If Americans Elect collapses, and "centrism" takes a hit, does anyone care?

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Well, so much for Americans Elect, that full-of-itself "centrist" organization that was hoping to run a third-party candidate for president in November. Politico explains:

The group had qualified for the general election ballot in 27 states, and had generated concern among Democrats and Republicans alike that it could wreak havoc on a close election between President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney.

But just after a midnight deadline Monday, the group acknowledged that its complicated online nominating process had failed to generate sufficient interest to push any of the candidates who had declared an interest in its nomination over the threshold in its rules.

What a charming euphemism: "failed to generate sufficient interest." The statement from AE CEO Kahlil Byrd is less negative, of course, but also more misleading: "Through the efforts of thousands of staffers, volunteers, and leadership, Americans Elect has achieved every stated operational goal. Despite these efforts, as of today, no candidate has reached the national support threshold required to enter the 'Americans Elect Online Convention' this June."

 

Uh-huh. Whatever. In other words, no one really gives a shit -- other than these supposed "thousands" and self-important (holier-than-thou) David Broder-oriented pundits like Thomas Friedman (whom Ed Kilgore suggests should be the group's nominee).

So does this mean "centrism" is dead? Of course not. It may not be a viable political movement (partisan even as it claims non-partisanship), and AE may not go anywhere, but there are still the likes of, oh, er, ah, Michael Bloomberg out there, not to mention all those self-glorifying pundits, and a lot of people like to call themselves centrists.

But, look, it really depends on what you mean by centrism. As I wrote back in November 2007:

It is also a rigid ideology that demands compromise between "left" and "right," however defined, no matter what, regardless of the merits of either side. And the split down the middle tends, from experience, to favour the right, which has manged in recent years to persuade the media, and many Americans, that the "center" is well to the right of where it really is.

And this Crossfire view of politics only serves to legitimize the extremist positions of the right, as well as their proponents, to bring them into the debate, to take them seriously, and, ultimately, to include them equally in whatever "compromise" is worked out.

This is how the right wins, with oblivious and self-important centrists enabling its hold on power.

 

Even further back, in November 2005, not long after I started this blog, when I was going through a period of self-examination with respect to just where I fit on the left, I wrote this:

The point is, the "center" is open to debate and interpretation. And if centrism for the left means abandoning liberal principles and ideals and embracing certain illiberal aspects of conservatism, then I'm not sure I really want much to do with it. It's fine to be a "moderate" or a "centrist," and I myself am no ideologue, but some things are worth standing up for over and above compromise. (For example: social security, universal health care of some kind, and the environment.)

Regardless, the center is with the Democrats, more to the left of where the Republican spin machine says it is. Indeed, I would say that liberalism is centrism. But it's up to liberals, and their Democratic candidates and representatives, to explain that to the American people, that is, to explain just how liberalism is at the very center of American life, how America's fundamental values are themselves fundamentally liberal.

 

I remembered all this when I found myself agreeing yesteday with Paul Krugman's assessment of centrism in general and AE in particular:

 

Americans Elect, a lavishly funded "centrist" group that was supposed to provide an alternative to traditional political parties, has been a ridiculous flop. Basically, about seven people were actually excited about the venture -- all of them political pundits. Actual voters couldn't care less.

 

What went wrong? Well, there actually is a large constituency in America for a political leader who is willing to take responsible positions -- to call for more investment in the nation’s education and infrastructure, to propose bringing down the long-run deficit through a combination of spending cuts and tax increases. And there is in fact a political leader ready and willing (maybe too willing) to play that role; his name is Barack Obama.

 

So why Americans Elect? Because there exists in America a small class of professional centrists, whose stock in trade is denouncing the extremists in both parties and calling for a middle ground. And this class cannot, as a professional matter, admit that there already is a centrist party in America, the Democrats -- that the extremism they decry is all coming from one side of the political fence. Because if they admitted that, they'd just be moderate Democrats, with no holier-than-thou pedestal to stand on.

 

Exactly. Damn centrists. (Unless it's the real center we're talking about, the liberal center, which is not what these self-styled centrists, nor those further to the right, would have you believe.)

Bifurcated democracy

By Carl 

This was an interesting op-ed in yesterday's New York Times:

OUR nation isn't facing just a debt crisis; it's facing a democracy crisis. For weeks, the federal government has been hurtling toward two unsavory options: a crippling default brought on by Congressional gridlock, or — as key Democrats have advocated — a unilateral increase in the debt ceiling by an unchecked president. Even if the last-minute deal announced on Sunday night holds together, it’s become clear that the balance at the heart of the Constitution is under threat.

