This item by Democratic strategist Robert Creamer, author of “Stand Up Straight: How Progressives Can Win,” is
cross-posted from HuffPost, where it appeared on July 22.
Despite warnings of some of its wisest strategists, the GOP is racing headlong into a political box canyon — and potential political marginality.
On issue after issue, the GOP has veered far from the mainstream of the American electorate. Worse, they are swimming upstream against a tide of changing demographics — and an electorate with ever-increasing numbers of young voters from the “millennial generation” that polls show is the most progressive generation in half a century.
So far, at least, efforts to “rebrand” the GOP have simply collapsed. And even though most Americans are primarily concerned with jobs and the future of the economy, the GOP leadership in Congress insists on focusing on cultural issues that pander to a narrow segment of the electorate — and are downright unpopular.
They seem to be practicing the politics of “subtraction” — which is not a good plan if you want to achieve an electoral majority.
A quick look at the issue landscape tells the tale.
Women’s Reproductive Rights. Women constitute more than a majority of the voting electorate and poll after poll shows that women want the right to make their own reproductive choices without interference from predominantly white, male lawmakers. But the GOP has made its campaign to ban abortion job one. And for many GOP lawmakers and activists it’s not just reproductive choice — it’s banning contraception. Really — in 2013.
Whether in state legislatures like Texas, or the House of Representatives in Washington, instead of jobs, the GOP focuses on passing laws that require doctors to insert unwelcome, medically unnecessary ultra-sound devices into women’s vaginas.
Recently, a GOP consultant advised Republicans to never utter the word “rape” — but they can’t help themselves. You’d think the spectacular collapses of the Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock Senate campaigns in 2012 would have made the point. But just this week, the sponsor of Texas’ restrictive abortion law, Rep. Jodie Laubenberg, explained that after being raped, that “rape kits” are used “clean out” a woman and help protect her from pregnancy. No, Jodie, “rape kits” are used by police to collect evidence to prosecute rapists — not as a primitive form of Plan B — which you presumably oppose.
Immigration Reform. The fall elections sent an unmistakable message that the GOP will be unable to compete for votes from Hispanics and Asian Americans — two fast-growing components of the new American electorate — if they continue to oppose immigration reform.
Some in the Senate got the message. But there is every bit of evidence that many House Republicans will continue to worry more about their narrow Tea Party base than the long-term ability of the GOP to compete.
Earlier this week, Public Policy Polling (PPP) published a poll of voters in the districts of seven GOP lawmakers who represent competitive districts with sizable Hispanic or Asian American populations. The poll found that, by almost two to one, voters said they would be less likely to vote for the GOP incumbent if they voted against immigration reform.
Just as importantly, by equal numbers, they said that if the GOP blocked immigration reform, they would be less likely to vote for Republicans generally.
That means that if Republicans in the House block immigration reform with a path to citizenship for immigrants, they could likely lose seven of the 17 seats the Democrats need to take over the House. And there are many additional districts where the poll results would likely be the same.
Blocking immigration reform could cost the GOP its House majority, but still — notwithstanding the political cover provided them by pro-immigration evangelical and business groups, and many GOP senators — you see large numbers of House Republicans who are dead set against it.
Climate Change and the Environment. Polling shows that very few issues move “Millennials” more than the threat of climate change. But many in the GOP are oblivious, or down-right anti-science — or they are wholly-owned subsidiaries of Big Oil. The result: they are driving away millennial voters in droves.
Millennials and the public at large support legislation to cut down on greenhouse gases, both because they are concerned with public health and because they correctly understand that renewable energy development underpins the economy of the future.
Gun Violence. As if reproductive choice wasn’t enough to drive away women voters, most GOP lawmakers have sold their souls to the NRA and oppose commonsense legislation to limit gun violence.
Of course there are big exceptions, like Senator Pat Toomey from Pennsylvania who noticed his state includes massive numbers of suburban women and decided to co-sponsor the Toomey-Manchin bill to create universal background checks.

