trends demographics and narrative over real metrics of actual results produces nice predictions but devalues leadership. If you get a majority you have to govern, and that’s always east to screw up.
Results.
In 2008 Nobody saw the Tea Parties coming, either. Americans simply got fed up with Washington, with all of its out-of-control spending, bloated bureaucracy, high taxes, bailouts, “stimulus,” and socialist agenda, such as ObamaCare. This is NOT the America most Americans want or grew up with and they want it to stop. Add to that the complete contempt and ridicule heaped on the Tea Party members by Obama and his toadies, and you get the makings of a revolution, one that will hit the ballot box on November 2nd like a freight train.
This is what happens when Washington no longer listens to the people in this country. I firmly believe that ObamaCare is what sent this administration over the cliff. It proved that Obama, Pelosi, and Reid were more concerned about ramming through their socialist agenda, rather than concentrating on what most Americans were concerned with, which was the economy and jobs. Making matters even worse, the only “jobs” the Democrats were interested in were the union jobs protected by even more government bailouts, such as the worst bailout of all, General Motors.
I believe the American people are right. They may not always be right but, in the end, they do eventually get it right. They may have been fooled by Obama in 2008, but soon the American public saw him for what he was, a big-government Socialist.
On November 2nd, the American people will speak again, and Obama, Pelosi, and Reid won’t like what they have to say. Count on it.
I think even more than Sarah Palin, the left truly fears Marco Rubio. If he is elected and stays true to his principles, he will become a national leader that will draw a majority of Hispanics to the conservative movement (and by extension the Republican party). The illusion that the Democratic party is the party of the downtrodden and “victims” is being exploded, primarily because in my estimation that the myth of victimhood is being deconstructed along with the notion that big government statism is the answer to all our problems. It is being recognized more and more AS the problem. They gain and keep power by dividing us. The Tea Party and conservatism seek to unify us as one people, which is one of the ideals by which our nation was founded. When people of all ethnicities and backgrounds recognize this, then that will be the end of the Dems, or at least they will become the regional party of Pacific Heights, the South Shore and the Upper West Side. How ironic.
November 2nd will be fantastic but it is not the end. It is only the beginning.
Yes, Rubio is their greatest fear, as proven by the shenanigans by Clinton and Christ last week. We may eventually look back on Meeks as a peculiar kind of hero.
I’m curious to see if Rubio will come under the kind of attack that Palin has had to endure. Do they dare risk alienating Hispanics, or do they think they can differentiate him from the rest? Obviously, they didn’t fear alienating women, but they may view Rubio as a shrewder enemy than Palin or they may just be holding back until he reaches the next level. My hunch is that there will be a massive coordinated attack on him in 2013 if the Republicans win in 2012. If the marxists win, it’s game over anyway.
I’m also curious to see whether the Republicans will have the wisdom to make him the veep candidate in 2012. If they do, he will be a game changer, and if so, the 2013 attack will begin in 2012.
2012 will be the life or death struggle for the country.
The key factors here, post-tsunami, will be all the victors sticking to their principles and promises. And that is going to be our responsibility to make sure they do not backslide. The “pre-masticated” memes put forth by the MFM and our cultural betters are being smashed, much to their shock and horror, but they have to be immediately replaced with the principles of conservatism, freedom, individual liberty and the free-market, shouted full-throated and often and at every opportunity.
I so hate to pidgeon-hole people, but I think Hispanics (and all Americans!) will have a fantastic role model in Marco Rubio (dare I say Reagan-esque?) and will abandon the Democrats in droves, recognizing that they’ve been nothing more than tools of political expediency. Many actually support secure borders and enforcement of immigration laws, contrary to what is portrayed, as it is in their self interest AS AMERICANS, not as a group of “victims.” Hopefully black Americans will do the same. Liberalism has kept them in chains for 50 years, literally destroying several generations of their youth with bankrupt statist policies.
Again, this election is just the opening battle in a war to take back our society and way of life from a malignant, alien ideology that has been a growing cancer for nigh on 80 years.
