Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:
>
> At 3:27 PM -0500 11/8/02, Nathan Newman wrote:
> >I think some left folks feel that being right is enough, so dealing
> >with bad convincing arguments are beneath them.
> >
> >It is exactly the swing pro-war Dems and moderate Repubicans who the
> >antiwar movement has to convince.
>
This is wrong even in terms of partisan politics. I assume at the very least that given the steady drift to the right, what is needed is a major shift, on the magnitude of Roosevelt's triumph in 1936. And that didn't come from "swing votes" -- it came from a massive influx of voters who had never voted before.
But in any case, only a mass movement at least of the magnitude of the civil rights and anti-war movements combined is necessary for a shift in policy that will make a detectable difference. The problem leftists face is first contributing to the growth of such a movement (it can't be willed into existence by leftists or anyone else) and secondly, preparing the best we can to avoid the collapse of such a movement, when it comes, into the arms of the DP.
A speculation: On elections.
What was the percentage of voting-age population that voted this year?
What was the percentage of Republican voters whose parents were also Republican voters?
What was the percentage of Democratic voters whose parents were also Democratic voters?
What was the percentage of Democrats who voted in 2000 who voted in 2002?
What was the percentage of Republicans who voted in 2000 who voted in 2002?
Hypothesis: The Republicans did better than the Democrats in getting their voters to the polls. Issues had nothing to do with it. The election was decided by voters who voted the same in 2002 as they voted in 1990, 1992, 1994, 1996, 1998, 2000, 2002.
The DP is a highly principled party. Its leadership _believes_ in the principles of TANF, of the Effective Death Penalty and Anti-Terrorism Act, of the provocations by the Carter administration which began the war in Afghanistan, of the bombing of Iraq and the continuation from 1993 to 2000 of the sanctions. It is so deeply committed to those principles that it would far sooner lose election after election than risk expanding the electorate, with consequent danger of mass movements developing.
"Swing voters" is a hallucination that belongs in _The Onion_.
Carrol