Holy shit. Can they actually do all those things?
It's like my wish list, minus UHC. Please let this not be bullshit.
Well, the earmarks, lobbying, and open government they can by fiat, I believe -- those are rules matters. I think there are constitutional and VRA problems with the non-partisan redistricting (not sure about the constitutional problems, but I bet if I thought about it a bit they're there) so it would have to be done in a weasely fashion, and who knows if it's passable. I haven't got a lot of hope for the publicly funded elections, nor for alternative energy, but I like them both as goals.
Can we have her when you've finished with her?
talk about what we think the Democratic Parts stands for
I know what my Democratic Parts stand for.
That's a restaurant-quality agenda right there. The election financing alone would make it possible for somebody to run for office without being independently wealthy or a sociopath who loves begging people for money. You know, like in all those European countries.
Eliminating earmarks and lobbying reform are incredibly important and help continue to frame the debate as honest government vs. corruption, which can only help in the long run.
I'd love publicly financed campaigns, but it doesn't stand a chance, because even relatively informed friends of mine don't seem to understand the issue. Only 11% of tax returns check the box to direct money toward matching funds.
Is redistricting even a federal issue, so long as it doesn't violate the VRA? I was under the impression that was left to the individual states.
I know what my Democratic Parts stand for.
8- I think the idea is to make it a federal issue. Which would run into all sorts of constitutional problems, but might be worth a go nonetheless.
I'd love publicly financed campaigns, but it doesn't stand a chance, because even relatively informed friends of mine don't seem to understand the issue. Only 11% of tax returns check the box to direct money toward matching funds.
Yes, there hasn't been nearly enough of a public campaign to teach people how much this would cut down on corruption. I myself have no idea how it would even be possible, given that our Supreme Court has repeatedly ruled that bribery both big and small are permitted under the First Amendment.
10: Check out the picture on the bottom row, second from the right. Now that is an example of how lighting and angle can contribute to an unrepresentative image.
Pretty good, but not restricting amendments to bills seems to me to be misguided, at least when stated so baldly. I can see being more open than the GOP was, but this isn't the Senate--no need to allow what will be a very nasty and bitter minority chances to offer up whatever crackpot amendments they like just to screw things up. Non-partisan redistricting also seems suspect to me--I don't trust any allegedly non-partisan endeavor in what is inevitably a partisan affair. It's a goo-goo kind of idea.
8: That's the thing. You could do it federally with carrot and stick legislation (Do what we say, or we take away your funding for X), but I'm not certain that you could do it directly.
Maybe make an argument that One-man-one-vote has constitutional import, and gerrymandering impinges on that right, so Congress can make laws protecting it? There's a doctrine (and I'm so not the right sort of maven for this) that Congress can pass laws protecting Constitutional rights which are beyond what the courts can do of their own accord: that is, civil rights law is within Congress's power under the Civil Rights Amendments, but that doesn't mean that a court reading those amendments would have had the power to impose all of the requirements of our civil rights statutes.
What constitutional mechanism did HAVA use to federalize aspects of state voting law? Couldn't Congress "strongly encourage" rather than mandate nonpartisan redistricting? The point of which, BTW, wouldn't be to remove partisanship from the process entirely, but to create significantly less gerrymandered districts.
As regards public financing, I like the Carville idea of offering the incumbent an equivalent amount to whatever the serious challenger raises. I assume it's an opt-in system, and if you provide sufficient cash, I bet people would opt-in.
15: Sound right -- if Congress makes a finding that gerrymandering violates voting rights, that's much stronger than a court's finding the same thing.
13, 14 and 15th Amendments all have a line saying 'Congress shall have the power to enforce this by appropriate legislation'
Could one build a doctrine of a constitutional requirement of free and fair elections - one person, one vote, etc - on the Art IV section IV guarantee of a republican form of government?
I think it's pretty clear you build anything whatsoever on the Art IV section IV guarantee of a republican form of government. Or at least haven't been able to thus far.
15 - I mentioned my federalism concern about redistricting to a lawyer friend of mine yesterday, and he pointed out that although he's not a constitutional lawyer, Article I, Section 4 would seem to suggest that Congress can meddle with state redistricting laws without having to get the 15th amendment involved.
I want a t-shirt with Pelosi's picture on it that says "I'm A Nancy Boy".
Never mind, I actually don't think there's a Constitutional problem at all. (I am so not the Con Law scholar.)
Look at this from Article 1, Section 4:
The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing Senators.
