Probably no term in the political lexicon evokes more confusion that ‘populism,’ which has been carelessly tossed around to describe philosophies ranging from progressive to outright racist demagoguery. Fortunately we have Mike Lux to straighten out the mess and put the term in modern context to describe what it means for progressives and how it can be leveraged to help Democrats win a stable majority. In his HuffPo post “A Modern Progressive Populist Platform,” Lux explains:

With voters angry at the establishment and incumbents in general, and deals in particular, Democrats who are defenders of the established order are working overtime to beat down the idea of winning elections by using scary populism. Using faulty historical analogies, polls with carefully designed questions in order to elicit certain answers, and the specter of far-right anti-intellectualism as reasons not to be populist, they fear what might happen if Democrats actually start listening to real voters and make the changes people were promised in 2008.
The good news is that if the Democrats running for office in this tough, tough year will respond to the anti-establishment anger that is out there and ride it, they can do better than anyone is currently predicting. Of course, if that happened, it would be a very bad thing for corporate Democrats who don’t want anything to change, because it would prove the lie that the only way for Democrats to win is to kow-tow to special interest power and conventional wisdom.

Lux takes writers Matt Bai and Kevin Mattson to task for adding to the confusion about populism, and critiques Mattson’s article in the Aug. 3rd edition of The American Prospect:

Read more…

Conservatives have succeeded in hustling many pundits with the meme that America is a center-right country. As a result, the “move right and win,” strategy has prevailed in GOP circles. But Alan I. Abramowitz, author of The Disappearing Center: Engaged Citizens, Polarization, and American Democracy, sees it a little differently. Not one to shoot from the lip without statistical corroboration, Abramowitz a TDS advisory Board member, explains it this way in his post “Will Republicans Blow It? Tacking right doesn’t always guarantee victory on Election Day” in The American Prospect:

One way of addressing this question is to look at the relationship between the ideologies of congressional incumbents and their electoral performance. The advantage of focusing on incumbents is that their voting records can be used to gauge their overall liberalism or conservatism. For example, in the current Senate, based on a widely used scale called DW-NOMINATE, Russ Feingold, a Democrat from Wisconsin, and Bernie Sanders, an independent from Vermont, have the most liberal voting records, while Republicans Jim DeMint of South Carolina and Tom Coburn of Oklahoma have the most conservative.
In order to evaluate the impact of ideology on electoral performance, I conducted a statistical analysis of all contested Senate races involving incumbents between 1992 and 2008. I controlled for other factors that influence election results, such as the strength of the parties in the incumbent’s state, the strength of the challenger, and the political climate at the time of the election.
The results showed that for Republican incumbents, conservatism had a significant negative influence on electoral support. A 10 percent increase in conservatism was associated with a decline of about 1 percentage point in the incumbent’s vote. This may not sound like much, but a 10 percent decrease in conservatism might have saved seven of the 21 GOP incumbents who were defeated in these elections, including George Allen Jr. and Conrad Burns in 2006 and Norm Coleman and Ted Stevens in 2008.

But does the relationship cut the other way? Not so much, according to Abramowitz:

What about the other party? Interestingly, for Democratic incumbents, liberalism did not have a significant impact on electoral performance. Only nine Democratic senators lost their seats between 1992 and 2008. Having a strongly liberal voting record neither helped nor hurt Democratic incumbents, which may reflect the fact that liberal Democrats generally don’t emphasize ideological themes to the extent that conservative Republicans do.

Abramowitz cautions that it’s unclear whether a similar relationship prevails concerning the ideological leanings of challengers or open-seat candidates. But he nonetheless concludes that “..the evidence from two decades worth of Senate races involving Republican incumbents does raise serious doubts about the “move right and win” theory…While ideological moderates may have a hard time winning GOP primaries these days, they make stronger general-election candidates than hard-line conservatives.”
And with GOP moderates an endangered species in the 2010 mid terms, that is good news for Dems, who hope to hold their majorities.

TDS Co-Editor Ruy Teixeira has bad and worse news for Republicans who think the road to mid-term glory is paved with Democrats who oppose their tax cuts and support repeal of the Administration’s health care reform package. in his ‘Public Opinion Snapshot’ out today, Teixeira explains:

…Just 30 percent of respondents in a recent Pew poll favored keeping all the Bush tax cuts in place, while 27 percent said the tax cuts for the wealthy should be repealed and the rest of the cuts should stay in place, and another 31 percent said all the Bush tax cuts should be repealed.

