Getting elected used to be about telling voters how they would benefit. \u201cTwo cars in every garage, a chicken in every pot<\/em>\u201d was Herbert Hoover\u2019s successful 1928 election slogan. Obama\u2019s slogans of \u201cYes We Can\u201d and \u201cChange We Can Believe In,\u201d<\/em> promised voters a better future. In the heat of battle, John McCain said of his opponent Barack Obama in 2008: \u201cHe\u2019s a decent family man, a citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues, and that\u2019s what this campaign is all about.\u201d<\/em><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n But that\u2019s not our politics in 2021. We are not about two candidates with \u201cdisagreements\u2026on fundamental issues\u201d. Rather, we are about one candidate who is represented as \u201cGood\u201d, and one candidate who obviously is \u201cEvil\u201d. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s not that there wasn\u2019t ugly campaigning before this past decade. In the election of 1800, the first truly contested Presidential campaign, one Federalist newspaper said about Democratic-Republican Thomas Jefferson:<\/p>\n\n\n\n “(He)writes aghast the truths of God’s words; who makes not even a profession of Christianity; who is without Sabbaths; without the sanctuary, and without so much as a decent external respect for the faith and worship of Christians.” <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Talk about \u201cEvil\u201d!<\/p>\n\n\n\n But today it\u2019s not just in campaigns. Or maybe it\u2019s that campaigning never seems to end. There is no respite from election to election, no time when the legislature can, behind closed doors, work the magic of \u201csausage making\u201d legislation and get things done for the Nation. Now it\u2019s all politics, all \u201cGood\u201d and \u201cEvil\u201d, all the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n How did we get this way? It used to be that there was a lot of common ground among the political parties. A \u201cBlue Dog\u201d Democrat was a fiscal conservative, much like the \u201cModerate\u201d Republican sitting beside him. Republicans like Richard Nixon created the Environmental Protection Agency and actually used the United States government to impose wage and price controls. There was a huge \u201cmiddle ground\u201d that both parties inhabited. Voting \u201cfor the candidate\u201d across party lines was possible without committing ideologic heresy. To win elections you needed to win the middle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Both political parties always contained the more \u201cextreme\u201d sides. In the Republican Party there was always a struggle between the more moderate \u201cCoastal Republicans\u201d like Earl Warren* of California and Tom Dewey of New York, and Midwest conservatives, led by Bob Taft of Ohio. The Coastal Republicans maintained control, nominating Eisenhower to win in 1952 and 1956, and California\u2019s Richard Nixon in 1960. <\/p>\n\n\n\n *Yep, that’s Earl Warren from the Warren Supreme Court. He was the Republican Governor of California for a decade, including World War II.\u00a0\u00a0He was appointed by Eisenhower, who assumed he\u2019d be a good \u201cRepublican Chief Justice\u201d.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Nixon\u2019s loss to Kennedy let the conservative wing finally get a chance in 1964, with arch-conservative Barry Goldwater of Arizona winning the Presidential nomination.\u00a0\u00a0He suffered the worst defeat in Presidential history, losing to moderate Lyndon Johnson.\u00a0\u00a0That silenced the \u201cconservative wing\u201d for the next sixteen years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The \u201cLiberal wing\u201d of the Democratic Party remained in control from the Roosevelt days.\u00a0\u00a0Adlai Stevenson was nominated in 1952 and 1956, and John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson were from that section of the Party as well.\u00a0\u00a0It wasn\u2019t until the Vietnam War that the Party fractured into the \u201cOld Liberals\u201d and the new \u201cAnti-War\u201d Democrats.\u00a0\u00a0The Old Liberals won the nomination with Hubert Humphrey, but the political division cost the general election.\u00a0\u00a0 Nixon narrowly won the Presidency in 1968.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Anti-War Democrats got their revenge in 1972, choosing South Dakota\u2019s George McGovern to lead the ticket. He lost to Nixon, in a defeat even worse than Goldwater\u2019s eight years before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So the extremes of both political parties suffered major defeats, and the moderates of both gained control. Jimmy Carter represented the true moderates in the Democratic Party, and even though he lost the Presidency in 1980, the moderates remained in control. Bill Clinton is the great example. He co-opted many moderate Republican ideas to use in his Presidency, making him popular with the \u201cmiddle voters\u201d. More Progressive Democrats saw him as \u201cRepublican-lite\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But the conservative wing of the Republican Party found a flag-bearer who could win. Ronald Reagan won the nomination and the Presidency in 1980, and his eight years in office forced the moderate Republicans (like his Vice President, George HW Bush) to choose. They could assume Reagan\u2019s conservative stand, or they could be left out of power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So while Bush was originally more moderate, he moved to the right to \u201cstay with the Party\u201d. And that has characterized the Republican Party even to today. Every time they had the opportunity to move back