The Democratic Party Ascendancy is Not Inevitable

Although I don't believe that democrats are going to go over the cliff with Hillary Clinton, it's still white knuckle time for me until everything is resolved. No sense in making the same arguments about why nominating Sen. Clinton is a colossally bad idea; suffice to say that if it happens, the Democratic Party's chances to win the presidency and build a progressive majority will look like the puff of smoke at the end of a Wile E. Coyote free-fall.

Obviously, it's not necessarily in the best interests of the long-term health of the Democratic Party to join Sen. Clinton in going over the side of the cliff. Let's just hope we all figure it out before we look down and and see that there's no ground beneath us. Democrats have a historic opportunity in this election. Not just in the race/gender context, but rather to build a thirty to forty year progressive coalition. Here's hoping we don't blow it.

I've broken down U.S. presidential elections into three distinct periods within a 112 year time frame. The trend-lines from each of these three periods are dramatically similar.

The first period comprises the thirty-six years from 1896 - 1932.

The second spans thirty-six years as well; 1932 - 1968.

The third comprises a forty year period from 1968 - 2008.

1896 to 1932:

The Republican Party held the presidency for 28 of these 36 years. The only candidate from the Democratic Party that was able to garner election during this period was Woodrow Wilson. Wilson was elected to two consecutive terms almost precisely in the middle of the 36 year republican run.

1932 to 1968:

Also a 36 year period except now the party holding the presidency flipped. During this period, the Democratic Party held the presidency for 28 of the 36 years. Much like the previous period, the party not in control of the presidency, the Republican Party, was only able to elect one individual during this period: Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Eisenhower, like Woodrow Wilson was a two-term president elected in the middle of the other party's run of presidential supremacy. Eisenhower's 8 years occurred in years 20 to 28 of the 36 Democratic Party run. This only slightly differs from Wilson, who held the presidency for 8 years during years 16 to 24 of the Republican Party run.

1968 - 2008:

Here, we have a 40 year run from the Republican Party. This 40 year period differs slightly from the previous periods.

First, there was a single one term presidency from the non-dominant party during this 40 year period. Jimmy Carter held the presidency for the Democratic Party from 1976 to 1980. Although this makes this period trend slightly different from the other two, I think Carter's election broke the regular cycle due to the historical anomaly of Watergate.

Again, notwithstanding Carter, the non-dominant party was able to control the presidency for 8 years. In this case Bill Clinton controlled the presidency for the non-dominant party between years 24 and 32 of the Republican Party run; a bit later than the previous two, which I think correlates to Carter's four years.

Now, I would argue that there are striking similarities between all three two-term presidencies of the non-dominant parties.

Wilson, Eisenhower, and Clinton all governed as centrists; sort of dominant party-lite. Each were constricted by a dominant party Congress that had powerful office holders. Wilson had Henry Cabot Lodge; Eisenhower had Lyndon Johnson; and Clinton had Newt Gingrich. Each were circumscribed in their ability to bring about sweeping change.

However, each dominant party had a two-term president that really shifted the political landscape for the others that followed. The first era had Teddy Roosevelt; the second had FDR; and the third had Reagan.

All of that is basically an incredibly long wind-up to make a very simple point: Barack Obama is the Democratic Party's opportunity to place its imprimatur on the presidency for a generation. Barack Obama is Teddy; he's FDR; he's Reagan, each of which were the right person in the right place at the right time.

We are in a period of Democratic Party presidential ascendancy. We have a historic opportunity to shape the landscape for a generation. This is not a moment in which democrats need to hold their nose and pick the best of bad options. This is a chance to be bold.

One of the biggest problems that I see with the Clinton campaign is that she's running for president as if it's 1992. She's stuck in a triangulating, republican co-opting time warp; whether that's voting for the war in Iraq or the absurd "gas-tax holiday" proposal. She cut her teeth on national politics in an era when for democrats to succeed they had to co-opt republican positions.

However, that's not where the country is now. And generally, I'm not one of those people that despises Bill Clinton for the DLC form of calculated politics. I think he did about the best he could given the political landscape he was in.

But, it's not 1992. We have an opportunity to transform the political landscape and build a long-term progressive majority. And we're only going to get it once.

