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Help Abu Muqawama Understand U.S. Politics (Updated)
Since I'm new to this town and don't really understand (American) politics, could someone please explain to me why the White House fears growing opposition from the Left on Afghanistan? As I see it -- and again, I am a political ingénue -- the Democrats are going to lose seats in the next midterm elections based on
a) health care reform and
b) other domestic issues, including the deficit.
But Afghanistan?
And I have a tough time believing, too, that Obama is going to face a tough primary challenge from an ati-war candidate in the 2012 elections or that he will lose the independent vote to a Republican in the general election because he is too hawkish on Afghanistan. So, why? Is this not like being scared of one's own shadow? Or is this just more evidence of an administration that seems to fear a fight with its own party more than a fight with the Taliban?
[NOTE: Although this blog normally steers clear of politics, I really am asking you political types out there for your opinion here. I'm not asking whether or not the war in Afghanistan is a good idea or a bad idea -- for those of you who want to debate that question, skip to the comments section two posts down. I really don't understand why President Obama should care what Russ Feingold thinks on this issue.]
UPDATE: A reader responds with what seems to be a reasonable explanation...
In 1994, Democrats lost control of the House not because Republicans turned out in higher numbers – but because Democrats didn’t. If liberals fear that Obama is leading the country down the wrong path in Afghanistan – and they become frustrated about the conduct of the war – they are more likely to say home on Election Day. Mid-term elections traditionally have lower turnout than presidential elections and depend on strong base turnout. Obama and congressional Democrats just can’t take the votes of progressives for granted.
Ok, first of all, there is
Ok, first of all, there is about a 5% chance that Mike Allen (who wrote the Politico article, and does a daily news aggregator email called Playbook that is awesome, and which you need to read if you don't already) reads this blog. I met him at a Kentucky Derby party a few months ago, and he spent half an hour asking me questions about working for the military, what I read, what the good blogs are, what I think of the job the SECDEF is doing, etc etc. I know he reads Spencer, and I directed him your way (along with SWJ, Noah at Danger Room, DoDBuzz, etc.). So maybe ask him.
But seriously (or more seriously), I'm not sure why this would be difficult to understand. Maybe it's the recent precedent of a president who was willing to make and keep enemies on the Hill, but the White House can't just ram through whatever it likes because eventually, the money will dry up. On top of that, the president doesn't want to have opposition within his own party all over the front pages; the war requires a huge investment of political capital that can't possibly be returned in any equivalent measure. We're well past the point of the White House getting slack for its domestic agenda in order to facilitate the "War on Terror," as you well know.
When it comes down to it, as much as you'd rather avoid discussion here of whether the war "is a good idea or not," you can't really avoid a consideration of the cost-benefit analysis: even the most optimistic proponents of escalation can't forsee an immediate, stark, and incontrovertibly positive turn in coalition fortunes, so the question now has to be (for the political types, anyway) what good can this war possibly do for the president or the Democratic Party? The simple act of asking that question smacks of cynicism, but you can be certain it's being asked. And the answer, I think you'll have to admit, is basically nothing.
(Now, to caveat that, if you're a true believer in this effort you can suggest that there's a lot of good to be done for the Afghan people, for NATO, for American national security writ large, etc etc. But remember that that's not the question we're asking.)
First, you're right. But,
First, you're right. But, it's a layered issue. We're seeing Obama's first true test as Dem-leader in Chief with health care reform and, if you believe the media, he's losing (or worst from the leftist of the left D's, he's compromising).
The White House is weighing their future political costs and benefits. The unfortunate truth is, it isn't just about Afghanistan, it's about the support the White House will need from D's on all future "big" votes.
Progressives feel betrayed, conservative Republicans are looking for wedge issues and the moderates are weighing the mid-term elections.
In 1994, Democrats lost
In 1994, Democrats lost control of the House not because Republicans turned out in higher numbers – but because Democrats didn’t. If liberals fear that Obama is leading the country down the wrong path in Afghanistan – and they become frustrated about the conduct of the war – they are more likely to say home on Election Day. Mid-term elections traditionally have lower turnout than presidential elections and depend on strong base turnout. Obama and congressional Democrats just can’t take the votes of progressives for granted.
This isn't necessarily about turning out liberal voters or retaining seats next year, as it seems pretty clear already that the Democrats are going to take significant losses. See here.