TAKE BACK OUR GOVERNMENT
TAKE BACK OUR SCHOOLS and SCHOOL BOARDS
TAKE BACK THE FAMILY
We must all get involved at every level. We have a tough row to hoe, but at the risk of mixing metaphors, a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.
VICTORY
Do they dare risk alienating Hispanics?
Look into Miguel Estrada. You probably havent heard of him, because the MSM didnt paint the Democrats/Left as anti Hispanic bigots for opposing his ascendency in the courts.
No fear, when you have control of information flow.
I think “they” no longer have control over information flow. I think the majority of Americans know that the MFM can no longer be trusted and the Dem/lib/leftist memes and messages are being exposed for the fraud that they are. Hence if people like Rubio and Allen West can be leaders of the Republican/Conservative and Tea Party movements, then the lie that said Republicans are racist-bigoted-homophobic will be shattered. QED.
They think they do, tho… that’s why Mr. O felt safe in making the “bitter clingers” comment, among others, as well as the idiotic things he’s said during this election season
Rubio is not the only Republican Hispanic running for major offices in this election. And look at the trouble Grijalva is having in Arizona. The theory of the Hispanic wave electing Democrats may be crumbling. If so, support for amnesty may collapse in the Democratic Party.
A saving grace for Rubio wil be that the Senate Ethics Rules are nowhere near as crazy as what Palin had to endure as Governor of Alaska; and, he will have a ready-available, Nationwide new-media to expose any abuse that the Left attempts to direct his way and to turn it back upon its generators.
Well let it be known by this old devil dog that things are not all what they seem, even here in Kansas. This part of the United States has more churches per mile than the entire libturd establishment. It will remain this way for a variety of reasons but the primary one is We the People are a Christian Nation. Just because you may have a fantasy about your beloved left approach to all things American, you are not in the majority no matter how loudly you proclaim it to be.
Thank you for the article and many of you commentators for the encouragement this old veteran needs daily. It is a good thing to be a good human first, a patriot second and a veteran third with the full knowledge that those of us who have served for the sake and security of our fellow brethren can go to sleep nightly with the knowledge that there still remains love and respect for the American way of life. Now get your butts out there and vote and show the lefturds we mean business and are not going to take the insults and mis-information to heart. Semper Fi.
First and foremost, thank you for your service. Unlike you, I am stuck in the heart of New York City. We are outnumbered to be sure, but not all of us are mind-numbed drone leftists. Were it not for the internet to stay connected to like-minded and decent people, as well as get the real information and analysis of what’s going on out there, I honestly don’t know what I would do.
Just keep the faith (semper fi!). You are not alone. Even from out here in Greenwich Village. It will be fun watching heads explode as the returns come in on Tuesday night, especially after remembering how I felt 2 years ago.
Keep ‘em flying!
I remember the book “What’s the matter with Kansas?”. Basically the premise was the author felt that voters in a middle or lower income bracket who didn’t vote for Democrats were voting against their own self interest. He simply thought that you had to be stupid to not want the “free money” that Democrats offered. But, the middle class person is not so stupid to believe you can get something for nothing. That is the basis of the whole argument that has been going on since Roosevelt or Wilson. Any issue you want to pick, over and over again the same argument;”here, I’ve got a free lollipop for you little girl”. So who is the stupid one?
The author of that book, Thomas Frank, had a column in the Wall Street Journal for years on the basis of that book. I notice he is no longer there. Another member of the unemployed.
Re: Thomas Frank.
I was told that he had moved over to Slate, or some such, where his Leftist proclivities were more in tune with the readership.
Actually, I believe he’s now a regular at the WSJ. Doesn’t make any more sense, you understand, but he still has a job.
The first mistake was the “post industrial” nonsense.
Snork-
I completely agree. It has been one of my pet peeves in the last 10 years that Leftists, and even some on the right, push the stupid narrative that postulates a post-industrial economy as one which will advance our best interests. This is pretty much wrong on its face. You only have to work at the street level of the economy for a few weeks to understand how wrong this is.