It's the state legislature's job to manage Congressional elections, which is what I was remembering as problematic, but Congress is specifically given the power to mess with them. No problem whatsoever.
What I find amazing is that people have convinced Joe Public to support things like abolishing the inheritance tax and lower top marginal tax rates under the delusion that he might be wealthy enough to have it affect him someday thanks to The American Dream but nobody has convinced him that he should support public financing of elections because he or someone he knows might want to pull a Mr. Smith Goes To Washington and run for office someday. I would totally dream of running for office if the money thing was off the table. And if I didn't have all kinds of damning things that could be used against me on the internets.
27: Dude, that's a post, not a comment. I've never thought of that, but it's brilliant. Toss it up on the main page.
All the items on the list look pretty great to me. LB, whether we have a disagreement or not isn't really clear. I say "ostensibly nonpartisan competence" while you go for "Democratic ideology." Whether these are really different depends on what you take the ideology to be.
It's important, I think, that everything on the list except for the last item are, or can be sold as, measures to ensure good clean government. They don't rest on the big philosophical disagreements between liberals and conservatives (the campaign finance thing might be an exception). It's not like the Republicans have a theory-driven commitment to earmarks, for example.
I hope that the Congress goes for all of these things whether or not they're feasible. Then, next election cycle, hammer the Republicans for blocking them. Even better if more geographically-driven gerrymandering can be made to work out in Democratic favor while also looking more natural.
As for the larger issue of "what the election means," here's my line. People voted for Democratic candidates in a year when things couldn't get much worse for the Republicans. It frightens me, honestly, that things had to get this bad to force a political realignment. Given that climate, and with the observation that voting behavior always underdetermines intention, I think it's a mistake to say that voters expressed a preference for some kind of lefty ideology. It's not like it was a vote on Ogged vs. Baa on the principles, since there were all sorts of considerations of incompetence, malfeasance, philosophical betrayals (big spending, e.g.), and so on, in addition to ideological differences.
Because of this, and because, as the Pelosi priorities show, there's a lot of mileage in moving toward competent, fair governance, I think it would be a mistake to see voters as having come out in favor of, say, labor over management, or UHC, or some other more ideologically infused goal. It's not that I'm opposed to those things, but I think it would be a big mistake to overread the mandate by pushing immediately for the more philosophically controversial goals. Better to have first some clear victories on things that, at least in principle, a wide range of the ideological spectrum can agree on-- in conjunction with some muckraking to expose bad faith & corruption on the other side. Then, we deliver the killing stroke by removing Joe D's pants.
I agree with the first half of 14 and vehmently disagree with the second part. Pretty much everything on the overall list is awesome though, and one of the more important things to do is market them in order the kind of credit from the public that effectuating them would deserve. In particular, every "centrist pundit" (who matter insofar as they continue to set the national discourse) should be in a perma-swoon for the next two years over this.
It's really a disagreement about rhetoric. I want Democratic goals put forth as 'perfectly normal. The voters elected us, and they know we're the party that wants to pass UHC. It's popular in the polls. Sorry, why were you characterizing a policy that 70% of the American electorate [or whatever the real number is] supports as extremist? Don't you trust the wisdom of the American public? What are you, some kind of out-of-touch elitist?'
I think too much caution on our larger goals reinforces the idea that this was just an accident, and that as soon as we've fixed things, the Republicans get to take back their natural majority. We get to be trusted by claiming, loudly, that we already are.
(But all the non-partisan, good-government, non-controversial stuff is great too, and we should do as much of that as at all possible.)
I want a t-shirt with Pelosi's picture on it that says "I'm A Nancy Boy".
No picture, but close enough?
I agree with FL, and to the extent that she disagrees (and I think she does), LB is a latte-drinking, Volvo-driving leftist who would like nothing more than to sell our country into dhimitude.
Hrm. Don't you think Republicans have gotten a lot of mileage out of presenting themselves as the party of normal, decent Americans who agree with everything the Republicans stand for, or why would they keep on electing us? I think that's worked for them, and I think it can very easily work for us too.
Not so much of a practical disagreement. My worry is about mistaking anger at Republican priorities and malfeasance for endorsement of Democratic principles. Believe me, I love UHC as much as almost anyone, but I remember 93-94 and I'm terrified that the politics will be botched, leading to another generation of waiting for the inevitable.
it would be a mistake to see voters as having come out in favor of, say, labor over management
I don't know how or when openings on the NLRB take place, but if one did, what would this mean in terms of Democratic strategy in filling them? Besides fighting for the nominee most likely to be a wizard cocksucker, I mean.