It's more likely a matter of retaining sufficient support on the Hill and in the party to get things done on his priorities.
1. War sucks. 2. Every
1. War sucks.
2. Every dollar spent on war is a dollar not spent elsewhere.
3. A lot of people are expecting a lot of "elsewhere".
"If liberals fear that Obama
"If liberals fear that Obama is leading the country down the wrong path in Afghanistan – and they become frustrated about the conduct of the war – they are more likely to say home on Election Day."
That makes sense in a 1 horse race. However the Republicans generally put up a candidate of their own. Have you see who's polling as their candidates ? You think any of those aren't going to have people chomping at the bit to vote against them ?
Meanwhile what AM said stands. If Obama put down his own healthcare plan and fought for it, you could invade Kazakhstan and it wouldn't make a difference. Which isn't a long way behind A-stan on the policies people care about. If he would take these strategy questions off the front page for 6 months (even just with some BS) it wouldn't even register in the press. I mean seriously, I'd like to see a poll of how many Americans thought the war started in the last 2 years, the amount of public/press interest it's received over the past decade.
Obama got elected for a
Obama got elected for a number of reasons - but a big one in progressive circles was his (qualified) anti-war message. Now the left is realizing we are in a war that might take some time (10 years?) to finish with. Its about maintaining the support and energy of (a) progressive intellectuals and (b) the Democratic base, which will affect this White House's ability to herd cats on the hill and keep the NYT editorial/op-ed pages saying nice things about him
It's a matter of votes,
It's a matter of votes, particularly in the House. Look at the recent supplemental appropriations bill--when it first passed the House, 50 liberal D's voted against it (Out of Iraq/Afghanistan types), but House Republicans supported it. When the conferenced version came before the House a month later, the D's had added a bunch of non-military spending to it, so House Republicans refused to support it. That meant that Speaker Pelosi had to win back 20 of those 50 liberal D's just to pass the supplemental. If Obama and leaders in Congress ignore the out of Afghanistan folks, they will be dependent on Republicans to pass Iraq/Afghanistan related bills, which is not where Obama & co. want to be.
Much like the commenter to
Much like the commenter to AM in the update, the concern has to be about retaining Dem/independent voters. But I don't think the general public is all that concerned about Obama's position on particular issues, to include health care or Afghanistan. Yes, there are fringe elements on both sides, but what the percentage of the general public who supported Obama want to see is forward momentum. We like winners. As long as GWB was seen as moving forward on his initiatives (like them or not), he was "popular" at least through 2005.
Challenge is that Obama needs Congress to tacitly support him to get initiatives to turn into law, and the Repubs have mastered the campaign of "NO" while the Dems are still unorganized and completely not used to the idea that they have the White House. Two biggest negatives continue to be that President Obama isn't doing what Candidate Obama said he would do, and that the Dem leadership continues to act like abused spouses who don't realize that they can fight back. But it's very premature to declare the mid-term elections as a losing proposition for the Dems. The campaigning in 2010 hasn't started yet, 13 months to go (which I will point out is more time than Obama's had in office yet), and he can still turn around both health care and the Afghan war - IF he offers leadership, IF Congress supports it, and IF the media doesn't ignore it.
David Brooks is rarely an
David Brooks is rarely an astute observer of American politics, particularly of progressive politics, which hidebound establishmentarians like him are especially ill-suited to understand. He'd like to think that Americans really don't want fundamental change; they're happy with how things are--they just want more of it. He's wrong. Even true conservatives (e.g., Andrew Bacevich), not just progressives, want change. The debate is over what kind of change. So here goes.
For progressives, the problem with Obama is that he has, in little more than six months, squandered the mandate he was given in the November election through failed leadership--that is, no leadership at all--to effect material change in both domestic and foreign policy. Health care is the big one domestically; Afghanistan the big one abroad. Domestically, he's allowed corporate America to control the debate over health care, leaving health care policy in such a muddle that the only benefits from whatever sludge Congress comes up with will go to the corporations. Abroad, he's failed to understand the pitfalls of empire and, it appears, with the full support of the "moderate democrats" at CNAS, he is ready to expand American military efforts in central Asia, with no clear idea of what such expansion is supposed to accomplish or worse, how it's going to be paid for. The Pope et al are starting to figure that out, but really can't admit it, so, like the Brits of yore, we'll muddle through on the backs and lives of American soldiers and marines, and still have to fight our way through the Kyber Pass eventually. In any case, with that strategic confusion, we fall back on the default position--we're there for empire, American style. The long haul. Profit and power for the economic elite; declining fortunes for the rest of us.