All of our “information” or “knowledge” workers – our lawyers, our bankers, our IT pros, our tillers in the media fields, our academics, our hedge fund operators, our designers, our engineers and many others – exist because they are required by people and organizations that MAKE things. What all of these professionals need serve is actually a manufacturing sector; they are the ones who use this knowledge and have the resources to pay for it. We cannot, as a whole nation, live off the ideas of our people alone. Very few people buy ideas alone, just interested corporations, and when they do, they do so in order to make something concrete of it. We cannot be a people who trade ideas alone and have no one to bake our bread, make our ovens, make our electric generators, our cars and computers.
When our economy finally has little or no manufacturing, our so-called “knowledge workers” will need to sell their services to the vibrant manufacturing sectors of foreign countries (see China, 2010). Our lucky ones, still with saleable skills, then become the employees of foreign industry, albeit fairly high paid ones, and our economy is therefore turned for a while to the very model of a smaller “second world” enterprise, a still nicely advanced colony of other nations’ manufacturing enterprises. Of course, the former middle class workers in industry are forever turned out of any hope of a job at this point and must become, to some extent or another, dependant on income from the state, still supported as it is on the tax revenues from those employed knowledge workers. This model, which I propose we now nearly resemble, may survive for some time at some middling level of economic prosperity, but its internal contradictions will not allow it to succeed for very long. That is because, in the nations with native labor forces educated and culturally advanced enough to produce efficiently in the manufacturing sector, a knowledge worker class will inevitably and soon form on their soil as well. So, with that class operating, there would be no need of our vaunted knowledge workers at all, and our national economy would only slip further still into a barely tolerable “high” third world status, with only natural resources and direct service in foreign corporations as our major sources of sustained employment.
We do not want to go there. We need to not lose sight of the fact that the knowledge worker sector is only one of those necessary to sustain high economic development within any particular society. Blithely saying goodbye to U.S. manufacturing is a very foolish and destructive thing to do.
I’ve always been tempted to force someone into the backseat of my car and take them on a tour of San Antonio. We have one of the more vibrant manufacturing sectors in the US, but it is tucked away where the real estate is cheap and we also produce little in terms of finished consumer goods (we mainly produce widgets and capital goods).
My favored sarcastic remark is “YA! Lets stop making all the metal parts that make your seat belt function, umbilical clips, medical imaging devices and tons of other little things that allow polite society to function and make IDEAS!”
cfbleachers, that is a great recap of the leftist mindset. One prominent element that you overlooked, was the evil greediness of businesses and CORPORATIONS. They are all out to cheat, pollute, gouge, and otherwise leverage their positions of power over the unsuspecting rube in the marketplace. Isn’t it fascinating how they actually manage to do any business at all by overcharging for inferior goods.
Meanwhile, in the real world, they are obliged to compete on product quality and effectiveness, merchantability of their wares, deliver at a competitive price, and ultimately stand behind their offering should something go wrong. To the leftist mindset, business and the economy in general is a zero sum game in which someone’s success can only be at the expense of another’s loss. This world exists only when people are entirely unaware of what is happening all around them. It demonstrates the victory of ideology over empirical observation.
Suppose the Democrats lose heavily in this election, as they seem about to do. How they interpret the defeat will govern how they respond to it. Potential explanations: 1. It’s Bush’s fault. Bush drove the country so deep into the ditch that even Obama’s Herculean efforts haven’t been able to rescue it. Hence, we need a third stimulus package, then a fourth… 2. It’s the Republicans’ fault. Our solutions haven’t solved the nation’s problems because Congressional Republicans, the Party of No, have been unpatriotically obstructionist. Therefore, the executive and judicial branches must usurp legislative authority and rule by executive order and judicial ruling. 3. Big Business did it, so let’s regulate them to death.
no brainer.
The election results, no matter what they are, will be an affirmation of the administration’s policies.
Either they moved too fast, or they didn’t move fast enough. The election will tell us which. Too hot, too cold, or mmm mmm good.