Also, part of increasing the chances of future Democratic victories just is increasing union enrollment, and that may well require giving people better reasons to/ making it easier to join unions.
But this is where all those maddening polls that have, for the last god knows how many years, been showing that liberal policies are really popular, so why won't they vote for us, come in. Polls show people want UHC. They want Social Security to be safe. These policies aren't unpopular, but we can make them so by acting as if they were.
Don't you think Republicans have gotten a lot of mileage out of presenting themselves as the party of normal, decent Americans who agree with everything the Republicans stand for, or why would they keep on electing us?
I don't think that's quite the way it worked. We paid a huge price for getting things done in the sixties. Republicans didn't seem normal; compared to some fairly prominent liberals, they were normal. And they husbanded that image for quite a while before becoming the full on freaks that they are today. It's important to me to fix us in the American mind as the default "normal" and even "conservative" party. From that base, we can build toward other things. But going full out now worries me: we don't understand our new and developing base well enough to have the appropriate rhetoric in place to woo them. I'm not even sure we've decided on our base; or rather, I'm sure we haven't.
Actually, LB, I think we agree on fighting for the "natural" turf. (Hilariously mistyped as "turd" the first time.) That's why I love the Pelosi list: who likes lobbyists? We're just the party of common-sense government, is all. Aw shucks, Pa, let's reform some health care.
Apparently I disagree with yippie activist Abu Labs, too.
But the thing is, Labs, what if "things that . . . a wide range of the ideological spectrum can agree on" are, in fact, Democratic/liberal goals? Why do we have to define "popular" as "non-partisan"? I think this ties in to the gerrymandering stuff. For better or for worse, the Democratic party is in fact broadly centrist, and most Americans actually support most of the things the Dems support. The myth of a perfectly divided electorate depends heavily on gerrymandering.
It also depends on propaganda about what Dems/liberals believe, of course. Which is why you get those polls that say that people like x and y but don't consider themselves Ds/liberal, when x and y are in fact D/liberal values.
Of course, this is just another version of the argument that there's not a "real" leftist party in this country, the flip side of which is that we, the liberals, did in fact win the war of ideology. Which is why the Rs are such bullshit propaganda artists--it's the only way for them to gain power.
42: Exactly. You betcha. Uh huh. And what B. said.
(Tim, the reeducation squad will be along soon. If you cooperate, the process shouldn't be too unpleasant.)
W/D, I don't think that we should give labor the finger. I want to strengthen unions, but I think it has to be done with an awareness that this is not a cause near and dear to many hearts, and for a lot of voters "unions" rank up there with "tenured radicals" as social parasites. This can change, but it hasn't happened yet. On the other hand, since most people don't know who the hell the NLRB is, pack it with people who are on labor's side. I'm still pissed about the grad student thing.
Yeah, labor is tough. It's so important, but it's been so successfully demonized. (Largely through behind-the-scenes manipulation of the law that makes it very difficult for unions to be effective, and then tarring them as ineffective and useless.)
I think you're right -- pack the NLRB, work on making the organizing climate less hostile, and then work on rehabilitating labor as an issue when there are more labor successes to point at.
Wait. I just read #38. Now I can't tell if I do or do not agree with Labs. A lot of this sounds like an issue of aggressiveness, and I'm suggesting we shouldn't be overly aggressive. Where "overly" means immediately follow the policy lead of Comrade Breath.
My heart's with LB, but I fear that FL and SCMT are right.
Rahm Emanuel was on Charlie Rose last night. If I hear him talk about the "vital center" one more time, I'm going to puke. He's sure that the Democrats lost in 94 because they wanted to overhaul the healthcare system.
Lawrence O'Donnell is pretty convinced that most Congressional Dems didn't actually want to do anything about healthcare. My view is that there ought to be some sort of 'conversation' (gag!) about healthcare to keep the idea out there.
I think that we shoudl start with young people. There are a lot of people who come out of college and find that their first job is temping, and they're too old to be on their parents' plan. "Medicare" (Don't make it SCHIP or Medicaid) for everyone 19-25 would be an awesome way to get young people to vote, and it wouldn't be all that expensive. Then they'd hit 26, find out that the HMO on offer from their company isn't quite as good as Medicare and they'd demand that their government healthcare be extended.
