Diegetics

What I want to see is the progressive movement cutting its ties to the Democracy and emerging as a third party. The system needs a shake-up.

I don't like it. The original progressive movement failed, in my opinion, because it never managed to build itself as an independent political entity.

- the Democratic legacy. A new party can and should start with a clean slate, put some distance between it and the corruption of the two big party syndicates.

- control over the Democratic party by the Progressive faction can be lost just as easily (or even more so) as it was gained.

This isn't anything new. The conservative Democrats lost in bigger numbers because they were defending seats in relatively conservative areas. The same thing happened to liberal Republicans in 2006 and 2008.

[If anyone read the longer version of this post, please ignore it. I missed at least one important point in it, and I'm contemplating whether I'd rather take the time to revise it, or simply throw it out.]

Continuation of my last post...

A slight oversimplification of how American politics works: Conservative Republicans get elected in places consistently controlled by the Republicans. Liberal Democrats get elected in areas consistently controlled by the Democrats. (More on that below.) Relatively liberal Republicans and relatively conservative Democrats compete over the remaining areas. When the liberal Republicans win, analysts say the Democrats have purged the conservatives from their ranks. They then either conclude that this will make the remaining Democrats more effective, or they conclude that the Democrats are now an irrelevant fringe party. When the conservative Democrats win, analysts say the Republicans have purged the liberals from their ranks. They then either conclude that this will make the remaining Republicans more effective, or they conclude that the Republicans are now an irrelevant fringe party.

Strengths and weaknesses for Democrats and Republicans: Black people, Latinos, and the cultural elite tend Democratic. The business elite tends Republican. The rest of the country has both economic incentives to vote Democratic - insofar as entitlements and other Democratic policies raise their standard of living - and economic incentives to vote Republican - insofar as today's Democratic policies disproportionately support black people and Latinos, and insofar as today's civil servants have exceptionally secure jobs and retirement plans, without having salaries low enough to justify those benefits. (Creating the impression - sometimes accurate, sometimes not - that the Democrats are taking white people's money away and giving it to black people, Latinos, and their own employees.) (Civil servants, of course, have more of an economic incentive to support the Democrats than other people. To a lesser extent, so do unionized workers.)

The rest of the country also has a social incentive to vote for either the Democrats or the Republicans, depending on the local culture; some areas of the country are more socially liberal, some areas are more socially conservative.

As far as voters are concerned, the economic incentives to vote Republican are stronger than the incentives to vote Democratic; social liberalism or the presence of industry only gives the Democrats a decisive advantage in extreme cases. Besides areas with big black or Latino populations, elite suburbs, and college towns, the Democrats only consistently control a few exceptionally socially liberal rural areas (in New England and around the upper Mississippi River) and a few heavily industrialized or mining areas (in eastern Michigan, northeastern Pennsylvania, southern West Virgina, and - until this year, at least - northeastern Minnesota). By contrast, the Republicans consistently control not only most of the white rural areas in the socially conservative south, but also most of the white rural areas in the socially moderate central plains and west.

The future: Some people extrapolate the idea that the future belongs to liberals (or "progressives") from the fact that the black and Latino share of the American population is growing, and black people and Latinos tend to vote on economic and racial issues rather than on social issues (where they tend conservative). But that situation is obviously unstable. More than that; today's entire American political system (liberal and conservative) can only exist as long as it's possible to convincingly equate black people and Latinos with the poorest people in America.

Some people also extrapolate the idea that the future belongs to liberals from the fact that Generation Y is more liberal than the Baby Boomers, and will probably be so at every stage of life. But then, Generation X was more conservative than the Baby Boomers, at every stage of life. The next generation might be more liberal than Generation Y, or more conservative, depending on how factors combine.

Liberals do have the future in the long term, because Christianity is fighting a losing war against agnosticism (a mixed blessing, in my atheist opinion), and because conservative economic policies (including today's Democrats' neo-liberalism) will destroy the country if followed long enough; meaning the liberals will either win outright, or rebuild the country after the conservatives ruin it. (Or maybe nobody will rebuild the country, in which case the future belongs to nobody.) But I think Tinker is talking about the more immediate future.

Agreed on many points.

To add:

1) BobW was correct to point out that social security and medicare is blacks subsidizing whites, among the many cruel jokes inherent in those programs. I can't remember the gender component but I think there was one.

2) I think it is safe to say that the "conservative economics will destroy the country" meme is dramatically more at odds with reality these days, and I honestly say that in a non-partisan fashion.

I'll have to think on that for a bit, but would add that we are where we are in an acute sense due to enormous capital losses through malinvestment rather than "not producing enough". We made lots and lots of houses. But you might mean something different.

Our overall indebtedness simply made those losses much harder to bear.

Finally, somebody that knows about this. I believe Aferim was the last person I had this conversation with.

So the $100 trillion question is since the money was coming in anyway what should we have done with it? I don't have an answer.

What's amusing about this, is this is the same sort of argument Mr. Perfect put forth about the Tea Party in 2008. The Conservatives won, and it was going to be revolutionary. And it was, modest electoral victories in 2010 for the elephants!

Not revolutionary, just near record setting. Your inability to grasp reality has led you into many teabaggings. I see more in your future.

Teabags are rolling out for 2012 as we speak Tinker. You are really ignoring a lot about politics, I'm telling you now....