The trouble is, we progressives know we can't afford it: we can't afford to solve serious, systemic, fundamental problems at home while pouring trillions into the rat holes of the world, filtered through the quarterly profit statements of global corporations, all in the name of America the Beautiful. In case people aren't paying attention, things are getting uglier here at home. Example; the health "fairs" being held in parts of the country that are being overwhelmed by those with no health insurance. Just like a Third World country. More and more of us are becoming refugees in our own country, with barely a nod from imperial Washington.
One of my favorite indicators of the intractable problems facing this country is the explosion of disease, both old diseases and new ones, among the country's wildlife populations from both climate change and continued exploitation and destruction of ecosystems.
The City on the Hill is crumbling, folks. That's the trend of US politics--the trend of American culture.
The one thing that stands out as I read the progressive tea-leaves is that progressives are becoming more and more disenchanted not only with Democrats, but with the entire system. Everything connected with American governance, from the local to state to the federal government, is dysfunctional. The common interest, our public spaces, and the civic institutions we grew up with and took for granted are disappearing or have disappeared into a kind of feudal feeding frenzy. The legitimacy of the United States Government itself is spiraling to the ground as it squanders trillions upon Capital, pennies, if that, on people.
People do notice these kinds of things, just as the troops know when the officers are incompetent.
Obama's proven himself to be just another Democrat, no better than Bill Clinton, and he would be right to fear the defection of progressives as real people, not politicoes nor bureaucrats nor establishment intellectuals nor corporate suits, fed up with the dysfunction of how things are, are slowly abandoning the system to solve their problems their own way. I predict fewer and fewer progressives will hang with the Democratic Party to try and effect change. We'll see even more emphasis on third party politics, especially locally and regionally. In time, I predict also that many will decide to say goodbye to Uncle Sam too.
One of the interesting things I've noticed over the last couple of decades is that those who might be considered Greens, such as myself, are finding considerable common ground with true conservatives--the local counts for more than the national; families and communities are more important than the State; foreign adventures worsen security; quality is better than quantity; wealth is best shared, not hoarded; natural resources are better conserved than exploited. I'm seeing a fundamental shift in political and cultural alliances.
While this trend, even if acknowledged, might be considered by many to be ephemeral or quixotic, the economic chaos we're going through, along with irreversible environmental decline and climate change, has gotten peoples' attention in a way that hasn't happened in America before. Even the naysayers on climate change are scared shitless; that's why they're they've moved onto houseboats on 'de Nile. Oh, the corporations and traditional governments will still be around, continuing to squeeze the system and people for profit and power, but they will be doing so without legitimacy as people realize that these institutions are no longer necessary to human existence.
The future is more interesting than ever before.
In other words, US politics is slowly becoming something other than US politics.
EMN
It's not so surprising that
It's not so surprising that George Will may call for an Afghan pullout. As his writings on Iraq have made clear, he is the last of the Taft Republicans -- anti-internationalist, small-government, and dyspeptic. (The only collectivist institution he supports is the Commissioner of Baseball, and even there he has doubts.) He hardly represents the bulk of the Republican party, which is still supportive of the war in Afghanistan.
The Democrats are another story. Afghanistan was a convenient stick with which to beat George Bush for his decision to send troops to Iraq while in opposition (particularly when Afghanistan seemed the "good war,") but it's a much tougher call for Dems as the ruling party when the war situation is getting worse. Afghanistan is unlikely to cost Dems many votes in 2010 -- it's the economy, stupid, in the worst recession in 70 years, not to mention health care, which will be determining. However, Democrats are seriously divided between the minority ready to commit to this war as a war of necessity -- not just in words, but in blood, treasure, time, and alternatives foregone -- and those who are not, for a variety of reasons. The latter include three overlapping trends: a pessimism about all military interventions reflecting leftover 60s anti-imperialism and anti-militarism, a tendency to damn George W. Bush and all his works -- with Hamid Karzai's government seen as one of them, and the relentlessly negative -- if often inaccurate -- media coverage of Afghanistan.