You wouldn't, however, want to extend Medicare as it is now to young people, because it doesn't cover annual physicals and that's what most young people think of when they think fo healthcare.
B, I think you secretly agree with me. The democrats should, sez me, Tim, and all decent red-blooded real Americans, have goals that are not ideologically controversial (at least initially). That helps the brand, as it were. In order to get the big prize, which for me is health care, the party has to be seen as competent and working for the interests of Joe and Joan Public. Let the Republicans be tied down by their crazy base and by their business base; let the Democrats take the space that opens up.
I'm pretty sure the only way UHC will happen is if a presidential candidate campaigns on it (among other things) and wins.
51: And even then, it might not happen.
Refresh my memory. The Clinton health care plan's failure, as I recall, came from (a) its development in a closed-door sort of way that didn't build a group of political allies, and (b) all the usual suspects pumping money into misleading ads about how awful it would be. It didn't fail just because it was health care reform. And things are a lot worse than they were.
50: I think that we agree on strategy, but not on intent. That is, I think that what you're positing as strategic actions are, I think, the genuine goals of the D party. I really don't know if the party, as a whole, is *quite* ready to say that UHC is part of its platform--not just b/c they're afraid the public won't buy it, but b/c a lot of Ds themselves don't buy it.
I, personally, think they should and eventually will, and I think the public will come along. It may even lead the party there, instead of vice-versa. But what you're saying sounds to me like there's a Sekrit Socialist Democratic Agenda that we need to keep under wraps until once we've lulled the public to sleep by crooning reassuring lullabies.
I think I will send Pelosi a gift basket after all.
53: c) the proposed plan was only marginally less byzantine and confusing than the existing system.
53: My memory is that it failed with the public because the Feminazi Phantom and the Commie Phantom were dragged out of the halloween decorations box by Newt Gingrich and his ilk.
56: Ding ding ding. It failed through over-caution. If they'd made a play for single-payer, it might have won.
B, I think you secretly agree with me. The democrats should, sez me, Tim, and all decent red-blooded real Americans, have goals that are not ideologically controversial (at least initially).
The key word here is "ideologically". UHC may not be controversial among Americans, in that 70% or so of Americans want it to happen, but it is a controversial idea among political theorists and economists and such. Thus, the Republicans could send out hundreds and hundreds of think-tankers and schmibertarians to engage in an enormous public debate on this issue.
Something like earmark reform is neither controversial among voters nor controversial among political theorists and pundits, so it would make Bush look horrible if he vetoed that sort of thing. It's an easy win.
Sekrit Socialist Democratic Agenda that we need to keep under wraps
There is, and we do. I want gay marriage to be legal, I want to raise taxes to pay for high-speed rail, I want to raise taxes for massive anti-poverty programs, and I want it to be legal to shoot whitey. These are not popular positions.
I never thought minimum wage hike would be an easy win, but it's starting to look like a can't-miss proposition now. All six minimum wage ballot measures passed in traditionally Republican states, and mostly with huge Yes votes: CO 53%, OH 56%, AZ 66%, NV 69%, MT 73%, MO 76%. I have to think the GOP can read the writing on the wall on this one.
I want it to be legal to shoot whitey
This is legal in some states, so long as you're hunting buddies and only had one beer at lunch.
Minimum wage hike is also ideologically controversial, but it's something that has happened many times in the past, rather than a big change in the status quo, so the Cato and Heritage Foundations can't run terrifying ad campaigns about hypothetical situations that will result from it.
I agree about most labor legislation. Most people don't know, don't care. Again, it's all in the timing. Do the stuff that might be unpopular in like April of 2007. People will forget in 18 months. Unless it's, like, an invasion of another country.
We should conduct a massive, public listening tour on health care. Make the Democratic agenda all health care, all the time, for a good 6 months or so. Have every Democrat say "health care" in response to every question from every reporter. Congress has some bully pulpit power, too.
60: Well, the gay agenda is out of the closet, so to speak. The others, though, you're right: not popular with the voting public. But I don't think they're popular with Dems, either. They're only popular with San Francisco hippie extremists like yourself.
Serious, then rhetorical, questions. What's the current status of Katrina recovery and New Orleans rebuilding? What can the Democratic Congress do to ensure that the rebuilding effort proceeds as efficiently and fairly as possible? And what about the issues brought up in posts like all the Beefo Meaty ones I've skimmed at Poor Man about how we shouldn't be rebuilding a full New Orleans.
