Gore Redux
This is the second of two essays written around the theme “Whither Democrats”. The first is immediately below. This one is more immediate, while the other (New Directions) falls back for a somewhat broader perspective. There is some over lap in the language.
Mr. Gore struck a campaign theme coming out of the Democratic Convention in 2000 that clearly and undeniably also stuck a chord with the American electorate. It was summed up in the phrase: “The People versus the Powerful”. With it, the Gore-Lieberman ticket almost immediately jumped ahead in the polls, and stayed there (well up, 5 –7 points) for several weeks. This puzzled the talking heads, and myself as well. It seemed to be classic Democrat Populism: old hat and old stuff. Yet it enjoyed a dramatic success. Might that not be because the public read it differently from the “Commenteratti”? The chattering class heard “The People versus the Powerful,” and, without thinking, wrung an exceedingly familiar transformation upon it: The Poor versus the Rich. Old hat and old stuff. But the public may have read it as The Great American Middle Class, versus the Powerful. The average American “Joe”, working hard and playing by the rules, versus those, who, with money and influence, were feverishly tilting the playing field against the interests of all the “average Joes”, and, not infrequently, against the long term best interests of the country as well.
So what happened? Gore, as the tribune of “The People” - Middle Class Americans –destroyed the identification with his graceless (or worse) performance in the first debate. He came across as obnoxious and overbearing. Not one who could, or would, be accepted as “my champion”. He plummeted in the polls, and never recovered until the very end, where a combination of bad luck, a very close election, and post election shenanigans extending all the way to the U. S. Supreme Court, finally defeated him.
How might he have saved the day? I think by understanding the post 2000 Convention appeal was indeed a new theme, that the “people” whose cause he was seeking to champion was in fact the Great American Middle Class, and not just the poorer, less advantaged, parts of it. He would have needed to understand the ease with which the message could be, and was being - almost unconsciously - transliterated into the sub-text of an old and tired refrain. Gore was a new Democrat, without really coming to terms with what that might portend.
It is this: the Democratic Party must become the party of the average American TRYING TO MAKE IT. The Party assumed its 20th century role in the 1930’s when it became the party of the average American trying to SURVIVE. In the heart of the Great Depression, it was a role that needed to be filled. The trauma of the Depression lingered long, but, through the 1950’s average Americans slowly and steadily came to see themselves as trying to MAKE IT – that is trying to make a genuinely decent life for themselves and their families – including, among other things, education up through college.
Perhaps to their credit, the Democratic Party remained identified with the interests of those struggling just to survive, but it cost them the broad base which was “movin’ on up”. The new Democrats formed around dealing with just this, and Clinton became one of the few who truly “got it”. Bill’s Populist touch was invaluable in holding traditional elements of the party together, while transforming both its message and its performance. That same touch fostered an understanding that when the Clinton campaign said “Put People First”, it meant “us”, i.e. The American Middle Class. When Gore, lacking Clinton’s unique empathy, said: “I want to fight for you” we weren’t entirely clear as to who the “you” was. It was Gore’s challenge to make VERY clear just who that “you” was, and he flubbed it – with the considerable help of the “Commenteratti” who reflexively took it (and energetically spun it) to mean: the poor.
In Gore’s recent NY Times Op-Ed piece he returned to the theme of The People versus the Powerful, without any real clarity that he had come to grips with the problems it presents for him. Just as clearly our “Commenteratti” began to take him to task for it, as witness Maureen Dowd’s typically wicked, typically brilliant take on it in the August 7, 2002 Times. The confusion over this had surfaced a week earlier, in the much publicized meeting of the Democratic Leadership Council, where new Democrats squared off against “traditional” Democrats over the issue of a Populist approach to Campaign 2002. It was a sign the Democrats still haven’t gotten to where they need to be. The average hard working American, playing by the rules and trying to make it, does very much want a champion, but does not recognize it in a party for whom populism is all too readily equated with advocacy for the truly down and out, BUT WITH LITTLE ELSE. Nor do they recognize it in the Republicans, who are more and more clearly being revealed as advocates for a self-absorbed plutocracy. “W”’s “homey” touch, and the call for Compassionate Conservatism are shown to be a thin veneer of for rapacious, naked self-interest.
For a broad mass of the public, it has become “a plague on both your houses” situation. In two straight elections, in ‘92 and ’96, Ross Perot, the maverick (in effect) “ plague on both your houses” candidate, won TWENTY PER CENT OF THE VOTE. When Buchanan and Nader tried to separate out that vote by appealing to the ideological roots of either side of the political dialog, neither was able to garner even five per cent of the vote. A New Note plainly needs to be sounded. The audience is waiting for it.
There is a path for the Democrats to follow.
A successful modern society can be viewed as a balance of three things: (1) what the individual brings – heart, mind, will, skill, ability, dedication; (2) what we mutually pledge to one another as we move on through life - beginning with locally based universal public education, police and fire departments, but ultimately on out to what we term the “social safety net”; and (3) given the first two, the genuine opportunity we find in society to achieve a good life for ourselves and our families.
The historic 20th century identification of the Democratic Party has been with the second of these elements, and in tough economic times the party continues to need to pursue it. (Who else will?) In good economic times, however, it has to make clear its commitment to building a broad base of genuinely graspable opportunity for all. It should seek, for example, to become the party of small business. Small business is rightly trumpeted as the primary source of innovation in our economy, and as its primary generator of new jobs. Becoming the champion of small business would force the Republicans to choose between the fat cats they have all too assiduously cultivated in recent years, and small business interests to which they pay little more than lip service. Among other things, it would be payback for the exploitation of the social conservative agenda by Republicans to split off parts of the traditional Democratic base.
If the Democrats can forge a new identity for themselves as a party promoting a broad base of graspable opportunity for all, they will be addressing the Great American Middle Class and its interests directly. They need not abandon their historic concerns. Many aspects of the social safety net are relevant: both education and affordable medical care directly affect our ability to grasp opportunity when it appears. But in good economic times Democrats should aggressively and persistently seek out ways to stimulate new business and new opportunity – AND BE SEEN TO DO SO.
7:59:31 PM 
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