How Nash McCabe Made Barack Obama's Point

Remember Nash McCabe? The "concerned citizen" through which ABC News laundered their atrocious patriotism impugning lapel-pin question in the Pennsylvania primary debate? I know; hard to believe it's only been five weeks ago--this primary campaign unfolds in psychotic reverse dog years with regards to how time feels.

First, a little background on Nash McCabe; there's a nice McClatchy profile HERE.

Second, it's impossible to not be completely sympathetic to her plight. I grew up in a single mother, paycheck-to-paycheck household. It's an incredible strain; and terribly difficult to break that cycle.

Third, I think Nash McCabe perfectly encapsulates the larger point that Barack Obama was attempting to make with his now infamous "bitter" comments.

A little background regarding Nash McCabe and the circumstances that led her to ask this question to Barack Obama in the debate preceding the Pennsylvania primary:

Senator Obama, I have a question, and I want to know if you believe in the American flag. I am not questioning your patriotism, but all our servicemen, policemen and EMS wear the flag. I want to know why you don't.

Nash McCabe lives in Latrobe, PA, located forty miles southeast of Pittsburgh. The population of the city is less than 10,000 and the city has lost more than 20% of its population between the 1990 and 2000 census. Latrobe is almost 99% white.

McCabe is fifty-two years old. She met her husband at a dance in 1983, and married him two months later; they have been married since. Six months into the marriage, Nash's husband was injured in an accident at the coal mine in which he was employed. He has been unable to work since.

The McClatchy article stated:

They never had children. He had back surgery. The muscle relaxers he took damaged his heart. He's had three bypasses, nine angioplasties, seven stents and a pacemaker. Three months ago doctors found a brain tumor. His choice: surgery that he may or may not survive, or life in a wheelchair.

Over 25 years of marriage, McCabe was the breadwinner. She said it took eight years to get her husband disability payments, during which time they racked up huge bills.

"I was a nurse's aide, a cashier," McCabe said. "From 1996 to 2000, I was a manager of a cleaning company. I started out as secretary and worked my way up to manager, and then the company decided to close. It took me almost two-and-a-half years to find a job that I got laid off from recently" as a clerk-typist. She has a high school diploma.

Sometimes the McCabes borrow money from her parents, who are in their 70s. She has a request in to the local food bank to see if she and her husband qualify.

Basically, a heartbreaking account of someone with an incredible amount of economic uncertainty, long-term health care concerns and obvious uneasiness about the ability to find steady work. In sum, Nash McCabe is the perfect embodiment of the very real substantive concerns that are weighing heavily on many Americans.

So, what did Nash McCabe care to know about Barack Obama?

I want to know if you believe in the American flag. I am not questioning your patriotism, but all our servicemen, policemen and EMS wear the flag. I want to know why you don't.

That's not an indictment of Mrs. McCabe. She has every right to be concerned about whatever issue she wants, regardless of what I think of her question. Is a flag pin going to make it easier for her to find a job? Make sure her husband is getting his disability payments? Trying to find decent health care? Of course not; it's not relevant to anything that might be able to improve her family's day-to-day life and allow them to live with a little dignity and security.

All of which brings me to Sen. Obama. Here's what he said--and, by the way, I can't read these words, even as inartfully as he attempted to make his point and not think of Nash McCabe:

Here's how it is: in a lot of these communities in big industrial states like Ohio and Pennsylvania, people have been beaten down so long, and they feel so betrayed by government, and when they hear a pitch that is premised on not being cynical about government, then a part of them just doesn't buy it. And when it's delivered by -- it's true that when it's delivered by a 46-year-old black man named Barack Obama (laugher), then that adds another layer of skepticism (laughter). [Next paragraph edited out]

But the truth is, is that, our challenge is to get people persuaded that we can make progress when there's not evidence of that in their daily lives. You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. So it's not surprising then that they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.

Again, the last sentence was not expressed in a manner that Sen. Obama would have preferred, as he himself has stated. However, up until the word 'bitter,' doesn't this sentiment both express and have sympathy for Pennsylvanians like Nash McCabe? Out of touch? Has a politician in our lifetime been more in touch with the struggles faced by folks in this country?

All of the problems with which Nash McCabe fights daily battles and what's the issue with which she has chosen to express the most concern: whether Barack Obama has a flag pin on his lapel?

That's where we are in this country. That's why, imperfect as he is, Barack Obama is the best choice for president of the United States.

God bless.