Read more…

This item by Erica Seifert was originally published on July 10, 2013.
As Congress returns from recess this week, we would like to believe that it will finally get down to the business of governing — but that would be too optimistic, even for us. Instead, the Republican Congress remains unprepared to address the real issues facing students, working women, and underemployed families. Most likely, the GOP’s top priority will be grinding government to a halt.
Republican leaders may believe that American voters don’t notice, or hope that their constituents will blame President Obama and the Democrats for the dysfunction in Washington. But if they do, the GOP will have severely underestimated the electorate.
Our recent battleground survey in the most vulnerable Republican districts and focus groups in two Republican-controlled states find that the GOP’s approach to “un-governing” has marginalized the party, even in red states.
Take these examples:

–In our recent battleground survey, 69 percent of voters in the most vulnerable Republican districts said that they wanted their representative to work with President Obama to address our problems. Just a quarter (26 percent) of voters in these districts would prefer that their representative try to stop the president from advancing his agenda.
–In the same survey, two of the top concerns among voters in the most vulnerable Republican-held districts were that the Republican Party is “so uncompromising that Washington is gridlocked,” and that the GOP is “only focused on blocking Obama’s agenda.”

In our focus groups, voters in Ohio and Florida were clear about their displeasure with the status quo. Here are some of the terms they used to describe the Republican Party and its leaders:

“Corrupted.”
“Con show.”
“Inflexibility.”
“Argumentative.”
“Too concerned about fighting with the Democrats.”

And when it comes to the Republican Party’s approach to the economy, they say:

“Not willing to work together.”
“Unwilling to compromise.”
“Being inflexible.”

Looking to the future, Republicans are going to have a very difficult time with young people. Here is what young voters in Florida think about the GOP:

“I think they’re just so far off the path that most Americans or people who generally identify themselves as Republicans look beyond.”
“They’re just so stuck.”
“I think it also goes back again to they’re just so… they have to do the opposite of what the Democrats are doing like it doesn’t matter like what it is, like they have to fight so they have to do the opposite. So if they want this then they’re going to want this.”
“This is a prime example of Republicans fighting just to fight, in my opinion.”

Clearly, the GOP is in need of a course correction. With even red-state voters expressing frustration at the nonstop obstruction, Republicans will continue their inflexible approach at their own peril.

This item by J.P. Green was originally published on June 25, 2013.
In his Wonkblog post, “Ross Douthat gets Washington right, then very wrong,” Ezra Klein gets the New York Times columnist right. Douthat argued that the political establishment’s current focus on lower-priority concerns like gun control, immigration and climate change, when the public wants action on jobs and the economy, shows how out-of-touch ‘Washington’ is. Klein explains:

Much of the work here is done by bundling all the relevant players into a disappointing, elitist mass Douthat simply calls “Washington.” It’s “Washington” that’s failing. “Washington” that is not “readying, say, payroll tax relief for working-class families.” “Washington” where “we’re left with the peculiar spectacle of a political class responding to a period of destructive long-term unemployment with an agenda that threatens to help extend that crisis.”

Douthat departs from the “blame Washington” meme long enough to note that “the public’s non-priorities look like the entirety of the White House’s second-term agenda.” It’s a fairly transparent propaganda trick. Blame the entire political system for the paralyzing obstructionism of a faction in congress, while singling out the major player willing to compromise for the common good as somehow responsible for the failure to secure an agreement.
The political system in Washington — not the capitol itself — is broken in places, but not in ways that Douthat is willing to acknowledge. The abuse of the filibuster, for example, is a destructive systemic malady, which must be fixed before a working consensus can be secured. Yet, even this systemic impediment exists because of the Republican Party’s refusal to negotiate in good faith on the priority concerns of jobs and the economy, as well as nearly all other issues.
“Washington” has become a term that conflict-averse and pro-Republican commentators use to delude the public, and in some cases themselves, that GOP obstructionism is not the core problem. Opinion polls indicate that it’s not working all that well. Sure, millions of people parrot silly expressions like “Washington is out of touch.” But when specifically asked which party is more out of touch, in poll after poll more will say it’s the Republicans.
The better conservative columnists and commentators like Will, Brooks and Douthat, will occasionally fault the GOP for lame comments by its leaders and dumb tactical moves. But when it comes to assessing the GOP’s grand strategy of knee-jerk, full-tilt obstructionism to anything significant proposed by the President or Democrats, top conservative commentators shrug it off. They never defend the gridlock strategy directly, but their silence knowingly gives it a free pass. Their party — and America — would be better-served if they opened up the dialogue.