And of course, they haven’t yet explained their nuanced wisdom in terms primitive enough for the neanderthals in fly-over country to understand. Coloring books may be necessary, or the Obamy’s may need to create a reality show so we can see them working their fingers to the bone to save us from evil.
It would appear that while the American people want a new government, the Democrats would like a new people. Let’s see how that works out.
“Democrats would like a new people” -
That is a communist concept, in fact. We know how that works out.
Top 10 Things Overheard in the White House During Obama’s First Term
10. “What should I do next, Senior Chavez?”
9. “Does a royal cape come with the title “Anointed One”?
8.”Honestly, Barack! A teleprompter in the bedroom?”
7. “I’m not sure a Che Guevara wall flag in the Oval Office is a good idea, Mr. President.”
6. “Heads, we take over the auto industry. Tails, we nationalize the oil industry.”
5. “Apology list: Iraq –check. Saudi Arabia – check. Palestine – check. Syria…”
4. “Canada’s health care system is a perpetual money-sucking vortex that has resulted in bloated bureaucracy, demanding unions, longer wait times, and a steady exodus of their best and brightest professionals out of the country. Finally we’ve found the perfect template for Obamacare!”
3. “Sean Penn, line two.”
2. “Have they chosen someone to play me in the movie yet?”
1. “Did MSNBC and David Letterman get our “secret” message?
Sure, I hope the dem disaster takes place next week. But, all this pre-election gloating grossly under estimates the core criminality of the dems and lefties. Voter fraud will be extraordinary!
I know it is always tasteless to compare our politicians to Hitler but one aspect of Obama reminds me of Hitler. When Hitler realized that the war was truly lost he ordered his men, who refused, to flood the Berlin subways and kill all the Germans who were hiding there because “the German people let him down.”
There’s scummy … and then there’s PJM scummy.
It’s not just the opposition to the Tea Parties that belies the left’s assertions, it’s the tenor and nature of the opposition. Leftists who actually believed in supporting “the people” would be expected at least to voice sympathy and understanding for what motivates the partiers. Instead they voice contempt, disdain, and outright hatred. I have noticed progressives who are solicitous of the motivations of murderous terrorists seem less interested in even inquiring as to what motivates the Tea Parties.
By the way, not infrequently do you hear the Tea Party movement called “fascist.” People can argue about the definition of the word but everyone agrees that an essential feature of fascism is aggrandizing power to a central government which is the one thing you can say with absolute certainty is what the Tea Party movement is *not* about.
Cfbleachers’s excellent post refers to Israel, which is yet another proof that whatever the left is about, it’s not about what it says it is. By every conceivable leftist proclaimed value–feminism, gay rights, free speech, etc.–the left should be wildly pro-Israel. Instead, it’s wildly anti-Israel.
With a group of people last night I saw a video of an Israeli movie, “Walk on Water” (not bad, by the way). One key scene takes place in an openly gay nightclub in Tel Aviv. Tel Aviv also hosts an annual gay pride parade. How far would such a parade get in, say, Damascus?
What the left is about is power, power to push other people around.
Mr. Radosh:
“Perhaps the title of his next book will be What’s Wrong With America?”
If he thinks it will sell, he will write it. If they think there’s a market, they will publish it.
That “The Emerging Democratic Majority” was published in 2004, the year in which George Bush creamed John Effin’ Kerry in an electoral turnout of historic proportions, tells you all that you need to know.
It’s true of everyone to an extent, but moonbats will worship you if you tell them what they want to hear.
As for the Obama coalition evaporating like a puddle of piss on a steel deck plate, it’s perfectly understandable when you bear in mind that the moonbats claimed a mandate to fundamentally restructure the nation in a socialist direction from a lousy 10% point presidential victory of the Alleged Hawaiian over the Senate’s most electable RINO.
We here in Phoenix got heavy dosages of this narrative under Janet Napolitano’s regime from 2002-2008. We were the 21st century emerging LA – the desired destination in the southwest – our Phoenix/Tucson corridor was poised to blossom like LA county after WWII. Thus the infusion of Latino population (most of it illegal) was a win-win prospect moving forward; not only would it underwrite progressive politics – a 25+% bloc voting Dem – it would help facilitate the export economy to Mexico and south and central America and perpetuate our prosperity.
