Column: Dems' themes can win election
Published April 18, 2008
Americans generally view politics as tactics, not strategy. That is, the media focus so much on who said what or which candidate is visiting which factory or farm. So the public often does not see the larger meaning behind these appearances. Although generally overlooked, campaign strategy is perhaps the most important aspect of politics.
When I talk about strategy, I mean the overall framing of the campaign. Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., seized “change” as the central theme of his campaign early on and has been framing his rhetoric and arguments upon that theme. Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., thought “experience” was the way to go.
For a long time, the Democratic Party thought the American people had rejected their core values. Ronald Reagan had a great deal to do with this, but the party elites were also at fault. When Bill Clinton won election and re-election in 1992 and 1996, it was on a more moderate platform.
In 2006, the party returned to its core beliefs, and Democrats unseated Republicans in six states: Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Virginia, Missouri and Montana. The last five of these states were considered by both experts and casual observers to be so-called Republican strongholds. It was Vermont Gov. Howard Dean’s strategy and the Democratic Party’s emphasis upon its core values that lead to these victories. Granted, demographic shifts and dissatisfaction with the Republican Party played a role in these victories. But it was the contrast that the Democratic candidates all offered the voters that put them over the top.
There are many in the party who remain afraid of the Republican machine; these are the same people who harbor an irrational view of the Democratic Party’s inability to win a national campaign. What these people do not realize is that the Republican Party is crippled; they are almost bankrupt, their coalition is falling apart and their central message of “guns, God, and gays” is a dog that just won’t hunt anymore. Regardless of the political realities, these people are the main advocates of moderation and acquiescence of the party’s core values. But both recent and not-so-recent history has shown us that this path is the road to perdition. As a party, we Democrats must embrace our core values of helping the middle class, of speaking for those that have no voice, of building an honest and open government and of making America a leader in the world, not a laughingstock.
There is no way a candidate has been defeated by running on a platform of middle-class tax cuts and an end to war. The framing of the overall debate for the Democratic Party must not be abstract; we must focus on our roots, our history as the party of retirement security, universal health care, sensible tax cuts and an intelligent foreign policy. If we build on these themes using the excellent ideas proposed by both of our sensible candidates and combine them with hard work from the party base, I have no doubt we will be victorious in November. Let’s build on our successes and cast aside our failures. Let’s build on our core values as Democrats and explain them to the American people the way former Sen. Zell Miller, D-Ga., did in 1992: “Not all of us can be born rich, handsome and lucky, and that’s why we have a Democratic Party.”