Nathan Newman wrote:
>And when you look at actually
>existing policy and votes by Democrats, there is no evidence of rightward
>drift and, in fact, good evidence that the average Democratic officeholder
>is more liberal than the typical one back in 1972.
-Who were the Humphrey and Hawkins that sponsored that full-employment -legislation? SWPers?
And what effect did the legislation have? It was sort of a rhetorical bill, where it required the Fed Chairman to appear at Congressional hearings occasionally.
-Who was voting to expand the U.S. welfare state -in the 1960s and 1970? And who was it who promised to end welfare as -we know it - and did?
First, as noted, there were more Dems in the 1960s to make those votes. But if you look at the tax and budget bills of 1993, you see a very progressive set of policies-- massively expanding the EITC while raising taxes on the wealthy to fund expansion of a number of other programs.
With the GOP in power after 1994, you didn't get bills like that passed, but it's pretty solid evidence of the fact that Dems in power were still quite progressive. As I've noted pointing to states where Democrats are numerous enough to exercise real power. Note the California legislatures vote to raise the minimum wage in that state to $7.75 per hour.
-And why is rhetoric so unimportant? It sets the tone and boundaries -for what can be talked about, and what can't. No prominent Dem today -would ever talk about the gov as employer of last resort - it doesn't -exist an idea to be taken seriously.
It's not unimportant, but I think too many on the left are more committed to the right words than to the right results. There is a strategic debate on rhetoric on where it's better to expand the realm of possibilities with visionary speech and where you can make pragmatic gains in power with more moderate language. God knows I've been on both sides of the debate in different contexts. And I think it's exactly that-- a contextual decision. Kucinich had lots of good rhetoric and terrible strategy for running a campaign. So you don't win by rhetoric alone.
-- Nathan Newman