This narrative was further fueled by the successful hollywood types who made Phoenix one of their half dozen or more ‘homes’ away from home; Bruce Springsteen/Rod Stewart or DMX plus the dozens of B & C list actors like David Spade right on down to the fabulously wealthy but tainted Jenna Jamison. Joined of course by the like-minded Below-the-line help that facilitate production in the entertainment world.
Of course it was all bunk.
Talk about exploding urban myths when financial hard times leaves the naked and the dead exposed once the tides have gone out. Liberal Democrats are in a state of near catatonic shock here. They are about to get a shellacking statewide as they are at the national level.
Not only has the population confirmed itself as a new variation on the same old legacy Goldwater libertarian leaning conservatives who continue to support Sheriff Joe (overwhelmingly the most influential pol in the state – even with his current Dept of Justic woes) – since the backlash over supporting SB1070 & Obama’s Washington orgy – the legislature is about to swing hard right far far beyond anything even imaginable just 10 years ago.
Arguably the 2nd most influential emerging pol is none other than Russell Peirce – who, besides authoring SB1070, is poised to take the reigns as Majority Leader in said senate.
This is a pol who came to the legislature after having tried to challenge Joe Arapio as a sergeant with the sheriffs dept; basically he was drummed out of the Maricop Co Sheriffs Dept(they have long since made up). He was considered a wingut for his ‘far right’ conservative views – not only on immigration but economics – and just about everything else as well. Basically he was dismissed as a middle aged white guy artifact; a non-entity, a lesser known media clown than Sheriff Joe.
Today, along with Jan Brewer, he is rapidly becoming the political face of Arizona.
This following the now defected Napolitano’s legacy being dismantled as a facade built on accounting trickery – & rapidly being rejected and permanently bulldozed due to the dire fiscal circumstances her addiction to growing gov (nearly 10% per year when in office) perpetuated.
Likewise, it turns out that far far more displaced Californians who moved here in the past ten years resemble the kind of economic refugees that have fled that states failed liberalism for the safe confines of a fresh start here or in Nevada or Colorado. Hardly the kind of Cali Flakes needed to ressurect the same model here – as was once suggested.
How do such ‘theories’ manage to hang on? Well Ron Radosh, how did communists continue for generations to convince themselves that Uncle Joe had so much going on? And so many of them at university seemed like otherwise smart folk. Go figure.
Ron–I found your essay interesting and provocative, as I almost always do… I think that Judis’ response to this, if he gave you one, would be that he doesn’t believe the coming election repudiates his thesis, but that the bailouts (which circumstances forced on Obama, and certainly weren’t part of any original plan of his), like 9/11, caused a temporary deviation from what he sees as the inexorable course that he and Texeira have outlined, and will yet be proven–in the end–to be correct. We’ll see, of course.
However, one point you made in which I strongly agree, is on the elitism of those liberals who still push Thomas Franks’ thesis that the folks here in “fly-over country” are so stupid that Republican politicians constantly bamboozle them. It IS true that “Kansas” votes against the economic interests of its state (just as a rich state like Connecticut does, as well, on the other side), however that doesn’t reflect the stupidity of its residents, but rather the conscious choice that they have made to choose their culture over their pocketbooks. We liberals simply don’t understand that–and so figure that these folks are stupid–when their choice is perfectly rational and defensible, just not the one we wish that they would make! I fear that we progressive Democrats are going to be wandering in the confused wilderness until we figure this point out…
I wonder at the comfort a group takes in demographics when they’re killing their babies. Perhaps they have a different interpretation of the word.
Since they have control of the education institutions and the media, so can indoctrinate yours and mine children at will, they rest well at night, assured of a Leftist future utopia. Until then, their is always demonizing white Euro Christians, and scaring minorities onto the plantation (plus mass immigration of Third Worlders).
While “small gov’t” is the theme that currently unifies the pro-life folk and the anti-tax folk, it is the pro-life folk who will most determine the future demographics.