to the center, instead they remained loyal to \u201cReagan conservatism\u201d. Mitt Romney is the classic example: a moderate Governor of Massachusetts (he came up with the plan that became the Affordable Care Ac<\/em>t)<\/em>, when he moved to become a national candidate, he also had to move hard right to become electable. (Watch what Governor Larry Hogan of Maryland does in the next few years<\/em>). <\/em><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n The pressure of Reagan conservatism pushed the Democratic Party to move to the left as well. On issues like abortion, \u201cPro-Life\u201d Democrats found themselves pushed out of the \u201cBig Tent\u201d of the Party. \u201cBlue Dog\u201d Democrats found that they could no longer get elected, and fewer remained empowered. And so the center of the Democratic Party leaned farther left, as the Republican Party moved hard right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But then there were three events that fractured our politics. The first was the election of Barack Obama as President in 2008. He wasn\u2019t incredibly \u201cleft\u201d, though he was on the \u201cProgressive\u201d side of the Party. But his election was such an outlier, a Black man as President. For many, his election summoned the future, an event unexpected until the middle of the 21st century. And for others, it was simply too much, too soon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That \u201ctoo much, too soon\u201d played a role in the development of the Tea Party, a reactionary, right-wing movement from the fringes of the Republican Party. Republicans saw that movement as a \u201cticket\u201d back into power, and after the defeat of a not so moderate Romney in 2012, the Party lurched even farther right. They ousted Michael Steele as Chairman of the Republican Party (Steele happened to be Black), and ignored the finding of the 2012 election \u201cautopsy\u201d that stated that the Party needed to appeal beyond white voters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Party instead assumed many of the issues championed by the Tea Partiers, who ultimately became \u201cmainstream\u201d Republicans. <\/p>\n\n\n\n And the third event was the refinement of computer-directed gerrymandering, like the Republican \u201cRedMap\u201d plan. This created legislative districts so dominated by one Party or the other, that the \u201cgeneral election\u201d became just a formality. The real race was in the party primaries, where the most \u201cdedicated\u201d political voters made the choice. This caused the more extreme candidates (in both parties) to have a better chance of winning, and made our legislatures, both Federal and State, more polarized. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Ohio is a classic example of the results of \u201cRed Mapping\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0Jim Jordan\u2019s District, Ohio\u2019s 4th, is the 10th most Republican District in the Nation. The only reason for a Democrat to run is to keep Jordan from donating his money to someone else.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Meanwhile, Nina Turner, a Bernie Sander\u2019s disciple, is running in the 11th District Democratic primary against the more moderate Shontel Brown, endorsed by Hillary Clinton and other establishment Democrats. The winner of that expensive primary will be the newest Congressman from Ohio<\/em>, as the District is so Democratic, the Republican doesn’t have a chance.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n When there are two Parties, so divided, elections become less about persuading the middle (like Clinton did) and more about exciting the base. Rather than two \u201c\u2026decent men or women<\/em>\u201d running, it\u2019s about demonization. Republicans are Fascists; Democrats Socialists or Communists. \u201cJoe Biden should be ex-communicated from the Roman Catholic Church\u201d. \u201cMike DeWine is a RINO (Republican in Name Only)\u201d. <\/em>Voters no longer feel they make a selection based on Jimmy Carter\u2019s ideal \u2013 \u201cWhy Not the Best\u201d. Instead they go to the polls determined to vote against someone: \u201cHold your nose and vote\u201d. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Persuasion, changing folks minds, really isn\u2019t \u201cthe thing\u201d anymore.\u00a0Our politicians have discovered that we are more motivated by \u201cthe negative\u201d than we are the \u201cpositive\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0Neither Party has the monopoly on that:\u00a0\u00a0the negative of Donald Trump drove more people to vote for Joe Biden than ever voted before.\u00a0\u00a0But keep in mind, the negative of Joe Biden drove more to vote for Trump than any candidate for President except one: Joe Biden.\u00a0\u00a0Neither candidate got all those votes because people were FOR them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Until more Americans get invested in the primary processes, then that negative campaigning advantage will continue to dominate our politics. As always, it\u2019s up to us. Neither gerrymandering nor even voter suppression can really stop \u201cWe the People\u201d from voting. And if we all did that, we could vote for what we want, not what we hate.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Common Ground<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
When Extremism Lost<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Reaganism<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Obama and the Tea Party (not a children\u2019s book)<\/em><\/em><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Damn Computers<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Driven by Demons<\/h3>\n\n\n\n