This item by J.P. Green was originally published on May 25, 2013.
In a more rational Republican Party, here’s a headline that would encourage the leadership to stop and rethink a few of their assumptions: “Fewer Americans Identify as Economic Conservatives in 2013: Thirty percent say they are liberal on social issues, a new high.” The headline comes from Andrew Dugan’s report on Gallup’s annual Values and Beliefs poll, conducted May 2-7.
The percentage of Americans who identify themselves as “economic conservative” has declined 5 percent, to 41 percent from 46 percent in the 2012 edition of the Values and Beliefs poll. Those who identify themselves as economic moderates picked up the gain, increasing their percentage from 32 to 37 percent. Those who call themselves economic liberals declined a point, from 20 to 19 percent, a figure that “has not fluctuated much since 2001”.
But there is some good news for liberals in the poll, as Dugan reports:

While economic liberalism remains stagnant, the percentage of Americans describing their social views as “liberal” or “very liberal” has achieved a new peak of 30% — in line with Gallup’s recent finding that Americans are more accepting on a number of moral issues. Thirty-five percent of Americans say they are conservative or very conservative on social issues and 32% self-identify as socially moderate.
Most Americans are ideologically consistent in their views of economic and social issues. For individuals who gave an answer to both questions, 75% of social conservatives also considered themselves economic conservatives, while 60% of social moderates were also economic moderates. Social liberals were less “consistent,” with a slim plurality, 44%, saying they were also economically liberal.
“Pure” conservatives — individuals who say they are conservative in both policy spheres — make up a substantial portion of self-identified or leaning Republicans, 63%. Pure liberals, by far less common than their ideological polar opposites, are a less sizable contingent of the Democratic Party, constituting 28% of its overall base.

While the poll may not reflect a political earthquake in the making, there is no good news here for the GOP. As Dugan concludes, “… The trend suggests that ideological attitudes in the country may be shifting. Social liberalism has grown by six points since 2001 and now attracts half of rank-and-file Democrats and Democratic leaners. It is possible that Americans are returning to a certain sense of normalcy on economic ideology, while social ideology continues to charter new ground.”
Perhaps the more interesting possibility is that Republican Party obstructionism has reached the point of diminishing returns — that the “conservative” brand has been tainted by association with the GOP, and growing numbers are more comfortable calling themselves something else.

This item by J.P. Green was originally published on May 22, 2013.
As one of the most important swing states, Florida’s election law reforms are of more than local interest. So, when Florida’s right-wing governor Rick Scott reverses his earlier opposition to early voting and suddenly signs into law reforms that actually improve voting rights, it may indicate that growing public discontent about voter suppression is making swing voters tilt Democratic. As Aaron Deslatte Tallahassee Bureau Chief of the SunSentinel, explains:

Gov. Rick Scott has signed an elections bill that allows more early voting, in an attempt to reverse some of the restrictions the Republican-controlled Legislature put in place in 2011…is a response to the ridicule Florida received in the days after President Barack Obama’s re-election, when votes were still being counted in a few counties…some urban counties like Miami-Dade, Broward and Orange saw lines that stretched for hours.
Miami-Dade, in particular, has been blasted for not re-aligning its voting precincts with updated population data, resulting in some polling sites that were slammed and others largely empty. Other counties like Palm Beach complained that vendors botched up ballots and software…The bill, HB 7013, lets the State Department fine vendors $25,000 for voting-machine problems that don’t get fixed.
…It also increases the allowable early voting hours, and goes from eight days to 14 days. The Legislature had reduced that early-voting window to one week in 2011, which some evidence has found decreased early-voting turnout last year — particularly among minorities.
And it expands the locations for early voting from just election offices and city halls to include courthouses, civic centers, stadiums, convention centers, fairgrounds and government-owned senior and community centers.
“…With this election reform package, Florida has achieved what many of us thought at one time might be impossible: a huge improvement to our democratic process and a giant step forward for Florida voters,” said Deirdre Macnab, president of the League of Women Voters of Florida.
…But Democrats and some voting-rights groups have been less-than-thrilled with the bill because it gives county election supervisors discretion in the number of hours of early voting they offer — as much as 168 hours — and whether or not to hold early voting on the Sunday before a general election. Some rural counties have said that Sunday is rarely used by voters, while it’s a main get-out-the-vote day among minorities in more urban counties…

The Republicans’ heavy-handed voter suppression may be backfiring with swing voters. Certainly the outrage about FL’s long lines at the polls in 2012 — 8 plus hours in some Miami precincts — aren’t helping the state GOP. Gov. Rick Scott seemed to be campaigning for poster boy for voter suppression before the election. Now he is all about expanding voter access, no doubt to save his political skin. He is running scared.
Looking toward 2014, polls taken in March by Public Policy Polling and Quinnipiac University showing Gov. Scott running 8 and 6 points, respectively, behind likely Democratic candidate for FL Gov. Charlie Crist.
Whether Dems can beat Gov. Scott or not in 2014, leveraging voting reforms in key states is a critical concern for Democratic GOTV. Florida is not only a key swing state with the 3rd largest electoral vote bloc (29 e.v.’s, tied w/ NY) ; it’s also a bellwether, having picked the winner in 12 out of the last 13 presidential elections (12 of the last 14, for those who believe the 2000 election was stolen). The DNC, major party contributors and progressives in general should gladly provide whatever help the Florida Democratic Party needs to take full advantage of the reforms.

This item by James Vega was originally published on May 21, 2013.
In a new piece titled provocatively titled, “Obama the Uniter? Not Really”, the Washington Post’s resident dispensers of inside the beltway common wisdom have once again managed to concede the reality of Republican extremism as the source of political polarization in one sentence and then turn around and lay the responsibility for it on Obama in another.
Just watch how this world Olympic-class “it’s not really his fault except it really is” gymnastic logical summersault is performed:

“Obama the Uniter? Not Really”,
…there’s little question that Republicans in Congress have been driven to the ideological right over the past few years due in large part to a series of primary victories by conservative insurgents over incumbents viewed as insufficiently loyal to party principles.
But, Obama is still the president who pledged — loudly and repeatedly — to change how Washington works. That has not happened. The economic stimulus bill and the healthcare law passed on party line votes in his first term. The gun bill failed on party lines in his second term. And, with a series of scandals and investigations now mounting, it seems more likely that partisanship will grow rather than shrink in the coming months…
None of that is Obama’s fault and there is nothing — or virtually nothing — he can do to change it. But, add it all up and you are left with one inescapable conclusion: The president who pledged to change Washington is almost certain to come up short on that promise.

Wow. I sure am glad Cillizza and Sullivan weren’t writing in the early 60’s. They probably would have evaluated Martin Luther King something like this:

Martin Luther King, Man of Peace? Not Really
…there’s little question that segregationists have been driven even further to the ideological right over the past few years due in large part to the growing demands for equality …But Martin Luther King is still the leader who pledged — loudly and repeatedly — to seek civil rights without violence.
That has not happened….A church in Birmingham has been bombed, civil rights workers have been murdered and John Kennedy has been assassinated.
None of that is King’s fault and there is nothing — or virtually nothing — he can do to change it. But, add it all up and you are left with one inescapable conclusion: The leader who pledged to seek civil rights without violence is almost certain to come up short on that promise.