When the pro-life folk dominate the Tea Parties over the anti-tax folk, the Tea Parties will become less important. But however the economy goes, the pro-life Tea Party folk aren’t going away until it is recognized that:
Human Rights are Fetal Rights, and Fetal Rights are Human Rights. And the First Right is to Life.
Judis is an idiot masquerading as an intellectual. “The Left” is not “all inclusive” nor does it “respect all points of view”. It’s socialist in nature, meaning that it will tolerate no deviation from socialist truth. There is no ‘compromise’ with it.
Seems like this Thesis went into the ditch with the car. After watching and listening to these so called intellectual elites bloviate their theories, they seem to be on the same level of competency as Professor Honeydew and his assistant Beaker, just not so entertaining.
Judis is part of “the chosen ones”, the same “chosen ones” who thought up communism and who instituted and revolution in Russia that led to the murders of 10s of millions. The same “chosen ones” who want to control us.
More than half a century ago, Bertolt Brecht noted that the East German government’s strategy for achieving a workers’ paradise was to dissolve the population and elect a new people.
…. ask Justice Thomas, Juan Williams, Doctor Rice ….
Using an analogy that puts Mr Williams in even the same sentence as Doctor Rice and Justice Thomas is as insulting to Justice Thomas and Doctor Rice as would be comparing either of them to, say, Michael Jackson.
Sure they are all Americans of an Afro-Ethnicity — but Mr Williams has never been more than an ideology-driven remote loudspeaker for the Left’s talking points. And having long played spoons with Radio Totalitarian’s dogs, has been bitten by its fleas?
Gambling at Ric’s, Eh, Claude?
Now there’s a surprise, Humphrey!
But it does show the utter intolerance of the left. Juan IS a leftist…all he did was to appear on Fox News and say one or two things that weren’t in the playbook and that was enough to force him out.
I blame this book for a lot because it basically said that the Dems could win everything no matter what they did, and every time they didn’t was just an unrepeatable fluke. (Really, it’s just 200 pages of excuses for the GOP thwacking them, time and again.)
As Communism found, the problem with predestined success is that you see no need to try. Too late you learn that your predestined success was contingent on actually delivering to a wide, moderate portion of the electorate, not just waiting for your moment to arrive.
Just as John Judis rushed to make his pronouncements about the coming Democrat party majority, we are now in a rush to rubbish his claims.
AFAIC, the damage has been done – whether is country is center-right or not,it surely has the set up of a socialist state – dizzying number of welfare programs, outright govt waste and fraud,social security, medicare and now nationalized health care that has been rammed down the people’s throat with ZERO chance of being repealed.
This country now has a law that can force you to buy health insurance and punish you financially (for now it is just a financial penalty) for not doing so – this is what Obama has accomplished already.
So whether Democrats remain in power or not does not matter to me – their harmful legislation will be around forever. Even the slightest reforms to Social Security, Medicare as suggested by Paul Ryan was demagogued by the Democrat party -and Ryan’s colleagues in the GOP ran like chicken sh**t cowards not knowing what to do.
Conservatives, I fear, are in for a rude shock and IMHO are celebrating way too early. The GOP is not going to be significantly different and cannot do anything as Obama will veto it’s best plans (assuming it has any other than tax cuts).
If the R’s can’t defund NPR with a 1,300 billion dollar deficit, we will have to wonder what good they are.
“Republicans have wiped out the advantage held by Democrats in recent election cycles among women, Roman Catholics, less affluent Americans and independents. All of those groups broke for Mr. Obama in 2008 and for Congressional Democrats when they grabbed both chambers from the Republicans four years ago, according to exit polls.”
Republicans have not wiped out anything, anymore than those groups broke for Mr. Obama in 2008. The people of our country are independent and self-reliant. They do not look for the government to run their lives, to take their money and spend it in a more enlightened way. When the Republicans betrayed those who elected them, we turned to the promises of the democrats in 2009 to put us back on course. The democrats took it as a mandate to impose a bigger and even more intrusive government on us. We are not accepting their behaviour any more than we accepted that of the Republicans and are voting them out. If the Republicans take this reversal of fortune as an opportunity to return to their previously rejected behaviour, we will replace them again, and this time with people who not only represent us, but are us. Call them tea partiers and anything else, they are just us.