Besides partisanship, the most important influences on American opinion regarding war tends to be how the public sees the chance of success. At present public opinion is mixed on our chances in Afghanistan. If there aren't visible signs of improvement, or at least stabilization, after the 2010 elections, there is likely to be growing pressure among Democrats -- and perhaps at the White House too -- to begin pulling back from Afghanistan, while Republic support is likely to soften.
The Politico article is
The Politico article is fluff and worth not a nano-second of consideration. Handicapping an election is the same as handicapping a sporting event or season or team or player. The similarity between the "pundits" on ESPN and the pundits on the political news/talk/rant shows is striking.
The Politico article is
The Politico article is fluff and worth not a nano-second of consideration. Handicapping an election is the same as handicapping a sporting event or season or team or player. The similarity between the "pundits" on ESPN and the pundits on the political news/talk/rant shows is striking.
Tell that to Nate Silver.
Obama wasn't given a
Obama wasn't given a mandate, my dear progressive friends. Independent people thought he was a moderate, progressives thought he was a progressive, and people like me on the right were just plain old skeptical for lots of reasons.
He was a mirror, you saw what you wanted, and now he has to govern. It's tough. I feel sympathy, but he and his crew need to get their act together.
Gulliver:
Gulliver:
Professional gamblers oftentimes handicap sporting events very accurately. My comparision to ESPN experts is that they use the same rhetorical devices as political experts. Because of the subject matter and because they may not be as skilled as their political cousins, we don't take them seriously (unless we're rabid fans or 16 years old). They're just like a bunch of guys shooting the breeze about their favorite team over a couple of beers. Sometimes they are carrying the water for the league, the team, the coach, the agent, or the player. But it's hard to tell when they're really serious. Most of the time it's just fluff. The political experts expect us to take them seriously all the time: and even when we disagree strongly with what they say we give them the benefit of the doubt and take them seriously (which most of the time, we shouldn't). If a person can see the similarity between the rhetorical devices used by sports experts, Hollywood gossip columinists, and telvevision rasslers on the one hand and the political experts on the other, it can be easier to understand Washington politics (which is AM's question).
Was it a mirror, or a plate
Was it a mirror, or a plate glass window?
I actually am a Democratic
I actually am a Democratic Party official with stakes in the wars (one son), the economy (another son), and, of course, elections.
The Politico article is shallow and involves characteristically self-serving accounts of past elections and superficial projections of the next election that are routinely generated by the DSCC/DCCC. These pimp-consultants brought us the nomination of Hillary Clinton, not!, staged "cap and trade" before "health care", and took single-payer off the table before taking bets from K-Street -- their only "constituency".
AM's simple prioritization of what the White House has to deal with is refreshingly correct and to the point. Those of us in the field understand his clarity as something like mission-type orders.
First, getting a healthcare reform bill out of Congress and on the President's desk by Christmas is immediately important simply to avoid defeat, rout, and humiliation of the entire Democratic leadership, including the risk of potentially catastrophic Congressional losses next year. Yes, "Home by Christmas" could be a false hope. But, "Hope" in Obama-speak is strangely like what John Boyd described as the moral, mental, and physical planes of strategy
The GOP is running what sounds to self-styled "progressives" like a self-defeating "Crazy Train". But, what the GOP is doing makes some sense from their perspective.Only this is not 1994 and Barack Obama is not Bill Clinton! So, for all the panic at Beltway Downs, I believe that my party will deliver on something between a Kennedy-compatible and Dean-compliant "public option" by some or no name. Moreover, I think the entire party leadership is not risk-averse or defensive about this: They plan to build a "Thirty Year Congress" on handing the GOP their head on a plate again based on practical policies delivered this year, not on just accepting "inevitable" losses regularly projected by pollsters who were predicting disaster for the Obama campaign this time last year and do not really get the difference between an auction and an election, who wage a war of moral attrition among themselves over campaign finance.
Second, "other matters" include energy policy. And, health care, energy, and Afghanistan bear -- in that order of magnitudes (all increasing costs) -- on all manner of social "gaps", economic "imbalances", and budget "deficits" -- in that order of importance. On these, there is still considerable disagreement, but no disarray, within my party. This troubles me, as all sorts of good people, inexplicably, either don't agree with me or haven't a clue what I am talking about, for instance, on energy policy. Worse, the President has not called me!
But, that is not the way leadership and responsible, two-party government work.