So much for the most widely-worshipped of GOP sacred cows. Then there is that other revered cause, the trashing of health care reform, about which Teixeira notes,

…The most recent Kaiser Health tracking poll now has 50 percent voicing a favorable reaction to the new law, versus just 35 percent unfavorable. This reverses a 44-41 unfavorable verdict from two months ago.

Democrats may have their problems in terms of historical patterns respecting the upcoming mid term elections. But public support for repeal of health care reform and irresponsible tax cuts are emphatically not the huge GOP assets conservative pundits and leaders have argued.

TDS Co-Editor Ruy Teixeira, and Hart Research analysts Guy Molyneux and John Whaley have a new 100-page report, “Better, Not Smaller,” (PDF here) that shatters one of the most treasured conservative myths — that shrinking the size of government is what most voters want. The report, based on a survey completed in May by Hart Research Associates for the Center for American Progress and its Doing What Works project, is one of the most thorough investigations of public attitudes and perceptions about the size and quality of government yet conducted.
The report is being released in conjunction with the ‘Doing What Works Conference’ now being streamed, live via webcast as we go to press, on the Center for American Progress Web pages. From the authors’ introduction to the report:

Public confidence in government is at an all-time low, according to a major new survey commissioned by the Center for American Progress. And yet clear majorities of Americans of all ages want and expect more federal involvement in priority areas such as energy, poverty, and education, the poll found.
The key lesson embedded in these seemingly paradoxical results: Americans want a federal government that is better, not smaller. CAP’s new research shows people would rather improve government performance than reduce its size. And they are extremely receptive to reform efforts that would eliminate inefficient government programs, implement performance-based policy decisions, and adopt modern management methods and information technologies.
The May survey of 2,523 adults conducted by Hart Research Associates found that public lack of confidence in government’s ability to solve problems is more closely related to perceptions of government performance than it is a function of partisan affiliation or political ideology. A majority of respondents indicated they would be more likely to support political candidates who embrace a reform agenda of improving government performance, effectiveness, and efficiency.

The survey noted “substantial support” among the younger respondents, as well as people of color, self-identified independents, political moderates and even some Republicans and Tea Party supporters, for reforms keyed to cutting inefficient programs, while redirecting support to cost-efficient programs, publishing evaluations of individual programs/agencies and modernizing management methods and information technologies. Further,

Americans have not significantly changed their opinion of government’s role. Indeed, clear majorities want more federal government involvement in priority areas, and they expect government’s role in improving people’s lives to grow rather than shrink in importance in the years ahead.
Rather than a rejection of big government, the survey reveals a rejection of incompetent government….

The authors caution, however:

The government receives mediocre to poor performance ratings from the public both in terms of how effective it is and how well it is managed. There is a widespread belief that government spends their tax dollars inefficiently, and the survey explores these perceptions of “wasteful spending” in significant depth. Improving these perceptions, we find, is a central challenge for reform efforts.
The message to politicians and policymakers is clear. Government will not regain the public trust unless it earns it. And earning it means spending taxpayer money more carefully–and doing what works.

Yet, overall, the study found “a surprisingly high level of confidence that government effectiveness can be improved” and “poor performance in the public sector is not inevitable.” The authors cite “a powerful commitment to realizing that potential for better government.” It appears that conservatives parroting the ‘big government’ as demon meme may be preaching to the choir. Democrats, on the other hand, just may be able to reach a more thoughtful constituency by talking about what it takes to create smart government.

In terms of historical trends, there is not much of an upside for Dems, who currently control 27 state legislatures, compared to the GOP’s control of 14 (8 split), in Tim Storey’s “Legislature Lowdown” at Larry J. Sabato’s Crystal Ball:

…Since 1900, there have been 27 elections held in the presidential mid-term year. In all but two of those mid-term elections, the party in the White House lost seats in state legislatures. The only exceptions were in 1934 and 2002. In 1934 during one of the lowest points of the great depression, Democrats campaigned on Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal and gained over 1100 legislative seats nationwide in FDR’s first mid-term election. In 2002, Republicans rode a groundswell of support for President George W. Bush in the wake of the September 11th attacks to pick up 177 seats. However, in the other 25 mid-term elections, the party of the president lost an average 495 legislative seats. Mid-term losses have been mitigated in recent decades since modern redistricting took hold, but the trend is still very consistent. This trend is not good news for Democratic legislative candidates running for the first time since 2000 with a Democrat in the White House.