The debate has threatened to play out as a destructive but all too familiar two-step, revealing how dysfunctional the relationship between Congress and the president has become. 

The article talks about how presidents have decided to exercise power unilaterally, like Obama's Libyan adventures (although the practice goes back decades to Reagan and even Nixon,) while the Congress has been unable to rally itself to challenge the President's usurpation of power. Either the Congress is divided (like now) or reinforces the person holding the Oval Office (as under Bush the Younger).

This is what the punditry tells us we want, over and over again: divided government. Given what we've experienced for over three decades now (absent the six years of Bush the Younger) is this really what we want? An ineffectual Congress hamstrung by the tyranny of the minority and a Presidency who usurps power like a king?

Mind you, none of this is partisan: Republicans and Democrats have been to blame in BOTH branches. Clinton was forced to legislate by executive order, much as Obama is. Both Bushes declared wars without making a firm case to the American people as to the need for them (this wasn't dominoes toppling or any such credible threat.) Reagan tossed American troops around like candy and American armaments to enemies.

In Congress, John Boehner can't even get a centerpiece of legislation passed trying to keep the party's dog-and-pony show from tearing each other up. When Pelosi was in charge, she had to placate Blue Dog Democrats, rather than muscle them into line.

Hell, about the only thing any Congress since 1990 has been able to agree upon is that Bill Clinton needed to be impeached and a bunch of Asian deserts bombed!

This has effectively emasculated an entire branch of government. Power seeks a vacuum. It's almost understandable that the president would unilaterally legislate.

Plus, members of Congress don't have to take a stand on anything controversial. Take the EPA actions earlier this year to regulate greenhouse gases. Now, long time readers of this blog know there are few people more concerned with global climate change than me. Maybe Al Gore. So while I don't have a problem with Obama taking the bull by the fumes... so to speak... I worry about the fact that Congress didn't vote on this.

Note: it wasn't voted down. The bill stalled before a vote could be taken. It's probably still in the hamper, waiting to be aired out. Look at what this saves Republicans from, say, Montana, where people believe climate change is real and a problem. The party would insist they vote against the EPA actions. Their constituencies would say "We need a better Congresscritter." No responsibility, yet they can parade around touting how angry they are that they didn't get their say.

The more a controversial issue remains undecided, and the more critical that issue becomes, the less likely it is Congress will ever actually take action. And the more likely it is they will cede that issue to the Executive branch. Fine for a liberal like me when a semi-liberal like Obama is in charge, but what happens when another Dumbya hits the Oval Office? One a little more clever?

Congress will still feel this is expedient.

But it is unhealthy. It is unhealthy for an economy, it is unhealthy for a Constitution and it is deep unhealthy for a society and its people.

(Cross-posted to Simply Left Behind.)

Elephant Dung #30: Majority of Republicans, including even more Tea Partiers, support new third party

Tracking the GOP Civil War

By Michael J.W. Stickings

(For an explanation of this ongoing series, see here. For previous entries, see here.)

There may be something to be said for a third party in American politics, or even for the American system to become a multi-party system, but the reality is that it's a two-party system (i.e., a system with two dominant parties and some tiny ones that never win anything) and that third parties have generally failed to capture the public's attention.

In the recent past, there has been talk of a third party emerging in the center to capture independent voters -- and, in generally, those who are economically conservative and socially liberal/libertarian. Think back to Ross Perot, for example. It was never clear to me how such a centrist party would survive, but the frustration with the two-party status quo that drive those movements was certainly real.

But what about a third party on the left or right, a third party that could actually challenge the dominance of the two parties while taking a significant chunk of support away from one of them? Given how conservatives tend to unify around the Republican Party, it seemed that a third party of this kind would most likely emerge on the left, a party of progressives and disgruntled ex-Democrats, a party that was fed up with the centrist and even GOP-leaning inclinations of the Democratic Party establishment, a party that would promote both social justice and something other than the barely-regulated capitalism that is embraced by both of the main parties.

But maybe not.

A new Gallup poll shows that support for the establishment of a competitive third party is particularly strong on the right, among Republicans and more significantly with the Tea Party:

A majority of Republicans said for the first time that a third party was needed in American politics, according to a Gallup poll released Monday.

Fifty-two percent of Republicans, and an even stronger number of Tea Party supporters, support the creation of a major, third political party, underscoring the occasional tensions between grassroots conservatives and the GOP establishment.

An overall majority of Americans, 52 percent, said that a third political party was needed; the most profound shift has come among Republicans.

The number of Republicans who said that a third political party was necessary was at an all-time high since Gallup first began tracking opinion on the issue in 2003. And while support for a third party has crept steadily upward in the GOP, for the first time, it represents a majority opinion.