What Americans really want, and need.
Politicians who can say:
“Read my lips, no new taxes.”
And mean it– voting consistently against new taxes. Even if that means also voting against new spending.
The adult conversation in Wash DC needs to be all about how to reduce spending, now and especially in the future.
On a related note: I heard a Democrat Party official here in MA on talk radio, say for the umpteenth time that the reason they are possibly going to lose In MA, is due to the Republican “smear machine”. I have a response for him:
If the Democrats lose on Tuesday it will not be because people love Republicans. You will lose because people have come to detest you.
Yes, people can’t stand you. Why? Because you cannot continue to be so arrogant and condescending without backing it up with results. You can’t continue to promise the moon, and then whine about how hard it is to, you know, actually GET the moon. Whininess combined with arrogance is head-shakingly disgusting to see in a person or party.
You cannot tell people that they are only angry and scared because they unthinkingly listen to Rush Limbaugh and talk radio. If people were not affected by high unemployment, if people were truly as happy and thankful as Dems think they should be, then Rush and Beck and their message from the evil “empire” (aka the GOP, that according to the President is “striking back” ), would not resonate.
If a businessman cannot afford to expand his business because of policies enacted or likely to be enacted by Dems, you can’t tell him he should thank you for spreading his wealth around.
You don’t see Repubs blaming the intelligence of the American public when they lose, or writing books like “What’s the matter with Kansas?”. Or going around like John Kerry stating that Americans are becoming “know-nothings” because they are rejecting his party’s policies. Or dismissing the opposition has unhinged racists.
Only the Dems can unashamedly promote a President that refers to other Americans as the enemy when attempting to encourage Latinos to vote; and who tells his Republican electorate that their representatives have to “sit in the back”.
You cannot continue to blame your incompetence on a party that has effectively been out of power for over two years. You sound inadequate and weak when you do that. (Plus, we are aware that Dems have controlled congress for almost four years now.) In short, you are losing because a lot of ordinary Americans have a message to send to your arrogant, elitist, and glaringly out-of-touch party: Screw you, and the high horse you rode in on.
On a related note: I heard a Democrat Party official here in MA on talk radio, say for the umpteenth time that the reason they are possibly going to lose In MA, is due to the Republican “smear machine”. I have a response for him:
If the Democrats lose on Tuesday it will not be because people love Republicans. You will lose because people have come to detest you.
Yes, people increasingly can’t stand you. Why? Because you cannot continue to be so arrogant and condescending without backing it up with results. You can’t continue to promise the moon, and then whine about how hard it is to, you know, actually GET the moon. Whininess combined with arrogance is head-shakingly disgusting to see in a person or party.
You cannot tell people that they are only angry and scared because they unthinkingly listen to Rush Limbaugh and talk radio. If people were not affected by high unemployment, if people were truly as happy and thankful as Dems think they should be, then Rush and Beck and their message from the evil “empire” (aka the GOP, that according to the President is “striking back” ), would not resonate.
If a businessman cannot afford to expand his business because of policies enacted or likely to be enacted by Dems, you can’t tell him he should thank you for spreading his wealth around.
You don’t see Repubs blaming the intelligence of the American public when they lose, or writing books like “What’s the matter with Kansas?”. Or going around like John Kerry stating that Americans are becoming “know-nothings” because they are rejecting his party’s policies. Or dismissing the opposition has unhinged racists.
Only the Dems can unashamedly promote a President that refers to other Americans as the enemy when attempting to encourage Latinos to vote; and who tells his Republican electorate that their representatives have to “sit in the back”.
You cannot continue to blame your incompetence on a party that has effectively been out of power for over two years. You sound inadequate and weak when you do that. (Plus, we are aware that Dems have controlled congress for almost four years now.) In short, you are losing because a lot of ordinary Americans have a message to send to your arrogant, elitist, and glaringly out-of-touch party: Screw you, and the high horse you rode in on.