Does anybody except me think that this is just world class crazy? I sure do hope so.

This item by J.P. Green was originally published on April 30, 2013.
Tom Raum’s AP article “Economic gains may not help Democrats much in 2014” really deserves a subtitle like, say, “Unless of Course They’re Really Good.” The nut of Raum’s argument:

–Presidential claims of responsibility for economic gains rarely win plaudits from voters, yet presidents nearly always get blamed when things get worse.
–The historical odds for midterm gains in Congress by the in-power party are slim at best. Since World War II, the president’s party has lost an average of 26 seats in midterm elections and gained seats only twice — Democrats in 1998 under President Bill Clinton and Republicans in 2002 with George W. Bush in the Oval Office.
–Presidential elections are often referendums on the economy. That applies less often to midterms.

Raum adds that “there has been a feeling of incremental improvement after Obama’s first term in office. That’s the key word, incremental. Presidents have to make the people believe that things are getting better every month.”
Raum concedes the good news Dems are trumpeting: “Right now, surveys and reports show that the recovery is continuing, although more slowly than most, despite continued high unemployment and an environment of modest economic growth and inflation. Home prices are on the rise, manufacturing is slowly improving.” He cites an uptick in consumer spending and economic growth statistics. He says economists credit Obama’s policies with creating about 3 million jobs, while the Administration claims 6 million jobs added.
But Raum believes sitting presidents have to be very cautious about how much they brag about their economic accomplishments:

Democratic strategists James Carville, Stan Greenberg and Erica Seifert concluded from focus-group sessions with both Democratic and Republican audiences that Obama fares far better in speeches when he highlights economic progress without taking credit.
People “are very much on edge financially … because they live it every day. Every speech needs to start from a place that understands this is not theoretical or ideological,” they wrote in a policy memo. Obama must “thread a very careful needle,” they concluded.

Raum also quotes Rutgers political science professor: “Americans would say, ‘Well, that’s our judgment to make, whether you’re doing a good job or not….Facts speak for themselves,” Baker said. “If things are good, you don’t really need to make any extraordinary claims.”
President Obama is certainly smart enough to avoid crossing the line between skilfully defending his record with facts and bragging immodestly. He’s got articulate surrogates who can amplify his accomplishments in a way that allows him to preserve his dignity. he also has a good sense of just how much he can get away with in terms of explaining his challenges without sounding like a whiner. We will never hear him echoing his predecessor’s mantra in the 2004 debate with Sen Kerry “It’s tough…It’s hard work”
Most voters are smart enough to know that presidents can have undeserved good luck or bad luck. The 2012 vote suggests that a healthy majority apparently gets it that President Obama inherited an unholy mess from his predecessor, and increasingly, that he has done fairly well, especially considering that the Republican party has zero interest in doing anything that might help the country if it also means helping Obama.
Historical patterns suggest that the Republicans will take control of the Senate and hold their majority of the House. For that to happen, however, a majority of the voters who show up at the polls in 2014 will have to think continued gridlock is a good thing or believe, against all evidence, that their Republican incumbent is capable of bipartisan cooperation for economic recovery.
What Democrats have going for them in 2014 is the growing realization among most informed voters that President Obama needs a substantial congressional majority to get anything done. Most swing voters will figure out that electing more Republicans means even more gridlock. Getting rid of a few Republicans on the other hand, just might enable the President to kick-start the economy. If Democrats do indeed have a qualitative edge in ground game mechanics and candidate recruitment for 2014, an upset just may be in the making.

This staff post was originally published on April 17, 2013.