Barack Obama is the Democratic Lincoln: He has taken up his head-of-state role and is discharging his military office with panache. He has established a reputable military command. That comes first. Take that from a Southerner of distinguished Confederate heritage.
In our corrupt financial, decrepit industrial, and disorderly economic affairs, he has a long way to go. But, he is not frantic or poll-driven.
That is comforting to me and I hope to young people who will have to deal definitively with matters my generation neglected. Oh, but we did not actually blow-up the world with nuclear weapons, and we could have done that. So, don't dismiss us altogether. We did a few things right and left some valuable, intellectual legacies, if not exactly a God-mode for the video-game of history.
Just heard Ex on The World
Just heard Ex on The World on NPR, repeating the same crazy "Democrats might stay home in '10 if they don't like Obama's war policy" idea that's highlighted in the update.
Sounded a bit like a guy trying to conceal the fact that he met his girlfriend on the internet, too: "this is something my... uh, friend said today." No shout-out for loyal reader-commenters!
AM, it isn't so much that
AM, it isn't so much that President Obama believes that Afghanistan will cost him votes in 2012, nor is it that he feels it will drag down Congressional candidates in 2010 (the ones who will lose seats are probably moderates anyways, given the districts that will be most likely to change hands), it is that in order to continue, or expand, operations in Afghanistan, he needs the support of the Democratic Party to fund ongoing operations. I didn't think that, previous to the last supplemental, I would have believed that Republicans would oppose supplemental/DOD spending requests based on their rhetoric. However, in practice they appear to be following an all 'No' strategy. So, as noted in justindc's comment, he will need liberal votes to keep funding Afghanistan. He needs to contain opposition in his own party because otherwise he'll be at the mercy of a GOP minority that has proven to be immune to most attempts at reasonable bipartisanship. That could spell the end of funding, which would be the end of the war.
You'll note that this sort of thing never happened while Bush was in office because the Republican Party is nothing if not disciplined and Democrats tend to waffle when faced with votes that could paint them as 'weak' on National Security (ignoring the fact that their actual waffling is what makes them look weak). So the GOP and moderate Democrats would pass supplemental budgets and increase the DOD budget at unsustainable rates. Now, Obama will need to keep his coalition together because a significant chunk of the party of No will oppose almost anything he does.
As to the Politico article itself; they've never met a process story they couldn't oversell as substance.
As to the Politico article
As to the Politico article itself; they've never met a process story they couldn't oversell as substance.
Not sure if you've noticed, but that's sort of what they do, and they're extremely successful with it.
John Behrman To tell you the
John Behrman
To tell you the truth, this reads more like a campaign speech out of the Obama 2012 committee rather than an accurate portrayal of Mr. Obama's performance as a leader in the first nine months of his presidency. Let me put it this way. Although Mahdu above seems to think otherwise, the President by his election did receive a mandate for fundamental change. If he didn't, then why are the Republicans determined to make health care reform his Waterloo, to be followed by his exile on some faraway political St. Helena while still in the White House? That's serious stuff, to be sure--to set out to completely destroy Obama's effectiveness as President in his first year, to undermine and subvert his mandate. There's no other explanation for the Waterloo analogy; the Republicans know he received a mandate, just as they were politically tarred and feathered and run out of town, and they're determined to destroy that mandate. (Quite frankly, it's almost treason, but after the Bush administration and the ensaintment of Sarah Palin, I'll believe anything of Republicans). In any case, it's an example of the absolute dysfunction in national politics, the refusal of too many elected officials, Republican or Democrat, to make any effort to solve the problems they were ostensibly elected to solve.
With health care reform, Obama's decision to leave the process to Congress in a naive gesture to bipartisanship rather than vigorously lead the process of reform himself has already proven to have been a serious strategic error--something progressives have been pointing out all summer. The Republicans, following a kind of bread and circuses strategy at the Fox colloseum, have damn near succeeded in maneuvering Obama into Wellington's grasp. It may be already too late to change to an offensive strategy and get a rational, practical, and moral bill--by which I mean, at a minimum, a viable public option--out by Christmas. Then it's 2010, and without success on this issue this year, the chances of true reform in the next three years decline to near zero. As it stands right now, as a matter of brass tacks politics, real reform is hanging on what the progressive caucus in the House does, not what the President does. And who knows what the caucus will eventually do?