Obama’s election and the DemocRAT’s Control of both houses of Congress have proved to American’s EXACTLY what the DemocRAT(ic) Party is – the Socialist Democrat Party of Marx and Engels.
There is not going to be a second chance for the Socialist-Marxist Schemes of Democrats and Obama’s Marxists. It’s over; now comes the cleanup – it will take at least six years, but the American People now know what has to be done.
Having outlined a number of facts that show the falseness of the view that America now constitutes a Democratic majority and that the GOP has been obliterated, Mr. Radosh’s concludes his article amusingly.
But his article is worth noting for another, deeper reason. It is typical of many commentators’ assessment of today’s political situation in that it fails to explain the fundamental ideas that are shifting Americans toward the GOP. Instead it dwells on present economic conditions to explain Americans’ disenchantment with the Democrat’s socialist policies and programs—best exemplified by the ill-conceived and atrociously unconstitutional new health care law.
While Mr. Radosh refers to things that are prompting Americans to turn toward the GOP, the absence of a discussion of the fundamental ideas behind those things is unfortunate. Those ideas need to be stated because without grasping them explicitly they can become lost in superficialities.
Two such ideas are best summed up in Joe the plumber’s slogan: “Distribute my work ethic, not my wealth.”
Americans have come to realize that it is wrong—morally wrong—for the government to forcibly take the earnings from those who produce values (products and services) and give that money to those who have produced nothing, or are financially irresponsible.
An example is the destructive consequences of Barney Frank’s Affordable Housing. In conjunction with Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, it caused our economic slump. It forced banks to provide risky loans to those who could not afford such a loan. The money American producers were forced to hand over caused them to sink into debt, while those who were handed the money are now being excused from their mortgage responsibilities.
That entire fiasco showed that you cannot create a healthy work ethic by forcing men to give handouts. It is wrong to insist man live for the group, the collective, other men—in short, for the state.
Another idea contained in Joe’s slogan is the recognition that wealth is created by working and thinking. A work ethic refers to a certain code of values that guide those who choose to work to earn their way.
Understanding this idea is also fueling the shift toward the Republicans. In seeing their jobs disappear, Americans realize that those who are scrambling to start fresh and create a new career are the thinking backbone of our workforce. Not only do they exert the effort to create wealth. They also accept the responsibility of thought, which creates new businesses and new jobs. They recognize, at least implicitly, that thinking is necessary in order to live. They are the self-starters. They are the spiritual brothers of the frontiersmen and 19th century producers who built this country. It was not built by welfare recipients.
Such are the two ideas that Americans have come to recognize:
1. it is wrong to force the earner to give his money to others;
2. a propersous economy depends on free men thinking of new ways to earn money.
Both ideas are essential to a free capitalist society.
We need to make certain the GOP leadership recognizes these ideas—and applies them. We must demand that they repeal the new health care law, lower taxes, begin phasing out the welfare state and begin to de-regulate. These are some of the practical applications of these two ideas. Some of the consequences will be prosperity, more freedom and less government
The left has a lot of dirty little secrets, but their biggest secret is so secret that even most of the left is completely unaware of it. And that is, the left doesn’t have an economics anymore.
Back in the heyday of the left during the early 20th century, the left had an economic theory, best supported by Marx’s theory of surplus value, which purported to mathematically demonstrate that how “surplus value” was created by labor only to be appropriated by capital in the form of profits. It is upon this theoretical basis that the left arrived at all of the economic conclusions regarding capitalism (the term itself coined by Marx) and corporations, management and labor, which are still held by leftists today.
But although virtually any early 20th century communist with a seventh grade education could tell you the economic roots of their philosophy, today it is uncommon even among leftist academics to have the first clue of the economic basis of their beliefs. Today, there isn’t an economics department on this earth that teaches the law of surplus value as anything other than economic history. In the 21st century the idea that capitalism IS economics is uncontroversial, leaving the modern left a hollowed-out crust of its former self.