What's wrong with this picture?
The Democrats midterm message is easy to understand: we've done things to help you, and Republicans are obstructionists for the sake of politics, want to bring back failed Wall Street friendly ideas, and are increasingly captive to the Tea Party audience. This is a good message for the core of the Obama coalition, but does it work for the midterm electorate -- particularly this midterm electorate?
Obama ran on a fundamental promise to make government work for the better, and Republicans believe they've blocked him from achieving that goal, and that the economy, combined with their own scorched earth strategy, has left voters extremely skeptical of government intervention again.
In what universe does it make sense for a party to seek political power on the open and avowed basis of preventing others from fixing dire problems? Not just refusing to help solve problems, mind you. That would be irresponsible enough. But actively working to block any solutions whatsoever? In what universe does that make sense?
That is not a rhetorical question. Because the answer, obviously, is "ours." But why is our universe the way it is? Understanding the "logic" to our universe is the key to changing it--or at least, in the short term, surviving long enough to have a chance to change it.
My explanation rests on three key points:
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| (1) Conservatives believe that they should rule the world. Liberals, not so much. Liberals tend to believe much more in process-that whoever wins elections should rule, and that ideally whoever's ideas are best should prevail. As long as there are processes in place protecting basic rights, liberals tend to trust the political process-or at, to trust its legitimacy. Conservatives, OTOH, tend to regard any loss of power as somehow illegitimate.
This is a pattern that holds true around the world.
(2) What makes America different is that conservatives have never ruled America in the same sort of virtually uncontested way that they have ruled other countries, and for that reason, they have never trusted the state, never assumed control of it the way that conservatives in other countries do--and know they can do, even when they are out of power. Although far from perfect, from the very beginning America's democratic republic left far too much power lying around where conservative elites couldn't control it in their sleep, which is the way that divinely sanctioned monarchies and the like have always been run. (Oh, sure, you have other scheming elites to watch out for. You can't control them in your sleep. But that's not the topic at hand.)
And thus Bismark-style or Vatican-style conservatism was never a viable option once the slave power was defeated, although there was a brief period of hope in the 1920s, before the conservative dream collapsed in the greatest economic catastrophe ever known. And thus, American conservatism has always been fundamentally seditious in a way that no other brand of conservatism in the world has been. Which is not to say its politics are unique, only that elsewhere they go under a less confusing, less contradictory name: they are reactionaries, nativists, proto-[and not-so-proto-]fascists and the like. They are of the right, but they are not conservatives. Only in America they are. America: where liberals are the true conservatives, the forgers of the constitution, and the governing philosophy it is based on, and the preservers of social stability by adopting policies of gradual change and political accommodation to create a single polity out of a roaring flux of change and transformation that would otherwise long ago have split the nation asunder.
(3) But 9/11 changed everything. 9/11 provided an opening for American conservatives to openly proclaim the secret dream they had always harbored--that someday they actually might dominate and control America the way that conservatives had dominated other countries. Of course, conservative "thinkers" and political operatives had long dreamed of such a triumph, but political realities were heavily against them. The welfare state was far too popular--it delivered far too much, and worked far too well for the majority of Americans. Americans were also far too rebellious. They liked their freedoms too much. And they were too well-off--too far removed from abject poverty and hereditary dependence to let their self-styled betters boss them around unthinkingly. The best conservatives could hope for was to keep conning people, preserving popular liberal forms, while corrupting their purpose and effective. Shutting the government down was a loser, but repurposing government to suit elite needs first and foremost--that was doable. And that is what they set out to do.
But then 9/11 happened, and they got all stupid and greedy. Well, make that an order of magnitude more stupid and greedy than they had previously been. This is where the neo-cons--never very large in numbers--managed to take the helm for a while, and the broader movement toward "big government" conservatism (aka "national greatness" conservatism) gained significant momentum. This was an unusual development in American conservatism: a return to the norm of what conservatism has always meant in most of the rest of the world. Of course, it didn't last. It was built on far too shoddy foundations. And so now the conservatives are back to their same old seditious anti-American ways, only fueled with a new, even more vitriolic anger and hostility, because their dream had come so close, and because they had so utterly and totally botched it.
So, back to their same old same old, with greater hostility than ever. They want the government to fail because they want everything to fail that they don't 100% control. They want America to fail because they want everything to fail that they don't 100% control.
This is the universe we live in. This is the universe in which it seems perfectly normal for a Versailles analyst to write:
The Democrats midterm message is easy to understand: we've done things to help you, and Republicans are obstructionists for the sake of politics, want to bring back failed Wall Street friendly ideas, and are increasingly captive to the Tea Party audience. This is a good message for the core of the Obama coalition, but does it work for the midterm electorate -- particularly this midterm electorate?
Obama ran on a fundamental promise to make government work for the better, and Republicans believe they've blocked him from achieving that goal, and that the economy, combined with their own scorched earth strategy, has left voters extremely skeptical of government intervention again.
And not think anything the least bit strange.
Can I burn your house down for you now?
It's the conservative thing to do, you see. It will make you more secure. Also, much freer.
Think of it this way: When you've got nothing, you've got nothing to lose. |
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