In other words, my judgment is that the President has not only damn near squandered his mandate, he's boxed himself into a posture of political weakness, regardless of the issue: health care, Afghanistan, energy, the economy, climate change, what have you. A defeat on health care, no matter how carefully spun, will turn him into a lame duck; I'm convinced of that.
And such a defeat on health care will certainly not encourage progressives to give the President a pass on Afghanistan, which is already a fool's errand. That's why he may be feeling a little uncomfortable with internal party politics right about now.
EMN
I don't begrudge them their
I don't begrudge them their success, but I stopped reading most of their material when I realized i wasn't getting actual news. I guess they cover insider/Hill type material well, but there's a limit to how much useful information you can get from that.
American elections are not
American elections are not decided by the will of the voters, they are decided by the will of the ideologically committed volunteers who drag the voters, whingeing and yawning, to the polling places. This holds true for both conservatives and liberals. For almost all eligible voters in America, there is no "who do I vote for?" decision, only a "will I vote?" decision for which the default answer is a very strong "huh?"
I don't begrudge them their
I don't begrudge them their success, but I stopped reading most of their material when I realized i wasn't getting actual news. I guess they cover insider/Hill type material well, but there's a limit to how much useful information you can get from that.
Agree... unless you're looking for "insider/Hill type material," which is the platform on which they've based their success. It's inside baseball, just like AM or SWJ; it's just a different kind of baseball.
"...the Repubs have mastered
"...the Repubs have mastered the campaign of "NO" while the Dems are still unorganized and completely not used to the idea that they have the White House."
Yeah it ain't that hard to find US politics confusing. You'd think that with the billions of campaign fundraising and both sides pretty comfortable with the concept of capitalism, that the Democrats could simply buy a Republican strategist just to find out how to win stuff, or at least act like you did/should.
There's no parallel universe where the greatest conservative mind inhabits the bodies of Reid/Pelosi and the RNC puts them on TV to explain policy.
"Tell that to Nate Silver."
That'll end any argument.
"the Republicans know he
"the Republicans know he received a mandate, just as they were politically tarred and feathered and run out of town, and they're determined to destroy that mandate. (Quite frankly, it's almost treason, but after the Bush administration and the ensaintment of Sarah Palin, I'll believe anything of Republicans)."
Treason ? This is the job of the opposition political party. Destroying the guy who received the mandate is theirs.
Speaking as a citizen, not
Speaking as a citizen, not as a party apparatchnik, it's treason. The purpose of politics is to solve problems, not undermine the political process of solving problems. Yet that's what we have. One reason our political system is absolutely dysfunctional and one reason I expect more and more people simply to opt out of the system.
EMN
Speaking as a self-described
Speaking as a self-described centrist Canadian observer of US politics I have to agree with Endymion's comment above. You could run a cadaver for both parties in a given election and you'd still have 30 or 40 % of the public voting for them irrespective of of actual policies (we don't need no steen-king policies!).
Even if you look at Obama's current overall approval rating it solidly appears to be divided along party lines with the people who decided the elections... the middle/centrist crowd... being undecided.
It's that middle crowd that you're risking burnout on with everything that's gone on over the last ten years in US politics. I suspect I'm not the only one who gets utterly sick and tired of seeing the word treason tossed around by both sides in "disucssions". It's hard to tell the "progressives" apart from the people they're ranting about most days...
One of the most interesting
One of the most interesting things that's happening politically in the US is that the center is rapidly becoming extinct as more and more people are made redundant, as the British say. I suspect they think differently about what treason means from someone who is still lucky enough to be in the center, even a Canadian Liberal.
EMN
Sorry EMN I don't see
Sorry EMN I don't see that.
The fact that the Democrats had to hand choose the "blue dog" candidates to have any hope of winning in some key districts last election show that the center is alive and well in the US. Those ridings would appear to have people who are willing to vote based off actual policies rather than just voting the party ticket no matter what. And sadly for your assertion about progressives they make up no more of the voting populace than the Religious right does.
Both oddly seem to share the same sense of not only entitlement but self-righteousness though.
And 52% of the popular vote in one of the most "contentious elections in US history" is no more an overwhelming mandate for wholesale change for Obama any more than it was for Bush with pretty much an identical percentage of the popular vote. Obama may certainly have nailed down the electoral college end of things... which is admittedly what counts... but the popular vote percentage shows the US is just as divided as it has been over the last ten years.
