Being the adult in the room doesn't work [View All]

1) Being the adult in the room doesn't work. There is a theory in certain Democratic circles that postulates that independent and moderate voters will come home to Democrats en masse if Democrats just show themselves to be the reasonable alternative to an increasingly extremist Republican Party. This isn't so much a theory of triangulation (though it suits the Third Way crowd nicely as well), as it is a theory that trusts that the center of opinion among the American public remains constant, that the public pays enough attention and has enough understanding about current events to know who has extremist views and who does not, and that voters will make rational choices in their own self-interest so long as the facts are laid bare for them.

None of the above is correct. The endless parade of Republican extremism since the 2010 election has not served to significantly weaken the GOP's position, beyond the normal loss of a honeymoon period shortly after Boehner took the gavel. The willingness of the Obama Administration to act the straight man to the GOP's clown has not won the Democrats any friends among independents. In fact, the reality is quite the opposite.

The reality is that 2006, 2008 and 2010 were three consecutive wave elections: a phenomenon unprecedented in at least recent, if not the entirety of American history. Wave elections occur either during realignments, or periods of intense voter frustration, or both. Realignments tend to produce one-sided waves that lead to lasting majorities, periods of relative calm and a new set of regional and factional affiliatons. That has not been the case in recent years. What has happened, rather, is that a tired, dispirited and confused public has lashed out at whatever party they perceived to be in power and doing damage, and have chosen to variously stay home from elections and/or vote in the opposite party just to shake things up and see if something will change. Democrats gained from this impulse in 2006 and 2008, but fell easy prey to it in 2010 when the promise of "hope" and "change" fell drastically short of expectations--expectations that, despite the gnashing of teeth among a small number of progressives about Guantanamo, torture, Afghanistan, and the like, were almost entirely economic in nature. Counting on voters to pick the moderate, even-tempered candidates and go for the "reasonable" choice in 2012 is a fool's errand. With no significant change in the economic climate since the Crash and even before, a wise prognosticator would count on the voters to make the unreasonable choice in 2012 just to make something happen to change the status quo. As much as every poll shows that voters want compromise, what they really want is answers.

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2011/07/souls-of-white-folk_23.html