Democrats can own American politics for the next generation. All they have to do? Abandon Progressivism.
Rhetorically, that is.
Progressivism has been America's political mainstream for 100 years, doesn't need defending, and can't be destroyed. The John Birch Society and its allies don't have to like it. Then again, they wouldn't even exist without Progressivism; the entire right wing project is about rolling it back--way back. One of their pet peeves; the estate tax--passed in 1906.
But that's also the problem; Progressivism is a 20th Century solution to 20th Century problems. This, as many have observed, is the 21st Century. We have 21st Century problems and need 21st Century solutions.
Instead, all we have, posing as politics, is a furious attack on Progressivism--you can call it the New Deal if you want--and a passionate defense of same. Ideas that don't fit that game are rejected out of hand by both sides. As you may have noticed, this is getting us nowhere.
Which is exactly what the country is sick of. Left and right, the national hunger is to solve America's problems like Americans; by doing what works--period. Whatever the right wing may say, Americans don't really want less government--they want better government.
That is, Americans know we're in trouble and are sick of being told they want less government, more government, or no government. We want to fix things and get back to work. Whatever it takes.
Which is where renouncing Progressivism comes in. Because if Democrats get up and say, "This is the 21st Century, we have 21st Century problems, and we need 21st Century solutions to solve them," they define themselves as the future.
The beauty part: When Republicans refuse to join them and attack--a likely outcome--the Right defines itself as the past; while otherwise, they'll have to actually throw off their old ideas, and prove their new ideas are...new ideas.
Would the Democrat's progressive wing like it? I doubt it. More likely, you'll just hear another passionate defense of the New Deal, spiced with accusations of party treason.
But doing that straps the Democratic left to the past, and they won't like that, either. At the end of the day, I'd say even the nation's most liberal Democrats would rather be alive and in the room than irrelevant, with their noses pressed against the window.
In any event, the progressive edifice isn't going anywhere. Whatever turn the nation takes, we'll still have an SEC, an FDA, Social Security, Medicare, the Federal Reserve--everything the right wants to wipe out. So the Democrats' left wing can relax.
This is especially true because going forward, the Democrats would still have enormous structural advantages, thanks to a Republican electoral strategy that, in the name of playing to its base, has alienated the votes of many African-Americans, many American women, many gay Americans, and, certainly, many Hispanic-Americans.
Even if Republicans claim they've jettisoned their previous bigotry--there's no other word for it--it's not just unlikely that people will forget it so fast; the right wing will remain a potent force in American politics for years to come, and unless the Republican National Committee not only denounces it, but begins attacking it, the twain will never part. And of course, Democrats may find themselves mentioning it, now and then.
Think of this strategy militarily. The Democrats occupy a sturdy fortress. It has to be taken before the Republican insurgents can take over. So they put the fortress under siege--there's nothing else for it.
As long as the defenders occupy the fort, they can hold off the insurgents. But they can't be driven away--all the defenders can do is try to outlast them.
But if the defenders come out from the walls and take ground of their own choosing, the attackers are at a disadvantage; not only would the defenders take the field with a fully-fledged army, but the attacker's entire apparatus is designed for a siege.
Guess who has better odds?
The bonus: If both sides abandon their useless posturing and put forth new ideas, they'll have returned the country to its pre-Reagan days, when people could actually talk politics and--when the stars were right--actually govern.
That would be a good thing, because America has serious structural problems and has to solve them, and as long as we cling to Industrial Age solutions to Industrial Age problems, that just won't happen. As Lincoln said, "As our case is new, we must think anew, and act anew; we must disenthrall ourselves; and then we will save our country."
Wadda ya say?