Ed Kilgore’s “The Era of Big Accomplishments Is Over–For Now” at The Washington Monthly provides a much-needed reality check for critics of President Obama: As Kilgore explains:

Look, everybody knows the score: so long as congressional Republicans refuse to work with Democrats on legislation dealing with the major challenges facing the country, there will be no Era of Big Accomplishments for a Democratic president if the GOP has either control of the House or 41 firm votes in the Senate. Right now they have both, and they know it. As the gun issue has shown, big Democratic advantages in public opinion do not significantly inhibit Republican obstructionism. And even on the one big issue where many Republicans feel it is in their long-range interest to bend–immigration–it’s (a) not at all clear comprehensive reform legislation can survive conservative opposition, and even if it does (b) it will likely be a less progressive reform than George W. Bush was proposing six years ago.
Since Democratic presidents have a habit of wanting to govern, of course Obama hasn’t thrown up his hands or thrown in the towel in the face of this situation. He’s laid down second-term markers that reflect what he campaigned for in 2012, and what his supporters expect from him, and has also risked that support by making an offer to congressional Republicans on entitlements that seems designed to further expose their incorrigible obstructionism. He’ll also, I’m sure, try some executive gambits (e.g., on greenhouse gas emissions), though it’s unclear how many he can actually execute without practical control of Congress.
But we’ve known for a good while now that the odds of Obama being able to do much of anything other than protect the accomplishments he achieved before 2011 (and even that will be difficult) were low, and probably won’t improve a great deal after another midterm election cycle where Republicans have all sorts of advantages.
Inveterate Obama critics from the Right, and those on the Left who expect Obama to deploy magical powers to overcome the entrenched power of the GOP, will mock his record for its limited accomplishments. Lord knows he’s made mistakes and isn’t perfect. But at this stage, even if Obama combined the public charisma of FDR with the legislative skills of LBJ, it’s difficult to see how the road gets any easier. An unlikely House takeover in 2014 combined with a continued Senate majority willing to undertake radical filibuster reform might change everything. But anything less won’t change the basic dynamics.

Republicans are going to keep bashing away at the president regardless of what he does. Obama’s Democratic critics will continue to fault him for his mistakes, doomed bipartisan overtures and perceived lack of gumption. That’s OK. Democrats are supposed to press the president toward more progressive policies at every opportunity. But let’s get real about the unprecedented wall of obstruction he faces — and the only hope for breaking it, which is a major upset in the 2014 midterms.