Storey identifies 27 “battleground” legislative chambers, where a pick-up of just 3 seats would lead to a switch of party in the majority. Dems have 14 to defend, compared to 11 for the GOP, with AK Senate and MT House tied. The big prizes, in terms of the more populous states, are the NY Senate (32 D – 29 R – 1 vacant), the OH House (53 D – 46 R), and the PA House (104 D – 98 R – 1 vacant). Close behind would be the TX House (73D – 77 R),
As Storey points out, in 44 states redistricting by state legislatures is a critical issue of concern with respect to national politics (6 states that have special commission-like structures for that purpose). Further,

The 2011 redistricting could be the first time since the era of modern redistricting began in the 1980s, following the 1960s landmark Supreme Court decisions on redistricting and the evolution of the process in the 1970s, that Republicans have the redistricting edge in the states, and it could be substantial. If November 2nd is a big Republican wave election, it could give the GOP sole redistricting authority in the drawing of more than 160 U.S. House districts–nearly six times more than their Democratic counterparts. Under this scenario, the bulk of the seats redrawn in the 2011 redistricting, about 200, will be in states with divided partisan control. The stakes for this November’s legislative elections could not be higher. It’s shaping up to be a year of historic volatility in state legislative elections.

In addition to redistricting concerns, adds Storey, “Legislatures enact over 20,000 new laws every year” and spend “about $1.5 trillion” in taxpayer money annually.”
Looking at the big picture, it’s possible Dems could lose some state legislatures, but still have control in a plurality of states. What may be more important in terms of congressional seats and the electoral college is what happens in the aforementioned larger states, especially TX, which is expected to gain as many as 3 or 4 U.S. House of Reps. seats. Perhaps Democratic contributors would do well to send a little love to the state Democratic Party organizations in NY, PA, OH and TX.

As with any election, the 2010 mid terms require that Democrats not only define their beliefs, but also make a credible case why their adversaries should be defeated. Writing at HuffPo, Robert Creamer, author of Stand Up Straight: How Progressives Can Win, has a handy summary of reasons why the Republicans must not be allowed to win control of congress. Here’s some excerpts:

…Over the course of eight short years — between 2000 and 2008 — the Republicans methodically executed their plan to transform American society. They systematically transferred wealth from the middle class to the wealthiest two percent of Americans — slashing taxes for the wealthy. They eviscerated the rules that held Wall Street, Big Oil and private insurance companies accountable to the public. They allowed and encouraged the recklessness of the big Wall Street banks that ultimately collapsed the economy and cost eight million Americans their jobs. They ignored exploding health care costs, tried to privatize Social Security, gave the drug companies open season to gouge American consumers and presided over a decline in real incomes averaging $2,000 per family. They entangled America in an enormously costly, unnecessary war in Iraq, pursued a directionless policy that left Afghanistan to fester, and sullied America’s good name throughout the world.
Their economic policy of cutting taxes for the wealthy and deregulating big Corporations failed to create jobs. In fact, over his eight year term, George Bush’s administration created exactly zero net private sector jobs. They inherited a Federal budget with surpluses as far as the eye could see and rolled up more debt than all of the previous Presidents in the over 200 years of American history. And in the end they left the economy in collapse.
This was not a disaster that could be remedied overnight. By taking bold action at the beginning of his administration, President Obama and the Democrats in Congress prevented the financial crisis from morphing into a Great Depression…Obama, the Democrats and their progressive allies have — after a century of trying — finally passed health care reform allowing America to end its status as the only industrialized nation that did not provide health care as a right. They are on the brink of reining in the recklessness of the big Wall Street banks. And they have set the stage for massive long-term investments in economic growth and clean energy.