IMNSHO it sadly seems to have hit the stage in the US where both parties have been hijacked by overly vocal minorities irrespective of what the rest of the voting populace may think. And the somewhat bizarre... at least to a non-American anyways... commitment to a two-party and only two-party system won't let that change any time soon.
You're left with the choice between dumb and dumber with both parties doing a fine job of competing for the dumber label.
Tom F Perhaps the reason you
Tom F
Perhaps the reason you don't see it is because 1) you don't live here and/or 2) have little contact with real people. Do you live in Toronto?
One can hardly derive any meaningful perspective on the state of the American Center from the mere statistics of an election, much less the most recent one, primarily because, as you point out, we have only two parties, not a parliamentary system. Americans get a limited choice in elections--either/or. By definition, there's no center to either/or. There's a whole lot about the state of America hidden in how the popular vote fell out.
As a practical matter, certainly with the Republicans, they're camped firmly on the right and far right; for anyone who doesn't believe that, go to any "public" meeting on health care and watch the rightwing brownshirts do their thing. It's surprising to a lot of people, but for those who have worked in the field of conservation of natural resources, it's old hat--disruption of public meetings, that is. SOP for the so-called Sagebrush Rebels. Indeed, what we're seeing with health care is the application of Sagebrush Rebel tactics to a different sector of politics. It's the same old Intimidation and fear.
In any case, Democrats are all over the map, as usual, but there can be no doubt, because I watched it closely, that it was progressives who did the heavy, grass roots politics for Obama's election, not moderates, who played Politics instead. There is a difference between politics and Politics. Let's be clear about that. Yet, none of those progressives have been included in the administration. A good example is Representative Raul Grijalva of New Mexico, who was the top choice of progressives in the conservation and environmental communities for the position of Secretary of the Interior. Instead we got Colorado conservative Democrat Ken Salazar, a rancher and Washington insider. He's no centrist; he has too much money. He's a member of the elite.
Much of the anger on the left is that the left did the hard work to get Obama elected, but now they have nothing to show for it.
It would be far more accurate to assess the state of the American center by looking at the state of the middle class, and by all definitions, particularly economic, the American middle class is disappearing with the growth of the largely service-oriented economy. As someone who has worked in the service economy (tourism--wilderness guide, hunting guide) I can most certainly tell you one cannot support a middle class lifestyle--that is, the traditional middle class lifestyle--with a service job. You sure as hell can't afford health care out of the service economy. So-called "good paying jobs," which were all almost associated with manufacturing, e.g., the auto industry, are few and far between, and are becoming fewer and more distant. This is an indisputable fact. I'm seeing even older men and women joining the military for economic reasons, as I did in 1978 at the age of 24 as a college graduate with degrees in the humanities, the economy in the Carter adminstration being poor. (Finding I liked it, I stayed in and got my commission).
It seems to me quite evident that as the middle class disappears, so will the Center. That is precisely what is happening here in American West as well as, as far as I can tell, everywhere else in the country. The working poor are increasing in number, while the elite remains pretty much the same, but with a bigger slice of the pie, thanks to Reagan and Bush. It is this economic process of falling incomes and economic opportunities in the global economy that is driving people either to the right or to the left. Here in the West, it's mostly to the right, except in Hispanic areas.
Agreed, with the usual run of Dems and Repubs, it's a choice between dumb and dumber. I have my doubts about how long progressives will remain with the Dems. I've already jumped ship.
EMN
Toronto? Hardly. LOL I live
Toronto? Hardly.
LOL
I live in Calgary which is about 8-10% American expat… depending on which set of stats you want to use… almost all of which are bachelor degree education level at the minimum. I also lived in Los Angeles for a number of years while I was going to School at UC Riverside and the company I work for has extensive operations in upstate New York. Or in other words I do actually have a nodding acquaintance with how the US works.
Not to mention the fact that decisions made by the US government generally have a larger effect on our economy than ones made by our Federal government given the direction of trade flows between the two countries so anyone with half a brain here pays more attention to what goes on in DC than in Ottawa.
As for your comments about the “progressives” doing the heavy lifting for Obama during the election I actually happen to agree with you. I also happen to think that by and large you probably should have:
a) Actually listened to what he was saying during the election rather than just projecting what you wanted him to do, and;
b) Maybe should have paid a bit more attention to the general political climate in the US and grasped that a “progressive” agenda is nothing more than a pipe dream as only a small percentage of the US populace would actually want to have it rammed down their throats any more than they would with the right wing ramming their agenda down people’s throats.