This item by James Vega was originally published on April 14, 2013.
Come on, progressives, let’s be honest. Of course it’s necessary and proper for progressives to criticize Obama’s budget compromises as either bad economics or lousy electoral strategy — or both. Heck, that’s the progressive coalition’s job and progressives would be derelict in their duty if they didn’t firmly oppose the compromise of basic progressive positions and goals.
But there’s no reason to resort to armchair psychiatry or to otherwise impugn Obama’s motives – saying he’s “timid” “gutless” “a DINO (Democrat in name only)” “gullible”, “in wall street’s pocket”, “a corporate tool” “a phony progressive” and all the other personal accusations against him when deep down we all know perfectly well the real reasons why he’s doing what he’s doing.
Let’s face it. Every Democratic president has to walk a very fine line in dealing with the business community and the economic elite of this country. That group is not entirely composed of extreme right wing ideologues like the Koch Brothers (although there is a very disturbingly large group who are). Many are relatively pragmatic individuals who are willing to accept a certain range of progressive policies when the political climate of the country overwhelmingly favors them. The majority of American businessmen are not going to go on a John Galt-style “producers strike” and shut down all their banks, offices and factories to protest a modest tax increase nor will they try to foment a military coup because they don’t like Elizabeth Warren.
But on the other hand, any Democratic president absolutely has to maintain a certain working relationship with the business community or face huge obstacles to almost all of his domestic priorities. Had Obama seriously threatened to prosecute substantial sectors of the business and the financial community for their role in the financial crisis when he first took office in 2008, he would not have gotten the stimulus bill, the modest financial regulation bill that he did get or health care reform. There were only a few major business figures who went overboard with hysterical accusations that Obama was out to destroy the entire free enterprise system in 2009, but if he had really come down hard on business and Wall Street that attack would have been picked up and become so widespread in the business world that plenty of Democratic Congress and Senate members would have melted away from supporting Obama’s first term agenda like snowflakes in forest fire.
Now, sure, its loads of fun to imagine an alternate reality in which a fiery populist president “takes his case to the people” and develops such titanic, fierce, ferocious and powerful grass roots support that American big business has no option except to meekly accept the president’s firmly populist agenda. And yes, we can all cheerfully recite Roosevelt’s stirring line “I welcome their hatred” as the great rhetorical model for how a really tough populist Democrat could deal with the business community.
But, come on, let’s face it, if intense grass roots support for that kind of muscular populism had really existed in recent years, Dennis Kucinich or John Edwards would have won the Democratic primaries by a landslide in 2008, blowing away the far more centrist Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama. In 2004 Howard Dean would have walked away with the Democratic nomination without raising a sweat and in 2000, Ralph Nader would have outpolled Al Gore. Right wing populists like George Wallace and Ross Perot pulled a major slice of the national vote in their campaigns in past decades while no left wing populist in the post-war era has ever even come close. You can’t just go around simply assuming and asserting the existence of some huge, sleeping left-wing populist majority that is just waiting to be mobilized as if it were a given fact of American political life when somehow or other it never seems to be able to drag its butt out of bed and go out to vote for firmly populist candidates on election days.
So let’s stop with the alternate reality stuff for a moment and try to visualize the strategic situation as Obama has to see it when he looks across the table during a meeting with a group like the Business Roundtable or similar organizations of the economic elite. He starts out knowing that a large segment of American business won’t even sit down with him at all – that they are wildly, irrationally and passionately opposed to everything he stands for and are willing to invest huge sums of money to defeat him and every policy he advocates.
So the members of the business and financial elite who are indeed willing to sit across the table from him are the ones he really needs to keep at least reasonably neutral if he doesn’t want an absolutely united front of business opposition to everything he does.
Now the business guys at the table are not completely unreasonable. A recent opinion study “Democracy and the Policy Preferences of Wealthy Americans,” by Benjamin I. Page and Jason Seawright of Northwestern and Larry Bartels of Vanderbilt, indicates that the “1 percenters” — those with $8 million in net worth – are at least somewhat open to some relatively liberal economic ideas. Most agreed, for example, with improving public infrastructure such as highways, bridges and airports; scientific research; and aid to education. They also agreed that the Social Security system should ensure a minimum standard of living to all contributors, even if some receive benefits exceeding the value of their contribution and they also agreed that people with high incomes actually should pay a larger share of their incomes in taxes than those with low incomes. And they recognized the need for sensible regulations.
But on the other hand, the study also found the following:

When we asked respondents how important they considered each of eleven possible problems facing the United States, budget deficits headed the list. Fully 87 percent of our wealthy respondents said deficits are a “very important” problem facing the country. Only 10 percent said “somewhat important,” and a bare 4 percent said “not very important at all.” The high priority put on this issue was confirmed by responses to an open-ended question about “the most [emphasis added] important problem facing this country today.” One third (32 percent) of all open-ended responses mentioned budget deficits or excessive government spending, far more than mentioned any other issue. Furthermore, at various points in their interviews many respondents spontaneously mentioned “government over-spending.” Unmistakably, deficits were a major concern for most of our wealthy respondents…. [In contrast, unemployment and education] were mentioned as the most important problem by only 11 percent, indicating that they ranked a distant second and third to budget deficits.

