I first became politically aware in the early 60s. My father was a died in the wool Democrat, and though my mother was initially an independent, she always voted Democratic. The first election that I followed closely was the Goldwater-Johnson affair. I remember sitting in front of the TV screen with a scorecard, waiting to tally the electoral votes. As it turned out, the night lacked suspense and the scorecard was unnecessary. Goldwater was crushed.
This morning, Frank Rich, as has a number of other pundits, speculates about whether the Republicans have doomed themselves to minority status for a generation. I can distinctly remember that the same type of speculation was rampant after the Goldwater debacle. In fact, after that crushing defeat, the Republicans went on to occupy the White House for 28 of the next 44 years (that’s 63% of the time for the mathematically challenged). They also went on to capture formal control of the Senate in 1980, and take majority control of both houses from 1994 to 2006 (for the reasons detailed below, they often had effective control even when the Democrats had a formal majority), with a brief hiatus in the Senate between 2000 and 2002. And they did it by embracing a perverse brand of Goldwaterism that even that icon would no doubt have rejected as un-American.
Is there any reason to think that this year is different-that this election really has driven a stake through the heart of the present avatar of the Republican party?
I think there’s reason to hope.
First, it’s important to examine the dynamics that allowed the Republicans to recover from the Goldwater defeat. The Democrats gained two seats in the Senate that year,giving them a two thirds majority in the Senate-theoretically filibuster proof. In fact, it was not, because of the large number of Southern Democrats, who were Republicans in all but name. Over the course of the next forty four years there was a realignment. Rascists Southerners moved to the Republicans. At the same time, but much more slowly, Northerners moved to the Democrats. That process is most strikingly illustrated here in Connecticut, with the extinction of the Rockefeller Republicans (at least in the House) with the defeat of Chris Shays.
So the political reality is as follows. Even when the Democrats had theoretical majorities, those majorities were riddled with “Blue Dog” Democrats, who often voted with Republicans and deprived the Democrats of an effective majority. The Republican takeover of the South was completed long before the Democratic takeover of the North. Republicans up here were able to get away with calling themselves “moderates” while effectively ceding their votes to the racist, religious fundamentalists that had taken control of the party. Thus, during a period when the Republicans were narrowing their appeal they were able to gain power through a combination of racist, whacko ideology in the South (financed by corporations looking to feed at the public trough) and inertia in the North. Put simply, they gained seats faster in the South than they lost them in the North. Over the course of the last 8 years we’ve watched as they have lost those Northern seats in an environment where there were no additional Southern seats to gain. The process is now near complete and the numbers are not good for the Republicans.
Regrettably, there are still three “moderate” New England Senate Republicans getting away with this scam, two from the great state of Maine, and one from New Hampshire. Here and there throughout what I would call the “Reason Belt”, extending from the Northeast to the Midwest, with a hop skip and a jump to the West Coast, there are a few more of the breed. But the fact is, their days are numbered, so long as the Republican party remains captive to the Sarah Palin wing of the party.
The North, West, and Southwest are going to be as solid as the South once was, and Democrats, as Obama has demonstrated, will make gains in the more enlightened of the Southern states. Yes, even the South will become more enlightened, as the old style racists die out and their children come to terms with the new reality and start to vote their own interests. A Southern Democratic coalition of blacks and intelligent whites is not inconceivable.
On the way up the Republicans were able to win by appealing to an ever narrower spectrum of the electorate. They can only come back by broadening their appeal, which means turning their backs on their base.
There was a myth in the early 70s that the “McGovern wing” of the Democratic party had factionalized the Democratic party. That was never much truth to that. During that time the Democrats were shedding the old style Southern Democrats, and the unions were self destructing over Vietnam. The former was part of a natural political process, the latter was sheer stupidity.
With the Republicans, we may see the real thing. It’s going to be harder for them to reach out to the rational part of the electorate without endangering their hold on their base. That base will not go to the Democrats, but it could split off or decide to stay home.
Of course, the Democrats are more than capable of blowing this opportunity. In the short run they can do it by timidity – by failing to grasp the opportunity they’ve been handed to deliver real change: health care, energy, etc. In the long run, like all ruling parties they will come to grief through the corruption that always accompanies majority control and, should they avoid the short run timidity problem, by their own success. This year, Americans voted as if their future depended on it, because they could see that it did. If the Democrats deliver a revitalized economy, universal health care, a successful energy policy, a rational foreign policy, etc., Americans will feel free to cast their votes for the guy they want to drink beer with. In short, they will once again be susceptible to the manipulative techniques that led them to vote for an incompetent like George Bush. The process will be aided by the corporate media, but a fat, satisfied electorate is a precondition to the Republican brand of manipulation.
So, in the short to medium term, it seems to me that the Democrats may retain their majority. In the long term, the Republicans will be back. The only question is whether they will be back as a party of the center-right, shed of their religious garb, or whether they will return as the old style party of racial and religious intolerance. If the former, then the whole country might benefit. If the latter, then we may find ourselves sinking into fascism.