As you may be able to tell I regard the so called progressive set to be just as authoritarian in nature as the people they bitch about on the right of the political spectrum. Pot meet Kettle.
As to the rest of your comments about economic equality and the global economy… and to get back to Abu Muqawama’s original point/question… I would suspect this is ultimately going to be the deciding factor on Afghanistan. Voter apathy due to economic conditions.
The administration has done such a bad job to date of explaining what America’s national interest is in being in Afghanistan that it’s going to be hard for the public to grasp the justification for expending American lives and treasure there while everything is going to hell in a hand basket at home. He seems to have a very poor grasp currently not only on his party but of the dynamics of his party.
The President may have a chance to pull a rabbit out of the hat for if the economy turns around but I for one don’t believe that the current “green shoots” is anything other than a dead cat bounce. When you actually look at the fundamentals of consumer debt loads and unemployment rates, commercial and residential mortgage rate defaults and any of the other assorted economic indicators there’s still an Imelda Marco’s size closet full of shoes yet to drop.
If you’re worried about having a job in 3 months you’re really not going to care whether or not Karzai or Abdullah wins the Afghan election. Or to borrow a quote “It’s the economy stupid”.
And one last point on your current health care and social security system. It's already functionally broke. Over half the funds for both are in the form of IOUs from the Treasury who would need to sell bonds to cover the value. You could cut the Defense budget to zero for the next 100 years and still not meet the current system's over the horizon costs as the baby boomers start retiring.
You may want to ask yourself where the extra money will come from and how long the government can keep minting debt to pay for the rest of it. Health care reform is meaningless unless it's sustainable. Note I'm not saying it's not needed but that ultimately it's meaningless unless the basics are taken care of which they are most certainly not under the current proposals.
Tom F, That, by the way, is
Tom F,
That, by the way, is what I would expect out of conservatives who were serious about their duties as legislators. Counter-proposals that address the issues of costs and the heavily distorted incentives of health care in America. Probably that's what Obama expected as well. His election opponent, McCain, understood this, from what he said during the campaign. (Has anyone heard from him in the last few months?) Instead the GOP as a whole seems to be interested only in destroying the Democrats, rather than making positive contributions that they could still point to in election season.
The GOP is not unique in this. In the Czech Republic, the main political parties have happily been throwing the country under the bus to pursue power, not only undermining all legislation from each other, but undermining initiatives from within their own parties in the course of internal power struggles. If it weren't for the independent national bank and for the check list Brussels gave for membership, which is the one thing they all took seriously, we would be stuffed here. If it weren't for the 6% annual growth for the last few years, we'd also be stuffed (and it is disputable whether the kind of FDI incentives responsible for that growth were fully justified, as the companies that came and paid no taxes are now leaving with the global downturn). Well, there's been 2 quarters of contraction now, and the cracks are showing.
Czech politicians however are a bunch of jokers who wouldn't last 5 minutes with the real bastards in say, New Jersey state politics, and who would be shredded at US national level. I expect more from US legislators.
@A.T, "...real bastards in
@A.T,
"...real bastards in say, New Jersey state politics.."
"...The people who were against us from the beginning....they get ground...They get ground into powder"
LOL
Dude, we've seen this before. A scelrotic bunch of drooling, drunk octogenerians hanging onto power in a bankrupt, overstretched nation, a young reformer comes along raising hopes and ends up crashing everything....it was called "The Politburo" .
That's what you're looking at, Andrew.
Comment by El mestengo negro
Comment by El mestengo negro on September 3, 2009 - 9:44am
"Perhaps the reason you don't see it is because 1) you don't live here and/or 2) have little contact with real people. Do you live in Toronto?"
You appear to be suggesting someone else is out of touch because they have little contact with real people, while calling opposition to a political policy treason, which I haven't seen from anyone else, anywhere. Great work.
Who'd of thought that you could find someone in support of Obamacare who heard the lies about "death panels" and thought that sounded like a great idea. Hangings of policy opponents at dawn.
I don't know what's in the health care reform bills for the American public, but I guess there ain't gonna be enough resources to provide mental health treatment you and so very many of your countrymen require.
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