Supporters of the Tea Party are even more likely to back a third party, the poll found. Sixty percent of Tea Party supporters back a third party, while 32 percent say the existing two parties are adequate. By contrast, 47 percent of Tea Party opponents said the bipartisan system is adequate, and 44 percent favored a third party. 

It seems unlikely that a Tea Party-ish third party would ever emerge on the right to challenge the GOP, and to divide conservatives, not least given that the GOP itself has moved steadily to the right in recent years and has come to embrace the Tea Party with open arms. And yet the Tea Party, or rather the multitude of groups that together make up the loosely-linked Tea Party, continues to wage war against insufficiently conservative (that non-Tea Party) Republicans. Targets include John Boehner, Richard Lugar, and Orrin Hatch, long-time solid conservatives and loyal Republicans who, despite their electoral success and political standing, have failed to embrace the new Tea Party GOP agenda with the fervent absolutism the Tea Party (and, more and more, the new GOP establishment) demands. And, indeed, the Tea Party has shown again and again that it is prepared to suffer at the polls for its absolutism, helping to select unelectable Republican nominees (like Sharron Angle) and, where they fail, throwing up their own candidates to divide the conservative vote. It's better to be "right," it would seem, than to win.

And so I wouldn't put it past the Tea Party, or some elements of it, to break from the GOP and create some right-wing party that adopts an extremist agenda, carves off a significant chunk of the conservative vote, and leaves the Republican Party unable to win even relatively safe seats.

Maybe that's more my hope than a prediction, but it's telling that the Tea Party, which helped the GOP take back the House last year, is increasingly prepared to go it alone.

(photo)

Americans are stupid

By Michael J.W. Stickings

No, no, no, that's not me talking -- perish the thought! -- that's Newsweek, which has conducted yet another test of American civic knowledge (or lack thereof) and found Americans, er, wanting:

How Dumb Are We?

NEWSWEEK gave 1,000 Americans the U.S. Citizenship Test -- 38 percent failed. The country's future is imperiled by our ignorance.

Indeed, the results hardly make one optimistic. The test includes easy questions on the Founding (e.g., name one of the writers of The Federalist), the Constitution (e.g., what are the first ten amendments called?), key figures in U.S. history (e.g., what was Martin Luther King, Jr. known for?), and current political figures (e.g., name the vice president), and, well, Americans should be embarrassed.

But we knew all this already, didn't we? Did we need yet another "test" to learn that far too many Americans know next to nothing about their history and politics? We have some updated quantifiable "proof," I suppose, but otherwise I'm not sure the exercise is worth much. (Besides, political and historical ignorance is hardly an American phenomenon. Trust me, I've gone to school not just in the U.S. but in Canada and Germany as well and ignorance is alive and well everywhere, if not necessarily to this appalling degree.)

And yet, credit Newsweek, there is at least some attempt here to explain the ignorance:

It doesn't help that the United States has one of the highest levels of income inequality in the developed world, with the top 400 households raking in more money than the bottom 60 percent combined. As Dalton Conley, an NYU sociologist, explains, "it's like comparing apples and oranges. Unlike Denmark, we have a lot of very poor people without access to good education, and a huge immigrant population that doesn't even speak English." When surveys focus on well-off, native-born respondents, the U.S. actually holds its own against Europe.

Other factors exacerbate the situation. A big one, Hacker argues, is the decentralized U.S. education system, which is run mostly by individual states: "When you have more centrally managed curricula, you have more common knowledge and a stronger civic culture." Another hitch is our reliance on market-driven programming rather than public broadcasting, which, according to the EJC study, "devotes more attention to public affairs and international news, and fosters greater knowledge in these areas."

It also doesn't help that Americans don't seem to take primary and secondary education seriously enough, or that a sense of extreme complacency has set in. The problem is that the world is rapidly passing America by:

For more than two centuries, Americans have gotten away with not knowing much about the world around them. But times have changed -- and they've changed in ways that make civic ignorance a big problem going forward. While isolationism is fine in an isolated society, we can no longer afford to mind our own business. What happens in China and India (or at a Japanese nuclear plant) affects the autoworker in Detroit; what happens in the statehouse and the White House affects the competition in China and India. Before the Internet, brawn was enough; now the information economy demands brains instead. And where we once relied on political institutions (like organized labor) to school the middle classes and give them leverage, we now have nothing.

The article examining the results of the test is actually quite hard-hitting, exposing some of the brutal truth about an empire that is declining and falling before our very eyes.

America sinks further and further into ignorance at its everlasting peril.