Good questions, and ones I don't know the answer to. I am ready to be persuaded by the idea that rebuilding New Orleans as it was is impractical, because the next hurricane will just blow it away again.
I don't like the amendment thing, or would put if off for six months. Republicans will use it to obstruct and embarrass. I hope Pelosi knows what she is going, and can limit and control the process.
Tim Burke had a decent discussion of redistricting. It is pretty difficult, for instance, to provide competitive seats in NYC or Mississippi. The nation has simply become geographically polarized, and we can't redistrict our way out of it.
Elections and Alternative Energy
sistersaralou at Next Hurrah has a terrific post on the item about oil subsidies and alternative energy.
Just brilliant Pelosi strategy in every way. She thinks it has a strong shot. I will believe Bush would sign such a thing when I see it.
I love New Orleans. New Orleans is a special city and near and dear to my heart and the rebuilding is an embarrassment.
That being said, nobody cares about New Orleans anymore. I'd really like to see the Democratic Congress do something about it but anyone who thinks that would be an effective tentpost for persuading people of how great the Democrats are compared to the GOP is crazy. There was a time when that could have been an effective issue but that passed a long time ago.
What I keep waiting for in the health care debate is some recognition that replacing the current system is the best way to protect the profits of American mega-corporations. Health care costs are, for example, famously the largest part of costs at GM and Ford. American companies ship jobs overseas in part because they won't have to be responsible for health care. Meanwhile millions of retirees (hi Mom!) are watching their healthcare benefits slip away in retirement.
Perhaps the Dems can balance the attempt to create Medicare drug-benefit negotiations with high-profile hearings encouraging corporations to speak out about how removing employers from the health-care process can protect American jobs.
I'd also like to see a debate on "No Child Left Behind" (up for reauthorization soon) that involves not only funding, but also the value of pervasive standardized testing as the primary measure of success--I get the impression that a lot of parents (as well as teachers) are getting frustrated.
I wish I thought there was a way to nationalize the debate on sprawl, but I can't see it yet...
Ending oil subsidies will be popular.
What I keep waiting for in the health care debate is some recognition that replacing the current system is the best way to protect the profits of American mega-corporations.
Agree entirely. But I think this is part of the debate within the Democratic Party that needs to happen.
Re: amendments, I think this is an important stand on principle. The GOP created the most repressive anti-minority practices in the history of Congress, and they never really got called on it. If the Democrats make a big noise about opening the debate, they get some insurance against having the tables turned.
Let's not forget that some of these new Dem seats are in districts created to favor the GOP; freshman Congresscritters are traditionally easiest to take down, and it's not impossible it will work. Also: "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind".
Getting the NLRB back in balance is a very important goal. But even without that, I think legislation to the effect that, for example, nurses who draw up shift assignments for other nurses are not "management", and are therefore eligible to join unions, would not be a particularly hard sell, and would probably even be popular.
It could be framed as a return to sanity and fairness in the face of activist administrators trying to legislate from the desk. Plus lots of examples that would resonate with average Joes & Janes of what a ridiculous ruling that was: "Guess what, the Republican-controlled NLRB thinks you're all managers now! Do you really feel like a manager? Did you get a payraise to go with your new lofty status?"
72: Oh, I like it a lot. Not so popular with Bush, Cheney, or their friends in Texas. Read the sistersaralou article. It is terrific.
But it would be a pretty direct personal slap at the President, and I am not sure he would accept that level of insult. It also establishes Democratic bases in the upper midwest, and strategically Republicans have to try to hold something other than Dixie.
UHC is popular. It also is a populist economic move that moderate democrats can support. Religious conservative don't give a fuck about UHC.
Spend a year getting other things done. Send a UHC bill to Bush in late '07, he vetos it then you run on that in '08.
Apparently there was more in the conference call about Iraq -- and since that was the major issue that brought the Dems to power (those who talked about it won, those who let it go lost), it's the approach there that's going to be most interesting.
Biggest risk for the Dems going forward is conflict between the new "base" (who AFAICT signed on for throwing the rascals out, cleaning up corruption, getting out of the war and repealing obscenities like the "who need habeas corpus?" law) and the old DLC-style consultant class who are going to want to blather on about the "vital centre" and use it as an excuse not to rock the boat too much with "partisan" ugliness like investigations, nevermind impeachment.
Pelosi's list is great as far as it goes, but it's those big, ugly questions -- the "how do you hold rich, high-ranking war criminals to account?" sort of questions -- that the Dems are really going to have to come to grips with if they want to win back their credibility as something other than the "vote against the GOP" party.