Creamer acknowledges the impatience of Americans about “the slow pace of economic recovery” and the “special interests that profited from their economic pain,” and he cites the Republicans’ “audacity” in arguing that Dems are to blame: “In effect they want the election to be a referendum on whether the Democrats have mopped and swept fast enough cleaning up the mess that they created.” Further, says Creamer,

Read more…

Conservatives are pulling out all stops in trying to implant the meme that the public wants an all-out war on the federal deficit, including spending cuts of the sort Republicans favor. In his latest ‘Public Opinion Snapshot’ at the Center for American Progress web pages, however, TDS Co-Editor Ruy Teixeira explains:

…The grain of truth here is that the public is in fact concerned about the size of the deficit. But everything else is wrong. There are many more important things to the public than cutting the deficit.
Take jobs, for example. The public declared by 60-38 in a mid-June Gallup/USA Today poll that they favored Congress passing new legislation this year that would provide “additional government spending to create jobs and stimulate the economy.” Of course, this is exactly the kind of legislation conservatives are now strenuously opposing on the grounds the public is sick and tired of spending to create jobs.

As for other cuts in social spending,

…A late June Pew poll asked the public if they’d approve of various spending cuts to balance their state’s budget this year. The public opposed all of them. This included 73-21 opposition to cutting funding for K-12 public schools; 71-25 opposition to cutting funding for police, fire, and other public safety departments; 65-27 opposition to cutting health care services provided by state or local government; and 50-43 opposition to cutting funding for maintaining roads and public transportation systems.

At a time when congress is considering a range of new initiatives to stimulate the economy and hiring, Teixeira says it’s important to remember that the public wants to keep essential social programs: “Policymakers would do well to remember this as they consider bills that would pump additional money into the economy by extending unemployment benefits, preventing teacher layoffs, and the like. Killing these bills in the name of deficit reduction is not doing the public’s bidding–it’s exactly the reverse.”

Joshua Green, senior editor of The Atlantic has an interesting post, “Do Marijuana Ballot Initiatives Help Democrats Win?” Green cites the piggy-back strategy used by Karl Rove as a possible template for Dems:

Not long ago, Karl Rove was considered a political genius. His mastery of the small, clever maneuver–typically unappreciated until it swung an election–was a big reason why. To his enemies, nothing exemplified Rovean perfidy like the state ballot initiatives he encouraged banning gay marriage that appeared across the country in 2004. Rove’s idea was that conservatives lukewarm on President Bush could be persuaded to support the ban–and, once they’d shown up to do that, would probably vote for Bush, too. On Election Day, the ballot initiatives passed easily and Bush narrowly won a second term.
…Acting on a tip from an Obama official, I found a few Democratic consultants who have become convinced that ballot initiatives legalizing marijuana, like the one Californians will vote on in November, actually help Democrats in the same way that gay marriage bans were supposed to have helped Republicans. They are similarly popular, with medical marijuana having passed in 14 states (and the District of Columbia) where it has appeared on the ballot. In a recent poll, 56 percent of Californians said they favor the upcoming initiative to legalize and tax pot.

The idea is to re-enthuse the youth base which was so helpful in Obama’s victory. Green quotes Jim Merlino, a Colorado political consultant, who helped pass marijuana initiatives in 2000 and 2006: “If you look at who turns out to vote for marijuana, they’re generally under 35. And young people tend to vote Democratic.”
The pro-legalization constituency undoubtedly can be found to some extent among all age groups, especially the greying generation of the 1960’s. The assumption would be that it might also increase mid term turnout of liberals, who favor legalization, but also libertarians, some of whom vote Republican and perhaps even some conservatives, who realize that minor marijuana offenses account for a substantial percentage of incarcerated individuals and associated expenditures.
Green acknowledges that there is no hard data indicating a clear link between marijuana ballot initiatives and increased Democratic turnout, nor even between same sex marriage ballot initiatives and Republican turnout. But he does cite a study indicating that in the 1982 midterms nuclear freeze initiatives in ten states had “a significant positive effect on Democratic candidates.”
In November up to a half-dozen states may hold ballot initiatives to permit medical patients, and others, to smoke marijuana. In California, which has already legalized marijuana use for medical purposes, voters will decide on legalizing it for adults. The state NAACP has endorsed Proposition 19, arguing that selective enforcement of current marijuana laws disproportionately penalizes people of color.