So it’s not just the professional deficit scolds like Pete Peterson or the PR shop called “Fix the Debt” who are pushing the deficit fixation. Nor is it just the columnists and editorial writers at the Washington Post. The belief that dealing with the deficit is the most important national issue is pretty much a consensus opinion of America’s wealthy and business elite.
And now here’s the funny thing. If you ask progressives, most of them would passionately agree that “the one-percent” — the economic elite like those in the survey above — really run the show in America and make the political system dance to their tune. Many progressives will be happy to recite in vast detail how the economic elites in countries like Chile organized the overthrow of democratically elected populist presidents when the latter got the plutocrats really ticked off.
Yet, at the same time, when it comes to evaluating the political strategy and political compromises a Democratic President has to employ in dealing with the economic elite and the business community, the pivotal role and power of the 1% suddenly does not have to be taken into account. It’s like suddenly they don’t have any power at all.
But in reality Obama is faced with a basic choice: he can tell the sector of the business community that is indeed willing to sit across the table from him that he thinks the whole deficit issue is completely overblown – just like Paul Krugman says it is — and accept the fact that they will walk away from the table completely unsatisfied with his answer or he can say that he understands their concern and is willing to make compromises if the GOP will meet him halfway.

Read more…

This item by James Vega was originally published on March 29, 2013.

Paul Krugman’s column today points out an important change:

Over the past few weeks, there has been a remarkable change of position among the deficit scolds who have dominated economic policy debate for more than three years. It’s as if someone sent out a memo saying that the Chicken Little act, with its repeated warnings of a U.S. debt crisis that keeps not happening, has outlived its usefulness….
…There has, of course, been no explicit announcement of a change in position. But the signs are everywhere. Pundits who spent years trying to foster a sense of panic over the deficit have begun writing pieces lamenting the likelihood that there won’t be a crisis, after all.
…What happened? Basically, the numbers refuse to cooperate: Interest rates remain stubbornly low, deficits are declining and even 10-year budget projections basically show a stable fiscal outlook rather than exploding debt.

Krugman goes on to discuss the new rationales now being put forward as replacement arguments for why America needs to immediately and radically cut Social Security, Medicare and other social safety net programs. But, from a strategic point of view, it’s worth pausing for a moment to consider just how much of a setback this change really represents for the forces that were trying to whip up a panic.
There has never been any argument (even from Krugman) that there is indeed a long term need to update and improve the American social safety net – not to dismantle it but to reinforce it for the future. These long-term issues are largely the result of demographic and other gradual societal changes that require carefully structured reforms to current programs.
But the essence of the “debt panic” strategy was to exploit the financial crisis of 2008 in order to demand massive and immediate, ideologically motivated reductions in the funding for those programs or even to achieve their effective elimination. The same groups and individuals that had kept a discrete and diplomatic silence about the ballooning deficits during the Bush era suddenly switched to the “crisis” message the moment Obama was elected. The plan shared by a wide range of conservative and business groups was essentially to “piggyback” the attack on the social safety net on the huge economic dislocations caused by the crisis in order to convince the public that immediate action was required.
It almost worked. Conservatives could have gotten a hugely advantageous deal back in the Spring of 2011 if the congressional GOP hadn’t decided to reject the first “grand bargain” Obama offered and chose instead to bet the farm on defeating him.
You have to put yourself in the debt crisis gang’s shoes to visualize what a huge fiasco this represents for them. Millions of dollars, massive organizational efforts, hundreds of TV appearances and thousands of articles, commentaries and op-ed pieces were all focused on the goal of building support for massive and immediate budget cuts that could be pushed through quickly, before the crisis atmosphere passed. But now, as Krugman says, the moment has slipped by and the debt crisis gang has to start all over again to come up with a basically new rationale.
To put it simply, from their point of view, the 2008 financial crisis offered the opportunity of a lifetime to rip a big gaping hole in the social safety net and because they overreached, they’ve let it slip away. For progressives, a moment of pleasurable schadenfreude is not inappropriate or unwarranted.