DLC-style consultant class who are going to want to blather on about the "vital centre" and use it as an excuse not to rock the boat too much with "partisan" ugliness like investigations, nevermind impeachment.
OMG, I just realized the root problem of the DLC. They think "center" = "closer to the republicans", rather than "in line with basic common sense values like clean government, decent schools, and not kicking the shit out of random countries simply to show who's boss."
Maybe y'all already knew that, but I just realized it.
That's a nice way of putting it, Rob. DLC-ers buy into the big lie that U.S. politics is perfectly described by the bilateral narrative of two parties, two ideologies.
70: Why do you think that? Why wouldn't renewed focus in Congress lead to renewed media focus, and then renewed popular focus, and until something else came up a self-reinforcing cycle.
So I had somehow missed this story even starting, and apparently it's now over, but Bush was going to try to confirm Bolton during the lame duck session, but Lincoln Chafee has come out as definitely opposed to sending the nomination to the floor, which ends it.
Also, I don't know if any of you DC'ers have run into Scott, but he's an old friend. He also does have the cat-that-ate-the-canary grin featured in his post-accompanying picture fairly often, at least in my experience
79: Well, it's certainly not news to me that the problem with the DLC is that they buy into the bilateral narrative as described in 80 and that they define their "centrist" project all too much in terms of getting as snuggly as possible with Republicans, but I'd love to see the referent of "centrist" quietly shift to your proposed alternative version.
Wouldn't the open government thingy allow for filibuster-by-amendment? i.e. someone who did not want a bill to be passed could propose endless amendments thereto and each one would need to be voted down, so the bill would never get to the floor. Easy enough to restrict this I guess -- I am not parliamentary specialist but I'm sure somebody thought of that already.
Aw, Linc Chafee. Seriously, nice way to go out.
Yeah, I kind of want to give Chafee a hug. I hope he can have a happier time in his post-Congress life.
It is sweet to see Republicans sweat it out.
I've felt for a long time that the DLC people actually fully believe their policy proposals (hawkishness, neglect of populist issues, free trade, corporate-friendliness) but use "the voters won't accept anything too liberal" as a way to bully the majority of the Democratic party with fake political realism.
The poisonous thing here is that the worse Democrats do in elections, the more the DLC can use this argument in inra-party debates and the more secure their control of the party is. I don't think that it's an accident that Democratic campaign have been weak for at least 8 years. It works for them.
Sounds paranoid, and I'm sure that very few of them clearly conceptualize it that way, but at someplace like the TNR (people not running for office and not working for the Democratic Party) you will often enough hear people saying almost that. "I'd rather lose than do the wrong thing for the coutnry". To them it's win-win: they keep their cushy jobs, and they get their Republican-lite policy proposals enacted. The only cost to them is that they often see high-octane Republican policy rammed through, but to them that's not as bad as seeing the liberals have any success.
Yes, I sometimes use hyperbole, but I really do believe exactly this. I hope that Dean and Kos et al terminate about half of the Dem pros and consultants, and I'm just sorry there's no way to prosecute them do something else to ruin their lives. (Rahm Emmanuel and Schumer will fight bitterly against any improvement.)
I've felt for a long time that the DLC people actually fully believe their policy proposals (hawkishness, neglect of populist issues, free trade, corporate-friendliness) but use "the voters won't accept anything too liberal" as a way to bully the majority of the Democratic party with fake political realism.
I think this is very true.
I have never understood why the minimum wage is seen as "bad economics." Sure, it's a little tough on small business owners, but it increases the churn in the U.S. economy. Since low-income families spend a much higher percentage of their income (rather than save/invest), the dollars they're paid turn around and are circulated many more times per year--allowing more businesses the opportunity to receive each individual dollar each year, even if they do have to pay more for their workers.
I think Emerson is right. I knew a few DLCers while in grad school in the DC area and they definitely believed their own neoliberal talking points -- they were academics and had no real reason to dissemble in the course of a seminar discussion or whatnot. I have a precious memory of one of them recoiling in genuine horror when I said I thought NAFTA had some serious problems.
They're quite entrenched in the consultant class, however, and I'm not sure Dean et al. can do much about them in the short term.
Does anyone know who else was on this conference call? I've fallen off of blogworld and can't find more on this conference call. . .sorry if it's a dumb qestion. . . .
I've been wondering, because I read a fairly broad range of the usual suspects, and haven't seen anything else.